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Nasa Institute For Advanced ConceptsNASA Institute for Advanced Concepts is apparently an organisation within NASA that funds research on "advanced concepts", that is, not some boring present day concepts, but exciting future technologies. It has given at least 20 millions dollars (is it correct?) in funding to various research programs. What is notable about this organisation is that it has attracted some very harsh criticism, particularly it was accused of fraud and inappropriate use of taxpayers' money, which was given out by NIAC's director Robert Cassanova without following a proper procedure (creating a fake review board), who usually allocated significant fractions of the grants to himself. Recently the criticism was expressed by Alexander Bolonkin, a New-York professor working in the field of AI. He pointed out that, according to American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics index of scientific publications, Robert Cassanova has written only one scientific paper (with 3 co-authors 30 years ago), questioning his qualifications to direct the NIAC. He also questioned why Mr. Cassanova was awarded 30% of almost a million-dollar research grant to Bradley Edwards. Finally, Mr. Bolonkin described his experience with the NIAC review process, revealing that most of the science board members appear to be fictious and that the review process is fake, designed to hide the fact that grants are given away to Mr. Cassanova's acquaintances. References * Как НАСА отфутболило Циолковского, by Alexander Bolonkin, Izvestia Nauki (Известия Науки), January 14, 2005 (in Russian).
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