Student Highlight: Moon Bears to Space
The human race has always wanted to learn more about what we have yet to understand. Luckily, space provides us with these opportunities. NASA (the National Aeronautics and Space Association) was founded in 1958 and since then we’ve learned of other planets and galaxies that exist in the universe. We’ve gone to the moon and even sent humans to space. The next step? Bringing life to the Moon. What kind of life? Well, tardigrades.
Tardigrades (also called moon bears) are very small creates; the largest recorded tardigrade has only grown to be one millimeter in length. They have plump, scrunched up bodies with eight legs that they use to move around. If you image the caterpillar from Disney’s interpretation of Alice in Wonderland, age him a decade or so and add a snout you’ll get the gist of what they look like.
While bringing these creatures to an astronomical body other than Earth seems a daunting task, a few students at our school are helping make this a reality. A group of four freshman students started the project last year, working to build the foundations and set the future of the project up for success. Now sophomores, the group has expanded to seven members who are beginning the process to bring life to the Moon. Christina N., Drew H., Remy H., Mark M., Jayme S., Holger K., and Justin S. call the project Moon Bears to Space and are working on the task as their expeditions internship.
“Basically, our internship is a combination of engineering, science, and a lot of business,” Christina let me know. Early last year when looking for internship opportunities, she reached out to scientist Sean Casey of Silicon Valley Space Center who brought up the idea of the project. Dr. Casey is the co-founder of SVSC and an experienced airborne astronomer. To learn more about SVSC and Dr. Casey, visit svsc.org.
Christina soon reached out to several other members of the Denali community of whom she thought might be interested and the project began. Now the group is working to create the habitat for their tardigrades in hopes of getting them on a zero-gravity test flight with Blue Origin, an aerospace manufacturer located in Washington state. After that, the group hopes to get their tardigrade habitat onto the International Space Station and eventually to the Moon. The required timeline and the fact that they are working with living beings means that the group can’t only work on the project during expeditions. They meet throughout the school year to work on the different aspects of the project that isn't “We’re going to send life to space. That’s pretty cool,” Justin told me when I asked what the group was excited about.
The group agrees that the most daunting task is raising the funds needed to get their work to the Moon. “I think what’s gonna be hard is gathering the money for it. I mean, you can always make something but sending something to space is so expensive.” The group will have to raise at least a million dollars to finish their four-year plan.
“It’s a challenge,” the group agreed when asked about the task ahead. “But we all take on different tasks and help each other out along the way.” Holger was happy to include that the snacks make the work environment a lot better.
Moon Bears to Space is looking for new members who are interested in joining their project, especially freshmen and middle schoolers. Dedication is the most important factor. “We need them to be able to work with us during expeditions and the school year to maintain the project,” Christina let me know. To learn more about how you can join this project, email Christina N. at cnguyen.de@mysummitps.org.
