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>> This is Mission Control Houston, again, we're getting ready to do an interview
with Mark Weislogel, of the Portland, Oregon State University.
Mark is the Principal Investigator for the Capillary Flow, Flow Experiment.
Welcome to Mission Control, Mark.
>> How you doing?
>> Doing great.
Hey, we know that you're the Principal Investigator for Capillary Flow Experiments 2,
could you tell us a little bit about the experiment?
>> Yeah. These experiments are set to try to understand some complicated interaction
between how liquids behave when gravity is gone in funny shaped containers.
So what we're trying to do is, is exploit how surface tension and wetting affects combined
with a strange geometry to make the liquid go where, where we want to in that container.
So without centrifuges or without thruster firings, without any manipulation or anything,
we can passively control where the liquid is in the container and maybe you can understand how
that might be important when gravity is gone so that when you actually go to get the liquid
out of the container, you can do that, 'cause you know where it is.
And the same thing is when you want to get the gas out, you know where that is too,
so, so that's our, that's our aim.
>> And so what kind of activities are going on with CFE this week?
>> Okay. We have, I believe Don Pettit is going to be doing some runs for us,
looking for what we call these magic wetting conditions where we, we, we change the juncture
by rotating a vein inside a, a elliptical container and at certain angles,
fluid will wick up certain passageways and change its orientation.
And by doing that, we can develop the mass skills to predict this behavior.
So we could design a tank that could actually exploit a, like, like I said before,
this shape to get the liquid to all go one direction.
>> And correct me if I'm wrong, but I think Don Pettit actually had some fun with this affect
after we installed and activated the water recycling system on board the space station.
He designed a zero gravity cup that they could do a toast with.
>> Yes. In fact we had something to do with that too.
We, we -- it in fact that cup exploits a similar kind of concept to what we're talking about is
where this fluid wicks up an interior corner in that container and then you can draw
from that corner just as if you were drinking on earth and the wetting
and surface tension affects perform the same function as gravity on earth.
So it looks and feels somewhat similar to drinking on the ground instead of,
instead of sucking from a bag, which is what I think after a while might feel a little funny.
>> Yeah. So, what exactly in terms, what does micro --
how does microgravity make your experiment possible?
>> Okay. So, when gravity is gone, what we normally see in capillary affects
and small tubes and sponges, you can see an enormous systems, enormous sponges, you know,
with, with pore sizes on the size of a meter or something.
So, you see capillary phenomenon like you would never see on earth,
what that does is it gives us great control over what the shape of the container is.
We can build basically, you know, complex systems that we know what the shapes are very,
very well and so we can -- our science there has much greater control compared
to what we can do on the ground.
It also has special application in space and we're
in fluid regimes that we can't get to on earth.
So, not only is, is it easier to study in space, but the applications are in space too,
so our confidence goes way up for the things that we discover there that we also want
to use there, like for space craft systems design.
>> How can we apply your research results to benefit people here on earth?
>> Okay. That, that's happening just recently, we find that some of the,
the rules and design tools that we are developing
for the space applications are also things we can design for, for ground use.
For instance, for what we call lab on chip technologies where you have a precious,
small liquid sample, like a blood sample or a, you know, whether it's an AIDs patients
or whether it's some, some other, other [inaudible] those reagents,
or those samples can go down on a chip, spread out by these capillary flow methods
and be analyzed and so we've actually consulted on a couple projects related to that.
And they're very easy for us because of, of what has been developed
from the, from the space experiments.
>> So it's all about the math, huh?
>> I'm sorry to say, yes and we're delighted by that, maybe not everybody is.
But in the end, what comes out of our work is an equation and that can be used
to very efficiently and very effectively either design, design systems and improve processes.
[ Background noise ]
>> And so, Mark, what's your background, where are you from, where'd you go to school,
what's your lab like where you work now?
>> Okay. Well, I'm from Portland State University and I arrived,
I arrived here via Industry Research in Colorado and from there before,
actually 10 years working at NASA Glenn Research Center.
And that was straight out of school and a PhD at Northwestern University.
Before that even, I was, you know, moving from, from state to state,
but I actually spent some time in Oregon, too, before so I'm kind of back
to a place where I went to high school.
It's a great place to be, there's no NASA center in the, in the vicinity,
so folks around are interested definitely to, to be involved in NASA work.
And some of our students have had just wonderful opportunities to be part of this research.
>> Well, you know, if the recent application process is any sign, a lot of folks want
to be astronauts, but there's a lot of other opportunities for people
to get involved in space and space research.
Do you have any advice for students or young people
who might want to get into your line of work?
>> Okay. If you -- if they're interested, they don't know --
a lot of students don't know how accessible a lot of these faculty
who are already involved are and I think just any professor would love to meet students
who are highly motivated and interested and have --
show signs, you know, tangible signs of that interest.
And the students that we have involved, they're training astronauts.
They're, they're involved in crew procedures, they've even been enabled in space to ground
to speak to the astronaut during the experiment.
Don Pettit and, and Dan Burbank have both request this,
this is just terrific, it's very exciting.
How do they tell their folks that they're doing this?
It's just, it's just wonderful.
And then of course the science that they're gathering is, is, you know, being published and,
and sending those students on their ways and their career in just wonderful ways.
So, so I would just recommend that they get pretty aggressive in identifying the work --
where the work is going on that they're interested in doing and then go for that.
People love to find people who are excited about what they do.
>> Well, Mark, thanks for being with us.
One last question for you, it's a nice day here in Houston,
although it started out a little bit foggy.
Are you seeing any signs of your science at work in Portland?
We all hear it tends to be a little bit damp there.
Are the -- are you seeing any surface tension on your windows today?
>> Every day.
We have looked for images from space of Portland for days and days, but have never seen it 'cause
of the clouds, but that's what we deal with.
>> All right.
Again, thank you very much, Mark Weislogel, the Principal Investigator
for the Capillary Flow Experiment 2, for being with us today.
And good luck on your research, Mark.
>> Okay. Nice talking to you.