2001 Awards IndexEditors' choiceElectronicsTransportationHealthEntertainmentAerospaceCommunicationsEnvironmentFinalists The Christopher Columbus Foundation Award
AEROSPACE
Northrop Grumman Corporation engineer Allen Arata created an aircraft wing edge that controls lift, roll, and pitch safely and efficiently with a single, continuous rigid surface rather than multiple surfaces.
Robert Hoyt of Tethers Unlimited designed a tethering system that relies on Earth's magnetic field instead of fuel to boost spacecraft into orbit or to pull dead satellites into the upper atmosphere for a quick burn.
A team led by retired AeroVironment vice president Ray Morgan designed Helios, an unmanned solar-powered aircraft that can remain aloft for months in the stratosphere to monitor pollution and weather and to act as a telecommunications relay.
