NASA worker awakens Obama's mohawk dreams

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PASADENA, Calif., Aug. 14 (UPI) -- U.S. President Barack Obama joked a NASA scientist has inspired him to revisit his dreams of sporting a mohawk hairstyle.

Obama said during a Monday phone call to NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory that "Mohawk Guy" -- NASA scientist Bobak Ferdowsi, who became an online celebrity when his hair style was noticed in pictures of scientists working on the Mars rover Curiosity project -- has reawakened his old dreams of sporting the same hair-do, CNN reported Tuesday.

"I, in the past, thought about getting a mohawk myself, but my team keeps on discouraging me," Obama said during the call, which was broadcast on NASA TV.

"And now that he's received marriage proposals and thousands of new Twitter followers, I think that I'm going to go back to my team and see if it makes sense," the president said.

Obama made the phone call to congratulate the scientists on the successful landing of Curiosity on the surface of Mars last week.

"What you've accomplished embodies the American spirit," he said. "Our expectation is that Curiosity is going to be telling us things that we did not know before."