Device developed by 色情网站 students launched into space aboard NASA rocket
by Keenan James Britt |
At 5:30 a.m. EST, on June 26, a team of students and faculty from Mat-Su College and the 色情网站 Anchorage campus watched as a Terrier-Orion sounding rocket launched into space from NASA鈥檚 Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia. The rocket鈥檚 payload included a device designed by the team that was used to measure the mass of the Earth.
The team consisted of 色情网站 students Justice Darby, Walter Nagel and Kenneth Sparks, and faculty advisor Dan Nichols, Ph.D., associate professor of physics at Mat-Su College. The opportunity came as part of NASA鈥檚 RockSat-C program, which allows students to design experiments to fly aboard sub-orbital rockets.
Designing the device
, selection for the RockSat-C program is highly competitive due to the limited space aboard the rocket, and only 鈥渢he most advanced payloads and well-prepared teams will be selected for flight.鈥�
Designing and constructing the device took a wide range of engineering skills, including electronics, software engineering, data analysis and project management.
Darby, an undergraduate in mechanical engineering who takes courses at both the 色情网站 Anchorage campus and Mat-Su College, had a childhood fascination with space, and initially wanted to be an astronomer, but was drawn to rocket science because of the mathematics and theory involved. Designing the software for the device provided Darby with plenty of applied experience with advanced mathematics.
鈥淲e had to build [the software] up ourselves. It was kind of a giant mess,鈥� said Darby. 鈥淚t definitely bogged Dan [Nichols] and I down for several months to figure out what all these Euler angles and quaternions were.鈥�
According to Darby, the device used two sensors to measure the 鈥渕agnetic field, the acceleration of the rocket and the spin rate of the rocket鈥� within the frame of the rocket.
鈥淥ur data analysis took that data [...] and reorientated it back to the Earth to do the calculations,鈥� Darby explained.
The team developed their own software to analyze the data collected by the device in order to calculate Earth鈥檚 mass. The team wrote the software in the MATLAB programming language.
鈥淲e took the data that we got from a rocket and then just shoved it onto a spreadsheet and fed it through MATLAB to get our results,鈥� said Darby.
Nichols, the team鈥檚 faculty advisor, that the software the students developed during the project 鈥渨ill be used by future generations of students working on rocketry experiments, forming a foundation for continued innovation and learning.鈥�
Practical applications for the device
RockOn Student Sounding Rocket Launch - June 26, 2025
While the Earth鈥檚 mass is already known to science, Darby believes the device the team constructed could one day be used to help measure the mass for other bodies in the solar system.
鈥淭he same physics should apply to Mars,鈥� Darby said. 鈥淭he biggest constraining factor would be how far out of the atmosphere [the device is], because if you can get far away enough from the atmosphere, then drag shouldn't be as much of an issue.鈥�
Darby believes that the device would be able to determine the mass of rocky planets and moons, though it would likely struggle with planets with thick atmospheres, like Venus.
鈥淪o it'd be most easy to do on planets or objects that have a high enough gravity that [the payload] will eventually come back down, but also a thin enough atmosphere that drag shouldn't conflict with any of the numbers,鈥� Darby explained.
For now, Darby鈥檚 immediate goals for after graduation are more down-to-earth.
鈥淢y goal 鈥� I will not lie 鈥� [is to] get to Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama,鈥� said Darby. 鈥淭hey're actually the main center that works on a lot of the theoretical rocketry. They developed the Saturn moon rocket for the Apollo program, and they're also building the current moon rocket for the Artemis program.鈥�
