[meteorite-list] University Of Wisconsin Students Win Space Habitat Competition

From: Ron Baalke <baalke_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Sun, 3 Jul 2011 21:29:37 -0700 (PDT)
Message-ID: <201107040429.p644TbFs004298_at_zagami.jpl.nasa.gov>

July 01, 2011

J.D. Harrington/Michael Braukus
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-5241/1979
j.d.harrington at nasa.gov/michael.braukus at nasa.gov

Lynnette Madison
Johnson Space Center, Houston
281-483-5111
lynnette.b.madison at nasa.gov


RELEASE: 11-213

UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN STUDENTS WIN SPACE HABITAT COMPETITION

HOUSTON -- University of Wisconsin students topped two other
university teams to win the 2011 NASA eXploration Habitat (X-Hab)
Academic Innovation Challenge, a competition to design and build a
space habitat. The team will now take its inflatable space loft to
NASA's annual Desert Research and Technology Studies (Desert RATS)
field test in Arizona in September. It will be tested as part of a
simulated astronaut mission to an asteroid.

"University students are helping NASA develop potential habitats for
future space missions," said Kriss Kennedy, habitat demonstration
unit project manager at Johnson. "The teams collaborated to
demonstrate how technology we might use in the future could actually
be developed."

The tree teams totaling 135 students each spent a week this month at
NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston setting up and deploying their
inflatable lofts for judging. Teams from Oklahoma State University,
Stillwater, and the University of Maryland, College Park also
competed.

"This is a great example of how NASA can obtain innovative system
concepts from universities," said Doug Craig, strategic analysis
manager for analog systems at NASA Headquarters in Washington. "These
technology concepts are a valuable part of our human space
exploration planning activities."

According to the judges, the 14-member University of Wisconsin team's
design held promise for habitability and application to the Desert
RATS mission simulation and was ready for field use because it had
little leakage in the inflatable systems. The loft will be part of
the home for a crew of four during the field test.

In June 2010, NASA invited university teams to submit inflatable loft
concepts for the X-Hab Challenge. The three competing universities
received $48,000 of seed funding to assist with their projects. The
winning university will receive $10,000 to offset costs associated
with the desert field test.

Next year's competition, X-Hab 2012, will look at volume, geometry and
habitability of a deep space habitat and technologies for plant
growth and geo-science sample handling. The competition is designed
to engage and retain students in the science, technology, engineering
and math disciplines, which in turn will help develop the next
generation of innovators and explorers. It also tests concepts and
solutions for potential future NASA missions.

X-Hab is sponsored by NASA's Exploration Systems Mission Directorate
and the Innovative Partnerships Office in the Office of the Chief
Technologist at NASA headquarters in Washington. For more information
about the X-Hab competition and updates about each team's designs,
visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/exploration/analogs/xhab_challenge.html
        
-end-
Received on Mon 04 Jul 2011 12:29:37 AM PDT