Pasadena, CA —18 JUN 10
Oregon State Student Developing Advanced Technologies for Atmospheric Measurements with NASA JPL
By: Jackie Juergens
Oregon resident Howard Hui is spending his Spring semester at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. with the Undergraduate Student Research Program (USRP). As a member of the Microwave Remote Sensing Instruments group, Hui is developing technologies for the Scanning Microwave Limb Sounder (SMLS) with NASA mentor Paul Stek.
The main priorities of SMLS are to better understand the Earth’s atmosphere in order to improve global pollution transport and climate change models that can be used to develop appropriate environmental policies. SMLS will do this by measuring,from space, the spectra of naturally occurring microwave thermal emissions from the “limb” or edge of Earth’s atmosphere. From these measurements, scientists can calculate horizontal and vertical profiles of atmospheric gases, temperature, pressure, and cloud ice.
“This has been quite a hands- on task. We needed a window for our cryogenic instrument that would block infra-red wavelengths and transmit in the microwave. Howard researched the optical properties of several possible materials, developed an anti-reflective window design, identified researchers at Cal Tech to help him develop fabrication procedures, fabricated the window, and tested he window performance. The resulting window will be incorporated into our demonstration instrument this spring ,” said JPL Mentor Paul Stek.
“This experience really gave me a chance to work on experiments that other places cannot provide,” Hui comments about his internship so far. “I have been able to learn and work with the best people in the field.”
“He is getting an opportunity to take ownership of a reasonable sized task that has relevance to his future career plans,” comments Stek about Hui’s internship.
Hui will receive a dual bachelor’s degree in mathematics and physics from Oregon State University in June 2010.
“The most important part is by spending so much time at NASA, it helped me to determine much more than just my future career plan. Working with my NASA mentors I was able to see the life of a brilliant NASA scientist. I recognized that this life is exactly what I want,” Hui adds.
Hui has had more than a few NASA experiences thus far. Along with his internship this Spring Hui was also a USRP intern at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in the fall of 2007 and spring of 2008. In the summer of 2008 he was part of the Student Internship Program at Goddard as well as the winner of the John Mather Nobel Scholarship. In summer 2009 Hui was part of the NASA Academy. All of these were in the Observational Cosmology Group.
If you would like to learn more about the MLS project you can visit their website at http://mls.jpl.nasa.gov. If you would like to learn more about the USRP internship program visit our website at http://usrp.usra.edu.
