Student Spaceflight Experiments Program

Student Spaceflight Experiments Program
Founder(s) Jeff Goldstein, director, NCESSE
Established June 2010
Mission STEM student outreach
Head Jeff Goldstein
Key people Stacy Hamel, National Program Manager
Drew Roman, Technology Manager
Harri Vanhala, Science Advisor
Tim Livengood, Science Advisor
Michael Hulslander, Education Advisor[1]
Website http://ssep.ncesse.org/

The Student Spaceflight Experiments Program (SSEP) provides an opportunity for student groups from upper elementary school through university to design and fly microgravity experiments in low Earth orbit (LEO).[2] SSEP is a program of the National Center for Earth and Space Science Education (NCESSE, a project of the Tides Center), the Arthur C. Clarke Institute for Space Education, and the private space hardware company NanoRacks.[3] SSEP operates under a Space Act Agreement between the sponsoring organizations and NASA, allowing the International Space Station (ISS) to be utilized as a national laboratory.[4]

History

The program was launched in June 2010, by NCESSE in the U.S. and by the Clarke Institute internationally.[3] As of 2015, SSEP has sponsored eight missions to LEO – two on board the Space Shuttle, and six to the ISS – with a seventh mission to the ISS announced in April 2014, and expected to fly in the spring of 2015.[5][6]

In the first eight SSEP flight opportunities, 48,900 students in grades 5 through 15 (junior undergraduate in the U.S. higher education system) participated in experiment design and proposal writing. Of 7,922 proposals received, a total of 114 experiments were selected for flight, with one from each community participating in each flight opportunity. As of 15 October 2014, 96 of these experiments have been successfully launched.[7] The 18 experiments comprising Mission 6 to the ISS were lost when the Cygnus CRS Orb-3 vehicle exploded shortly after launch on 28 October 2014.[8]

Key dates

Date Event
Jun 1, 2010 Program start
May 16, 2011 STS-134 launch
Jul 8, 2011 STS-135 launch
May 22, 2012 M1 launch
Oct 7, 2012 M2 launch
Sep 18, 2013 M3a launch
Jan 9, 2014 M3b/M4 launch
Jul 13, 2014 M5 launch
Oct 28, 2014 M6 launch (Cygnus CRS Orb-3 failure)
Jan 10, 2015 M6 launch
Jun 28, 2015 M7 launch (SpaceX CRS-7 failure)
Apr 8, 2016 M7 launch
Jul 16, 2016M8 launch (planned)

Process

The competition to select student projects for flight is designed to resemble a standard research proposal process. Interested groups must submit proposals in response to announced criteria; these proposals are then peer-reviewed against the criteria in a two-stage selection process, with the vast majority of proposals rejected.[9]

Each selected experiment is provided with one mini-laboratory, which is flown on the ISS and then returned to Earth for analysis.[6] Experiments selected for flight have included research into crystal growth, composting, cell division, seed germination, and calcium metabolism.[10][11][12] The cost of each experiment is on the order of US$21,000, which must be raised by the community developing the experiment.[13]

Students have an opportunity to share their research at a national conference sponsored by the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, NCESSE, and the Clarke Institute.[3] Students participating in the program have also been given the chance to participate in a videoconference with space station astronauts.[14]

References

  1. ↑ "Key Individuals". ssep.ncesse.org. National Center for Earth and Space Science Education.
  2. ↑ "Student Spaceflight Experiments Program". ncesse.org. National Center for Earth and Space Science Education. October 30, 2012.
  3. 1 2 3 Gaskill, Melissa (August 6, 2014). "Student Scientists Present Unexpected Results from Space Station Research". Space Station: Research & Technology. NASA.
  4. ↑ "Student Spaceflight Experiments Program – Mission 6 to the International Space Station". spaceref.com. SpaceRef Interactive Inc. October 30, 2013.
  5. ↑ "SSEP in the News". Student Spaceflight Experiments Program Community Network Hubsite. National Center for Earth and Space Science Education.
  6. 1 2 Goldstein, Jeff (April 21, 2014). "New Flight Opportunity for School Districts: Announcing Student Spaceflight Experiments Program (SSEP) Mission 7 to the International Space Station for 2014-15 Academic Year". ncesse.org. National Center for Earth and Space Science Education.
  7. ↑ "Experiments Selected for Flight". Student Spaceflight Experiments Program Community Network Hubsite. National Center for Earth and Space Science Education.
  8. ↑ Bever, Lindsey (October 29, 2014). "Students lost science experiments in Antares explosion". The Washington Post. Retrieved 31 October 2014.
  9. ↑ "The Flight Experiment Design Competition". ncesse.org. National Center for Earth and Space Science Education.
  10. ↑ "Selected Experiments on SSEP Mission 4 to ISS". Student Spaceflight Experiments Program Community Network Hubsite. National Center for Earth and Space Science Education.
  11. ↑ "Selected Experiments on SSEP Mission 5 to ISS". Student Spaceflight Experiments Program Community Network Hubsite. National Center for Earth and Space Science Education.
  12. ↑ "Selected Experiments on SSEP Mission 6 to ISS". Student Spaceflight Experiments Program Community Network Hubsite. National Center for Earth and Space Science Education.
  13. ↑ Bass, Dale (January 28, 2014). "Kamloops students set for space trip". Kamloops This Week. Aberdeen Publishing.
  14. ↑ Grove, Tim (April 26, 2013). "An Out-of-This-World Program". nasm.si.edu. Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum.
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