The U.S. National Academy of Sciences (NAS) and the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) will hold two meetings in 2014 as part of the first CAS-NAS Forum for New Leaders in Space Science.  The first will be in Beijing from May 8-9 and the second from November 3-4 in the Los Angeles area.

The forum “is designed to provide opportunities for a highly select group of young space scientists from China and the United States to discuss their research activities in an intimate and collegial environment,” according to an announcement on the Space Studies Board (SSB) website.  The SSB is part of the National Research Council, which along with the National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering and Institute of Medicine comprise The National Academies.  SSB’s counterpart for the forum is the National Space Science Center (NSSC) of the CAS.

Participants in the two meetings will be selected from applicants who had to meet a number of criteria, including being no more than 40 years old on December 31, 2014.  The application period is closed.  Selections will be made by the end of  February.

Language in the newly enacted FY2014 Consolidated Appropriations Act (colloquially referred to “the omnibus”) continues prohibitions on NASA and the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy with regard to discussing or engaging in bilateral space cooperation with China unless certain criteria are met.  Those restrictions do not affect other government or non-government organizations, however.  (NAS is a non-government entity.)

The three-fold purpose of the CAS-NAS forum, according to the SSB’s website, is —

• to identify and highlight research achievements of the best and brightest young scientists currently working at the frontiers of their scientific disciplines;
• to build informal bridges between the space science communities in China and the United States; and
• to enhance the diffusion of insights gained from participation in the Forum to the larger space-science communities in China and the United States.

NOAA weather satellites, in addition to providing weather data, carry transponders as part of the international Cospas-Sarsat search and rescue system to locate people in distress.   In 2013, 253 people throughout the United States and in surrounding waters were rescued.

NOAA reports that 139 people were rescued from marine emergencies, 34 from aviation incidents, and 80 from land-based events.

Cospas-Sarsat started as a joint effort among the Soviet Union, United States, France and Canada in the 1980s, using transponders on polar-orbiting spacecraft (U.S. weather satellites and Soviet navigation satellites).  Today, it involves 41 countries and two independent organizations.  Since 1982, more than 35,000 people worldwide have been rescued using the system, of which 7.252 were in the United States.

Aircraft, marine vessels and individuals can be equipped with devices that broadcast an emergency signal when activated manually or, in some cases, automatically.  The signal is detected by polar orbiting satellites equipped with Cospas-Sarsat transponders that alert control centers in various countries.  NOAA operates the control center for the United States in Suitland, MD.

Cospas is the Russian acronym for Space System for Search of Vessels in Distress.  Sarsat is the English acronym for Search and Rescue Satellite Aided Tracking.  More information is on NOAA’s Cospas-Sarsat website.

As part of its action on the FY2014 Omnibus Appropriations bill, the House and Senate appropriations committees rejected the Obama Administration’s controversial reorganization plan for STEM education funding and said it would take a lot more work by NASA before they decide on the fate of the President’s proposed Asteroid Redirect Mission (ARM).

Both initiatives, though substantively unrelated to each other, share the distinction of coming as a surprise to Congress early last year. 

The Administration’s plan to reorganize how the government manages programs to promote Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) education affected many more agencies than NASA, but the NASA community was the most vocal in its opposition.   At the top level, the plan, developed over several years by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) and its National Science and Technology Council, sought to consolidate activities funded by 13 agencies into three agencies:  the Department of Education for K-12 programs, the National Science Foundation for college and university programs, and the Smithsonian Institution for informal education.

NASA funds a significant amount of STEM education activities not only through its Office of Education, but by funding that, under NASA policy, is set aside in each of NASA’s science programs (1 percent of each program’s budget).  Scientists associated with NASA’s science programs were flabbergasted that the money would be sent to the Department of Education, which had no expertise and reportedly only one person assigned to STEM education, or transferred to NASA’s own Office of Education and they would have to compete to obtain it to support their program-related activities.

The report accompanying the Omnibus Appropriations bill released last night makes clear that although Congress appreciates efforts to make STEM programs more efficient and effective, this is not the plan:  “The proposal contained no clearly defined implementation plan, had no buy-in from the education community and failed to sufficiently recognize or support a number of proven, successful programs.  Accordingly, the agreement [on the Omnibus] does not adopt the reorganization.”  The issue is not dead, however.  The language in the OSTP portion of the Commerce-Justice-Science (CJS) section of the report directs OSTP to try again, this time using an “inclusive development process,” and Congress will reconsider that future proposal.  No time is suggested for when that might be.

The Asteroid Redirect Mission (ARM) similarly received underwhelming support in the Omnibus bill.  The Obama Administration proposed ARM last year as a variation of its 2010 directive that NASA’s next step in human spaceflight be a mission to an asteroid.   In the ARM concept, rather than sending astronauts on a several month journey into deep space to rendezvous with an asteroid, a robotic spacecraft would fly to an asteroid already headed in Earth’s direction and nudge it into a lunar orbit.  The astronauts then would be sent to study the asteroid in lunar orbit, a much shorter trip and within the capabilities of the early versions of the Space Launch System (SLS) and Orion spacecraft.

The idea failed to win support in Congress or with NASA”s international partners.  A Global Exploration Roadmap produced by the United States and 11 other countries as part of the International Space Exploration Coordination Group (ISECG) made clear that all the other countries remain focused on sending astronauts to the Moon as the next “beyond low Earth orbit” destination.  Only the United States champions the ARM mission.

For its part, the House Science, Space and Technology Committee reported out its version of a 2013 NASA Authorization Act that prohibits spending any funds on ARM.  The bill cleared committee on a party line vote and has not advanced further, but a Democratic alternative offered by Rep. Donna Edwards did not endorse ARM either.  That bill, and two bills in the Democratically-controlled Senate (the Senate Commerce Committee’s version of the 2013 NASA authorization act, and the Senate Appropriations Committee’s report on the FY2014 CJS appropriations bill), were silent on the proposal, as though it did not exist.   The House Appropriations CJS bill said that the idea needed more thought and agreed studies could be conducted, therefore neither approving nor prohibiting it.

The CJS portion of the FY2014 Omnibus Appropriations bill, which reflects a compromise between the House and Senate CJS subcommittees, essentially adopts the House position, saying neither no nor yes, but that more work is needed before they’ll sign on.  “While ARM is still an emerging concept, NASA has not provided Congress with satisfactory justification materials such as detailed cost estimates or impacts to ongoing missions.  The completion of significant preliminary activities is needed to appropriately lay the groundwork for the ARM prior to NASA and Congress making a long term commitment to this mission concept.”