Hello,
I helped test particle detectors for the CHARM sounding rocket that was launched from the Poker Flat Research Range in Alaska yesterday. You can read about what it was like testing the particle detectors by clicking on the link to the blog near the top of the page.
I've also done a little bit of work with the spare flight electronics for the Wideband Data Plasma Wave Receiver on board the Cluster mission. We were not quite sure how to interpret some of the data after the Cluster mission was launched. Fortunately, we still had a spare instrument here on Earth that I could take a look at. I made up signals like the ones we see in space, input them into the receiver, and looked at the output on a computer.
You can read about the Cluster mission here -
http://clusterlaunch.esa.int/science-e/www/area/index.cfm?fareaid=8 You can also read about the Wideband Data Plasma Wave Receiver and see a picture of the shiny metal box that holds the electronics here -
http://www-pw.physics.uiowa.edu/cluster/ Kris