VIEW OF SATURN'S MOON ENCELADUS

The photo and following  excerpt is from the NASA website:
Below a darkened Enceladus, a plume of water ice is backlit in this view of one of Saturn's most dramatic moons. Dramatic plumes, both large and small, spray water ice from many locations along the moon's famed "tiger stripes" near the south pole of Enceladus. The tiger stripes are fissures that spray icy particles, water vapor and organic compounds. The terrain seen here is on the leading hemisphere of Enceladus (313 miles, or 504 kilometers across). North is up. The image was taken in visible light with the Cassini spacecraft narrow-angle camera on Feb. 20, 2012. The view was acquired at a distance of approximately 83,000 miles (134,000 kilometers) from Enceladus and at a Sun-Enceladus-spacecraft, or phase, angle of 165 degrees. Image scale is 2,628 feet (801 meters) per pixel. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute

NASA SEARCHING FOR PROPOSALS FOR HEAVY- LIFT ROCKET

The following excerpt is from the NASA website: 

HUNTSVILLE, Ala. -- NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, 
Ala., has issued a NASA Research Announcement (NRA) for advanced 
development proposals to support the nation's next heavy-lift rocket, 
the Space Launch System (SLS). 

NASA is soliciting proposals from industry and academia for innovative 
advanced development in areas including concept development, trades 
and analyses, propulsion, structures, materials, manufacturing, 
avionics and software. These efforts will focus on affordability and 
sustainability of the SLS as it evolves from a 70-metric-ton vehicle 
to a 130-metric-ton vehicle. 

"We look forward to hearing from both industry and academia on 
advanced development solutions that will enable the full capability 
of the evolved Space Launch System," said Mindy Niedermeyer, the 
evaluation team chair. "It's an exciting time for NASA. These 
solutions will create entirely new developments in space technology, 
taking humans farther in space than ever before." 

NASA anticipates making multiple awards in response to this 
solicitation with approximately $48 million in total funding. Of this 
total amount, the funding anticipated for the base year (Fiscal Year 
2013) is $22 million, with $14.5 million for the first year option 
(Fiscal Year 2014), and $11.5 million for the second year option 
(Fiscal Year 15). Total funding to be allocated to academic awards 
for this NRA is approximately $1.5 million per year. Individual 
academic awards are expected to be valued up to $250,000 per year. 
The deadline to submit proposals is May 15, 2012. 

MARS ROVER AS SEEN BY ITSELF

This self portrait from NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity shows dust accumulation on the rover's solar panels as the mission approached its fifth Martian winter. The dust reduces the rover's power supply, and the rover's mobility is limited until the winter is over or wind cleans the panels. This is a mosaic of images taken by Opportunity's panoramic camera (Pancam) during the 2,111th to 2,814th Martian days, or sols, of the rover's mission (Dec. 21 to Dec. 24, 2011). The downward-looking view omits the mast on which the camera is mounted. The portrait is presented in approximate true color, the camera team's best estimate of what the scene would look like if humans were there and able to see it with their own eyes. Opportunity has worked through four Martian southern hemisphere winters since it landed in in January 2004 about 14 miles (23 kilometers) northwest of its current location. Closer to the equator than its twin rover, Spirit, Opportunity has not needed to stay on a sun-facing slope during the previous winters. Now, however, Opportunity's solar panels carry a thicker coating of dust, and the team is using a strategy employed for three winters with Spirit: staying on a sun-facing slope. The sun will pass relatively low in the northern sky from the rover's perspective for several months of shortened daylight before and after the southern Mars winter solstice on March 30, 2012. Opportunity is conducting research while located on the north-facing slope of a site called "Greeley Haven." Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Cornell/Arizona State Univ.
The above excerpt and photo are from the NASA website:

AN OLD SOL FLARES UP

The photo and excerpt are from the NASA website:
NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) captured this image of an M7.9 class flare on March 13, 2012 at 1:29 p.m. EDT. It is shown here in the 131 Angstrom wavelength, a wavelength particularly good for seeing solar flares and a wavelength that is typically colorized in teal. The flare peaked at 1:41 p.m. EDT. It was from the same active region, No. 1429, that produced flares and coronal mass ejections the entire week. The region has been moving across the face of the sun since March 2, and will soon rotate out of Earth view. A solar flare is an intense burst of radiation coming from the release of magnetic energy associated with sunspots. Flares are our solar system’s largest explosive events. They are seen as bright areas on the sun and last from mere minutes to several hours. Scientists classify solar flares according to their x-ray brightness. There are 3 categories: X-, M- and C-class. X-class flares are the largest of these events. M-class flares are medium-sized; they can cause brief radio blackouts that affect Earth's polar regions. Compared to X- and M-class, C-class flares are small with few noticeable consequences on Earth. Image Credit: NASA/SDO

STUDENTS OFFERED CHANCE TO DESIGN DEEP SPACE HABITAT

The following excerpt is from the NASA website:

HOUSTON -- NASA is offering college and university students a chance 
to help design a deep space habitat. The Exploration Habitat (X-Hab) 
Academic Innovation Challenge is accepting applications for the 2013 
challenge, inviting students to design, manufacture, assemble and 
test systems for use on NASA's deep space habitat prototype. 

Past projects have included an inflatable loft for crew sleeping 
quarters, plant growth systems and sample handling tools. This year, 
students in multiple disciplines can choose projects from a variety 
of possibilities, including photovoltaic solar arrays, a workstation 
to support human-robotic collaboration or a telepresence and holodeck 
conceptual system. Students will work together on potential solutions 
to needs future astronauts might have living and working outside 
Earth. 

"Students will play a vital role in our critical early system planning 
and development," said Alvin Drew, a NASA astronaut and habitat 
systems project manager at the agency's Johnson Space Center in 
Houston. "Their designs could become the basis for the concepts and 
technologies that will make up the habitat we eventually send to 
space." 

The X-Hab Challenge is part of a continuing effort to engage and 
retain students in science, technology, engineering and mathematics, 
or STEM, and provide a real-world challenge exposing them to 
engineering and design processes. NASA will directly benefit from the 
development of innovative habitation-related concepts and 
technologies that could be applied to future missions. 

The challenge is run by the National Space Grant Foundation for the 
deep space habitat project team at Johnson, which is part of NASA's 
Advanced Exploration Systems Program. The goal of for the X-Hab 
Challenge is to help NASA inspire the STEM workforce of the future 
and the next generation of explorers. Winners will receive between 
$10,000 and $49,000 to produce functional products based on their 
designs. Proposals are due May 2, 2012, and awardees should expect to 
deliver their product to Johnson in May or June 2013. 

SPACE ROBOTS

The following excerpt is from the NASA website:
WASHINGTON -- NASA's Robotic Refueling Mission (RRM) experiment aboard
the International Space Station has demonstrated remotely controlled
robots and specialized tools can perform precise satellite-servicing
tasks in space. The project marks a milestone in the use of the space
station as a technology test bed.

"We and our partners are making important technological
breakthroughs," NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said. "As we move
ahead toward reaching our exploration goals, we will realize even
more benefits from humans and robots working together in space."

The Canadian Space Agency's (CSA) robotic handyman, Dextre,
successfully completed the tasks March 7-9 on the space station's
external RRM module, designed to demonstrate the tools, technologies
and techniques needed to robotically refuel and repair satellites.

"The Hubble servicing missions taught us the importance and value of
getting innovative, cutting-edge technologies to orbit quickly to
deliver great results," said Frank Cepollina, a veteran leader of
five Hubble Space Telescope servicing missions and associate director
of the Satellite Servicing Capabilities Office (SSCO) at NASA's
Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. "The impact of the
space station as a useful technology test bed cannot be overstated.
Fresh satellite-servicing technologies will be demonstrated in a real
space environment within months instead of years. This is huge. It
represents real progress in space technology advancement."

Before a satellite leaves the ground, technicians fill its fuel tank
through a valve that is sealed, covered and designed never to be
accessed again. The RRM experiment demonstrates a remote-controlled
robot can remove these barriers and refuel such satellites in space.

Dextre successfully retrieved and inspected RRM tools, released safety
launch locks on tool adapters, and used an RRM tool to cut extremely
thin satellite lock wire. These operations represent the first use of
RRM tools in orbit and Dextre's first participation in a research and
development project.

RRM was developed by SSCO and is a joint effort between NASA and CSA.
During the next two years, RRM and Dextre will conduct several
servicing tasks using RRM tools on satellite parts and interfaces
inside and covering the cube-shaped RRM module.

NASA expects the RRM results to reduce the risks associated with
satellite servicing. It will encourage future robotic servicing
missions by laying the foundation for them. Such future missions
could include the repair, refueling and repositioning of orbiting
satellites.

"We are especially grateful to CSA for their collaboration on this
venture," Cepollina said. "CSA has played a pivotal role in the
development of space robotics, from the early days of the space
shuttle to the work they are doing with Dextre on space station."

During the three-day RRM Gas Fittings Removal task, the 12-foot
(3.7-meter) Dextre performed the most intricate task ever attempted
by a space robot: cutting two separate "lock wires" 20 thousandths of
an inch (0.5 millimeters) in diameter using the RRM Wire Cutter Tool
(WCT). Deftly maneuvered by ground-based mission operators and
Dextre, the WCT smoothly slid its hook under the individual wires and
severed them with only a few millimeters of clearance. This
wire-cutting activity is a prerequisite to removing and servicing
various satellite parts during any future in-orbit missions.

RRM operations are scheduled to resume in May 2012 with the completion
of the gas fittings removal task. The RRM Refueling task is scheduled
for later this summer. NASA and CSA will present RRM results at the
Second International Workshop on on-Orbit Servicing, hosted by
Goddard May 30-31, 2012.

Dextre and RRM are an example of how robots are changing operations in
space. Another is Robonaut 2, or R2, a project of NASA and General
Motors. R2, the first human-like robot, was launched into space in
2011 and is a permanent resident of the International Space Station.

OFF WORLD ASTRONAUTS SEEK TO CONTROL EARTH ROBOTS FROM SPACE

The following excerpt is from the NASA website:
MOFFETT FIELD, Calif. -- This semester, Academy of Art University
Industrial Design students will collaborate with the NASA Ames
Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif. to design a user interface
that will allow future astronauts in space to remotely operate a
robot on Earth. A number of thesis level students have been chosen
and will use a variety of design skills to complete the project,
including storyboarding, task analysis, ideation, brainstorming,
sketching and rendering. The students’ work will be used to create
the user interface elements, including icons wireframes and glyphs.
Simultaneously the team is identifying opportunities for additional
design disciplines to be integrated into the experience. Already the
team is starting conceptual work on interior architecture, product
design, and apparel.

"This is a once in a lifetime opportunity for students to contribute
to our country's innovative space program," said Dr. Elisa Stephens,
President of Academy of Art University. “We are constantly looking
for hands-on learning opportunities for our students so that while
they are in school, they get the real-world experience that will
prepare them for a career in their industry of choice. We are
grateful to NASA for working with us and are excited to see students
contribute to our nation’s space program."

The NASA project will require students to create storyboards that show
how astronauts in space can perform work on the ground using robots.
The students will also develop sketches and paper prototypes,
emphasizing graphical elements and other highly usable displays for
the astronauts. A group of NASA scientists will be present at the
Academy of Art University classes to work with the students and
students will also have an opportunity to visit NASA Ames during the
semester.

"Operating a robot is extremely complex and these designs we've tasked
the students with developing require both an in-depth knowledge of
engineering – and the advanced creative skills necessary to make
these designs user friendly for the astronauts,” said Dr. Terry Fong,
Director of the Intelligent Robotics Group at NASA Ames. “The final
products from the students will play a big role in how we think about
future astronaut-centered robotics, and we are grateful to the
Academy of Art for collaborating with us to explore the design space
in new ways."

Future human missions to the Moon, Mars, and other destinations offer
many new opportunities for exploration. With the limited amount of
work that astronauts can do from space, robots complement human
explorers by performing work on the ground under remote control from
spacecraft in orbit. Robots can perform tasks that are tedious,
highly repetitive or long-duration and beyond human capability.

In Summer 2013, NASA will perform an experiment in which astronauts on
the International Space Station remotely operate the "K10" mobile
robot on Earth. The astronauts will use K10 to layout a simulated
radio telescope on an outdoor terrain at the NASA Ames Research
Center. This work will require capturing images with the robot's
cameras and making measurements with other robot-mounted instruments.
The student designs will help NASA plan this and carry out this
engineering test.

NASA OFFERS NEW VIEW OF ORION NEBULA

The photo and excerpt below are from the NASA website:
This new view of the Orion Nebula highlights fledgling stars hidden in the gas and clouds. It shows infrared observations taken by NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope and the European Space Agency's Herschel mission, in which NASA plays an important role. Stars form as clumps of this gas and dust collapses, creating warm globs of material fed by an encircling disk. These dusty envelopes glow brightest at longer wavelengths, appearing as red dots in this image. In several hundred thousand years, some of the forming stars will accrete enough material to trigger nuclear fusion at their cores and then blaze into stardom. Spitzer is designed to see shorter infrared wavelengths than Herschel. By combining their observations, astronomers get a more complete picture of star formation. The colors in this image relate to the different wavelengths of light, and to the temperature of material, mostly dust, in this region of Orion. Data from Spitzer show warmer objects in blue, with progressively cooler dust appearing green and red in the Herschel datasets. The more evolved, hotter embryonic stars thus appear in blue. Infrared data at wavelengths of 8.0 and 24 microns from Spitzer are rendered in blue. Herschel data with wavelengths of 70 and 160 microns are represented in green and red, respectively. This image was released on Feb. 29, 2012. Image Credit: NASA/ESA/JPL-Caltech/IRAM

NATIONAL MUSEUM OF THE AIR FORCE WILL DISPLAY A SPACE SHUTTLE CREW COMPARTMENT TRAINER

The following excerpt below is from the Department of Defense Armed With Science website:

“By Rob Bardua
A retired NASA space shuttle crew compartment trainer is expected to arrive this summer at the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force.

The CCT is a high-fidelity representation of the Space Shuttle Orbiter crew station that was used primarily for on-orbit crew training and engineering evaluations.
It was in this trainer that astronauts learned how to operate many of the orbiter sub-systems in more than 20 different classes. All Air Force astronauts in NASA’s shuttle program trained in the CCT.

The crew module of the CCT consists of a flight deck and a mid-deck, and contains components such as panels, seats and lights visible to or used by the flight crew. Non-functional switches, connections, guards and protective devices all have the same physical characteristics, operating force, torque and movement as a real space shuttle.
The museum is currently working with NASA to package the CCT for airlift to the museum via NASA’s “Super Guppy” aircraft, which routinely carries outsized loads such as missile and rocket components. After arrival, technicians will offload the CCT and place it on interim display in the Cold War Gallery, before later moving it to a new Space Gallery in the planned fourth building.

According to the director of the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force, retired Lt. Gen. Jack Hudson, the CCT will be a great addition to the museum.
“When the CCT exhibit is completed, it will allow the public to have an up-close and personal look into the cockpit and mid-deck areas of a shuttle and learn how astronauts trained for their missions,” Hudson said. “We also plan to build a full-scale mock-up of the payload bay and develop other new exhibits with an emphasis on science, technology, engineering and math to further illustrate the rich history of the Air Force’s space programs and vital Air Force, NASA and aerospace industry partnerships.”
The new Space Gallery, where the CCT will eventually reside, is a part of a multi-phase, long-term expansion plan and will house the museum’s growing space collection. The gallery will include a Titan IV space launch vehicle; Mercury, Gemini and Apollo spacecraft; and many recently retired NASA artifacts such as a nose cap assembly, landing gear strut and a variety of astronaut equipment. In addition, a range of satellites and related items will showcase the Air Force’s vast reconnaissance, early warning, communications and other space-based capabilities. Other new exhibits will be developed to showcase Air Force technologies with many unique characteristics in design, propulsion, payload capacity, human factors, communication, range, speed and operating environment.

One of the unique features of the fourth building will be the creation of dedicated, interactive spaces for learning in the galleries. Three “Learning Nodes” will provide a unique environment for lectures and demonstrations, as well as extensions of the exhibit experience. These 60-seat “gallery classrooms” will allow museum staff to facilitate new science, technology, engineering and math experiences, while guest scientists and engineers from Air Force organizations, the aerospace industry, and area colleges and universities will be invited to share their expertise. Multimedia presentations will introduce students to air and space missions and the men and women responsible for their execution. When the nodes are not in use for scheduled programs, multimedia presentations will captivate public audiences.
The Air Force Museum Foundation, an IRS 501(c)(3) organization chartered to assist the National Museum of the United States Air Force with the development and expansion of facilities, is in the process of raising the funds to meet the growing requirements of the museum. Currently, $38 million has been secured by the Foundation for the fourth building project, which is expected to cost an estimated $48 million. The fourth building will house the Space Gallery, Presidential Aircraft Gallery and Global Reach Gallery featuring cargo and tanker aircraft.

The National Museum of the United States Air Force is located on Springfield Street, six miles northeast of downtown Dayton. It is open 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. seven days a week and is closed Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s Day. Admission and parking are free.”

KOI961 PLANETARY SYSTEM CONDENSED

This artist's concept depicts a planetary system so compact that it's more like Jupiter and its moons than a star and its planets. Astronomers using data from NASA's Kepler mission and ground-based telescopes recently confirmed that the system, called KOI-961, hosts the three smallest exoplanets currently known to orbit a star other than our sun. An exoplanet is a planet that resides outside of our solar system. The star, which is located about 130 light-years away in the Cygnus constellation, is a red dwarf that is one-sixth the size of the sun, or just 70 percent bigger than Jupiter. The star is also cooler than our sun, and gives off more red light than yellow. The smallest of the three planets, called KOI-961.03, is actually located the farthest from the star, and is pictured in the foreground. This planet is about the size of Mars, with a radius of 0.57 times that of Earth. The next planet to the upper right is KOI-961.01, which is 0.78 times the radius of Earth. The planet closest to the star is KOI-961.02, with a radius 0.73 times the Earth's. All three planets whip around the star in less than two days, with the closest planet taking less than half a day. Their close proximity to the star also means they are scorching hot, with temperatures ranging from 350 to 836 degrees Fahrenheit (176 to 447 degrees Celsius). The star's habitable zone, or the region where liquid water could exist, is located far beyond the planets. The ground-based observations contributing to these discoveries were made with the Palomar Observatory, near San Diego, Calif., and the W.M. Keck Observatory atop Mauna Kea in Hawaii. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

The above photo and description are from the NASA website:

GEMINI VI ASTRONAUTS SUIT UP

Gemini VI astronauts Walter Schirra (seated), command pilot, and Thomas Stafford, pilot, go through suiting up exercises in preparation for their forthcoming flight in this image from October 1965. The suit technicians are James Garrepy (left) and Joe Schmitt. On the third attempt, Gemini VI successfully launched on Dec. 15, 1965. Once in orbit, Schirra and Stafford spent the next six hours catching up to the Gemini VII crew, consisting of commander Frank Borman and pilot James Lovell. Through careful maneuvering, Gemini VI and VII achieved their rendezvous with no relative motion between them. For the next three Earth revolutions, the two craft got as close as 0.30 meters, or about 1 foot apart. Image Credit: NASA

The above photo and excerpt are from the NASA website:

MOON SATELLITES HAVE BEGUN COLLECTING INFORMATION

The following excerpt is from the NASA website:

“WASHINGTON -- NASA's Gravity Recovery And Interior Laboratory (GRAIL)
spacecraft orbiting the moon officially have begun their science
collection phase. During the next 84 days, scientists will obtain a
high-resolution map of the lunar gravitational field to learn about
the moon's internal structure and composition in unprecedented
detail. The data also will provide a better understanding of how
Earth and other rocky planets in the solar system formed and evolved.


"The initiation of science data collection is a time when the team
lets out a collective sigh of relief because we are finally doing
what we came to do," said Maria Zuber, principal investigator for the
GRAIL mission at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in
Cambridge. "But it is also a time where we have to put the coffee pot
on, roll up our sleeves and get to work."

The GRAIL mission's twin, washing-machine-sized spacecraft, named Ebb
and Flow, entered lunar orbit on New Year's Eve and New Years Day.
GRAIL's science phase began yesterday at 8:15 p.m. EST (5:15 p.m.
PST). During this mission phase, the spacecraft will transmit radio
signals precisely defining the distance between them. As they fly
over areas of greater and lesser gravity caused by visible features
such as mountains, craters and masses hidden beneath the lunar
surface, the distance between the two spacecraft will change
slightly. Science activities are expected to conclude on May 29,
after GRAIL maps the gravity field of the moon three times.

"We are in a near-polar, near-circular orbit with an average altitude
of about 34 miles (55 kilometers) right now," said David Lehman,
GRAIL project manager from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in
Pasadena, Calif. "During the science phase, our spacecraft will orbit
the moon as high as 31 miles (51 kilometers) and as low as 10 miles
(16 kilometers). They will get as close to each other as 40 miles (65
kilometers) and as far apart as 140 miles (225 kilometers)."

Previously named GRAIL A and B, the names Ebb and Flow were the result
of a nation-wide student contest to choose new names for the
spacecraft. The winning entry was submitted by fourth graders from
the Emily Dickinson Elementary School in Bozeman, Mont. Nearly 900
classrooms with more than 11,000 students from 45 states, Puerto Rico
and the District of Columbia, participated in the contest.

JPL manages the GRAIL mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate
in Washington. The GRAIL mission is part of the Discovery Program
managed at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala.
Lockheed Martin Space Systems in Denver built the spacecraft.”

HUBBLE PANCHROMATIC VIEW OF GALAXY CENTAURIS A

“Resembling looming rain clouds on a stormy day, dark lanes of dust crisscross the giant elliptical galaxy Centaurus A. Hubble's panchromatic vision, stretching from ultraviolet through near-infrared wavelengths, reveals the vibrant glow of young, blue star clusters and a glimpse into regions normally obscured by the dust. The warped shape of Centaurus A's disk of gas and dust is evidence for a past collision and merger with another galaxy. The resulting shockwaves cause hydrogen gas clouds to compress, triggering a firestorm of new star formation. These are visible in the red patches in this Hubble close-up. At a distance of just over 11 million light-years, Centaurus A contains the closest active galactic nucleus to Earth. The center is home for a supermassive black hole that ejects jets of high-speed gas into space, but neither the supermassive black hole or the jets are visible in this image. This image was taken in July 2010 with Hubble's Wide Field Camera 3. Image Credit: NASA, ESA, and the Hubble Heritage (STScI/AURA)-ESA/Hubble Collaboration Acknowledgment: R. O'Connell (University of Virginia) and the WFC3 Scientific Oversight Committee”

The above picture and excerpt are from the NASA website:

U.S. BUDGET AND SPACE MILITARY CAPABILITIES

The following excerpt is from a U.S. Defense Department American Forces Press e-mail:
Official: 2013 Budget Targets Space Capability Resilience
By Cheryl Pellerin
American Forces Press Service
WASHINGTON, March 9, 2012 - The $9.6 billion for space programs within President Barack Obama's fiscal year 2013 budget request will boost resilience for U.S. space capabilities but cut some modernization and other programs, Air Force Gen. William L. Shelton, commander of the Air Force Space Command, told a House panel yesterday.
Shelton testified on national security space activities before the House Armed Services Committee's strategic forces subcommittee, along with Ambassador Gregory L. Schulte, deputy assistant secretary of defense for space policy, Gil I. Klinger, deputy assistant secretary of defense for space and intelligence, and other experts.
The president's budget request, Shelton said, "invests in programs that enhance the resiliency and effectiveness of our space capabilities, namely missile warning, positioning, navigation and timing, satellite communications, space situational awareness and space launch."

A 22 percent drop in the 2013 request from 2012 represents mainly "fact-of-life programmatic changes," the general said, along with "some very difficult budget decisions leading to cuts to some modernization programs, and restructuring our approach" to the Operationally Responsive Space Office, or ORS, and the Space Test Program.
Congress established the ORS in 2007 to shorten the space acquisition cycle while responding to urgent warfighter needs. The Space Test Program has been providing access to space for the DOD space research and development community since 1965.

The command, Shelton said, also seeks to speed the acquisition process for the Advanced Extremely High-Frequency Program, a joint service satellite communications system for high-priority military ground, sea and air assets, and the Space-Based Infrared System, a key part of North America's missile early warning and defense system.

The general said the Air Force Space Command is working closely with NASA and the National Reconnaissance Office to "bring stability and predictability to our launch programs."

Schulte told the panel that three elements are critical to the U.S. strategy in space: resilience, promoting responsible behavior in space, and energizing the space industrial base.

Examples of resiliency, he said, include hosted payloads, commercial augmentation, international cooperation and backup capabilities in other domains.
In 2008, the European Union published a draft Code of Conduct for Outer Space Activities and a revised draft in 2010.

"The EU's draft is a promising basis for an international code," Schulte said.
"It focuses on reducing the risk of creating debris and increasing transparency of space operations. It is not legally binding and recognizes the inherent right of self-defense. It addresses behavior rather than unverifiable capabilities and better serves our interests than the legally binding ban on space weapons proposed by others," he added.
"As we participate in the development of an international code," Schulte told the panel, "the department is committed to ensuring that it advances our national security."
The ambassador said the United States could energize the space industrial base by allowing industry to compete internationally for the sale of satellites and technologies that are already widely available.
Today, some commercial satellite components reside on the Munitions List, a registry of items subject to the International Traffic in Arms Regulations because they are considered dual-use exports -- those that can be used for peaceful and military ends. The State Department strictly regulates and licenses such exports.

Last year, Schulte said, the departments of Defense and State concluded that commercial communications satellites and related components, with a few exceptions, can be moved from the U.S. Munitions List to the Commerce Control List without posing an unacceptable security risk.

The forthcoming final report, he added, will identify more items that can be safely moved.
"This approach -- higher fences around fewer items -- will require new legislation," he told the panel.

"Your support can help energize our industrial base and thereby enhance our national security," Schulte added. "Giving our industrial base new commercial opportunities is particularly important at a time of defense spending constraints."
Deputy Assistant Secretary Klinger told the panel that DOD is recapitalizing virtually all its space lines of business, "and doing so at precisely a time of sharply constrained resources and as the nation remains at war."

The department is doing the following:
- Executing oversight earlier in the acquisition process so program managers can achieve authority to proceed early and then focus their energies on program execution.
- Using fixed-price contracts, more innovative contracting and evolutionary upgrades where those make sense.

- Pursuing a block buy for the Advanced Extremely High-Frequency 5 and 6 satellite programs and developing a plan to use the savings to improve the capability of military satellite communications overall.

"This is extremely important as we plan ahead to maintain the resources to protect our seed corn of promising technologies," Klinger said. "We intend to use competition where and when it makes sense."

APOLLO 9 SPACEWALK

The following excerpt and picture are from the NASA website:


This image, taken on March 6, 1969, shows the Apollo 9 Command and Service Modules docked with the Lunar Module. Apollo 9 astronaut Dave Scott stands in the open hatch of the Command Module, nicknamed "Gumdrop," docked to the Lunar Module "Spider" in Earth orbit. His crewmate Rusty Schweickart, lunar module pilot, took this photograph from the porch of the lunar module. Inside the lunar module was Apollo 9 commander Jim McDivitt. The crew tested the orbital rendezvous and docking procedures that made the lunar landings possible. Image Credit: NASA