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His name never goes unnoticed. This is the consequence of being called Peter Parker. But you could say that, like his counterpart in comics, his work is something of a heroic one. And it's that this 63-year-old professional is heading NASA's Statistical Engineering Group . And while it may seem uninteresting, his work helps reduce the risk of failure of a space mission. He was recently in the country as part of the III International Conference on Quality and Applied Statistics of the University of Piura.
-What does a statistician engineer do?
People think that my job is to be in a box surrounded by numbers This is not like that. The statistical engineer is responsible for converting a large amount of data into specific decisions. In other words, we reduce uncertainty. It is a process in which the information is interpreted, the quality of the data is evaluated, its origin and its application.
-What is its application in NASA?
We use statistics to strategically plan studies that evaluate the behavior of different systems during a space mission. For example, I participated in a project to develop a rocket engine system. In collaboration with a multidisciplinary team, we had to estimate how much the rocket would turn during its launch and devise a method to counter this shift. For this we took one of the two engines of an old ferry and we used it with a new configuration.
-C is a job at constant risk.
Many. But the main thing is the loss of human lives, astronauts. I worked on projects where the space shuttle was sitting on the launch pad and was waiting for the decision to take off or not astronauts aboard. The risk is never zero. There are many ways to make decisions: by experience, by instinct, and so on. But such arguments are not acceptable when a person's life is at stake. That is why we must effectively overcome these risks, through information, in order to make the most objective decision.
-The fine data can be the difference between failure and success.
If you see the story of NASA you'll know we've had some spectacular mistakes. Some of them have arrived because of statistical failures. We are a research organization, we do things that no one has done before. That's why we never put all our trust in the data. The information must go through a process of in-depth analysis and interpretation in which many factors are taken into account, and a multidisciplinary team works.
-What types of tools or technologies are used to make these decisions?
We have simulation facilities. One of them is the wind tunnel, where the behavior of aerospace systems is evaluated and measured. We also use tools related to the design of experiments, surface response methodology, reliability and statistical processes. But the most important thing is the way we approach the problem and study it
– What do you consider to be the mission that has struck you the most?
I worked on the Curiosity rover, currently on Mars. . It's very exciting to have worked on something that covers the Martian surface to this point. This is the largest rover that NASA put on Mars. It's the size of a small car. I have participated in the area known as the descending landing entrance. This is when the vehicle collides with the atmosphere of Mars and begins its entry on the planet. This is the most critical part of the flight for the vehicle, since everything must be done autonomously, we have no control at this stage. My job was to develop a system that would rebuild or estimate the trajectory of the vehicle as it enters the Martian atmosphere until it reaches the surface. But what is innovative in this project is that we managed to land the Curiosity in a smaller area than before. We have managed to reduce the uncertainty of this landing, so that in the future the missions will not have to land alone in large flat areas and not so interesting.
– Statistics are vital for man to reach Mars?
This is an essential component. This challenge is in the big, complex and unstructured problems that statistical engineering seeks to solve.
– Which project do you currently participate in?
I can not give details [risas]. But I can say that one of NASA's initiatives is to partner with private companies for them to develop vehicles that allow us to bring astronauts into the world. # 39; space. It is in this area that I spent most of my time working. There are very important challenges because we do not control the design, it is the vehicles of someone else, we only control the choice of takeoff, boarding or not. This is a very large field of work and a cultural change for the NASA .
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