Space Missions12/3/2000
Students to Help Cassini Study Jupiter
As Cassini approaches Jupiter, middle and high school students are making Earth-based observations to aid the spacecraft's investigation of the planet. by Vanessa Thomas
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During the next few months, students at 25 middle schools and high schools in 13 states will be controlling radio telescopes in California and collecting data to help the Cassini spacecraft study Jupiter. The project is part of a hands-on program that teaches students about science through radio astronomy. From their classrooms, the students use the Internet to direct two 112-foot (34-meter) radio dishes at the Goldstone tracking station in California’s Mojave Desert. Goldstone is part of the worldwide Deep Space Network (DSN) |
that communicates with spacecraft during their journeys through the solar system. Following the construction of newer, more powerful radio telescopes, NASA decided to decommission one of the Goldstone dishes that had been working for DSN since the early 1960s. In 1997, rather than dismantling the telescope, NASA donated the dish to the Apple Valley Science and Technology Center (now the Lewis Center for Educational Research) for an educational program that would inspire science students across the country. |
The students are using the Goldstone-Apple Valley Radio Telescope (and a second dish, added to the project later) to monitor natural radio emissions from Jupiter's atmosphere and radiation belts. These observations will be used to interpret measurements that Cassini will make in January. "We know that the radio emission from Jupiter's radiation belts changes over time, and we want to know whether Cassini is looking on a normal day or an unusual day," explained Scott Bolton, a science team member for Cassini. “The observations the students collect will be our primary gauge to determine the state of the radiation belts.” |
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Data collected by the students will also help calibrate the spacecraft's radio equipment in preparation for Cassini's examination of its main target, Saturn, in 2004. |
"I've found that students who participate in this really show a lot of interest in science, and it whets their appetites," said Joe Monaco, Earth sciences teacher at Redlands East Valley High School in California. One of his pupils, junior Brian Dansereau, said he likes the vibrancy of real research in contrast to lessons from a textbook. "It inspires you to go on and do more in science," Brian said. |
For more information:
http://www.astronomy.com/content/dynamic/articles/000/000/000/231mayqv.asp