USU Students Take Research Beyond Earth
In 1982, Utah State University made history with its first student-generated space research project launched by NASA on the Space Shuttle. This milestone was the work of USU’s Get Away Special (GAS) Team, a student-run, extracurricular research group within the Physics Department dedicated to aerospace research. It is named after the NASA Program that allowed universities and organizations to send small experiments aboard space shuttles.
In 1976, Gilbert Moore purchased the first payload reservation for the program and donated it to Utah State University, leading to the first-ever launch of this historic payload in 1982. GAS provides students with the opportunity to gain hands-on engineering experience while contributing to aerospace research. Driven by a passion for advancing space technology, members of the GAS Team design, develop, test, and produce innovative solutions to complex problems that prepare them for careers in the industry or academia as collaborative and effective leaders. Over the next two decades, USU's GAS Team successfully launched 10 payloads, while students also participated in "Vomit Comet" flights.
Following the Columbia Disaster in 2003, the GAS program was discontinued. From 2003 to 2010, the GAS Team adapted by flying experiments on "Vomit Comet" flights, and high-altitude balloon flights. In 2010, the team initiated the CubeSat Program, which eventually led to the creation of GASPACS, which focused on deploying a meter-long inflatable boom to passively stabilize a satellite. After a decade of development, GASPACS was deployed from the International Space Station in January 2022.
Today, the GAS team is currently working on GASRATS, a satellite that was designed to test an optically transparent patch antenna in collaboration with Dr. Reyhan Baktur of Utah State University.
Aggies Support Space Classmates
The Utah Statesman clippings shown here include advertisements for the upcoming research and team project, in addition to highlighting and celebrating the success of experiments that were on the Columbia flight.