USV Program Status 2009

The Italian research program named PRORA-USV (Unmanned Space Vehicle) is a technology-driven effort aimed at developing a number of topics that are considered enabling for future space access, reentry and hypersonic vehicles, with the belief that sooner or later trip to space and back will be guaranteed by actual aviation-like systems. An equally important complementary objective of the USV program is to contribute to the development of know-how enabling for future transatmospheric hypersonic commercial flight. The paper describes the different parts of the program as they as fixed today, after some 9 years of activity, with regard to technological objectives, actual achievements and future steps.