An important part of being an astronomer is communicating science to the public and working to inspire the scientific curiosity of young students.
As part of my “Broader Impacts” portion of the NSF fellowship, I work with middle school, high school, and incoming college freshmen to launch scientific payloads via high-altitude weather balloon. This is done in collaboration with the University of Utah Center for Science and Mathematics Education (CSME) Refugees Exploring the Foundations of Undergraduate Education in Science (REFUGES) program.
The purpose of the High-Altitude Balloon Project is to teach students how to think critically about the natural world around them, as well as provide valuable experience executing important tasks in the field. The project consists of four major phases:
- Learn about what makes a “good scientific question”, and how to come up with such a question.
- Design an experiment to answer a scientific question posed by the students.
- Launch this experiment via high-altitude balloon.
- Analyze the data using the coding language Python.
To date, we have had two successful launches out of two attempts. Both launches contained instruments onboard that measured the temperature and pressure of the atmosphere from 4,000 ft to 80,000 ft. We also put cameras on the payload to prove to people that we aren’t just making things up. Here is a video of one of the projects we did:
For those who didn’t want to watch the video, here is a plot that the summer students made of our data from the two launches!
Many of the payload parts and balloons are obtained from https://www.highaltitudescience.com/. Launching a high-altitude ballon can be tricky, but with the right guide and some discipline, just about anyone can do it! If you have any questions about launch logistics, do not hesitate to contact me! I am working on putting together a guide, so email me if you want a draft of it.