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Nature 421, 559 (6 February 2003) | doi:10.1038/421559a

Open Innovation Challenges

Where now for NASA?

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The loss of the space shuttle Columbia and its seven astronauts has cast a shadow over America's space agency. But it also presents an opportunity to redirect the US space programme towards the lofty goal of exploration.

Three times in the space age, Americans have placed flowers on the graves of astronauts, but under such different circumstances that they might have happened in three different countries. The Apollo 1 launchpad fire in 1967 was a tragic setback, but it failed to deter a determined nation in its race to reach the Moon.