Mar 8 2017

From The Space Library

RELEASE 17-011 NASA Marks International Women’s Day, Women’s History Month with Virtual Tour Highlighting Women in STEM

In celebration of International Women’s Day on Wednesday and Women’s History Month in March, NASA has unveiled an educational virtual tour that brings students into the exciting careers of seven women in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) fields at the agency.

Building on NASA’s participation with the 20th Century Fox film Hidden Figures, NASA’s Modern Figures tour introduces several amazing women who are contributing to America’s space program today, and is the first NASA-themed career tour available via the free Google Expeditions mobile app.

NASA’s Modern Figures virtual tour gives students a three-dimensional experience in a 100,000-square-foot aircraft hangar, simulated Martian landscape, space flight operations facility, and other fascinating locations where these women work as materials scientists, launch directors, software engineers, and in other STEM fields.

The agency signed a Space Act Agreement with Google in late 2016 to collaborate in the areas of education and public engagement, which includes developing a series of NASA-themed virtual field trips and tours available freely to classrooms worldwide. In addition to the Modern Figures Expedition, NASA contributed content for the development of a 3-D tour of the International Space Station, as well as two new tours that allow students to experience NASA’s Juno mission to Jupiter, and the surface of Mars, as captured by NASA rovers.

These tours provide virtual field trip experiences that teachers can lead while students view NASA content in 3-D via Google Cardboard viewers in their classrooms. The Google Expeditions partnership supports NASA’s mission to inspire and attract kids into STEM studies and careers by providing opportunities for students to virtually step out of the classroom and experience NASA careers, missions and locations in space without leaving their desks.

RELEASE 17-024 NASA Selects Over 100 Small Business Projects to Advance Space Innovation

NASA has selected 133 proposals from U.S. companies to conduct research and develop technologies that will enable NASA's future missions into deep space and benefit the U.S. economy.

The proposals, valued at approximately $100 million total for contract negotiations, were selected under Phase II of NASA’s Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program.

"We are pleased to select SBIR proposals from over 112 small businesses," said Steve Jurczyk, associate administrator for the Space Technology Mission Directorate (STMD) at NASA Headquarters in Washington. "Technology drives exploration, and selection of these projects represents an investment in achieving our space exploration goals and supporting the U.S. innovation economy, as well."

SBIR Phase II projects will expand on the results of recently-completed Phase I projects. Phase I projects received six-month contracts of as much as $125,000. Phase II contracts are awarded up to $750,000 and the period of performance is no more than two years. Successful Phase II projects may go on to Phase III of the program – commercialization of the innovation.

The proposals were selected according to their technical merit and feasibility, in addition to the experience, qualifications and facilities of the companies, and their work plans and commercial potential. The fundamental requirement, however, is that the proposals answer needs that are core to the agency’s future exploration goals, such as:

• Multifunctional, lightweight metallic materials that can be used to create the advanced structures needed for future deep space missions and next-generation aeronautics capabilities;
• Compact, high-powered 3-D LIDAR (light Detection and ranging) system for unmanned aircraft that significantly reduces the size and weight of object-detection sensors, with applications ranging from autonomous aircraft to space missions;
• A technology that integrates a plastic recycling system, a dry-heat sterilization system and a 3-D printer to create materials that can be used to print food- and medical-grade devices, lowering mission costs and trash generated on long-duration manned missions;
• A technology that will allow constellations of individual satellites to fly in precise formation and perform coordinated science, enabling new capabilities such as autonomous rendezvous and docking, and precision formation flying both for human and robotic exploration missions.

NASA's SBIR program is a competitive, awards-based program that encourages U.S. small businesses to engage in federal research, development and commercialization. The program allows businesses to explore technological potential and provides the incentive to profit from new commercial products and services. Small businesses create about two out of every three jobs in the United States each year, and about half the workforce either own or work for a small business.

The SBIR program is managed for STMD by NASA's Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley. STMD is responsible for developing the cross-cutting, pioneering, new technologies and capabilities needed by the agency to achieve its current and future missions.