ART+SCIENCE 2019

       This visit to JPL was very different than our last visit since it felt like we were in one room most of the time we were there. The focus for this session was focused on Julia Christensen’s “Tree of Life” project. It is a 200-year-old piece that will be a collect and track tree and the sound or song they produce. Honestly, this project is still very confusing, and many questions are still left unanswered. I understand that being able to hear the tree’s song sounds super cool, but as a collective whole, I don’t know why humanity and people should care. Or even how to get them to care about a project that lots of taxpayer money are going towards. Not to undermind the project but creating a project in response to the Tree of Life. While I am still confused about the intention of the Tree of Life, meeting the team and brainpower behind the project was excellent. It was refreshing to be part of the process and see the project in the beginning stages, and I can’t wa...

NISAR Mission              The NISAR NASA mission is scheduled to launch in December of 2020.  This mission is a collaboration between the American space program, NASA, and the Indian space program, ISRO. This mission will be to launch a satellite into orbit around the Earth . This satellite will be the first radar imaging satellite to use dual frequencies to monitor and collect data from around the world in a variety of different subjects. This mission will cost an estimated $1.5 billion dollars making it the most expensive Earth-imaging satellite to date.              NISAR stands for NASA, ISRO, Synthetic Aperature Radar. This satellite once launched will help to produce one of the most detailed images of Earth ever produced. NISAR will help us to image the Earth to an accuracy that has not yet been achieved by current satellites. The main focu...

JPL Visit #2 In our second visit to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, it had seemed that we were much more aquatinted with our surroundings, however the excitement and anticipation that we all shared was felt by all.  We first began by visiting the "art/creative" department of NASA who are responsible for their largest project, "The Tree of Life".  In a brief, short summary, the Tree of Life project is designed to answer the most troubling question in the science field, "How can we produce a creation that is long-lasting and has the ability for longevity for centuries to come?".  The creative department thus brain-stormed various ways in which a man-made creation can last for generations to come.  However, what if something that can last didn't have  to be man-made but rather found in nature.  Thus, the idea to utilize trees to carry the mission's projects became the focus point of the Tree of Life experiment. ...

Blog #7 By Makayla Gallimore   I was so excited to have the opportunity to visit JPL for the second time!! What really intrigued me was going to the OPs lab and talking to Sasha. The fact that we could virtually set foot on Mars and walk around and even draw with our hands is out of this world, literally!! Wow what a concept! So cool! I definitely felt like a kid in a candy store! I could bend down and see the detail of each rock and even change the size of the Mars rover. This was one of the coolest pieces of technology that I have seen by far. It just goes to show how much technology has evolved and it also shows us a glimpse of what is to come in the future. The astounding inventions that JPL has shown in front of our very eyes has inspired me a lot.  We also had the pleasure of discussing the new project that is proposed to last 200 years. It was fun collaborating with JPL scientists,engineers, computer scientists and more! We got to give our input and ideas ab...

Olivia Collins November 20, 2019  The second time at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab was different from our first trip. Unlike having a tour of more projects and rooms, we were in a lecture with the A Team. This collaborative team works on the Tree of Life Project that we learned briefly about from out first field trip. We spent predominantly our whole time at JPL in this brainstorming session with the A Team. The Tree of Life Project seemed to only get more confusing for all of us in the end. Julia Christensen lectured again about the premise of the project and then one of the people outside of the project explained the project. This woman’s explanation helped clear some aspects of it up but even this woman seemed confused on a lot of the logistics between the tree and the cubesats.  We then had a question portion where we were all asked to write questions on sticky notes. Many of us had similar questions: Why does a cubesat need to be sent to space if a sound can be made ...

The main aspect of this week’s JPL trip was discussing Julia Christensen’s Tree of Life project with the A-Team. While it was cool to see how the A-Team works and get a feel for their space, I had a hard time grasping the tree of life concept and execution. It seemed like everyone else in the class had a similar response so I didn’t feel too terrible about it. One of my main overarching questions is why-- why send a satellite to space to garner information from trees, especially if we already have NISAR working effectively? It’s hard for me to see the true intention of the tree of life project. It doesn’t really seem like an art piece to me, and it also doesn’t seem like it is going to create a breakthrough discovery for science. I feel like the result they are going for could just be a low budget project, not linked to JPL at all. Another issue I had was: how are we getting info from the actual tree? It seemed to me that the information was coming from sensors that detect light. To m...

The majority of our time during this visit to JPL consisted of working with the A-Team to go over the Tree of Life project, which we were introduced to during our first visit last month. The last time we learned about it, I left feeling really confused about exactly what the project was and how it has relevance, so being able to inquire more on this trip was helpful. That being said, though, I am still having a hard time wrapping my head around what the goal of the mission is. It's clear that they were inspired by how we can eventually create a mission that has the ability to arrive at Proxima B, and the drive behind the Tree of Life is this idea of time and longevity. However, the team still doesn't seem clear about how the information they gain from this project can be applied to a future mission involving Proxima B. Or if they do know, they aren't effectively articulating it to the general public, which I believe is going to be vital for keeping interest in the 200 year ...