They bring a fresh perspective to the endeavor

Apr 7, 2010 23:01 GMT  ·  By
NASA experts and university graduate students work together to make the advanced JWST a reality
   NASA experts and university graduate students work together to make the advanced JWST a reality

When complete, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) will be the most complex, advanced and sensitive observatory to ever fly into space. Its capabilities will only be matched by its size, and by the huge challenges associated with constructing it. This effort, currently conducted at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) in Greenbelt, Maryland, is being augmented by university partnerships that NASA signed with numerous learning institutions in the United States. Graduate students are now working in Building 5 at the GSFC, innovating the technology that will go on the JWST.

These partnerships, NASA believes, will play a critical role, serving the dual purpose of bringing in fresh perspectives on designing current and future spacecrafts, and getting the young generation interested in advanced, exact science. Officials at the agency think some of the engineers and scientists that will be working at its labs will come from this collaboration program. At this point, the students involved in the JWST program are working on adjusting the lasers and mirrors that will constitute the basis of the observatory, while spending long hours analyzing their own results in front of computer terminals.

“Investments in students today help us build what comes after the Webb telescope. University professors serve on our advisory boards. It allows us to tap the brightest minds in the country,” says of the initiative the GSFC Webb telescope Optical Telescope Element manager, Lee Feinberg. “When you're a graduate student, wherever the funding is, you are going to develop partnerships and relationships. There is a potential to go beyond graduate school. It's good for the university and its good for attracting young talent to NASA,” adds University of Rochester graduate student Matthew Bolcar.

He was involved in a partnership program at the GSFC more than six years ago, and is now a full-time optical engineer for the Center's Wavefront Sensing and Control (WFSC) group. “It takes four to five years to really train someone in wavefront-sensing technology,” states WFSC group leader and GSFC scientist Bruce Dean. “This is a win-win for the schools and NASA. We fund their graduate students, and in return, we get really bright, fresh minds working on NASA's most challenging missions,” Lee Feinberg concludes, quoted by PhysOrg.