Wednesday
November 23, 2005
news@michigandaily.com
SCIENCE
5
University students experiment with tethered satellites on the 'Vomit Comet'
Flying
into
Zero-Gravity
By Ryan Anderson U
Daily Science Reporter
PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY DAVID TUMAN/Daily
graduates will plummet 8,000 feet out of
T his summer, a team of engineering under-
the sky, and they'll do it eighty times in two
days. As a part of NASA's Reduced Grav-
ity Research Program, 10 students from the Univer-,
sity's Student Space Systems Fabrication Laboratory,
or S3FL, will test a new satellite design on a series
of microgravity flights out of Johnson
Space Center in Houston....:.
To create the effect of :, r>
weightlessness, a NASA
C-9 jet, also called .
the "Vomit Comet," I
climbs from 24,000 [
feet to 32,000 feet,
then dives back
down to repeat the
process. As the jet
rapidly changes from a
steep dive.to an equally
abrupt.climb, the passen-
gers and cargo are shoved
to the floor by twice the nor-
mal force of gravity.
Then, as the jet reaches the top of
its trajectory, it enters a controlled free-fall,
simulating zero gravity. At this point, grav-
ity is actually as strong as ever, but the plane
is falling just as fast as everything inside so
there is no force holding objects down - the
floor is literally falling out from under them.
This is the same reason astronauts experience
microgravity while in orbit.
The S3FL students will conduct micrograv-
ity experiments to assist with the Air Force-
funded Tethered SATellite Testbed, or TSATT.
The project is comprised of two small satellites
connected with a kilometer-long tether.
"The goal of TSATT is to prove the concept
of formation flying and rendezvous technologies
using a tethered satellite pair," said Ashley Smeta-
na, Engineering junior and chief engineer on the
C-9 microgravity project.
Formation flying will eliminate the need for dif-
ficult planning and calculations in the control room
every time a satellite needs to be moved while in
orbit. In addition, a group of small satellites fly-
ing in formation could do the job of a much larger
satellite for a fraction of the cost. It will benefit
scientific research as well as reconnaissance mis-
sions. Rendezvous technologies are crucial, too.
They will allow satellites to safely dock with one
another in orbit, a very important ability for robotic
and manned missions.
The work done by the S3FL students will help to
predict how the satellites will behave as they sepa-
rate. Two spinning satellites connected by a tether
can have very complicated behaviors, so it is cru-
cial to know what to expect before launching the
full-scale TSATT into orbit. This will directly
help the TSATT team avoid problems during
the initial deployment.
On the C-9 flights, the students will test
a scaled-down version of TSATT to under-
stand how it behaves as the two satellites
separate. While in microgravity, after giving
the TSATT model a certain spin, a signal will
be sent to release the pins holding the satellites
together. As they pull apart, two digi-
tal video cameras will follow the
positions of colored tracking
stickers on the model.
Back on the ground, "the
image of the satellite will
. be imported into a com-
puter program which
will read the colored
stickers and decipher
where each sticker was
and how it moved from
frame to frame," said
Suzanne Lessack, assistant
lead on the project and Engi-
neering freshman. "A 3-D model
will be generated on the computer and
we will be able to recreate what happened in our
experiment and analyze the data."
Participating in a gut-wrenching microgravity
flight is not easy. Several weeks ago, the S3FL stu-
dents submitted their project proposal to NASA.
Once approved, they earned the chance to fly on
the plane by putting in long hours designing and
constructing the satellite.
Finally, after passing a flight physical, they are sub-
ABOVE GRAPHIC BY GERVIS MENZIES AND SATELLITE GRAPHIC COURTESY OF SUSAN LESSACK
jected to centrifuge testing to become familiar with rap-
idly changing levels of gravity. "I think flying will be
a great experience," Smetana said. "It's not something
every undergraduate gets to experience, so flying a proj-
ect we've worked so hard on will be very rewarding,"
The microgravity flights will take place this June.
The Student Space Systems Fabrication Labora-
tory is entirely student-run, and participates in a
number of engineering projects.
In addition to the C-9 microgravity project, a
team is involved in studying tether re-entry decel-
eration: the use of a trailing tether to slow the fall
of a re-entering satellite. Another group is devel-
oping robotic space elevator technology, a concept
that may revolutionize access to. space.
Three teams are also working on developing and launch-
ing cansats: small can-sized atmospheric probes that record
temperature and pressure over a range of altitudes.
Educators discuss difficulties
of teaching math and science
Natural history
museum opens
Darwin exhibit
Indiana educational
system holds two-day
conference on issue
INDIANAPOLIS (AP) - Getting kids
interested in science, math and other complex
subjects isn't easy for high school teachers,
who face the daily challenge of explain-
ing often abstract concepts to their students
without boring them.
About 500 Indiana educators gathered last
Thursday to tackle that daunting task during
a two-day conference exploring how teachers
can spark students' interest in subjects that
could eventually help them land high-paying
policy-makers, businesses and educators to
create a highly skilled Hoosier work force
attractive to high-tech industries such as bio-
technology companies.
This week's conference is a collaborative
effort hosted by the Center of Excellence in
Leadership of Learning at the University of
Indianapolis.
The teachers, principals, superintendents
and others who signed up for its sessions
hope to learn something from the North
Carolina Science, Mathematics, Technology
Education Center, a nonprofit formed 2 1/2
years ago at North Carolina's Research Tri-
angle Park.
That privately funded group is trying to
improve the performance of North Caroli-
"But the big-
Sest thing we
ave to earn is
that change will
always be with us
in education."
- Suellen Reed
Indiana Superintendent
of Public Instruction
NEW YORK (AP) - He was a lacklus-
ter student, bored by the rote memorization
of Latin words. He tried medical school, but
hated it. Charles Darwin figured he would
end up in the clergy, his love of nature and
the sciences just a hobby.
Then came the invitation - one of his
mentors had been asked to go on a voyage
but was too busy. Perhaps Darwin would
be interested in the post of naturalist on the
HMS Beagle, setting sail for South America
in 1831?
That five-year voyage would change
the course of Darwin's life - and ours. It
The exhibit includes some of Darwin's
own papers, samples he collected,-his mag-
nifying glass, as well as fossils, live animals
including two Galapagos tortoises, and a
recreation of Darwin's study at his English
countryside home.
Futter said the show is meant not only
to present Darwin, but to explain evolu-
tionary theory and highlight the process
by which scientific theory and research
are done.
"We're humanizing the scientific
enterprise, we're reminding people that
this is about individuals who were curi-
ous_ individuals who hadd to know" Fuitte~r