Week 2: Over(leaf) the moon for Theory
Kira A -
Greetings from the world of LaTeX! This week, along with participating in my last Arizona Music Educators Association West Region Honor Band, I shifted my focus for my project from instrumentation and design of my spacecraft toward theory and writing for my final paper.
This past summer, while participating in the Astrophysics Summer Science Program (SSP) at CU Boulder I learned to use Overleaf typesetting with LaTeX. LaTeX is a document preparation system where one can code the content of their documentation producing a final product that is far more conducive to professional and scientific papers. This is why I have opted to use Overleaf to write my paper. Below is an example from my SSP Orbit Determination Paper for asteroid 66269 (1999-JN3) of how graphs and equations can seamlessly and cleanly integrate into the text.
Additionally, here is an example of the Overleaf typesetting interface for the title page of my paper as well as a sneak peek of the page itself. 🙂
To make my paper digestible and accessible to all readers, I am dedicating the theory section of my paper to explaining the most commonly used concepts, or fundamental equations, and their derivations in my project. This includes everything from the definitions of concepts such as the orbital elements which will help in defining the orbit and trajectory of my spacecraft, to the final orbit-raising maneuver which is the culmination of everything in my project. This theory section will also reinforce my knowledge of the concepts within my project and ensure I have a solid understanding of them to build upon for more advanced concepts later down the line as I transition into my college classes this fall.
Beyond this, to integrate the theory needed for the final orbit-raising maneuver into my paper, I have been hand-deriving the equations to grasp the process of obtaining them so as to not merely pull equations from textbooks and implement them into my final code without a clear understanding of what they mean and how they fit into the bigger picture. One such equation is the modified rocket equation. This equation plays a major role in my calculations as it will allow me to calculate the mass expelled from the rocket as exhaust during each orbit-raising maneuver the rocket completes. This mass can be equated to the fuel used during the maneuvers which I aim to reduce through this project and the orbit-raising maneuver. Below is a picture of the derivation for the rocket equation I completed on a whiteboard.
Looking towards this upcoming week, I am excited to be able to participate in the senior trip as well as a snowboarding vacation with my family; however, I will not have access to my laptop at all times to work on LaTeX, so I will use this coming week to focus on spacecraft instrumentation as well as mission objectives.
As, always, I am forever grateful to Mr. Joseph and Dr. Farooq who are willing to offer their time to guide me throughout this project, and to all of you who take the time to read and comment on my posts. I hope you will all tune in next time.
Ad Lunam!
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