Abstract:
Many years before we sent the first spacecraft to other planets, I was observing and reading all the books I could find about the mysterious red planet. At the same time, I enjoyed all of the classic science fiction movies where space travelers landed on other strange planets that, oddly, always had the appearance of the Southwestern desert. I wondered about the strange landscapes and rocks of those planets. Then we started seeing that Mars was remarkably similar to the dry deserts of Earth – in fact, very similar to New Mexico. Thus was born a dual interest in other planets and in geology here on Earth; and that led me to follow a path that eventually ended up as a scientist on many Mars and Venus missions. As a student, I was able to work on the very first orbiter images of Mars from the Viking mission; and as a planetary geologist and mission scientist, I have been able to work on rovers exploring the surface of the planet. With the rovers Spirit and Opportunity we “went to work on Mars” every day. And with another orbiter we began see images of Mars that were so detailed they looked like aerial photos. Now, as a scientist on the Perseverance rover mission, I am able to do Earth-style “field geology” on Mars every day; and we are learning about the geologic evolution of one of our nearest neighbors in space – and perhaps something about our own planet too. This presentation will take a look at that long road and some of the latest results from the Perseverance rover and Ingenuity, the first Mars helicopter, as they explore the rocks and landscape of an ancient lake on Mars.

Speaker Bio:
Larry S. Crumpler, Ph.D. is Research Curator of Volcanology and Space Sciences at the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science. He received his doctorate from the University of Arizona in Planetary Sciences and MS from the University of New Mexico in Geology. Prior to the Museum, he worked as a research scientist at Brown University.

His research includes the geology of the inner planets of our solar system, with particular emphasis on Mars, and studies of New Mexico volcanism with an emphasis on lava flows.

Currently, he is a member of the Perseverance Rover Mission science team, and was a member of the development team for the Ingenuity helicopter. Previously, he was a science team member on the Mars Exploration Rover (Spirit & Opportunity) mission, Mars Odyssey Gamma Ray Spectrometer, and the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter High-Resolution Camera (HiRISE). On the Mars Exploration Rover mission, he served as “Long-term Planning Lead” and downlinked information from the rovers on a daily basis from his office at the Museum. On the Perseverance Mission he is responsible for geologic context mapping of the terrain traversed by the rover.

He began his work with Mars as a student intern with NASA’s Viking Mission and later worked with the Pathfinder Mars mission, Magellan radar mission to Venus, and planning for the Russian Mars 96 mission. He has participated in Mars landing site selection for all of the landed science missions to date, and in many Mars rover field tests. He has published many professional papers, book chapters, and geologic maps; and has just completed a book about Mars and his personal journey as a Mars scientist, entitled “Missions to Mars,” that will be published by Harper-Collins in late 2021. He is a Fellow of the Geological Society of America.

Abstract:
Do you want to learn how to bridge the gap between academic research and industry implementation? Join us on Tuesday November 9 from 10-12am to learn from UNM Center for Water and the Environment researchers on how to use techno-economic assessment to identify economic feasibility and sustainability of a new technology to guide future research and development.

Speaker Bio:
Dr. Anjali Mulchandani is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Civil, Construction, and Environmental Engineering at the University of New Mexico. She leads the Water and Environmental Resource Sustainability group. Her research converges environmental engineering with materials science, nanotechnology and data analytics to design and predict feasibility of novel water treatment and resource recovery technologies. Her passions include designing hands-on learning tools and leading public outreach initiatives for STEM awareness and engagement among all levels of learners.

Abstract: New space, the influence of the private sector into all space-related efforts, and NASA’s Artemis program are making possible the realization of crewed long-term duration missions. New Mexico faculty are contributing toward this effort and the New Mexico Space Grant Consortium (NMSGC) and New Mexico NASA EPSCoR are supporting their research. Our panel, representing the three research universities in the state, will present their research, their motivations to study out of this world concepts, and how students gain experience into the new space. Our panelists are responding to the needs of a not-too-distant future where habitats on the Moon and Mars will one day materialize. Our panel will discuss some of the aspects of their research for making the dream of humans to travel and thrive in outer space safe and feasible. Everything begins with an idea; this panel will share some their wildest ideas and entertain the wildest questions.

Paulo Oemig is the Director of the New Mexico Space Grant Consortium (NMSGC) and the New Mexico NASA EPSCoR program. Paulo is an Assistant Professor in the College of Health, Education and Social Transformation at New Mexico State University. He teaches courses in research methods, bilingual education and methods of teaching science. His research areas are integration of STEM education and the development of science-literate identities, particularly among underrepresented and underserved students. Paulo completed an Albert Einstein Distinguished Educator Fellowship with NASA, has five years of experience as a chemist and ten years of experience as a STEM educator. Paulo Oemig holds a bachelor’s degree in chemistry, master’s degree in anthropology and a Ph.D. in science and bilingual education. Dr. Oemig is a member of the Math and Science Advisory Council of the New Mexico Public Education Department.

Sally Seidel received her Ph.D. in experimental particle physics from the University of Michigan in 1987 for a search for nucleon decay using the IMB water Cherenkov detector. As a research scientist with the University of Toronto on the ARGUS Experiment from 1987-1991, she participated in the construction of a drift chamber optimized for B physics and published a study of charmed baryon decay. Sally joined the University of New Mexico faculty in 1991. As a member of the CDF experiment, she co-led the upgrade tracker sensor design team and carried out a study of multi-jet final states. She then co-led the ATLAS Run-1 pixel sensor group. On ATLAS her analysis team focuses on signatures of new physics in rare decays of B mesons. Her past ATLAS analysis work included discovery of the excited heavy meson Bc(2S). The Seidel group is also developing radiation-hard technologies for particle sensing and tracking in extra-terrestrial conditions and at future particle colliders. She has served on the DOE High Energy Physics Advisory Panel, the Fermilab Users Executive Committee, and the Fermi Research Alliance Board of Directors and has held the positions of Secretary-Treasurer of the American Physical Society (APS) Topical Group on Hadronic Physics and Member-at-large of the Executive Committee of the APS Division of Particles and Fields (DPF). She is Past Chair of the APS Four Corners Section. She has served as chair of the DPF Instrumentation Award Committee. Seidel has held fellowships from the Fulbright Foundation, the Vietnam Education Foundation, the Royal Institute of Technology (Stockholm), the University of Canterbury Erskine Programme, and the European Union, as well as a Sigma Xi Distinguished Lectureship. She has served as a National Advisor to the DPF Instrumentation Task Force and is the recipient of awards from the NSF Major Research Instrumentation and Career Advancement programs as well as the DOE Advanced Detector Research program. She currently serves as Chief Editor of Advances in High Energy Physics and as Editor-in-Chief of Open Physics. Sally joined the LANSCE (Los Alamos National Laboratory) Users Executive Committee in 2018.

Dr. Marlena R. Fraune is a Psychology Professor at New Mexico State University. She leads the Intergroup Human-Robot Interaction Lab. She received her B.A. in Psychology at Beloit College in 2013 and her PhD at Indiana University in 2018. Dr. Fraune studies how to make human-robot more efficient and enjoyable by examining group interaction. She performs research in Japan, Portugal, and Germany, and she collaborates with the US Air Force, Toyota Research Institute, and the New Mexico Space Grant Consortium. In her spare time, Dr. Fraune enjoys ballroom dancing, hiking, reading, and playing board games.

Dr. Andrei Zagrai is a Professor at New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology. His research interests encompass intelligent, adaptive structures, structural health monitoring (SHM) and vibrations. Dr. Zagrai’s current research is concentrated on structural health monitoring and diagnosis of space systems. His team has conducted first demonstrations of active SHM during a stratospheric flight and a suborbital spaceflight. This work has culminated in launching an experiment to International Space Station. Dr. Zagrai has published more than seventy technical papers and has received a number of national and international awards including the Achenbach medal for contribution in the field of SHM. Andrei is an active member of ASME NDPD division and serves as an associate editor of ASME Journal of Nondestructive Evaluation, Diagnostics and Prognostics of Engineering Systems.

Dr. Fernando Moreu is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Civil, Construction, and Environmental Engineering (CCEE) at UNM. He holds courtesy appointments in the Departments of ECE, Mechanical Engineering, and Computer Science. He is the founder and director of the Smart Management of Infrastructure Laboratory (SMILab). SMILab’s research interests include structural dynamics and control, structural health monitoring, wireless smart sensor networks, cyber-physical systems, computer vision, earthquake engineering, augmented reality, unmanned aerial systems, bridge engineering, and aerospace structures monitoring and reusability. He has published 73 journal papers and conference proceedings. Prof. Moreu received his MS and PhD degrees in structural engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (2005 and 2015, respectively). Prof. Moreu received the CCEE Stamm Teacher of the Year award and Research of the Year award, in 2019 and 2021, respectively. Prof. Moreu’s projects are funded by NSF, DOE, DOD, NAS, USDOT, NASA, TRB, and the commercial sector. He is a Member of ASCE, ASME, SPIE, and AREMA. Prof. Moreu’s students have received the NMSGC scholarship in 2019 and 2021, respectively; Air Force Research Scholar of the year in 2019 and 2021, respectively; and 2nd place in ASCE EMI SCHM student paper competition in 2020.

Dr. Elba Serrano is a Regents Professor of Biology at New Mexico State University. Serrano’s research focuses on the sensory systems for hearing and balance, neurogenetics, and glial neurobiology. Her laboratory’s NASA related investigations explore the impact of altered gravity environments on cell growth and gene expression. An advocate for interdisciplinary research and education, Serrano is an elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the recipient of a Presidential Award for Excellence in Science, Mathematics and Engineering Mentoring (PAESMEM). Elba serves as NMSU lead PI for the NSF HSI National STEM Resource Hub, a capacity-building and faculty development initiative that aspires to increase STEM student success at over 550 Hispanic Serving Institutions across the United States. Serrano is a first-generation-to-college researcher and educator who received a Ph.D. in biological sciences from Stanford University with an emphasis in neuroscience and biophysics, and an undergraduate degree in physics with a chemistry minor from the University of Rochester.

Dr. Paul Fuierer is Professor of Materials & Metallurgical Engineering at NMT. He teaches courses at all college levels, introductory through graduate, with specialty areas including ceramic engineering, solid state physics, crystal chemistry, and electronic and other functional (magnetic, optical) materials. Paul’s primary research involves the novel processing of functional ceramics in bulk or film form, in particular processes which invoke texture, grain orientation and anisotropy. Recently, his focus has been Dry Aerosol Deposition (DAD), a unique spray process for creating fully dense, nano-crystalline ceramic films and coatings. Application areas include sensing, energy conversion, and erosion and thermal protection (for example space materials and structures). Fuierer is an Eastman Kodak Fellow, NSF early CAREER and Materials World Network awardee, and DFG (German Research Agency) Mercator Fellow (as Guest Research Professor at the University of Bayreuth). He has a B.S. degree in Ceramic Engineering from Alfred University, and Ph.D. in Solid State Science from the Pennsylvania State University. He also has three years of experience in the industrial manufacturing sector.

Dr. Douglas Cortes is the Harold Foreman Endowed Professor for Excellence in Civil Engineering at New Mexico State University. He received his BS, MS, and PhD degrees from the Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA, USA. He is the secretary of the ASCE Sustainability in Geotechnical Engineering Committee, the Principal Investigator for NMSU’s new NASA M-STAR grant, a senior investigator at the Center for Bio-mediated and Bio-inspired Geotechnics and the POC for New Mexico State University at the Lunar Surface Innovation Consortium. Doug’s research interests include bio-inspired geotechnics, ground improvement, wireless underground sensor networks, and planetary landed exploration, construction and mining.