For Release: Sept. 17, 1997

Jerry Berg
Media Services Branch
(256) 544-0034
jerry.berg@msfc.nasa.gov

Release: 97-237

Two microgravity research payloads were successfully launched aboard Black Brant XII sounding rockets Friday, completing one investigation and continuing another sponsored by the Microgravity Research Program at Marshall Center.

The Friday flights, launched within 30 minutes of each other at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico, are a continuation of the first series of sounding-rocket-based, microgravity-combustion research ever accomplished.

Aboard the two rockets launched Friday were investigations known as the Spread Across Liquids experiment and the Diffusive and Radiative Transport in Fires experiment, managed by the Lewis Research Center in Cleveland, Ohio. Both were successfully recovered after their up-and-down parabolic flights of less than 30 minutes, to altitudes between 30 and 100 miles above the Earth.

These flights provided just over five minutes of near weightlessness in which the microgravity experiments could perform. In the coming weeks, further hardware and scientific analysis will be conducted on the video and data files from the rockets’ parachute-recovered payloads.

"The success of the two launches confirms our plans to fly more microgravity science experiments aboard suborbital rockets," explained Microgavity Research Program manager Joel Kearns of Marshall Center. "In the future, we'll take more advantage of these vehicles and include flights of experiments such as biotechnology and materials science experiments that are managed here at Marshall, as well as fundamental physics experiments designed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory."

This was the fourth and final flight of the Diffusive and Radiative Fire experiment. Its objective is to increase the fundamental understanding of the mechanisms that cause flames to burn over solid fuels in a reduced-gravity environment. The experiment may lead to improved fire safety in space and on Earth.

The principal investigator for the experiment is Dr. R.A. Altenkirch, dean of engineering and architecture at Washington State University in Pullman, Wash.

The Spread Across Liquids experiment studies the burning of liquid fuels in microgravity. Investigators are excited over the preliminary flight results because they were able to observe a vortex forming in the gas phase of the fuel, a phenomenon which to this point had only been theorized. The understanding of the liquid fuel burning experiment may also lead to improved fire safety in space and on Earth. This was the experiment’s fourth flight. An additional four flights are planned over the next four years.

The principal investigator for the liquid gas experiment is Dr. Howard Ross of the NASA Lewis Research Center.

Sounding rockets are of relatively low cost and a payload can be developed in as quickly as six months. These rockets provide a reasonably economical means of conducting both scientific studies and engineering tests of instruments and devices used on satellites and other spacecraft prior to their use in more expensive activities. Because of their low cost and short mission lead time, the rockets have proven to be valuable tools for students conducting graduate work in scientific fields.

Many of the rocket motors used in the program are surplus military motors, which helps to keep research costs down. NASA uses 14 different sounding rockets in a variety of sizes -- from the single-stage Super Arcas which stands 7 feet high, to the four-stage, 65-foot-tall Black Brant XII.

Sounding rockets take their name from the nautical term "to sound," which means to take measurements. NASA launches an average of 30 sounding rockets each year with a success rate of about 98 percent.

Sounding rockets are launched routinely from established sites such as White Sands Missile Range; Wallops Island in Virginia; and Poker Flat Research Range, Alaska, as well as sites in Canada, Norway and Sweden.

They can also be launched from temporary launch ranges. Launch programs have been conducted from Peru, Puerto Rico, Greenland, Australia, and even from an aircraft carrier in the Pacific Ocean.

The Marshall Center is NASA’s lead center for the Microgravity Research Program and manages: combustion science and fluid physics research through the Lewis Research Center; fundamental physics projects through the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.; and biotechnology and material science experiments through Marshall, including cell tissue research at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas.