SE Valley Times

Sixteen students from Arizona State University (ASU) are participating in the 2024 Breakthrough, Innovative and Game-changing (BIG) Idea Challenge. This NASA-sponsored competition invites students to design, build, and test projects for real-life NASA missions, offering them a chance to advance their aerospace careers.

Tyler Smith, senior director of ASU’s Luminosity Lab, highlighted the significance of this opportunity: “It's an amazing experience for the students who participate. They have the opportunity to work on a real project to advance the technology-readiness level of a concept and further NASA's mission to return to the moon.”

Participants were tasked with creating an inflatable system to address lunar challenges. The ASU team was among six finalists awarded up to $150,000 for their proposal: The AEGIS — Inflatable Lunar Landing Pad System. This system aims to enable rockets to land safely on the moon.

The final student teams will present their prototypes at a forum in Las Vegas on November 11-12. “This is NASA's largest student-funded grant competition, so it's very competitive and prestigious,” said Smith. He expressed optimism about ASU's chances of winning again this year.

Janice Miller from the National Institute of Aerospace explained that the top honor, the NASA Artemis Award, goes to concepts with potential integration into future Artemis missions.

The ASU team has been testing components at ASU’s Interplanetary Initiative Lab. Connor Owens, a second-year mechanical engineering student involved in designing and building the inflatable system, noted ongoing challenges: “There is still a lot of work to do.”

Elizabeth Arnold, who participated in a previous challenge and now advises the team, discussed some hurdles: “By making a landing pad that has a rim at a certain angle, we can redirect all of the thrust.” She also mentioned handling high temperatures during landings as another significant challenge.

Students from various disciplines contributed to this project. Tokiya Aono, studying fashion design at Herberger Institute for Design and Arts shared his unique experience: “As a fashion student... being part of this project is bizarre but exciting.”

Grant Lesley leads this challenging project: “There is a lot of energy going into this project... we have to make all necessary assumptions.” He added that working with NASA has opened many opportunities.

Miller emphasized how such competitions often lead participants towards internships or jobs due to exposure through BIG Idea Challenge events. Kevin Kempton from NASA’s Game Changing Development program noted that insights gained from these projects help decide feasible technologies for development.

Jim Bell from ASU’s School of Earth and Space Exploration praised his students' involvement in such initiatives: "Working as a team on this kind of NASA engineering challenge activity represents an amazing opportunity."