WASHINGTON - NASA's Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate has amended its NASA Research Announcement to solicit research proposals that address the "Integration of Advanced Concepts and Vehicles into the Next Generation Air Transportation System," known as NextGen.

The focus of the research effort is to conduct a study that addresses the issues associated with deploying new, advanced vehicles by exploring the tradeoffs among procedures, vehicle characteristics and overall NextGen performance.

The study constitutes a major undertaking and will support NASA's entire Aeronautics program portfolio. The effort will establish a framework for an analysis infrastructure to answer questions involving the interaction of air traffic management, vehicle, safety and environmental issues.

Specific evaluation criteria, deadlines and points of contact are available in the announcement. For this announcement and additional research topics in other project areas, visit NASA's Research Opportunities Web site at:

http://nspires.nasaprs.com

For more information about NASA's Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate, visit:

www.aeronautics.nasa.gov