In summer 2025, I worked with Siyuan Zhou and Elijah Conley, mentored by Dr. Alex Roth, through Taylor University’s FMUS program. We designed and tested low‑cost air bearings to simulate microgravity for lab‑scale experiments.

Microgravity testing is essential for spacecraft systems, robots, and CubeSats, yet commercial rigs often cost tens of thousands of dollars—placing them beyond the budgets of smaller labs. To address this gap, we:

• Reviewed existing air‑bearing designs and performance literature.

• Modeled bearing geometries in Fusion 360 and simulated airflow using ANSYS Fluent.

• Fabricated multiple prototypes in Taylor’s machine shop.

• Performed experiments to measure lift and airflow under varied conditions.

Our experiments examined how orifice size, chamber shape, and bearing geometry influence airflow patterns and generated lift. The goal was to determine whether low‑cost, in‑house air bearings can provide comparable microgravity simulation performance to expensive commercial systems for lab‑scale testing.