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KU RocketStars take top honors at First Nations Launch International Rocket Competition
LAWRENCE — The KU RocketStars, a team of Indigenous STEM scholars from the University of Kansas and members of the KU American Indian Science and Engineering Society chapter, won two awards at the 16th Annual First Nations Launch High-Powered Rocketry Competition, hosted by NASA’s Wisconsin Space Grant Consortium. One award recognized the group’s outreach to KU groups, Lawrence and Free State high schools, and to the Girl Scouts of Kansas City.
KU graduate student completes prestigious fellowship at Oak Ridge National Laboratory
LAWRENCE — A University of Kansas graduate student is back in Lawrence after spending three months conducting nuclear science research at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee as part of a highly competitive research fellowship sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). Amrit Gautam, a KU graduate student in the physics doctoral program from Pokhara, Nepal, was among just 62 doctoral students nationwide selected for the DOE’s Office of Science Graduate Student Research Fellowship.
Full stories below.
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Contact: Palvih Bhana, School of Engineering, 785-864-3620, [email protected]
KU RocketStars take top honors at First Nations Launch International Rocket Competition
LAWRENCE — The KU RocketStars, a team of Indigenous science, technology, engineering and math scholars from the University of Kansas and members of the KU American Indian Science and Engineering Society chapter, won two awards at the 16th Annual First Nations Launch High-Powered Rocketry Competition, hosted by NASA’s Wisconsin Space Grant Consortium.
The competition, held April 25–27 at the Richard Bong State Recreation Area in Kansasville, Wisconsin, brought together an international field of top institutions including the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, University of Toronto, Northern Arizona University, University of British Columbia, University of Washington, Queens University of Canada, and tribal colleges such as Menominee Nation, Leech Lake and Turtle Mountain.
KU’s team stood out among strong international competition, securing the Outreach Award and winning the Patch Design Contest for its rocket, The Star Snagger.
The KU RocketStars team members include:
Chamisa Edmo (Navajo, Blackfeet, Shoshone-Bannock), graduate student in computer science, Lawrence.
Kate Rosa (Sicangu Lakota), undergraduate in molecular biology, Emporia.
Trey Jimboy (Tlingit), undergraduate student in electrical engineering, Lawrence.
Annalise Guthrie (Cherokee), doctoral student in ecology & evolutionary biology, Kansas City, Missouri.
Mollie Coffey (Comanche), undergraduate student in microbiology with a minor in Spanish, Lawrence.
Karen Middleton (Kickapoo), undergraduate student in computer science, Lawrence.
The Outreach Award recognized KU RocketStars’ exceptional commitment to community engagement.
Throughout the year, the team led innovative STEM education activities, including:
Film canister rocket demonstrations at the KU Carnival of Chemistry and the KU Powwow.
A rocket launch event for the Girl Scouts of Kansas City, helping scouts earn their STEM patches.
A “Learn Rocketry” series with Lawrence and Free State high schools, where Indigenous Intertribal Club students built and launched Estes rockets and toured KU Engineering, and were introduced to KU’s Indigenous STEM research opportunities.
“This is about more than rockets,” said Edmo, team lead. “It’s about showing Indigenous youth that they belong in science, engineering and in space exploration.”
Now, in their second year, the KU RocketStars have steadily expanded their knowledge and technical certification. Five members — Edmo and Rosa (Level 2 certification), Guthrie, Jimboy and Coffey (Level 1 certification) — have achieved High Powered Rocketry Certification through the national Tripoli Rocketry Association, with earlier successful flights at the Argonia Cup competition.
In its 16th and final year, the First Nations Launch competition has offered a unique opportunity for students from tribal colleges, Native American-Serving Nontribal Institutions (NASNTI) and AISES collegiate chapters to gain hands-on aerospace experience. The program has aimed to ignite a passion for STEM fields among Indigenous students by combining technical challenges with cultural pride and community building.
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Contact: Ranjit Arab, College of Liberal Arts & Sciences, [email protected]
KU graduate student completes prestigious fellowship at Oak Ridge National Laboratory
LAWRENCE — A University of Kansas graduate student is back in Lawrence after spending three months conducting nuclear science research at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee as part of a highly competitive research fellowship sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE).
Amrit Gautam, a KU graduate student in the physics doctoral program from Pokhara, Nepal, was among just 62 doctoral students nationwide selected for the DOE’s Office of Science Graduate Student Research Fellowship. He is one of only two students from Kansas and the only student chosen from KU this year.
The fellowship, which recognizes top doctoral students across fields like physics, chemistry, engineering and computational sciences, provides supplemental awards to outstanding U.S. graduate students so they can pursue part of their graduate thesis research at participating DOE labs and facilities in areas that address scientific challenges central to the department’s mission. This unique research experience helps advance the graduate students’ doctoral thesis and gives them access to the expertise, resources and capabilities available at DOE labs and facilities.
In Gautam’s case, he spent the fellowship conducting his thesis research at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, developing and testing readout systems for pixel technologies used in nuclear physics experiments. This cutting-edge research will significantly contribute to advancements at the future Electron-Ion Collider, which is currently being built at Brookhaven National Laboratory in Upton, New York, and is expected to be operational within the next decade.
“It was a great opportunity to further develop my doctoral training in some advanced nuclear physics areas that complement the skills that I have developed at KU,” Gautam said.
This fellowship comes on the heels of Gautam receiving another prestigious fellowship. Last year, he was awarded a Summer Students Exchange Program fellowship, which is jointly sponsored by the DOE and Italy’s Institute for Nuclear Physics. That fellowship enabled him to conduct research at the Institute of Nuclear Physics in Bologna, Italy.
One person who is well-aware of Gautam’s research excellence is Daniel Tapia Takaki, professor in the Department of Physics & Astronomy at KU. Not only is Takaki Gautam’s research adviser, he is also the chair of the ALICE-USA Council at the CERN Large Hadron Collider, which Gautam is a member of.
Takaki said the new technologies Gautam is developing for the Electron-Ion Collider will generate technological breakthroughs with far-reaching impacts on human health and national challenges.
“We are proud of Amrit’s commitment to pushing the frontiers of nuclear physics,” Takaki said. “His achievements underscore the significant research being conducted at KU in nuclear science, highlighting the university’s dedication to academic excellence and innovation.”
The DOE’s Office of Science Graduate Student Research Fellowship program is sponsored and managed by the DOE Office of Science’s Office of Workforce Development for Teachers and Scientists (WDTS), in collaboration with the six Office of Science research programs and the DOE national laboratories/facilities.
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Erinn Barcomb-Peterson, director of news and media relations, [email protected]
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