The Robert A. and Virginia Heinlein Prize Trust is pleased to announce
the start of the Flight into the Future Project Contest. This is a
competition to promote innovative scientific works and is being held
to commemorate the memory of the famous American writer, and one of
the founders of modern science fiction, Robert A. Heinlein. The main
goal of the competition is to identify and support talented young
researchers and to encourage their innovative activities that will
help to bring humanity closer to Heinlein's dream of our future in space.

The Flight into the Future contest opened officially on November 1st,
2004, and is open to all citizens of European, African and Middle
Eastern countries (the other Trust's project will be available for the
rest of the world), including students, post-graduate students and
young specialists who will be under 30 years of age at the time of the
award ceremony on July 7th, 2005, which is the birthday of Robert
Heinlein. The authors of the winning projects will receive monetary
prizes and Heinlein Trust Diplomas at the ceremony.

The participant prospective projects are to be in the field of space
exploration and its peaceful use: projects whose realization would
result in significant economic benefit to humanity. The submitted
works should include scientific, technical and economic substantiation
(business plan) of the proposed project proving the potentials of its
practical realization and expected economic and social benefit. The
projects will be judged by an international Expert Committee.
In 2004, the pilot Flight into the Future contest was conducted in
Russia by the Trust and the Russian Aviation and Space Scientific
Innovation Educational Complex (RASSIEC). The RASSIEC will act as the
Trust contractor for the Flight into the Future 2005 Contest. RASSIEC
is an association of leading Russian aerospace industries and
universities that have joined together to promote new forms of
professional education and international cooperation programs.
The competition is part of the Heinlein Prize Project
(http://www.heinleinprize.com), which has been created to encourage
commercial activity in space. The Heinlein Prize, a major new award
for practical accomplishments in commercial space activities, was
announced during the 54th International Aeronautical Congress that was
held in Bremen, Germany in 2003.

The Trustees of the Robert A. and Virginia Heinlein Prize Trust are
Mr. Arthur Dula of Houston, Texas; Dr. Buckner Hightower of Austin,
Texas; and Mr. James Miller Vaughn, Jr. also of Houston, Texas: all in
the USA.

The Heinlein Prize honors the memory of Robert A. Heinlein, a renowned
American author. Through his body of works in fiction spanning nearly
fifty years during the commencement of man's entry into space, Mr.
Heinlein advocated human advancement into space through commercial
endeavors. After Mr. Heinlein's death in 1988, his widow, Virginia
Gerstenfeld Heinlein, established the Trust in order to further her
husband's vision of humanity's future in space. Funding for the
Heinlein Prize came from Mrs. Heinlein's estate after her death in 2003.

FOR ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:

Flight into the Future Organizing Committee
contest@...
+7 916 182 3507
http://www.heinleinprize.com
http://www.heinleincontest.info
For information on Robert A. Heinlein, see also: www.heinleinsociety.org