News Letter

CSE Department news room

Teacher: Open your textbook, page 137, Step 1:

identify the need for NASA to make a Robotic Arm

and define the problem…

Then, in a magical moment, the astronaut who

participated in the design of the robotic arm described

in the book appeared on the screen! He was invited by

the teacher, Dr. Abdelaziz Bouras, to give to the

students in a video-conference session the needed

details of the exercise… and a complementary

overview on the Robotic Arm mission and its ability

to “walk” around the International Space Station (ISS)

under its own control, with an ability to perform many

tasks automatically or semi-automatically (Installation

and deployment of solar arrays, Inspection of the

station, Support of astronauts during space walks). He

also informed them about future space projects and

insisted on how this necessitates continues research to

develop innovative systems and solutions for the

aerospace, human-machine interaction, robotic

systems and so on.

What better than having an astronaut to complement the

course textbook’s exercise?

Astronaut Michel Tognini is a former European

and

astronaut who served as Head of the

European Astronaut Centre of the European Space

Agency. He made spaceflight on the space shuttle

Columbia (deployment of the Chandra X-Ray

Observatory), and earlier on Soyuz (to link with

station). He attended NASA Johnson Space Center

and worked on the International Space Station (ISS).