Small Radioisotope Power System Concepts Technical Interchange Meeting


NASA will hold a Technical Interchange Meeting (TIM) to review potential
applications and design concepts for small Radioisotope Power Systems (RPS)
that may be used on future space flight missions. The meeting will take
place on March 2, 2004, starting at 8:00 a.m. at the Jet Propulsion
Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, CA.

NASA and the Department of Energy (DOE) are currently studying RPS concepts
with power levels ranging from 10's of milliwatts to 10's of watts. As
presently envisioned, these systems would use existing plutonium-238 heat
sources. This TIM will consist of NASA and DOE presentations on potential
mission concepts, power unit types, and promising power conversion
technologies. An important objective of the meeting is to start developing
top-level requirements that would guide any future development, such as
power level and lifetime.

Members of the science community who may be interested in utilizing the
capabilities offered by small RPSs on future space missions are invited to
attend. Because of limited space, please contact Robert Abelson (at
818-393-1500 or Robert.Abelson@...) by February 20 if you are
interested in attending. Neither JPL nor NASA can help defray the cost of
attending. More information on current NASA and DOE activities on small
RPSs can be obtained by contacting the NASA Program Executive for
Radioisotope Power System Development, Dr. George Schmidt, at
George.Schmidt@....