SpaceX engineering model of its Dragon capsule. Credit: Misha Gravenor

In a much anticipated announcement, the U.S. space agency finally awarded four commercial companies funds to develop spacecraft that can carry astronauts to space. The awards are part of NASA's commercial crew development program, initiated to utilize the private sector to reduce the gap in American human spaceflight capabilities as the space shuttles are scheduled to retire this year, and the Obama administration has canceled the agency's Constellation program.

"The next American-flagged vehicle to carry our astronauts into space is going to be a U.S. commercial provider," said Ed Mango, NASA's Commercial Crew Program manager, in a press release.

The four companies selected: Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX), which currently has a contract to carry cargo to the International Space Station, will receive $75 million to make its Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon space capsule ready for humans; Sierra Nevada Corporation will receive $80 million for its space plane design; Boeing will receive $92.3 million for a capsule design; and Blue Origin will receive $22 million to develop its capsule design.

"We're committed to safely transporting U.S. astronauts on American-made spacecraft and ending the outsourcing of this work to foreign governments," said NASA Administrator Charles Bolden, in the press release. Until commercial spacecraft are ready the U.S. will have to rely on the Russians to carry astronauts to space at a cost of more than $50 million per seat. SpaceX's vice president of astronaut safety, Ken Bowersox, told me that the company estimates its seats at $20 million each with a crew of seven, or $140 million per mission.

"These agreements are significant milestones in NASA's plans to take advantage of American ingenuity to get to low-Earth orbit, so we can concentrate our resources on deep space exploration," said Bolden.

Credit: NASA/GM

Despite President Obama's new budget proposal to scrap moon-landing plans NASA is pushing forward with a new lunar-based mission, dubbed Project M.

According to the agency, "the proposition is simple: land an operational humanoid robot on the moon in 1,000 days."

NASA made a big splash earlier this year when it unveiled a humanoid robot called Robonaut2 in partnership with GM. At the time, Rob Ambrose, chief of the Software, Robotics and Simulation Division at NASA, told Technology Review that the agency wanted to use the robot for a number of different missions, starting with visits the International Space Station. The proposed Project M, which oddly hasn't been discussed much by NASA officials, seems to be part of this plan. The agency is also testing a prototype lunar lander to launch the robot at Armadillo Aerospace located near Dallas, TX. NasaWatch.com reports that the agency plans to land something on the moon in 2013.

According to NASA's Project M white paper:

The humanoid will travel to the moon on a small lander fueled by green propellants, liquid methane and liquid oxygen. It will perform a precision, autonomous landing, avoiding any hazards or obstacles on the surface. Upon landing the robot will deploy and walk on the surface performing a multitude of tasks focused on demonstrating engineering tasks such as maintenance and construction; performing science of opportunity (i.e. using existing sensors on the robot or small science instruments); and simple student experiments.

Below is a video of the Project M lunar lander in action.

The Mars500 facility in Moscow. Credit: ESA

Six people will soon find out what it would be like to live on Mars by enclosing themselves in a Russian-built mock-up of the red planet for 520 days. The group is part of a European and Russian experiment, called Mars500, designed to provide a better understanding of the mental and physical challenges of such a long-duration expedition.

The experiment will start this summer. It follows a 14-day mission in the simulated chamber in 2007, and a 105-day mission last year. The new mission is the final phase of the experiment.

The facility, which mimics the red planet's landscape, includes a mocked up interplanetary spaceship and Mars lander. For the simulation, the crew will spend 250 days in a spacecraft traveling to Mars, then 30 days exploring it's surface, during which 3 people will move to the surface simulator and the others will remain in the spacecraft. The remaining 240 days will be spent traveling home.

During the mission, the crew will experience emergency situations like communication failures and food rationing, and will be required to conduct scientific experiments in an isolation chamber. Researchers hope to gather data on the crew's psychological health--crews have to keep journals and fill out questionnaires throughout the experiment--to better prepare humans for the loneliness of extended exploration missions. The mission will be almost three times longer than the longest mission on the International Space Station (six months), and the participants will spend majority of that time in a small spacecraft journeying to the red planet.

A crew member's bedroom in the facility. Credit: ESA