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Story summary
- A NASA study shows private industry creates cheaper spacecraft for simpler missions, averaging 30% lower costs.
- For complex missions, NASA and industry spacecraft have similar costs, influenced more by mission risk and mass.
- Spacecraft development typically represents 40% of total project costs, with payloads and management making up the rest.
- The Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) proposed a mission to study interstellar comets through high-speed flybys.
- SwRI's calculations indicate low-energy trajectories for these missions are resource-efficient compared to traditional Solar System missions.
