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SALT LAKE CITY (AP) -- Utah State University's Space Dynamics Laboratory will have to cut 20 to 30 jobs next month because of the cuts in NASA's science budget, the laboratory's director said.
The laboratory, based in North Logan, constructs small satellites and space instruments. It employs nearly 350 people under the umbrella of the USU Research Foundation.
Employees were told last week that up to 18 percent of the work force would have to go during the next fiscal year.
Michael D. Pavich, the laboratory's director and president of the foundation, said that in early July, the laboratory's staff will be reduced by 20 to 30 employees, and workers may be laid off before the end of the next fiscal year on June 30, 2007.
The total layoffs for the fiscal year could amount to about 60.
However, if more funding becomes available in fiscal 2007, "then we can mitigate that number," said Trina Paskett, spokeswoman for the laboratory.
Pavich said the reduction is absolutely connected to NASA's recent budget cuts in the area of science.
"We had a 40 percent program cut in a program called WISE, which is a NASA Explorer program," he said.
WISE stands for Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer. The satellite project -- the lab's biggest program -- was to map the sky in infrared light, searching for the nearest and coolest stars, the origins of stellar and planetary systems and the most luminous galaxies.
Peter Eisenhardt of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, in Pasadena, Calif., told the Deseret Morning News in 2004 that WISE would be 500 times more sensitive than previous infrared surveys at some wavelengths, and at some others it would be 500,000 times more acute.
"Probably the most exciting thing about WISE for me is the potential for finding a star closer to the sun than any we know about now," he said.
In 2004, the Space Dynamics Lab at USU won a $40 million contract to be paid over three years, to provide the science equipment for the satellite, including the telescope and cooling assembly.
Funding for WISE has been slashed as NASA shifts resources from its science-based programs to those relating to human spaceflight.
However, the project is still going ahead.
"The whole NASA science budget is probably underfunded because of other priorities that they're working on -- the International Space Station and the space shuttle," Pavich said.
The laboratory is hoping some workers will take early retirement, and it will offer severance for others being cut.
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Information from: Deseret Morning News, http://www.deseretnews.com
(Copyright 2006 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
