{"id":124498,"date":"2021-11-22T09:57:50","date_gmt":"2021-11-22T14:57:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ucf.edu\/news\/?p=124498"},"modified":"2021-11-22T09:57:50","modified_gmt":"2021-11-22T14:57:50","slug":"doctoral-student-hopes-to-develop-better-rocket-fuel-through-nasa-fellowship","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ucf.edu\/news\/doctoral-student-hopes-to-develop-better-rocket-fuel-through-nasa-fellowship\/","title":{"rendered":"Doctoral Student Hopes to Develop Better Rocket Fuel Through NASA Fellowship"},"content":{"rendered":"

After seeing the U.S. Navy Blue Angels perform over Jacksonville as a child, Jessica Baker \u201920 fell in love with flight. The Florida native felt influenced by the nearby Space Coast, and quickly developed a passion for aerospace engineering<\/a>, which she earned a bachelor\u2019s in at UCF. Now, she\u2019s earning a doctoral degree in mechanical engineering<\/a> from UCF and is about to start a fellowship at the agency she\u2019s always dreamed of working for \u2014 NASA.<\/p>\n

Baker is the recipient of a 2021 NASA Minority Serving Institution Fellowship, which is awarded to graduate students who attend Minority Serving Institutions. The fellowship will last for the duration of her doctoral studies and will allow her to travel to NASA\u2019s Marshall Space Flight Center in Alabama to conduct research for 10 weeks each summer. She is one of 12 recipients this year.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am very excited and honored to have received this fellowship,\u201d Baker says. \u201cI feel confident that this project will provide essential insights into the development of the next generation of rocket fuels.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rocket fuels are at the core of Baker\u2019s research. As a graduate research engineer in Professor Subith Vasu\u2019s lab, she studies alternative rocket fuels made from natural gas, hydrogen and hydrogen-containing compounds, which are cleaner and more cost-effective.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe goal is to minimize toxic emissions such as carbon monoxide and nitrous oxide, and test what percentage of impurity in natural gas fuels is acceptable while maintaining performance and minimizing cost,\u201d Baker says. \u201cI use this information to refine and make chemical models that can be used to predict combustion conditions at pressures and temperatures relevant to rocket systems.\u201d<\/p>\n