NASA Centennial Challenges Program
NASA’s Space Technology Mission Directorate (STMD) works to develop space technologies to enable future missions.
As NASA embarks on its next era of exploration, STMD is focused on advancing technologies and testing new capabilities at the Moon that will be critical for crewed missions to Mars. The Centennial Challenges listed below are created to engage and inspire thousands of entrepreneurs, researches and innovators, creating a community of America’s best and brightest working on the nation’s toughest challenges.
Watts on the Moon Challenge
As NASA works to extend human exploration of the solar system, unprecedented capacity for energy distribution, management, and storage will be needed to support a sustained human presence and the beginning of industrial activity. NASA’s Watts on the Moon Challenge seeks solutions for energy distribution, management, and/or storage that address NASA technology gaps and can be further developed for space flight and future operation on the lunar surface. Not only could novel solutions make a difference in lunar and space exploration, but technologies discovered during this Centennial Challenge could help facilitate new power options on Earth.
Award: Up to $500K in prizes for Phase 1
Open Date: September 25, 2020
Close Date: March 25, 2021
Frequency: Potential for two phases
Break the Ice Lunar Challenge
From garage inventors to university students and entrepreneurs, NASA is looking for ideas on how to excavate the Moon’s icy regolith, or dirt, and deliver it to a hypothetical processing plant at the lunar South Pole. The NASA Break the Ice Lunar Challenge, a NASA Centennial Challenge, is now open for registration. The competition will take place over two phases and will reward new ideas and approaches for a system architecture capable of excavating and moving icy regolith and water on the lunar surface. The mission architectures developed in the Break the Ice Lunar Challenge aim to help guide machine design and operation concepts for future terrestrial and lunar mining and excavation operations and equipment for decades to come.
Open Date: November 18, 2020
Close Date: June 18, 2021
Awards: Up to $500K for Phase 1
Frequency: Potential for two phases
Deep Space Food Challenge
In coordination with the Canadian Space Agency, NASA has opened the Deep Space Food Challenge. The goal is to generate novel food production technologies or systems that require minimal resources and produce minimal waste, while providing safe, nutritious, and tasty food for long-duration human exploration missions.
Astronauts need hearty nutrients to maintain a healthy diet in space, but like any of us, they want their food to taste good, too! As NASA develops concepts for longer crewed missions to Mars and beyond, the agency will need innovative and sustainable food systems that check all the boxes. Additionally, advanced food systems will have benefits here on Earth, too. Solutions from this challenge could enable new avenues for food production around the world, especially in extreme environments, resource-scarce regions, and in new places like urban areas and in locations where disasters disrupt critical infrastructure.
Open Date: January 12, 2021
Registration Close Date: May 28, 2021
Submission Deadline: July 30, 2021
Awards: Up to $500K for Phase 1
Frequency: Potential for two phases