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Early Career Faculty 2024

Back to ECF Home Transformational Advanced Energetic Propulsion Power Systems to Enable Small System Operations in Permanently Shadowed Lunar Regions

Developing Oxychalcogenide Membranes for Superconducting Power Transmission

ECF 2024 Quadchart Yang.pdf Shuolong Yang University of Chicago This effort will leverage the latest developments in superconductors to build a power transmission cable that can operate in the extreme cold temperatures found on the Moon with very low electrical…

Power on the Dark Side: Stimulus-Responsive Adsorbents for Low-Energy Controlled Storage and Delivery of Low Boiling Fuels to Mobile Assets in Permanently Shaded Regions

ECF 2024 Quadchart McGuirk.pdf Christopher McGuirk Colorado School of Mines This project will investigate and develop improved storage methods for the fuels needed to generate electrical power in places where sunlight is not available. The effort will focus on particularly…

Piezoelectric-Based Power Conversion for Lunar Surface Systems

ECF 2024 Quadchart Boles.pdf Jessica Boles University of California, Berkeley This project will develop piezoelectric-based power conversion for small power systems on the lunar surface. These piezoelectric systems can potentially offer high power density to significantly reduce size, weight, and…

Lightweight Deployable Solar Reflectors

ECF 2024 Quadchart Arya.pdf Manan Arya Stanford University This grant will design and develop lightweight, low-cost modular solar reflectors that can be stowed for transport in a compact volume. These reflectors can potentially be used to reflect and concentrate sunlight…

Stabilized Z-Pinch Fusion Driven Electromagnetic Propulsion

ECF 2024 Quadchart Underwood.pdf Thomas Underwood University of Texas, Austin This project will demonstrate a fusion propulsion system based on z-pinch which is a method of compressing plasma by running electrical current though it. The z-pinch will compress and heat…

$Origami-inspired Diffractive Sail for Directed Energy Propulsion$

Origami-inspired Diffractive Sail for Directed Energy Propulsion

ECF 2024 Quadchart Oguri.pdf Kenshiro Oguri Purdue University This project will investigate one of the key fundamental challenges associated with directed-energy light-sailing technology, similar to solar sails but powered by a laser beam pointed at the sail instead of by…

Concept Demonstration of Directed Energy Propulsion with Metasurface Lightsails

ECF 2024 Quadchart Ilic.pdf Ognjen Ilic University of Minnesota This effort will aim to demonstrate the feasibility of directed-energy propulsion through a combination of computational simulations and prototype testing. The project will model the interactions between lightsail material and a…

Development of a MW-Scale High-Voltage Multiphase Dual-Rotor Generator and Rectifier for a PMAD in an NEP System

ECF 2024 Quadchart Beik.pdf Omid Beik Colorado School of Mines This project will design a power management and distribution (PMAD) system that can be coupled with a megawatt-scale nuclear power generation system for nuclear electric propulsion (NEP) that is suitable…

A Fond Farewell: NASA’s C-130 Begins New Mission in California

NASA’s C-130 Hercules, fondly known as the Herc, went wheels up at 9:45 a.m., Friday, April 18, as it departed from its decade-long home at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia, for the final time. The aircraft is embarking on…

Dust Storm Sweeps Through Iraq

A thick dust plume in the Middle East dimmed skies and sent thousands to the hospital in April 2025.

Hubble Spies Cosmic Pillar in Eagle Nebula

As part of ESA/Hubble’s 35th anniversary celebrations, the European Space Agency (ESA) is sharing a new image series revisiting stunning, previously released Hubble targets with the addition of the latest Hubble data and new processing techniques. New images of NGC 346…

3 min read

NASA Glenn to Test Air Quality Monitors Aboard Space Station

As NASA prepares to return to the Moon, studying astronaut health and safety is a top priority. Scientists monitor and analyze every part of the International Space Station crew’s daily life—down to the air they breathe. These studies are helping…

4 min read

Hubble Spots a Squid in the Whale

Today’s rather aquatic-themed NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image features the spiral galaxy Messier 77, also known as the Squid Galaxy, which sits 45 million light-years away in the constellation Cetus (The Whale). The designation Messier 77 comes from the galaxy’s…

Origins Uncertain: ‘Skull Hill’ Rock

Written by Margaret Deahn, Ph.D. Student at Purdue University Last week, NASA’s Mars 2020 rover continued its journey down lower ‘Witch Hazel Hill’ on the Jezero crater rim. The rover stopped along a boundary visible from orbit dividing light and…