NASA has chosen four teams to develop a suite of advanced technologies
slated for space flight validation on the New Millennium Programs Space
Technology 8 (ST8) Mission.
The ST8 Mission, slated for launch in 2008, is a New Millennium Carrier that will
host a varied payload of four advanced technologies. Each technology validation
experiment will include diagnostic instruments. They will perform detailed
measurements to characterize and determine how well the technologies performance
in space corresponds to predictions derived from ground-based testing and
modeling. The resulting data will be provided to science mission planners to
enable a broad range of space-based science projects at significantly reduced
risk and cost. The selected suite of advanced technology experiments includes:
Ultraflex Next Generation Solar Array System (NGU) from AEC-Able Engineering,
Inc., Goleta, Calif. The NGU is an ultra-lightweight flexible-blanket solar array
that deploys to provide a significant advancement in performance over existing
state-of-the-art for high power arrays. The proposed experiment cost for the NGU
is $6.9 million.
SAILMAST Ultra Lightweight Boom from AEC-Able Engineering, Inc. The SAILMAST is
an ultra-light graphite mast intended for solar sail propulsion systems. The
proposed experiment cost for the SAILMAST is $4 million.
Miniature Loop Heat Pipe Small Spacecraft Thermal Management System (MLHP) from
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md. The MLHP can transport large
heat loads over long distances with small temperature differences and without
external pumping powers to provide precise temperature control and reduce the
need for supplemental heaters. The proposed experiment cost for the MLHP is $9.8
million.
Environmentally Adaptive Fault Tolerant Computing System (EAFTC) from Honeywell
International, Inc., Clearwater, Fla. The EAFTC will provide high rate on board
processing for science data and autonomous control functions. The proposed
experiment cost for the EAFTC is $10 million.
“These technological capabilities will provide orders of magnitude in performance
compared to the state-of-the-art technologies used in NASA satellites,” said
NASA’s Deputy Associate Administrator of the Science Mission Directorate, Dr.
Ghassem Asrar. “Future NASA science and exploration missions will benefit greatly
from these technological capabilities, which will be developed for first flight
validation. The ST8 project will effectively develop these technologies from the
early stages to flight readiness, and then validate them in space prior to using
them in NASA sponsored scientific missions,” he said.
NASA’s New Millennium Program plans to invest approximately $40 million to
develop and flight-validate the selected technology experiments. The total
project cost for formulation and implementation, including technology payloads,
the carrier spacecraft and the launch vehicle, is planned at $100 million.
The Programs’ previous technology validation missions included Deep Space 1, Deep
Space 2 and Earth Observing 1. The programs validated a broad range of advanced
technologies including ion propulsion, autonomous onboard mission planning, and
advanced land-imaging instruments. Current projects include: Space Technology 5,
a mission to validate next generation constellations of micro-satellites; Space
Technology 6, which is developing both an autonomous onboard science and mission
planning system and an advanced inertial stellar compass; and Space Technology 7,
which is developing the precision sensing and control systems required for future
gravity wave science.
The four technology teams for the ST8 flight validation opportunity were selected
from 37 proposers responding to a NASA Research Announcement (NRA) in February,
2003. As a result of the NRA, 10 teams were awarded contracts for a six-month
concept definition study phase. Study phase results were evaluated by a NASA-led
independent peer review, which culminated in the selection of the four teams for
continuation to the formulation refinement and implementation phases. NASA’s Jet
Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., manages the New Millennium Program for
the Science Mission Directorate. More information about the New Millennium
Program and its technology validation projects, including ST8, is available on
the Web at:
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