AstraQua Wins $1.275M NASA Phase II Deal to Give Autonomous Aircraft a Sense of 'Pain'

NASA is putting $1.275 million behind a rather unusual idea: teaching autonomous aircraft to know when something is wrong with them. The agency has handed the money to AstraQua, a US company working on physical artificial intelligence, as a Phase II contract for its AstraSense platform aimed at electric and hybrid-electric aircraft, advanced air mobility included.

The concept gets described, half-jokingly, as giving machines the ability to “feel pain.” Strip away the metaphor and the goal is practical — an aircraft that reads its own condition from sensor data and onboard analysis, then weighs that against the job it has been asked to do.

What Phase II actually covers

The first phase was about proving the basics. AstraQua showed NASA it could run real-time diagnostics and predictive health monitoring, flagging trouble before it turns into a breakdown.

The next stage moves from demonstration to integration:

• Wiring into aircraft systems: AstraSense has to talk to the rest of the airframe, not sit in a lab.
• Health-informed decisions: the system’s output should shape what the aircraft does next, not just light up a warning.
• Safety-critical validation: verification and validation work to assess whether the technology holds up where failure is not an option.

The thinking behind it is that an autonomous machine should be able to keep going, change how it operates, or call it quits — and make that call based on how healthy it actually is, rather than simply following a route or task list.

Teaming up when one machine taps out

AstraQua also wants AstraSense to grease the wheels between different autonomous platforms. Say a drone can no longer finish its assigned inspection; its status could be passed to other suitably equipped systems, and the leftover work handed off. The company points to drones and ground robots sharing industrial inspection duties as the kind of scenario it has in mind.

Processing is meant to stay light and onboard, with less reliance on a constant cloud link. That matters for aircraft flying where connectivity is thin or absent — though plenty of testing still lies ahead before anyone can say how well the system performs in the air.

The key caveat: The NASA contract is funding development and validation. It is not an approval for certified aircraft or commercial autonomous flight.

That distinction is worth keeping in view. A Phase II award signals NASA sees enough promise to keep paying for the work. It does not mean AstraSense has cleared the regulatory bar for passenger-carrying or revenue operations. For now, the company has a well-funded runway to prove its idea — and a long checklist of verification ahead.