![]() ![]() “But after serving my time this summer there and learning about all these projects and plasma fission and building these bioreactors, it really did broaden the spectrum of things that I thought I'd maybe be interested in doing.” I didn't want anything to do with chemistry,” he said. “I worked in the applied chemistry lab in the Neil Armstrong building at Kennedy Space Center and before I went there, I hated chemistry. However, his experiences this summer have changed his outlook. Broadening PerspectivesĪs an Aerospace Engineering major, sustainability and chemistry weren’t necessarily on Connor’s radar, the latter being far from his favorite subject. “And of course, we had a mentor in the lab with us, but it was me and two other interns who were running the tube furnace, and that was kind of an important part because it was a regulator for the system.”įortunately, the interns were not reprimanded and the incident was a learning moment for the research team to change the procedure in future experimentation. “In the middle of one of the experiments, we were performing combustion process within the tube furnace and the material we had in there was dried, so in one second, it jumped from 22 PSI to 50 PSI and cracked our defender,” he said. Breaking NASA PropertyĬonnor shared a story of an instance where he and other interns accidentally broke something while conducting an experiment. Other activities included viewing other interns’ projects on the site, visiting the cryo lab and dipping objects in liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen, seeing plant research and visiting the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB), where engineers are preparing to build the next Artemis rocket. Yes, we were there to perform a job and to fulfill our internship, but our mentors were also focused on getting us out and doing stuff while we had access to the NASA site.” We got to go see some Blue Origin launching facilities, meet some of the SpaceX crew. ![]() “We went out to the launchpad where they launched the shuttle missions and Apollo missions. “They were leaving the clean room for the Orion capsule, and I got to talk with Christina Koch and Victor Glover,” he said. Connor and other interns were lucky enough to catch up with the Artemis II crew members after they visited the Neil Armstrong Operations and Checkout Building to see the Orion spacecraft, in which they will orbit the moon in 2024. One of his favorite parts of interning at NASA? Meeting astronauts on the job. NASA astronaut Christina Koch with Connor Arnold on the NASA site. These projects included analyzing wattage and amperage of composters for use on spacecraft, analyzing off-gassing using gas and plasma chromatography, analyzing materials from composters and a tube furnace for nutrient content and researching and testing replacements for transit materials used on the International Space Station (ISS) to reduce environmental impact-plus a few details he can’t talk about. “I had four different projects, which all centered around recovery of resources and then putting that towards closing the loop in spaceflight habitation,” he explained. Resource Recoveryįor 10 weeks, Connor worked on resource recovery and recycling technology development for human space exploration for NASA. Up against thousands of other students from across the country, Connor was one of 50 selected to intern with NASA at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. This past summer, Connor Arnold (’25) was lucky enough to have that dream come true. It’s a dream for any Aerospace Engineering student to have a chance to work with NASA. ![]()
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