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This viewgraph presentation gives examples of possible future uses of nanotechnology, with some emphasis on carbon nanotubes and medical applications. The presentation provides an overview of organizations conducting nanotechnology research in the United States, and suggests a timeline for nanotechnology development.
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Historically, tremendous effort has been put into processing and displaying mission health and safety telemetry data; and relatively little attention has been paid to extracting information from missions time-tagged event log messages. Todays missions may log tens of thousands of messages per day and the numbers are expected to dramatically increase as satellite fleets and constellations are launched, as security monitoring continues to evolve, and as the overall complexity of ground system operations increases. The logs may contain information about orbital events, scheduled and actual observations, device status and anomalies, when operators were logged on, when commands were resent, when there were data drop outs or system failures, and much much more. When dealing with distributed space missions or operational fleets, it becomes even more important to systematically analyze this data. Several advanced information systems technologies make it appropriate to now develop analytic capabilities which can increase mission situational awareness, reduce mission risk, enable better event-driven automation and cross-mission collaborations, and lead to improved operations strategies: Industry Standard for Log Messages. The Object Management Group (OMG) Space Domain Task Force (SDTF) standards organization is in the process of creating a formal standard for industry for event log messages. The format is based on work at NASA GSFC. Open System Architectures. The DoD, NASA, and others are moving towards common open system architectures for mission ground data systems based on work at NASA GSFC with the full support of the commercial product industry and major integration contractors. Text Analytics. A specific area of data analytics which applies statistical, linguistic, and structural techniques to extract and classify information from textual sources. This presentation describes work now underway at NASA to increase situational awareness through the collection of non-telemetry mission operations information into a common log format and then providing display and analytics tools to provide in-depth assessment of the log contents. The work includes: Common interface formats for acquiring time-tagged text messages Conversion of common files for schedules, orbital events, and stored commands to the common log format Innovative displays to depict thousands of messages on a single display Structured English text queries against the log message data store, extensible to a more mature natural language query capability Goal of speech-to-text and text-to-speech additions to create a personal mission operations assistant to aid on-console operations. A wide variety of planned uses identified by the mission operations teams will be discussed.
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Utah State University (USU) and the University of Alabama’s (UA) X-Hab design project created a 3D printed substrate to facilitate plant growth in a microgravity environment. The design team proposed a 3D printed substrate that would allow the plants to have a root support matrix, necessary oxygen flow, and a passive water and nutrient delivery system. This substrate was designed to easily integrate into NASA’s Veggie and Advanced Plant Habitat platforms. 3D printed components are easily replaceable at a relatively low cost. In addition, since research and development has moved to using 3D printers in space, any needed garden components for the blocks could be easily re-printed while in orbit.
I believe we are facing a critical time where innovative engineering design is of paramount importance to the success of our aerospace industry. However, the very qualities and attributes necessary for enhancing, educating, and mentoring a creative spirit are in decline in important areas. The importance of creativity and innovation in this country was emphasized by a special edition of the Harvard Business Review OnPoint entitled: "The Creative Company" which compiled a series of past and present articles on the subject of creativity and innovation and stressed its importance to our national economy. There is also a recognition of a lack of engineering, critical thinking and problem-solving skills in our education systems and a trend toward trying to enhance those skills by developing K-12 educational programs such as Project Lead the Way, "Science for All Americans", Benchmarks 2061 , etc. In addition, with respect to spacecraft development, we have a growing need for young to mid-level engineers with appropriate experience and skills in spacecraft design, development, analysis, testing, and systems engineering. As the Director of Engineering at NASA's Johnson Space Center, I realized that sustaining engineering support of an operational human spacecraft such as the Space Shuttle is decidedly different than engineering design and development skills necessary for designing a new spacecraft such as the Crew Exploration Vehicle of the Constellation Program. We learned a very important lesson post Columbia in that the Space Shuttle is truly an experimental and not an operational vehicle and the strict adherence to developed rules and processes and chains of command of an inherently bureaucratic organizational structure will not protect us from a host of known unknowns let alone unknown unknowns. There are no strict rules, processes, or procedures for understanding anomalous results of an experiment, anomalies with an experimental spacecraft like Shuttle, or in the conceptual design of a spacecraft. Engineering design is as much an art as it is a science. The critical thinking skills necessary to uncover lurking problems in an experimental design and creatively develop solutions are some of the same skills necessary to design a new spacecraft. Thus, I believe engineers unfamiliar with or removed from design and development need time to transition and develop the required skill set to be effective spacecraft designers. I believe the creative process necessary in design can be enhanced and even taught as early as grades K-12 and should continue to be nurtured and developed at the university level and beyond. I am going to present a strategy for developing learning teams to address complex multidisciplinary problems and to creatively develop solutions to those problems rapidly at minimal cost. I will frame a real problem, the development of on-orbit thermal protection system repair of the Space Shuttle, and step through the series of skills necessary to enhance the creative process. The case study I will illustrate is based on a real project, the R&D Reinforced Carbon-Carbon (RCC) Repair Team's development of on-orbit repair concepts for damaged Space Shuttle RCC nose cap and/or leading edges.
How many of us have worked in organizations where the discipline was so rigid and unyielding that it would send even a Marine Corps Drill Instructor screaming into the night? How many of us have worked in organizations where sightings of senior management were sporadic and rare, and any other interactions were by appointment only? Or, how many of us have worked in organizations where your role, absent specific direction, was to be seldom seen and rarely heard? And how many of us have worked in organizations where seemingly light itself was not permitted to escape without the acquiescence and approval of the director? Sadly, there are organizations that embody some of these conditions, and the resultant adverse effects on employee productivity, creativity and morale are profound. But what if you could work in an organization in which there was little hierarchy, where rank and seniority played no part, where there were no closed meetings or doors, where everyone knows what was expected of them, and where creativity was not only tolerated but encouraged and celebrated? Was there ever such a place? There was, and it was known as NASA's Space Station Task Force. I was fortunate enough to work there for a time, and I would like to tell you how this organization with few apparent rules led to incredibly high levels of employee satisfaction and fulfillment, and yielded work products of enduring quality. On May 20, 1982, NASA Administrator James M. Beggs established the Space Station Task Force under the direction of John D. Hodge. The Task Force was charged with the responsibility for "the development of the programmatic aspects of a Space Station as they evolve, including mission analysis, requirements definition and program management," and was authorized to draw on Space Station activities at the NASA Program Offices and Field Centers. No additional conditions or directions were provided. Hodge knew that in order to accomplish the job he had been given, he was going to have to obtain the services of the "best and the brightest" and facilitate the unleashing of the full force of their creative capabilities. In order to avoid the stultifying effects of a typical hierarchical organization, he set up a loosely structured, horizontal organization with only one supervisor of record - himself. He populated this organization with detailees from Headquarters, the field Centers and the Jet Propulsion Lab, thereby assuring himself of the political and technical expertise with which to deal with Congress and the bureaucracy, and conduct the required engineering studies and analyses.
The standard distinction between poetic and referential language, the gulf between science and the humanities, and the distress many teachers of English feel when faced for the first time with the prospect of teaching technical writing are discussed. In the introduction of many technical writing textbooks. Technical communication is divorced from other forms of linguistic experience by making language limiting and reductive rather than creative and expansive. The emphasis on technical/scientific writing as radically different had blinded people to those traits it has in common with all species of composition and has led to a neglect of research, on fundamental rhetorical issues. A complete rhetorical theory of technical discourse should include information about the attitudes and motives of writers, the situations which motivate (or coerce) them to write, definitive features of technical style and form, interrelationship of expression and creativity, and functions of communication in shaping and preserving scientific networds and institutions. The previous areas should be explored with respect to contemporary practice and within an historical perspective.
Software Design and Documentation Language (SDDL) provides effective communication medium to support design and documentation of complex software applications. SDDL supports communication among all members of software design team and provides for production of informative documentation on design effort. Use of SDDL-generated document to analyze design makes it possible to eliminate many errors not detected until coding and testing attempted. SDDL processor program translates designer's creative thinking into effective document for communication. Processor performs as many automatic functions as possible, freeing designer's energy for creative effort. SDDL processor program written in PASCAL.
Hughes Aircrafts 13-year productivity study clearly identifies management as the key link in the entire productivity chain. This fact led to the establishment of a long-term series of seminars on personal, managerial, organizational, and operational productivity for all levels and sectors of line and staff management. To inspire the work force to higher levels of productivity and creativity management, itself, must first be inspired. In turn they have to clearly understand the productive and creative processes, fashion an effective productivity improvement plan with sound strategy and implementation, create an optimal environmental chemistry, and provide the outstanding leadership necessary to propel their organizations to achieve full potential. The primary goals of the seminars are to (1) ignite that spark of inspiration, enabling productive action to follow, (2) provide participants a credible roadmap and effective tools for implementation, and (3) develop a dedicated commitment to leadership and productivity throughout the management team.
The design proposal of a semester long design project by group 'F' for AE 441 is addressed. In formulating this design, the driving philosophy was not just to fulfill the mission requirements (discussed in chapter two), but to do so in a creative manner - this explains the unconventional aircraft design, named the F-92 RELIANT. Although unconventional, and perhaps more expensive to produce, the design has distinct advantages which could only be attained through such a creative design. Major components of the F-92 Reliant include: (1) unobstructed cargo bay, 1024 cu. in. capability; (2) loading ramp; (3) dual wing configuration; and (4) polyhedral wing configuration. These design components either originated or evolved to create an aircraft that would most effectively meet the goals of cargo transportation in AeroWorld at minimum cost.
Stimulating creativity in problem solving, particularly where software development is involved, is applicable to many disciplines. Metaphorical thinking keeps the problem in focus but in a different light, jarring people out of their mental ruts and sparking fresh insights. It forces the mind to stretch to find patterns between dissimilar concepts, in the hope of discovering unusual ideas in odd associations (Technology Review January 1993, p. 37). With a background in Engineering and Visual Design from MIT, I have for the past 30 years pursued a career as a sculptor of interdisciplinary monumental artworks that bridge the fields of science, engineering and art. Since 1979, I have pioneered the application of computer simulation to solve the complex problems associated with these projects. A recent project for the roof of the Carnegie Science Center in Pittsburgh made particular use of the metaphoric creativity technique described above. The problem-solving process led to the creation of hybrid software combining scientific, architectural and engineering visualization techniques. David Steich, a Doctoral Candidate in Electrical Engineering at Penn State, was commissioned to develop special software that enabled me to create innovative free-form sculpture. This paper explores the process of inventing the software through a detailed analysis of the interaction between an artist and a computer programmer.
I recently accompanied my son Dan to one of his guitar lessons. As I sat in a separate room, I focused on the music he was playing and the beautiful, robust sound that comes from a well-played guitar. Later that night, I woke up around 3 am. I tend to have my best thoughts at this hour. The trouble is I usually roll over and fall back asleep. This time I was still awake an hour later, so I got up and jotted some notes down in my study. I was thinking about the pure, honest sound of a well-played instrument. From there my mind wandered into the realm of high-performance teams and successful projects. (I know this sounds weird, but this is the sort of thing I think about at 3 am. Maybe you have your own weird thoughts around that time.) Consider a team in relation to music. It seems to me that a crack team can achieve a beautiful, perfect unity in the same way that a band of brilliant musicians can when they're in harmony with one another. With more than a little satisfaction I have to admit, I started to think about the great work performed for you by the Knowledge Sharing team, including this magazine you are reading. Over the past two years I personally have received some of my greatest pleasures as the APPL Director from the Knowledge Sharing activities - the Masters Forums, NASA Center visits, ASK Magazine. The Knowledge Sharing team expresses such passion for their work, just like great musicians convey their passion in the music they play. In the case of Knowledge Sharing, there are many factors that have made this so enjoyable (and hopefully worthwhile for NASA). Three ingredients come to mind -- ingredients that have produced a signature sound. First, through the crazy, passionate playing of Alex Laufer, Michelle Collins, Denise Lee, and Todd Post, I always know that something startling and original is going to come out of their activities. This team has consistently done things that are unique and innovative. For me, best of all is that they are always trying to improve on what they've done before. Second, success in any endeavor stems from people who know how to interpret a composition to sound beautiful when played in a different style. For Knowledge Sharing to work, it must be adapted, reinterpreted, shaped and played with at the centers. In this regard, we've been blessed with another crazy, passionate, inspired artist named Claire Smith. Claire has turned Ames Research Center in California into APPL-west. She is so good and committed to what she does that I just refer people to her whenever they have questions about implementing project management development at the field level. Finally, any great effort requires talented people working behind the scenes, the people who formulate a business approach and know how to manage the money so that the music gets heard. I have known many brilliant and creative people with a ton of ideas that never take off due to an inability to work the business. Again, the Knowledge Sharing team has been fortunate to have competent and passionate people, specifically Tony Maturo and his procurement team at Goddard Space Flight Center, to make sure the process is in place to support the effort. This kind of support is every bit as crucial as the activity itself, and the efforts and creativity that go into successful procurement and contracting is a vital ingredient of this successful team.