Important for understanding the trajectories that the space and planetary sciences took, was the reality that the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) was formed not as a scientific agency, but as an engineering one. This chapter illuminates some of the ways NASA's early focus on engineering has influenced its evolution as a scientific enterprise. Within NASA's shadow engineering network, tensions exist between a desire for innovation and the demand for reliability. Ambitious missions resolve all these tensions favorably, save one: the desire for cost control. After the loss of Shuttle Challenger and its crew in 1986, the links between space and planetary sciences and human space flight were largely broken. A final aspect of the growth of the space sciences was the role of existing specialist societies in adapting to the opportunities afforded by new technologies and greatly expanded funding.


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    Title :

    Space and Planetary Sciences


    Contributors:


    Publication date :

    2015-10-06


    Size :

    13 pages




    Type of media :

    Article/Chapter (Book)


    Type of material :

    Electronic Resource


    Language :

    English






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    Anderson, H. R. / Conel, J. E. / Eimer, M. et al. | NTRS | 1962



    Lunar and planetary sciences

    Norton, R. H. | NTRS | 1967