The astrophysics team is looking for a dead star.
On August 21st, the NASA-funded team will launch its " Micro-X" rocket. A quick image of a remnant of a star that exploded 11,000 light-years away from Earth will be taken by the rocket after fifteen minutes in space. The rocket will land in the desert about 45 miles from the launchpad, where it will be recovered.
The Micro-X rocket will carry a superconductor-based X-ray imager that is capable of measuring the energy of each incoming X-ray from the sky with unprecedented accuracy.
The supernova remnant is so hot that most of the light it emits is not seen. Our atmosphere absorbs X-rays so we have to use X-ray images. We need to go into space to understand that. If you jumped into the air, snapped a photo and then landed back down, it's like that.
A professor in the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences, Figueroa-Feliciano is also a member of the Center for Interdisciplinary Exploration and Research in Astrophysics. A group of graduate students, fellows and post-baccalaureate researchers spent the past 10 years building and testing a rocket.
Although Micro-X will be launched from New Mexico, the team built the rocket in a lab on the campus. Even though the detectors are super-conducting, they can't be kept at extremely cold temperatures. The team solved the issue by putting a thermos filled with liquid helium on the rocket skin.
It is a challenge to build the Micro-X rocket. It needs to be completely hands off once it launches. It has to send data back to us on its own. Students can learn how to build and test technology.
The team is putting the rocket together in New Mexico. The team can be followed on social media.
The team tested the rocket at NASA's Wallops Flight Facility and launched it for the first time. During the first flight of the rocket, the researchers showed off their detectors, which were used in space.
Figueroa-Feliciano wants to learn more about life on Earth and inside our bodies.
He said that they are all made of star stuff. Stars make the elements in our bodies. ejecta is shot into space when stars explode The sun, the 14 closest stars to the sun, and the supernova remnant are all in the same place. The debris from these events travels through the universe to make planets.
The University of Wisconsin at Madison is one of the collaborating institutions.
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