science

Mojave Aerospace Ventures

Mojave Aerospace Ventures is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Mojave Aerospace Ventures rather than just read about it. In short: Mojave Aerospace Ventures (MAV) is a company founded by Paul Allen and Burt Rutan to handle the commercial spinoffs from the Tier One project. It owns the intellectual property arising from Tier One, and it is in turn owned by Allen (the majority shareholder) and Rutan's Scaled Composites.

Key takeaways

Mojave Aerospace Ventures belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Mojave Aerospace Ventures to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Mojave Aerospace Ventures from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Mojave Aerospace Ventures (MAV) is a company founded by Paul Allen and Burt Rutan to handle the commercial spinoffs from the Tier One project. It owns the intellectual property arising from Tier One, and it is in turn owned by Allen (the majority shareholder) and Rutan's Scaled Composites. In 2004, it signed a deal with Virgin Galactic to develop the Virgin SpaceShip, a suborbital spacecraft, for space tourism. Virgin Group and Scaled Composites have subsequently formed a joint venture, The Spaceship Company, to manufacture the spacecraft.

Company The structure of Mojave Aerospace Ventures appears to be the basis of the deal between Allen and Rutan for the funding of Tier One. The company owns all the intellectual property of the Tier One project, such as patents, and so controls commercial exploitation. Allen, the sole source of funding for Tier One, is the majority owner. Rutan, having developed the technology, owns a minority stake. This stands in contrast to the company more usually associated with Tier One, Scaled Composites, which, as of 2007, is owned by Northrop Grumman. MAV serves to separate Tier One spinoffs from Scaled. Mojave Aerospace Ventures is part of Allen's Vulcan Aerospace.

Tier One derivative applications

Virgin Galactic On September 25, 2004, MAV agreed on a joint venture with Richard Branson's newly formed company Virgin Galactic, to develop a suborbital spacecraft for the space tourism market. The initial plan is to build five Virgin SpaceShips, based on scaling up the Tier One SpaceShipOne (SS1) design, with White Knight One (WK1) similarly evolved. The spacecraft would be manufactured by The Spaceship Company. The designs for the Tier 1b customer suborbital spaceflight vehicles are referred to as SpaceShipTwo (SS2) and its carrier aircraft is White Knight Two (WK2). The system, a suborbital space tourist system. A further development of the technology, Tier Two and SpaceShipThree (SS3) was mooted. Either as, initially an orbital system, or, later, suborbital transcontinental/transoceanic transport. SS3 would eventually become into a further development of Tier 1b.

Stratolaunch Systems A further application of the Tier One technology is for Allen's Stratolaunch Systems under Vulcan Aerospace with its Stratolaunch carrier aircraft Roc.

References

External links

Scaled Composites Vulcan Inc.

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Mojave Aerospace Ventures

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Mojave Aerospace Ventures claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Mojave Aerospace Ventures before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Mojave Aerospace Ventures ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Mojave Aerospace Ventures

In research: Mojave Aerospace Ventures appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Mojave Aerospace Ventures in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Mojave Aerospace Ventures is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Mojave Air and Space Port, Private spaceflight companies, Scaled Composites, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Mojave Aerospace Ventures outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Mojave Aerospace Ventures in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Mojave Aerospace Ventures means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Mojave Aerospace Ventures out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Mojave Aerospace Ventures in simple terms?

Why does Mojave Aerospace Ventures matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Mojave Aerospace Ventures?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Mojave Aerospace Ventures.