NASA’s Office of Safety and Mission Assurance has developed a three-year plan to develop Nondestructive Evaluation (NDE) methodologies designed to ensure the production of safe and reliable Additive Manufactured (AM) parts for spaceflight applications. AM, or 3-D printing, is a rapidly growing technology that has the potential to revolutionize manufacturing by reducing component lead time, cost, material waste and energy usage. 

Henry Livingston, an engineering fellow and technical director at BAE Systems Electronic Systems, is in the process of writing a series of essays — "Ruminations, Myths and Unreliable Facts" — that provides insight on the serious and growing issue of counterfeit parts. The Introduction and Chapters 1-2 are now available on his website.

NASA’s Office of Safety and Mission Assurance held a quality benchmarking visit at Ball Aerospace and Technologies Corp. in Boulder, Colorado, Sept. 23. It was the third in a series of benchmarking meetings intended to enhance quality across NASA and the space industry.

The October 2014 issue of Orbital Debris Quarterly News includes an article featuring the comet Siding Spring and the science opportunities it presents. Continue reading for the full article.

NASA’s Safety Culture Program assesses and promotes a healthy Safety Culture at all levels of the agency.

John Evans and Reza Ghaffarian co-presented their paper on accelerated testing of advanced electronics as keynote speakers for the 2014 Accelerated Stress Testing & Reliability Workshop.

Agile development helps support NASA’s next-generation missions, but it also poses new challenges for Software Assurance oversight.

Goddard Space Flight Center has made reliability a key component in the development of SpaceCube.

The EEE Parts Bulletin for June-August 2014 is now available.

The NASA Safety Center’s Audits and Assessments Office hosted the first Federal Agencies Alliance for Institutional Safety and Quality Assurance Audits meeting July 15-16 in Washington, D.C.