Project M was a proposed NASA project to send a Robonaut to the Moon.[1] This was originally hoped to be achieved in just a thousand days from the official announcement, but was later shifted into Project Morpheus.[2]
NASA projected the project could have cost less than US$200 million. An additional $250 million would have been needed for the launch vehicle. The project could have been accomplished in a thousand days or less once it had been approved. The project would have used a variation of lander developed by Armadillo Aerospace.[1][3] On June 23, 2010, a flight carried a prototype known as the Guidance Embedded Navigator Integration Environment (GENIE). GENIE was developed to demonstrate fully functional, real-time, guidance, navigation, and control (GNC) code in a terrestrial rocket vehicle applicable to landing on the surface of the Moon.[4]
The idea, known as Project M, is almost a guerrilla effort within NASA, cooked up a year ago by Stephen J. Altemus, the chief engineer at Johnson. He tapped into discretionary money, pulled in engineers to work on it part time, and horse-traded with companies and other NASA units to undertake preliminary planning and tests.
Project Morpheus started out as "Project M," a concept that called for landing a humanoid robot on the moon in 1,000 days. Then reality set in, and the project was redefined.
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