In the Summer of 2013, I worked at the NASA Goddard Spaceflight Center (GSFC) performing small scale tensile tests. Space exposure can negatively affect the mechanical properties of materials. Mechanical testing can be used to assess this affect; however, materials recovered from space are scarce and not suited for traditional mechanical testing due to the high degree of space-induced damage.

 

Micro-scale mechanical testing allows for the measurement and assessment of the mechanical response of very small samples of materials with techniques that mimic macro-scale testing. I developed a LabView program to enable different modes of mechanical testing by actuating a 6-axis piezoelectric stage in multiple axes to aid in the development of small-scale testing capabilities at the GSFC.

 

I performed micro-tensile tests with material from the multi-layer isolation of the Hubble Space Telescope and digital image correlation analysis to calculate the strain in the samples. The material was exposed in space and recovered to assess the effect of space conditions on the mechanical properties of the outer layer of the insulation. During that summer, I also developed a LabView gui to control a 6-axis stage to improve the already existing micro-tensile testing setup by adding degrees of freedom that would extend the capabilities of testing.