Focus on Alumni

Octocopter Set to Explore Titan, Saturn's Very Cool Moon

NASA is on a mission to explore Titan — the largest moon of Saturn. To do that, scientists are building a nuclear-powered, self-driving drone (technically an octocopter) called Dragonfly. Scheduled to launch in 2026 and arrive on Titan in 2034, Dragonfly could provide clues about how the building blocks of life started here on Earth.

Martian Ice Revealed: Dr. Ali Bramson

Dr. Ali Bramson, a planetary scientist with expertise in spacecraft remote sensing of ice on other worlds, discusses how to find ice on Mars.

Alumna Explores Existence of New Planet with Wittenberg Series’ Speaker

Wittenberg graduate Kathryn Volk is boldly going where few others have gone before – to the Kuiper Belt along the far edges of the solar system in hopes of proving the existence of a few more planets.

The Dusty Plains of Arcadia Planitia (podcast)

SpaceX has been requesting HiRISE images from an area called Arcadia Planitia as potential landing sites for their Starship vehicle. Dr Ali Bramson, a planetary scientist at the University of Arizona’s Lunar and Planetary Lab and expert on the region, joins Jake to talk about what’s going on there and why SpaceX might be interested.

Meet The Nuclear-Powered Self-Driving Drone NASA Is Sending To A Moon Of Saturn

On the face of it, NASA's newest probe sounds incredible. Known as Dragonfly, it is a dual-rotor quadcopter (technically an octocopter, even more technically an X8 octocopter); it's roughly the size of a compact car; it's completely autonomous; it's nuclear powered; and it will hover above the surface of Saturn's moon Titan.

Scientist Uses HPHT Presses to Study Planet Formation

To gemologists, the high-pressure, high-temperature (HPHT) press speaks of synthetic diamond growth or newfangled methods of diamond color treatment.

For Valerie Hillgren, a research scientist at the Carnegie Institution of Washington’s Geophysical Laboratory, the presses that create these conditions are a means to another end: studying how the terrestrial planets of our solar system might have formed.