Physics professor leads Center for Microgravity Research and Education

The Center for Microgravity Research and Education is a joint venture between UCF and Space Florida, an aerospace economic development agency. The center, which is located on UCF’s Orlando campus, conducts and facilitates research in microgravity.

“Some of the experiments that we’re working on in the center are looking at the early stages of planet formation, studying how those objects collide and stick together,” said Dr. Joshua Colwell, the director of CMRE and an associate professor of physics at UCF. “We need microgravity to simulate that.”

According to NASA’s website, microgravity emerges whenever an object is in free fall. Unlike what the name may imply, microgravity doesn’t refer to low levels of gravity but rather the condition of an object moving freely in response to gravity.

Colwell, whose research has primarily been in planetary sciences, continues to perform experiments in that area of astronomy at the center. As a result, Colwell and the center can help UCF establish itself as a worldwide competitor in microgravity research.

Read more here.