Purdue News

For David Wolf, a boy's dream is fulfilled in space Somewhere out there is a 9-year-old boy or girl, captivated by the exploits of an astronaut. The youngster watches events beamed live from the space shuttle or videotaped and broadcast on a science show for kids. Inspired, he child will work a bit harder at school, making plans someday to go aloft. He or she might even be heard to say, "How do you get to be an astronaut when you grow up?" This is one of the legacies of space exploration. While grown-ups might look on the comings and goings of space shuttles with the detachment usually reserved for watching El Nino coverage on TV news, kids find it fascinating. It might be astronauts' courage or that they're the closest thing to a real superhero. Or maybe being an astronaut is just an out-of-this-world goal to set. Lately kids have been watching David Wolf, who spent four months on the Mir space station. The 1978 Purdue electrical engineering graduate was one of seven U.S. astronauts to have served aboard the Russian craft. The Indianapolis native was received as the hero he is when he returned home in early May. More than 150 people, including fifth-graders from Spring Mill Elementary, the school Wolf attended, greeted him at Indianapolis International Airport. The adulation represents a role reversal for Wolf. Back in the mid-1960s, Wolf was among those youngsters trying to imagine what it would be like to go into space. A spacewalk by astronaut Edward White during a Gemini mission in 1965 fed that curiosity. "When I was a boy, Ed White's spacewalk really inspired me to be an astronaut," Wolf says. "At that point, I set a goal to be an astronaut." That goal would lead him to Purdue University and the Schools of Engineering in 1974. The University already had produced Neil Armstrong, the 1955 aeronautical engineering alumnus who in 1969 piloted the first spacecraft to land on the moon and then descended to the lunar surface as the first human to set foot on the moon. Wolf went on to earn a medical degree from Indiana University in 1982, to work in biomedical engineering for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, and to his present position as an astronaut, scientist and member of the design team for the International Space Station. Each phase of manned space exploration has served as a platform for the next. Lessons learned from Mercury and Apollo missions provided important lessons for the shuttle program. The tribulations of Skylab and aboard Mir have proven invaluable in designing the International Space Station. The next great stride into space after ISS is built will be a manned trip to Mars or a permanent outpost on the moon, which will be a staging area for a flight to Mars. Thanks in large part to a Purdue education and the kind of focus that comes from setting lofty goals, Wolf will have a continuing role in charting the future of space exploration. Meanwhile, that 9-year-old will be watching. And one day, that youngster might just be among the first humans to fly to Mars - or beyond.