The Cornell Daily Sun (https://cornellsun.com/tag/nasa/)
As a co-investigator of InSight’s science team, Banfield monitors weather data like Mars’ wind and temperature through the use of seismometers and other instruments attached to the spacecraft.
Natalie Batalha, a former project scientist for NASA’s Kepler Mission who made into the list of 2017 Time’s 100 most influential people, will lead the audience on a journey to the stars in an upcoming lecture.
Linda Mikula recently discovered a “lost” recording of a lecture by Carl Sagan titled “The Age of Exploration.” The lecture was released on what would have been the former professor’s 84th birthday.
Principal investigator of the Mars rover missions, Prof. Steven Squyres ’78 is “now teaching adults, college students, who cannot remember a time when there wasn’t a rover on Mars.” The rover, Opportunity, who has been on Mars for 14 years became unresponsive in June following a massive dust storm on the planet.
Christa Glazier ’01 was honored with the Cornell New York State Hometown Alumni Award. The current vice president of communications and marketing at CenterState Corporation for Economic Opportunity sent her awarded donation to InterFaiths Works’ Center for New Americans.
There’s something about outer space that naturally captures our imagination. From little kids dreaming about becoming astronauts, to full grown adults gazing up at the majesty of the stars, the final frontier timelessly inspires us all. Despite this seemingly natural fascination, few could ever hope to get there because of the exorbitant costs often associated with space flight missions. However, with the advent of 3D printing and work from Space Systems Design Studio – the research lab of Prof. Mason Peck, mechanical and aerospace engineering – this reality is sure to change in the near future. This past March, NASA selected 11 research groups from across the country to partake in their CubeSat launch initiative, which was a project designed to encourage the development of “CubeSats,” or “nano-satellites.” According to NASA, a typical CubeSat unit measures 4×4 inches, and weighs roughly three pounds.
“We’re about two percent different from chimps,” Prof. Chris Mason said. “He would have been a different species if seven percent of his DNA changed.”
At the hearing on Wednesday, senators questioned Bridenstine on his previous statements denying humans’ role in climate change.
After 20 years, NASA’s Cassini mission ended with the spacecraft’s spectacular plunge into Saturn. To the very end, Cassini had its antenna pointed back at Earth to relay information about the planet’s atmosphere. Over the years, many Cornell astronomers had the opportunity to work closely on the project and have plenty of memories to share. Among them is Prof. Joseph Burns, astronomy, who is a member of Cassini’s imaging teams.
“Were it not for Saturn’s fleet of 62 satellites, the cloud of dust orbiting Saturn would assume the form of a circular disk in the equatorial plane, rather than discrete rings”, Burns said. “Cassini taught us that in order to understand the behavior of planetary ring systems, we need to observe them continuously over an extended period of time.
The group has already won $100,000 from NASA, and it could earn over $1,000,000 more.