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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
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Heliophysics Environmental & Radiation Measurement Experiment Suite (HERMES): A Small External Payload for Gateway with Big Challenges

Currently scheduled for liftoff in 2024, Gateway will be an outpost orbiting the moon for astronauts headed to and from the lunar surface and will serve as a staging point for deep space exploration. In January 2020, NASA Headquarters contacted Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) with a request that they provide a Heliophysics instrumentation package for Gateway. This package would later become known as the Heliophysics Environmental & Radiation Measurement Experiment Suite (HERMES). HERMES consists of four high-heritage instruments – a Miniaturized Electron pRoton Telescope (MERIT), an Electron Electrostatic Analyzer (EEA), a Solar Probe Analyzer-Ions (SPAN-I), and Noise Eliminating Magnetometer Instrument in a Small Integrated System (NEMISIS), which consists of one fluxgate and two magneto-inductive magnetometers. Launching HERMES with Gateway would provide an opportunity to conduct early science experiments on Gateway, but the plan to develop HERMES concurrently with Gateway and launch with the co-manifested vehicle brought numerous technical challenges for the pathfinder payload. HERMES was intended to be a low-cost, tailored Class-D mission, and maintaining that programmatic position proved difficult as the technical challenges grew. The effects of Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) were not factored in from the beginning and also created programmatic challenges. This paper will discuss what’s being done to overcome the technical and programmatic challenges to put HERMES on track for a 2024 Launch Readiness Date (LRD).

Joe Burt↗
NASA NTRS2021

Revisiting Topographic Horizons in the Era of Big Data and Parallel Computing

Widely used to calculate illumination geometry forestimates of solar and emitted longwave radiation, and forcorrecting remotely sensed data for topographic effects, digitalelevation models (DEMs) are now extensive globally at 10–30-mspatial resolution and locally at spatial resolutions down to afew centimeters. Globally, regionally, or locally, elevation datasetshave many grid points. Many software packages calculate gradi-ents over every grid cell or point, but in the mountains, shadingby nearby terrain must also be assessed. Terrain may obscure aslope that would otherwise face the Sun. Four decadesago, a fastmethod to calculate topographic horizons at every point in anelevation grid required computations related only linearly to thesize of the grid, but grids now have so many points that parallelcomputing still provides an advantage. Exploiting parallelismover terrain grids can use alternative strategies: among columnsof a rotated grid, or simultaneously at multiple rotation angles,or on different tiles of a grid. On a multi-processor machine, theimprovement in computing time approaches 2/3 the number ofprocessors deployed,

Jeff Dozier↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

The Big Plunge at Venus: The DAVINCI Descent Phase

DAVINCI (Deep Atmosphere Venus Investigation of Noble gases, Chemistry, and Imaging) was selected as one of two new Discovery missions in summer of 2021 with the primary goals to study how the Venus atmosphere formed and changed over time. DAVINCI does this by making in situ measurements of the atmosphere, taking images below the cloud layer during the descent phase, and imaging the surface and clouds during two flyby science opportunities. The Descent Sphere is neither designed nor required to land on the surface so all critical science data must be taken and transmitted to a relay spacecraft prior to impact. This architecture drives the mission to a carefully-crafted concept of operations; deployments, instrument operations, and communications are choreographed to ensure the right data is gathered at the right altitude given the uncertainties in the trajectory and timeline. A complex flow of analyses and tests throughout development will validate the system’s ability to execute the mission goals. In the end DAVINCI will be ready for its one hour of descent time to meet its driving science goals.

DAVINCI↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

What’s Next in Regional (Air) Mobility? Finding the next possible big ideas in selected problems

This presentation summarizes studies ongoing under the "What's Next in Regional (Air) Mobility" umbrella within the Intercenter Systems Analysis Team. It includes a look at the Regional Air Mobility (RAM) market potential, simulation of a RAM passenger network to gather statistics, and scrutinizes airport energy needs to support RAM operations. It also references a companion presentation provided by the DOT Volpe Center presented by Jacob Wishart related to RAM market and demand estimates.

Advanced Air Mobility↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

The Big Plunge at Venus: The DAVINCI Descent Phase

DAVINCI (Deep Atmosphere Venus Investigation of Noble gases, Chemistry, and Imaging) was selected as one of two new Discovery missions in summer of 2021 with the primary goals are to study how the Venus atmosphere formed and changed over time. DAVINCI does this by making in situ measurements of the atmosphere and taking images below the cloud layer during the descent phase. The probe is neither designed nor required to land on the surface so all critical science data must be taken and transmitted to a relay spacecraft prior to impact. This architecture drives the mission to a carefully-crafted concept of operations; deployments, instrument operations, and communications are choreographed to ensure the right data is gathered at the right altitude given the uncertainties in the trajectory and timeline. A complex flow of analyses and tests throughout development will validate the system’s ability to execute the mission goals. In the end, DAVINCI will be ready for the one opportunity at one hour of descent time to meet its driving science goals.

DAVINCI↗