School Students Seek to Improve the Psychological Climate in Orbit

For the second consecutive year, organizers of Sputnik All-Russian competition for Young Research Engineers with international participation offer schoolchildren an opportunity to present an experiment that could be conducted by astronauts during their mission to the International Space Station. This became possible after creation of the Centre for Experiments in Space at Samara National Research University in 2021.

This year, 15 projects in the finals of “School Experiments in Space” track were proposed by 7th to 11th grade students from different parts of the country. The contestants not only presented the idea of the experiment, but also conducted research of its uniqueness, offered their ideas for implementation on board the space station, and thereby carefully studied the physical laws that act in zero gravity, as well as the requirements for safety of manned flights. Eventually, the jury of experts was also offered projects to create equipment for experiments.

“The contest gives senior school students an opportunity to try themselves at fairly non-trivial things, because any space experiment involves interdisciplinarity,” said Andrey Kramlich, director of the Centre for Experiments in Space at Samara National Research University, one of the organizers of the “School Experiments in Space” contest. “Many topics are devoted to growing various plants at ISS. There are topics related to manned astronautics — schoolchildren suggest studying the behavior of astronauts, tracking the bodily reaction to weightlessness — not all aspects have been studied yet. A number of experiments are aimed at making the orbital stay of astronauts more comfortable in an inherently uncomfortable environment. Most of the experiments involve biology. And this is logical: if we want to fly to distant planets and colonize space, it is necessary to test ideas in orbit.”

How to study the effect of weightlessness on the immunity of an astronaut, on the coordination of fine motor skills? Is it possible to fry eggs in space? And how to deliver eggs aboard the station without breaking them on the way? How do you paint in weightlessness? Is it possible to grow living tissue on moss substrate? The answers to these and other questions are the result of curiosity, the ability to wonder, to look for inconsistencies in seemingly familiar patterns.

“Is it possible to fry eggs on a space station?” wonders a 10th grader from the Gagarin Lyceum in Shchelkovo Darya Kutnik. This question resulted in a rather elaborate project that involved not only a demonstration of knowledge of physics, but also the application of engineering ingenuity: it was necessary to get the eggs into orbit without damaging them during the overloads experienced by the taking-off rocket. And then, one had to come up with a frying pan. So how do you eat real eggs where there is no open flame, and the yolk can soar into the air and float over the cook under the influence of air flows? Quite easily, as it turns out. The “Frying pan” — the temperature control unit “Glazunya” (“Sunny Side Up”) should be placed on the porthole of the station, facing the Earth: the Sun’s light reflected from the planet’s atmosphere will heat the egg to the desired temperature (up to 100 degrees Celsius, in fact)! Darya also took care of the delivery of the fragile product — she came up with a special container, a way to fry, and a way to clean the egg.

This is not the first time Darya has participated in such competitions. Last year, she designed a model of a Mars rover in a contest by Roscosmos. She was very excited to hear about the “School Experiments in Space” track as part of the Sputnik contest: “You grow fond of a subject, and at some point a question comes up that you want to answer. That’s what happened with the experiment of frying eggs on ISS window.”

Authors of the project to print chocolate on a 3D printer in ISS conditions — 7th grader from Orsk Maria Seliverstova and 8th grader from Petrozavodsk Yulia Karavaeva — met offline for the first time only in Samara, at the final of the contest. “We met on VK and decided to do the project together,” the girls said. Their project is aimed at reducing stress in astronauts. Stress is accompanied by a surge of adrenaline, and glucose can offset this hormone. Glucose is found in the chocolate, and you can use a 3D printer to print a fancy form instead of just a usual bar; such non-trivial activities also reduce stress. The girls showed the jury a model of a 3D printer. “We factored in the thickness and stickiness of the chocolate paste necessary for the printer to print a shape in weightlessness conditions. We put the printer in a cube so the chocolate drops don’t fly around,” said Maria Seliverstova. “We will consult confectioners for recipes of chocolate mass, so that it is not only tasty, but also healthy,” added Yulia.

Veronika Chepygova studies in the 8th grade at the Shampkinskaya village school in the Muchkapsky district of the Tambov region. The girl is passionate about painting and wants to give astronauts the opportunity to sketch what they see on the station, not with pencils, as they do now, but with real paints. “My project is to paint with liquid paints — oil, watercolors. It is also about creating such conditions that these drops do not fly around. The idea is to place this drop at the intersection of two sound waves. When I had the idea, I shared it with my brother, and he helped me prove that it really could be done. So sound wave generators need to be installed in the right places,” she added. Notably, one of the most famous astronaut painters was an honorary doctor of Samara University Alexei Leonov.

Veronika said she was not afraid of the defence: “I was wondering what the experts would say”. Subject matter experts of the university indeed listened to the schoolchildren very attentively — the first vice-rector — vice-rector for research work Andrey Prokofiev, associate professor of General and Theoretical Physics Department and Head of Scientific Staff Training Department Mark Shleenkov, associate professor of Laser and Biotechnical Systems Department Vadim Konyukhov, assistant professor of Human and Animal Physiology Department, acting executive director of biological faculty Irina Romanova. The jury also included Denis Prudnik, lecturer of the Russian Znanie Society, participant in the selection for cosmonaut corps, and Ilya Ovchinnikov, Head of the Development Department of the Education of the Future company, spacecraft specialist.

As a result of the defense, the experts selected four projects to be prepared for implementation at the International Space Station. 2023 winners are Sofya Shabanova from Samara with her project “Technology for Space Exploration: Testing of Solar Panels on Earth and in Space”, Alexandra Borisova with her project “Immunitas. Influence of Weightlessness on Immunity Functioning”, Yuliana Zhulitova and Stas Sergeenkov with their project “Man in Space: Flexible Electrodes for Astronaut Medical Monitoring Systems” and Lubov Krupinkina with her project “Preventive Application of Microgreens in Space Food (Growing Microgreens in Space)”.

The next stage is preparation of an application according to the requirements of ROSCOSMOS State Corporation.

For reference:

Sputnik All-Russian contest of young research engineers with international participation for students of 7–11 grades of schools in Russia and abroad, organized by Samara National Research University, is being held in the academic year 2022/2023 for the seventh time. It is part of the agglomeration of space competitions “Planet Watch” by the Foundation for the Promotion of Innovation.

Photo: Olga Zharkova