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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 451 records · Page 25

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NASA NTRS1988

Neutral environment for space station

The results of studies to determine the contamination compatibility of the cross boom and dual keel Space Station configurations with attached payloads are presented. The approach was to define the 3-D configuration of the Space Station and calculate surface-to-surface view factors and solid angles between surfaces and points in an extensive point matrix around the Space Station via a modified TRASYS model. The molecular number column densities along specific experiment lines-of-sight on the cross boom generally meet JSC 30426 requirements. The deposition of contaminants on payload surfaces exceeds the JSC 30426 requirements. These model predictions require updating because of the impact on background brightness predictions. An increase of a factor of 2 to 10 in column densities would result in an unacceptable optical background.

Rantanen, R. O.↗

NASA NTRS2018

Innovative Development of a Cross-Center Timeline Planning Tool

The Payload Operations Integration Center (POIC) at Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) is the United States focal point to support operations controllers and payload developers conducting payload science operations for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) aboard the International Space Station (ISS). Some of the key functions are planning, coordination and scheduling of science activities. This effort occurs in coordination with other NASA centers, international partners, and payload developers. The ability to efficiently plan and re-plan in response to change is critical to the flight planning teams. Additionally, in Fall 2017, NASA will increase its ability to perform payload science operations aboard the ISS with a fourth crew member. In order to support this, there will be an increasing need to quickly plan and schedule more activities. In the past, it was cumbersome and time-consuming to consolidate copious amounts of planning and change request data from various sources. Planners would summarize information from the Johnson Space Center (JSC) Operations Planning Timeline Integration System (OPTIMIS) and manually integrate it with other data in order to produce a Timeline Planning Summary (TPS). This lengthy process of updating static documents while planning and re-planning was cumbersome, introduced human error, and was inflexible to last minute changes. There was a need for a dynamic, more efficient, less erroneous, and more concise way of building a report that could be readily updated as fast as payload science plans change.

Pedoto, Ramon W.↗

NASA NTRS1982

Capillary surface discontinuities above reentrant corners

A particular configuration of a vertical capillary tube for which S is the equilibrium interface between two fluids in the presence of a downward pointing gravitational field was investigated. S is the graph a function u whose domain is the (horizontal) cross section gamma of the tube. The mean curvature of S is proportional to its height above a fixed reference plane and lambda is a prescribed constant and may be taken between zero and pi/2. Domains gamma for which us is a bounded function but does not extend continuously to d gamma are sought. Simple domains are found and the behavior of u in those domains is studied. An important comparison principle that has been used in the literature to derive many of the results in capillarity is reviewed. It allows one to deduce the approximate shape of a capillary surface by constructing comparison surfaces with mean curvature and contact angle close to those of the (unknown) solution surface. In the context of nonparametric problems the comparison principle leads to height estimates above and below for the function u. An example from the literature where these height estimates have been used successfully is described. The promised domains for which the bounded u does not extend continuously to the boundary are constructed. The point on the boundary at which u has a jump discontinuity will be the vertext of a re-entrant corner having any interior angle theta pi. Using the comparison principle the behavior of u near this point is studied.

Korevaar, H. J.↗

NASA NTRS1980

Electromagnetic scattering from two identical pseudospheres

In an attempt to gain some insight into the problem of how close particles have to be on the average before phase effects become important, the cross section and phase matrices for two identical particles as a function of the distance between their centers for both broadside and end-on illumination have been calculated. The point dipole approximation is employed to build two pseudospherical particles each consisting of 32 dipoles with an effective size parameter of 0.9283 and refractive index of 1.54-0.0i. In regard to cross sections, it is found that in certain cases several percent deviation from the converged value, which is twice the single particle cross section, could be found up to distances of separation of 25 single particle diameters. The maxima and minima in the cross section curves can be explained in terms of simple interference effects. Also the element P11 of the phase matrix showed a great deal of structure, and the position of maxima and minima could be explained by phase shift analysis.

Kattawar, G. W.↗

NASA NTRS2001

Modeling Ballistic Current Flow in Carbon Nanotube Wires

Experiments have shown carbon nanotubes (CNT) to be almost perfect conductors at small applied biases. The features of the CNT band structure, large velocity of the crossing subbands and the small number of modes that an electron close to the band center / Fermi energy can scatter into, are the reasons for the near perfect small bias conductance. We show that the CNT band structure does not help at large applied biases - electrons injected into the non crossing subbands can either be Bragg reflected or undergo Zener-type tunneling. This limits the current carrying capacity of CNT. We point out that the current carrying capacity of semiconductor quantum wires in the ballistic limit is different, owing to its band structure. The second aspect addressed is the relationship of nanotube chirality in determining the physics of metal-nanotube coupling. We show that a metallic-zigzag nanotube couples better than an armchair nanotube to a metal contact. This arises because in the case of armchair nanotubes, while the pi band couples well, the pi* band does not couple well to the metal. In the case of zigzag nanotube both crossing modes couple reasonably well to the metal. Many factors such as the role of curvature, strain and defects will play a role in determining the suitability of nanotubes as nanowires. From the limited view point of metal-nanotube coupling, we feel that metallic-zigzag nanotubes are preferable to armchair nanotubes.

Anantram, M. P.↗

NASA NTRS1990

Advanced technology optical telescopes IV; Proceedings of the Meeting, Tucson, AZ, Feb. 12-16, 1990. Parts 1 & 2

The present conference on the current status of large, advanced-technology optical telescope development and construction projects discusses topics on such factors as their novel optical system designs, the use of phased arrays, seeing and site performance factors, mirror fabrication and testing, pointing and tracking techniques, mirror thermal control, structural design strategies, mirror supports and coatings, and the control of segmented mirrors. Attention is given to the proposed implementation of the VLT Interferometer, the first diffraction-limited astronomical images with adaptive optics, a fiber-optic telescope using a large cross-section image-transmitting bundle, the design of wide-field arrays, Hartmann test data reductions, liquid mirrors, inertial drives for telescope pointing, temperature control of large honeycomb mirrors, evaporative coatings for very large telescope mirrors, and the W. M. Keck telescope's primary mirror active control system software.

Barr, Lawrence D.↗

NASA NTRS1985

Verification of L-band SAR calibration

Absolute calibration of a digital L-band SAR system to an accuracy of better than 3 dB has been verified. This was accomplished with a calibration signal generator that produces the phase history of a point target. This signal relates calibration values to various SAR data sets. Values of radar cross-section (RCS) of reference reflectors were obtained using a derived calibration relationship for the L-band channel on the ERIM/CCRS X-C-L SAR system. Calibrated RCS values were compared to known RCS values of each reference reflector for verification and to obtain an error estimate. The calibration was based on the radar response to 21 calibrated reference reflectors.

Larson, R. W.↗

NASA NTRS1986

Thermohydrodynamic analysis for laminar lubricating films

A Galerkin-type analysis to include thermal effects in laminar lubricating films was performed. The lubricant properties were assumed constant except for a temperature-dependent Newtonian viscosity. The cross-film temperature profile is established by collocation at the film boundaries and two interior Lobatto points. The interior temperatures are determined by requiring that the zeroth and first moment of the energy equation be satisfied across the film. The fluidity is forced to conform to a third--degree polynomial appropriate to the Lobatto-point temperatures. Preliminary indications are that the use of just two such sampling points enables satisfactory prediction of bearing performance even in the presence of substantial viscosity variation.

Elrod, H. G.↗

NASA NTRS1988

Vehicle antenna for the mobile satellite experiment

A low profile, low cost, printed circuit, electronically steered, right hand circularly polarized phase array antenna system has been developed for the Mobile Satellite Experiment (MSAT-X) Program. The success of this antenna is based upon the development of a crossed-slot element array and detailed trade-off analyses for both the phased array and pointing system design. The optimized system provides higher gain at low elevation angles (20 degrees above the horizon) and broader frequency coverage (approximately 8 1/2 percent bandwidth) than is possible with a patch array. Detailed analysis showed that optimum performance could be achieved with a 19 element array of a triangular lattice geometry of 3.9 inch element spacing. This configuration has the effect of minimizing grating lobes at large scan angles plus it improves the intersatellite isolation. The array has an aperture 20 inches in diameter and is 0.75 inch thick overall, exclusive of the RF and power connector. The pointing system employs a hybrid approach that operates with both an external rate sensor and an internal error signal as a means of fine tuning the beam acquisition and track. Steering the beam is done electronically via 18, 3-bit diode phase shifters. A nineteenth phase shifter is not required as the center element serves as a reference only. Measured patterns and gain show that the array meets the stipulated performance specifications everywhere except at some low elevation angles.

Peng, Sheng Y.↗

NASA NTRS2004

Solar Pumped High Power Solid State Laser for Space Applications

Highly coherent laser light provides a nearly optimal means of transmitting power in space. The simplest most direct means of converting sunlight to coherent laser light is a solar pumped laser oscillator. A key need for broadly useful space solar power is a robust solid state laser oscillator capable of operating efficiently in near Earth space at output powers in the multi hundred kilowatt range. The principal challenges in realizing such solar pumped laser oscillators are: (1) the need to remove heat from the solid state laser material without introducing unacceptable thermal shock, thermal lensing, or thermal stress induced birefringence to a degree that improves on current removal rates by several orders of magnitude and (2) to introduce sunlight at an effective concentration (kW/sq cm of laser cross sectional area) that is several orders of magnitude higher than currently available while tolerating a pointing error of the spacecraft of several degrees. We discuss strategies for addressing these challenges. The need to remove the high densities of heat, e.g., 30 kW/cu cm, while keeping the thermal shock, thermal lensing and thermal stress induced birefringence loss sufficiently low is addressed in terms of a novel use of diamond integrated with the laser material, such as Ti:sapphire in a manner such that the waste heat is removed from the laser medium in an axial direction and in the diamond in a radial direction. We discuss means for concentrating sunlight to an effective areal density of the order of 30 kW/sq cm. The method integrates conventional imaging optics, non-imaging optics and nonlinear optics. In effect we use a method that combines some of the methods of optical pumping solid state materials and optical fiber, but also address laser media having areas sufficiently large, e.g., 1 cm diameter to handle the multi-hundred kilowatt level powers needed for space solar power.

Fork, Richard L.↗

NASA NTRS2015

Next Generation UAS Based Spectral Systems for Environmental Monitoring

This presentation provides information on the development of a small Unmanned Aerial System(UAS) with a low power, high performance Intelligent Payload Module (IPM) and a hyperspectral imager to enable intelligent gathering of science grade vegetation data over agricultural fields at about 150 ft. The IPM performs real time data processing over the image data and then enables the navigation system to move the UAS to locations where measurements are optimal for science. This is important because the small UAS typically has about 30 minutes of battery power and therefore over large agricultural fields, resource utilization efficiency is important. The key innovation is the shrinking of the IPM and the cross communication with the navigation software to allow the data processing to interact with desired way points while using Field Programmable Gate Arrays to enable high performance on large data volumes produced by the hyperspectral imager.

onboard processing↗

NASA NTRS2018

On-Orbit Performance & Operation of the Attitude & Pointing Control Subsystems on ASTERIA

The Arcsecond Space Telescope Enabling Research in Astrophysics (ASTERIA) is a 6U CubeSat that was deployed from the International Space Station on 20 November 2017. The underlying goal of the mission is to image and perform photometry on bright, nearby stars and possibly detect transiting exoplanets orbiting these stars. As a technology demonstration with an eye to enable this science, the payload must be pointed with a stability of 5 arcseconds RMS over 20-minute observations and a repeatability of 1 arcsecond RMS across multiple observations. A two-stage control system was employed to achieve these pointing requirements: reaction wheels control the attitude of the spacecraft bus while a piezo stage translates the focal plane array to control the pointing of the payload. This paper will present on-orbit results that demonstrate a pointing stability of 0.5 arcsecond RMS over 20 minutes and a pointing repeatability of 1 milliarcsecond RMS from observation to observation, the best pointing of a CubeSat to date. In addition, this paper will discuss the pointing achieved by the attitude control subsystem alone, pointing issues due to temporarily bright pixels, hot pixels, and reaction wheel speed reversals or zero crossings, the deployment and Sun acquisition phase, momentum management issues arising from a large residual dipole, and some of the anomalies encountered with the attitude control subsystem.

Pong, Christopher M.↗

NASA NTRS1981

Compressible boundary-layer stability calculations for sweptback wings with suction

The stability of the laminar boundary layers on two transonic wings of infinite span with distributed suction is investigated with the compressible, parallel-flow stability theory. Both wings have supercritical airfoil sections; one has a sweep angle of 23 deg, the other of 35 deg. Zero-frequency disturbances are used to represent cross-flow instability, and disturbances with the wavenumber vector aligned with the local flow direction represent traveling-wave instability. In both cases, the maximum spatial amplification rate is used as a measure of the instability. For the suction, distributions with constant mass flux downstream of the starting point are used. The main objective is to determine how the maximum amplification rate varies with the magnitude and starting point of the suction. It is found for both types of disturbances that the maximum amplification rate varies almost linearly with the suction magnitude up to at least the point where the amplification rate is halved. Different starting locations for the suction in the first 4% of the chord were found to affect cross-flow instability, but to have little influence on traveling-wave instability.

Mack, L. M.↗

NASA NTRS2018

Quantifying Boreal Forest Structure and Composition Using UAV Structure from Motion

The vast extent and inaccessibility of boreal forest ecosystems are barriers to routine monitoring of forest structure and composition. In this research, we bridge the scale gap between intensive but sparse plot measurements and extensive remote sensing studies by collecting forest inventory variables at the plot scale using an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) and a structure from motion (SfM) approach. At 20 Forest Inventory and Analysis (FIA) subplots in interior Alaska, we acquired overlapping imagery and generated dense, 3D, RGB (red, green, blue) point clouds. We used these data to model forest type at the individual crown scale as well as subplot-scale tree density (TD), basal area (BA), and aboveground biomass (AGB). We achieved 85% cross-validation accuracy for five species at the crown level. Classification accuracy was maximized using three variables representing crown height, form, and color. Consistent with previous UAV-based studies, SfM point cloud data generated robust models of TD (r(sup 2) = 0.91), BA (r(sup 2) = 0.79), and AGB (r(sup 2) = 0.92), using a mix of plot- and crown-scale information. Precise estimation of TD required either segment counts or species information to differentiate black spruce from mixed white spruce plots. The accuracy of species-specific estimates of TD, BA, and AGB at the plot scale was somewhat variable, ranging from accurate estimates of black spruce TD (+/−1%) and aspen BA (−2%) to misallocation of aspen AGB (+118%) and white spruce AGB (−50%). These results convey the potential utility of SfM data for forest type discrimination in FIA plots and the remaining challenges to develop classification approaches for species-specific estimates at the plot scale that are more robust to segmentation error.

aboveground biomass↗

NASA NTRS2013

EDSN: A First Demonstration of a Distributed System of Nanosatellites

Edison Demonstration of SmallSat Networks (EDSN) is the first demonstration of a distributed system of nano-scale satellites to use intersatellite communication while working towards common science and technology goals. This unique mission configuration poses key technological challenges, including multi-satellite deployment, close proximity flight, cross-satellite communications, and simplified and effective operations. Tackling these challenges has required extensive development on EDSNs guidance navigation and control (GNC) and flight software systems. Although use of COTS component is common to the CubeSat community, it is prudent to point out that utilization of these components enables EDSN to accomplish its objectives at relatively low cost ($12M) in comparison to current multi-satellite missions capable of cross-link communications. EDSN is on cost and schedule with flight unit shipment in August 2013. This paper aims to update the community of EDSN's progress since SRR and speaks to the approach EDSN has taken to resolve some of the main issues revolving around a distributed system of nano-scale satellites.

Nanosatellite↗

NASA NTRS1974

Observations of the chromospheric network - Initial results from the Apollo Telescope Mount

A preliminary analysis of early data taken by the HCO spectrometer on Skylab shows that the solar chromospheric network can be clearly seen with varying contrast in the extreme-ultraviolet emission characteristic of temperatures between 10,000 K (the Lyman continuum) and 300,000 K (O VI). In the emission of Mg X, a coronal line formed at about 1,500,000 K, the network is generally unrecognizable. This is interpreted as being due to a spreading of the magnetic field lines of the network boundary in the height interval corresponding to the temperature difference between 300,000 and 1,500,000 K. We note that in certain anomalous cases, bright points of the network are seen to extend with high contrast and essentially unchanged in their cross-section through the full range of temperatures characteristic of the chromosphere, transition region, and low corona.

Reeves, E. M.↗

NASA NTRS1980

Substorms and magnetospheric energy transfer processes

Evidence is presented which suggests a direct process for the conversion of solar wind energy into the various manifestations of the auroral substorm. This is in contrast to the widely accepted premise that solar wind energy is accumulated in the magnetosphere and then released by an instability process occurring in the magnetotail. It is shown that much of the plasma sheet behavior associated with auroral substorms can be interpreted in terms of single-particle models and simple variations of the cross-tail electric field intensity which does not invoke release of stored magnetic energy. It is also pointed out that the major entry of substorm energy into the magnetosphere occurs through the boundaries of the lobes of the magnetotail. This paper is not intended to be a complete theory of the magnetospheric substorm - rather the intention of this paper is to point out directions of research deserving of more attention.

Swift, D. W.↗

NASA NTRS1982

Confirmation of the anomalous behavior of energetic nuclear fragments

Cosmic-ray nuclei have been observed to produce 2072 secondary fragments in nuclear interactions detected in nuclear emulsions. These fragments produce 557 further interactions. Previous reports that these secondary nuclei show anomalously short mean free paths near their point of origin are confirmed. This effect can be interpreted as being due to all fragments having cross sections about twice normal for some 10 to the -10 sec after creation, or to a small fraction having cross sections an order of magnitude greater than normal.

Barber, H. B.↗