"Go Bruins" In Outer Space

From UCLA Today:

When Space Shuttle Atlantis mission STS-125 lifts off on Monday, May 11, for NASA’s final mission to service the Hubble Space Telescope, a proud Bruin will be among the seven crew members. On her first space flight, Mission Specialist K. Megan McArthur earned her B.A. in aerospace engineering at UCLA in 1993. She went on to obtain a Ph.D. from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego. In 2000, she joined NASA, where she worked in the Shuttle Avionics Integration Laboratory and the Space Station and Space Shuttle Mission Control centers. In 2004, she served as the crew support astronaut, stationed at the Johnson Space Station in Houston, for the Expedition 9 crew during their six-month mission aboard the International Space Station. The planned repairs to the Hubble should allow the telescope to function until at least 2013, when its successor, the James Webb Space Telescope, is due to be launched.

You can read UCLA Today's interview with Megan over here. I will just bring attention to this detail that caught my attention:

We understand you’ll be taking along a couple of items from UCLA?

We are allowed to fly some small personal items for our families as well as for organizations that are important to us. I contacted the School of Engineering and told them, “I’d really like to fly something that represents UCLA with me on my flight because UCLA was a big part of my life.” I’m going to take along a miniature IMP, the computer switch that served as the first node of the Internet at UCLA in 1969. I’ll also be bringing along a UCLA T-shirt because, as you know, go Bruins! I had a lot of life-changing events when I went to school there, so I’m happy to fly with a little piece of UCLA.

Just gives a whole new meaning to concept of a greater "Bruin Nation."

GO BRUINS.