May 17th, 2006

MICHIGAN AEROSPACE CORPORATION ANNOUNCES SUCCESSFUL AIRCRAFT QUALIFICATION OF WIND MEASUREMENT INSTRUMENT

Testing Enables Operation on Airborne Platforms

Michigan Aerospace Corporation (MAC), a provider of optical products and advanced engineering services, has successfully vibration-tested a tunable LIDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) receiver for flight operation aboard a high-altitude aircraft. The testing was performed in conjunction with, and funded by, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, The success of this testing represents a significant advancement in highly-accurate, tunable instruments for measuring atmospheric properties from challenging aircraft platforms. Michigan Aerospace Corporation is a world leader in Fabry-Perot based devices that measure properties such as wind speed and direction, density, and temperature in the atmosphere. The company specializes in building instruments that can operate in harsh environments on the ground, aircraft, and spacecraft. Applications include weather forecasting, turbulence detection, guidance and control.”

March 8th, 2006

MICHIGAN AEROSPACE CORPORATION AWARDED CONTRACT BY APPLIED PHYSICS LAB (APL) TO DEVELOP SPECTROMETER QUALIFIED FOR AIRCRAFT AND SPACECRAFT

Contract Will Make Technology Available for Numerous Aircraft & Spacecraft Applications and Will Enhance Weather Forecasting

The instrument is based on MAC’s Light Detection and Ranging (LIDAR) technology, and will enable measurements of cloud top temperature, pressure and altitude on a global scale, when deployed in geostationary orbit. Introduction of these data points into weather forecasting models will lead to significant improvements in the forecasting of weather events, including hurricane motion and intensity.

Commenting on the importance of this new instrument, Scott Lindemann, Manager of the Optical Products Business Unit said, “Successful deployment of the GIFS instrument will not only provide important meteorological data points which are currently unavailable, but will also represent a significant advancement in the availability of platforms for the deployment of LIDAR based technologies, including aircraft and spacecraft applications.”