The Apollo program solved one of humanity’s greatest engineering challenges: landing people on the Moon and bringing them safely home. For Rusty Schweickart, however, that achievement led to a new question: What challenge should we solve next? His answer unfolded over decades, each step building naturally on the last.

Schweickart began by bringing together the people who had shared his experience. In 1985, he founded the Association of Space Explorers, creating a global organization of astronauts and cosmonauts united by the perspective of having seen Earth from space.

That community soon turned its attention to a problem few others were thinking about. As chair of the Association of Space Explorers’ Near-Earth Object Committee, Schweickart led the development of Asteroid Threats: A Call for Global Response, a landmark report submitted to the United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space. It was among the first coordinated efforts to argue that asteroid impacts were not simply a scientific curiosity, but a global challenge requiring international planning and cooperation.

Recognizing that awareness alone was not enough, Schweickart co-founded the B612 Foundation in 2002 to advance the science, technology, and public engagement needed to detect and ultimately prevent hazardous asteroid impacts. More than two decades later, B612 launched the Schweickart Prize, an annual award recognizing innovative ideas that advance planetary defense. Each winning student or team receives a museum-quality award featuring an authenticated meteorite and a $10,000 prize.

Rusty Schweickart receiving the inaugural Schweickart Prize in 2023

Throughout history, prizes have played a unique role in accelerating innovation. Rather than prescribing the answer, a prize poses a challenge and invites the world to respond. As founding sponsor of the Schweickart Prize and fellow astronaut Anousheh Ansari explains: “I’ve seen how prizes are able to really bring about innovation and create excitement and awareness and change mindset. I’m hoping that this prize will embody everything that Rusty has demonstrated throughout his career.”

The Schweickart Prize was created to catalyze the next breakthrough, be it in asteroid detection, space infrastructure, international cooperation, public preparedness, or entirely new approaches that have yet to be imagined. Like the challenge it seeks to address, the Prize’s broad vision is already reflected in the ideas it has recognized.

The inaugural 2024 Prize was awarded to Joe DeMartini, whose proposal focused on one of the most fundamental challenges in planetary defense: finding hazardous asteroids before they find us. His SUNSET Collaboration proposed a coordinated twilight observing campaign to improve the detection and confirmation of near-Earth objects that are difficult to observe using conventional surveys.

In 2025, the winning proposal shifted from science to governance. Jordan Stone and collaborators recognized that as humanity expands its presence in space, our own activities may inadvertently alter asteroid orbits. Their proposed Panel on Asteroid Orbit Alteration (PAOA) called for an international body to establish scientific, technical, and policy frameworks before those risks become reality.

In 2026, Brian Murphy and Richard Cannon proposed expanding planetary defense beyond Earth’s surface, arguing that future lunar bases, satellites, and cislunar infrastructure will themselves require protection. Their winning proposal calls for the creation of an International Commission on Space Infrastructure Resilience (ICSIR) to investigate these emerging risks and establish a new international body to help coordinate protection of humanity’s assets outside of our atmosphere.

Rusty Schweickart with each of the Schweickart Prize winners (from left to right: Joe DeMartini, Jordan Stone, and Brian Murphy

In reflecting on the importance of the Prize for the field of planetary defense, 2026 Schweickart Prize recipient Brian Murphy explained, “The funding is extremely freeing… It enables a level of creativity and complex problem solving that is just not capable in the current funding environment.” Rather than optimizing for financial return or short-term outcomes, the Prize creates space to tackle questions whose value lies in their long-term benefit to humanity.

Murphy sees that freedom is essential to the future of planetary defense. “The main incentive here is the betterment of mankind, and the protection of what we hold most dear: life on Earth, life in space, our future in the cosmos.”

More than fifty years after Apollo 9, Rusty Schweickart’s legacy continues to evolve. The artifacts in this auction commemorate one chapter of that story. The Schweickart Prize is helping write the next.

By participating in the Schweickart Auction, you’re preserving an extraordinary piece of space history while helping support the ideas that may shape humanity’s future beyond Earth.

Click here for full details on the July 2026 auction and join our mailing list to receive the latest stories and insights from Annalise Schweickart as she explores the history and meaning behind her grandfather Rusty’s Space Collection.

 

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Annalise Schweickart, Ph.D.

Annalise Schweickart is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Buck Institute for Research on Aging, using AI and computational methods to explore human longevity. She holds a Ph.D. in biological data science, specializing in metabolomic models for complex metabolic disease. Her commitment to protecting life on Earth runs in the family. As a granddaughter of Apollo 9 astronaut and co-founder of B612, Rusty Schweickart, Annalise carries that legacy forward through the Schweickart Prize, an annual award recognizing the next generation of graduate student leaders in planetary defense.