Louisiana Space Grant Consortium NASA Partnership Leads to Student Payload Launches

Every spring in Palestine, Texas, the wide-open fields around NASA’s Columbia Scientific Balloon Facility fill with students and faculty from across Louisiana. They arrive carrying sensors, laptops, and carefully engineered payloads they have spent months preparing. The goal is to send their experiments to the edge of space and return with meaningful data, while reflecting NASA’s long-standing commitment to develop future scientists and engineers.

NASA’s student programs have long served as an entry point for hands-on exploration, connecting students to the agency’s missions and giving them direct exposure to real aerospace environments. Among these initiatives, the Louisiana Aerospace Catalyst Experiences for Students, also known as LaACES, provides a robust undergraduate introduction to scientific ballooning.

Just after dawn on May 19, student-crafted instruments lifted off smoothly from the flight line, notching the 74th and 75th launches in a long-running collaboration between the facility and Louisiana Space Grant Consortium. The 2026 LaACES campaign consisted of 11 payloads that were designed and built by nine Louisiana university teams – Louisiana State University, Northwestern State, Southeastern Louisiana State, McNeese State, Loyola University, and Southern University, as well as and one high school team, St. Joseph’s Academy, during the weeklong event.

Read the full article on miragenews.com

Author Credit: The Mirage

Image Credit: The Mirage / NASA

Original Post Date: 8.4.26