Parker Solar Probe – STEM Innovation Lab

Mixed Reality: New setup for the Lab

Virtual Reality environments can be a challenge to fully perceive by watching through a TV screen. However, Mixed Reality, where a camera plus software can remove a green screen background to place a user directly into the environment for all to see is hugely more collaborative.

Prior to the STEM Innovation team traveling down to Kennedy Space Center (KSC) last week, the VR development team were lucky enough to receive and quickly test a Mixed Reality setup.

Mixed Reality, depending on what articles you read, seems to have slightly different meanings. Here we talk about Mixed Reality as a method for people to more clearly see what a VR user is seeing – by overlaying the person directly inside their VR environment and displaying it onto a TV screen.

Once we got the camera and software (we tested a product called LIV), we went about learning how to set it up for our Lab and our Space science related products. Our VR summer intern spent a few days trying, and found it challenging to setup the ‘triangulation part’ of the software. This part of the setup effectively generates a depth perception of the VR environment i.e. to estimate when a person is in front/behind a virtual object.

We did manage to get Mixed Reality working briefly, just prior to shipping our equipment to Kennedy, but we did not have the time to perform robust tests to ensure it would smoothly operate when the team went on the road. This meant the VR team were able to use the Parker launch at KSC was a great testbed for us to learn what is needed to demonstrate Mixed Reality while on tour during future conventions and conferences.

Have you tried a different system to operate Mixed reality in your Lab, or on the road? If so, let us know how you got along and what you liked about it?

Parker Solar Probe: T Minus 1 day

Today is the STEM Innovation team travel day. We are mostly arriving from various airports around the Washington DC area and at different times of the day. The flight is about 2hours and 15min. But have you ever wondered how long it would have taken Parker to travel the same distance?

Today, the majority of the STEM innovation team have been in transit to Florida. Not only have we transported the majority of the equipment and technology ahead of time, but many of us are also bringing smaller items that we are more intimately involved with – and perhaps things where last minute changes were needed.

A few days ago you saw us in a blog, as we boxed up several gear VR headsets. When you come to visit us this week (not if, because why wouldn’t you ☺), you will see some amazing projects that the team has been developing: From looking closely at a NASA spacecraft and Earth’s magnetic field called the magnetosphere using gear VR technology, through to NASA data visualized and interpreted into a 3D cube of LED lights, and even fly with Parker in VR as your buddy while it circles the Sun. And of course, not forgetting, so much awesome NASA related material for you to take home and learn about Space.

When Parker flies around the Sun, it speeds up as it gets closer to the Sun (this is the conservation of angular momentum). But did you know that Parker at its closest position to the Sun will be traveling a monstrously large speed of about 430,000 miles per hour.

Can you calculate how long it would take Parker to travel our same journey from DC to Orlando? When it took us over 2 hours to fly.

Look away now if you do not want to see the answer:

By guessing the plane follows mostly the eastern coastline, the flight is about 875 miles (using an online map).
Using the trusted formula of speed = (distance / time) , we can rearrange the formula to:

Time = (distance / speed).
Which gives us (875 / 430,000) hours.

So actually it would take Parker a mere 7 seconds !!!

Want to know more details about Parker or get hands on experience with what real scientists are investigating? Then come talk to a scientist at Kennedy this week and talk to the STEM innovation Team.

[edit: Sorry this blogs was meant to go live on Thursday night, but had delays in its release]

Parker Solar Probe: T Minus 2 days

Did you know NASA has several definitions for a countdown?!? “T Minus”, “L Minus”, and NASA even sometimes uses “E Minus”. What do they all mean and why do we have them? NASA Launch Services Program at Kennedy Space Center can help with the translations.

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Parker Solar Probe: T Minus 3 days

Today, we had the big team meeting prior to flying down to Kennedy Space Center. We discussed everything from the big picture to the finest of details, all to ensure the American people receive the best support possible. We went through contingencies, scheduling, logistics, more contingencies, events, equipment, science and engineering message, and even more contingencies.

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Parker Solar Probe: T Minus 4 days

Less than a week to go before the launch of the Parker Solar Probe, and so, this marks the beginning of our journey together as I begin to write daily blogs for a week. Today, the team gathered together to collate all the equipment to transport down to the Kennedy Space Center.

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Where’s Parker? An interactive orbit viewer for the web

We have created a “where’s Parker?” web viewer. To help navigate where our Parker spacecraft will be in the future and to better understand how close to the Sun it will be going, check out our new interactive web tool that we quickly prototyped in a week.

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I’m all ’bout that Parker, ’bout that Parker Solar Probe – in Virtual Reality!

The first mission to touch the Sun – Parker Solar Probe – will be launching in less than a month! We are beginning our month long campaign to focus on supporting all the great NASA scientists working on the Parker Solar Probe mission. First, Parker in Virtual Reality!

Over the next month we will demo a wide range of technologies related to the Parker mission. From 3D printers to touch-tables and Virtual Reality.

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