About NCAM

NCAM combines education, research, and manufacturing to provide leadership in technology. We are located in New Orleans, Louisiana on NASA's Michoud Assembly Facility (MAF).

NCAM was created in March 1999, when a partnership was formed between NASA, the State of Louisiana, and The University of New Orleans (UNO). The purpose of the partnership was to:

• Address NASA's needs in research and technology development,
• Build the technology base for manufacturing next generation launch vehicle systems.

Current activity at NCAM includes research and applications of advanced technology processes such as:

• Friction Stir Welding - A novel welding technique that produces high-strength, defective-free joints and a uniform weld in metallic materials that are difficult to fusion
• Advanced Fiber Placement  - An automated composites manufacturing process of heating and compacting resin pre-impregnated non-metallic fibers on typically complex tooling mandrels. The fibers are placed in layers at different angles for strength. NCAM has two fiber placement machines.
• Non-Destructive Evaluation - A system that applies non-destructive evaluation techniques in the testing of composite materials.

NCAM, under the auspices of the UNO College of Engineering, leads a consortium of seven universities where research is conducted, with the initial focus on using composite and metallic materials in the production of aerospace structures.