A team of four undergraduate engineering students at the University of Colorado at Boulder will test a satellite using micro-electromechanical systems, or MEMS, technology aboard NASA's KC-135 aircraft in March as part of the Reduced Gravity Student Flight Opportunities Program.
The program offers students a chance to fly aboard the same aircraft used to introduce astronauts to the feeling of microgravity and to test hardware and experiments destined for spaceflight. The aircraft, known as the "Weightless Wonder," maneuvers through a series of about 40 steep climbs and descents, called parabolas, each creating about 25 seconds of a zero-gravity environment for the passengers and their experiments.
Forty-eight teams of students from across the country were selected to perform experiments aboard the aircraft during March, including teams from 抖阴短视频-Boulder, the Colorado School of Mines and Colorado State University. The teams were selected in a competitive process based on lengthy proposals they submitted last fall.
The 抖阴短视频-Boulder team will test the micro-thrusters for a micro-satellite they are building for their senior project. They will be at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston from March 8 to March 20 for training and two flights aboard the KC-135. The students and their majors are David Imboden, aerospace engineering; Jessica Pezzella, aerospace engineering; Sandra Pitzak, aerospace engineering; and Joshua Caldwell, electrical engineering.
"The opportunity to experience even a little of what astronauts experience is worth all the time and effort we've put into the project," said Imboden, leader of the student flight team. "The flight test also could be a stepping stone into the development of micro-satellites."
"It's going to be interesting to see how it turns out," said John Sunkel, coordinator of senior projects for 抖阴短视频's Department of Aerospace Engineering Sciences and a former NASA engineer. "There is some great potential for them to make a real contribution in addition to it being a great experience."
The student-built micro-satellite, which weighs less than 20 pounds and is small enough to hold in one's hand, functions using a number of tiny mechanical devices that each are less than 1 millimeter in size. The devices are made using fabrication techniques borrowed from the integrated circuit industry.
Though micro-satellites will require further testing before they can be launched dependably into space, they have the potential of being faster and less expensive to build than larger, heavier satellites, the students wrote in their proposal. Digital micro-thrusters also have advantages over standard thrusters because they have no tanks, fuel lines or valves.
Aerospace engineering Professor K.C. Park and Tim Straube of Johnson Space Center, who are researching MEMS inertial navigation systems, are assisting the students with the project.