Fly Your Thesis! teams also participate in partial-g parabolic flight campaign
One month ago, two Fly Your Thesis! 2021 teams, AIMIS-FYT and RELOX participated in a 0 g parabolic flight campaign. No sooner did that campaign conclude, that the same two teams were given the remarkable opportunity to participate in yet another parabolic flight campaign, this time partial-g! The term ‘partial-g’ refers to any gravity levels between 0 and 1 and, for this campaign 0.16 g (lunar) and 0.38 g (Martian) were offered to the scientists.
These opportunities opened up to the students because Covid-19 restrictions and quarantine requirements prevented other teams from participating to ESA’s 74th parabolic flight campaign, leaving two slots open to the teams from Germany and the UK. Since the campaign occurred once again in Germany and all students met the strict government travel conditions, no restrictions imposed on their participation.
This partial gravity campaign was scientifically valuable for the teams as it complemented their microgravity data from the previous flights. AIMIS-FYT attempted to build mini truss-like structures out of UV-curable resin which could form the basis of planetary habitats. However, the focus in this campaign was to examine the limits of the technology capabilities and determine ideal factors such as the resin extrusion speed and curing times.
RELOX on the other hand, investigated the efficiency of electrolysis in Martian and lunar g, but also the angles and surface nano-structures of the electrodes which would be best at reducing the accumulation of gas bubble retention, fundamental research that will help with in situresource utilisation (ISRU) when exploring lunar or Martian surfaces.
Safety and security from Covid-19 was still very much at the forefront of the campaign and daily testing of all persons present was undertaken by onsite medical staff. Covid-19 specific tests were performed over the 10 days of campaign which included saliva samples and nasopharyngeal swabs. Of course, regular temperature monitoring was performed throughout each day also. These additional measures ensured all participants could keep working in a safe environment.
The students were delighted with the flights, obtaining in large part all the data that they were hoping to get. After such a hectic period with two campaigns back to back, the teams have returned home for some well-deserved rest before they tuck into their data sets.