2008 Annual Report - NASA Airborne Science Program
2008 Annual Report - NASA Airborne Science Program
2008 Annual Report - NASA Airborne Science Program
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<strong>Science</strong> Focus: Astromaterials<br />
Sponsor: M. Lindstrom, <strong>NASA</strong> HQ<br />
Location: North America, Europe<br />
Cosmic Dust<br />
Experiment<br />
The Cosmic Dust Laboratory<br />
at the Johnson Space Center<br />
(JSC) supports the collection<br />
and curation of stratospheric<br />
dust particles, principally to help<br />
scientists study cometary and asteroidal<br />
grains that enter the Earth’s atmosphere.<br />
Many tons of dust grains, including samples<br />
of asteroids and comets, fall from space onto<br />
the Earth’s atmosphere each day. Once<br />
in the stratosphere, this “cosmic dust” and<br />
spacecraft debris joins terrestrial particles<br />
such as volcanic ash, windborne desert dust,<br />
forest fire soot and pollen grains, which are<br />
also of special interest to scientists.<br />
In <strong>2008</strong>, the <strong>NASA</strong> ER-2 and WB-57F aircraft<br />
were again outfitted with special “sticky”<br />
collector plates to capture this dust as it fell<br />
through the stratosphere. A total of 133<br />
flight hours were performed during multiple<br />
dedicated and piggyback flights on the ER-2<br />
(see p. 63) and WB-57, flying primarily over<br />
North American sites. Dr. Michael Zolensky<br />
of <strong>NASA</strong> Johnson is the Principal Investigator<br />
for the Cosmic Dust Experiment.<br />
Examination of cosmic dust also reveals<br />
much about the population of interplanetary<br />
dust and orbital debris particles, critical<br />
information for engineers planning protection<br />
of Space Station against damage from highvelocity<br />
dust grains. As a result of <strong>NASA</strong>’s<br />
Stardust mission (which returned particles<br />
from Comet Wild 2), the demand for samples<br />
is at an all time high in the 27-year history<br />
of the Cosmic Dust <strong>Program</strong>. The terrestrial<br />
dust collected by the <strong>Program</strong> are revealing<br />
33