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Hi, I'm Deidre Mangin, from Memphis Tennessee Our Lady
of Perpetual Help Catholic Schools and this is NASA Now.
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Hi I'm Matt.
In today's show you are going to meet three NASA experts
who all have one thing in common.
Engineering.
We'll learn about the unique projects they are working on
and how science, technology, engineering
and mathematics played a key role in their path to NASA.
That's ahead, first here's what's happening at NASA Now.
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Launching a satellite the size of a coffee mug.
. . During the recent launch of the Antares rocket,
NASA successfully delivered a trio
of PhoneSat nano-satellites to low earth orbit.
The goal of this project, known as PhoneSat 1.0,
is to lower the cost of building a reliable space satellite.
In fact, the total cost of the components
for each satellite is only about thirty-five hundred dollars.
Approximately the size of a coffee mug and weighing less
than four pounds, each of these easy-to-build satellites is made
extensively
of commercial-off-the-shelf components,
including an unmodified, consumer-grade smartphone.
While in orbit, these satellites are expected
to send back digital images of Earth
and space using an onboard cameras, as well as information
about the satellite's health.
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From lasers to drop tests to aerobraking,
our experts use some of the same principles, theories
and approaches you are learning in school right now.
You are going to hear from three different engineers
who will share a little bit
about the missions they're working on
and the secret to their success.
I'm an Aerospace Engineer here at NASA Langley Research Center.
I work on planetary exploration missions that use the atmosphere
to fly through to slow down the spacecraft,
to safely reach either the surface of the planet,
or to safely achieve a circular orbit around the planet.
Aerobraking has been used on four different missions so far.
The first one was Magellan at Venus, and the second, third,
and fourth missions were all at Mars.
Aerobraking is very much like if you had two very large arms
and stuck them out the sides of your car windows,
and if your arms are large enough,
they could maybe slow down your car.
Now it's very much the same principle
as what we use at Mars.
The spacecraft have two very large arms -- or solar panels.
And they put them right into the flow of the wind
so that they drag the spacecraft through the atmosphere.
I was a physics major in college, and was unsure
of what path I wanted to take.
So I decided to undergo more school, and I decided
to do graduate school at George Washington University,
which was located here at NASA Langley Research Center.
And it was my first experience with engineering, but I was put
into such a wonderful field that the first thing I did was work
on aerobraking orbiters.
And it's something I immediately loved
and decided to stick with it.
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I'm working on ASCENDS, which is an atmospheric remote sensing
system that eventually will be put in space
to monitor greenhouse gases such as CO2 to monitor global winds,
which gives us a better ability
to predict the weather and climate patterns.
If you're trying to measure CO2 or ozone, the light wave length
or color that that molecule
or element responds to is different.
So, we design and develop laser systems to produce enough power
in the right wavelengths that would allow us
to actually make the measurement and that's, of course,
more challenging when you're trying to make that measurement
from space because it requires more powerful systems
where power is one of your limiting factors.
You can't exactly stretch an extension cord all the way
up to the space station.
For me the path was a very diverse one.
I always enjoyed math
and science wasn't really sure what I wanted to do though,
I started out actually attending college studying mechanical
engineering technology.
I was fortunate enough to get
into a technician training program here at NASA.
I worked as a technician for a number of years
and really developed an interest and a skill and aptitude
for working on laser systems.
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My current project is
on the Orion Multipurpose Crew Vehicle Landing test
for water impact.
The Orion Program, much like Apollo, initially wanted
to have a land landing
and we were conducting land landing tests.
Basically because of weight constraints it's actually much
easier to design a system that will land in the water.
To conduct the test we have a hydro impact basin.
It was filled with approximately a million gallons of water,
its 20 feet deep and 115 feet long and 90 feet wide
and it allows us, with the use of the gantry,
to simulate the velocities
that the Orion crew module would have upon splashdown
in the ocean.
I always had interest in how things worked.
I use to love to take apart things.
I had an interest in gears, in, small engines and also in nature
in understanding how mankind has designed
and how we mimic nature in many cases.
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Now that you've seen how engineering plays
such a critical role in aerospace and aeronautics,
here's a chance for you to test your engineering design skills
in this challenge.
Teacher's you and your students can work
on a project involving the Orion Multipurpose crew vehicle.
Look for Real World Mathematics: Preparing for a Soft Landing
under the extension activity tab
on the NASA Explorer Schools Virtual Campus.
Well that's it for NASA NOW.
Be sure to visit our facebook page and leave a comment.
We'll see you next time on NASA NOW!
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NASA NOW comes to you from the Virtual Campus
at NASA Explorer schools.