Here's an excerpt from the 2011 Departments of Commerce and Justice, and Science, and Related Agencies Appropriations Bill report (PDF):
Promoting STEM Education Through Competition.—The future of U.S. competitiveness rests on our ability to train the next generation of scientists and engineers. The Committee has acted on the ‘‘Rising Above the Gathering Storm’’ recommendation to improve K–12 STEM education by robustly funding the National Science Foundation and other science agencies. The Committee also recognizes the important contributions of groups and organizations that have developed nationwide STEM robotics competitions to inspire and train America’s students. The Committee directs NSF to set aside $2,000,000 for a competitive program of grants to promote STEM education through robotics competitions.
BLOG: Update on the NASA Authorization Bill - The Planetary Society - The reason that I included this here is that there's an interesting hint about a possible new Planetary Society prize at the end of the post:
A big first step will be consideration of the human asteroid mission. The Planetary Society will be participating in an upcoming NASA workshop on this subject, and we're getting ready to announce a new competition to advance the concept of humans exploring an asteroid. So stay tuned!
More Masten Space pictures
A brief glimpse of leg at Masten Space
Armadillo Aerospace flies Pixel - all 3 from RLV News
ISEC e-Newsletter #6 - August 2010 - International Space Elevator Consortium (ISEC) - This newsletter has a lot of information about Space Elevator Games Centennial Challenges and other prizes. Here are some excerpts, but the newsletter has many more details:
The Climber / Power-Beaming competition has been postponed until next year. ... The Strong Tether competition will be held at the upcoming Space Elevator Conference. The current schedule calls for this competition to be held on Friday, August 13th, at 4:15pm (US Pacific time) ...
In March, the International Space Elevator Consortium (ISEC) announced the Yuri Artsutanov and Jerome Pearson Prizes for Space Elevator research. ... the prize committee did not feel that any of them met the criteria; ... the prize committee did award an "Honorable Mention" to a paper submitted by Mr. Gaylen R. Hinton and he and his entry will be honored at the upcoming Space Elevator Conference. These prizes will be repeated next year. A new topic will be chosen for ... the Pearson prize ...
From August 6th-8th, the Japan Space Elevator Association (JSEA) will host it's second annual JSETEC (Japan Space Elevator Technical & Engineering Competition) event. ... The 2009 competition was held on a 150 meter tether. This year's competition will be held on a 300 meter tether. Next year, they plan on using a 600 meter tether. But, unlike the Space Elevator Games, they plan on holding the tether aloft with balloons, not a helicopter.
NASA Centennial Challenges 2010 Strong Tether Challenge - SpaceRef
Astrobotic designs excavator to recover lunar volatiles - Google Lunar X PRIZE Teams page
NASA Seeks Data from Innovative Lunar Demonstrations - NASA:
NASA has issued a Broad Agency Announcement (BAA) to purchase specific data resulting from industry efforts to test and verify vehicle capabilities through demonstrations of small robotic landers. The purpose is to inform the development of future human and robotic lander vehicles. ... The ILDD BAA challenges industry to demonstrate Earth-to-lunar surface flight system capabilities and test technologies.
Astrobotic to pursue NASA data purchase offer - RLV News
First Lindbergh Electric Aircraft Prizes Announced At AirVenture - Lindbergh Electric Aircraft Prize (LEAP) - You can find out about this year's prizes at the link. There is also some information about next year's prizes:
LEAP announced that in 2011, LEAP prizes will be awarded at Aero-Friedrichschafen in Germany as well as at AirVenture.
Fueling Innovation (100 MPGe at a time) - Energy Blog (Department of Energy)
See much, much more about the Progressive Automotive X PRIZE here.
And the winner is… Offering a cash prize to encourage innovation is all the rage. Sometimes it works rather well - The Economist
This is a guest post from Nathan Wong, the Director of Social Media at We Want Our Future (WWOF). You can follow him on Twitter: @nathanpwong and @WeWantOurFuture.
Participatory exploration + lunar analogs = win.
The NASA Space Exploration Vehicle (SEV) will be roving around the lunar-like environs of Northern Arizona in September, and they want you to tell them where to go. They've posted two Gigapans on the Desert RATS website that allow you to explore the area, then ask for your vote on specific locations from that photo.
Admittedly, I was a little disappointed that I couldn't select the top of the mountain there in the distance. But letting the public choose which lava outcroppings to investigate is still pretty darn cool, and a perfect example of participatory exploration at its best. Oh, and Gigapan is awesome.
You can check out the website and vote here, but hurry -- voting ends soon! You can also keep up with the Desert RATS team on Twitter: @DESERT_RATS.
X PRIZE has had quite a busy summer so far -- the Progressive Automotive X PRIZE is in its last (validation) stage, a new X Challenge for Oil Spill Cleanup was announced last week, some of the team has been supporting the Centennial Boy Scout Jamboree, and as ever, there are always more super sekrit projects in the works.
Well, it’s bitter sweet to say goodbye. I am looking very forward to returning to our X PRIZE office next week, but am sad to leave the friends that I have made here at the Jamboree. We (Amanda, Mitch and I) have blogged a lot about this event. This is mainly because we spent close to two weeks out here at Fort A.P Hill Virginia where the Centennial Jamboree took place. We have spent time with National Boy Scout Leadership, Tech Quest Volunteers and Boy Scouts from all parts of the world. One of our objectives for participating at the Boy Scout Jamboree was to build partnerships with organizations that are passionate about STEM Education for youth. I can gladly say that this goal has been achieved. Our partnership with the Boy Scouts has been launched and I am excited about the future projects that will be developed, not only with the Boy Scouts, but the Venturing Program which has girl and boy members. We also look forward to building partnerships with GeoCaching.Com and the Lemelson MIT Program.
Here are some of the highlights that I will take away from this great experience:
- Met youth from all parts of the US and the world, 43,000+ in attendance.
- We surveyed approximately 1,000 boys about their ideas for X PRIZE merit badges, including space exploration education.
- Survived all time recording breaking Virginia heat.
- Met and worked with CISCO (X PRIZE Sponsor) volunteers.
- I got to have daily “school box lunches” which included my favorite childhood Capri Suns.
- I learned how crazy-fun-obsessed youth & adults are when it comes to patch trading.
- I got to experience hands-on demonstrations in Space Exploration, Inventing, Wood Working, Electrical Engineering, Robotics, Drafting and even Dentistry.
More fun pictures!
I had a great time catching up with Robert and Sebastian from the Part Time Scientists team last week. So good a time we decided to do it again!
On the first day of training Boy Scout Volunteers to work in our X PRIZE tent, I noticed someone out of the corner of my eye paying extra attention to our message. His name is John McMillan. On the second day of the Jamboree, I once again notice someone, it's John. He is diligently going though our X PRIZE website reading about all of the PRIZEs. Half way through the second day, I ask John if he would like to run our X PRIZE videos: Making the Impossible Possible and What Do You Prize? He enthusiastically agrees and from then on, John has been our official volunteer spokesman for X PRIZE here at Technology Quest.
I cannot even begin to tell you how great John has been with the boys the last week and a half. He has not only told the X PRIZE story to thousands of youth, but has shared real life examples of how Boy Scouts can live the X PRIZE dream. As I pass by the makeshift movie theatre (which we built a couple different ways- thank heavens for the Boy Scouts' handy work), I have heard John ask questions like, “How many miles does your car currently get... wouldn’t it be nice to get a 100 miles per gallon?“ “If a 10 million dollar cash prize was put together for a team to sequence 100 genomes, do you think we could find information to design medicine to cure and help diseases? AND, my favorite, “How many of you guys are interested in space? Have you ever heard about the dark side of the Moon, it is like being in super refrigerator.”
Some background about John:
John comes from a family of engineers; grandfather was an aerospace engineer that designed parts for the 747. His uncle was a civil engineer and his aunt works for NASA. John always liked space exploration and computers when he was a kid. He completed many merit badges related to science and technology and earned his Eagle Scout when he was 16. Currently, John is a sophomore at the University of Hawaii, majoring in electrical engineering. He is also looking for internships and has asked me how to get a job at X PRIZE. Anyone have ideas?
In all, John has not only gotten the kids excited about X PRIZE, but he has gotten these youth excited about their dreams. Taking one of the many messages that I have heard John tell the youth, “This is your future and we want to know what you want for the future. Tell us your ideas and maybe you can be a part of the next X PRIZE dream!”
Over the past few days we've asked a number of Scouts, "What do YOU Prize?" Here is a video compilation showing some of their responses:
I recently posted about 3 new Centennial Challenges: the Nano-Satellite Launch Challenge, the Night Rover Challenge, and the Sample Return Robot Challenge. These links to the 3 challenges have some information that either I didn't catch and post about when these challenges were introduced, or that wasn't available then.
Nano-Satellite Launch Challenge
The current description of the objectives for the Nano-Satellite Launch Challenge is more detailed and nuanced than the one I originally saw:
- Safe, low-cost, small payload delivery system for frequent access to Earth orbit.
- Innovations in propulsion and other technologies as well as operations and management for broader applications in future launch systems.
- A commercial capability for dedicated launches of small satellites at a cost comparable to secondary payload launches--a potential new market with Government, commercial, and academic customers.
The prize purse section mentions the possibility of additional prize money for a 2nd-place or a bonus prize. My interpretation is that NASA would like to have a 2nd-place prize and bonus prizes, but Centennial Challenges doesn't have the money to do that. Will someone else step up to the plate, or will Centennial Challenges fund these augmentations in a later year?
Night Rover Challenge
In my earlier post, I speculated about the length of the "night" in the Night Rover Challenge, given some hints about the Moon in the material on the challenge. I recall that some other observers on the Internet were wondering the same thing. The current description of the challenge's objectives makes it more likely that the Moon's day/night cycle will govern the length of the "night" in the challenge with the following point:
- Innovations in energy storage technology for space operations and, in particular, to meet the demands imposed by the daylight/darkness cycle on the Moon.
The Challenge would be to demonstrate a portable energy collection and storage system through several cycles of daylight and darkness. ... The winning system would be the one that moved the greatest distance during darkness in an allotted time period (over several day/night cycles) using only its own stored energy.
The competition could be held in a typical Earth environment, but
Competitors with successful and appropriate system designs might be invited to test their energy storage systems in NASA thermal-vacuum chambers to demonstrate applicability to the space and lunar environment.
Sample Return Robot Challenge
The description gives some ideas about what the sample return environment will be like:
The roving area should include rolling terrain, granular medium, soft soils, and a variety of rocks. A pre-cached sample and several other samples would be located in smaller sampling zones within the larger roving area.
There could be 2 levels of prizes in this competition:
In order to win a Level-1 prize, a robot must retrieve only the pre-cached sample. Robots should be autonomous, but periodic intervention with teleoperation would be permitted with penalties imposed for its use.
In order to win a Level-2 prize, a team must autonomously navigate at all times and must retrieve the pre-cached sample and several additional sample types that may include rock, regolith, gas, liquid, etc...
