Dawn Mission at Vesta Showcased USA Science & Engineering Festival, Washington, DC, April 27-29, 2012 The 2012 USA Science & Engineering Festival began with an exclusive event on "Sneak Peek Friday" for teachers and students from area and underserved schools, homeschoolers, military families, House and Senate members and their staffers, White House officials, and key agency representatives to tour the exhibits before it opened to the general public on Saturday and Sunday at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center in Washington, D.C. The Festival was attended by ~ 150,000 science & engineering enthusiasts over the course of the weekend. Increased international participation was achieved by engaging the foreign embassies, enabling students and others to share the innovative developments in science and engineering that are currently taking place in other countries. At the NASA Dawn booth, students, parents, and science community members engaged in hands- on activities (asteroid mystery, the grape and raisin, tactile Vesta, the ion propulsion simulation, and a Vesta image match) and exciting new images and findings recently unveiled by Dawn’s year-long visit at Vesta. Dr. Lucy McFadden from the Dawn science team addressed an attentive audience who were especially curious about the latest findings that the Dawn spacecraft had uncovered, while several fascinating continuous-looping images of Vesta were showcased behind her on the NASA Hyperwall. For more information about NASA’s Dawn mission, see: http://dawn.jpl.nasa.gov May 7, 2012