NASA Asking Global Community to Help Combat Asteroid Threat

NASA continues to broaden its search for ideas that could help prevent killer asteroids from striking Earth.

Agency officials will attend the World Maker Faire in New York City on Saturday and Sunday, with the goal of convincing the global community of inventors and tinkerers to help discover, track and deflect asteroids that could put Earth in peril.

At Maker Faire, NASA will highlight its "Asteroid Grand Challenge," a call for ideas from the public, industry and academia that the space agency unveiled this past June. [Potentially Dangerous Asteroids (Images)]

"Unlike traditional NASA missions of exploration and science, this grand challenge is driven by the idea that protecting our planet is an issue bigger than any one program, mission or country," NASA chief technologist Mason Peck said in a statement. Read more...