Technology Demonstration

CADRE (Cooperative Autonomous Distributed Robotic Exploration)
Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS)
Earth's Moon
Game Changing Development Program
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Space Technology Mission Directorate
Technology
Technology Demonstration
A trio of suitcase-size rovers and their base station have been carefully wrapped up and shipped off to join the lander that will deliver them to the Moon’s surface. Three small NASA rovers that will explore the lunar surface as a team have been packed up and shipped from the agency’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in […]
Posted February 11, 2025
Space Communications & Navigation Program
Ames Research Center
Communicating and Navigating with Missions
Goddard Space Flight Center
Small Satellite Missions
Space Communications Technology
Technology Demonstration
NASA’s TBIRD (TeraByte InfraRed Delivery) demonstration and its host spacecraft — the PTD-3 (Pathfinder Technology Demonstrator-3) — have completed their technology demonstration. The TBIRD payload spent the past two years breaking world records for the fastest satellite downlink from space using laser communications.
Posted September 25, 2024
Glenn Research Center
Aeronautics
Aeronautics Research
Human Space Travel Research
International Space Station (ISS)
ISS Research
Space Communications & Navigation Program
Technology Demonstration
Technology Demonstration Missions Program
White Sands Test Facility
A team at NASA’s Glenn Research Center in Cleveland streamed 4K video footage from an aircraft to the International Space Station and back for the first time using optical, or laser, communications. The feat was part of a series of tests on new technology that could provide live video coverage of astronauts on the Moon […]
Posted July 24, 2024
Human Landing System Program
Artemis
General
Marshall Space Flight Center
Space Technology Mission Directorate
Technology Demonstration
Technology Demonstration Missions Program
As part of NASA’s Artemis campaign to return humans to the Moon for the benefit of all, the agency is working with SpaceX to develop the company’s Starship human landing system (HLS), which will land astronauts near the Moon’s South Pole during the Artemis III and Artemis IV missions. On March 14, SpaceX launched the […]
Posted March 14, 2024
Marshall Space Flight Center
Space Technology Mission Directorate
Technology Demonstration
By Wayne Smith In his youth, NASA technologist Les Johnson was riveted by the 1974 novel “The Mote in God’s Eye,” by Jerry Pournelle and Larry Niven, in which an alien spacecraft propelled by solar sails visits humanity. Today, Johnson and a NASA team are preparing to test a similar technology. NASA continues to unfurl […]
Posted February 12, 2024
Deep Space Network
Space Communications & Navigation Program
Space Communications Technology
Space Operations Mission Directorate
Space Technology Mission Directorate
Technology Demonstration
Technology Demonstration Missions Program
Capable of receiving both radio frequency and optical signals, the DSN’s hybrid antenna has tracked and decoded the downlink laser from DSOC, aboard NASA’s Psyche mission. An experimental antenna has received both radio frequency and near-infrared laser signals from NASA’s Psyche spacecraft as it travels through deep space.
Posted February 8, 2024
Glenn Research Center
Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS)
Cryogenic Fluid Management (CFM)
Technology Demonstration
Editor’s note, Feb. 6, 2024: This article has been updated to clarify that the Radio Frequency Mass Gauge estimates how much propellant is available in a tank. It does not make an exact measurement. It’s easy to measure fuel in tanks on Earth, where gravity pulls the liquid to the bottom. But in space, the game […]
Posted February 6, 2024
Glenn Research Center
Artemis
Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS)
Cryogenic Fluid Management (CFM)
Marshall Space Flight Center
Moons
Space Technology Mission Directorate
Tech Demo Missions
Technology Demonstration
Establishing sustained operations at the Moon and Mars presents a multitude of opportunities and challenges NASA has yet to encounter. Many of these activities require new technologies and processes to ensure the agency is prepared for its ambitious Artemis missions and those beyond.
Posted January 11, 2024
Laser Communications Relay
General
Goddard Space Flight Center
Space Communications & Navigation Program
Technology Demonstration
A NASA technology experiment on the International Space Station completed its first laser link with an in-orbit laser relay system on Dec. 5, 2023. Together, they complete NASA’s first two-way, end-to-end laser relay system.
Posted December 13, 2023
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