The uncertainty surrounding the Stratospheric Observatory For Infrared Astronomy - also known as SOFIA - emerged Monday, when NASA unveiled its budget request for FY 2007. Although the project was budgeted at $48 million for FY 2006, NASA has cut that figure to zero in FY 2007 and beyond.

"As a result of ongoing cost growth due to technical and schedule problems, NASA will conduct a review of the SOFIA project in early 2006 and coordinate the agency's analysis and position on SOFIA with the (DLR) according to the memorandum of understanding between the two agencies," NASA said in its budget document. "This review will allow NASA to determine the best course of action, given the project's status as well as competing science requirements."

The space agency's concern about problems with SOFIA notwithstanding, the Universities Space Research Association - which developed and will operate SOFIA - said this week in a statement that the new observatory has completed all major modifications required for flight testing.

SOFIA is a Boeing 747 that has been modified extensively to carry a 50,000-pound, 2.5-meter telescope provided by the German Aerospace Center - also known as DLR - SOFIA will fly at altitudes up to 45,000 feet, above 99 percent of Earth's water vapor, "to capture infrared images not possible by even the largest ground-based telescopes," the USRA said in a statement.

"SOFIA will provide an excellent platform for the study of black hole environments, galactic evolution, the chemical composition of interstellar gas clouds, complex organic molecules in space and the formation of stars and solar systems," the USRA statement said.

NASA selected the USRA in 1996 to develop and operate SOFIA to replace the 0.91-meter Kuiper Airborne Observatory, an instrument aboard a C-141 transport that flew successfully for more than 20 years.

Since then, SOFIA has progressed steadily through its key developmental milestones, including delivery of the German-built telescope in 2002, installation of the telescope inside the aircraft in 2003, structural testing of the aircraft and initial ground-based testing of the telescope in 2004, and completion of the first-flight configuration of the NASA telescope cavity door in 2005.

SOFIA is now in the final phase of ground testing and FAA verifications, with initial flight tests scheduled for late this year. When engineers complete testing of the aircraft and the telescope - assuming the program is not canceled - SOFIA will operate from NASA's Ames Research Center in Mountain View, Calif.

The German connection may be the key to SOFIA's salvation. NASA has funded 80 percent of SOFIA's cost, but the DLR contributed the remainder, and the memo between the two agencies callsfor joint operations for perhaps the next 20 years.

In 2004, the DLR funded the German SOFIA Institute at the University of Stuttgart to coordinate participation in the program, and German astronomers are planning to access 20 percent of SOFIA's observing time in exchange for their country's investment.

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