SPOKANE, Wash. — A student Odyssey at Libby Center in Spokane has been named as a finalist in NASA’s Power to Explore Challenge.
Lilah Coyan wrote an essay on how Radioisotope Power Systems (RPS) could be used to explore one of about 300 moons in our solar system.
RPS is a nuclear battery system that uses heat to create electric power for machines that traverse the darkest, dustiest and most distant places in our solar system.
NASA said the heat in RPS is made by the natural radioactive decay of plutonium-238.
Coyan wrote an essay entitled “Ambition: The Rover on Callisto.”
Callisto is outmost of the four Galilean moons that orbit Jupiter.
In her essay, Coyan pointed to the possibility that there could be evidence of life on the moon Callisto, listing a subsurface ocean, and an atmosphere made up of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen, which can all support life.
Callisto has a subzero environment, which would require special equipment to explore its deep, dark craters, and RPS could generate enough heat to prevent a rover from freezing while digging for samples of dust and rock, theorized Coyan.
Coyan named her theoretical space rover Ambition, and hypothesized that her rover could still take its final measurements and feed them back to earth in the most challenging terrain on Callisto while its dying.
Coyan is one of 45 semifinalists who wrote essays for how to use RPS for future exploratory space missions.
She was one of four in Washington that qualified as a semifinalist.
“This year’s submissions to NASA’s Power to Explore Challenge were immensely enthralling, and we’re thrilled that the number of entries reached a record high,” said Carl Sandifer II, program manager of the Radioisotope Power Systems Program at NASA’s Glenn Research Center in Cleveland. “It was particularly interesting to see which moons the students selected for their individual essays, and the mysteries they hope to unravel. Their RPS-powered mission concepts always prove to be innovative, and it’s a joy to learn about their ‘superpowers’ that exemplify their path forward as the next generation of explorers.”
Semifinalists received a NASA RPS Prize Pack, consisting of pins, stickers and printed materials.
The finalists for the Power to Explore Challenge will be announced April 23, 2025.
Odyssey at Libby Center is a MAGNET school of choice for “highly capable” students, specializing in STEM curriculum.
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