Messenger - Vol. 1, No. 1, Page 10 Fall 1991 Land, sea...and space grant, too The University of Delaware is now a space-grant institution, as well as a land-grant and sea-grant campus. In February, Delaware received a four-year, $600,000 NASA grant, which will support three graduate students and a post-doctoral fellow, permit the purchase of state-of-the-art computer equipment, help sponsor an outreach program and support faculty summer research. Only 13 states received the NASA grants. Delaware's grant was supplemented by the University's Bartol Research Institute to bring the total to nearly $1 million. Norman F. Ness, president of Bartol, will direct the National Space Grant fellowship program. "NASA has vast resources of information that must be analyzed in a timely fashion," Ness said, indicating that the students will be trained in the analysis and interpretation of data from space-borne instruments. The three graduate students selected as first space fellows are Tracey E. Obeda, who will work with Vic Klemas, professor of marine studies, on remote sensing of wetlands biomass production and methane gas emission; Philip H. Larson Jr., who will work with Jack Vinson, H. Fletcher Brown Professor of Mechanical Engineering, on engineering "smart" space structures; and Jason Tillett, who will work with James MacDonald, assistant professor of physics and astronomy, on nuclear burning of neutron stars. A search is under way for a post-doctoral fellow in physics and astronomy, who also will be supported by the program. As part of the space grant outreach program, an open house and tours of Sharp Laboratory are planned this fall, and a lecture series on astronomy, supported by the University and Mt. Cuba Observatory, will be enlarged. Support will be given, as well, to the Delaware Aerospace Academy and the Delaware Science Alliance. The academy sponsors a summer program for junior high school students, and the Science Alliance, a volunteer teaching partnership made up of representatives from industry, schools and the University, is expected to include programs on space science.