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HOUSTON,
April 22, 2005 —NASA has awarded Rice University’s
Carbon Nanotechnology Laboratory a four-year, $11
million contract to produce a prototype power cable
made entirely of carbon nanotubes.
The new project will be discussed with media in a
briefing at the Johnson Space Center at 2 p.m. CDT
April 26. Available to media in that session will
be:
-- Jefferson D. Howell,
Jr., Director, NASA Johnson Space Center
-- Richard Smalley, Director, Carbon Nanotechnology
Laboratory (CNL)
The project aims to
pioneer methods of producing pure nanotube power cables,
known as quantum wires, which may conduct electricity
up to 10 times better than copper and weigh about
one-sixth as much. Such technologies may advance NASA's
plans to return humans to the moon and eventually
travel to Mars and beyond.
“Technology advances like these are exactly what will
be needed to realize the future of space exploration,”
Howell said. “We are extremely fortunate to be able
to pool the unique expertise available at JSC, Rice
and the other collaborators in this effort.”
The contract was awarded by NASA’s Exploration Systems
Mission Directorate. It calls for an additional $4
million in related research at JSC, where researchers
will conduct crucial work in the area of nanotube
growth, and at NASA’s Glenn Research Center, where
nanotube composites will be developed for fuel cell
components.
Rice’s portion of the funding includes support for
collaborative projects at Houston-based Carbon Nanotechnologies
Inc., which specializes in large-scale nanotube production;
GHG Corp.; Duke University and the University of Pennsylvania.
“In the Space Shuttle, the primary power distribution
system accounts for almost 7 percent of the craft’s
weight,” said Smalley, University Professor, the Gene
and Norman Hackerman Professor of Chemistry, professor
of physics and the lead researcher on the project..
“To support additional instrumentation and broadband
communications, NASA’s next generation of human and
robotic spacecraft will need far more power. For ships
assembled in orbit, a copper power distribution system
could wind up accounting for one-quarter the weight
of the vessel.”
The contract calls for CNL to provide NASA a one-meter
prototype of a quantum wire by 2010. This will require
major breakthroughs in the production and processing
of nanotubes. Notably, a way has yet to be found to
produce a specific type of nanotube, and of the hundreds
of types available, only about 2 percent are pure
metals. These metallic tubes – also known as “armchair”
nanotubes – are the only types that conduct electricity
well enough for quantum wires.
“We need to find a way to make just the nanotubes
we want, and we need them in large quantities,” said
CNL Executive Director Howard Schmidt. “Another major
focus of the research will be finding new ways to
combine armchair nanotubes, which are single molecules
just a billionth of a meter wide, into large-scale
fibers and wires.”
The April 26 briefing will be available to media in
attendance only and will not be broadcast on NASA
Television.
MEDIA CONTACTS:
John Ira Petty
Johnson Space Center
Houston
281-483-5111
Jade Boyd
Rice University
o 713-348-6778
c 713-302-2447
jadeboyd@rice.edu
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