Famous for relaying such historical proclamations as "Houston, Tranquillity Base here. The Eagle has landed" from the 1969 Apollo 11 moon mission, the Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center, Houston, TX possesses a large research and development support matrix that makes less splashy but no less valuable contributions to society. As the center for manned spaceflight control, Johnson performs life science research focused on maintaining the human body as well as plant life in space, which has led to an array of spin-offs from heart pumps to bioreactors. Computer software developed for complex astronaut training tasks also has found use in Earthbound activities.
From its conception in 1961, when it was called the Manned Spacecraft Center, JSC has been responsible for monitoring and controlling manned space missions after liftoff. The center officially opened in 1963 on a 1620-acre cattle pasture donated by Rice University, and in 1965 the Mission Control Center (MCC) took over manned operations from Cape Canaveral, beginning with Gemini 4. Renamed in February 1973 after the late us president, Johnson in the 1980s took on the immense task of training all US astronauts--pilots, mission specialists, and payload specialist--for the space shuttles, building simulators, and controlling each mission from the ground. Now more than 100 astronauts rank among the 3200 federal employees and 14,000 contractor personnel working at or near the center.
JSC's research supporting space exploration spans the gamut--prop ulsion, structures, energy generation, storage and transmission, human factors engineering, aerospace medicine, sensors, communications, computers, and materials. Indicative of the creative juices flowing at Johnson, its researchers have won NASA's Invention of the Year Award for the last three years.
Technology transfer at JSC involves moving concepts and products from the government into the private sector either by licensing technology or through cooperative development projects. The Technology Transfer and Commercialization (TTC) Office, "seeks our promising technologies that can form the basis for new and improved products, manufacturing processes, and services," according to Bob Dotts, assistant director at the TTC Office. "It also promotes some technologies that are new and perhaps risky, that might not be developed in time to compete in rapidly changing world markets without partnerships with industry and government."
Services available through the office include technology licensing, information on JSC technologies and facilities, assistance in forming cooperative research and development agreements, and technical problem-solv ing assistance. Licenses for JSC patents are individually negotiated with a prospective licensee, with each license specifically addressing its duration, product commercialization, royalties, and periodic reporting. To assist in the development and commercialization of certain innovations. Johnson may supply licensees technical support from its scientists and engineers. There are also commercialization opportunities for some technologies not protected by patents.
The TTC Office accepts problem statements--one-to two-page descriptions of companies' needs. The office cannot locate a potential solution, it forwards the problem statement to the Mid-Continent Technology Transfer Center, which canvases the other NASA field centers as well as other federal labs and assists the client if the technology is found.
The office continually assesses the commercial potential of Johnson's evolving technologies. Contract clauses require contractors to report new technologies--ideas, prototypes, products--that emerge from contracted activities, and these are inventoried and categorized according to perceived commercial potential. Johnson does this categorization in cooperation with its external partners and the technologies with the highest commercial potential are studied for patentability or publication in NASA Tech Briefs.
JSC's external partners include IC2, technology incubator at the University of Texas in Austin; the Mid-Continent Technology Transfer Center at Texas A & M University in College Station, TX; and the Research Triangle Institute in North Carolina. While Johnson provides access to the technologies, the commercialization centers help industries identify and incorporate these technologies into processes and products. The centers also assess markets for the best way to focus federal commercializa tion efforts.
Johnson has produced many technologies that have found utility beyond the center. Armed with NASA turbopump technology and capabilities in computational fluid dynamics analysis, JSC researchers teamed up the Baylor College of Medicine specialists, to devise the Left Ventricular Heart Assist Pump. This small turbine pump helps the heart circulate blood throughout the body, keeping a patient with a diseased heart alive until the organ recovers or is replaced by a transplant. As it can be used either as a temporary or permanent device, it can also allow patients who are not transplant candidates or whose hearts may not recover, the chance to live a normal life; with out such a pump, many heart-diseased patients would be bedridden. 20
Johnson's need to train astronauts and space-station flight controllers resulted in the 1994 NASA Invention of the Year Award for the General-Purpose Architecture for Intelligent Computer-Aided Training (NASA Tech Briefs, Vol. 19, No. 4, April 1995). The system substitutes a computer teacher for a human on training tasks, adapting to the trainee's learning ability or skill level. JSC distributes the software directly and has arranged for private companies to distribute some derivative versions.
Johnson's live science research into growing plants in our space led to a synthetic growth medium that requires only water for growth, which has been licensed to two private companies for general marketing. A rotating bioreactor cell-culture apparatus that produces cell types that would not otherwise grow outside the body has also been licensed for commercial development.
A Johnson facility in New Mexico, the White Sands Test Facility, has been reaching out to industry in designing, testing, and operating safer oxygen systems. White Sands has expertise in Advanced materials testing for oxygen and propellant exposure environments, including materials ignition and combustion. Oxygen system manufacturers often have difficulty accessing hazard analysis and test data for their equipment, so White Sands made its facilities available to industry. Users gain relatively inexpensive access to the testing complex--and White Sands in turn often benefits. While Sands conducted hazardous tests for Wendell Hull & Associates, Las Cruces, NM, for example, and the company now serves as a liaison for White Sands, arranging contract testing and finding ways to cut the time--in some cases, down to as little as two weeks--for obtaining and setting up data. Companies such as General Electric Aircraft Engines, Evendale, OH, and Exxon Research and Engineering Company, Florham Park, NJ, have economically obtained combustion test data from White Sands.
For further information, contact Johnson Space Center, Technology Transfer & Commercialization Office, Mail Code HA 2101 NASA Road 1, Houston TX 77058-3969; Tel: (713)483-3809; Fax: (713) 244-8452; E-mail: commercialization 40jsc.nasa.gov.