There's more to Zack's story. Zack and some fellow students at Colorado put together a satellite called the Citizen Explorer I. It will collect ozone data and downlink it to schools around the world. Plus, it will introduce all the participating schools to ham radio, since the downlink frequencies are in the ham bands.

Zack is responsible for the satellite communications subsystem at the ripe old age of 22. He took out the original overly complex, special purpose modulation hardware and replaced it with a terminal node controller (TNC) and implemented the point-to-point protocol (PPP--the connection protocol used by the vast majority of Internet users). To prove the system would work, he experimented across town using two-meter packet radio with his old friend Eric Permut. He demonstrated to his colleagues how AO-27 and UO-14 work to show the potential of ham radio. As it turns out, since the uplink is on a ham frequency, all the control center operators are, in fact, ham radio control operators in the FCC sense. So, Zack became an Amateur Radio Elmer. At the end of his class, 10 out of 11 of his students passed their Technician exam on the first try!

A BARC Junior is now introducing others to Amateur Radio--in a very big way! Ellie Van Winkle exclaimed, "I now have ham radio grandchildren!" -- Dave Casler, KE0OG