WASHINGTON — U.S. firms seeking to open space to private citizens saw a modest 6 percent growth in 2008 with over a quarter of a billion dollars in total collective revenue last year, though investment in the emerging personal spaceflight industry rose more than 20 percent since January 2008, according to highlights of an annual report commissioned by the Commercial Spaceflight Federation.

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Debra Werner is a correspondent for SpaceNews based in San Francisco. Debra earned a bachelor’s degree in communications from the University of California, Berkeley, and a master’s degree in Journalism from Northwestern University. She is a recipient...