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","benefits":"As most CubeSats are constrained to 10's of watts of electrical power due to the limited surface area available for photovoltaics, LISA-T seeks to address the issue by developing deployable arrays that increase available surface area for photovoltaics thus providing hundreds of watts.
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“A robust and competitive commercial space sector is vital to continued progress in space. The United States is committed to encouraging and facilitating the growth of a U.S. commercial space sector that supports U.S. needs, is globally competitive, and advances U.S. leadership in the generation of new markets and innovation-driven entrepreneurship.”
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FO has its lineage from the former Innovative Partnership Program (IPP) of FY09, specifically the Facilitated Access to the Space Environment for Technology (FAST) project and the Commercial Reusable Suborbital Research (CRuSR) project. The FAST and CRuSR activities are continued within the FO Program, as the parabolic and suborbital, flight campaigns, respectively. The flights will provide opportunities to expose new technologies to low-g environments and/or high altitude environments. The intent is to demonstrate and mature various technologies for future applications. These emerging technologies will come from the nine other programs within the Space Technology Mission Directorate, from the other Mission Directorates and external sources (other Government Agencies, Academia, and Commercial Industries.
The NASA Flight Opportunities (FO) Program has been established as a part of the Space Technologies Mission Directorate (STMD) to rapidly develop, demonstrate and infuse revolutionary, high-payoff technologies through transparent, collaborative partnerships, expanding the boundaries of the aerospace enterprise by providing the nation’s investments in space technologies to make a difference in the world around us. FO focuses on maturation of technologies that are of benefit to multiple customers, to flight readiness status with an outcome of Technology Readiness Level (TRL) 6 or higher. These crosscutting capabilities are those that advance multiple future aerospace missions, including flight projects where near-space or in-space demonstration is needed before the capability can transition to direct mission application. Maturing technologies to a higher TRL status through relevant flight opportunities testing is a significant challenge from both a cost and risk perspective.
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