Stardust Status Report

May 24, 2002

There were two Deep Space Network tracking passes and all spacecraft subsystems are performing normally. The power subsystem's performance continues to be excellent. A test of the new multi-mission command system, part of a major ground data system upgrade, was successfully performed during the last DSN pass.

The Stardust Education and Public Outreach (E/PO) team, as part of its passing on lessons learned to other Discovery small body missions, has started planning for the CONTOUR educators training at KSC in preparation for launch support. E/PO also gave a tour of JPL for local Girl Scout Brownie troops, with Dr. Bob Parker, the former shuttle astronaut, speaking about his "out of this world" experiences.

The Discovery Channel Canada and the BBC Discovery Channel, London, aired the Guinness World Book of Records aerogel story. The Pasadena Star News, Los Angeles Times, Space.Com, CNN Science and NY Times Science News also ran articles highlighting JPL's aerogel achievement.

For more information on the Stardust mission - the first ever comet sample return mission - please visit the Stardust home page:

http://stardust.jpl.nasa.gov