NASA wants to team up with the X-Prize foundation to fund two new competitions to develop technology for sub-orbital space vehicles, as part of its Centennial Challenges program.

Subject to statutory budget approval, NASA will stump up prize money of more than $250,000 for each competition, while the X-Prize Foundation will handle the business of running the contests.

The two organisations have proposed two contests: one tentatively called Suborbital Payload Challenge and the other Suborbital Lunar Lander Analog Challenge.

As the name suggests, the Suborbital Payload Challenge will go to the first team that can demonstrate a reusable, sub-orbital rocket capable of reaching altitude or speeds that would be useful to scientists. The winning kit could then find its way into regular use by NASA and other research organisations.

The Suborbital Lunar Lander Analog Challenge, meanwhile, will be won by the first team that can demonstrate a vehicle that can land and take off (vertically) from the surface of the moon. It might be sub-orbital on Earth, but a technology from a craft like this could end up being used in lunar exploration. ®

Related stories

Carmack's X-Prize rocket explodes on pad (29 October 2007)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/10/29/carmack_x_prize_lander_kaboom/
Fatal explosion hits Virgin space programme (27 July 2007)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/07/27/scaled_composites_mojave_spaceship_two_explosion/
NASA moon-dirt robodigger compo ends in chaos (15 May 2007)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/05/15/moondirt_robodigger_catastrophe/
Crashed Armadillo rocket means no lunar X-Prize this year (26 October 2006)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/10/26/armadillo_crashes/
Private enterprise needed in space: NASA (17 November 2005)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/11/17/nasa_private_investment/
No winner in space elevator contest (25 October 2005)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/10/25/space_elevator/
Hubble seeks breath of fresh air in lunar soil (24 October 2005)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/10/24/hubble_seeks_fresh_air/
Virgin space tourists will blast off to Bowie (11 October 2004)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/10/11/space_oddity/
SpaceShipOne claims X-Prize (4 October 2004)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/10/04/spaceshipone_claims_x_prize/
Cheap rocket crumbles in hunt for $10m space prize (9 August 2004)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/08/09/rocket_crash_xprize/
Rutan bagsies 'shotgun' in SpaceShipOne (5 August 2004)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/08/05/rutan_passenger/
X-prize race hots up (12 July 2004)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/07/12/space_race_on/
US edges closer to private space flight (14 May 2004)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/05/14/private_space_flight/