NASA Approves X-ray Space Mission (NuSTAR)

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/features.cfm?feature=2306

NASA Approves X-ray Space Mission
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
September 04, 2009

NASA recently confirmed that the Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope
Array,
or NuSTAR, mission will launch in August 2011. NuSTAR will carry the
first high-energy X-ray focusing telescopes into orbit, providing a
much
deeper, clearer view of energetic phenomena such as black holes and
supernova explosions than any previous instrument has provided in this
region of the electromagnetic spectrum.

NuSTAR is a NASA Small Explorer mission led by Caltech, managed by
JPL,
and implemented by an international team of scientists and engineers.
Fiona Harrison, a professor of physics and astronomy at Caltech, is
the
team's principal investigator. The official confirmation follows two
years of detailed design and reviews that have enabled NASA to
determine
that the NuSTAR team is ready to build the flight hardware. More
information is online at

http://www.nustar.caltech.edu .