SPACE-AGE UV PROTECTION

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April 23, 2024

For information on admission to Notre Dame Prep, please click here. 

Notre Dame Prep honors chemistry students conduct research on UV protective materials for potential application on future astronaut spacesuits.

Students in Louise Palardy's honors chemistry class were involved this week in a "citizen science" lab, which is a crowd-sourced initiative that relies on voluntary public participation in the scientific process while addressing real-world problems. 

According to Palardy, who also serves as the school's STEM specialist and manager of the robotics center, citizen science is a perfect fit for Notre Dame Prep's International Baccalaureate program philosophy of community engagement and international mindedness.

She said she discovered this week's lab on using UV light in material science while looking through the citizen science database, which is funded by citizenscience.gov. 

"I bought a book that was a field guide to citizen science and it made the process of finding a project very easy," she said. "The field guide description said, 'as we face global challenges, we may want to find local ways to make a difference. Citizen science is a global collaborative effort. It brings you together with teams of scientists who need and value your work for authentic research.'"

Her search turned up several possibilities, but she ended up with a project collaboration from the Royal Society of Chemistry in the UK called Mission: Starlight. The project's overarching goal, according to RSC, is to test a variety of materials and coatings to determine how best to protect future astronauts from the harmful effects of UV light.

"We tested a variety of materials to see how well they block or minimize ultraviolet light from penetration and a variety of sunscreens and other liquids that could be used as coatings," Palardy said. "We created a database of findings from all four sections of honors chemistry, nearly 90 students. The students were then tasked with creating recommendations for the ideal spacesuit.

"Materials science is an area of study that I am very passionate about," she continued. "It brings engineering and chemistry together and creates the ability to engage our students with hands-on, real-word experiences in the classroom."

Palardy will be taking her passion for material science to MIT this summer for a special class called the Genome Materials Initiative Class sponsored by the ASM Materials Education Foundation. 

More on the Genome Materials Initiative: The Materials Genome Initiative is a federal multi-agency initiative for discovering, manufacturing, and deploying advanced materials twice as fast and at a fraction of the cost compared to traditional methods. The initiative creates policy, resources, and infrastructure to support U.S. institutions in the adoption of methods for accelerating materials development.

For information on admission to Notre Dame Prep, please click here.

Comments or questions? mkelly@ndpma.org

About Notre Dame Preparatory School
"At Notre Dame Prep, we inspire our students to become the best versions of themselves. We challenge them through an experience of academic excellence, focused on active, project-based learning. We invite them to explore a world of opportunities beyond the classroom. We guide them as they grow in spirituality within a community strong in its Catholic and Marist identity."

Notre Dame Preparatory School is a private, Catholic, independent, coeducational day school located in Oakland County. Notre Dame Preparatory School's upper school enrolls students in grades nine through twelve and has been named one of the nation's best 50 Catholic high schools (Acton Institute) four times since 2005. Notre Dame Prep's middle and lower schools enroll students in pre-kindergarten through grade eight. All three schools are International Baccalaureate "World Schools." NDP is conducted by the Marist Fathers and Brothers and is accredited by the Independent Schools Association of the Central States and the National Association of Independent Schools. For more on Notre Dame Preparatory School, visit the school’s home page at www.ndpma.org.