The Lunar Leopards visited NASA June 5–8.
Calling themselves the Lunar Leopards, a group of Wentworth undergraduates visited NASA’s Johnson Space Center in June to test spacewalk tools they designed for challenges related to deepspace exploration.
The group is one of 32 student teams that advanced to the testing phase in a NASA program called Micro-g Neutral Buoyancy Experiment Design Teams, or Micro-g NExT.
The Institute was in Houston from June 5 through 8.
The only students from a New England college or university in the program, the Wentworth group spent several months building prototypes and preparing for the test, which took place in NASA’s Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory—a 40-foot-deep pool where astronauts train for spacewalks. During the Fall 2016 semester, the Wentworth group submitted a proposal for a pneumatic drill and sample collection tool called “Microgravity Regolith Extractor.” The device is in the design refinement phase with guidance from an appointed NASA mentor.
The Wentworth team is composed of four Mechanical Engineering seniors: Kristen Lundebjerg, Troy Doyle, Joshua Mortin, and Jacob Williams, and their faculty advisor, Associate Professor Anthony W. Duva.
Micro-g NExT is managed by the Office of Education at Johnson. The program helps support the agency’s education policy of using NASA’s unique missions and programs to engage and encourage students to pursue science, technology, engineering, and math careers.
For more information about NASA’s education programs, visit: www.nasa.gov/education.
— Dennis Nealon
