Engineering capstone students take flight to test laser welding for space

How do you repair a spaceship in orbit? Under the current operating procedures, the parts would be assembled on Earth and then flown up to space and attached, racking up tremendous costs.  

A group of Ohio State University College of Engineering senior capstone students and faculty, along with a team of NASA engineers, are developing an alternative – a robotic laser welding machine that can manufacture and join materials in space. The research project is funded by the Ohio Federal Research Network, which is managed by Parallax Advanced Research.