Photo Courtesy of Arizona SciTech Festival/MJS Designs

Logo of the Arizona SciTech Festival.

(Photo by Andrew Bernier - KJZZ)

A synthetic cadaver, or Syndaver, at UA Medical School Downtown.

(Photo Courtesy of NASA/Origins Spectral Interpretation Resource Identification Security - Regolith Explorer (OSIRIS-REx))

OSIRIS-REx will travel to a near-Earth asteroid and bring a sample back to Earth for study.

With downtown Phoenix transformed into Super Bowl Central, the University of Arizona is giving visitors a hands-on experience with some of its projects, and is kicking off a much larger state-wide festival.

The Connect 2 STEM event Saturday at the downtown UA Medical School is launching the Arizona SciTech Festival, which features nearly 800 STEM events through the year.

UA's Allison Otu said with Super Bowl Central expecting big crowds, it’s time to start showcasing Arizona organizations committed to STEM.

“We have an estimated million people that will be visiting downtown Phoenix in the next few days and how do we capitalize on that to show off some neat, new innovative technologies that might inspire kids to maybe go into some STEM-related careers and fields?” Otu said.

The outside displays will cover areas from inside the cell to the far reaches of outer space.

“We have 50 different tables and booths to learn more about outer space technology or medical education technology and touch a synthetic cadaver,” Otu said.

One of UA’s feature projects, the OSIRIS-REx mission which aims to collect and return samples of an asteroid to Earth will be there. Dante Lauretta is the principal investigator of the mission.

“We will have hands on experiments dealing spectroscopy. That people can understand how we look at light reflected off the surface of asteroids to infer something about their physical properties and their chemistry and their mineralogy," Lauretta said.

Lauretta notes the public should be involved in OSIRIS-REx and events like this may even spark the interest and talent needed to replace student staff who graduate from the project.

“We seek to really engage the public in OSIRIS-REx" Lauretta said. "We really feel like it’s the public’s mission. It’s funded by American taxpayers. It’s a great adventure that requires a diverse array of talent.”

While the mission hopes for a touchdown on the asteroid in 2019, they can still score a couple recruits now to help the mission succeed down the line.