delgadosandovals@lopers.unk.edu
The Society of Physics Students is building a weather balloon that they plan to launch by the end of the semester.
The student organization will be hosting a series of building events throughout the semester where students can help assemble and design the weather balloon, leading up to the grand launch.
“A weather balloon has instruments attached to it that can record various properties of the atmosphere as it climbs into very high altitudes,” said Jeremy Armstrong, faculty adviser for the Society of Physics Students. “You can get readings of temperature, pressure, ozone concentration levels and various other properties of humidity that vary with altitude until at some point it comes down.”
A weather balloon can be filled with either hydrogen or helium, which can reach from 30,000 to 90,000 feet of altitude once released into the atmosphere. The last time the physics department did a project of this kind was in 2014.
“I hope students can get to see this somewhat complex project from start to finish,” Armstrong said. “If students want to be more enthusiastic about science, physics in particular or meteorology, they would get to see the process of a scientific project. If you are not in science, you kind of just see the results at the end. Attending these events will provide a feeling of what really goes behind projects like these.”
Kimberly Larbey, president of the Society of Physics Students, said there is not a hard launch date yet.
“We are hoping that the skills of building it, the problem solving, the fun of it, really will encourage learning while enjoying,” Larbey said. “Putting a weather balloon together is like putting puzzle pieces together. You can make it as complicated as you like, such as programming the different sensors the balloon needs to measure the atmosphere.”
The series of meetings surrounding the building of the weather balloon will gain momentum in the fall when students go through the data the balloon has collected.
“The data we collect will be analyzed with professors to potentially fuel future teaching usage,” Larbey said. “Although there won’t exactly be a published research paper, we are hoping this is a fun learning experience that not a lot of people get to do. We are open to all students on campus, coming from all different levels of abilities.”
Students choosing to be a part of this project will have the chance to participate in fun experiments and receive guidance from expert weather enthusiasts during the building series of events.
