NASA Invests in Shapeshifters, Biobots, Other Visionary Technology

NASA is investing in technology concepts that include meteoroid impact detection, space telescope swarms and small orbital debris mapping technologies that may one day be used for future space exploration missions. Five of the concepts are from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California.
The agency is investing in 25 early-stage technology proposals that have the potential to transform future human and robotic exploration missions, introduce new exploration capabilities, and significantly improve current approaches to building and operating aerospace systems.
The 2018 NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts (NIAC) Phase I concepts cover a wide range of innovations selected for their potential to revolutionize future space exploration. Phase I awards are valued at approximately $125,000, over nine months, to support initial definition and analysis of their concepts. If these basic feasibility studies are successful, awardees can apply for Phase II awards.
"The NIAC program gives NASA the opportunity to explore visionary ideas that could transform future NASA missions by creating radically better or entirely new concepts while engaging America's innovators and entrepreneurs as partners in the journey," said Jim Reuter, acting associate administrator of NASA's Space Technology Mission Directorate. "The concepts can then be evaluated for potential inclusion into our early stage technology portfolio."
The selected 2018 Phase I proposals are:
Shapeshifters from Science Fiction to Science Fact: Globetrotting from Titan's Rugged Cliffs to its Deep Seafloors
Aliakbar Aghamohammadi, NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California
Biobot: Innovative Offloading of Astronauts for More Effective Exploration
David Akin,University of Maryland, College Park
Lofted Environmental and Atmospheric Venus Sensors (LEAVES)
Jeffrey Balcerski,Ohio Aerospace Institute, Cleveland
Meteoroid Impact Detection for Exploration of Asteroids (MIDEA)
Sigrid Close,Stanford University, California
On-Orbit, Collision-Free Mapping of Small Orbital Debris
Christine Hartzell,University of Maryland, College Park
Marsbee - Swarm of Flapping Wing Flyers for Enhanced Mars Exploration
Chang-kwon Kang,University of Alabama, Huntsville
Rotary Motion Extended Array Synthesis (R-MXAS)
John Kendra,Leidos, Inc., Reston, Virginia
PROCSIMA: Diffractionless Beamed Propulsion for Breakthrough Interstellar Missions Chris Limbach, Texas A&M Engineering Experiment Station, College Station
SPARROW: Steam Propelled Autonomous Retrieval Robot for Ocean Worlds
Gareth Meirion-Griffith, JPL
BALLET: Balloon Locomotion for Extreme Terrain
Hari Nayar, JPL
Myco-Architecture off Planet: Growing Surface Structures at Destination
Lynn Rothscild, NASA's Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, California
Modular Active Self-Assembling Space Telescope Swarms
Dmitry Savransky, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York
Astrophysics and Technical Study of a Solar Neutrino Spacecraft
Nickolas Solomey, Wichita State University, Kansas
Advanced Diffractive MetaFilm Sailcraft
Grover Swartzlander, Rochester Institute of Technology, New York
Spectrally-Resolved Synthetic Imaging Interferometer
Jordan Wachs, Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corporation, Boulder, Colorado
Radioisotope Positron Propulsion
Ryan Weed, Positron Dynamics, Livermore, California
"The 2018 Phase I competition was especially fierce, with over 230 proposals and only 25 winners," said Jason Derleth, NIAC program executive. "I can't wait to see what the new NIAC Fellows can do for NASA!"
Phase II studies allow awardees time to refine their designs and explore aspects of implementing the new technology. This year's Phase II portfolio addresses a range of leading-edge concepts, including a breakthrough propulsion architecture for interstellar precursor missions, a large scale space telescope, novel exploration tools for Triton, and Mach effect gravity assist drive propulsion.
Awards under Phase II of the NIAC program can be worth as much as $500,000 for two-year studies, and allow proposers to further develop Phase I concepts that successfully demonstrated initial feasibility and benefit.
The selected 2018 Phase II proposals are:
Pulsed Fission-Fusion (PuFF) Propulsion Concept
Robert Adams, NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Alabama
A Breakthrough Propulsion Architecture for Interstellar Precursor Missions
John Brophy, JPL
Kilometer Space Telescope (KST)
Devon Crowe, Raytheon, El Segundo, California
Dismantling Rubble Pile Asteroids with AoES (Area-of-Effect Soft-bots)
Jay McMahon, University of Colorado, Boulder
Triton Hopper: Exploring Neptune's Captured Kuiper Belt Object
Steven Oleson, NASA's Glenn Research Center, Cleveland
Spacecraft Scale Magnetospheric Protection from Galactic Cosmic Radiation
John Slough, MSNW, LLC, Redmond, Washington
Direct Multipixel Imaging and Spectroscopy of an Exoplanet with a Solar Gravity Lens Mission
Slava Turyshev, JPL
NIMPH: Nano Icy Moons Propellant Harvester
Michael VanWoerkom, ExoTerra Resource, Littleton, Colorado
Mach Effect for in space propulsion: Interstellar mission
James Woodward, Space Studies Institute, Inc., Mojave, California
"Phase II studies are given to the most successful Phase I fellows, whose ideas have the best possibility of changing the possible," said Derleth. "Their two-year timeframe and larger budget allow them to really get going on the business of creating the future."
NASA selected these projects through a peer-review process that evaluated innovativeness and technical viability. All projects are still in the early stages of development, most requiring 10 or more years of concept maturation and technology development before use on a NASA mission.
NIAC partners with forward-thinking scientists, engineers and citizen inventors from across the nation to help maintain America's leadership in air and space. NIAC is funded by NASA's Space Technology Mission Directorate, which is responsible for developing the cross-cutting, pioneering new technologies and capabilities needed by the agency to achieve its current and future missions.
For more information about NIAC, and a complete list of the selected proposals, visit:
https://www.nasa.gov/niac
For more information about NASA's investments in space technology, visit:
https://www.nasa.gov/spacetech
News Media Contact
Gina Anderson
NASA Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1160
gina.n.anderson@nasa.gov
Jane Platt
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-354-0880
jane.platt@jpl.nasa.gov
2018-066

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NASA Invests in Shapeshifters, Biobots, Other Visionary Technology

NASA is investing in technology concepts that includes meteoroid impact detection, space telescope swarms and small orbital debris mapping technologies that may one day be used for future space exploration missions.

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Online Tickets to 'Explore JPL' Available Soon

WHAT: Tickets to this year's "Explore JPL" event at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, will be available to the public online on April 7, 2018. Tickets are free, but very limited, and will be distributed on a first-come, first-served basis, with a maximum of five tickets per requestor.

No one will be admitted without a ticket. Visitors to JPL during the event -- to be held June 9-10 from 8:30 a.m. to 4 p.m.-must have their tickets in hand, and anyone age 18 or over must show a matching legal ID. Tickets are not transferable and cannot be sold.

The tickets -- which will be for specific time slots -- will be available onlineat 9 a.m. PDT (noon EDT) on Saturday, April 7. The maximum number oftickets per requestor is five, and orders for more than five tickets may besubject to cancellation. In addition, tickets must be reserved for specificnames.

At "Explore JPL," visitors will have the opportunity to see, among other things, a life-sized model of InSight -- the next mission to Mars, scheduled to launch in May -- and Mars rovers, plus JPL's machine shop, where precise parts are made for spacecraft. This event coincides with the 60^th anniversary of NASA. The agency was created in 1958.

Although children under two do not require a ticket, experiences at the event are not intended for very young guests.

Vehicles entering NASA/JPL property are subject to inspection. Visitors cannot bring these items to NASA/JPL: weapons, explosives, incendiary devices, dangerous instruments, alcohol, illegal drugs, pets and all types of skates, skateboards and Segways. Bicycling to NASA/JPL is welcomed, but not inside the event, as the venues are crowded with pedestrians. Bike racks will be provided near the main entrance. No bags, backpacks or ice chests are allowed, except small purses and diaper bags. Drones are not allowed to fly over NASA/JPL under any circumstances.

Follow @NASAJPL on Twitter and Instagram, and join the conversation by using the hashtag #ExploreJPL.

WHEN: Online ticket registration isSaturday, April 7, 2018 at 9 a.m. PDT

WHERE: For more information, visit:

https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/events/special-events.php

News Media Contact

Esprit Smith / Jane Platt

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

818-393-6215 / 354-0880

esprit.smith@jpl.nasa.gov / jane.platt@jpl.nasa.gov

2018-065

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NASA is Ready to Study the Heart of Mars

A regional dust storm currently swelling on Mars follows unusually closely on one that blossomed less than two weeks earlier and is now dissipating, as seen in daily global weather monitoring by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.

Images from the orbiter's wide-angle Mars Color Imager (MARCI) show each storm growing in the Acidalia area of northern Mars, then blowing southward and exploding to sizes bigger than the United States after reaching the southern hemisphere.

That development path is a common pattern for generating regional dust storms during spring and summer in Mars' southern hemisphere, where it is now mid-summer.

"What's unusual is we're seeing a second one so soon after the first one," said Mars meteorologist Bruce Cantor of Malin Space Science Systems, San Diego, which built and operates MARCI. "We've had orbiters watching weather patterns on Mars continuously for nearly two decades now, and many patterns are getting predictable, but just when we think we have Mars figured out, it throws us another surprise."

Weekly Martian weather reports including animated sequences of MARCI observations are available at:

http://www.msss.com/msss_images/latest_weather.html

Weather updates from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter science team provide operators of Mars rovers advance notice both for taking precautions and for planning observations of storms, particularly in case a regional storm grows to encircle the whole planet. A planet-encircling Martian storm last occurred in 2007.

The orbiter monitors storms with its Mars Climate Sounder (MCS) instrument as well as with MARCI. MCS measurements of high-altitude atmospheric warming associated with dust storms have revealed an annual pattern in the occurrence of large regional storms, and the first of these back-to-back storms fits into the identified pattern for this time of the Martian year.

Researchers have watched effects of the latest storms closely. "We hope for a chance to learn more about how dust storms become global, if that were to happen," said David Kass of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California. "Even if it does not become a global storm, the temperature effects due to thin dust hazes will last for several weeks."

Cantor reported the second of the current back-to-back regional storms on March 5 to the team operating NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity. The earlier storm, which had become regional in late February, was dissipating by then but still causing high-altitude haziness and warming.

"There's still a chance the second one could become a planet-encircling storm, but it's unlikely because we're getting so late in the season," Cantor said this week. All previously observed planet-encircling dust storms on Mars occurred earlier in the southern summer.

Opportunity Project Manager John Callas, at JPL, credits MARCI weather reports with helping his team protect rovers when sudden increases in atmospheric dust decrease sunlight reaching the rover solar arrays. For example, Cantor's warning about a regional storm approaching the rover Spirit in November 2008 prompted JPL to send an emergency weekend command to conserve energy by deleting a planned radio transmission by Spirit. That saved enough charge in Spirit's batteries to prevent "what would likely have been a very serious situation," Callas said.

During the most recent global dust storm on Mars, in 2007, both of the rovers then operating on the planet -- Spirit and Opportunity -- were put into a power-saving mode for more than a week with minimal communication. The early-2010 ending of Spirit's mission was not related to a dust storm.

The same winds that raise Martian dust into the atmosphere can clear some of the dust that accumulates on the rovers. On Feb. 25, as the first back-to-back was spreading regionally, Opportunity experienced a significant cleaning of its solar panels that increased their energy output by more than 10 percent, adjusted for the clarity of the atmosphere. Dust-removing events typically clean the panels by only one or two percent. The Opportunity operations team has noticed over the years that a large dust-cleaning event often precedes dusty skies. Since Feb. 25, the atmosphere over Opportunity has become dustier, and some of the dust has already fallen back onto the solar panels.

"Before the first regional dust storm, the solar panels were cleaner than they were during the last four Martian summers, so the panels generated more energy," said JPL rover-power engineer Jennifer Herman. "It remains to be seen whether the outcome of these storms will be a cleaner or dirtier Opportunity. We have seen both results from dust storms in the past."

NASA's Curiosity rover, on Mars since 2012, uses a radioisotope thermoelectric generator for power instead of solar panels, so it doesn't face the same hazard from dust storms as Opportunity does. The possibility of observing the growth and life cycle of a regional or global storm offers a research opportunity for both missions, though. Scientists temporarily modified Curiosity's weather-monitoring regime last week in response to learning that a regional dust storm was growing.

"We'll keep studying this for weeks as the dust clears from the sky," said atmospheric scientist Mark Lemmon of Texas A&M University, College Station. Sky observations at multiple lighting angles can provide information about changes in the size distribution of suspended dust particles as additional dust is lifted into the sky and larger particles drop more quickly than smaller ones.

News Media Contact

Guy Webster

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

818-354-6278

guy.webster@jpl.nasa.gov

Laurie Cantillo / Dwayne Brown

NASA Headquarters, Washington

202-358-1077 / 202-358-1726

laura.l.cantillo@nasa.gov / dwayne.c.brown@nasa.gov

2017-064

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NASA Ready to Study Heart of Mars

NASA is about to go on a journey to study the interior of Mars. The space agency held a news conference today at its Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California, detailing the next mission to the Red Planet.

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NASA to Host News Conference Announcing New Supersonic Test Aircraft

NASA will host a news conference at 11 a.m. EDT Tuesday, April 3, to announce the agency's plans for its next experimental aircraft, or X-plane, called the Low-Boom Flight Demonstrator (LBFD).

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NASA Visualizes the Dance of a Melting Snowflake

A new video features a visualization of the first three-dimensional numerical model of melting snowflakes in the atmosphere, developed by scientist Jussi Leinonen of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. A better understanding of how snow melts can help scientists recognize the signature in radar signals of heavier, wetter snow -- the kind that breaks power lines and tree limbs -- and could be a step toward improving predictions of this hazard.

Snowflake research is one of many ways that NASA studies the frozen regions of Earth, collectively known as the cryosphere.

This visualization is based on the first three-dimensional numerical model of melting snowflakes in the atmosphere, developed by scientist Jussi Leinonen of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. A better understanding of how snow melts can help scientists recognize the signature in radar signals of heavier, wetter snow -- the kind that breaks power lines and tree limbs -- and could be a step toward improving predictions of this hazard.

Leinonen's model reproduces key features of melting snowflakes that have been observed in nature. First, meltwater gathers in any concave regions of the snowflake's surface. These liquid-water regions then merge to form a shell of liquid around an ice core, and finally develop into a water drop. The modeled snowflake shown in the video is less than half an inch (one centimeter) long and composed of many individual ice crystals whose arms became entangled when they collided in midair.

Some of the most remote places on Earth are showing signs of change, with potentially global impacts. In 2018, NASA is scheduled to launch two new satellite missions and conduct an array of field research that will enhance our view of Earth's ice sheets, glaciers, sea ice, snow cover and permafrost. Collectively, these frozen regions are known as the cryosphere. Over the course of the year NASA will share an inside look at what the agency is doing to better understand this critical component of our home planet.

Leinonen said he became interested in modeling melting snow because of the way it affects observations with remote sensing instruments. A radar "profile" of the atmosphere from top to bottom shows a very bright, prominent layer at the altitude where falling snow and hail melt -- much brighter than atmospheric layers above and below it. "The reasons for this layer are still not particularly clear, and there has been a bit of debate in the community," Leinonen said.

Simpler models can reproduce the bright melt layer, but a more detailed model like this one can help scientists understand it better, particularly how the layer is related to the type of melting snow and the radar wavelengths used to observe it.

A paper on the numerical model, titled "Snowflake melting simulation using smoothed particle hydrodynamics," recently appeared in the Journal of Geophysical Research -Atmospheres.

News Media Contact

Alan Buis

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California

818-354-0474

Alan.Buis@jpl.nasa.gov

Written by Carol Rasmussen

NASA's Earth Science News Team

2018-063

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'Marsquakes' Could Shake Up Planetary Science

Starting next year, scientists will get their first look deep below the surface of Mars.

That's when NASA will send the first robotic lander dedicated to exploring the planet's subsurface. InSight, which stands for Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, will study marsquakes to learn about the Martian crust, mantle and core.

Are there earthquakes on Mars? Or rather, "marsquakes?" And what could they teach us about the Red Planet? Find out more in this 60-second video and by visiting mars.nasa.gov/insight .

Doing so could help answer a big question: how are planets born?

Seismology, the study of quakes, has already revealed some of the answers here on Earth, said Bruce Banerdt, Insight's principal investigator at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California. But Earth has been churning its geologic record for billions of years, hiding its most ancient history. Mars, at half the size of Earth, churns far less: it's a fossil planet, preserving the history of its early birth.

"During formation, this ball of featureless rock metamorphosed into a diverse and fascinating planet, almost like caterpillar to a butterfly," Banerdt said. "We want to use seismology to learn why Mars formed the way it did, and how planets take shape in general."

A Planetary CT Scan

When rocks crack or shift, they give off seismic waves that bounce throughout a planet. These waves, better known as quakes, travel at different speeds depending on the geologic material they travel through.

Seismometers, like InSight's SEIS instrument, measure the size, frequency and speed of these quakes, offering scientists a snapshot of the material they pass through.

"A seismometer is like a camera that takes an image of a planet's interior," Banerdt said. "It's a bit like taking a CT scan of a planet."

Mars' geologic record includes lighter rocks and minerals -- which rose from the planet's interior to form the Martian crust -- and heavier rocks and minerals that sank to form the Martian mantle and core. By learning about the layering of these materials, scientists can explain why some rocky planets turn into an "Earth" rather than a "Mars" or "Venus" -- a factor that is essential to understanding where life can appear in the universe.

A Fuzzy Picture

Each time a quake happens on Mars, it will give InSight a "snapshot" of the planet's interior. The InSight team estimates the spacecraft will see between a couple dozen to several hundred quakes over the course of the mission. Small meteorites, which pass through the thin Martian atmosphere on a regular basis, will also serve as seismic "snapshots."

"It will be a fuzzy picture at first, but the more quakes we see, the sharper it will get," Banerdt said.

One challenge will be getting a complete look at Mars using only one location. Most seismology on Earth takes measurements from multiple stations. InSight will have the planet's only seismometer, requiring scientists to parse the data in creative ways.

"We have to get clever," Banerdt said. "We can measure how various waves from the same quake bounce off things and hit the station at different times."

Moonquakes and Marsquakes

InSight won't be the first NASA mission to do seismology.

The Apollo missions included four seismometers for the Moon. Astronauts exploded mortar rounds to create vibrations, offering a peek about 328 feet (100 meters) under the surface. They crashed the upper stages of rockets into the Moon, producing waves that enabled them to probe its crust. They also detected thousands of genuine moonquakes and meteorite impacts.

The Viking landers attempted to conduct seismology on Mars in the late 1970s. But those seismometers were located on top of the landers, which swayed in the wind on legs equipped with shock absorbers.

"It was a handicapped experiment," Banerdt said. "I joke that we didn't do seismology on Mars -- we did it three feet above Mars."

InSight will measure more than seismology. The Doppler shift from a radio signal on the lander can reveal whether the planet's core is still molten; a self-burrowing probe is designed to measure heat from the interior. Wind, pressure and temperature sensors will allow scientists to subtract vibrational "noise" caused by weather. Combining all this data will give us the most complete picture of Mars yet.

JPL, a division of Caltech in Pasadena, manages the InSight Project for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington. Lockheed Martin Space in Denver, Colorado, built and tested the spacecraft. InSight is part of NASA's Discovery Program, which is managed by NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama.

For more information about InSight:

https://mars.nasa.gov/insight/

News Media Contact

Andrew Good

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

818-393-2433

andrew.c.good@jpl.nasa.gov

2018-062

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NASA Prepares to Launch Next Mission to Search Sky for New Worlds

NASA's Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) is undergoing final preparations in Florida for its April 16 launch to find undiscovered worlds around nearby stars, providing targets where future studies will assess their capacity to harbor life.

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NASA Awards Contract for Environmental Compliance, Operation Services

NASA has awarded a contract to Navarro Research and Engineering, Inc., of Oak Ridge, Tennessee, for continued environmental compliance and operation services at the agency’s White Sands Test Facility in Las Cruces, New Mexico.

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Be a Flight Director: NASA Accepting Applications for Mission Control Leaders

How would you like to sit at the helm of human spaceflight, responsible for the success of missions and the highly trained teams of engineers and scientists that make them possible? NASA is hiring new flight directors for just this job at its mission control at Johnson Space Center in Houston.

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