Posted by tourdemars to Technology at July 29, 2003 12:00 PM

NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) has awarded a contract to a Boeing-led [NYSE: BA] team to study deep space propulsion systems for the Jupiter Icy Moons Orbiter (JIMO) mission, scheduled to launch no earlier than 2011. JIMO would be the first space science mission in NASA's Project Prometheus, a part of the space agency’s initiative to develop space nuclear power and electric propulsion technologies to revolutionize space exploration.