The Department of Defense is sponsoring the Hypersonics Horizon High Speed Video Challenge, which includes cash prizes and is open to high school and college students.
“The Hypersonics Horizons High Speed Video Challenge is essential to building lasting advantage by investing in tomorrow’s workforce,” said April Erickson, Assistant Secretary of Defense for Science and Technology. “The Joint Hypersonic Transition Office is leveraging the Smart Scholarship Program to create a pathway for a diverse and technically skilled workforce to protect national security and American prosperity for years to come. We continue to develop and invest in our future talent by partnering with developing academic institutions.”
“This challenge is designed to inspire the next generation of hypersonic workforce,” said Mark A. Glenn, director of the Joint Hypersonic Transition Office.
Instructions for high school teams of up to three students include describing the types of challenges they might encounter on Mercury, Venus, Titan, Ceres, or a spacecraft, Glenn said. It involves creating a 3-5 minute video. Pluto. You should also mention how your spacecraft design is affected by the environmental challenges of your chosen celestial body and explain how you will overcome those issues.
For post-secondary student teams, Glenn said, students spend three to five minutes discussing the design of an airplane-like spacecraft designed to launch, reach hypersonic speeds, and safely land on Mars. He said he needed to create a video. Next, we need to address the challenges that spacecraft and astronauts may face upon landing. He added that the problem set includes interdisciplinary challenges and solutions, so students can learn from a variety of subjects, not just physics and engineering.
Lori Michelle Stiglitz, director of workforce development at JHTO, said this is the second year of hypersonic challenges.
Last year’s challenges included how to transport people at hypersonic speeds. Many university and high school students applied, and not only students but also science and engineering teachers applied enthusiastically. The students conducted research and pored over many open source documents on this and related topics, she said.
One of last year’s undergraduates who took part in the challenge plans to pivot to hypersonics in graduate school, Stiglitz added.
Last year’s high school winner knew nothing about hypersonics. “So he digs deep into hypersonics and shares that knowledge with all the students, teachers and administrators at the high school. Some of the physics teachers didn’t even know about the subject.” It’s widespread,” she said.
“Kids are very creative and enthusiastic about hypersonics, and we can collect their unique thinking on hypersonic issues,” she said.
The award will likely be announced in February after evaluators working across the Department of Defense hypersonics community provide feedback and ratings. They may also gain new insights from this challenge, she added.
About a month ago, Stiglitz said he spoke with about 300 mechanical engineers at Montana State University and shared the challenges ahead and everyone started talking about it enthusiastically.
For more information about the challenge, please visit the challenge entry webpage here.
