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Published May 31, 2004; Category: ARTS & SCIENCES
Professor builds rockets to study Northern Lights
When asked about her job, Kristina Lynch usually says she studies the
Northern Lights - the dancing auroral lights that often appear in the night
sky.
From left: Kristina Lynch, Assistant Professor of Physics and Astronomy;
Jonathan Tullis '05; and Robert Michell, graduate student in physics and
astronomy, test a circuit board for a rocket. (Photo by Joseph Mehling
'69)
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"It sounds better than saying I'm a rocket scientist," she says.
Both are true, of course. Lynch studies the aurora, and to do that, she builds
rockets.
Lynch, Assistant Professor of Physics and Astronomy, is trying
to figure out what causes the structure in the aurora.
"We understand the basic picture of how the Northern and Southern
Lights work; it's the activity of charged particles, electrons, hitting the air
in the atmosphere. But we don't understand exactly what makes all the pretty,
dynamic fine structure."
Examining the aurora requires specialized rockets equipped with sensors to
measure electrons and ions, and capture information about the electrical and
magnetic fields. The data is relayed back to earth in real time during the
rocket's flight of 300 to 600 miles into the air. As the rocket flies through
and over the aurora, spring-loaded, sensor-laden payloads come apart during the
trip at a predetermined time. The goal during the 10- to 15-minute ride is to
take an array of measurements through time and space in order to get a more
complete understanding of how the aurora is constructed.
"Some auroras look like they have this rippling curtain effect,"
says Lynch, "and other times they swirl around. If a rocket only takes
measurements as it moves through the aurora at one point in time, the sensors
can't differentiate between the two phenomena. It looks the same both ways to
the sensors."
To meet this challenge, Lynch and her students along with collaborators at
Cornell University have increased the number of payloads on their rockets.
Grouped payloads can measure more variations and gradients in the aurora. Last
December, the group gathered in dark, cold, but beautiful (according to Lynch)
Svalbard, Norway, to launch a rocket with two payloads. Winter months at high
latitudes yield more active, brilliant auroras. This summer they will build a
five-payload rocket to launch in Alaska in February.
With each payload that is added, the team must compact the electronics
inside it to keep the rocket from getting too big and heavy to travel the
necessary distance above the atmosphere. Inside each payload, there are many
circuit boards to control the experiments. Each board requires hundreds of
electronic parts that are interconnected and attached to it. Students Sarah
Jones '04 and Jonathan Tullis '05 with graduate student Rob Michell will spend
a great deal of this summer soldering and testing the circuits. Lynch says that
many of her past students have applied their rocket building experience to
embark on careers in satellite technology.
"There is so much to learn about the aurora; more questions come up
all the time."
- Kristina Lynch
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Another student, Sarah Markus '07, who participates in Dartmouth's Women in Science Project, works on
outreach initiatives to help a broader audience understand the science behind
the rockets. Markus is creating a web page, and she will also work this summer
with graduate student Kristen Frederick-Frost developing an exhibition in
collaboration with the Montshire Museum of
Science in Norwich, Vt. The exhibition will describe the different elements
of an auroral rocket and explain the difficulties and complexities of taking
measurements in space. (See www.dartmouth.edu/~aurora.)
Lynch dreams one day of building a rocket with a 50-payload cargo, which she
says should be only about 10 to 15 years away.
"There is so much to learn about the aurora; more questions come up all
the time," she said. "The more payloads we deploy, the more
information we gather about how the energy is transferred and how the rocket
itself might influence the energy readings we get, the more interesting
questions we find."
The research is funded by NASA.
By SUSAN KNAPP
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