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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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At least 199 records · Page 11
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS1982

Top Down Implementation Plan for system performance test software

The top down implementation plan used for the development of system performance test software during the Mark IV-A era is described. The plan is based upon the identification of the hierarchical relationship of the individual elements of the software design, the development of a sequence of functionally oriented demonstrable steps, the allocation of subroutines to the specific step where they are first required, and objective status reporting. The results are: determination of milestones, improved managerial visibility, better project control, and a successful software development.

Jacobson, G. N.↗
DOE OSTI2014

SU-E-J-240: The Impact On Clinical Dose-Distributions When Using MR-Images Registered with Stereotactic CT-Images in Gamma Knife Radiosurgery

Purpose: Most Gamma knife treatments are based solely on MR-images. However, for fractionated treatments and to implement TPS dose calculations that require electron densities, CT image data is essential. The purpose of this work is to assess the dosimetric effects of using MR-images registered with stereotactic CT-images in Gamma knife treatments. Methods: Twelve patients treated for vestibular schwannoma with Gamma Knife Perfexion (Elekta Instruments, Sweden) were selected for this study. The prescribed doses (12 Gy to periphery) were delivered based on the conventional approach of using stereotactic MR-images only. These plans were imported into stereotactic CT-images (by registering MR-images with stereotactic CT-images using the Leksell gamma plan registration software). The dose plans, for each patient, are identical in both cases except for potential rotations and translations resulting from the registration. The impact of the registrations was assessed by an algorithm written in Matlab. The algorithm compares the dose-distributions voxel-by-voxel between the two plans, calculates the full dose coverage of the target (treated in the conventional approach) achieved by the CT-based plan, and calculates the minimum dose delivered to the target (treated in the conventional approach) achieved by the CT-based plan. Results: The mean dose difference between the plans was 0.2 Gy to 0.4 Gy (max 4.5 Gy) whereas between 89% and 97% of the target (treated in the conventional approach) received the prescribed dose, by the CT-plan. The minimum dose to the target (treated in the conventional approach) given by the CT-based plan was between 7.9 Gy and 10.7 Gy (compared to 12 Gy in the conventional treatment). Conclusion: The impact of using MR-images registered with stereotactic CT-images has successfully been compared to conventionally delivered dose plans showing significant differences between the two. Although CTimages have been implemented clinically; the effect of the registration has not been fully investigated.

60 APPLIED LIFE SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2016

The effectiveness of pretreatment physics plan review for detecting errors in radiation therapy

Purpose: The pretreatment physics plan review is a standard tool for ensuring treatment quality. Studies have shown that the majority of errors in radiation oncology originate in treatment planning, which underscores the importance of the pretreatment physics plan review. This quality assurance measure is fundamentally important and central to the safety of patients and the quality of care that they receive. However, little is known about its effectiveness. The purpose of this study was to analyze reported incidents to quantify the effectiveness of the pretreatment physics plan review with the goal of improving it. Methods: This study analyzed 522 potentially severe or critical near-miss events within an institutional incident learning system collected over a three-year period. Of these 522 events, 356 originated at a workflow point that was prior to the pretreatment physics plan review. The remaining 166 events originated after the pretreatment physics plan review and were not considered in the study. The applicable 356 events were classified into one of the three categories: (1) events detected by the pretreatment physics plan review, (2) events not detected but “potentially detectable” by the physics review, and (3) events “not detectable” by the physics review. Potentially detectable events were further classified by which specific checks performed during the pretreatment physics plan review detected or could have detected the event. For these events, the associated specific check was also evaluated as to the possibility of automating that check given current data structures. For comparison, a similar analysis was carried out on 81 events from the international SAFRON radiation oncology incident learning system. Results: Of the 356 applicable events from the institutional database, 180/356 (51%) were detected or could have been detected by the pretreatment physics plan review. Of these events, 125 actually passed through the physics review; however, only 38% (47/125) were actually detected at the review. Of the 81 events from the SAFRON database, 66/81 (81%) were potentially detectable by the pretreatment physics plan review. From the institutional database, three specific physics checks were particularly effective at detecting events (combined effectiveness of 38%): verifying the isocenter (39/180), verifying DRRs (17/180), and verifying that the plan matched the prescription (12/180). The most effective checks from the SAFRON database were verifying that the plan matched the prescription (13/66) and verifying the field parameters in the record and verify system against those in the plan (23/66). Software-based plan checking systems, if available, would have potential effectiveness of 29% and 64% at detecting events from the institutional and SAFRON databases, respectively. Conclusions: Pretreatment physics plan review is a key safety measure and can detect a high percentage of errors. However, the majority of errors that potentially could have been detected were not detected in this study, indicating the need to improve the pretreatment physics plan review performance. Suggestions for improvement include the automation of specific physics checks performed during the pretreatment physics plan review and the standardization of the review process.

60 APPLIED LIFE SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2014

BISON Software V&V Plan

The primary vision for the BISON development team is to deliver a nuclear fuel performance simulation tool that is used to provide a researcher or fuel designer with best estimate calculations of the highly coupled and nonlinear phenomena that govern nuclear fuel behavior. Accurately simulating nuclear fuel behavior is a challenging computational undertaking and verification and validation (V&V) play an important role in realizing this vision. The purpose of this V&V plan is to express the BISON team’s definition of the terms verification and validation, document what we have done regarding V&V, and outline what we plan to do.

11 NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE AND FUEL MATERIALS↗
DOE OSTI2018

Preparation for a PROTEUS Software Quality Assurance Plan

PROTEUS is the neutron transport solver package developed at Argonne National Laboratory under the DOE Nuclear Energy Advanced Modeling and Simulation (NEAMS) program. For the purposes of this report, we consider the PROTEUS package to include the three solvers PROTEUS-NODAL, PROTEUS-MOC, and PROTEUS-SN, as well as the PROTEUS mesh tools and utilities.

21 SPECIFIC NUCLEAR REACTORS AND ASSOCIATED PLANTS↗
NASA NTRS1992

SLS-PLAN-IT: A knowledge-based blackboard scheduling system for Spacelab life sciences missions

The primary scheduling tool in use during the Spacelab Life Science (SLS-1) planning phase was the operations research (OR) based, tabular form Experiment Scheduling System (ESS) developed by NASA Marshall. PLAN-IT is an artificial intelligence based interactive graphic timeline editor for ESS developed by JPL. The PLAN-IT software was enhanced for use in the scheduling of Spacelab experiments to support the SLS missions. The enhanced software SLS-PLAN-IT System was used to support the real-time reactive scheduling task during the SLS-1 mission. SLS-PLAN-IT is a frame-based blackboard scheduling shell which, from scheduling input, creates resource-requiring event duration objects and resource-usage duration objects. The blackboard structure is to keep track of the effects of event duration objects on the resource usage objects. Various scheduling heuristics are coded in procedural form and can be invoked any time at the user's request. The system architecture is described along with what has been learned with the SLS-PLAN-IT project.

Kao, Cheng-Yan↗
NASA NTRS1993

Software reuse in spacecraft planning and scheduling systems

The use of a software toolkit and development methodology that supports software reuse is described. The toolkit includes source-code-level library modules and stand-alone tools which support such tasks as data reformatting and report generation, simple relational database applications, user interfaces, tactical planning, strategic planning and documentation. The current toolkit is written in C and supports applications that run on IBM-PC's under DOS and UNlX-based workstations under OpenLook and Motif. The toolkit is fully integrated for building scheduling systems that reuse AI knowledge base technology. A typical scheduling scenario and three examples of applications that utilize the reuse toolkit will be briefly described. In addition to the tools themselves, a description of the software evolution and reuse methodology that was used is presented.

Mclean, David↗
NASA NTRS1993

Repository-Based Software Engineering Program: Working Program Management Plan

Repository-Based Software Engineering Program (RBSE) is a National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) sponsored program dedicated to introducing and supporting common, effective approaches to software engineering practices. The process of conceiving, designing, building, and maintaining software systems by using existing software assets that are stored in a specialized operational reuse library or repository, accessible to system designers, is the foundation of the program. In addition to operating a software repository, RBSE promotes (1) software engineering technology transfer, (2) academic and instructional support of reuse programs, (3) the use of common software engineering standards and practices, (4) software reuse technology research, and (5) interoperability between reuse libraries. This Program Management Plan (PMP) is intended to communicate program goals and objectives, describe major work areas, and define a management report and control process. This process will assist the Program Manager, University of Houston at Clear Lake (UHCL) in tracking work progress and describing major program activities to NASA management. The goal of this PMP is to make managing the RBSE program a relatively easy process that improves the work of all team members. The PMP describes work areas addressed and work efforts being accomplished by the program; however, it is not intended as a complete description of the program. Its focus is on providing management tools and management processes for monitoring, evaluating, and administering the program; and it includes schedules for charting milestones and deliveries of program products. The PMP was developed by soliciting and obtaining guidance from appropriate program participants, analyzing program management guidance, and reviewing related program management documents.

Source record↗
NASA NTRS2019

Simulation-to-Flight 1 (STF-1): Automating the Planning, Scheduling, Assessment and Data Processing/Reduction for a Small Satellite

On December 16, 2019, a 3-U CubeSat named STF-1 launched as West Virginia's first spacecraft. This event marked the culmination of a run-up to launch involving the production of the spacecraft, creation/configuration of command and control infrastructure, and the evolution of its co-creation, the NASA Operational Simulator for Small Satellites (NOS3). This event also marked the beginning of a new phase: operations. While plans, procedures, and infrastructure were already in place or started for operations, many lessons were learned during the operations phase, especially during early operations (first month/commissioning phase). Additional plans, procedures, and infrastructure, especially related to communication planning and automated data processing, were created and developed to fill needs for the operation of the STF-1 mission.This paper and presentation will overview the STF-1 operations team's solutions to addressing the many needs of operating a low-earth orbiting CubeSat mission with a single ground antenna that is shared and scheduled with several other missions. The STF-1 operations team deployed a combination of virtualization technologies, ground station technology solutions, collaboration software, custom planning software solutions, and existing ground antenna scheduling solutions to create an effective and efficient CubeSat operations environment. The end-solution satisfied the operations stakeholders, which include NASA, its industry partner TMC Technologies, and four independent professor-student teams at West Virginia University.

CubeSat↗
NASA NTRS2019

STF-1 Ground Operations - Automating the Planning, Scheduling, Assessment and Data Processing/Reduction for a Small Satellite

On December 16, 2018, a 3-U CubeSat named STF-1 launched as West Virginia's first spacecraft. This event marked the culmination of a run-up to launch involving the production of the spacecraft, creation/configuration of command and control infrastructure, and the evolution of its co-creation, the NASA Operational Simulator for Small Satellites (NOS3). This event also marked the beginning of a new phase: operations. While plans, procedures, and infrastructure were already in place or started for operations, many lessons were learned during the operations phase, especially during early operations (first month/commissioning phase). Additional plans, procedures, and infrastructure, especially related to communication planning and automated data processing, were created and developed to fill needs for the operation of the STF-1 mission.This paper and presentation will overview the STF-1 operations team's solutions to addressing the many needs of operating a low-earth orbiting CubeSat mission with a single ground antenna that is shared and scheduled with several other missions. The STF-1 operations team deployed a combination of virtualization technologies, ground station technology solutions, collaboration software, custom planning software solutions, and existing ground antenna scheduling solutions to create an effective and efficient CubeSat operations environment. The end-solution satisfied the operations stakeholders, which include NASA, its industry partner TMC2 Technologies, and four independent professor-student teams at West Virginia University.

Suder, Mark↗
DOE OSTI2017

RELAP-7 Software Verification and Validation Plan: Requirements Traceability Matrix (RTM) Update and Code Verification Strategy

This document describes the recent progress of the RELAP-7 Software Verification and Validation Plan (SVVP). The RELAP-7 RTM has been updated by adding the validation requirement items, rearranging the requirement items, and introducing the classifier to better describe the RELAP-7 V&V status at a specified point in time. Also, from the perspective of nuclear system code validation, six items from the list of LWR safety-relevant phenomena were identified as validation data gaps. Lastly, motivated by the needs revealed from the previous RELAP-7 IV&V activities, the independent verification plan for RELAP-7 has been established. The verification method, procedure, and verification test coverage suite discussed in this document will be applied to the future work for the RELAP-7 independent verification.

42 ENGINEERING↗
DOE OSTI2018

Argonne Reactor Code Software Verification and Validation Plan for the Versatile Test Reactor

This Argonne Reactor Code (ARC) software has taken a pivotal role in the design work of the Versatile Test Reactor. The ARC software itself consists of several independent or semiindependent pieces of software that are used in concert to carry out specific analysis and design objectives. In this report, we discuss the validation that is needed for the ARC software overall and discuss available, usable experimental data and how it relates to the VTR project. We also discuss the verification that is required for the ARC software with respect to its usage in the VTR project and give some concrete examples as to what it must accomplish. A list of goals for the verification and validation work are presented as the general procedure that will be implemented for every individual piece of software in ARC. The ARC software has been continuously developed for over 50 years and many of the features used for the VTR project have thus been rigorously tested for accuracy during that timeframe. The ARC software is presently under source code control and undergoes nightly regression testing of not only the individual pieces, but the interconnected aspects that are common to most analysis projects. Its greatest weakness, from a software verification and validation perspective, is both a lack of documentation and outdated documentation. As an example, much of the previous validation work will require contemporary effort to re-evaluate given the updated base data libraries and modifications to the software that have occurred since. This requires new documentation to be produced to support the usage of the software in the VTR project. The bulk of the ARC software is focused on steady state neutronics and TH behavior of a reactor system. In this regard, we have identified the ZPPR, FFTF, and EBR-II programs as the best candidates for sources of validation data for the VTR project. The ZPPR-15 series in the ZPPR program was chosen as it is the best representation of the VTR fuel form and reactor core layout of all of the ZPPR measurements. Additional support for it comes from the fact that most of the data has already been processed into usable ARC models for VTR validation. The FFTF and EBR-II reactors were both functional reactors that provide reactor scale measurements. FFTF is clearly a closer match to VTR and its startup measurements would be a very valuable validation basis. EBR-II has invaluable burnup related measurements that will play a key role in the ARC software validation work. Each piece of ARC software will require a report detailing the software verification. The validation work will be logically split into the results of modeling each identified experimental resource (ZPPR, EBR-II, FFTF). The intended timeline for the VTR project is to have the ARC software verified and validated by the end of fiscal year 2020. This is incumbent on sufficient funding allocated to V&V activities and no change in programmatic priorities.

21 SPECIFIC NUCLEAR REACTORS AND ASSOCIATED PLANTS↗
DOE OSTI2016

RELAP-7 Software Verification and Validation Plan - Requirements Traceability Matrix (RTM) Part 2: Code Assessment Strategy, Procedure, and RTM Update

This document addresses two subjects involved with the RELAP-7 Software Verification and Validation Plan (SVVP): (i) the principles and plan to assure the independence of RELAP-7 assessment through the code development process, and (ii) the work performed to establish the RELAP-7 assessment plan, i.e., the assessment strategy, literature review, and identification of RELAP-7 requirements. Then, the Requirements Traceability Matrices (RTMs) proposed in previous document (INL-EXT-15-36684) are updated. These RTMs provide an efficient way to evaluate the RELAP-7 development status as well as the maturity of RELAP-7 assessment through the development process.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗