[Satellite Today 10-24-08] Aerojet, a subsidiary of GenCorp, received a contract to provide propulsion systems for a NASA mission to study the Earth’s radiation belts, Aerojet announced Oct. 24.
    Under the contract from the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, Aerojet will provide a monopropellant hydrazine propulsion systems for a pair of spacecraft that will make up the Radiation Belt Storm Probes (RBSP) mission.
    The mission is intended to study the fundamental physics underlying the source, loss and transport processes that govern the two radiation belts encircling the Earth, and the pair of spacecraft must  make identical measurements in order to observe changes in the radiation belts through space and time.
fields that transport them and the magnetic fields that guide their motion.
    The mission, part of NASA’s Living With a Star program, is scheduled to be launched in 2011.