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Living and working in space requires preparing a little closer to Earth. Through a suborbital flight test on December 19, 2023 with industry supplier Blue Origin, NASA Flight Opportunities Program is helping 14 research payloads take a step toward future space missions and commercial applications. Flown technologies aim to address some of the opportunities and obstacles presented by humanity’s sustained presence in space.
Launched aboard Blue Origin’s New Shepard reusable suborbital rocket from the company’s launch site one in West Texas, the payloads reached an altitude of 351,248 feet. During the flight, those payloads experienced about three minutes of microgravity, providing insights into the effect of reduced gravity on both technologies and living beings.
“NASA relies on emerging commercial spaceflight capabilities to rapidly test disruptive solutions for space applications,” said Danielle McCulloch, program director for Flight Opportunities at NASA. NASA Armstrong Flight Research Center in Edwards, California. “Working with commercial flight providers like Blue Origin allows the agency to make space exploration and commerce more accessible to a broader range of researchers.”
A strong commercial space industry also helps NASA advance scientific exploration of the Moon, Mars, and beyond. In addition to the research teams supported by NASA, this flight was also an important milestone for Blue Origin, as it served as a return to flight with its New Shepard rocket.
NASA-backed technologies aboard New Shepard
Sometimes everyday products can be the key to advancing space goals. For example, paraffin and beeswax are not just for cosmetics and candles. Researchers are using this flight to evaluate these common materials and determine whether they could be key to safer, cheaper fuel for spacecraft. Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology are evaluating manufacturing techniques in space convert these wax-based products into alternative options for propelling small spacecraft.
Also on board the flight was a project formeter The small company Ecoatoms Inc. in Reno, Nevada, is designed to advance the production of biosensors in low Earth orbit. Earth’s gravity often causes sensors to have rough, uneven layers that negatively affect performance. Manufacturing in microgravity could allow for smoother, more uniform development, resulting in better detection. The startup hopes the flight test with Blue Origin will be a step toward in-space manufacturing of healthcare tools for patients on Earth and astronauts on long-duration missions, improving crew safety while taking advantage of the space economy. expanding to benefit life on Earth.
“We are excited to test scale manufacturing of biosensors in space. Coating hundreds of sensors in microgravity will provide us with extremely valuable information to advance our technology,” said Solange Massa, founder and CEO of Ecoatoms. “Preparing for suborbital flight with Flight Opportunities gave us experience that we will apply to future flights for our customers.”
In another example of how a common substance can help pave the way toward our understanding of space, researchers at Montana State University and the University of Colorado Boulder will use a variant of yeast (Candida albicans) as a springboard to better understand how microgravity affects humans. . Observations of how several minutes of microgravity affect this simple biological organism, made possible by the team’s work. unique sampling systemIt may provide a window into the cellular and physiological adaptations of the human body, which will be critical knowledge for planning extended human space missions.
Other technologies that will benefit from these flight tests include:
- A electrophysiological measurement system and lensless imaging system from imec USA in Kissimmee, Florida, as well as two student payloads administered by imec that examine the effect of gravity on ultrasonic sound waves and a variety of sensors.
- An experiment at the University of Central Florida in Orlando to Apply electric fields to a dust simulator.
- TO tool to evaluate the geophysical properties of soil on near-Earth asteroids developed by Honeybee Robotics Ltd., in Altadena, California
- A system from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratoryohry in Southern California for evaluate multiphase reservoirs for sample mixing and bubble migration
- TO propellant metering system during in-orbit transfer and refueling operations from Carthage College in Kenosha, Wisconsin
- A technology from Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana, to Modeling propellant sloshing in microgravity.
- He TOMORROW Draper’s Multi-Environment Browser in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
- An experiment at the University of Alabama in Huntsville to collect thermal data from fluids in microgravity
- TO sensor to measure the volume of water used to keep an astronaut cool in an exploration spacesuit, developed by Creare in Hanover, New Hampshire and funded by NASA STTR Program (Technology Transfer for Small Businesses)
- TO Regenerative technology to provide energy storage. for spaceflight applications, developed by Infinity Fuel Cell in Windsor, Connecticut and funded by a NASA Tipping Point Award through the NASA program. Game-changing development program
Flight Opportunities is managed by NASA Armstrong and funded by NASA’s Space Technology Mission Directorate. This program provides funding for flight testing and technology payload development, as well as subject matter expertise to help researchers maximize the impact of their commercial flight testing. The program allows innovators to collect the data they need to advance their work ahead of larger, more expensive missions and applications.
