RESTON, Va., July 08, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Rising high school senior Eleanor Sigrest is the winner of the Design/Build/Launch (DBL) competition sponsored by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) and Blue Origin.

Eleanor Sigrest is enrolled in a dual program at Forest Park High School in Woodbridge, Virginia, and the Governor’s School at Innovation Park in Manassas, Virginia. Her winning experiment Improving Fluid Management Through A Novel Microgravity Slosh Mitigation Technique will be the first AIAA-sponsored payload to launch on Blue Origin’s New Shepard rocket. She will present her findings at AIAA’s new space event ASCEND.

“Ever since I can remember,” she said, “I’ve looked at the stars and known I want to go to space. I want to be the first person on Mars. Through research, I feel I better my personal knowledge and contribute to a community, all sharing the same goal of exploring beyond our Earth and developing the technologies necessary to get to Mars – technologies that will also benefit all humankind.”

She also received the first-place AIAA “Look Up!” Award at the 2020 Regeneron International Science and Engineering Fair (Intel ISEF).

AIAA Executive Director Dan Dumbacher said, “If aerospace is to continue pushing boundaries to create a better world for us all, we need students like Eleanor to be inspired to take up the challenge.”

“Eleanor’s passion to explore the unexplored and determination to bring clarity to science we don’t yet understand are unmatched, and we can’t wait to see how her experiment performs in space,” said Dr. Erika Wagner, Payload Sales Director at Blue Origin. “We’re humbled to inspire students to pursue careers in STEM through payloads on our reusable New Shepard vehicle and our non-profit, Club for the Future.” 

Full Release
Media contact: Michele McDonald, michelem@aiaa.org, 703.264.7542  

About Blue Origin
For information on Blue Origin, visit www.blueorigin.com and follow @BlueOrigin on Twitter and Instagram. To learn more about Club for the Future and our space mail program, visit clubforfuture.org and follow @ClubForFuture on Twitter and Instagram.

About AIAA 
The American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) is the world’s largest aerospace technical society. With nearly 30,000 individual members from 91 countries, and 100 corporate members, AIAA brings together industry, academia, and government to advance engineering and science in aviation, space, and defense. For more information, visit www.aiaa.org, or follow AIAA on Twitter, Facebook, or LinkedIn.  

A photo accompanying this announcement is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/ae597736-0ca2-42aa-aaf5-2d6ee04c050b

Eleanor Sigrest

Eleanor Sigrest wins Design/Build/Launch competition sponsored by Blue Origin and AIAA.