IT IS PROPOSED TO USE THE FACILITY AT THE STANFORD RESEARCH INSTITUTE (SRI) TO CARRY EXPERIMENTS ON THE RESPONSE OF PICA_N (PICA-PHENOLIC IMPREGNATED CARBON ABLATOR COATED WITH NUSIL - SILICONE) MATERIALS TO CONTROLLED ENVIRONMENTS. THE MATERIAL IS OF INTEREST TO NASA AS IT HAS BEEN FLOWN ON THE MARS SCIENCE LABORATORY (MSL) CAPSULE THAT DELIVERED THE CURIOSITY ROVER TO MARS. IT WILL BE USED ON THE MARS 2020 MISSION. IT IS PROPOSED TO CARRY TGA (THERMO GRAVIMETRIC ANALYSIS) COUPLED TO MASS SPECTROSCOPY AND MEASURE THE PERMEABILITY OF THE MATERIAL AS IT REACTS WITH VARIOUS GASES. THE OUTCOME OF THE EFFORT WILL RESULT IN A UNIQUE FUNDAMENTAL DATA ON THE RESPONSE OF PICA_N UNDER CONDITIONS OF INTEREST TO NASA. IT IS EXPECTED THAT THE RESULTS OF THE EFFORT WILL BE PUBLISHED IN RESEARCH PAPERS AND IN JOURNAL ARTICLES.