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الاستماع والقراءة

Roger D. Launius

Howard E. McCurdy

A look into the history of space exploration and its possible future, and just where exactly robotics fit into it all.

Given the near incomprehensible enormity of the universe, it appears almost inevitable that humankind will one day find a planet that appears to be much like the Earth. This discovery will no doubt reignite the lure of interplanetary travel. Will we be up to the task? And, given our limited resources, biological constraints, and the general hostility of space, what shape should we expect such expeditions to take?

In Robots in Space, Roger Launius and Howard McCurdy tackle these questions with rigorous scholarship and disciplined imagination, jumping comfortably among the worlds of rocketry, engineering, public policy, and science fantasy to expound upon the possibilities and improbabilities involved in trekking across the Milky Way and beyond. They survey the literature—fictional as well as academic studies—and outline the progress of space programs in the United States and other nations. They also assess the current state of affairs to offer a conclusion startling only to those who haven’t spent time with Asimov, Heinlein, and Clarke: to traverse the cosmos, humans must embrace and entwine themselves with advanced robotic technologies …

2008 Outstanding Academic Title, Choice Magazine

Praise for Robots in Space

“This short volume manages to capture the history of U. S. space flight, to explain the underpinnings of U. S. space policy and to plot out the possibilities for our future in space in a style that most anyone can enjoy.” —Andrew McMichael, Park City Daily News

Johns Hopkins University Press

New Series in NASA History

Robots In Space: Technology, Evolution, and Interplanetary Travel

Donald A. Beattie

A former NASA scientist shares a behind-the-scenes history of the Apollo space program and the fight to include science activities in the missions.

In 1961, President Kennedy set a goal of putting a man on the moon in order to assert American dominance in the escalating Cold War. The mission’s sole purpose was to beat the Soviets to the punch. So how did science get aboard the Apollo rockets? And what did scientists do with the space allotted to them? 

Donald A. Beattie served at NASA from 1963 to 1973 in several management positions, including as program manager of Apollo Lunar Surface Experiments. In Taking Science to the Moon, Beattie takes readers inside NASA headquarters and the struggle to include science payloads and lunar exploration as part of the Apollo program.

Taking Science to the Moon: Lunar Experiments and the Apollo Program

Stephen B. Johnson

“Skillfully interweaving technical details and fascinating personalities, Johnson tells the history of systems management in the U.S. and Europe.” —Howard McCurdy, author of Space and the American Imagination 

Winner of the Emme Award for Astronautical Literature from the American Astronautical Society

 How does one go about organizing something as complicated as a strategic-missile or space-exploration program? Stephen B. Johnson here explores the answer—systems management—in a groundbreaking study that involves Air Force planners, scientists, technical specialists, and, eventually, bureaucrats. Taking a comparative approach, Johnson focuses on the theory, or intellectual history, of “systems engineering” as such, its origins in the Air Force’s Cold War ICBM efforts, and its migration to not only NASA but the European Space Agency.

 Exploring the history and politics of aerospace development and weapons procurement, Johnson examines how scientists and engineers created the systems management process to coordinate large-scale technology development, and how managers and military officers gained control of that process. “Those funding the race demanded results,” Johnson explains. “In response, development organizations created what few expected and what even fewer wanted—a bureaucracy for innovation. To begin to understand this apparent contradiction in terms, we must first understand the exacting nature of space technologies and the concerns of those who create them.”

“Johnson’s in-depth, nuts-and-bolts manual sheds much light on a seldom studied secret of our recent space history.” —Space Review

“A book for general readers interested in business and management issues in the space program.” —Choice

The Secret of Apollo: Systems Management in American and European Space Programs

“This excellent summary of an important part of NASA’s history is recommended for all readers.” —Choice

 In Faster, Better, Cheaper: Low-Cost Innovation in the U.S. Space Program, Howard E. McCurdy examines NASA’s recent efforts to save money while improving mission frequency and performance. McCurdy details sixteen missions undertaken as the twentieth century drew to a close—including an orbit of the moon, deployment of three space telescopes, four Earth-orbiting satellites, two rendezvous with comets and asteroids, and a test of an ion propulsion engine—which cost less than the sum traditionally spent on a single, conventionally planned planetary mission.

 He shows how these missions employed smaller spacecraft and cheaper technology to undertake less complex and more specific tasks in outer space. While the technological innovation and space exploration approach that McCurdy describes is still controversial, the historical perspective on its disappointments and triumphs points to ways of developing “faster, better, and cheaper” as a management manifesto.

 “Readers interested in either the management or economics of complex organizations will find a wealth of material in this well-written exposition. Fans of space travel, like the author himself, will also enjoy the behind-the-scenes look at NASA’s operation.” —Enterprise and Society

Faster, Better, Cheaper: Low-Cost Innovation in the U.S. Space Program

Joan Lisa Bromberg

A timely exploration of the relationships between NASA and the private sector: “An interesting read.” —Spaceflight

Few federal agencies have more extensive ties to the private sector than NASA. NASA’s relationships with its many aerospace industry suppliers of rocket engines, computers, electronics, gauges, valves, O-rings, and other materials have often been described as “partnerships.” These have produced a few memorable catastrophes, but mostly technical achievements of the highest order. Until now, no one has written extensively about them.

In NASA and the Space Industry, Joan Lisa Bromberg explores how NASA’s relationship with the private sector developed and how it works. She outlines the various kinds of expertise public and private sectors brought to the tasks NASA took on, describing how this division of labor changed over time. She explains why NASA sometimes encouraged and sometimes thwarted the privatization of space projects and describes the agency’s role in the rise of such new space industries as launch vehicles and communications satellites.

New Series in NASA History - سلسلة الكتب

New Series in NASA History - سلسلة الكتب

New Series in NASA History كتب بالترتيب

الاستماع والقراءة