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SCSU professor prepares for NASA space mission
The newest achievement of one professor in the Department of Physics, Astronomy and Engineering Science is out of this world-literally.
"Basically what happened was NASA said, we have an opportunity to fly two satellites in 2005, anyone interested in flying a satellite, make a proposal as to what you would like to do," said Dr. John Harlander, who teaches introductory courses in physics and astronomy at SCSU.
According to Harlander, the competitive process lasted three years during which 46 teams sent space mission proposals to NASA. In the proposals, teams worked out every detail from budgeting and cost review to actually designing the instruments necessary to carry out the missions.
In a 35-member group including Harlander and other specialists from Washington DC, the University of Colorado, Utah State University, Ball Aerospace and Hampton University, AIM was born.
The satellite mission, Aeronomy of Ice in the Mesosphere, is dedicated to the research of Polar Mesopheric Clouds, which were first detected in 1885. These clouds appear to shine at night because of their high location where they remain illuminated by the sun even while the lower atmosphere is dark.
"We are trying to understand why and how these clouds form," Harlander said. "There is all kinds of evidence indicating the earth's atmosphere is changing and this is very important to us since all life depends on it."
Harlander's involvement with AIM was specifically in the design of a spacial heterodyne spectrometer.
"I started working with the group at the naval research lab in 1993 and they had an instrument they were building to fly on the space shuttle to measure OH in the atmosphere," Harlander said. "The problem is, the instrument is very large, the size of a phone booth. I got involved in the design of a smaller second generation instrument."
According to Harlander, not only does this cheaper newer model gather more light than its competition it is significantly smaller, the size of an ink jet printer, which enables it to accommodate smaller satellites.
While Harlander has been involved in the project for nine years, he first became interested in the area of spacial heterodynes spectrometers when he was a graduate student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
"This has been nine years in development, I am delighted," Harlander said.
The reward of Harlander's achievement is one that he plans to share with his students as well as the world of science.
"I hope to get some students involved in various aspects of what I am doing," Harlander said. "These sorts of opportunities bring real world scientific practice into the classroom."
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