Houston — Unconstrained by budget forecasts, and even the limits of current technology, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s 100-Year Starship project is surging ahead with concepts for the first human interstellar mission. The program is taking a visionary look at propulsion systems that extract their fuel from dark energy, manipulate space-time or look to other sources that have yet to be dealt with.

Leaves execution of GOES-R and Joint Polar Satellite System programs an 'extremely challenging' proposition

The Senate is poised to vote early Sept. 22 on a bill to continue funding the government in fiscal 2013 — legislation that will freeze funding for all programs, including Boeing’s U.S. Air Force KC-46A tanker program in a year when its budget was expected to take off. In fiscal 2012, the program received $877.1 million. The fiscal 2013 request was $1.8 billion.

Has meanwhile passed the halfway point on its way to its first science destination area

JSC SUPPORT: S&K Global Solutions LLC, of Polson, Mont., has been selected by NASA’s Johnson Space Center to consolidate computer product support for the facility’s Engineering Directorate under a potential $50 million, five-year agreement. Effective Oct. 18, the contract includes a three-year, cost-plus, fixed-fee, firm-fixed-price agreement and a single two-year option. S&K Global Solutions’ team includes Booz Allen Hamilton, of McLean, Va., and S&K Aerospace LLC, of St. Ignatius, Mont.

LOS ANGELES — Boeing is revising the CST-100 air bag landing system for use in water landings, after tests and further analysis revealed the space capsule would encounter greater loads than expected on splashdown.

Has determined that all bidders for the Orbital/Suborbital Program-3 contract will be eligible to compete

'If industry takes up launch vehicles and satellites it will benefit all of us'