Enjoying A Rockin’ Good Time

The UW Geological Museum features a variety of rocks, which are divided into three basic types depending on their formation.

Laura Vietti, UW Geological Museum and collections manager.

ENJOYING A GOOD TIME

Maija Veinbergs points at a display case in the Geological Museum.

UW GEOLOGICAL MUSEUM EDUCATES PUBLIC ON IMPORTANCE OF WYOMING’S GEOLOGY.

For a fifth year, the University of Wyoming Geological Museum and the Wyoming State Geological Survey (WSGS) welcomed more than 320 visitors, in celebration of Earth Science Week, to their “Wyoming Rocks: Critical Resources for a Sustainable Future.”

“This event highlights why Wyoming’s rocks are important to us as humans, the state, the country and even the world,” says Laura Vietti, UW Geological Museum and collections manager. “We hope to instill a sense of pride and understanding of how important Wyoming’s rocks are and why we are so fortunate to live where we do.”

The event at the Geological Museum featured activities highlighting a sustainable future and some of Wyoming’s finite resources, such as minerals, critical elements and the rocks we find that play a critical role today and in our future.

“We don’t realize how many items in our households are made from minerals,” says Christina George, WSGS outreach and publications manager. “From the food we eat to the material used in building our houses, minerals are involved.”

Geology is a branch of science that studies the earth, and geologists are the scientists who conduct these studies. The efforts of geologists benefit humankind in many ways by making

The UW Geological Museum during the “Wyoming Rocks: Critical Resources for a Sustainable Future” community event in celebration of Earth Science Week.

human existence safer and easier.

Earth Science Week 2022 celebrated “Earth Science for a Sustainable World,” a theme that emphasizes the essential role of earth sciences in helping people make decisions that maintain and strengthen the planet’s ability to support thriving life, according to the American Geosciences Institute (AGI), which has organized the national and international event since 1998.

“Many of our students’ first interaction with UW is through the UW Geological Museum,” says Vietti. “This event is a wonderful way to generate a positive association and love for the university that we hope will encourage them to come back for their college education. We have several current and past students who’ve said the museum has played a key role in why they chose to come to UW.”

What makes this event unique is the geologic processes that have helped shape Wyoming and the clues

Visitors of the “Wyoming Rocks: Critical Resources for a Sustainable Future” community event were able to dig into a variety of featured activities highlighting a sustainable future and some of Wyoming’s finite resources, such as minerals, critical elements and the rocks we find that play a critical role today and in our future.

left behind in these rocks. Minerals are the building blocks of rocks, and rocks are divided into three basic types depending on their formation: igneous, metamorphic and sedimentary.

“Wyoming has an incredible geologic record, and our Department of Geology and Geophysics and the UW Geological Museum reflect the importance and prominence of geology in the state,” says Vietti. “This event condenses much of what we do as researchers at UW into tangible and understandable concepts that we hope convey how important Wyoming’s rock resources are.”

The event featured hands-on activities, including a scavenger hunt in the museum’s “Hero’s Rock Collection”; making a rock identification kit of where critical minerals in Wyoming are extracted; and a creative art activity.

“We hope that the community takes away a sense of wonder and pride about Wyoming’s rocks and recognizes how important and special they are in today’s world and for a sustainable future,” says Vietti.

The event included partnerships with the UW School of Energy Resources and UW Art Museum. Wyoming Homeland Security provided promotional items about earthquake preparedness, an important step for the future. Earthquakes occur regularly in Wyoming, and it is essential to be prepared.

In addition to the hands-on activities, the Harry C. Vaughan Planetarium offered two free showings of “Leftovers! Asteroids, Comets, Meteors, and Rings” during the event.

“We want to inspire future generations of geologists and interest in geology in general, and this is a great way to do so,” says Vietti.

To learn more about the UW Geological Museum and upcoming public events, visit www.uwyo.edu/ geomuseum.

UW Spinout Company Receives

$1.2M Grant to Fund Research and Development of Advanced Technologies

By Ron Podell

A Laramie business that originated at the University of Wyoming has received a $1.2 million Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II grant from the U.S. Department of Energy that will be used to fund the continued development and commercialization of instrumentation platforms for the nondestructive manipulation and analysis of micro- and nano-sized materials.

“Particle identification and manipulation on the micro- to nanoscale level are increasingly necessary for advanced technologies, such as the semiconductor and electronics industries and nuclear forensics and nuclear nonproliferation,” says Kristin Di Bona, CEO and co-founder of Wyonics and an adjunct professor of chemistry at UW. “An advanced instrumental platform will be developed and prototyped to specifically manipulate and analyze these small particles. A key application of the technology will be the analysis of very small individual particles of actinide-containing materials, which is critical to ongoing nuclear nonproliferation efforts.”

Radioactive elements, such as uranium and plutonium used in nuclear power and nuclear weapons, are considered actinides.

Caleb Hill, an associate professor of chemistry at UW and co-director of UW’s Nuclear Energy Research Center, is the other co-founder of Wyonics.

Wyonics is a scientific innovation company founded in 2017, with the mission to develop sustainable technologies for Wyoming and beyond. The company’s scientific staff, which brings together researchers from the UW Department of Chemistry and the private sector, possesses a combined expertise spanning the chemical, biological and materials science fields. Additional ongoing projects at Wyonics include the development and commercialization of low-temperature processes for the extraction and recovery of rare earth elements and other critical materials from alternative sources and the development of biodegradable filtration materials to combat future pandemics.

The SBIR Phase II grant runs for two years, beginning this month and ending in August 2024.

Hill will receive a $200,000 subcontract from this work, which will fund the work of one full-time UW graduate student and two or three UW undergraduate students during the grant’s duration. Declan McDonald, a senior from Littleton, Colo., majoring in chemistry and chemical engineering, is a part of the research team.

This award continues and advances the work from the company’s $200,000 Phase I grant obtained last year, Di Bona says.

“Phase I thoroughly demonstrated the feasibility of the proposed technology, showing that it can serve as an ideal tool for the manipulation of small-scale particles and is compatible with any desired ex situ analytical methods,” she says. “Phase II will focus on the continued development of the manipulation platform demonstrated in Phase I, with the ultimate goal of producing a functional prototype system for commercialization. Prototyping, software development, customer outreach and beta testing in Phase II will produce a robust commercial-ready platform, capable of meeting the needs of current and emerging high-tech applications.”

Kristin Di Bona and Caleb Hill.

UW Student Team First From Wyoming to Participate in NASA Design Challenge

The Cowboy Claw undergoing NBL testing and the official University of Wyoming Space Wranglers Cowboy Claw logo.

A team of University of Wyoming students was the first from Wyoming to be selected and participate in NASA’s 2022 Micro-g Neutral Buoyancy Experiment Design Teams (NExT) engineering design challenge.

Five undergraduate students in the UW College of Engineering and Physical Sciences, dubbed the Wyoming Space Wranglers, designed and built the Cowboy Claw, a lunar reusable surface anchoring device. Team members were Cameron Ball, from Colorado Springs, Colo.; Forrest Bucholz, of Alpine; Reese Romero, from Cody; James Sheets, of Powell; and Daniel Wenger, from Vale, Ore.

“We were ecstatic to hear that we had been accepted to the Micro-g NExT challenge,” says Sheets, who graduated this spring. “After several months of deliberation, NASA released the accepted teams in the form of an acceptance video. We were very happy to hear our name called. We were selected alongside other large schools in the nation, who had teams much larger than ours.”

Micro-g NExT encourages undergraduate students to design, build and test a tool or device that addresses an authentic, current space exploration challenge. The experience includes hands-on engineering design, test operations and public outreach. Micro-g NExT provides a unique opportunity for students to contribute to NASA’s missions, as the design challenges are identified by NASA engineers as necessary in space exploration missions. “The challenge provided an opportunity to invent something new,” Sheets says. “It was really a great opportunity to tinker.” Wenger says his favorite part of the experience was rapid prototyping and testing. “It’s one thing to spend a lot of time designing a project on paper and building it once, but we had the chance to try lots of different ideas and test new parts every day,” he says. “I think we were able to use a lot of creativity.”

The 2022 challenges focused on the lunar surface extravehicular activity (EVA) operations of Artemis, NASA’s lunar exploration program. The three challenges involved designing an EVA sample size location calibration marker; an EVA sample bag and dispenser; and a lunar reusable surface anchoring device.

The Wyoming Space Wranglers participated in the third challenge. The objective was to design and manufacture an anchoring mechanism that is able to provide holding force on a variety of objects with different types of surfaces.

“Our main inspirations for the design were the dexterity and versatility of the human hand,” Sheets says. “Inside the human hand, the knuckle joints are known as compliant mechanisms. They bend to accomplish a goal and then return to their original shape. We mimicked this by creating joints out of a 3D printed thermoplastic polyurethane that is available in the University of Wyoming Innovation Wyrkshop. These joints, in combination with stainless steel tendons, allowed for our device to maintain a strong grip

WATCH A VIDEO

MICRO-G NEXT 2022 TESTING – UNIVERSITY OF WYOMING

on a variety of rocks. Our team used these two key aspects of the design to create a lightweight, reusable, durable and nonpenetrative device.”

The importance of an anchoring mechanism in space is mission critical.

“The Cowboy Claw is intended to allow astronauts to tether themselves, their gear or other EVA devices to the lunar surface,” Ball says. “A quickly established anchoring point enables astronauts to safely conduct their research. Additionally, anchoring devices, such as ours, can be applied to other manned or unmanned future space exploration efforts to Mars and beyond. Furthering mankind’s understanding of the lunar environment will help us understand our world better and help prepare us for future planets that await us.”

The Cowboy Claw was delivered to NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston at the end of May. Micro-g NExT coordinators and NASA personnel examined the UW team’s device as well as the other selected teams’ devices.

“We felt a combination of excitement, stress and nervousness through the challenge process,” Sheets says. “The timeline for the development of this device was extremely fast, so we had to rapidly manufacture the device and quickly test it. This led to a lot of worries about if our idea would work or not. It ended up exceeding our expectations.”

In June, the UW team participated in a test readiness review before traveling to Houston to have its project tested by professional divers in the NASA Johnson Space Center Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory (NBL), a simulated microgravity environment.

“It was a lot of fun to watch the divers test our device in the NBL, and the testing experience felt very authentic,” Sheets says. “Our device first had to pass through a safety check to ensure nobody got hurt. Then, we were able to brief the diver with some instructions before use.”

When it came time for the Cowboy Claw to be tested, the Wyoming Space Wranglers were allowed to sit in a control room and supervise the test.

“One of our team members was allowed to communicate with the diver over radio to provide instructions, and all of this was broadcast to the rest of the schools at the NBL,” Sheets says. “Perhaps the most fun was watching how devices from other schools performed. Some schools had some designs that were fairly similar to ours, and other teams went in entirely different directions. Of course, we were excited to see the Cowboy Claw hold its own against devices from large and well-known institutions.”

Ball, who graduated in May with a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering, will begin his career with Lockheed Martin in Colorado, where he will work in the company’s space division. He says he would like to see other UW students be part of the Micro-g NExT experience.

“I hope that future UW senior design teams or students in some kind of a ‘NASA challenges club’ follow in our footsteps,” Ball says.

For more about the NASA Micro-g NExT challenge, visit microgravityuniversity.jsc.nasa.gov/about-micro-g-next.

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NASA’S 2022 MICRO-G NEXT CHALLENGE SELECTION. UW STARTS AT 19:30

The Space Wranglers in the Mission Control room.