Fw: DARPA FUNDING: Lunar Study
Erinn van Wynsberghe
President & CEO
VanWyn Inc.
Hello,
DARPA has announced a new, unique program regarding a 10-Year Lunar Architecture (LunA-10) capability study. This opportunity is open for global participation, which is highly encouraged and welcome.
Please refer to the announcement (https://www.darpa.mil/news-events/2023-08-15) and see below for additional details.
Documents relevant for interested proposers are attached and can be found here: https://sam.gov/opp/54586656144548e598d75adea4d129b7/view.
Background & Vision
It is the year 2035, and a thriving lunar economy exists on the Moon. How did we get there?
DARPA supports a future model where the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), international governments, and commercial industry can rapidly scale up lunar exploration and commerce, enabled and supported by the deployment of an efficiently combined, integrated lunar infrastructure framework. An integrated framework would upend the current technical paradigm, whereby each lunar lander or activity must organically support all required resources such as survival power, communications, and data storage.
The 10-Year Lunar Architecture (LunA-10) program aims to study the rapid development of non-terrestrial technology concepts designed to move away from individual scientific efforts within isolated, self-sufficient systems and toward a series of shareable, scalable, resource-driven systems that can operate jointly, creating monetizable services for future lunar users in a mass-efficient manner.
DARPA has a rich history of technological innovation leading to invaluable civil applications such as the Internet, miniaturizing Global Positioning Systems (GPS) receivers for everyday use, and mRNA vaccines. DARPA now seeks to galvanize the setup of a future civil lunar framework through the early development and system-level design of integrated pathfinder infrastructure to catalyze widespread activity on and around the Moon over the next ten years (2025-2035), as well as out to 2050.
To achieve this, DARPA sees overlap potential in multiple areas under current exploration. For example, an independent market analysis of the future lunar economy posits specific key sectors that must be developed into services to sustain a long-term presence on the Moon:
1) Construction;
2) Mining;
3) Transit (referred to herein as Mobility);
4) Energy;
5) Agriculture;
6) Medicine;
7) Robotics;
8) Life sustainment;
9) Experiments (defined herein as lunar/planetary science);
10) Communications;
11) Digital infrastructure for modern lunar computing2 and;
12) Position, Navigation, and Timing2 (PNT).
Important milestones for Proposers | |
Milestone | Dates |
Technical Area 1 (TA-1) Questions Due Date | 22 August 2023 |
TA-1 Abstracts Due Date | 06 September 2023 by 4:00 PM ET |
TA-1 White Paper and Technical Presentation Due Date | 25 September 2023 by 4:00 PM ET
|
TA-1 Anticipated announcement of Selectees | 10-12 October 2023 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in association with the Lunar Surface Innovation Consortium Fall Meeting
|
Closing Date | 14 August 2023 |
If you have any questions specific to proposals for this opportunity, please contact DARPA-E...@darpa.mil.
Attachments
- LunA-10 Announcement (DARPA-EA-23-02)
- A. Research Other Transaction template
- B. Price Proposal spreadsheet
- C. Certifications for Research Other Transaction template
Warm Regards,
DARPA International Cooperation