The Space Hour

Starting things off today with the folks at DARPA and their very low earth orbit satellites, known as VeeLEOs, which have become important in a variety of surveillance and imaging applications. Trouble is, they're so low, they don't stay up very long without propulsion to keep them up. Eventually they run out of fuel. That's a problem the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency is trying to solve with a program known as Otter. For details, DARPA program manager Sarah Popkin joined Federal News Network's Tom Temin in studio to discuss.

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Federal Space projects require a lot of different organizations to take care of the many, many technical needs, whether for defense or exploration purposes. The problem is, many of those niche companies don't exactly have long standing relationships with federal and defense agencies. To help facilitate those relationships, companies like BMNT which is a defense tech innovation firms to make sure these partnerships actually produce what they intend to. To learn more, I spoke with Ellen Chang, who is a vice president with BMNT.

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Though they are still grounded on earth, the observatories that stay looking at the sky are vital to exploring space and finding every nook and cranny in the universe. One of them, Carnegie Observatories does just that from its world famous Las Campanas Observatory in Chile. I recently got to speak with Dr. John Mulcahaey, who is director and chair of the observatories, about the work they all do.

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You can't overlook the role venture capitalists have played in the rise of the commercial space industry. In an industry that relies on failed tests, there needs to be those sponsors who are alright with not seeing a quick return on investment. So what does it take to make those smart investments and what goes into the decision-making process? For answers to those questions, I spoke to Ethan Batraski who is a partner with the firm Venrock.

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NASA has a history of firsts. Now it has a new first. A first chief artificial intelligence officer. Joining Federal Drive Host Tom Temin last week was that very chief AI officer, Dave Salvaginni 

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An academic course, endorsed by the Defense Department and delivered by accelerator company BMNT, aims to help science and engineering students develop their ideas into companies. It's called Hacking for Defense. One startup, called Pharos Aerospace, hopes to help both Defense and commercial satellite operators deal with space debris. For more, Federal News Network's Tom Temin spoke with former University of Chicago students Victor Tyne and Brian Klein.

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The company MSI-DFAT, has a unique specialty. It blasts very loud sound at satellites and spacecraft that mimics the incredibly loud and harsh rocket launch noise environments for launch certification. It's an important step in making sure these multibillion dollar pieces of equipment are going to be able to make the journey to the final frontier. I recently had a chance to speak with two of the company's leaders, Alex Carrella CEO of the MSI-DFAT, and Bradley Hope, who is the U.S. Area Sales Manager.

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We begin today talking about the weather. Well not the actual weather itself, but the hardware needed to track it. Recently, NASA selected Lockheed Martin to build he nation's next generation weather satellite constellation, Geostationary Extended Observations, or GeoXO. It's a contract with an estimated value of just over $2.25 billion. To find out what the GeoXO mission is all about, I spoke to Dylan Powell, Lead Strategist for Weather and Earth Science at Lockheed Martin.

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Voyager Space has entered into an agreement with NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center to help develop an airlock for the Mars Transit Vehicle, also referred to as Deep Space Transport. It's a 12-month study that will look at the applying the concept of Voyager's Bishop Airlock design, currently being utilized on the International Space Station, towards a future mission to Mars. To learn more, I spoke with Marshall Smith, Chief Technology Officer for Voyager Space.

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George Mason University will be the site of the recently approved Landolt NASA Space Mission. The mission will kick off in 2029 by launching a light into the sky that will help scientists determine the brightness of starts so they can more accurately study how fast the universe is growing. Leading the mission is GMU associate professor Peter Plavchan, who joined me earlier to discuss.

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