Over in the Department of Aeronautical Engineering at my alma mater, the University of Kansas, faculty and students are hard at work on an interesting project: the construction of the Meridian, an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) that will use ground-penetrating radar waves to measure the thickness and conditions of Antarctica’s ice sheets.
Given the harsh climate in which the vehicle will operate, the development of the Meridian poses a number of challenges, not the least of which are the needs to create anti-icing concepts to keep the aircraft aloft and temperature-control systems for shielding its electronic systems. In the meantime, the project is providing an ideal laboratory for preparing students to work with technologies that will increasingly define aviation in the twenty-first century.
ScP
December 22, 2006 - 4:01 am
This sounds like a very intriguing project with loads of potential in understanding one of the most extreme areas of our planet. Do you know off hand if the group at KU will be using any NASA related technology in this endeavor (i.e. de-icing technology that allows their crafts to travel through space without freezing up)? In essence it sounds as if this UAV has a lot in common with the U.S. military’s unmanned aircraft/spy planes currently being used in Iraq, except of course without weapons. Keep us informed of the progress if you can.