The Iowa Spaceflight Laboratory (ISL) is a cutting-edge laboratory that serves as the hub of space-based instrument development at the University of Iowa. Researchers, engineers, students, and faculty use this laboratory to develop, test, and qualify instruments for NASA missions. 

The Department of Physics & Astronomy has a long history of developing spaceflight instrumentation for exploration of the Earth, dating back to 1958, when Professor James Van Allen helped put a cosmic ray instrument on Explorer 1, the first orbiting spacecraft launched by the United States. This effectively makes the University of Iowa the birthplace of space-based scientific investigation. 

Our department has either built instruments or entire packages of instruments for things that orbit the Earth for over 100 different missions over the course of our history, including the Voyager I & II probes, missions to Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn, and most recently the TRACERS mission for NASA's Heliophysics division.

Participants will meet scientists and engineers who enable this work at UI and see the facility where NASA instruments are under development.