{"id":17577,"date":"2021-03-25T18:58:54","date_gmt":"2021-03-25T10:58:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/lasers-on-the-moon-nuclear-rockets-nasa-awards-millions-for-way-out-tech\/"},"modified":"2021-03-25T18:58:54","modified_gmt":"2021-03-25T10:58:54","slug":"lasers-on-the-moon-nuclear-rockets-nasa-awards-millions-for-way-out-tech","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/lasers-on-the-moon-nuclear-rockets-nasa-awards-millions-for-way-out-tech\/","title":{"rendered":"Lasers on the moon? Nuclear rockets? NASA awards millions for way-out tech"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Nuclear
Future spaceships could use nuclear thermal propulsion to get to Mars quickly. (Illustration via USNC-Tech)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

NASA\u2019s latest crop of space technology grants will fund work on projects ranging from power-beaming lasers for lunar missions to high-temperature testing of components for nuclear-powered rockets.<\/p>\n

Those are just a couple of the 365 concepts attracting a total of $45 million in grants from NASA\u2019s Small Business Innovation Research and Small Business Technology Transfer programs, also known as SBIR and STTR.<\/p>\n

Jim Reuter, associate administrator for the space agency\u2019s Space Technology Mission Directorate, said the release of the SBIR\/STTR Phase I solicitation was accelerated by two months to help small-scale tech ventures cope with the COVID-19 crisis.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt NASA, we recognize that small businesses are facing unprecedented challenges due to the pandemic. \u2026 We hope the expedited funding helps provide a near-term boost for future success,\u201d Reuter said today in a news release.<\/p>\n

This year\u2019s batch of SBIR\/STTR Phase I grants will go to 289 small businesses and 47 research institutions across the country. More than 30% of the awards are going to first-time NASA SBIR\/STTR recipients.<\/p>\n

Phase I grants provide up to $125,000 for establishing the merit and feasibility of tech innovations that could further NASA\u2019s goals for aeronautical development and space exploration. Phase I SBIR contracts run for six months, while the STTR contracts last for 13 months. Recipients may become eligible for further funding, depending on their progress in Phase I.<\/p>\n

Read more<\/strong>: PowerLight\u2019s ambitions for laser power beaming extend to the moon<\/h4>\n

You can scan the full list of SBIR and STTR grants on NASA\u2019s website. Here are the seven Washington state ventures receiving SBIR funding:<\/p>\n

LaserMotive, d.b.a. PowerLight Technologies, Kent:<\/strong> Developing an efficient laser power beaming system for a variety of lunar mission scenarios, including crewed bases and autonomous rovers.<\/p>\n

Ultra Safe Nuclear Corp. \u2013 Technologies, Seattle:<\/strong> Designing a scalable, ultra-high-temperature facility for testing material properties and evaluating performance, specialized for space nuclear reactor core and fuel components. Last month, USNC-Tech received a separate grant from the NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts program to look into building a compact spacecraft for studying interstellar objects.<\/p>\n

American Daedalus LLC, Puyallup:<\/strong> Investigating the feasibility of infrasonic monitoring as a method for detecting aircraft-scale atmospheric turbulence.<\/p>\n

Bechamo LLC, Bothell: <\/strong>Optimizing the integrated design of aircraft and flight controls for electric and hybrid aircraft, including delivery drones and air taxis.<\/p>\n

Convergent Manufacturing Technologies US, Seattle:<\/strong> Optimizing the production of composite parts for tailored manufacturing processes.<\/p>\n

Okean Solutions, Seattle:<\/strong> Improving the tools for fault management system modeling by integrating Okean Solutions\u2019 MONSID system with the Jet Propulsion Laboratory\u2019s CAESAR platform.<\/p>\n

Tunoptix, Seattle: <\/strong>Reducing the size, weight and power needs of hyperspectral imaging systems through the use of meta-optics and computational imaging.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Future spaceships could use nuclear thermal propulsion to get to Mars quickly. (Illustration via USNC-Tech) NASA\u2019s latest crop of space technology grants will fund work on projects ranging from power-beaming lasers for lunar missions to high-temperature testing of components for nuclear-powered rockets. Those are just a couple of the 365 concepts attracting a total of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[4515,4758,625,190,4442,4517,4355,4566,4583],"class_list":["post-17577","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-lasermotive","tag-lasers","tag-moon","tag-nasa","tag-nuclear-power","tag-powerlight-technologies","tag-sbir","tag-sttr","tag-ultra-safe-nuclear"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17577"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17577"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17577\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17577"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17577"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17577"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}