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Newsletter #4 - January 13th, 2003

Thank you for your continued interest in the Mars Gravity Biosatellite project. As always, you can find out more by visiting the website. Here's the news since our last update.

NASA MEETING: Program Manager Paul Wooster, Science Director Erika Brown, Engineering Director Col. John Keesee, and Program Office member Chris Carr met with NASA representatives on Tuesday, December 3 in Washington, D.C.. Mars Gravity will be following up with NASA to discuss further opportunities for mission sponsorship beyond current support from NASA/Ames Research Center Fundamental Biology Program.

PDR: The date for the project-wide Preliminary Design Review has been set for January 25, 2003. Members from all three schools will meet at MIT for the PDR presentations.

INFORMATION SYSTEMS GRANT: The iCampus program at MIT has donated approximately $30,000 to improve team coordination and efficiency at all three schools. The grant will be used to focus on data distribution, project management, and real-time communication. Many thanks to I-Campus for their generosity!

PAYLOAD EXPOSITION: The payload expo presented the first demonstration of a prototype temperature/humidity control unit, using the technologies intended for the flight life support system. The team also presented an integrated functional design of the payload systems that will be fleshed out for our upcoming Preliminary Design Review.

RECRUITING AT MIT: MIT completed an end-of-semester recruiting drive, and now has many new team members working during the January intersession. The team is expanding rapidly and plans to use its new resources to increase productivity before spring classes start in February.

SUMMER AT UQ: The 8-strong summer group at UQ has been working full time since November 25, and released its version 1 Entry, Descent, and Landing System design on December 13. This will help UW and MIT in their design process by providing a first draft of major system interfaces in the form of a CAD model. Efforts to raise funds continue with a proposal to the university in progress and a corporate mail out in the planning.