NASA Announces Research Grants In Microgravity Materials Science

This research offers investigators the opportunity to use a microgravity or low-gravity environment to enhance the understanding of fundamental physical and chemical processes associated with materials science.

As the lead center for NASA’s microgravity research, Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., will manage the research efforts under the auspices of NASA's Office of Life and Microgravity Science and Applications at NASA Headquarters in Washington, D.C.

Researchers will use NASA's microgravity research facilities such as drop tubes, drop towers, and aircraft flying parabolic trajectories, with the flight-definition investigators working toward experiments on space flight test beds such as the International Space Station and Space Shuttle.

Sixty of the grants are to conduct ground-based research, while the remaining five are flight-definition efforts. Twenty-two of these grants are for continuation of work currently being funded by NASA, but the remaining 43 represent new research efforts. NASA received 232 proposals in response to this research announcement. These proposals were all peer-reviewed by scientific and technical experts from academia, government, and industry. In addition, a team from NASA's Marshall Center reviewed the engineering feasibility of those proposals selected for flight definition.

A list of awardees (by state), their institutions, and research titles can be found on the Internet at: ftp://ftp.hq.nasa.gov/pub/pao/pressrel/2000/00-001a.txt

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Note to Editors / News Directors: Interviews supporting this release are available to media representatives by contacting Steve Roy of the Marshall Media Relations Department at (256) 544-0034. For an electronic version of this release, digital images or more information, visit Marshall's News Center on the Web at: http://www.msfc.nasa.gov/news