AEDC White Oak students making a difference

  • Published
  • By Shawn Jacobs
  • AEDC/PA
ARNOLD AIR FORCE BASE, Tenn. --  The Hypervelocity Wind Tunnel 9 has enjoyed several successes this summer with the rollout of a new control room, validation of several advanced instrumentation techniques and a highly successful Scramjet test.

Perhaps the greatest success story of the summer at Arnold Engineering Development Center's White Oak, Md., facility is the dedication to technical nurturing of new employees.

The student program managed by John Lafferty and mentored by Joseph Norris continues to pay huge dividends in developing new capabilities and advancing the understanding of high speed physics, according to Dan Marren, director of AEDC White Oak. Students continue to find unique ways to distinguish themselves including earning advanced degrees, presenting journal-quality research at technical symposia and participating in challenging technique development for Tunnel 9.

"We have found a willing and extremely able partner in the University of Maryland in taking student activities to a whole new level," Marren said. "Students, AEDC employees and advising professors work as colleagues learning from each other and together creating something quite remarkable."

AEDC shares the White Oak campus with the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and opportunities to participate in technical and social activities abound. The FDA holds a student technical poster exhibit among its many sponsored students working at the Federal Research Center at White Oak. AEDC's students were welcome to attend and four University of Maryland students represented AEDC with outstanding technical posters representing their summer projects.

Gino Perrotta presented temperature sensitive paint data reduction based on his participation in this unique test technique. Robin Klomparens presented results from the design and calibration of a Mach 3 nozzle in the White Oak Student Lab and its importance to the operation of Hypervelocity Wind Tunnel 9. Brian Kwong presented the mechanical design and fabrication project he headed that supported the return-to-service test in Tunnel 9 making possible simultaneous measurements. Alex Bounitch presented results on pitot acoustic measurements in Tunnel 9, which for the first time gave clues to scaling parameters useful to predicting transition on actual flight vehicles based on Tunnel 9 data.

Besides his academic and professional successes, Perrotta competed in the FDA- sponsored 5K run on this spring, finishing with a time of 21:26. He was by far the fastest employee at Tunnel 9, second in his age group and in the top 10 finishers from more than 300 participants.

"In a real sense, our student population is encouraged to become part of AEDC in every way possible and it's that attitude that pays high dividends," Marren said.