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RELEASE: 01-01
The answer to that question will have to wait about a year. In the
first step of a two-step process, NASA's Office of Space Science
selected three proposals for detailed study as candidates for the
next mission in the agency's Discovery Program of lower cost,
highly focused, rapid-development scientific spacecraft.
The selected proposals were judged to have the best science value
among 26 proposals submitted to NASA last August. Each selected
team will receive $450,000 to conduct a four-month implementation-
feasibility study focused on cost, management and technical plans,
including educational outreach and small business involvement.
* The Dawn mission intends to orbit Vesta and Ceres, two of the
largest asteroids in the solar system. According to current
theories, the very different properties of Vesta and Ceres are the
result of the asteroids being formed and evolving in different
parts of the solar system. By observing both asteroids with the
same set of instruments, Dawn would probe the early solar system
as well as determine in detail the properties of each asteroid.
Dr. Christopher T. Russell of the University of California at Los
Angeles would lead Dawn at a total cost to NASA of $271 million.
http://discovery.nasa.gov/
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