Decadal Planning Team - NASA Exploration Team

NASA Exploration Team

In early 2001, DPT expanded and became the NASA Exploration Team (NExT), which also reported directly to the agency’s most senior leadership and was led by Mr. Gary Martin. NExT had the additional responsibility to turn concepts and recommendations into specific mission designs, management plans, and priority technology investment strategies. Martin's appointment as Space Architect was announced in a NASA press release on October 11, 2002.

The two teams were kept internal to the space agency and were almost unknown within NASA and by the media. This avoided likely and distracting influences from multiple external interest groups: aerospace industry, Congress, the “space press,” and academia. As such, neither DPT nor NExT were widely known, although their work presaged and significantly influenced the processes that led to President George W. Bush’s 2004 Vision for Space Exploration (VSE). The pioneering work of the DPT and NExT became more widely known when Goldin was succeeded as NASA Administrator by Sean O'Keefe in 2002. The position of Space Architect Office was then established to even further expand the work of the DPT and NExT, moving it into the mainstream of NASA programs. Mr. Martin became the first Space Architect, although the position was abolished by incoming NASA Administrator Dr. Michael D. Griffin.

Although not widely known at the time, the Decadal Planning Team, the NASA Exploration Team, and the Space Architect's office prepared NASA leadership to coordinate its participation in developing the VSE during late 2003.