Finalists picked for second spaceship contest

NASA has narrowed the field of private space companies vying for $175 million in public funds the U.S. space agency expects to award in early February for demonstration flights to the international space station, according to industry sources closely following the competition.

At least eight firms, and perhaps as many as 14, submitted proposals in late November under the Commercial Orbital Transportation Services program, or COTS.

Established in 2006, COTS aims to spur development of privately operated space transportation systems capable of delivering cargo and eventually astronauts to the space station.

NASA selected two companies - Space Exploration Technologies, or SpaceX, and Rocketplane Kistler - in mid-2006 to share about $500 million. But NASA has since pulled the plug on Rocketplane Kistler's award for non-performance, freeing up the $175 million NASA intends to give to some other company next month.

According to multiple industry sources, NASA has notified four companies that they are finalists for the $175 million and should prepare to meet with COTS selection officials in Houston in the days ahead to defend their proposals.

Spacehab was one of the companies notified this week that it had made the cut, Eva DeCardenas, a spokeswoman for the Houston-based company, confirmed on Thursday.

The other companies, according to sources, are: Andrews Space of Seattle; Orbital Sciences of Dulles, Va.; and PlanetSpace of Chicago.

NASA spokeswoman Beth Dickey would not confirm that a downselect had taken place, because the agency has refrained from comment while the COTS competition remains under way.

Industry sources said NASA intends to announce its final selection on Feb. 7, the date by which the U.S. Government Accountability Office is required to rule on Rocketplane Kistler's challenge of NASA's use of Space Act Agreements for the COTS program. Rocketplane Kistler maintains that a traditional federal contract would be a better fit for COTS.

The COTS money has been paid out according to a schedule of milestones for spacecraft development, and NASA paid Rocketplane Kistler $32 million for meeting early milestones before terminating its Space Act Agreement. SpaceX is in line to receive $278 million if it hits all its milestones through 2010. Another $15 million was set aside for NASA's administration costs.

(In addition to the $500 million NASA-funded COTS program, five companies have been working with NASA on cargo supply projects on an unfunded basis. Those companies include PlanetSpace and Spacehab, as well as SpaceDev, SpaceDev and Transformational Space, or t/Space.)

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world’s blackest black

Scientists create world's blackest black
Super-dark carbon nanotubes could be used in solar cells and sensors
Researchers say they have made the darkest material on Earth, a substance so black it absorbs more than 99.9 percent of light.

Made from tiny tubes of carbon standing on end, this material is almost 30 times darker than a carbon substance used by the National Institute of Standards and Technology as the current benchmark of blackness.

And the material is close to the long-sought ideal black, which could absorb all colors of light and reflect none.

"All the light that goes in is basically absorbed," Pulickel Ajayan, who led the research team at Rice University in Houston, said Tuesday in a telephone interview. "It is almost pushing the limit of how much light can be absorbed into one material."

The substance has a total reflective index of 0.045 percent - which is more than three times darker than the nickel-phosphorus alloy that now holds the record as the world's darkest material.

Basic black paint, by comparison, has a reflective index of 5 percent to 10 percent.

The researchers are seeking a "world's darkest material" designation by Guinness World Records. But their work will likely yield more than just bragging rights.

Ajayan said the material could be used in solar energy conversion. "You could think of a material that basically collects all the light that falls into it," he said.

It could also could be used in infrared detection or astronomical observation.

Ajayan, who worked with a team at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, N.Y., said the material gets its blackness from three things.

It is composed of carbon nanotubes, tiny tubes of tightly rolled carbon that are 400 times smaller than the diameter of a strand of hair. The carbon helps absorb some of the light.
These tubes are standing on end, much like a patch of grass. This arrangement traps light in the tiny gaps between the "blades."
The researchers have also made the surface of this carbon nanotube carpet irregular and rough to cut down on reflectivity.
Such a nanotube array not only reflects light weakly, but also absorbs light strongly," said Shawn-Yu Lin, a professor of physics at Rensselaer, who helped make the substance.

The researchers have tested the material on visible light only. Now they want to see how it fares against infrared and ultraviolet light, and other wavelengths such as radiation used in communications systems.

"If you could make materials that would block these radiations, it could have serious applications for stealth and defense," Ajayan said.

The work was released online last week and will be published in an upcoming issue of the journal Nano Letters. The Indian-born Ajayan holds the 2006 Guinness World Record as co-inventor of the smallest brush in the world.

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