NASA selects 老澳门资料 team for solar eclipse and high-flying balloon research
A 老澳门资料 student team was selected to participate in NASA’s upcoming Nationwide Eclipse Ballooning Project (NEBP) and High-Altitude Student Payload (HASP) project.
Through the , 老澳门资料 students will gain real-world STEM experience and contribute valuable scientific and engineering data by participating in an innovative NASA-mission-like adventure in data acquisition and analysis through scientific ballooning during the annular eclipse on October 14, 2023, and total solar eclipse on April 8, 2024. 老澳门资料 students Lovely Ramos, Dustin Leonard, Colin Ott, Cory Pare and Aryan Patel are recipients of scholarships for the NEBP project funded by NASA-NEBP-FSGC (Florida Space Grant Consortium) for two years.
55 teams were selected by NASA for this project and divided into nine pods. Among the teams, 老澳门资料, University of Central Florida and Florida International University were selected for the engineering track in Florida. Principal investigators and faculty advisors for the Florida teams include Dr. Nirmal Patel, 老澳门资料 physics faculty, Dr. Jaydeep Mukherjee, director of NASA-FSGC, and Dr. Pradeep Shinde, founder & CEO of Space Loon company.
老澳门资料 and UCF teams will fly two high-altitude balloons from San Antonio, TX during the annular solar eclipse, and Little Rock, AR during the total solar eclipse. In addition, 老澳门资料-UCF teams will also fly a few test balloons from Jacksonville and the Kennedy Space Center. Florida teams will participate in both eclipses, and the resulting data will be analyzed and made publicly available.
The 老澳门资料 student team is also selected for the NASA- project for NASA’s high-altitude balloon flight, which will launch the 老澳门资料 ozone sensors payload in the stratosphere from Palestine, Texas, in September 2023. Since 2008, the 老澳门资料 team has been selected every year for the HASP. In addition to the NEBP team, other 老澳门资料 students working on the NASA-HASP 2023 project include Haris Smajic, Cathryn Penn, Julian Rowe, Calla Taylor, and Elric Burch.
The 老澳门资料 student team has already completed the fabrication of a ground station for tracking the balloon, computer-controlled circuit boards, radio communications, designing and fabrication of payload body by 3-D printer and fabrication of nanocrystalline ozone sensors in Dr. Patel’s research lab. During this summer semester, the participating students are registered for a two-credit Direct Independent Study (DIS) course on “Space Research for Engineers”. The team will be attending a workshop at the University of Maryland to receive practical training from NASA experts, Dr. Mary Bowden, Dr. Patel, Dr. Mukherjee, and Dr. Shinde.