STANFORD UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF MEDICINE

STANFORD MEDICAL CENTER
PALO-ALTO,- CALTIBORNIA294304

DEPARTMENT OF GENETICS Stanford, California 94305 Area Code 415

Instrumencation Research Laboratories / 321-1200
Elliotr C. Levinthal, Director ,

March 20, 1969

Dr. Donald G. Rea

Deputy Director, Planetary Programs

Office of Space Science and Applications
National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Washington, D. C. 20546

Dear Don:

I received a phone call from Mr. R. H. Olds, Lockheed, Sunnyvale,
on March 7th. He wished to discuss a proposal he is preparing in
response to a NASA RFP. The purpose of the proposal is to study
a range of missions whose accomplishment would be enhanced by the
development of a nuclear rocket stage. It was felt that no one
mission could justify the development but that perhaps a sufficient '
collection of scientific goals could be found. One such goal to
be studied was a return sample from Mars. This is to cover
opportunities from 1975 onward. My impression is that a fairly
extensive study is being asked for. He didn't know which NASA
office was issuing the RFP.

I expressed to him my concern that any resources were being devoted
to such a study (referring only to the Mars return sample segment of
the study). Even optimistic projections of the knowledge of the
planet that will be obtained from prior US missions ('69, '71, and
'73) could not justify the planning of such a mission for 1975.

Even a few thousand dollars spent in this coming fiscal year on

such a study, in competition with the pressing near term needs of
the '71 and '73 missions, postpones further into the future the time
when we would have enough information to justify carrying out such a
mission. Such a mission would have to be preceded by a more elaborate
lander than is contemplated in '73. It is therefore not cost
effective to devote any resources now to its study - it is, in fact,
counter-productive.

Would you care to comment on this? Is there anything that you can
suggest I could do that would result in reconsideration of this phase
of the RFP? ;

. Sincerely yours,

Elliott Levinthal
ECL/mla

bee: J. Lederberg «~~