What do music ensembles and human spaceflight have in widespread? They require the harmonization of various parts to create an inspiring opus.
NASA’s Paige Whittington has expertise with each.
As a principal flutist for Purdue College’s Wind Ensemble, Whittington helped fellow flutists play stunning music collectively whereas pursuing her graduate diploma. Now, as an area exploration simulation architect at Johnson House Middle in Houston, she strives for a cross-team concord that may inform the company’s Moon to Mars exploration method.
“Simulation usually sits on the intersection of a number of groups as a result of we combine numerous designs and mission necessities,” she mentioned. “We’ve got to discover ways to greatest match these groups and their priorities collectively to allow cutting-edge human exploration.”
Whittington is a part of the NASA Exploration Programs Simulations (NExSyS) group, which develops physics-based simulations to guage numerous automobiles and mission ideas. Her function contains working with lunar and Mars structure groups inside NASA’s Technique and Structure Workplace to evaluate present and potential future parts of car design, logistics, and planning.
“Our simulations assist inform engineers, astronauts, and managers in regards to the new, difficult environments that await us on the Moon and Mars,” she mentioned.
One of the difficult and rewarding tasks she is engaged on is the Artemis Distributed Simulation. “NExSyS develops and maintains a number of particular person simulations resembling rovers, landers, and habitats. Nevertheless, human exploration on different planetary our bodies requires cautious integration and coordination of those particular person items,” she defined.
The distributed simulation brings these items collectively to allow company groups to examine a whole Artemis mission to the lunar floor. Totally different parts could be added or eliminated to create all kinds of eventualities. The simulation can run routinely with predetermined settings or be aware of real-time and randomized adjustments. Contributors can function the group’s video partitions, mock-up mission management console, digital actuality platforms, and lander piloting facility to work together collectively inside the chosen Artemis mission situation.
“I’m very proud to know that the simulations I assist develop have impacted a number of the choices being made by NASA’s structure groups,” she mentioned.
She is worked up to tackle a brand new duty, as nicely. Whittington lately turned undertaking supervisor of the JSC Engineering Orbital Dynamics software program bundle. Also called JEOD, this open-source instrument was created by NASA to mannequin spacecraft trajectories, resembling proposed flight paths for a lunar lander. JEOD calculates gravitational and different environmental forces performing on spacecraft to simulate the place and orientation of these automobiles over time, whether or not they’re orbiting a cosmic physique or touring between planets.
Whittington’s household moved continuously throughout her childhood, calling 5 completely different states house as she grew up. Their time in Florida would have a life-long influence.
“My dad and mom drove me and my sister throughout the state to go to NASA’s Kennedy House Middle. It was mesmerizing, awe-inspiring, and seemingly a complete completely different world from the place my 8-year-old self thought I used to be dwelling,” she mentioned. Her love of area by no means waned, and a highschool physics instructor inspired her to review aerospace engineering in school. “That was the turning level after I realized area exploration didn’t have to remain in my desires – it was a profession subject I may really work in.”
Whittington took her instructor’s recommendation, incomes a bachelor’s diploma in aerospace engineering from the College of Texas at Austin. She additionally accomplished two internships at Johnson by the Universities House Analysis Affiliation and interned with a NASA contractor after commencement. Whereas pursuing a grasp’s diploma in Aeronautics and Astronautics at Purdue, Whittington was accepted to NASA’s Pathways Program and did two rotations with the Simulation and Graphics Department earlier than becoming a member of the group as a full-time worker in June 2022.
Whittington has realized a number of key classes throughout her 5 years with NASA, together with the important half open, common communication performs in understanding a person’s or group’s core wants and limitations. She additionally careworn the significance of adaptability.
“The trail that you just deliberate for will not be the trail you find yourself selecting. However that planning enabled you to be who you at the moment are and to make completely different selections,” she mentioned. “I didn’t anticipate working in simulations after I began my aerospace engineering diploma, however I took the chance when it was introduced, and I’m so comfortable that I did.”