Development & Demonstration of Novel Concepts for Precision Deployable Optical Structures (PDOS)

This proposal addresses Novel Concepts for Precision Deployable Optical Structures (PDOS). The proposed development and demonstration effort would provide an innovative solution to a problem which is becoming more and more important to organizations which must provide space based optical systems for the defense of the Nation and advancement of understanding of space.Both the Department of Defense and NASA face dramatic new challenges about the way they conduct space based optical sensor programs. On one hand, costs must be reduced by factors of many. But on the other hand, there are strong pressures for ever improved performance.The first and most obvious way to reduce space systems costs is to reduce spacecraft size and mass so that smaller, cheaper launch vehicles (e.g. Delta or Atlas) may be used. However, in the case of optical systems, increased performance usually implies directly an increased size of the payload. Development and demonstration of novel and unique optical-structural concepts to resolve this inherent dichotomy is the subject of WJSA's SBIR proposal. We will demonstrate how modern technology can be directly applied to reduce cost and weight, without sacrificing performance.