NASA will grant $175,000 value of funding to 14 initial-stage research below the NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts program because it continues to foster area expertise developments that would assist future missions. 

The area company mentioned Tuesday that the awarded endeavors, that are all of their conceptual improvement stage, embody analysis on fluidic telescopes, area exploration, long-distance lunar characterization, manufacturing methods and energy methods, amongst others. 

NIAC researchers will look into the feasibility of the Phase 1 tasks, map out needed expertise improvement, determine potential mitigating components and seek for transition alternatives to materialize the ideas. 10 out of the 14 researchers are first-time NIAC funding recipients. 

“These initial Phase I NIAC studies help NASA determine whether these futuristic ideas could set the stage for future space exploration capabilities and enable amazing new missions,” mentioned Michael LaPointe, program govt for the NASA program.