Caltech Students Venture to NASA's Houston Space Center

Serena Eley, Dirk Englund, John Ferguson, and Joseph Jewell in front of the "Vomit Comet" before their flight. (NASA photo)

Twice a year students from universities across the country are encouraged by NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston to submit research proposals as part of its Reduced Gravity Student Flight Opportunities Program (RGSFOP). The teams that are selected are allowed two flights on the KC-135, at which time they conduct their experiments. The research plane flies through 30 parabolic trajectories, producing about 30 seconds of weightlessness each time.

For the summer 2001 session a Caltech team consisting of senior physics majors Serena Eley, Dirk Englund, and John Ferguson, and sophomore aeronautics major Joseph Jewell, were selected as one of 35 teams that participated in the program. The team's fiber optic experiment is sponsored by Caltech physics professor Hideo Mabuchi as well as Lute Maleki and Vladimir Iltchenko from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

Dirk Englund experiences weightlessness on the flight.(NASA photo)

The team's experiment focused on a new type of glass called ZBLAN (an acronym based on the metals present in the glass: zirconium, barium, lanthanum, aluminum, and sodium), which could be the fiber optic material of the future because of its wider band of wavelength transmittance. This glass is fabricated from the heavy metal fluoride family as opposed to the current silica-based fiber optic glass. "The advantage of ZBLAN over silica-based fiber is that it is many times less absorptive, over a much larger optical window--from the near-ultraviolet to the near infrared regions of the spectrum. In fact, the attenuation of a perfect ZBLAN glass should approach the theoretically lowest levels allowed by matter," said Englund.

The benefits of ZBLAN could be applied to a wide range of fields, besides telecommunications. For instance, ZBLAN can be used to create a small and inexpensive laser that has applications in electrodynamics, communications, and medicine. At present, making such a laser is very costly.

The difficulty with the production of ZBLAN is that, if it is created under the presence of gravity, it crystallizes-destroying its unique optical properties. The mission of the Caltech team is to manufacture microspheres under the different gravity conditions provided by the KC-135's parabolic trajectory.

Serena Eley and Dirk Englund with their experiment during the flight.(NASA photo)

The team's experiment was split into three parts. First, before leaving for Johnson Space Center the team made microspheres at the Caltech and JPL labs. On the plane, these three sets of microspheres were produced again under the differing gravitational conditions. Finally, the microspheres created on the KC-135 were brought back to the labs at Caltech and JPL for tests and analysis.

Each team in the program must participate in a community project. The four Caltech students have chosen to present their experiments at several elementary and high schools in various districts around Southern California.

Eley, Englund, Ferguson, and Jewell were at Johnson Space Center from August 22 to September 1. The first few days were devoted to training for the flight. Though the program pays for the training and the cost of the flight on the KC-135, the team had to raise the money for equipment, transportation to and from Houston, and accommodations. Caltech and JPL covered most of the costs.

Contact: Neda Afsarmanesh (626) 395-3227 [email protected]

Visit the Caltech media relations web site: http://pr.caltech.edu/media

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