UPDATE # 19 - April 3, 1998

PART 1: Linda's Out to Launch
PART 2: Calendar of events
PART 3: Dotting our i's and crossing our t's before shipping
PART 4: BJ's Houston Trip
PART 5: Some final thoughts as the mission approaches
PART 6: Subscribing & unsubscribing: how to do it!

LINDA'S OUT TO LAUNCH!

When next you hear from me I will be at Florida's Kennedy Space Center
from where I will be bringing you a NeurOn's eye view of the activities
surrounding the launch of STS-90.

Believe it or not, we're almost there. For those of us who have joined the
Neurolab watch early, this has been an incredibly exciting time. In
September we traveled to Johnson Space Center for the Investigators'
Working Group at Johnson Space Center, Houston, Texas. There we began to
meet the diverse group that would become a part of the NeurOn team over
the ensuing 6 months, interested in bringing their excitement for working
at NASA to the classroom.

We've chatted with and shared the lives of folks, from those who
envisioned the experiments to those who designed the hardware, people who
order supplies and others who pack them onto the shuttle, people who train
astronauts and Neurolab crew members themselves. What a rich variety of
very special people!

And now, at least the California (NASA ARC) team is chasing its hardware
east to see it safely on its way into orbit. So I will be joining them, to
follow this process through to launch. See the Calendar of Events below
for some hints on how to plan to accompany me on this adventure. Some
scheduling details will be firmed up when I arrive in Florida and get a
good "lay of the land."

But exciting as it is, lest you think that launch is the end, remember,
the purpose of Neurolab is the study of the brain and nervous system in
limited gravity! What is done on orbit in Neurolab, on Earth during the
mission and then after landing is the part that will live long after this
mission ends. It's like Neurolab is finally up to bat after three years
overall of preparation and training! 

The inflight activities will be monitored at Kennedy Space Center in
Florida, at Johnson Space Center in Texas and at Ames Research Center in
California (to mention only three!) Below Chris Barreras mentions that he
will be a part of the monitoring at ARC, Chris Maese (see his journal
below also) will be at JSC and I will spend a little time at KSC. So, the
countdown is really only the beginning of a new phase of this NeurOn
project.

With you to Cape Canaveral,
Linda

CALENDAR OF EVENTS

->Monday, April 6, at 7 p.m. Eastern time:  from Penn State on public
radio station WPSU-FM (90.1, 91.5 & 106.7) Penn State's first faculty
member to fly aboard  the shuttle (crew member Jim Pawelczyk) will join
President Graham Spanier to discuss the future of space exploration on the
next edition of "To the Best of My Knowledge," Internet users may to link
to sound and pictures from the program at www.psu.edu/ur/tech/tech.html;
and they will be able to contact the President during the program via
e-mail sent to response@psu.

->April 13, 14 and 15, NeurOn manager Linda Conrad will bring live reports
from Kennedy Space Center surrounding the launch of STS-90.
See     http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/neuron/events/launch
for frequent journals and details on the Webcasts as they become
available.

->Wednesday, April 15 at 10:00 a.m.-11:00 a.m. Pacific Time:
Janis Davis-Street, Nutritionist as the final WITN Career Segment chat.
See:    http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/neuron/video
Janis is part of a team whose job is finding out what foods and nutrients
are important for the astronauts as they venture into space.

Please join us for following two bilingual chats:

->Wednesday, April 22 at 11:00 a.m.12:00 noon Pacific Daylight Time
Angel Plaza, Payload Project Engineering Manager
http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/neuron/team/plaza.html
Angel is payload project engineering manager for NASA, at the Johnson
Space Center. He oversees the development of all the hardware for certain
life science experiments for the mission. Born and raised in Ponce, Puerto
Rico, Angel is completely bilingual.

->Friday, May 15 at 8:00 - 9:00 a.m. Pacific Daylight Time
Jose Limardo, Hardware Project Engineer
http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/neuron/team/limardo.html
Jos is currently working on three experiments for the STS-90 Neurolab
mission. Born and educated in Puerto Rico, Jos is completely bilingual.

To see a complete list of bilingual chats featuring scientists and
engineers from other Sharing NASA projects:
        http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/common/bilingual

All NeurOn chats are listed at: http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/neuron/chats

DOTTING OUR I'S AND CROSSING OUR T'S BEFORE SHIPPING

by Chris Maese
http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/neuron/team/maese.html

January 9, l998
This is the largest payload that this office has ever done. The
experiments were designed to be a reflight of previously flown hardware. I
think when we set out to do these flight experiments, we were using
different guidelines about how we could achieve that plan. In essence we
do have some re-flown hardware, but the experiments to be flown in this
hardware have made us modify the hardware to some extent. The concepts
that we had from previous flights have been used for this flight, but it
wasn't exactly reusing the same hardware. We've had to readjust our
thinking in how we approach this.

As I said, it's the largest payload we've ever done. The fact that we are
flying international hardware, and everything for the ARC portion of the
payload must go through ARC. We're trying to do this in an established
timeline though we've had to deal with down-sizing and decreases in
funding; so we try to be smart about it. It's very difficult to be smart
and frugal and meet the schedule. It's a constant shell game trying to
figure out what is best and minimize risk to make sure we have a
successful mission. We try to make sure that we have the appropriate
checks and balances; that we've dotted our i's and crossed our t's. That's
difficult when folks are focused on one area and not looking at the big
picture. Trying to get people to expand themselves and to focus in is
always the constant challenge. I think that we're getting there. We've got
so few days left for this mission.

We've really pushed the envelope to make these experiments happen.
We've taken our punches, but it will be worth it in the end. We want to go
into a situation where we know we can be successful. We know there is
risk, and we want to know how we can make it work in flight. That's the
ultimate goal.

It's kind of exciting now in this last couple of months: we're getting
ready to ship - we'll receive our animals at KSC on February 2 (in another
couple of weeks), and then we'll be out at Kennedy for awhile. With a
launch April 2 [now 16], we've already got people leaving so there is a
lot happening. Plus: consider all the organisms we have onboard. We have
crickets, rats, mice, pregnant mice, rat mothers with their neonates. So
it's kind of an exciting payload!

I think I'll be ready for a rest. It's hard when you work at this
intensity, when you're trying to remember so much. You wonder if you ever
can go back to a simpler time when things are more controllable. I am
looking for this to end and to be successful, and to take a breather, to
clean my office, and then move on to the next thing. Right now I don't
know what that's going to be, but I certainly am ready for it.

BJ'S HOUSTON TRIP
by B.J. Navarro

http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/neuron/team/navarro.html

March 10, 1998

Howdy Space Friends and Family
Well, the Houston weather was agreeable, but the airlines lost one of my
bags. I had to invest in purchasing some personal items so I could go in
the next day looking appropriate for my scheduled activities.

I located the flight cold experiment equipment that had been shipped
from Ames Research Center (ARC) and worked with our astronaut crew
trainers to kit and place it on the Spacelab refrigerator racks for the
crew to review on Monday, 3/16. I was preparing the hardware for the
review, which our lead engineer would be attending with the crew
trainers. I returned home on Saturday.

The most important reason I was at Johnson Space Center (JSC) was to
participate in the Middeck Stowage Bench Review that I mentioned in
my last journal. I went over to the Boeing building on Thursday with
our lead crew trainer to view the ARC flight experiment hardware and
make sure everything was ready for the Friday the 13th late afternoon
review. We together discovered a couple of problems, and I had to call
back to ARC for assistance and to have some additional items sent the
next morning.

I also did not see an important hardware item which was coming from
Kennedy Space Center (KSC) and had to make some contact with
another Ames engineer to assist me in locating the hardware item and
getting it to Houston by the 1:00 p.m. review. He did some detective
work and found that the item had not been sent from the shipping area at
KSC, somehow the need date of 3/6 had been changed to 3/16.
Fortunately, for me the shipping person at KSC got the item on a plane
to Houston and the shipping person at JSC coordinated the pickup and
delivery. It was an item that needed a van to pick it up. So, with a lot
of team work (help from my friends) the hardware was at the review for the
astronaut crew to look at. It's a good thing too, because they decided to
put a couple of extra labels on it to make it easier for them to use when
they get up in space. Some memory joggers for them!

All in all, the review went well. There were a couple other pieces of
experiment hardware that the astronaut crew wanted to add and so I took
the action to get these resolved back at ARC. As of this posting all items
have been gathered and shipped to support these added items. Also,
there were actions assigned from the flight cold stowage review on the
following Monday. To complete all of this I am in the process of writing
a letter to our Mission Manager at JSC to explain what ARC did to
accomplish the action requests by the astronaut crew. ARC is really me
and the engineers I work with. I always have to explain things in
writing.

The next couple weeks will be very hectic; closing out documentation,
reviewing final integration documents and making sure the experiment
equipment that was at JSC gets to where it is suppose to go and then
finally shipping, from ARC, the remainder of the flight stowage
hardware. It'll be a lot of work, but I'm up for it!!!! I have a great
team here at ARC supporting this final effort!!!

Neurolab is on a roll at ARC!
bj

P.S. The airlines brought my bag to my hotel the next day so I looked
absolutely marvelous for my Friday the 13th review and I really didn't
have any bad luck that day!

SOME FINAL THOUGHTS AS THE MISSION APPROACHES

by Chris Barreras
March 4, l998

Hello again to everyone keeping track of the mission of the Brain

I had a small break in the action so I thought I would pass on some final
thoughts as the mission approaches:

We are at L-21 days and we are doing daily afternoon tagup meetings in
bldg. 240A with our payload manager Chris Maese. He wants to make
sure we have not left any stone unturned and that all open issues are
addressed prior to launch.

I have much respect for Chris M. He has a lot on his mind. We have one
more big test to do with Columbia and that is called PAD IVT which
electrically tests the connections between the Spacelab, the Orbiter
throughout the PAD and back to the control rooms ( A big important test).

As you know Columbia is at the PAD. We are loading foodbars for the
rodents for both the AEMs and RAHF cages and these will be shipped
out on 3/31. I did some foodbar loading myself since we are short
handed. I have always felt any Engineer should be ready to jump in and
turn the screws when the team needs help.

In addition, I am presently closing out last minute paperwork and pushing
out final shipments and preparing for any contingency operations at KSC.

I will fly out to KSC on 4/5/98 and return on 4/17 to support inflight
monitoring from ARC.

Take care all,
We have a good crew
A good ship
A good team
GO NEUROLAB!!!!!

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