Baen Tougher, Astro Physics and Astronomy, Week Two

This is the second week of my 6-week internship in Boulder Colorado, studying astrophysics. This second week has been a little slower than the first week. The people I have been working with have been trying to meet a deadline for the new Sprite Cube-Sat that they are working on, so a lot of time this week has been spent in meetings, because of this I have been able to learn a lot about the time and planning that goes into space missions.

This week Loudon and I finished making the stencil for epoxying the solar panels onto the Cube-Sat and will begin testing the glue next week. In the meantime, we were given a new project. We were tasked to model and lay out the flat-sat components and will assemble the flat-sat by the end of the month. The flat-sat must be done so that the coding team can test their code. The flat-sat for all intents and purposes, is the same as the actual cube-sat that will be launched into space next year. The flat-sat is made so that we can test communication with the actual cube-sat to make sure that everything is working. On Thursdays, the LASP team has a guest speaker that comes in and talks about a topic that they specialize in. Last Thursday we had someone come in and talk about asteroids. he talked about the research he has been doing and everything that has gone into his career path.

Outside of work I have been climbing at the CU Boulder recreational center and bouncing on the trampoline outside our house. Our roommates, who just graduated from college, have been talking to Loudon and me about college life and their experiences. Talking to them has been extremely eye-opening and made me very excited to start applying to colleges next year. When our roommates are not talking to us about life they are typically playing music. I have started playing guitar with them regularly and it has been a blast. This past week has been great and I can not believe that it has already been 2 weeks. this internship has been extremely eye-opening and I am excited for what is to come.