NASA associate administrator Nicky Fox outlined a plan to accelerate and diversify the agency's robotic science missions by deploying multiple lower-cost commercial spacecraft and pursuing block-buy procurement strategies. The approach would shift away from the model of single, purpose-built billion-dollar missions toward fleets of smaller spacecraft built on commercial platforms.

"Mr. Isaacman is very keen on us doing things quicker and for less," Fox said, referring to NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman. "More shots on goal is one of his favorite phrases. Not everything has to be $1 billion or more. His challenge is he wants 10 $100 million missions to be flying."

NASA is launching fewer telescopes and planetary science missions than it did 25 years ago. The agency's science budget this year is $7.25 billion, roughly the same as in 2000 in inflation-adjusted terms, and the Trump administration attempted to drastically reduce that funding. Budget proposals for NASA's science program come from the White House, not from NASA headquarters.

Cost constraints would force trade-offs in mission design. "Maybe you fly fewer instruments, but maybe you fly three [spacecraft] together. How do we really pick up the pace? It's certainly not what anyone wants to see," she said.

NASA's robotic science missions traditionally use purpose-built satellites and instruments manufactured by contractors such as Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman, university laboratories, or NASA itself. Small CubeSats are suitable for missions close to Earth but are not suitable for missions to more distant destinations. NASA also collects scientific data by placing instruments on the International Space Station and on commercial communications satellites.

"For $100 million, you can't buy a bus from somewhere and put four instruments on it and send it to flight to Enceladus to look under the ice there," she said. "No, that's a big, ambitious mission. We want to fly an interstellar-type probe. We also talked about actually flying a mission to Uranus."

Companies including Firefly Aerospace, Intuitive Machines, Astrobotic, Blue Origin, K2 Space, Rocket Lab, Apex Space, Blue Canyon, Millennium Space Systems, and Vast are developing mass-produced satellite platforms for use in Earth orbit and deep space, targeting U.S. military and commercial markets. Blue Origin is assembling and testing its first Blue Ring spacecraft, which the company describes as an "all-in-one, high-powered hybrid solar electric and chemical propelled spacecraft" capable of maneuvering, hosting, and deploying payloads at "dramatically lower profile costs."

"What can we do with these commercial off-the-shelf buses? I would love to walk in and say, 'I'll buy 10 of those,'" she said.

NASA is considering block buys for upcoming commercial lunar missions. Under the Commercial Lunar Payload Services program, privately owned landers and orbiters carry NASA-owned payloads. Mars is being considered as the next destination to apply the CLPS model. "Mars is sort of an obvious next one," she said. "Why can't I do that with a mission going somewhere else, and say, 'Hey, who wants to take these instruments here?' I'm actually really excited about the possibilities that the commercial sector open up to us."

Since taking office in December, Isaacman announced an overhaul of the Artemis program, canceling a planned lunar-orbit space station in favor of building a base on the lunar surface, and is pushing for NASA to launch a first-of-its-kind nuclear-powered spacecraft in 2028 to deliver three drone rotorcraft to explore Mars. NASA's Artemis II mission last month carried four astronauts around the Moon.