Lectures & Tours & Musicals, Oh My!

Last week was such a fun week! It was a pretty chill week in terms of work; the design team and I basically just spent our time printing our prototypes, reaching out to people around the Bay Area that could serve as resources for Dr. Cagle's project, and working on our own independent CAD projects (for example, I CAD'ed a fidget spinner from scratch using Fusion 360).

However, the Smith students were offered the opportunity to go to lots of cool lectures and tours over the course of this week. As I mentioned in my last post, we went on a tour of the 80x40 wind tunnel on Monday. The fun and adventures only continued as the week progressed.

I began last Tuesday by going to a lecture entitled "Satellite Formation-Flying for Future Space Science and Exploration." The talk was given by a Stanford professor named Simone D'Amico, and it was about how we can pair two or more satellites to accomplish mission objectives. He talked about the rendezvous of the Gemini 6 and 7 satellites, as well as the network of satellites that support our GPS services. The lecture was very math heavy, so a lot of it went over my head. However, I think the idea of pairing satellites is fascinating, and I definitely think NASA and other space organizations could use this technology in the future to complete mission objectives.

On Wednesday, all of Dr. Cagle's students were required to attend a lecture sponsored by Made In Space. Made In Space is a private company that works with NASA to provide 3D printing technology to the International Space Station (ISS). This honestly may be my favorite lecture that I have attended since arriving here at NASA Ames. I was able to really engage with the lecture since I have been working with 3D printers a lot during my internship. I was even able to ask an educated question to the lecturer, which not everyone did. And best of all, I feel like in-space 3D printing could really be revolutionary to Dr. Cagle's project if NASA ends up using her product in space.

Thursday was a very packed day. We started the day at noon with a lecture and demonstration from Dr. Curtis Cripe. Dr. Cripe holds degrees in both aerospace engineering and neuroscience, and identifies as a "neuro-engineer." He has developed a kind of Rehabilitation Cognitive Remediation Training that can help people who have suffered from traumatic brain injuries, have developmental disabilities, or have experienced tissue degradation while in space. I have absolutely no background in neuroscience, so most of this lecture was far beyond my understanding. However, I am very excited that work is being done that can reverse certain mental symptoms and conditions. This is especially interesting to me because I have an autistic brother, and I am wondering how treatments like Dr. Cripe's can help children like him.

Right after Dr. Cripe's lecture, we were given a tour of the Black Hawk helicopter hangar. The hangar contained two full-sized Black Hawks, and one smaller version. The US Army tests experimental parts & equipment on the Black Hawks at NASA Ames. I also learned that when the Army wants to name a vehicle after a Native American tribe or warrior, they must receive approval for that name from the respective tribe. If the tribe approves, they bless the vehicle before it is added to the fleet.

Black Hawk Helicopter.

There was another lecture late in the afternoon on Thursday from an astrobiologist named Penelope Boston. She explores underground caves that could potentially be similar to extreme environments on other planets, and examines the biology within those caves to get a better idea of what life on other planets could be like. She mostly looks at microbes, which are the really small, single-cell organisms that are all over our planet. She was really cool and interesting, and she told a lot of awesome stories about her various cave trips.

On Friday, we kind of skipped having our weekly check-in meeting with Dr. Cagle. Instead, she took us to the 20G centrifuge. This is where they subject astronauts to conditioners similar to those in space. In the center of the centrifuge (i.e. around the origin), there is actually 0G when the centrifuge is spinning. We were able to take lots of cool photos, and we kind of did our own little photo shoot with Dr. Cagle and with each other.

20G centrifuge.

Posing with Dr. Cagle inside the 20G centrifuge room.

This weekend I headed back to San Francisco to hang out with Maddy. On Saturday we walked across the Golden Gate Bridge and back. The views were amazing, and we were able to see whales coming up underneath the bridge. It was really windy and therefore it was kind of hard to walk, but it was completely worth it for the experience. I definitely got my exercise in by walking that day.

Golden Gate Bridge.

Whale breaching next to a boat under the Golden Gate Bridge.

On Sunday Maddy, Freddie, Abe and I went to see a musical in downtown San Francisco. It was A Night with Janis Joplin. It was a kind of cross between a jukebox musical and a rock concert, and it featured music by Etta James, the Chantels, Bessie Smith, Odetta, Nina Simone, and of course Janis Joplin. I was very interested to see how the famous blues and soul women were going to be portrayed in the musical; I have studied these figures extensively throughout my music coursework. At the end of the day, each musician was portrayed through their music rather than through their backstory. Even though this method left out part of the overall picture of blues and soul, it meant that the music and singing was absolutely incredible. I am so glad that I was able to see a show while here in the Bay Area, especially one that was about some of my favorites artists.

The stage from A Night with Janis Joplin.

Today was a fairly chill day as well. I went over to the NASA Ames Spaceshop to learn how to use the laser cutter. I was able to fabricate this really cool nametag using the laser cutter! I did a little research on the computer in the afternoon, and I started taking a course using Coursera to refresh myself on the basics of Materials Science. It is important to keep the concepts fresh in my mind as I head into my senior year as an Engineering major, and into a possible career in Materials Science.

Nametag that I made in the NASA Ames Spaceshop.