Students from across the nation were invited to travel to the NASA Johnson Space Center (JSC) to test informatics display prototypes they designed within an augmented reality (AR) environment to enhance task communication during spacewalks.
Student teams from RCC, Boise State University, Bradley University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, University of Akron, University of California, Davis, University of Colorado, Boulder, University of North Florida, University of Maryland, College Park, University of Miami, and University of North Dakota were selected to participate in the project. RCC was the only community college selected.
The students were tasked with advancing to the testing phase in NASA’s Spacesuit User Interface Technologies for Students - NASA SUITS. They’ve spent the last several months coding their AR-based prototypes and preparing for the test, which will take place in NASA’s Human Integrated Vehicles and Environments (HIVE), a facility used to develop and build human interfaces for human-in-the-loop testing.
The AR informatics displays designed for NASA SUITS address an authentic, current space exploration challenge. Upon successful testing, each of the proposed displays have the potential to aid in a future NASA spacewalk or exploration mission.
RCC’s team members were Eric Barrett, Hector Espinoza, Branden Hitt, Jorin Mejia, Jesse Lopez, Harley Vasquez, Angel Lim, Alfredo Arreola, Tandy Dang, Shane Hazelquist, Danny Valencia, Cory Chesebro.
NASA SUITS is managed by the Office of Education at JSC. The program helps support the agency's education policy of using NASA's unique missions and programs to engage and encourage students to pursue science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) careers.