Aug 17 2012

From The Space Library

CONTRACT RELEASE: C12-042 NASA AWARDS CALTECH FIVE-YEAR JET PROPULSION LABORATORY CONTRACT

WASHINGTON -- NASA has awarded the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena a new five-year contract to manage the agency's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). The contractor's primary mission is to support NASA's Science Mission Directorate (SMD) in carrying out specific objectives identified in the SMD Science Plan. The contract is for $8.5 billion. The contract extends the agreement between Caltech and NASA for management of JPL beyond its current expiration date of Sept. 30. The new contract runs from Oct. 1 through Sept. 30, 2017. "We are very pleased to be continuing our partnership with NASA," said Caltech President Jean-Lou Chameau. "Through this sustained collaboration, we ensure that JPL continues to be a national resource for space exploration, scientific leadership, technology and discovery, as well as an inspiration for young scientists and engineers." NASA's only federally funded research and development center, JPL conducts research expanding human understanding of Earth, the sun, the solar system, stars, planetary systems, galaxies, and the formation and evolution of the universe. JPL also manages NASA's Mars Exploration Program, which currently operates two spacecraft orbiting the Red Planet and two rovers on its surface, including the recently landed Curiosity. JPL's other responsibilities include support of NASA's applications, space sciences, Earth science and other science programs. Spacecraft managed by JPL have visited every planet in our solar system.

RELEASE: 12-282 NASA PICKS REVOLUTIONARY SPACE TECH PROPOSALS FOR DEVELOPMENT

WASHINGTON -- NASA's Space Technology Program has selected five technologies that could revolutionize America's space capabilities. In March, NASA issued a call for proposal focused on sudden and unexpected innovations that hold a potential for providing a "game-changing" impact on the efficiency and effectiveness of the agency's space capabilities. NASA has selected the following proposals for funding: --"Representing and Exploiting Cumulative Experience with Objects for Autonomous Manipulation," University of Massachusetts, Amherst. This technology could improve autonomous robotic operations using artificial intelligence during deep space missions. --"Lightweight High Performance Acoustic Suppression Technology Development," NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. This technology could suppress acoustic environments during launch. By reducing vibrations by acoustic suppression during launch, the amount of prelaunch vibration stress testing for onboard instruments also could be reduced. --"Fast Light Optical Gyroscopes for Precision Inertial Navigation," NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Ala. This technology could enhance navigation capabilities for spacecraft by improving the performance of existing gyroscopes by a factor of 1,000. --"EHD-Based Variable Conductance Thermal Interface Material," The Boeing Company, El Segundo, Calif. The development of this thermal material could provide better heat management for spacecraft. --"Membrane Enabled Reverse Lung," Oceaneering Space Systems, Houston. This technology could reduce the number of life support systems needed for astronauts. "NASA's Space Technology Program is enabling our future in space by investing in revolutionary and game-changing technologies that could open new doors for how we live, work and investigate space," said Michael Gazarik, director of the program at NASA Headquarters in Washington. "We are confident these selected technologies, with their highly qualified research teams, will enable great new opportunities for the next chapter in NASA's innovation story." The selected proposals take steps toward addressing critical technological barriers for advancing exploration and science missions, while also lowering the cost of other government and commercial space activities. Projects were selected through independent review of technical merit, alignment with NASA's Space Technology Roadmap priorities and the technology objectives identified by the National Research Council in its review of these roadmaps. Awards range from $125,000 to $1.8 million, with a total NASA investment of approximately $6 million through 2015. NASA's Game Changing Development Program, located at the agency's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va., is responsible for the management of these awards. The Game Changing Development Program is part of NASA's Space Technology Program, which is innovating, developing, testing and flying hardware for use in future science and exploration missions. NASA's technology investments provide cutting-edge solutions for our nation's future.

RELEASE: 12-284 NASA COMPLETES PILOT PROGRAM FOR ONE-ON-ONE VIRTUAL MENTORING OF MIDDLE SCHOOL GIRLS

WASHINGTON -- NASA's new virtual mentoring program is helping girls get excited about careers in science and technology by working one-on-one with agency professionals. Twenty-one girls in grades 5-8, representing 12 states from New York to Hawaii, have completed a pilot mentoring program called NASA Giving Initiative and Relevance to Learning Science (NASA GIRLS). NASA GIRLS is the first program to pair up girls with NASA female mentors from the Women@NASA program using online video programs such as Skype and Google Chat. Participants were selected from more than 1,600 applications. "NASA GIRLS allows young students to work directly with women who successfully have established STEM careers," said NASA Deputy Administrator Lori Garver. "The program uses technology familiar to the young generation and allows NASA to share its mission in regions where there may not be a NASA center." The mentoring sessions consisted of lessons in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM). The last session focused on applying one of the STEM subjects to two real-world events. The girls mathematically calculated the shift of Earth's tilt caused by the 2011 Japan earthquake. They also computed the volume of SpaceX's Dragon capsule, which in May became the first commercial spacecraft to deliver supplies to the International Space Station. The program included hands-on learning. During an engineering lesson, the girls and their mentors were challenged to build a robot hand or a Wright Brothers' model airplane while virtually connected. NASA GIRLS aims to use commercially available technology to provide convenient and meaningful mentoring in STEM subjects to inspire young girls to learn how science and engineering can help them reach their goal of making the world a better place. Recent data from the Girl Scouts Research Institute shows that female mentors are important when young girls decide to pursue advanced math and science courses. Many of the NASA GIRLS mentors offered their mentees guidance after the program, potentially forming long-term relationships that could help young women make decisions about college majors and career choices. NASA will evaluate the results from the pilot year of the program to offer a larger group of girls access in the second round.

RELEASE: 12-286 NASA ROCKET MISSION CARRYING UNIVERSITY STUDENT EXPERIMENTS

WALLOPS ISLAND, Va. -- University students will put their academic skills to the test when atmospheric and technology experiments they developed fly on a NASA suborbital sounding rocket. The launch will take place between 6:30 and 10 a.m., Thursday, Aug. 23, from the agency's Wallops Flight Facility at Wallops Island, Va. Four university experiments will be flown as part of an educational project called RockSat-X, which is designed to provide students hands-on experience in designing, fabricating, testing and conducting experiments for space flight. The project is a joint effort between NASA and the Colorado Space Grant Consortium at the University of Colorado at Boulder. The selected experiments for this year's RockSat launch are from Baylor University in Waco, Texas; University of Colorado at Boulder; the University of Puerto Rico; and Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech) in Blacksburg, Va. "RockSat-X is part of a series of student flight programs designed to enhance students' skills and prepare them for careers at NASA and in the aerospace industry," said Chris Koehler, director of the Colorado Space Grant Consortium. The program begins with a hands-on workshop called RockOn and then proceeds to the RockSat-C and RockSat-X programs. At each level, the experiments become more complex, which provides students an opportunity to gain a greater understanding of the requirements for developing space-based experiments. The experiments will fly on a two-stage Terrier-Improved Malemute rocket to a projected altitude of 98 miles. After the 15-minute flight, the payload carrying the experiments will splash down via parachute in the Atlantic Ocean approximately 66 miles off the coast of Virginia. The 875-pound payload will be recovered for re-use and experiment analysis. The University of Puerto Rico will use a mass spectrometer to conduct an analysis of atmospheric particles and pressure. Virginia Tech and Baylor universities have teamed up to measure nitric oxide and atmospheric dust. The University of Colorado will be testing a device to assist in de-orbiting small spacecraft and the Colorado Space Grant Consortium will fly seven cameras to capture all the action in high-definition, which will be made available to the public shortly after recovery. The RockSat-X concept provides students with a payload structure with pre-defined mechanical, power and data interfaces and volume and mass limits. This is the second RockSat-X mission, with the first having been flown July 11, 2011. The project will be the ninth suborbital rocket mission this year from NASA's launch facility on Wallops Island and the first of four launches scheduled through mid-September.

RELEASE: 12-287 NASA CURIOSITY TEAM PINPOINTS SITE FOR FIRST DRIVE, FIRST LASER USE ON TAP THIS WEEKEND

WASHINGTON -- The scientists and engineers of NASA's Curiosity rover mission have selected the first destination for their one-ton, six-wheeled mobile Mars laboratory. The target area, named Glenelg, is a natural intersection of three kinds of terrain. The choice was described by Curiosity Project Scientist John Grotzinger of the California Institute of Technology during a media teleconference on Aug. 17. "With such a great landing spot in Gale Crater, we literally had every degree of the compass to choose from for our first drive," Grotzinger said. "We had a bunch of strong contenders. It is the kind of dilemma planetary scientists dream of, but you can only go one place for the first drilling for a rock sample on Mars. That first drilling will be a huge moment in the history of Mars exploration." The trek to Glenelg will send the rover 1,300 feet (400 meters) east southeast of its landing site. One of the three types of terrain intersecting at Glenelg is layered bedrock, which is attractive as the first drilling target. "We're about ready to load our new destination into our GPS and head out onto the open road," Grotzinger said. "Our challenge is there is no GPS on Mars, so we have a roomful of rover-driver engineers providing our turn-by-turn navigation for us." Prior to the rover's trip to Glenelg, the team in charge of Curiosity's Chemistry and Camera instrument, or ChemCam, is planning to give their mast-mounted rock-zapping laser and telescope combination a thorough checkout. On Saturday night, ChemCam is expected to "zap" its first rock in the name of planetary science. It will be the first time such a powerful laser has been used on the surface of another world. "Rock N165 looks like your typical Mars rock, about three inches wide. It's about 10 feet away," said Roger Wiens, principal investigator of the ChemCam instrument from the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. "We are going to hit it with 14 millijoules of energy 30 times in 10 seconds. It is not only going to be an excellent test of our system, it should be pretty cool too." Mission engineers are devoting more time to planning the first roll of Curiosity. In the coming days, the rover will exercise each of its four steerable (front and back) wheels, turning each of them side-to-side before ending up with each wheel pointing straight ahead. On a later day, the rover will drive forward about one rover-length (10 feet, or 3 meters), turn 90 degrees, and then kick into reverse for about 7 feet (2 meters). "There will be a lot of important firsts that will be taking place for Curiosity over the next few weeks, but the first motion of its wheels, the first time our roving laboratory on Mars does some actual roving, that will be something special," said Michael Watkins, mission manager for Curiosity from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. The Mars Science Laboratory spacecraft delivered Curiosity to its target area on Mars at 10:31:45 p.m. PDT on Aug. 5 (1:31:45 a.m. EDT on Aug. 6), which included the 13.8 minutes needed for confirmation of the touchdown to be radioed to Earth at the speed of light. The mission is managed by JPL for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The rover was designed, developed and assembled at JPL, a division of Caltech. ChemCam was provided by Los Alamos National Laboratory. France provided ChemCam's laser and telescope.