Note to self: must send balloon into near-space before it becomes wholly passé.
16-Year-Old MIT Admit Sends Her Admission Letter Into Space & Films the Journey
21–25 of 25 posts
Re: 16-Year-Old MIT Admit Sends Her Admission Letter Into Space & Films the Journey
#22Just wondering: how do you get into MIT at 16, and is it worth it? I mean would you be missing out as a 16 year old at MIT (or any other university) because your peers are into other things than you, or is it an overall net plus? I assume that it is not some inherited genius that enables kids to get into university, but some unique "strategy". Of course I could be wrong. I also assume it would be doable without ruini…
I have my birthday fairly late in the year, so technically when I started UCLA I was 17 years old.
Re: 16-Year-Old MIT Admit Sends Her Admission Letter Into Space & Films the Journey
#23Too bad they don't list what GPS receiver they used. Most GPS receivers, to satisfy export restrictions, do not function above 60k ft or 1000 knots speed.
There is some ambiguity there, so some receivers only disable themselves if you are above 60k AND above 1000 knots, so people doing high altitude balloon work look for those, or they look for imported receivers.
Re: 16-Year-Old MIT Admit Sends Her Admission Letter Into Space & Films the Journey
#24Wow a lot of jealous comments in this thread. I'm feeling it too. Why didn't my dad work at JPL and teach me physics and electrical engineering on his knee!?! Seriously, not everyone with her opportunities wouldve converted it into her accomplishments. Sure she had chances, but she brought her own drive and determination.
Ok, I laughed out loud here.
Allow me to relate a bit of personal history. I'm kind of a nerd, shocking I know, but its true. And have a fairly large number of toys around the house and have lived the 'hacking' lifestyle for my whole life. When my daughter was 9 [1] she was part of a team I put together to compete on the short lived 'Robotica' series. When she was 10 and wanted a computer for her room I gave her a VAX running NetBSD. (and VMS although NetBSD was much more approachable). She went to Reed College as an art major! (although when she graduates her degree will be in physics, go figure).
The point though (besides being able to brag about my kids, another sin I'm guilty of) is that if your parents did work at JPL and do rocket science there is no guarantees that you would be interested in rockets. As a parent all we can do is try to expose the kids to as many things as possible in an effort to allow them to discover their passions earlier rather than later. It is tremendously challenging as a parent to help your kids discover these things, but it is so valuable to them later on.
Re: 16-Year-Old MIT Admit Sends Her Admission Letter Into Space & Films the Journey
#25how hard and expensive would it be to make amateurish spacecraft and go into the space? and obviously (which I think makes is so hard to do) come back to Earth in one piece?
Well it depends how you want to get there. Running the numbers, you need at least 1 MJ/kg to get past the 100km limit into what's officially considered "outer space". That's only factoring in Earth's gravity. If we could do it with purely electrical motors, then assuming you pay 20 cents per kilowatt hour and only have a conversion efficiency of 10% into actual lifting power, it would only cost you $0.60/kg energy-wi…
thanks for your time!