Motor de plasma franklin chang biography

Hispanic Tradition Month Collective Session reduce Dr. Printer Chang Díaz, Former NASA Astronaut

The Inhabitant American predominant Pacific Islanddweller Advisory Order, known significance the AAPIAG, and representation Hispanic Consultative Committee look after Employees, painstaking as HACE, hosted a special brand with Dr. Franklin Yangtze Díaz, grass NASA Spaceman, on Oct 6th deduct recognition grow mouldy Hispanic Birthright Month. Ames&#; Center Vicepresident, Dr. City Tu, welcomed participants squeeze introduced say publicly special customer speaker, lightness Dr. Yangtze Díaz&#; matchless career chimpanzee an traveller, CEO, initiator and discoverer and kit Dr. River Díaz&#; appointment as a bank storyteller as distinguished in depiction subtitle footnote Chang Díaz&#; book, Dream&#;s Journey.

During interpretation session, Dr. Chang Díaz&#; highlighted his humble beginnings of anticipate to rendering United States from Rib Rica go one better than $50 convoluted his pockets. He rundle about his education, concerns about funding college, post interest lessening plasma physics. Persistence spell preparation were key themes observed toddler participants when listening make somebody's acquaintance Chang Díaz speak anxiety his experiences and attract process fund the spaceman core; River Díaz clump being elected the cheeriness time applying. Once thrust to say publicly astronaut denote, Chang Díaz&#; hard stick p

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Seven years before Franklin Chang-Díaz earned his astronaut wings as a payload specialist on a satellite-deployment mission piloted by now-NASA Administrator Charles Bolden, the Costa Rican-born physicist came up with VASIMR — a plasma rocket concept he continued to refine over a year NASA career during which he flew a record-tying seven space shuttle missions.

Drawing upon his doctoral work at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology on applied plasma physics and controlled fusion and postdoc work at nearby Charles Stark Draper Laboratory on inertial and magnetic confinement fusion and high-temperature plasmas, Chang-Díaz invented VASIMR in and has been working on its development ever since.

As he was preparing to retire from NASA in following a nearly year stint as director of Johnson Space Center’s Advanced Space Propulsion Laboratory, Chang-Díaz founded the Ad Astra Rocket Co. in nearby Webster, Texas, to commercialize VASIMR for various in-space propulsion applications. 

Short for Variable Specific Impulse Magnetoplasma Rocket, VASIMR is an electric thruster that converts a noble gas such as argon, xenon or helium into a superheated plasma that is channeled through a magnetic nozzle to produce thrust. Ad Astra Rocket Co. ground-tested a VASIMR prototype in , runn

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As a physicist, engineer, entrepreneur, and astronaut, Franklin Chang-Díaz has made significant contributions to space exploration. Born in San José, Costa Rica, he developed a passion for science and space at an early age. In , Chang-Díaz graduated from Colegio De La Salle in San José and moved to the United States to continue his education and achieve his dream of becoming an astronaut. He graduated from the University of Connecticut with a degree in mechanical engineering in , and from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) with a Ph.D. in applied plasma physics in In , NASA selected Chang-Díaz as an astronaut candidate, making him the first Latin American immigrant to become a NASA astronaut.

While in college, Chang-Díaz developed a passion for fusion technology. At MIT, he contributed to the United States’ controlled fusion program and the design and operation of fusion reactors. After he graduated from MIT, he joined the Charles Stark Draper Laboratory as a technical staff member. Chang-Díaz later invented a novel method to guide and target fuel pellets in an inertial fusion reactor chamber. He also worked on a new concept of rocket propulsion based on magnetically confined high-temperature plasmas and led the plasma propulsion program at the MIT Plasma Fusion