James Voss

Conference on World Affairs: Talking isolation and loneliness with astronaut Jim Voss

Anonymous — Mon, 14 Sep 2020 18:04:52 +0000

Conference on World Affairs: Talking isolation and loneliness with astronaut Jim Voss Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 09/14/2020 - 12:04

The University of Colorado Boulder Conference on World Affairs included a special virtual panel: "Zooming" in on Loneliness, featuring five-time NASA astronaut and Smead Aerospace Scholar in Residence Jim Voss. The event was streamed live on Sept. 11.

[video:https://youtu.be/d_oKOXnmxAU?t=521]

The webinar starts at 8:40.

The University of Colorado Boulder Conference on World Affairs included a special virtual panel: "Zooming" in on Loneliness, featuring five-time NASA astronaut and Smead Aerospace Scholar in Residence Jim Voss. The event was streamed live on Sept. 11...

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CU Boulder team advances in NASA tech competition

Anonymous — Wed, 26 Feb 2020 19:46:57 +0000

CU Boulder team advances in NASA tech competition Anonymous (not verified) Wed, 02/26/2020 - 12:46

Jeff Zehnder

The Microsoft Hololens system.

University of Colorado Boulder students are designing next-generation spacesuit technology.

The CU Technology for Extreme Environments (CUTEE) Club is competing in the NASA SUITS Challenge to design and create an augmented reality system – an interactive, heads-up display – that could present live electronic information to astronauts inside their spacesuit helmets.

Heads Up Technology

It is technology that could be used to show astronauts their spacesuit status, outline procedures for assignments, provide wayfinding, and generally help them more work more efficiently.

“We want to help astronauts be more self-reliant, so they don't need to radio back and forth with ground control as much,” said Chris Hill, a senior in computer science and the team president. “If we want to go to Mars or colonize other planets, radio signals to Earth take longer and longer to transmit, so astronauts have to be able to work on their own.”

NASA is particularly interested in student solutions because they often bring unique perspectives to challenging problems and approach issues differently than career scientists and engineers.

The competition has two phases. The first, completed during fall semester, was a written proposal. In December, NASA announced CU Boulder as one of 21 finalist teams selected to develop prototype systems.

CUTEE is using the Microsoft HoloLens headset platform to design their AR system. In April, they'll travel to Johnson Space Center and present their projects to NASA judges, including actual astronauts.

Thankfully for CUTEE, one of their faculty advisors has plenty of space experience of his own – Jim Voss, a scholar-in-residence in the Ann and H.J. Smead Department of Aerospace Engineering Sciences, is a five-time NASA astronaut with 202 days of space experience under his belt.

“The team has great ideas that will help astronauts accomplish tasks. The most enjoyable part for me is seeing the creative, innovative thinking of our young engineering students,” Voss said.

K-12 Outreach

PhD student Jordan Dixon talking with K-12 students in Telluride.

Part of any NASA college competition is to scout talent – both in new ideas and potential future hires. For SUITS, the agency is extending that to K-12 students. As part of the project, college teams are required to conduct outreach to school districts.

Hill and members of the CUTEE team have held sessions in elementary, middle and high school classrooms across Colorado both in person and via Skype and are co-hosting a Family Engineering Day at CU Boulder on Feb. 23. All of these events aim to show students new technology, like the HoloLens system, and build enthusiasm for STEM careers.

“We want to show kids we’re just normal people and to have them come away not just thinking about NASA, but technology generally,” Hill said. “Tech is changing youth culture. Augmented reality, implantable tech, things like that are the future of how people will see the world.”

Allie Anderson, an assistant professor in Smead Aerospace and team advisor, says they’re particularly focused on outreach beyond the Denver metro.

“We’re engaging in Hayden, Telluride, Ouray – rural communities that don’t have the easy access to museums, planetariums, and science that the Front Range does,” Anderson said. “We want to increase awareness for STEM in places students might not immediately consider it as a career.”

NASA Suits Logo.

University of Colorado Boulder students are designing next-generation spacesuit technology. The CU Technology for Extreme Environments (CUTEE) Club is competing in the NASA SUITS Challenge to design and create an augmented reality system – an interactive, heads-up display – that could present live electronic information to astronauts inside their...

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Students designing augmented reality system for astronauts

Anonymous — Fri, 21 Dec 2018 04:05:21 +0000

Students designing augmented reality system for astronauts Anonymous (not verified) Thu, 12/20/2018 - 21:05

Jeff Zehnder

NASA is turning to university students for help with the next big space technology – augmented reality.

The University of Colorado Boulder has been selected by NASA as one of 16 colleges to participate in the Spacesuit User Interface Technologies for Students (SUITS) 2019 challenge.

The mission? To develop an interactive heads up display system for use inside space helmets that could be used by astronauts during space walks.

“The idea is to make EVAs easier. To guide them through procedures they need to follow or have someone at mission control be able to draw on the display itself to point out a component,” said Christine Chang, the CU Boulder team project manager and a computer science PhD student.

The team has until April to develop and program a prototype system using the Microsoft HoloLens headset platform. Then they will travel to Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas where a group of testers, likely including actual astronauts, will try out their prototypes.

To ensure the team’s product meets the approval of such a demanding audience, they have an advisor with first-hand experience: CU Boulder aerospace faculty member and five-time astronaut Col. Jim Voss.

The Microsoft HoloLens system.

“He’s our voice of experience. He’s done EVAs and can say, ‘Don’t worry about having the interface do X, but instead here’s something that would be really useful’,” Chang said.

The team is also advised by Allie Anderson, assistant professor of aerospace engineering sciences. Anderson’s research focuses on space suit design and wearable space sensor systems.

In addition to Chang, the team includes two aerospace PhD students, three computer science undergraduate, and two students from ATLAS.

NASA is specifically calling the experience a “challenge,” instead of a competition. They’re not looking to crown a formal winner, they’re seeking the best ideas and designs.

K-12 STEM Outreach

The team is promoting science and engineering to Colorado K-12 students. Their efforts emphasize the NASA SUITS challenge, applications of augmented and virtual reality technologies, the engineering design process, and other STEM topics. Learn more about their outreach.

“NASA is particularly interested in student solutions. Students bring a fresh perspective. Someone who is 22 years old doesn’t see the same restrictions as a career scientist or engineer,” Chang said.

This is the second year for the SUITS challenge, and the team is building on ideas and tests they began in 2017. In fact, their earlier work recently earned some unique recognition.

After submitting an abstract on their user testing, they have been invited to participate in the 2019 International Conference on Environmental Systems in Boston, Massachusetts in May.

If you are a student interested in joining the team, they are accepting new members. Email NASAsuits@lists.colorado.edu.

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Aerospace faculty member Jim Voss has been to space five times. Commuting from Houston to Boulder is no big deal

Anonymous — Tue, 04 Sep 2018 21:12:51 +0000

Aerospace faculty member Jim Voss has been to space five times. Commuting from Houston to Boulder is no big deal Anonymous (not verified) Tue, 09/04/2018 - 15:12

Jim Voss is no stranger to work travel.

In one two-year stretch, he flew monthly between Houston and a job site in Star City, Russia, near Moscow.

That wasn’t even extreme: As a NASA astronaut, Voss (MAero’74; HonPhD’00) circled Earth more than 550 times during five Space Shuttle missions.

He spent 201 days in space, 163 as a resident of the International Space Station. In 2001, he and a crewmate floated outside it for 8 hours, 56 minutes, setting the record for longest spacewalk.

Now 69 and three times retired and unretired, Voss continues traveling long-distance for work. Since 2009, he’s been teaching in CU Boulder’s aerospace engineering program, commuting twice a month from Houston, where his wife, Suzan, still works for NASA.

Usually Voss flies Southwest Airlines to Denver. But every few months he pilots himself in one of two small aircraft he owns, a single-engine, four-seat Cirrus SR22 with tan leather interior. He’s also got a two-seat Rutan Long-EZ experimental aircraft he built himself.

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