Two Waite High School students have been chosen to showcase their cosmic dust collector to astronauts at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston. Seniors Nataly Diaz-Sanchez and Chevy Irwin have been working all school year on designing a real-world product for NASA as a part of HUNCH.
Each high school team is given a list of tools that NASA needs. The students then pick one to create. “It was hard to find what we wanted to do, but after we figured out what we wanted to do, we kind of rolled with it,” Irwin said.
The students researched, designed, and 3D printed a prototype for a cosmic dust collector. The device will allow astronauts to collect samples in space for research. Diaz-Sanchez and Irwin had to factor in the conditions of space, like zero gravity, in their design. Their team caught the attention of NASA, who selected their product as one of the finalists from across the country. Next week, Diaz-Sanchez and Irwin will go to the Johnson Space Center in Houston to show their prototypes to astronauts and engineers.
“It’s literally a dream come true,” Diaz-Sanchez said. The students said their prototype will be used to create a real device that NASA will use at the International Space Station. “They might fix it a little bit but they probably will use it in space,” Diaz-Sanchez said. Irwin said they went through several designs before they landed on their final product. Diaz-Sanchez was the main researcher and Irwin designed the mechanics of the final product, which she based on a push-open lollipop container.
“[NASA wants] to use that imagination that students have to come up with out-of-the-box ideas to solve problems,” said Seth Alder, a science teacher at Waite High School and the instructor for HUNCH. The students say the device will not only help capture dust samples but protect them from contamination. Every HUNCH team has a NASA mentor that they meet with each week over video call. Alder said their team had a special connection to their NASA consultant, David Hornyak.
Hornyak works at NASA in Houston and is in charge of life support for the International Space Station. He’s also an alum of Waite High School. Alder says that shows students that the possibilities are limitless. “To see somebody that came from Waite and got to that level and then to have these young ladies work with him on a weekly basis, because they could be that next person, they could be the next person running the space station,” Alder said.
In the 10 years since Alder started the HUNCH team at Waite, he said only one other group was chosen to present at NASA. He said that experience was life-changing for those students and is ecstatic that Diaz-Sanchez and Irwin are headed to Houston. He said they were one of about 60 teams chosen out of around 670 teams that applied. “They’re beyond anything that I could’ve ever hoped,” Alder said. “They are taking it to the next level. They have bright futures and I’m just really proud to be a part of that.”
Both seniors hope to study STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) after they graduate. Sanchez-Diaz hopes to study biology with a focus on pre-med, and Irwin hopes to go into computer science. The students hope their story reaches other young people. “I feel like we’ll be able to inspire other students to create projects,” Diaz-Sanchez said. “I think a lot of people undermine what high schoolers can do. And I think that this is a sign that no matter where you are, no matter where it is, you can create something.”
“Don’t stop believing in yourself just because you fail. Push forward, work hard because one day that is going to basically pay off,” she said.