By Andrew Crawford

He’s already been a classical violinist and a professional snowboarder. Now mechanical/aerospace engineering student and Montana-native Andrew Crawford is learning what it’s like to be an intern at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. This summer, he’ll share his experiences working in the Deep Space Network’s Antenna Mechanical group. Read his full blog on the JPL Education website.

My mentor Jason Carlton oversees the high-bay hoisting of the spreader bar used to lift and stack the Mars Science Laboratory rover Curiosity and the rover container. Does it get much cooler than bunny suits?!

Checking in … beep-beep … beep-beep.

It’s been an incredible and almost surreal week in the land of jet propulsion, and to try and summarize the emotions and sights into words is daunting, as the vocabulary escapes me.

It seems as though around every corner, you meet someone who is so friendly and inspiring that it’s hard not to just smile and try and listen in amazement. From sending beeps aimed at distant galaxies looking for anomalies in the return signal, to brilliant twenty-somethings building descent stage thrusters capable of hovering above the surface of Mars like a UFO, to the beautiful array of different languages and cultures you hear just on your way to the coffee grove, the people and mission here make it hard to contain a smile.

The department I’m writing from is the Deep Space Network (DSN), Antenna Mechanical Group, an incredibly diverse group of people who have welcomed me with open arms. Comprised of a complex network and interface of all different departments and jobs, the DSN is responsible for monitoring all spacecraft currently exploring the universe, searching the night sky for signals and pushing the envelope of what is possible for future communication and data acquisition.

I have an official government NASA office with a phone and voice mail to boot, and the speed and vigor at which things move around here is mind-blowing. It seems imperative to listen and write fast, even if what you’re hearing seems unreal or beyond belief, and before you know it, you’re neck deep in documents and learning curves that didn’t seem possible when you got out of bed this morning. The part I enjoy tremendously is walking outside my office and seeing my fellow DSN antenna mechanical office mates, who are mechanical, civil, structural, aerospace engineers, attacking a white dry erase board with looks of determination. They make cuts in beams, figure out angles and calculate distributed loads in order to find failure points for future antenna-component construction, all of which Effat Rady, my amazing engineering professor at Montana State University has taught me and stressed the importance of, time and time again. It seems as thought the days are lightning quick here, and the only thing I can seem to do after riding my bike home is run in the San Gabriel mountains as far as I can to try to process everything that happened in a day.

The Mars Science Laboratory rover, Curiosity, the largest and most intelligent rover to date, departed the Lab this morning after years of complete dedication and planning by thousands of people.

I was one of a handful of people who was lucky enough to witness the incredible entourage and police escort of the rover — sending it one step further on its quest to explore where Mankind has not yet set foot — as my mentor Jason Carlton was an integral part of the rover, descent stage, and heat shield container builds, assembly, and mating of all components with their transports. He is with the rover as I write this now, bound for the NASA’s Kennedy Space Center aboard an Air Force plane, probably forty-thousand feet above you.

As I write, I’m sitting in the Media Relations Office at JPL bouncing off the walls as my blog goes live, now getting to share this amazing experience and my enthusiasm for this wonderful launching pad of planetary exploration.

› Read Andrew’s full blog on the JPL Education website

By Marc Rayman

NASA’s Dawn spacecraft is less than one month away from getting into orbit around its first target, the giant asteroid Vesta. Each month, Marc Rayman, Dawn’s chief engineer, shares an update on the mission’s progress.

NASA’s Dawn spacecraft obtained this image on its approach to the protoplanet Vesta, the second-most massive object in the main asteroid belt. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA/MPS/DLR/PSI. › See more images

Dear Dawnstinations,

Vesta beckons, and Dawn responds. Now more than halfway through its approach to Vesta, Dawn continues creeping up on the destination it has been pursuing since it began its interplanetary travels. The separation between them gradually shrinks as the probe’s ion thrusting brings its orbit around the sun into a closer and closer match with Vesta’s. At the same time, the giant protoplanet’s gravity tugs gently on the approaching ship, luring it into orbit.

Starting at the beginning of the approach phase on May 3, Dawn interrupted thrusting once a week to photograph Vesta against the background stars. These images help navigators determine exactly where the probe is relative to its target. This technique does not replace other means of navigation but rather supplements them. One of the principal methods of establishing the spacecraft’s trajectory relies on accurately timing how long it takes radio signals, traveling, as all readers know, at the universal limit of the speed of light, to make the round trip between Earth and Dawn. Another uses the Doppler shift of the radio waves, or the slight change in pitch caused by the craft’s motion. These sensitive measurements remain essential to navigating the faraway ship as it sails the interplanetary seas.

Despite the very slow approach, the distance is small enough now that observing Vesta weekly is no longer sufficient. To achieve the navigational accuracy required to reach the intended orbit in early August, last week the frequency of imaging was increased to twice per week. In each session, half of the pictures are taken with long exposures to ensure many stars are detectable, thus overexposing the much brighter disc of the nearby Vesta. The other half use short exposures to ensure that the rocky world shows up correctly so its precise location can be measured. The visible and infrared mapping spectrometer has been commanded to observe Vesta during three of these sessions, each time providing valuable information that will help scientists select instrument settings for when Dawn is close enough to begin its detailed scientific measurements.

In addition to the regular campaign of imaging for navigation, mission controllers have other plans in store for the approach phase that were laid out more than a year ago. Twice in the next few weeks, the spacecraft will watch Vesta throughout its complete 5.3-hour rotation on its axis, revealing exciting new perspectives on this uncharted body. The explorer also will search for moons of the alien world.

› Continue reading Marc Rayman’s June 23, 2011 Dawn Journal

By Julie Cooper

Each month in “Slice of History” we’ll be featuring a historical photo from the JPL Archives. See more historical photos and explore the JPL Archives at https://beacon.jpl.nasa.gov/.

Anechoic Chamber — Photograph Number 383-5765Ac

This aerodynamic noise facility, also called an anechoic chamber, was used to study the noise generating mechanisms in supersonic and subsonic jets in the early 1970s. It was housed at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in building 57 (which no longer exists) located next door to the wind tunnel that was in building 79 at the time. The large round opening in the wall is an exhaust silencer inlet. Standing next to it is Paul Massier, co-author of a technical report about this chamber. On the right is a support structure for microphones. Fiberglass wedge blocks cover the ceiling and walls, which were mostly reinforced concrete. Spaces were left open to allow for observation windows and instruments to record test data. There were also openings in the walls that allowed air to flow into the chamber to replace the air forced out during tests.

This post was written for “Historical Photo of the Month,” a blog by Julie Cooper of JPL’s Library and Archives Group.