Research with NASA leads to innovation
Three recent graduates and one student from RIT’s imaging and photographic technology program experienced human spaceflight without leaving earth’s orbit. The team flew aboard NASA’s Weightless Wonder, a C-9 aircraft that simulates zero gravity.
RIT’s team spent a week at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston this summer as part of its Reduced Gravity Student Flight Opportunities Program. Student teams from other top universities including Brown University, University of Michigan, University of Kansas and University of Texas were also accepted. The program allows undergraduate students to propose, build and fly a reduced gravity scientific experiment.
”I am really excited I got to go,” says Greg Sharp, a 2008 RIT graduate. “It was a lot of fun. I had to keep grabbing on to things to keep myself from floating all over uncontrollably.”
The aircraft, more popularly known as the “Vomit Comet,” follows a parabolic flight path over the Gulf of Mexico, providing short periods of free fall in which people experience reduced gravity or weightlessness, similar to a ride on a rollercoaster. During the 90-minute flight, participants experience more than 30 free falls, each lasting between 18 and 25 seconds.
The team’s experiment looked at the feasibility of inkjet printing in a microgravity environment, focusing on print heads, ink drop characteristics, ink drop flight and printing accuracy.
”We tested thermal and piezo electric methods of inkjet printing, printing out standard targets to see if there were changes in quality,” says James Craven, a 2008 RIT graduate. “We also used a high-speed camera to image an inkjet droplet to determine if there were differences in size, shape, speed and amount.”
One potential application of the inkjet technology for long-term space missions would be creating circuit boards.
”Our experiment found the technology is capable of working in a microgravity environment, however, for optimum results, the printers’ moving parts would need to be modified to compensate for those conditions,” says Christopher Ubelacker, fourth-year RIT student. “The movement degraded their effectiveness.”
Team members got to meet astronaut Barbara Morgan and present their experiment. This is the second time since NASA began the program that an RIT proposal made the cut.
So did the Vomit Comet live up to its reputation? For some, not all.
”Weightlessness is quite an interesting experience along with the nausea that comes with it,” says Jarret Whetstone, a 2008 RIT graduate. “Luckily for me, I did not expel anything.”
To learn more about the program visit http://imaging.rit.edu.
by Kelly Downs, RIT University News
