MIT Department of Aeronautics & Astronautics | November 2024

Announcements

Nominations are open for the 2025 MIT Martin Luther King Jr. Leadership Awards! The deadline is Monday, December 2 to nominate a student, alum, staff member, faculty member, or group that embodies Dr King’s ability to bring communities together. Winners will be recognized at the annual MIT MLK Celebration in the spring.

Accessibility guidelines: Communications and the AeroAstro CommLab have put together an internal best practices guide for everyday accessibility in your communications.

Submit your photo to be featured on our Meet AeroAstro screen: Share a fun fact, your research interests, or anything else you would like the community to know about you, along with your favorite photo of yourself, to be featured in the second-floor hallway.

Upcoming event:

“Materials Matter: How materials impacted our world and my career” with MLK Visiting Scholar Justin Wilkerson

Thursday, Dec. 5, 12:00 - 1:00pm

The Nexus, Hayden Library, 14S-130 or via Zoom

The Roundup is a monthly newsletter to keep the AeroAstro community up-to-date on research, community news, and important happenings across the department and MIT.

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In Memoriam

Course 16 alum and National Air and Space Museum Wall of Honor honoree Leonard Silver SB ‘66, SM ‘67 has passed away at age 80. Leonard, or “Len,” began his career at the MIT Instrumentation Laboratory and contributed to Apollo missions 7–17 by developing spacecraft simulations to test onboard software.

Community Corner

CommLab manager Brian Mernoff captured November’s full Beaver Supermoon during peak illumination on Friday, November 15. The name relates to the time of year when beavers begin to take shelter in their lodges for the winter ahead. Look closely – is that Tim’s outline visible in the shadows?

📸: Pam Fradkin participating in an unofficial “Hold a Concorde Day,” according to a student who happened to have a model of the retired supersonic airliner handy.

This month’s Maker Meeting taught attendees how to make self-folding origami robots in all kinds of shapes, from boxes to dragonflies and trees.

HR bits

Spot Awards: Congratulations to Alexa Torres, Echo Aodhan, Pam Fradkin, and Venecia Siders on being recognized by your peers for your outstanding efforts this month.

Have someone you would like to recognize? Submit a nomination any time!

Seasons of love: Congratulations to Rachael Draper on her engagement to Michael Aitchison, and MaryAnn Carey on hers to Matthew Alt! Both pairs are looking forward to their ceremonies in spring 2025 – but only one ceremony will be planned by MaryAnn.

Congratulations!

Professor Hamsa Balakrishnan was honored at the 2024 New England Choice Awards. The event celebrated the success of 10 individuals and organizations from the Indian American community.

Alum Emily Calandrelli SM ‘13 became the 100th woman to fly to space aboard Blue Origin’s NS-28 mission. The capsule reached an apogee of 65.8 miles, flying 3 miles above the Kármán line.

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion

The annual Thankful Gathering brought the department together to share a meal and express gratitude for all that we have accomplished and look forward to all that is in store for the AeroAstro community. Congratulations to the winners of the pie giveaway!

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion best practices:

Eight Keys to Bridging our Differences, by Scott Shigeoka and Jason Marsh

Seeking faculty mentors for MIT Summer Research Program (MSRP):

For over 40 years, MSRP has inspired the next generation of talented undergraduate scholars representing identities traditionally underrepresented in graduate education. Faculty mentors play an essential role in fostering a student’s success in research at MIT or other top-tier graduate programs. Sign up to be a faculty mentor, or learn more on the MSRP website.

Highlights

A launchpad for entrepreneurship in aerospace | With the aerospace industry at an inflection point, the Certificate in Aerospace Innovation Program is giving students the tools and confidence they need to turn their ideas into successful investments.

Chloé Gentgen was featured in Le Monde des Grandes Ecoles et Universités’ special issue on CentraleSupélec, her alma mater in France, to talk about her research experience at MIT.

NASA announced a new strategy review team for its Mars Sample Return Program, led by MIT Prof. Maria Zuber. AeroAstro Professor of the Practice Eric Evans will also serve on the team.

Prof. Andreea Bobu has launched the Collaborative Learning and Autonomy Research Lab (CLEAR Lab), focused on developing autonomous agents that learn to perform tasks for, with, and around people, aligning AI behavior with human expectations across a range of users.

This year’s MIT ARCLab Prize for AI Innovation in Space challenges participants to harness the power of AI to help satellites weather cosmic storms by improving space weather forecasting. Registration for the competition opens on December 16.

The 2024 MIT Portugal Ideas to Impact conference featured a significant presence from AeroAstro, with faculty and alumni contributing to discussions on aerospace and sustainability initiatives.

Amelia Gagnon introduced the MIT Wind Ensemble’s “We The Seven” piece at MIT’s annual Family Weekend concert. The piece is inspired by the experiences of the seven astronauts recruited for Project Mercury, the first human spaceflight program in the United States.

Seven students from three historically black colleges and universities visited campus for the AeroAstro HBCU Partnership Program. The students toured labs and connected with current students to explore graduate studies at MIT.

Members of the Aerospace Plasma Group attended the standards committee meeting for wind turbine lightning protection, organized by the International Electrotechnical Commission. Prior to the meeting, members of the committee visited MIT and enjoyed a department tour, including a visit to the Wright Brothers Wind Tunnel.

A new book from alum Whitney Lohmeyer and co-authors called Satellite Orbits & Communications is making the field of satellite engineering and communications tech accessible to all ages and enjoyable for all backgrounds.

Olivia Alabi attended the 2024 AFROTECH conference, sponsored by AeroAstro and the National Society of Black Engineers. She enjoyed the opportunity to network, learn about the industry, and explore NASA’s Johnson Space Center.

CommLab

The AeroAstro Comm Lab provides 1-1 peer coaching sessions for all forms of technical communication. Make an appointment today to improve the effectiveness of your next paper, poster, presentation and more!

Check out our new digital resources:

Upcoming Workshops:

Master’s Thesis Workshop

Tuesday, 1/28, 12-1:30pm

RSVP Here

Research

New AI tool generates realistic satellite images of future flooding | MIT scientists have developed a method that generates satellite imagery from the future to depict how a region would look after a potential flooding event.

APG

Mapping of the performance envelope and energy pathways of plasma-assisted ignition across combustion environments | A methodology for conducting insightful numerical simulations of thermo-chemical interactions between combustion and plasma by tracking the energy deposition pathways to better understand the process.

CTG

Revealing causal links in complex systems | A team of engineers have developed a method that can be applied to a wide range of situations to identify those variables that likely influence other variables in a complex system.

SSL

Visibility metric for planning SAR observations in challenging terrain | PhD student Evan Kramer and Prof. David Miller introduce a systematic and general method for identifying observation geometries that optimize visibility for any region of interest, regardless of its shape or location.

In the Media

Eco-Roundup: How Activists Used a New NASA-Funded Toxic Prisons Map to Respond to Helene | Alleen Brown reports on Ufuoma Ovienmhada’s interactive map of environmental hazards impacting prisons and how the technology is being used to support people in prisons during the hurricanes this fall.

In an interview with Physics Today, postdoctoral fellow Stewart Isaacs discussed his research and work supporting communities in need, his commitment to addressing climate change, and where his passion for jump rope fits into it all.

Sheila Widnall: Conversations with Engineering Pioneers | National Academy of Engineering | A video interview with aerospace engineering pioneer Sheila Widnall, known for her contributions to fluid dynamics and pioneering public service work and for championing the role of women in engineering.

Do you have highlights to include in future editions of the

Monthly Roundup?

Send them to aa-communications@mit.edu.