Dawn Community
More than Just Names On a microchip
Welcome to the Voice of the Dawn Community!
The “Dawn Microchip” is a very special computer chip that carries the names of more than 360,000 people worldwide who signed up during the “Send Your Name to the Asteroid Belt” campaign to join together in a “virtual voyage” to the asteroid belt. The names were submitted one by one online by the public - between September 2005 and November 2006. These space enthusiasts are now bound together for an eight year trip to the beginnings of space.
The Dawn Microchip has been installed above the forward ion thruster, underneath the spacecraft's “High Gain Antenna.” A copy of the microchip was also made, and this back-up copy is on display at the 2007 Open House at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.
If you are one of the lucky people to get your name on that chip, please leave your comments on this site for the rest of us to hear.
DAWN MICROCHIP
Courtesy: NASA - Jim Grossman
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