PASADENA, Calif. – 08 June 11
Universität Bremen Student Takes on Titan
By: Heather L. Ogletree
The Cassini program consists of 12 teams whose aim is to explore Saturn and its moons in a cooperative international effort between NASA, the European Space Agency (ESA), the Italian space agency: Agenzia Spaziale Italiana (ASI), as well as several separate European academic and industrial. One such team, the Visible and Infrared Mapping Spectrometer (VIMS) team, processes infrared images to study Titan, Saturn’s largest moon.
“Titan is the only moon of the solar system with a dense atmosphere rich in organic molecules and the only place, besides Earth, with stable liquid on its surface. However, optical remote sensing observations are made difficult by the strong absorption and scattering in the atmosphere,” said Christophe Sotin, an international Senior Research Scientist with the VIMS group. “The VIMS team has demonstrated that one can observe Titan’s surface in several infrared windows.”
This spring, Bianca Reinhardt traveled from Bremen, Germany, to the Jet Propulsion Lab (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif., to join Sotin in his research. Reinhardt, who was born in Port Charlotte, Fla., jumped at the chance to come to NASA through the Undergraduate Student Research Program (USRP) and to take part in a hands-on internship project compiling VIMs images from the Cassini spacecraft. The senior mechanical engineering major from the Universität Bremen said, “Since aerospace engineering is still a male dominated business, my desire for engineering for engineering wasn’t always taken seriously.... Through hard work and perseverance I have shown that I am dedicated and capable, and that has earned me the opportunity to be a part of [USRP].”
And USRP made the right choice; Sotin commented, “Bianca has been an excellent student and has helped us a lot in the processing of the Cassini/VIMS data. I am very satisfied with her work.”
When Reinhardt arrived at JPL, she faced many challenges, including learning the organizational structure at JPL and learning how the lab works; however, she stated, “The biggest challenge I had to face during this internship was to learn several new pieces of software. Thankfully the people I worked with were very helpful, which made the task easier and much more enjoyable.”
During her 15 weeks, Reinhardt worked to map the surface of Titan using Cassini infrared and radar images. She explained, “By analyzing the images it’s possible to determine the morphology of the surface, such as the physical properties of the moon. This is important because Titan is one of the few bodies in our solar system that contains a stable atmosphere and liquids on its surface. The implications of better understanding its physical features could go a long way towards our understanding of space.” Reinhardt also made sure to mention how amazing it was to see part of another planet close up and was excited to be responsible for putting together the images that others would see.
Now with this experience under her belt, Reinhardt plans to enroll in a master’s program in space engineering in Bremen, Germany, and hopes to end up at NASA or the ESA. She said, “Knowing that [Titan] is 9.5 au [890 million miles] away from Earth and it is still possible for us to receive data to create an image of the surface was awe inspiring and it added to my passion for space engineering.”