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S P A C E T E A M O N L I N EUPDATE # 63 - December 11, 1998 PART 1: Happy Holidays! HAPPY HOLIDAYS!
These Space Team Online updates will be taking a holiday break and will return the week of December 31, 1998, so that when you gear up for next year, you can be updated and ready to go. In the meantime, you can follow the progress on STS-88 and the exciting space walks plus great events like this morning's launch as NASA's Mars Climate Orbiter began its journey to Red Planet. Never a dull moment! See our Launch page at: http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/ltc/sto/launch Have you been having trouble getting to us this past week? The San Francisco Bay Area had a major power failure affecting, well, the most pertinent thing here is: Quest! Although we really never had a sensation of the loss of power, since Ames kicked in with a generator, the hiccup was long enough to crash our server. In the process of putting it back on line, a series of "updates to the software" were found to have serious problems, and without a whole lot of technical gobbledygook, Quest, especially the QuestChat, software has been unreliable. Please don't get discouraged! We believe that we are beyond the problem now, and a full complement of chats will be scheduled beginning the new year. New this week: We have placed a new set of Microgravity lessons online in the Teacher's Lounge: http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/space/teachers There is a Teacher's manual with 16 Activities in Science, Mathematics and Technology online for your use. 'Tis the season for gift-giving: You too can own or give a t-shirt like the one Jay Buckey wore in space on STS-90! (Naturally, yours won't have the special autographs from Mrs. Force's 4th grade class at the Ray School in Hanover, New Hampshire.) See the picture at: http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/neuron/photos/buckey.jpg The selection of Quest shirts can feature your school's name, a Sharing NASA logo, the NASA meatball and the banner from your favorite project. (Just in case: NASA is not profiting from the manufacture or sale of these shirts. Personally, I just think they're a neat idea!) Info on how to get yours is at: http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/common/shirts Despite the missing Updates, I will continue to post the weekly puzzle at: http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/space/events/puzzle (see Part 3 below) I will highlight any new happening as a feature on the top page: http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/space And I invite you to write to me. I will be here and value your inputs very much. This is, after all, your project. I want to wish you and yours the happiest and "refreshingest" of holidays, Linda UPCOMING LIVE EVENTS QuestChats require pre-registration. To register go to: http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/space/chats ->The QuestChat scheduled for Dec. 9 with Luis Rodriguez was a casualty of the present network difficulties. It will be rescheduled for January. Please stay tuned! ->Wednesday, December 16: Tour of the International Space Station Training and Mockup Facility 10:00 AM Pacific (1 PM Eastern) We host this event every third Wednesday of every month. You are invited to join our tour guide at Johnson Space Center (JSC) in Houston, Texas. You will be able to ask your questions during the tour and have them answered during the event. If you are not able to join us this month, we hope you can make next month's tour. http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/ltc/sto/tours ->Wednesday, January 6, 1999, 10 AM PST (1 PM EST): Michael Ciannilli is a test project engineer from Kennedy Space Center and is known most recently for his energetic accounting of facts as they happened at the launch of STS-95. Be sure to read Mike's profile at: http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/space/ciannilli.html to prepare for this chat. CHALLENGE PUZZLE QUESTION #4 http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/space/events/puzzle It's not too late to participate in this project. The only change is that your answers will now be sent to Stephanie Wong, who proposed the idea. Scoring will also appear online, updated at the end of each week. This week's question with a deadline of 12/19/98: Name the division of NASA that explores gravity's role in life and sponsored the Challenge Project. [Editor's note: Luis' primary responsibility as a senior safety engineer is to make sure that design engineers and scientists use NASA-approved materials, chemicals and electrical components when designing their experiments. The QuestChat with Luis was cancelled last week and will be rescheduled for January.] MY STS-95 INVOLVEMENT http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/space/team/rodriguez.html Interviewed by: Lori Keith December 5, l998 Astronaut training for every mission is different. Each shuttle mission crew training session is based on a group of people who integrate their different specialties. The many experiments that go up on the flights usually require the crew to do some training on their operation or, if nothing else, at least relay data back to the ground. Even if it just requires a press of a button, a flip of a switch, or reading a digital display, it is covered in the training for the mission. This is important also because crew timelines are planned so tightly to the minute. Sometimes the experiments require the crew to run the equipment, perform the experiment or simply monitor it. The experiment begins with the PI, the Principal Investigator. The PI could be a student, a professor, a teacher, an engineer, a scientist or a group of people (an entity) working together. The PI is responsible for the experiment, which is usually an original idea developed by the PI or another scientist in his/her organization. The PI works with the folks at NASA to make his/her experiment flight ready and is responsible for making sure the astronauts know the objective of the experiment. If available, the PI briefs the astronauts on the background and objectives of the experiment. Communication and familiarization are very important. Even if only a few crew members will be working the experiment they all like to get familiar with it in the event someone must step in for someone else. Besides communication and familiarization, having a good back-up system is also important. During training the astronauts are briefed on what a piece of equipment looks like, what functions it will perform in space, and how they will perform the functions needed by them -- flipping a switch, pressing a button, loading software, taking photographs, adding something to something else, etc. The crew's interaction could require many different things. My job for STS-95 was to support crew training regarding safety aspects and any potential problems. A mission, and the space program for that matter, is a team effort. Its success is always based on teamwork. This particular flight's crew included our famous astronaut, Senator John Glenn. It was an honor to spend time with him, training for this mission, and to share a few moments with him. He is an excellent person to work with and train and is very down to earth. The experiment I was involved with was the Cell Culture Module - Version A (also referred to as CCM-A). I supported crew training for this experiment. CCM-A is an experiment regarding bone density and muscle mass reduction in space caused by microgravity. Scientists are always working on trying to figure out exactly why this happens and ways to prevent it and facilitate rebound (bouncing back) after returning to Earth from spaceflight. The effects of these two problems could hurt the overall health of astronauts working long-term spaceflights. The scientists are also always working on how to create artificial gravity, which would help combat these two ailments. The CCM-A analyzes bone and muscle loss at the cellular level to find answers and hopefully solutions to bone density and muscle mass loss in microgravity. They find that certain cells are either dying or not receiving the nourishment needed due to the lack of muscle activity. To work on strategies to reduce or reverse this effect on the human bodies, they must understand how the cell itself is working. Why is the cell losing energy or slowing down? This experiment takes up live human and animal muscle cells and attempts to keep them alive throughout the mission to study the growth and effects of the space environment on them. The goal of these types of experiments is to find answers and to develop solutions to combat the effects of the stress of the microgravity environment on the human body. This particular experiment is sealed so the astronauts don't have to touch anything inside the experiment. During the ground process at Kennedy Space Center prior to launch, the experiment is loaded into the Orbiter and is powered up with batteries until the Orbiter is up. Then they power it up to the Orbiter. Because of the live cells the experiment is powered up continuously. Once the Orbiter is in space the cells are then under microgravity, just like the human body. Several versions of this experiment have been done before. In this version, the cells were sealed in the experiment box and mixed with certain chemicals (done by computer) and then analyzed when returned to Earth. Another version allows the crew to monitor throughout the flight the different stages of the cells' activities on a display mounted to the front of the experiment. They could also relay video of this activity back to the ground. On STS-95, the astronauts' role in this experiment was to monitor the temperature of the environment of the experiment (enclosed in a box). The primary crew members involved with the CCM-A experiment were Scott Parazynski and Chiaki Mukai. In space, everything relaxes. Bodies get one to two inches longer because the spine is not as compressed, the heart expands, veins get slightly bigger and everything seems to expand and get bigger. As the body ages, it experiences some of the same symptoms the body experiences in long-term spaceflight, like bone density and muscle mass loss. This is why these kinds of studies are so important for spaceflight and for understanding the effects of aging on the body. [Editor's note: Tony's work with the Advanced Projects and Analysis Office involves generating new ideas and developing new systems in support of mission operations.] DESIGNING FUTURE SPACESUITS http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/space/team/bruins.html Interviewer: Lori Keith December 4, l998 System engineering and integration is the skill of the 21 century. Without this skill, it will be very hard to compete. To begin with, we have to take a system perspective. What does each different user want and need and how do they want it to function? If we get good user feedback up front, it helps to ensure a good quality product and good customer service. The first set of system requirements is laid out by taking what's common among all the users. Then we figure out what's unique and different for each user -- and that's where the system integration comes in. System integration becomes much easier if we are thinking in parallel, as opposed to linear thinking. When systems are integrated, technology is enabled. We have just about completed Phase I of the wireless Advanced Wireless Communicator. What this phase entailed was to develop the system requirements and design. Though the system design is not complete, we have decided the basic core capabilities. The Systems Requirement Document is finished, and a partial prototype has been constructed. The prototype is of the ear piece and has no electronic components as of yet. The controller unit prototype will be delivered this month and can be worn as a watch or put on the chest. Both will have push to talk capability. We have talked to flight controllers, Shuttle/Space Station EVA people, astronauts, X-38 people, NBL (Neutral Buoyancy Lab) people, LCC (Launch Control Center) and Orbiter Processing Facility (OPF) people in Florida. This is how we figured out our system perspective. We know the core electronics capability will be the same, but we will have to package it differently for the various users and their specific applications. My whole group is also working on Russian Increment projects. We are working to understand many of the challenges facing us both concerning EVAs (Extravehicular Activity). We are infusing research and technology for system integration of the two differing EVA philosophies. Between the years 2000 and 2002, more EVA will be done than in the entire history of the space program. This is because of the construction of the space station. EVAs are very stressful for the astronauts' bodies -- specifically their fingers, hands, wrists and forearms -- because of the short repetitive movements and limited mobility. We want to infuse technology and breakdown what we refer to as the "EVA Wall" and try to make it easier on the astronauts doing these EVAs. The EVA Wall is the amount of EVAs we will have to perform during the above mentioned three years. We must be able to meet these challenges to get the space station built, so it has become a wall of sorts for us to get over. The spacesuit project I am working on is going well. The S3 Project was demonstrated at Inspection Day 98 here at JSC. The S3 Project supports the development of an advanced spacesuit with virtual prototyping and modeling. At JSC, we can model the forces of the joints collectively -- the wrist, elbow, shoulder, hip, knee and ankle. The state-of-the-art technology for modeling the flexion of the fingers and the toes was not NASA's, but came from Dr. Rice. What we are working on is software, and the suit is physical hardware. Virtual simulation and modeling (software) help in the development and construction of the suit by saving time and money, and by answering many "what ifs" beforehand - trial and error at its best. The astronaut's spacesuit is called an EMU (Extravehicular Mobility Unit), and this project involves EMU upgrades. One of the first areas we are looking at upgrading is the helmet, as we want to integrate the Advanced Communicator technology to allow for advanced wireless communication. We've also looked into updating the gloves. A virtual prototype, similar to the S3, will help considerably in saving time and money. On the home front, I have a new dog, a dachshund named Kasi. My pit bull, ShyShy, is going to have puppies soon. That should be interesting. The magazine "Popular Science" is sending someone to talk to personnel in our area about existing and future spacesuits, including Dr. Rice's S3 project. STATUS OF COLUMBIA PROCESSING
Below, we provide reports on the processing of Shuttle Columbia taken from the detailed daily reports found at the NASA Shuttle Status web site at http://www-pao.ksc.nasa.gov/kscpao/status/status.htm At times these reports will contain jargon and unfamiliar terms; our intent is not to confuse you but to provide a glimpse at all the steps involved. Functional tests on the orbiter's external tank umbilical door are complete. This past week, a transducer on Columbia's freon coolant loop No. 2 was replaced and servicing of the coolant loop No. 2 is now complete. Leak tests of the orbiter's crew compartment are being performed. Workers are performing a routine modification on orbiter Columbia by shimming the payload bay's aft bulkhead to ensure proper payload bay door closure. In the Vehicle Assembly Building, external tank and solid rocket booster mating activities concluded last week and closeouts continue on schedule. No new data today, 12/11/98. STS-93 SCHEDULED OPERATIONAL MILESTONES (dates are target only): Payload bay doors closed (Dec. 21) Orbiter weight and center of gravity testing (Jan. 9) Orbiter transferred to VAB for mate to external tank (Jan. 11)
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