HOUSTON — NASA’s ambitious plans to identify and retrieve a small asteroid and park it near the Moon for a visit by U.S. astronauts as early as 2021 would require a twofold improvement in solar electric propulsion (SEP) technologies, according to NASA. Efforts to improve SEP were under way well ahead of the yet-to-be-priced asteroid mission featured in President Barack Obama’s proposed $17.7 billion space agency budget for 2014, NASA says.

NASA’s proposed mission to wrangle an asteroid into lunar orbit would marry the embattled space agency’s disparate programs while providing the foundation for humans to move beyond low Earth orbit, according to a key official’s remarks on Capitol Hill.

Said current policy fails to serve U.S. national security interests

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COLORADO SPRINGS — Inspiration Mars, the bold plan to send a man and woman on a 501-day trip around the Red Planet beginning in January 2018, reports individuals and industry are offering their services for the task, including “hundreds” of couples who have qualifications that would put them in the running.

Also plans to trim facility expenses, spending on consultants

NO CONFLICT: French Prime Minster Jean-Marc Ayrault says there is no conflict between a new Europeanized variant of Soyuz and France’s plan to introduce a lighter, more modular successor to its Ariane 5 heavy-lift launcher, which will ultimately eliminate Europe’s need for the Russian medium-lift rocket.

COLORADO SPRINGS — Orbital Sciences Corp. believes it can sell space on the commercial cargo vehicle it has developed with NASA seed money as an orbiting laboratory once it is unloaded and unberthed from the International Space Station. The Orbital Sciences Antares medium-lift launch vehicle set for its inaugural flight next week won’t carry the Cygnus capsule developed to deliver cargo to the ISS, but the instrumented mass simulator it is set to place in orbit will remain there for several months before re-entering the atmosphere.