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One of the most interesting things that I've been a part of while at NASA has been the
investigation of some debris that was brought back by the astronauts from the
International Space Station.
The astronauts collected the debris while they were on a spacewalk.
Many of the particles were smaller than a grain of sand.
And even though they were so tiny, we were able to determine that the debris was coming
off of a joint that rotates to keep the solar arrays so that they're always facing the
sun.
We were also able to determine why the debris was coming off, which allowed engineers on
the ground to allow astronauts to clean the joint so that we could continue using the
solar arrays.
This was a large-scale investigation, which involved engineers from across NASA and also
required many space shuttle missions and astronaut spacewalks.