Purdue method to help engineers design systems for Mars, Moon missions

Purdue University researchers, in the culmination of a four-year NASA-funded project, have created a method that will enable engineers to design more efficient systems for heating, cooling and other applications in spacecraft for missions to Mars and the moon.
The new method uses a model that was recently shown to be highly accurate in experiments onboard a NASA KC-135 aircraft that creates reduced gravity conditions such as those in earth orbit, on the moon and Mars. The aircraft flies in steep maneuvers, causing brief periods of microgravity in which to test theories for the design of space hardware, said Issam Mudawar, a Purdue professor of mechanical engineering, director of Purdue's Boiling and Two-Phase Flow Laboratory and the university's International Electronic Cooling Alliance.

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All News summaries for December 07, 2004