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Student-Made Satellite Goes Into Orbit

Posted by Zonk on from the all-i-did-in-college-was-play-video-games dept.

College Student writes "A Satellite built by aerospace students from 23 university groups successfully took off from Plesetsk, in northern Russia. From the article: 'A Russian booster rocket successfully carried a satellite designed by students into a low Earth orbit yesterday for the European Space Agency under a programme intended to help to inspire and train future aerospace workers.'"

3 of 77 comments (clear)

  1. Science lead... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    As a kid I'd read a book about some high school students building model rockets. The final scene was one where they'd put a mouse (named "Maika" IIRC, in homage to Laika) into a rocket and brought it safely back to earth. There were books like "Encyclopedia Brown" and "Danny Dunn" -- many used science or education to solve problems.

    On a recent trek through a local Monstrous Book Store, I saw a different group of childrens' books... They talked about tolerance, religion, Barbie, single motherhood, Care Bears, Barney, Bratz... but scant few with scientists as the hero.

    In fact, I turn on the TV or rent a DVD, and scientists (and knowledge for that matter) has become the scapegoat for all the world's ills. Toxic spills create monsters. Scientists create doomsday machines. Researchers unleash deadly viruses. And some nice guy who doesn't have all that there book learnin' comes and rescues everyone.

    Now I'm not saying that movies should not be entertaining -- I enjoyed The Matrix not for its pseudo-mysticism but because of the cool fight scenes -- but please please please have a good guy scientist who gets the girl (or a good gal scientist who gets the guy) at least once a decade.

  2. Hey NASA, why not do this? by Cerdic · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I see a collaboration between several European nations and the European Space Agency to get student involvement in space technology.

    What kind of opportunities do we have here in the US to do something similar? Is NASA putting together a student cooperative to put a satellite in space? Bill O'Reilly and friends said that we're the #1 superduperpower, but we aren't doing stuff like this. Why?

    --
    Advice for my fellow geeks: before seeking out that threesome you dream of, you might see what a TWOsome is like first.
  3. Re:Not to rain on their parade, but... by phliar · · Score: 3, Insightful
    this isn't a first by any means. ... I have a friend helping to build one of the next Mars orbiters, and students were also involved in builidng Spirit and Opportunity.
    This is "a satellite designed by students". Seems to me there's a teeny difference between "helping to build" (or "involved in") and "designed by".
    --
    Unlimited growth == Cancer.