U.Arkansas Instruments to Dig Deep in Space (Forwarded)

University Relations
University of Arkansas

Contact:

Rick Ulrich
Professor
Ralph E. Martin Department of Chemical Engineering
College of Engineering
Deputy director, Arkansas Center for Space and Planetary Sciences
(479) 575-5645

Melissa Lutz Blouin
Director of science and research communications
University Relations
(479) 575-5555

FOR RELEASE: Thursday, April 26, 2007

Instruments to Dig Deep in Space

NASA awards University of Arkansas researchers an instrumentation grant to
build a probe for planetary rovers.

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. -- University of Arkansas researchers, in partnership
with a local company will develop a probe for future planetary rovers that
will help scientists study the history of the solar system by examining
the properties of layers of material beneath the surface of the moon,
Mars, comets and other planetary bodies.

Scientists at the Arkansas Center for Space and Planetary Sciences and
officials of Space Photonics Inc. received a $403,000 grant from the
Planetary Instrumentation Development branch of NASA, which will allow
them to create an optical probe that can be used to determine the
composition and amount of ice beneath the surface of a planetary body.

"Our intention is to deliver to NASA hardware that is ready for a
mission," said Rick Ulrich, professor of chemical engineering and
principal investigator for the project. This particular instrument will
help researchers answer questions that have been around since planetary
bodies were discovered.

"When we look out at these places, we only see the surface, and we wish we
could see what lies beneath," Ulrich said. "Those layers contain the
timeline of the solar system's history."

To examine the layers, the researchers will build an Optical Probe for
Regolith Analysis, an instrument they refer to as OPRA.

The instrument will operate at the base of a rover, driving a spike into
the soil. The spike, which may be anywhere from one to four feet long,
will contain several dozen quartz windows along its length with fiber
optic cables connected to an infrared spectrometer back in the rover,
which will provide spectral analysis as a function of depth. Because all
the electronics will be isolated in the rover, there will be no heat
source to alter the possibly frigid interior of the planetary body.

"OPRA will analyze these layers without disturbing them," Ulrich said.
"We'll get composition versus depth at every layer." The infrared spectrum
will provide information on the kind of rock, its chemical composition,
the amount of water in the rock and how the molecules are arranged. By
looking at the compositions of different layers, the researchers can peel
back time and look at the geologic history of the planetary body.

"NASA wants simple, robust and effective hardware, and OPRA is all three
of these," Ulrich said. The public-private partnership with Space
Photonics strengthens the university's ability to attract major
instrumentation funding.

Space Photonics has served as a research and development company for the
Department of Defense and for NASA and has reported recent product sales
to Honeywell, Lockheed-Martin and Orbital Sciences.

"The relationship with the University of Arkansas has been key for us,"
said Matthew Leftwich, a senior development specialist and lead engineer
at Space Photonics, a University-based start-up company. Space Photonics
will develop the fiber optic cable interface that will carry the infrared
light signals to and from the alien soil, through the sub-surface probe.
Infrared light sent to and reflected back from the alien soil into the
probe's fiber-coupled interconnect system will deliver the data to the
Fourier-transform infrared spectrometer for analysis.

"SPI will be collaborating with the OPRA design team to determine the
optimal methods of fiber-to-quartz lens coupling and fiber routing
throughout the OPRA probe," he said.

To test the instrument, the researchers will build a large sandbox-like
structure that will contain a Mars soil simulant, clay or other materials
that might be found on planetary bodies. They will use this and other
means to test the instrument, trying to determine the force necessary to
penetrate the ground, how the windows should be positioned and how many
times the probe can be used before the material begins to wear. They also
will compile a library of spectral results from the different materials.

"We envision that this will work on Mars, the Moon, comets and asteroids,"
Ulrich said. At the end of the project, the probe will be ready for NASA
to consider for a mission, and it could be in space in 4 to 6 years.

Ulrich credits the work of the W.M. Keck Laboratory for Space Simulation
and the multidisciplinary nature of the team for the success of the
proposal -- the researchers have expertise in materials science, geology,
engineering, chemical engineering, fiber optics and space science. The
team includes Ulrich; Larry Roe, professor of mechanical engineering;
space center director Derek Sears, who holds the W.M. Keck Professor of
Space and Planetary Sciences; Vincent Chevrier, a postdoctoral fellow in
space and planetary sciences; and Leftwich with Space Photonics.

The Arkansas Center for Space and Planetary Sciences is a joint center in
the J. William Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences and the College of
Engineering. For information, please see
http://spacecenter.uark.edu

Space Photonics develops, markets and sells optical networking systems and
components specifically designed to address the reliability and bandwidth
limitations of military and commercial aircraft and spacecraft. For
information, please see
http://www.spacephotonics.com