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September

Welcome to the 2002/2003 School year!

Dear GAVRT Teachers;

I hope you are enjoying the beginning of another school year and the extremely important part you play in shaping our future! I would like to take this opportunity to invite you and your students to participate in the GAVRT Project for the 2002/2003 school year. There are multiple opportunities for you to participate and broaden your involvement this year. I would encourage you to contact Kelli Cole at the Operations Control Center (OCC) and sign up for your antenna time as we have an expanded number of missions this year.

We have some new “Special Mission Projects” and opportunities for you and your students! Last year we successfully expanded the Student/Scientist Teleconference. The Student/Scientist Teleconference involves students in your classroom engaging in a one-hour question and answer period with JPL and various professional scientists. Those of you who participated found it to be an enriching experience for your students. It was also an inspiring experience for the JPL scientists who are involved in donating their time to talk with students. I would like to invite you to participate in this valuable educational experience.

The first of our new “Special Mission Projects” to debut this school year is the Galileo-Jupiter Microwave Observing Campaign. The Galileo spacecraft is flying by the Jovian moon, Amalthea, on November 5th, 2002. This is Galileo’s closest approach to the planet Jupiter thus far. It will be closer than it has ever been in the past, diving into the heart of the radiation belts that we observe from the ground. We will be contributing our ground-based measurements and conducting those measurements in the traditional manner. You and your students can take data on Jupiter just as you have in the past. However, in this mission, we are trying to get more data than we have usually collected in the past and are coordinating it with the mission and the VLA schedule. With the GAVRT data, we are focusing on collecting data on Jupiter’s total flux (the beaming curve) and noting any possible changes in the brightness or intensity of the radiation belts. The Very Large Array (VLA) in Socorro, New Mexico will be generating new maps of the radiation belts during the spacecraft’s flyby and on other dates, which we have outlined in this month’s newsflyer. The VLA will compare these new maps with maps they have generated in the past and note any correlation with the GAVRT flux measurements. The months of October, November, and December are prime observing periods for this mission. I hope this captures your interest as you deepen your participation in the real world of science!

Welcome back to a new and exciting year!

Sincerely,

Dave MacLaren
Manager, GAVRT Curriculum & Training