January 26, 2016  

Purdue team to test futuristic transportation design in contest

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. —A student team from Purdue University will compete in the SpaceX Hyperloop pod competition this weekend.

The contest takes place Friday (Jan. 29) and Saturday (Jan. 30) at Texas A&M University, College Station, Texas. The 18-member Purdue Hyperloop Team is among more than 1,000 students from from 120 universities competing in the event.

Hyperloop transportation involves a passenger capsule, which might travel at nearly the speed of sound in a vacuum tube. The company, SpaceX, released the concept in 2013.

Paul Witsberger, Purdue’s team captain, says the design project needed input from students in the College of Engineering’s schools of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Mechanical Engineering, Electrical and Computer Engineering and Industrial Engineering, as well the departments of Computer Science and Physics and Astronomy in the College of Science.

“It’s a very multi-disciplinary problem,” said the senior majoring in aeronautics and astronautics.

Teams will set up displays of their designs for judging at the competition. The top five teams and five additional teams chosen by SpaceX will move on to design testing later this year at a SpaceX Hyperloop test track. Five others that receive corporate sponsorship also will test their designs.

The Purdue Hyperloop Team was selected to compete after submitting a preliminary design last year.

Team members participated in a hyperloop class taught by faculty members, including Alina Alexeenko, an associate professor in the School of Aeronautics and Astronautics. Witsberger said 56 people in the class last semester worked on the project. Another 40 assisted this semester. 

Writer: Brian L. Huchel, 765-494-2084, bhuchel@purdue.edu 

Source: Paul Witsberger, pwitsber@purdue.edu 

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