A NEW WAY TO NAVIGATE CAMPUS PORTLAND STATE UNIVERSITY is one of the first places in the Pacific Northwest to be outfitted with GoodMaps, a platform that uses scanning technology to map buildings in detail, and provide wayfinding for its users via a smartphone app.The technology, developed by Louisville-based GoodMaps, a startup born out of the American Printing House for the Blind, is especially useful for blind or visually impaired users. GoodMaps and Intel began mapping Smith Memorial Student Union in May 2021.They used Lidar mapping, which is more accurate than GPS and allows someone—in this case, marketing and communications coordinator Randy Mishler—to add labels, common-sense descriptions of each room and formal designations that otherwise wouldn’t be available. Mishler said the entire mapping process took only a few hours and required a rig resembling a backpack to record the building. Once the building was added to GoodMaps’ database in December, the labeling process could begin. Damkerng Mungthanya, a PSU student with a visual impairment, described using the app like walking with friends. “If we have GoodMaps in every building, every place, I can travel with confidence that I will go to the right place,”Mungthanya said. “I will be safe.” —KATY SWORDFISK OREGON’S FIRST SATELLITE LAUNCHES AFTER MONTHS and months of research, testing and development, the Portland State Aerospace Society (PSAS) sent Oregon’s first satellite into space.The interdisciplinary student group delivered the satellite known as OreSat0 to Seattle-based Spaceflight, which launched the satellite aboard an Astra Rocket 3.3 from Kodiak, Alaska on March 15. OreSat0 is the first in a series of three satellites designed by PSAS and is just about the size of a tissue box.The satellite includes solar panels, batteries, a color camera and an amateur radio system. Andrew Greenberg, electrical and computer engineering faculty and PSAS Advisor, said OreSat0’s mission is simple: “It’s supposed to not catch fire in space.” But OreSat0 also gives PSAS a chance to test its open-source satellite design before building the next iteration. Scheduled to take flight in late 2022 with NASA’s CubeSat Launch Initiative, that satellite will examine cirrus clouds on a climate science mission. See where OreSat0 is in space right now at bit.ly/viksatellite or check out its live data feed at bit.ly/vikdata. —KATY SWORDFISK ELVIS HAS LEFT THE…ATMOSPHERE? ROCK AND ROLL legend Elvis Presley “left the building” for the last time in 1977. Now another Elvis is gearing up to make an exit in 2023, but this time the journey is from Portland State to the International Space Station. Developed by Jay Nadeau, physics faculty, and her research group, the ELVIS—or Extreme Life Volumetric Imaging System—combines a holographic microscope and light-field microscope. Astronauts on the space station will use ELVIS to watch bacteria swim in three-dimensional space. “The cool part is they’re going to relay everything live and the astronauts will show us a video of what they’re doing,” says Nadeau. ELVIS has the potential to answer some important questions about how being in space changes bacteria. “In theory, microgravity should not affect bacteria.They’re too small,” says Nadeau. “Yet, starting with the very earliest experiments on the space station, people have found the bacteria act very differently when they’ve been exposed to microgravity and that includes things like salmonella becoming much more dangerous.”These changes can be bad news for astronauts who suffer from increased intestinal, respiratory and urinary tract infections in space. Students have been instrumental in developing ELVIS and will help work out the logistics that will make the microscope operational. —SUMMER ALLEN OreSat0 Oregon’s First Satelitte! ART BY SOFIA ESTRADA FERRY ’20 SPRING 2022 // 9
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