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By NASA
Students are recognized for their hard work in STEM-related extended-day programs at their school through a partnership with NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia.Credit: NASA Media are invited to the kickoff event of a collaboration between NASA and the U.S. Department of Education at 4 p.m. EDT Monday, Sept. 23, at the Wheatley Education Campus in Washington. The interagency project, 21st Century Community Learning Centers, aims to engage students in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) education during after-school hours.
During the event, media will have the opportunity to learn about the STEM collaboration, hear remarks from leadership, and have one-on-one interviews with NASA and Education Department officials upon request. Additionally, students will have the opportunity to engage in educational activities, as well as participate in an engineering design challenge.
Officials providing remarks at the event include:
Kris Brown, deputy associate administrator, NASA’s Office of STEM Engagement, Headquarters in Washington Cindy Marten, deputy secretary, U.S. Department of Education Media interested in covering the event must RSVP no later than Friday, Sept. 20, to Abbey Donaldson: abbey.a.donaldson@nasa.gov.
Through the project, NASA’s Glenn Research Center in Cleveland and the Education Department will align resources to provide STEM activities, professional development, and funding for after-school programs nationwide. NASA will offer staff training, continuous program support, and opportunities for students to engage with NASA scientists and engineers. The initiative also will include student activities that demonstrate practical applications of STEM concepts.
In May 2023, NASA and the Education Department signed a Memorandum of Understanding, strengthening the collaboration between the two agencies, and expanding efforts to increase access to high-quality STEM and space education to students and schools across the nation. NASA Glenn signed a follow-on Space Act Agreement in 2024 to support the 21st Century Community Learning Centers.
Learn more about how NASA’s Office of STEM Engagement is inspiring the next generation of explorers at:
https://www.nasa.gov/stem
-end-
Abbey Donaldson
Headquarters, Washington
202-269-1600
abbey.a.donaldson@nasa.gov
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Last Updated Sep 18, 2024 EditorJessica TaveauLocationNASA Headquarters Related Terms
STEM Engagement at NASA Learning Resources Opportunities For Students to Get Involved Partner with NASA STEM View the full article
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By European Space Agency
Hera asteroid mission launch kit
Everything you'd ever want to know about ESA's first planetary defence mission
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By NASA
The X-15 hypersonic rocket-powered aircraft, built by North American Aviation (NAA), greatly expanded our knowledge of flight at speeds exceeding Mach 6 and altitudes above 250,000 feet. A joint project among NASA, the U.S. Air Force, and the U.S. Navy, the X-15’s first powered flight took place on Sept. 17, 1959, at the Flight Research Center, now the Armstrong Flight Research Center, at Edwards Air Force Base (AFB) in California. NAA chief test pilot A. Scott Crossfield piloted this flight and other early test flights before NASA and the Air Force took ownership of the aircraft. Between 1959 and 1968, 12 pilots completed 199 missions and achieved ever higher speeds and altitudes, knowledge and experience that later influenced the development of future programs such as the space shuttle.
Left: During its October 1958 rollout ceremony at the North American Aviation (NAA) facility in Los Angeles, NAA pilot A. Scott Crossfield poses in front of the X-15-1. Right: Rollout of X-15-2 at the NAA facility in February 1959.
The origins of the X-15 date to 1952, when the Committee on Aerodynamics of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) adopted a resolution to expand their research portfolio to study flight at altitudes between 12 and 50 miles and Mach numbers between 4 and 10. The Air Force and Navy agreed and conducted joint feasibility studies at NACA’s field centers. In 1955, the Air Force selected North American Aviation (NAA), Los Angeles, to build three X-15 hypersonic aircraft.
On Oct. 1, 1958, the new National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) incorporated the NACA centers and inherited the X-15 project. Two weeks later, on Oct. 15, 1958, the rollout of the first of the three aircraft took place at NAA’s Los Angeles facility where several of the early X-15 pilots, including Crossfield, attended. After the ceremony, workers wrapped the aircraft, placed it on a flatbed truck, and drove it overnight to the High Speed Flight Station, renamed by NASA the Flight Research Center in September 1959, where all the X-15 flights took place. Before this first aircraft took to the skies, NAA rolled out X-15-2 on Feb. 27, 1959. The X-15-3 rounded out the small fleet in early 1960.
Aerial view of the Flight Research Center, now NASA’s Armstrong Flight Research Center, at Edwards Air Force Base, California, with one of the B-52 carrier aircraft at left and an X-15 at right. Image credit: courtesy JD Barnes Collection.
Left: Diagram showing the two main profiles used by the X-15, either for altitude or speed. Right: The twin XLR-11 engines, left, and the more powerful XLR-99 engine used to power the X-15.
Like earlier X-planes, a carrier aircraft, in this case a modified B-52 Stratofortress, released the 34,000-pound X-15 at an altitude of 45,000 feet to conserve its fuel for the research mission. Flights took place within the High Range, a flight corridor extending from Wendover AFB in Utah to the Rogers Dry Lake landing zone adjacent to Edwards AFB, with emergency landing zones along the way. Typical research missions lasted eight to 12 minutes and followed either a high-altitude or a high-speed profile following launch from the B-52 and ignition of the X-15’s rocket engine. After burnout of the engine, the pilot guided the aircraft to an unpowered landing on the lakebed runway. To withstand the high temperatures during hypersonic flight and reentry, the X-15’s outer skin consisted of a then-new nickel-chrome alloy called Inconel-X. Because traditional aerodynamic surfaces used for flight control while in the atmosphere do not work in the near vacuum of space, the X-15 used its Ballistic Control System thrusters for attitude control while flying outside the atmosphere. NAA substituted eight smaller XLR-11 engines that produced only 16,000 pounds of thrust because of delays in the development of the 57,000-pound thrust XLR-99 rocket engine, built specifically for the X-15, For the first 17 months of test flights, the X-15 remained significantly underpowered. NAA chief pilot Crossfield had the primary responsibility for carrying out the initial test flights of the X-15 before handover of the aircraft to NASA and the Air Force.
Left: Flight profile of the first unpowered glide test flight of the X-15. Right: A. Scott Crossfield pilots the X-15 during its first unpowered glide test flight in June 1959.
With Crossfield at the controls of X-15-1, the first captive flight during which the X-15 remained attached to the B-52’s wing, took place on March 10, 1959. Crossfield completed the first unpowered glide flight of X-15-1 on June 8, the flight lasting just five minutes.
Left: The B-52 carrier aircraft taxis on the runway at Edwards Air Force Base in California, with the X-15 and pilot A. Scott Crossfield ready to perform the first powered flight of the hypersonic research aircraft. Right: The B-52 carries the X-15 and Crossfield to the drop altitude.
Left: Pilot A. Scott Crossfield is visible in the cockpit of the X-15 shortly before the release from the B-52 carrier aircraft. Image credit: courtesy North American Aviation. Right: The X-15 dumps excess fuel just prior to the drop.
Left: The X-15 drops from the B-52 carrier aircraft to begin its first powered flight. Middle: The view from the B-52 as the X-15 drops away. Right: Pilot A. Scott Crossfield has ignited all eight of the X-15’s engines to begin the powered flight.
Left: View taken from a chase plane of the X-15 during its glide to the lakebed following its first powered flight. Middle: Pilot A. Scott Crossfield brings the X-15 to a smooth touchdown on the lakebed runway at Edwards Air Force Base in California. Image credit: courtesy North American Aviation. Right: Crossfield hops out of the cockpit at the conclusion of the X-15’s first successful powered flight.
On Sept. 17, at the controls of X-15-2, Crossfield completed the first powered flight of an X-15. Firing all eight of the XLR-11 engines for 224 seconds, he reached a speed of Mach 2.11, or 1,393 miles per hour, and an altitude of 52,341 feet. Overcoming a few hardware problems, he brought the aircraft to a successful landing after a flight lasting just over nine minutes and traveling 88 miles. During 12 more flights, Crossfield expanded the aircraft’s flight envelope to Mach 2.97 and 88,116 feet while gathering important data on its flying characteristics. His last three flights used the higher thrust XLR-99 engine, the one designed for the aircraft. Crossfield’s 14th flight on Dec. 6, 1960, marked the end of the contracted testing program, and North American turned the X-15 over to the Air Force and NASA.
Standing between the first two aircraft, North American Aviation chief test pilot A. Scott Crossfield, left, symbolically hands over the keys to the X-15 to U.S. Air Force pilot Robert M. White and NASA pilot Neil A. Armstrong at the conclusion of the contracted flight test program. Image credit: courtesy North American Aviation.
Left: Chief NASA X-15 pilot Joseph “Joe” A. Walker following his altitude record-setting flight in August 1963. Middle left: Air Force pilot William J. “Pete” Knight following his speed record-setting flight in October 1967. Middle right: NASA pilot Neil A. Armstrong stands next to an X-15. Right: Air Force pilot Joe H. Engle following a flight aboard X-15A-2 in December 1965.
Over nine years, Crossfield and 11 other pilots – five NASA, five U.S. Air Force, and one U.S. Navy – completed a total of 199 flights of the X-15, gathering data on the aerodynamic and thermal performance of the aircraft flying to the edge of space and returning to Earth. The pilots also conducted a series of experiments, taking advantage of the plane’s unique characteristics and flight environment. NASA chief pilot Joseph “Joe” A. Walker flew the first of his 25 flights in March 1960. On his final flight on Aug. 22, 1963, he took X-15-3 to an altitude of 354,200 feet, or 67.1 miles, the highest achieved in the X-15 program, and a record for piloted aircraft that stood until surpassed during the final flight of SpaceShipOne on Oct. 4, 2004.
On Oct. 3, 1967, Air Force pilot William J. “Pete” Knight flew X-15A-2, with fully fueled external tanks, to an unofficial speed record for a piloted winged vehicle of Mach 6.70, or 4,520 miles per hour. The mark stood until surpassed during the reentry of space shuttle Columbia on April 14, 1981. NASA pilot Neil A. Armstrong and Air Force pilot Joe H. Engle flew the X-15 before joining NASA’s astronaut corps. Armstrong took to the skies seven times in the X-15 prior to becoming an astronaut, where he flew the Gemini VIII mission in 1966 and took humanity’s first steps on the Moon in July 1969. Engle has the unique distinction as the only person to have flown both the X-15 (16 times) and the space shuttle (twice in the atmosphere and twice in space). Of the first powered X-15 flight, Engle said, it “was a real milestone in a program that we still benefit from today.”
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Tests on Earth appear to confirm how the Red Planet’s spider-shaped geologic formations are carved by carbon dioxide.
Spider-shaped features called araneiform terrain are found in the southern hemisphere of Mars, carved into the landscape by carbon dioxide gas. This 2009 image taken by NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter shows several of these distinctive formations within an area three-quarters of a mile (1.2 kilometers) wide. NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona Dark splotches seen in this example of araneiform terrain captured by NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter in 2018 are believed to be soil ejected from the surface by carbon dioxide gas plumes. A set of experiments at JPL has sought to re-create these spider-like formations in a lab. NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona Since discovering them in 2003 via images from orbiters, scientists have marveled at spider-like shapes sprawled across the southern hemisphere of Mars. No one is entirely sure how these geologic features are created. Each branched formation can stretch more than a half-mile (1 kilometer) from end to end and include hundreds of spindly “legs.” Called araneiform terrain, these features are often found in clusters, giving the surface a wrinkled appearance.
The leading theory is that the spiders are created by processes involving carbon dioxide ice, which doesn’t occur naturally on Earth. Thanks to experiments detailed in a new paper published in The Planetary Science Journal, scientists have, for the first time, re-created those formation processes in simulated Martian temperatures and air pressure.
Here’s a look inside of JPL’s DUSTIE, a wine barrel-size chamber used to simulate the temperatures and air pressure of other planets – in this case, the carbon dioxide ice found on Mars’ south pole. Experiments conducted in the chamber confirmed how Martian formations known as “spiders” are created.NASA/JPL-Caltech “The spiders are strange, beautiful geologic features in their own right,” said Lauren Mc Keown of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. “These experiments will help tune our models for how they form.”
The study confirms several formation processes described by what’s called the Kieffer model: Sunlight heats the soil when it shines through transparent slabs of carbon dioxide ice that built up on the Martian surface each winter. Being darker than the ice above it, the soil absorbs the heat and causes the ice closest to it to turn directly into carbon dioxide gas — without turning to liquid first — in a process called sublimation (the same process that sends clouds of “smoke” billowing up from dry ice). As the gas builds in pressure, the Martian ice cracks, allowing the gas to escape. As it seeps upward, the gas takes with it a stream of dark dust and sand from the soil that lands on the surface of the ice.
When winter turns to spring and the remaining ice sublimates, according to the theory, the spiderlike scars from those small eruptions are what’s left behind.
These formations similar to the Red Planet’s “spiders” appeared within Martian soil simulant during experiments in JPL’s DUSTIE chamber. Carbon dioxide ice frozen within the simulant was warmed by a heater below, turning it back into gas that eventually cracked through the frozen top layer and formed a plume.NASA/JPL-Caltech Re-Creating Mars in the Lab
For Mc Keown and her co-authors, the hardest part of conducting these experiments was re-creating conditions found on the Martian polar surface: extremely low air pressure and temperatures as low as minus 301 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 185 degrees Celsius). To do that, Mc Keown used a liquid-nitrogen-cooled test chamber at JPL, the Dirty Under-vacuum Simulation Testbed for Icy Environments, or DUSTIE.
“I love DUSTIE. It’s historic,” Mc Keown said, noting that the wine barrel-size chamber was used to test a prototype of a rasping tool designed for NASA’s Mars Phoenix lander. The tool was used to break water ice, which the spacecraft scooped up and analyzed near the planet’s north pole.
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This video shows Martian soil simulant erupting in a plume during a JPL lab experiment that was designed to replicate the process believed to form Martian features called “spiders.” When a researcher who had tried for years to re-create these conditions spotted this plume, she was ecstatic. NASA/JPL-Caltech For this experiment, the researchers chilled Martian soil simulant in a container submerged within a liquid nitrogen bath. They placed it in the DUSTIE chamber, where the air pressure was reduced to be similar to that of Mars’ southern hemisphere. Carbon dioxide gas then flowed into the chamber and condensed from gas to ice over the course of three to five hours. It took many tries before Mc Keown found just the right conditions for the ice to become thick and translucent enough for the experiments to work.
Once they got ice with the right properties, they placed a heater inside the chamber below the simulant to warm it up and crack the ice. Mc Keown was ecstatic when she finally saw a plume of carbon dioxide gas erupting from within the powdery simulant.
“It was late on a Friday evening and the lab manager burst in after hearing me shrieking,” said Mc Keown, who had been working to make a plume like this for five years. “She thought there had been an accident.”
The dark plumes opened holes in the simulant as they streamed out, spewing simulant for as long as 10 minutes before all the pressurized gas was expelled.
The experiments included a surprise that wasn’t reflected in the Kieffer model: Ice formed between the grains of the simulant, then cracked it open. This alternative process might explain why spiders have a more “cracked” appearance. Whether this happens or not seems dependent on the size of soil grains and how embedded water ice is underground.
“It’s one of those details that show that nature is a little messier than the textbook image,” said Serina Diniega of JPL, a co-author of the paper.
What’s Next for Plume Testing
Now that the conditions have been found for plumes to form, the next step is to try the same experiments with simulated sunlight from above, rather than using a heater below. That could help scientists narrow down the range of conditions under which the plumes and ejection of soil might occur.
There are still many questions about the spiders that can’t be answered in a lab. Why have they formed in some places on Mars but not others? Since they appear to result from seasonal changes that are still occurring, why don’t they seem to be growing in number or size over time? It’s possible that they’re left over from long ago, when the climate was different on Mars— and could therefore provide a unique window into the planet’s past.
For the time being, lab experiments will be as close to the spiders as scientists can get. Both the Curiosity and Perseverance rovers are exploring the Red Planet far from the southern hemisphere, which is where these formations appear (and where no spacecraft has ever landed). The Phoenix mission, which landed in the northern hemisphere, lasted only a few months before succumbing to the intense polar cold and limited sunlight.
News Media Contacts
Andrew Good
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-393-2433
andrew.c.good@jpl.nasa.gov
Karen Fox / Molly Wasser
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1600
karen.c.fox@nasa.gov / molly.l.wasser@nasa.gov
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Last Updated Sep 11, 2024 Related Terms
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