Caitlin Milera

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — As part of a large-scale effort to unlock clues about the origins of life on Earth, Brown University researchers are analyzing rare fragments from the asteroid Bennu, hoping to reveal its ancient secrets.

The work is happening at the NASA-funded Reflectance Experiment Laboratory (RELAB), which is housed on the University’s campus and led by Brown planetary scientist Ralph Milliken.

The researchers at RELAB are among approximately 200 scientists around the world to have received samples from Bennu to date. The analysis is part of NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission, which was the first U.S. mission to collect a sample from an asteroid and deliver it to Earth.

“These samples are the best examples we have today of some of the most primitive material in our solar system,” said Milliken, who also directs the NASA Rhode Island Space Grant Consortium and is an associate professor of Earth, environmental and planetary sciences at Brown. “It’s really amazing and humbling to know our group is one of a handful of specialized spectroscopy labs who are working with this material that has been in space for the last four and a half billion years.”

NASA’s robotic OSIRIS-REx spacecraft launched in 2016 and returned in September 2023, delivering a container filled with about four ounces of rock and dust from Bennu, which it collected on Oct. 20, 2020. Samples of Bennu started to arrive at Brown in November 2023 for initial analysis due to the lab and University’s long history of working with sensitive extraterrestrial samples.

Read the full article on Brown.edu.

Image Credit: Nick Dentamaro/Brown University

Author Credit: Juan Siliezar | juan_siliezar@brown.edu

Original Post Date: Oct. 29, 2024

MIDDLETOWN, Pa. — A team from Penn State Harrisburg spent a week at a NASA facility over the summer, building a scientific experiment and sending it to space through the RockOn! program.

NASA’s RockOn! is a weeklong, hands-on workshop teaching participants how to create a sounding rocket experiment and then launch it into space at the end of the workshop.

Penn State Harrisburg students Trent Townsend, a mechanical engineering major, and Neil Lerch, a graduate student in electrical engineering, and University Park student Sara Jambhekar, who is studying aerospace engineering, participated, along with Brian Maicke, associate professor of mechanical engineering at Penn State Harrisburg. The students’ participation was funded by the Pennsylvania Space Grant Consortium.

Maicke and the students spent a week in Virginia at the NASA Wallops Flight Facility, where they built a scientific payload consisting of a Geiger counter, accelerometer, gyroscope, magnetometer, pressure, and temperature measurements.

Read the full article on PSU.edu.

Image Credit: Brian Maicke / Penn State. Creative Commons

Author Credit: Penn State

Original Post Date: Oct. 21, 2024

Seven University of Alabama at Birmingham undergraduate students have been awarded NASA Alabama Space Grant Consortium scholarships, and two UAB graduate students have been selected as research fellows.

The scholarship and fellowship programs encourage and equip students to pursue career and research opportunities within the space science and aerospace technology fields.

Designated as NASA Space Grant Scholars, the seven UAB undergraduate recipients demonstrated a proficiency in research and an aptitude for space-related careers. They have been awarded scholarships ranging from $750-$1,500. Each student will conduct an outreach activity to educate and inform the surrounding community on science and technology.

Lalitha Appana is an 18-year-old biomedical sciences major from Cumming, Georgia. Appana is a UABTeach minor and member of the UAB Honors College going into her second year at UAB.

“As an aspiring doctor who loves to teach and wants to help improve the quality of education to all students, I hope to translate my passion in science to enhance the K-12 curriculum as this gives me the optimal opportunity to get involved in the community and make a positive difference in the schools around me,” Appana said.

Read the full article on UAB.edu.

Author Credit: Micah Hardge

Image Credit: ALSGC and UAB

Original Post Date: 7/18/2024

Chandlor Dobbs, an undergraduate senior in biomedical engineering, a member of UAB’s Honor College, and a participant in the National Space Grant College and Fellowship Program, is a recipient of NASA’s Alabama Space Grant Consortium Scholarship.

This scholarship encourages and equips students to pursue career and research opportunities within the space science and aerospace technology fields, and range from $750-$1,500. As part of the program, Dobbs will conduct an outreach activity to educate and inform the surrounding community on science and technology.

Read the full article on uab.edu.

Author Credit: Hannah Buckelew

Image Credit: UAB

Original Story Post Date: 7/14/2024

Student teams from three U.S. universities became the first to measure what scientists have long predicted: eclipses can generate ripples in Earth’s atmosphere called atmospheric gravity waves. The waves’ telltale signature emerged in data captured during the North American annular solar eclipse on Oct. 14, 2023, as part of the Nationwide Eclipse Ballooning Project (NEBP) sponsored by NASA.

Through NEBP, high school and university student teams were stationed along the eclipse path through multiple U.S. states, where they released weather balloons carrying instrument packages designed to conduct engineering studies or atmospheric science experiments. A cluster of science teams located in New Mexico collected the data definitively linking the eclipse to the formation of atmospheric gravity waves, a finding that could lead to improved weather forecasting.

Read the full article on nasa.gov.

Image Credit: NASA

Author Credit: NASA

Original Story Post Date: 9/5/2024

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Seventeen graduate students from Penn State have been awarded research fellowships and six undergraduate students from the commonwealth have been awarded scholarships for 2024 from the Pennsylvania Space Grant Consortium (PSGC).

PSGC is one of 52 NASA Space Grant programs across the country that are part of the NASA-run initiative to support educational initiatives in the STEM fields — science, technology, engineering and mathematics. Each year PSGC receives funds from the national NASA Space Grant Project to develop and implement student fellowships and scholarships programs. Through this funding PSGC administers the Graduate Fellowship Program and Undergraduate Scholarship Program.

Read the full article on psu.edu.

Author Credit: Pennsylvania State University

Original Story Post Date: 9/3/2024

Through Artemis, NASA plans to conduct long-duration human and robotic missions on the lunar surface in preparation for future crewed exploration of Mars. Expanding exploration capabilities requires a robust lunar infrastructure, including practical and cost-effective ways to construct a lunar base. One method is employing in-situ resource utilization (ISRU) – or the ability to use naturally occurring resources – to produce consumables and build structures in the future, which will make explorers more Earth-independent.

An ISRU process that NASA wants to learn more about is forging metals from lunar minerals to create structures and tools in the future. Through its 2023 Breakthrough, Innovative and Game-Changing (BIG) Idea Lunar Forge Challenge, NASA sought innovative concepts from university students to design an ISRU metal production pipeline on the Moon. The year-and-a-half-long challenge, funded by NASA’s Space Technology Mission Directorate (STMD) and Office of STEM Engagement, supports NASA’s Lunar Surface Innovation Initiative in developing new approaches and novel technologies to pave the way for successful exploration on the surface of the Moon.

Finalist teams presented their research, designs, prototypes, and testing results to a panel of NASA and industry judges at a culminating forum on Nov. 16, in Cleveland, Ohio.

Read the full article on NASA.gov

Image Credit: National Institute of Aerospace

Author Credit: Stefanie Payne

Original Post Date: Nov. 21, 2023

Getting to work on cutting-edge research is a privilege typically reserved for graduate students, but South Dakota Mines is not your typical university, and Jaden Dougal, a junior mechanical engineering major from Rockwall, Texas, is not your typical student.

Dougal has been helping conduct research on laser ablation for efficient space debris removal. She describes it as using space-based lasers to target debris in low earth orbit: shooting them with a nanosecond or femtosecond laser to change the debris’ trajectory — either slow it down enough to fall into the Earth’s atmosphere to burn up or speed it up enough to be sent to a graveyard orbit.

Dougal can participate in this research thanks to Prasoon Diwakar, PhD, an assistant professor of mechanical engineering, and research supported from the NASA South Dakota Space Grant Consortium.

Read the full article on SDSMT.edu

Author Credit: South Dakota Mines

Image Credit: South Dakota Mines

Original Post Date: 3/28/24

Rising University of South Dakota senior Maddie Rozmajzl landed a prestigious summer internship with NASA at the Ames Research Center at Moffett Federal Airfield in California’s Silicon Valley, an opportunity she describes as a dream come true.

“I am so grateful to be chosen for this opportunity, and I can’t wait to see my progress by the end of the summer,” said Rozmajzl, a biomedical engineering major from Omaha, Nebraska. “I have dreamt to work for such a prestigious company as NASA, and I have dreamt about being a part of a team who is known for achieving the impossible.”

During her 10-week internship, Rozmajzl is working in the Bioengineering & Instrumentation Lab, participating in projects connected to the Lunar Explorer Instrument for space biology Applications (LEIA) mission, which is set to launch in 2026. Her responsibilities include working on the biocompatibility of materials and an optical density probe for LEIA group support equipment.

Read the full article on USD.edu

Image Credit: University of South Dakota

Author Credit: Hanna DeLange

Original Post Date: 7/1/2024

Florida Space Grant Consortium supported research published research results in Astrobiology, “Effects of Spaceflight on the Brain.”

Read the research article online in the National Library of Medicine.

Astrobiology & Journal Impact Factors

Article Date: 6/27/24