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NAME: Loren W. Acton (Ph.D.)
Payload Specialist
PERSONAL DATA: Born March 7, 1936, in Lewiston, Montana. Married. Two children.
EDUCATION: Received a bachelor of science degree from Montana State University in 1959, and a doctor of philosophy from the University of Colorado in 1965.
ORGANIZATIONS: American Astronomical Society, International Astronomical Union, Sigma Chi, Astronomical Society of the Pacific, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and Tau Beta Pi.
EXPERIENCE: Dr. Acton is the senior staff scientist with the Space Sciences Laboratory, Lockheed Palo Alto Research Laboratory, California. As a research scientist, his principle duties included conducting scientific studies of the Sun and other celestial objects using advanced space instruments and serving as a co-investigator on one of the Spacelab 2 solar experiments, the Solar Optical Universal Polarimeter. In 1985, he was a payload specialist on STS-51F/ Spacelab-2. At mission conclusion, Dr. Acton had traveled over 2.8 million miles in 126 Earth orbits, logging over 190 hours in space.
SPACE FLIGHT EXPERIENCE: STS-51F/Spacelab-2 Challenger (July 29 to August 6, 1985) was launched from Kennedy Space Center, Florida, and returned to land at Edwards Air Force Base, California. STS-51F was the first pallet-only Spacelab mission, and the first mission to operate the Spacelab Instrument Pointing System (IPS). It carried 13 major experiments in astronomy, astrophysics, and life sciences. Mission duration was 7 days, 22 hours, 45 minutes and 26.
AUGUST 1985
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