Space: the final frontier.
A group of Penn State undergraduate engineering majors will soon reach this frontier when they launch the SPIRIT II rocket later this month as part of The Student Projects Involving Rocket Investigation Techniques.
The student engineers built and designed the SPIRIT II rocket, which is expected to be launched between March 31 through April 6, said Timothy Wheeler, payload manager for SPIRIT II.
SPIRIT II will be a suborbital rocket, Wheeler said, and will go into the atmosphere, collect data and then return to earth.
The program is a long-duration project, lasting about three years, Wheeler said. SPIRIT II operates in conjunction with NASA and Clemson University. The rocket will be launched from NASA's Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia, Wheeler said.
Electrical engineering majors are the project's primary participants, but other engineers also contribute, said Timothy Kane, associate professor of electrical engineering.
The rocket's payload will contain components for measuring wind in the mesosphere, Wheeler said.
"What is unusual is that the students are entirely responsible for building the payloads," Wheeler said.
The studies that the engineering students will conduct through SPIRIT II utilize a technique that is not widely used in the United States in this type of research, Wheeler said. This method employs balloons that are equipped with global positioning satellite transmitters, which analyze atmospheric measurements, he said.
"This is so exciting because this method of testing is not common in the U.S.," Wheeler said.
The SPIRIT II project gives engineering majors the opportunity to find good job offers with NASA after graduation, said Yashar Fakhari (senior-computer engineering), the power and wiring team leader for SPIRIT II.
"I know students who worked on the project that now work for NASA," Fakhari added.
A high number of engineering graduates who work on the project move on to space-related programs at NASA, Wheeler said.
The students working on the SPIRIT II project often try to involve the local community in space and ballistic education, Wheeler said. The aspiring engineers have gone to local middle schools and conducted seminars to spread awareness of the field, he said.
