August 6, 2001

NASA SELECTS ADVANCED TECHNOLOGY CONCEPTS FOR FURTHER STUDY

     NASA's New Millennium Program, managed by the Jet 
Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., has selected 13 
technology organizations to study advanced technologies that 
may fly in 2004 and 2005 as part of the Space Technology 7 
project.

     Space Technology 7 will test and validate advanced 
technologies that may become part of future NASA space 
missions.  The newly-contracted studies will be completed by 
November.  The technology concepts and providers are: 

-- Aero-Entry/Capture/Maneuver -- technologies that allow a 
spacecraft to be captured into orbit via sophisticated 
controlled entry into atmospheres of planets (provided by the 
Charles Stark Draper Laboratory, Inc., Cambridge, Mass.; NASA 
Langley Research Center, Hampton, Va.; Lockheed Martin 
Astronautics Operations Space Systems, Denver, Colo.)

-- Autonomy and On-board Processing -- software and hardware 
for an autonomously operated mission with a rapid sense-
decide-act loop that integrates on-board science processing, 
activity planning and subsystem decision conflict resolution 
(provided by NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif.; 
JPL; Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Mass.; 
the Robotics Institute, Carnegie Mellon University, 
Pittsburgh, Pa.; BAE Systems, Information and Electronics 
Systems Integration Inc., Manassas, Va.)

-- Disturbance Reduction System -- sensor and thrust-producing 
technologies to control a space vehicle's trajectory so that 
its payload responds only to gravitational forces (provided by 
Stanford University, Stanford, Calif.; Busek Co. Inc., Natick, 
Mass.)

-- Solar Sail System -- technologies to deploy, control and 
operate a solar sail (provided by JPL; Swales Aerospace, 
Beltsville, Md.; Arizona State University, Tempe, Ariz.; AEC-
Able Engineering Company, Inc., Goleta, Calif.)

     "The Space Technology 7 integrated system flight 
validation concepts are very challenging advanced 
technologies," said Dr. Chris Stevens, Program Manager of the 
New Millennium Program at JPL.  "I am very pleased by the 
number and quality of the responses to the solicitation and 
look forward to the results of the ST7 Concept Study Reports." 
In December 2001, an independent review board at NASA 
will evaluate the reports and select which technology will 
fly.

     Further information on the New Millennium Program is 
available at http://nmp.jpl.nasa.gov .
 
     The New Millennium Program was created in 1994 to 
identify, develop and flight-validate advanced technologies 
that can lower costs and enable critical performance of 
science missions in the 21st century. The program is managed 
by JPL for NASA's Office of Earth Science and Office of Space 
Science, Washington, D.C. JPL is a division of the California 
Institute of Technology in Pasadena.
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8/3/01 CM
#2001-165

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Contact: Carolina Martinez (818) 354-9382

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