Wednesday, July 2, 2008

UMass grad student joins NASA for summer

By Brendan Lynch

University of Massachusetts Amherst graduate student Erin Dominov has won an internship with NASA, according to the space agency.

Dominov, a West Hatfield native and a second-year grad student studying planetology, will join 23 other students from around the country for NASA’s 10-week Student Internship Program, in which they will take part in research projects with the help of a mentor.

According to her UMass website, Dominov, who plans to become a planetary geologist, started her internship in June, at the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., as well as at the University of Maryland Baltimore County. Over the course of the internship, Dominov will work more than 40 hours a week as a research assistant. She received her undergraduate degree from Bridgewater State College.

At UMass, Dominov’s research project involves mapping an area of Mars called Ausonia Mensa. Dominov, who said she has wanted to study the planet Earth since the eighth grade, focuses her research on learning about planets via remote sensors, and mineralogic and petrologic information.

To qualify for the NASA Student Internship Program, college sophomores, juniors, seniors or grad students must have at least a 3.0 grade point average and major in engineering, math, computer science, biology, physics, chemistry, or another aerospace-related field. Among the fields of study by NASA interns this summer are astrophysics, artificial intelligence, earth systems science, interplanetary physics, materials analysis, space communications and other subjects.