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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 469 records · Page 26
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS2007

Simulating Operations at a Spaceport

SPACESIM is a computer program for detailed simulation of operations at a spaceport. SPACESIM is being developed to greatly improve existing spaceports and to aid in designing, building, and operating future spaceports, given that there is a worldwide trend in spaceport operations from very expensive, research- oriented launches to more frequent commercial launches. From an operational perspective, future spaceports are expected to resemble current airports and seaports, for which it is necessary to resolve issues of safety, security, efficient movement of machinery and people, cost effectiveness, timeliness, and maximizing effectiveness in utilization of resources. Simulations can be performed, for example, to (1) simultaneously analyze launches of reusable and expendable rockets and identify bottlenecks arising from competition for limited resources or (2) perform what-if scenario analyses to identify optimal scenarios prior to making large capital investments. SPACESIM includes an object-oriented discrete-event-simulation engine. (Discrete- event simulation has been used to assess processes at modern seaports.) The simulation engine is built upon the Java programming language for maximum portability. Extensible Markup Language (XML) is used for storage of data to enable industry-standard interchange of data with other software. A graphical user interface facilitates creation of scenarios and analysis of data.

Nevins, Michael R.↗
NASA NTRS2006

Simulating Humans as Integral Parts of Spacecraft Missions

The Collaborative-Virtual Environment Simulation Tool (C-VEST) software was developed for use in a NASA project entitled "3-D Interactive Digital Virtual Human." The project is oriented toward the use of a comprehensive suite of advanced software tools in computational simulations for the purposes of human-centered design of spacecraft missions and of the spacecraft, space suits, and other equipment to be used on the missions. The C-VEST software affords an unprecedented suite of capabilities for three-dimensional virtual-environment simulations with plug-in interfaces for physiological data, haptic interfaces, plug-and-play software, realtime control, and/or playback control. Mathematical models of the mechanics of the human body and of the aforementioned equipment are implemented in software and integrated to simulate forces exerted on and by astronauts as they work. The computational results can then support the iterative processes of design, building, and testing in applied systems engineering and integration. The results of the simulations provide guidance for devising measures to counteract effects of microgravity on the human body and for the rapid development of virtual (that is, simulated) prototypes of advanced space suits, cockpits, and robots to enhance the productivity, comfort, and safety of astronauts. The unique ability to implement human-in-the-loop immersion also makes the C-VEST software potentially valuable for use in commercial and academic settings beyond the original space-mission setting.

Bruins, Anthony C.↗
NASA NTRS2010

LISA Technology Development and Risk Reduction at NASA

The Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA) is a joint ESA-NASA project to design, build and operate a space-based gravitational wave detector based on a laser interferometer. LISA relies on several technologies that are either new to spaceflight or must perform at levels not previously demonstrated in a spaceflight environment. The ESA-led LISA Pathfinder mission is the main effort to demonstrate LISA technology. NASA also supports complementary ground-based technology development and risk reduction activities. This presentation will report the status of NASA work on micronewton thrusters, the telescope, the optical pointing subsystem and mission formulation. More details on some of these topics will be given in posters. Other talks and posters will describe NASA-supported work on the laser subsystem, the phasemeter, and aspects of the interferometry. Two flight-qualified clusters of four colloid micronewton thrusters, each capable of thrust Levels between 5 and 30 microNewton with a resolution less than 0.l microNewton and a thrust noise less than 0.1 microNewton/vHz (0.001 to 4 Hz), have been integrated onto the LISA Pathfinder spacecraft. The complementary ground-based development focuses on lifetime demonstration. Laboratory verification of failure models and accelerated life tests are just getting started. LISA needs a 40 cm diameter, afocal telescope for beam expansion/reduction that maintains an optical pathlength stability of approximately 1 pm/vHz in an extremely stable thermal environment. A mechanical prototype of a silicon carbide primary-secondary structure has been fabricated for stability testing. Two optical assemblies must point at different distant spacecraft with nanoradian accuracy over approximately 1 degree annual variation in the angle between the distant spacecraft. A candidate piezo-inchworm actuator is being tested in a suitable testbed. In addition to technology development, NASA has carried out several studies in support of the mission formulation. The results of systems engineering work on flight software, avionics and reliability will be summarized.

Stebbins, Robin T.↗
NASA NTRS2010

LCROSS - Lunar Impactor: Pioneering Risk-Tolerant Exploration in Search for Water on the Moon

The Lunar CRater Observation and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS) was launched with the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) on June 18, 2009 to determine the presence of water-ice in a permanently shadowed crater on the south pole of the Moon. However, an equally important purpose was to pioneer low-cost, quick-turnaround NASA missions that could accept a higher-than-normal-level of technical risk. When the LCROSS mission proposal was competitively selected by the NASA Exploration Systems Mission Directorate to design, build, and launch a spacecraft in 31 months with a $79M cost-capped budget and a fixed mass allocation, NASA Ames Research Center and its industry partner, Northrop-Grumman, needed a game-changing approach to be successful. That approach was a ground-breaking combination of having a risk-tolerant NASA Class D mission status and finding the right balance point between the inflexible elements of cost and schedule and the newly-flexible element of technical capability.

Andrews, Daniel R.↗
NASA NTRS2010

Lunabotics Mining: Evolution of ARTEMIS PRIME

This slide presentation reviews the development of Amassing Regolith with Topper Engineers eMploying Innovative Solutions (ARTEMIS) in a competition to develop robotic lunar mining capabilities. The goal of the competition was to design, build and operate a remotely controlled device that is capable of excavating, transporting and discharging lunar regolith simulant in a lunar environment over a 13 minute period.

Bertke, Sarah↗
NASA NTRS2011

NASA Mission Operations Directorate Preparations for the COTS Visiting Vehicles

With the retirement of the Space Shuttle looming, a series of new spacecraft is under development to assist in providing for the growing logistical needs of the International Space Station (ISS). Two of these vehicles are being built under a NASA initiative known as the Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program. These visiting vehicles ; Space X s Dragon and Orbital Science Corporation s Cygnus , are to be domestically produced in the United States and designed to add to the capabilities of the Russian Progress and Soyuz workhorses, the European Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) and the Japanese H-2 Transfer Vehicle (HTV). Most of what is known about the COTS program has focused on the work of Orbital and SpaceX in designing, building, and testing their respective launch and cargo vehicles. However, there is also a team within the Mission Operations Directorate (MOD) at NASA s Johnson Space Center working with their operational counterparts in these companies to provide operational safety oversight and mission assurance via the development of operational scenarios and products needed for these missions. Ensuring that the operational aspect is addressed for the initial demonstration flights of these vehicles is the topic of this paper. Integrating Dragon and Cygnus into the ISS operational environment has posed a unique challenge to NASA and their partner companies. This is due in part to the short time span of the COTS program, as measured from initial contract award until first launch, as well as other factors that will be explored in the text. Operational scenarios and products developed for each COTS vehicle will be discussed based on the following categories: timelines, on-orbit checkout, ground documentation, crew procedures, software updates and training materials. Also addressed is an outline of the commonalities associated with the operations for each vehicle. It is the intent of the authors to provide their audience with a better understanding of the mission assurance that MOD brings to commercial ventures to the ISS

Shull, Sarah A.↗
NASA NTRS2011

Testing Strategies and Methodologies for the Max Launch Abort System

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Engineering and Safety Center (NESC) was tasked to develop an alternate, tower-less launch abort system (LAS) as risk mitigation for the Orion Project. The successful pad abort flight demonstration test in July 2009 of the "Max" launch abort system (MLAS) provided data critical to the design of future LASs, while demonstrating the Agency s ability to rapidly design, build and fly full-scale hardware at minimal cost in a "virtual" work environment. Limited funding and an aggressive schedule presented a challenge for testing of the complex MLAS system. The successful pad abort flight demonstration test was attributed to the project s systems engineering and integration process, which included: a concise definition of, and an adherence to, flight test objectives; a solid operational concept; well defined performance requirements, and a test program tailored to reducing the highest flight test risks. The testing ranged from wind tunnel validation of computational fluid dynamic simulations to component ground tests of the highest risk subsystems. This paper provides an overview of the testing/risk management approach and methodologies used to understand and reduce the areas of highest risk - resulting in a successful flight demonstration test.

Schaible, Dawn M.↗
NASA NTRS2001

Jet Propulsion Laboratory: Annual Report 2000

Year 2000 began with an intense period of self-examination for the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Late in the previous year, two Mars-bound missions failed as they were arriving at the red planet, disappointing engineers, scientists and the public at large. After a probing series of internal and external reviews, a redesigned Mars program emerged that is intended to be more robust and more tightly coupled to the questions that scientists are attempting to answer. NASA expressed a significant vote of confidence in JPL by assigning an ambitious project to the Laboratory - to design, build and fly twin rovers to Mars in 2003. Among other missions and research programs, the news was more gratifying. Another Mars orbiter completed its first year of mapping operations, gathering more pictures than those collected over the entire missions of the two Viking orbiters. Stalwart spacecraft such as Galileo continued to deliver scientific discoveries, while a new generation of smaller solar system exploration missions got under way. In Earth sciences, a growing array of spaceborne instruments and satellites gave us new perspectives on the home planet, including an imaging radar mission on the Space Shuttle and two JPL instruments that began science operations after their launch on NASA's Terra orbiter in late 1999. In astronomy and physics, a JPL-built camera continued to perform flawlessly on NASA's Hubble Space Telescope, offering previously unglimpsed views of the deep universe.

Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL)↗
NASA NTRS2011

Lessons Learned from the Design, Certification, and Operation of the Space Shuttle Integrated Main Propulsion System (IMPS)

The Space Shuttle Integrated Main Propulsion System (IMPS) consists of the External Tank (ET), Orbiter Main Propulsion System (MPS), and Space Shuttle Main Engines (SSMEs). The IMPS is tasked with the storage, conditioning, distribution, and combustion of cryogenic liquid hydrogen (LH2) and liquid oxygen (LO2) propellants to provide first and second stage thrust for achieving orbital velocity. The design, certification, and operation of the associated IMPS hardware have produced many lessons learned over the course of the Space Shuttle Program (SSP). A subset of these items will be discussed in this paper for consideration when designing, building, and operating future spacecraft propulsion systems. This paper will focus on lessons learned related to Orbiter MPS and is the first of a planned series to address the subject matter.

Martinez, Hugo E.↗
NASA NTRS2008

Percussive Excavation of Lunar Soil

It has been suggested using a percussive motion could improve the efficiency of excavation by up to 90%. If this is proven to be true it would be very beneficial to excavation projects on the Moon and Mars. The purpose of this study is to design, build and test a percussive tool which could dig a trench and then compare this data against that of a non-percussive tool of the same shape and size. The results of this test thus far have been inconclusive due to malfunctions in the testbed and percussive bucket; however, experimental results from small scale experiments confirm this higher efficiency and support further testing.

Whittaker, Matthew P.↗
NASA NTRS2012

Peregrine 100-km Sounding Rocket Project

The Peregrine Sounding Rocket Program is a joint basic research program of NASA Ames Research Center, NASA Wallops, Stanford University, and the Space Propulsion Group, Inc. (SPG). The goal is to determine the applicability of this technology to a small launch system. The approach is to design, build, and fly a stable, efficient liquefying fuel hybrid rocket vehicle to an altitude of 100 km. The program was kicked off in October of 2006 and has seen considerable progress in the subsequent 18 months. This research group began studying liquifying hybrid rocket fuel technology more than a decade ago. The overall goal of the research was to gain a better understanding of the fundamental physics of the liquid layer entrainment process responsible for the large increase in regression rate observed in these fuels, and to demonstrate the effect of increased regression rate on hybrid rocket motor performance. At the time of this reporting, more than 400 motor tests were conducted with a variety of oxidizers (N2O, GOx, LOx) at ever increasing scales with thrust levels from 5 to over 15,000 pounds (22 N to over 66 kN) in order to move this technology from the laboratory to practical applications. The Peregrine program is the natural next step in this development. A number of small sounding rockets with diameters of 3, 4, and 6 in. (7.6, 10.2, and 15.2 cm) have been flown, but Peregrine at a diameter of 15 in. (38.1 cm) and 14,000-lb (62.3-kN) thrust is by far the largest system ever attempted and will be one of the largest hybrids ever flown. Successful Peregrine flights will set the stage for a wide range of applications of this technology.

Zilliac, Gregory↗
NASA NTRS2012

Experimental Modeling of Sterilization Effects for Atmospheric Entry Heating on Microorganisms

The objective of this research was to design, build, and test an experimental apparatus for studying the parameters of atmospheric entry heating, and the inactivation of temperature-resistant bacterial spores. The apparatus is capable of controlled, rapid heating of sample coupons to temperatures of 200 to 350 C and above. The vacuum chamber permits operation under vacuum or special atmospheric gas mixtures.

Schubert, Wayne W.↗
NASA NTRS2012

The Montana ALE (Autonomous Lunar Excavator) Systems Engineering Report

On May 2 1-26, 20 12, the third annual NASA Lunabotics Mining Competition will be held at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. This event brings together student teams from universities around the world to compete in an engineering challenge. Each team must design, build and operate a robotic excavator that can collect artificial lunar soil and deposit it at a target location. Montana State University, Bozeman, is one of the institutions selected to field a team this year. This paper will summarize the goals of MSU's lunar excavator project, known as the Autonomous Lunar Explorer (ALE), along with the engineering process that the MSU team is using to fulfill these goals, according to NASA's systems engineering guidelines.

Lars Osborne↗
NASA NTRS2012

Hollow Retroreflectors for Lunar Laser Ranging at Goddard Space Flight Center

Laser ranging to the retroreflector arrays placed on the lunar surface by the Apollo astronauts and the Soviet Luna missions have dramatically increased our understanding of gravitational physics along with Earth and Moon geophysics, geodesy, and dynamics. Although the precision of the range measurements has historically been limited by the ground station capabilities, advances in the APOLLO instrument at the Apache Point facility in New Mexico is beginning to be limited by errors associated with the lunar arrays. At Goddard Space Flight Center, we have developed a facility where we can design, build, and test next-generation hollow retroreflectors for Lunar Laser Ranging. Here we will describe this facility as well as report on the bonding techniques used to assemble the retroreflectors. Results from investigations into different high reflectivity mirror coatings, as well as dust mitigation coatings will also be presented.

Preston, Alix M.↗
NASA NTRS2013

Structural Dynamics and Data Analysis

This project consists of two parts, the first will be the post-flight analysis of data from a Delta IV launch vehicle, and the second will be a Finite Element Analysis of a CubeSat. Shock and vibration data was collected on WGS-5 (Wideband Global SATCOM- 5) which was launched on a Delta IV launch vehicle. Using CAM (CAlculation with Matrices) software, the data is to be plotted into Time History, Shock Response Spectrum, and SPL (Sound Pressure Level) curves. In this format the data is to be reviewed and compared to flight instrumentation data from previous flights of the same launch vehicle. This is done to ensure the current mission environments, such as shock, random vibration, and acoustics, are not out of family with existing flight experience. In family means the peaks on the SRS curve for WGS-5 are similar to the peaks from the previous flights and there are no major outliers. The curves from the data will then be compiled into a useful format so that is can be peer reviewed then presented before an engineering review board if required. Also, the reviewed data will be uploaded to the Engineering Review Board Information System (ERBIS) to archive. The second part of this project is conducting Finite Element Analysis of a CubeSat. In 2010, Merritt Island High School partnered with NASA to design, build and launch a CubeSat. The team is now called StangSat in honor of their mascot, the mustang. Over the past few years, the StangSat team has built a satellite and has now been manifested for flight on a SpaceX Falcon 9 launch in 2014. To prepare for the final launch, a test flight was conducted in Mojave, California. StangSat was launched on a Prospector 18D, a high altitude rocket made by Garvey Spacecraft Corporation, along with their sister satellite CP9 built by California Polytechnic University. However, StangSat was damaged during an off nominal landing and this project will give beneficial insights into what loads the CubeSat experienced during the crash. During the year, the MIHS students generated a SolidWorks (CAD software) geometry model of StangSat. This model will be imported into FEMAP (Finite Element Analysis (FEA) Software) and a finite element model wiiJ be created to predict the loads encountered during the crash of this rocket. This analysis will require learning how to import CAD models into the FEM, mesh and add constraints and concentrated masses to represent components inside the CubeSat frame, such as circuit boards, batteries and accelerometers. During the analysis the loads will be varied, in effort to duplicate the damage to the CubeSat. Results will then be peer reviewed and documented.

Luthman, Briana L.↗
NASA NTRS2014

Design, Integration, Certification and Testing of the Orion Crew Module Propulsion System

The Orion Crew Module Propulsion Reaction Control System is currently complete and ready for flight as part of the Orion program's first flight test, Exploration Flight Test One (EFT-1). As part of the first article design, build, test, and integration effort, several key lessons learned have been noted and are planned for incorporation into the next build of the system. This paper provides an overview of those lessons learned and a status on the Orion propulsion system progress to date.

McKay, Heather↗
NASA NTRS2013

The Arctic Regional Communications Small SATellite (ARCSAT)

Traditional satellite missions are extremely complex and expensive to design, build, test, launch and operate. Consequently many complementary operational, exploration and research satellite missions are being formulated as a growing part of the future space community capabilities using formations of small, distributed, simple to launch and inexpensive highly capable small scale satellites. The Arctic Regional Communications small SATellite (ARCSAT) initiative would launch a Mini-Satellite "Mothership" into Polar or Sun Sync low-earth-orbit (LEO). Once on orbit, the Mothership would perform orbital insertion of four internally stored independently maneuverable nanosatellites, each containing electronically steerable antennas and reconfigurable software-defined radios. Unlike the traditional geostationary larger complex satellite communication systems, this LEO communications system will be comprised of initially a five small satellite formation that can be later incrementally increased in the total number of satellites for additional data coverage. ARCSAT will provide significant enabling capabilities in the Arctic for autonomous voice and data communications relay, Maritime Domain Awareness (MDA), data-extraction from unattended sensors, and terrestrial Search & Rescue (SAR) beacon detection missions throughout the "data starved desert" of the Arctic Region.

Casas, Joseph↗
NASA NTRS2014

The Benefits of Nuclear Thermal Propulsion (NTP) in an Evolvable Mars Campaign

NTR: High thrust high specific impulse (2 x LOXLH2chemical) engine uses high power density fission reactor with enriched uranium fuel as thermal power source. Reactor heat is removed using H2propellant which is then exhausted to produce thrust. Conventional chemical engine LH2tanks, turbopumps, regenerative nozzles and radiation-cooled shirt extensions used --NTR is next evolutionary step in high performance liquid rocket engines During the Rover program, a common fuel element tie tube design was developed and used in the design of the 50 klbf Kiwi-B4E (1964), 75 klbf Phoebus-1B (1967), 250 klbf Phoebus-2A (June 1968), then back down to the 25 klbf Pewee engine (Nov-Dec 1968) NASA and DOE are using this same approach: design, build, ground then flight test a small engine using a common fuel element that is scalable to a larger 25 klbf thrust engine needed for human missions

Nuclear thermal rocket↗