Uwingu Applauds Mars Rover Landing, Plans to Support Mars Research With The Uwingu Fund

Aug. 20, 2012 - PRLog -- Uwingu, a space-themed, for profit start up company, applauds NASA and its planetary science community for the successful landing of the Curiosity rover on Mars earlier this month.

Saluting that achievement, Uwingu announces today that in our first Announcement of Opportunity (AO), we will seek proposals that fund Mars researchers and educators—increasing what can be done above the levels NASA can support.

UwinguTM (which means “sky” in Swahili, and is pronounced “oo-wing-oo) consists of astronomers, planetary scientists, former space program executives, and educators. Included in the company’s portfolio of space heavyweights are space historian and author Andrew Chaikin, space educator Dr. Emily CoBabe-Ammann, citizen science leader Dr. Pamela Gay, author and museum science director Dr. David Grinspoon, planet hunter Dr. Geoff Marcy, planetary scientist and aerospace executive Dr. Teresa Segura, planetary scientist and former NASA science boss Dr. Alan Stern, and planetary scientist and CEO of the Planetary Science Institute, Dr. Mark Sykes.

Uwingu’s launch project is already built. Through the IndieGoGo crowd-funding web site, Uwingu is now engaged in a campaign to raise money for Internet and other business costs it will incur when early sales operations begin. The campaign to raise funds to launch Uwingu can be found at http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/180221?a=904032. The campaign launched 3 weeks ago and has just three more weeks to go.

For more information, contact Dr. Alan Stern at stern@uwingu.com, or Dr. Pamela Gay at starstryder@gmail.com. Dr. Stern may also be reached by phone at 303.324.5269.

Follow Uwingu on Twitter at UwinguSky; and friend Uwingu on Facebook.