Dear colleagues,

NASA's New Millenium Instrument & MEMS technology development announcement is
out and available on the WWW (http://procurement.jpl.nasa.gov) as indicated in
the following document. The Web pages are self explanatory and include many
FAQs. Note that the reply date is June 23.

For those of you working for the government, the corresponding announcement is
going out today. It will NOT be posted on the web, but will be distributed
through your institution. Like the non-government announcement, there will be 5
weeks to respond to the MEMS/Instruments component. Please do not write or call
me asking how to get the government announcement - I will pass this information
on as soon as I get it.

Michael Hecht
MEMS/Instruments Integrated Product Development Team Co-Lead

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Dear Colleague:

NASA is in the process of forming Integrated Product Development Teams (IPDTs)
to support the planned New Millennium Program (NMP). The NMP is being
implemented as a partnership between NASA's Office of Space Science, Office of
Mission to Planet Earth, and Office of Space Access and Technology. The Program
will be managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

The goal of the NMP is to enable frequent, affordable, capable scientific
missions in the 21st-century by identifying, developing and flight validating
key spacecraft, instrument and operations technologies which can significantly
contribute to lowering life cycle costs and increasing scientific returns.
Primary program emphasis is placed on the development of small, highly
autonomous spacecraft which can be built for a fraction of the cost of
conventional spacecraft, launched on small launch vehicles, and operated with
small operations teams. The NMP will validate those technologies identified as
being critical to achieving this goal, so that future science missions can take
advantage of these technologies without having to bear the additional
development time or increased risk inherent in their first use.

The Jet Propulsion Laboratory has released an announcement seeking industry,
academia and non-profit organization members for the Instruments and
Microelectromechanical Systems (MEMS) IPDT. This team is one of five IPDTs
being formed to support the NMP. The Instruments and MEMS IPDT will be
responsible for developing a technology road map that supports NASA's vision
for space and Earth sciences exploration in the 21st-century, with specific
emphasis on instrument and MEMS technologies. The IPDT is expected to spawn
partnerships between government, industry and academia, and as appropriate, to
develop and deliver key instrument and MEMS technologies for flight validation
by the NMP.

If you are a member of industry, academia or a non-profit organization and not
in receipt of the JPL announcement, and you wish to review or respond to it,
you may access it through the World Wide Web (WWW) at URL http://
procurement.jpl.nasa.gov or through Internet electronic mail at "
Procurement@jpl.nasa.gov".Refer to the Internet electronic mail or WWW
instructions under the NMP Procurement home page. If you or your organization
does not have access to the Web or Internet, you may request a copy of this
announcement by calling the NMP Procurement Representative, Gerald O'Connell at
(818) 354-4885.

If you are an employee of a federally funded research and development center
(FFRDC), NASA or another government agency, please do not respond to the JPL
solicitation. A separate announcement soliciting government and FFRDC
participation on the five NMP IPDTs is being released from NASA Headquarters.
If your government/FFRDC organization is not in receipt of the announcement
from NASA Headquarters, it is available in electronic form at the following
file transfer protocol (ftp) site: ftp.hq.nasa.gov. Log in as anonymous and use
your ID as the password. Go to the directory "pub/oss/nmpsol/". A "readme" file
at this location contains further instructions. If you or your organization
does not have access to Internet, you may contact me at (202) 358-0735.

Both the JPL and the NASA Headquarters solicitations provide more detailed
information about the NMP. Should you have general questions about the program,
you are encouraged to review either one of these solicitations.

Please note that the response time for the Instrument and MEMS IPDT
solicitation will be relatively short (approximately 5 weeks from receipt of
this letter). If you are interested in this solicitation, I encourage you to
access the WWW or Internet to obtain the necessary information.

Sincerely,

Mary E. Kicza
Assistant Associate Administrator (Technology) Office of Space Science