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NASA NTRS1987

Theoretical Problems in High Resolution Solar Physics, 2

The Science Working Group for the High Resolution Solar Observatory (HRSO) laid plans beginning in 1984 for a series of workshops designed to stimulate a broadbased input from the scientific community to the HRSO mission. These workshops have the dual objectives of encouraging an early start on the difficult theoretical problems in radiative transfer, magnetohydrodynamics, and plasma physics that will be posed by the HRSO data, and maintaining current discussions of results in high resolution solar studies. This workshop was the second in the series. The workshop format presented invited review papers during the formal sessions and contributed poster papers for discussions during open periods. Both are presented.

Athay, G.↗

NASA NTRS1990

Depth and latitude dependence of the solar internal angular velocity

One of the design goals for the dedicated helioseismology observing state located at Mount Wilson Observatory was the measurement of the internal solar rotation using solar p-mode oscillations. In this paper, the first p-mode splittings obtained from Mount Wilson are reported and compared with those from several previously published studies. It is demonstrated that the present splittings agree quite well with composite frequency splittings obtained from the comparisons. The splittings suggest that the angular velocity in the solar equatorial plane is a function of depth below the photosphere. The latitudinal differential rotation pattern visible at the surface appears to persist at least throughout the solar convection zone.

Rhodes, Edward J., Jr.↗

NASA NTRS1997

End-to-End System Test and Optical Performance Evaluation for the Solar and Heliosphere Observatory (SOHO) Ultraviolet Coronagraph Spectrometer (UVCS)

The UVCS is one of the instruments carried by the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO), a joint NASA/ESA Spacecraft launched in November 1995. It is designed to perform ultraviolet spectroscopy and visible light polarimetry of the extended solar corona. The primary scientific objectives of the UVCS investigation are to study the physical processes occurring in the extended solar corona, such as: the mechanism of acceleration of the solar wind, the mechanism of coronal plasma heating, the identification of solar wind sources, and the investigation of the plasma properties of the solar wind. The UVCS End-to-End test activities included a comprehensive set of system level functional and optical tests. Although performed under severe schedule constraints, the End-to-End System Test was very successful and served to fully validate the UVCS optical design. All test results showed that the primary scientific objectives of the UVCS Mission were achievable.

Carosso, Paolo A.↗

NASA NTRS1999

The DROPPS Program: A Rocket/Lidar/Radar Study of the Polar Summer Mesosphere

During July of 1999, two sequences of rockets were launched from the Norwegian rocket range in Andoya, Norway. The purpose of these studies was to investigate the properties of the polar summer mesosphere, particularly relating to polar mesospheric summer echoes (PMSE) and their possible relationship to noctilucent clouds (NLC). Each of two sequences was anchored with a DROPPS Black Brant payload, consisting of 20 instruments to measure the electrodynamic and optical structure of the mesosphere and lower thermosphere. These were provided by participants from five American and two European scientific laboratories. The DROPPS (Distribution and Role of Particles in the Polar Summer) payloads were each accompanied by a sequence of meteorological rockets, and by several European payloads designed to study electrodynamics structure of the same region. ALOMAR (Arctic Lidar Observatory for Middle Atmosphere Research) Lidars, and MF (Medium Frequency) and MST (Mesosphere, Stratosphere, and Troposphere) Radars were used to continuously monitor the mesosphere for NLCs and PMSEs respectively. EISCAT VHF (European Incoherent Scatter Radar Very High Frequency) radar provided similar information about PMSEs downstream from the launch site. Sequence 1 was launched on the night of 5-6 July into a strong PMSE display coupled with a weak NLC at the low end of the PMSE. Sequence 2 was launched on the early morning of 14 July into a strong NLC with no PMSE evident. Here we describe the details of the program along with preliminary results.

Goldberg, Richard A.↗

NASA NTRS2002

Comparison of Stress Relief Procedures for Cryogenic Aluminum Mirrors

The Infrared Multi-Object Spectrograph (IRMOS) is a facility instrument for the Kitt Peak National Observatory Mayall Telescope (3.8 meter) and an engineering prototype for a potential design for the Next Generation Space Telescope/Multi-Object Spectrograph. IRMOS is a low-to mid-resolution (R = lambda/delta-lambda = 300-3800), near-IR (0.8-2.5 micron) spectrograph which produces simultaneous spectra of approximately 100 objects in its 2.8 x 2.0 arcmin field of view using a commercial MEMS multimirror array device. The instrument operating temperature is 80 K and the design is athermal --- the optical bench and mirrors are machined from aluminum 6061-T651. In spite of its baseline mechanical stress relief, aluminum 6061-T651 harbors some residual stress, which, unless relieved during fabrication, may relieve and distort mirror figure to unacceptable levels at the operating temperature. Other cryogenic instruments using aluminum mirrors for both ground-based and space IR astronomy have employed a variety of heat treatment formulae, with mixed results. We present the results of a test program designed to empirically determine the best stress relief procedure for the IRMOS mirrors. Identical test mirrors with spherical and flat optical prescriptions are processed with five different heat treatment formulae from the literature and compared to samples with out any additional processing. After figuring via diamond turning, the mirrors are tested for figure error and radius of curvature at room temperature and at 80 K for several thermal cycles. The heat treatment procedure for the mirrors that yielded the least and most repeatable change in figure error and radius is applied to the IRMOS mirror blanks. We correlate the results of our optical testing with heat treatment and metallographic data.

Ohl, Raymond G.↗

NASA NTRS2002

Profiling Tropospheric Winds with the Goddard Lidar Observatory for Winds (GLOW)

The Goddard Lidar Observatory for Winds (GLOW) is a mobile direct detection Doppler lidar system designed to measure wind profiles from the surface into the lower stratosphere. Recently, the GLOW lidar has participated in several field deployments measuring tropospheric winds in a variety of conditions including both daytime and night operation. More than 50 hours of line-of-sight wind profit data were obtained in September, 2000 during a three week intercomparison experiment at the Ground Winds facility in North Glen, NH. Typical clear air lidar wind profiles extended to altitudes of 20 km with a 1 km vertical resolution and 1 minute averaging. An additional 40 hours of lidar profiles of wind speed and direction were obtained during HARGLO-2, an intercomparison experiment held at Wallops Flight Facility, VA in November, 2001. A description of the mobile system is presented along with the examples of validated lidar wind profiles obtained during these experiments.

Gentry, Bruce M.↗

NASA NTRS2001

Optical metrology for testing an all-composite 2-meter diameter mirror

The Herschel Space Observatory (formerly known as FIRST) consists of a 3.5 m space telescope designed for use in the long IR and sub-milimeter wavebands. To demonstrate the viability of a carbon fiber composite telescope for this application, Composite Optics Incorporated (COI) manufactured a fast (f/1), large (2 m), lightweight (10.1 kg/m squared) demonstration mirror. A key challenge in demonstrating the performance of this novel mirror was to characterize the surface accuracy at cryogenic (70 K) temperatures. A wide variety of optical metrology techniques were investigated and a brief survey of empirical test results and limitations of the various techniques will be presented in this paper. Two complementary infrared (IR)techniques operating at a wavelength of 10.6 microns were chosen for further development: (1) IR Twyman-Green Phase Shifting Interferometry (IR PSI) and (2) IR Shack-Hartmann (IR SH) Wavefront Sensing. Innovative design modifications made to an existing IR PSI to achieve high-resolution, scannable, infrared measurements of the composite mirror are described. The modified interferometer was capable of measuring surface gradients larger than 350 microradians. The design and results of measurements made with a custom-built IR SH Wavefrong Sensor operating at 10.6 microns are also presented. A compact experimental setup permitting simultaneous operation of both the IR PSI and IR SH tools is shown. The advantages and the limitations of the two key IR metrology tools are discussed.

IR metrology phase shifting interferometry Shack-H↗

NASA NTRS2000

Large-scale visualization of digital sky surveys

Designed and developed within JPL/Caltech's supercomputing and visualization environment, the virtual observatory software described in this paper permits high performance visualization and analysis of large sky images and catalogs.

sky survey↗

NASA NTRS2015

VUV Testing of Science Cameras at MSFC: QE Measurement of the CLASP Flight Cameras

The NASA Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) has developed a science camera suitable for sub-orbital missions for observations in the UV, EUV and soft X-ray. Six cameras were built and tested for the Chromospheric Lyman-Alpha Spectro-Polarimeter (CLASP), a joint National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (NAOJ) and MSFC sounding rocket mission. The CLASP camera design includes a frame-transfer e2v CCD57-10 512x512 detector, dual channel analog readout electronics and an internally mounted cold block. At the flight operating temperature of -20 C, the CLASP cameras achieved the low-noise performance requirements (less than or equal to 25 e- read noise and greater than or equal to 10 e-/sec/pix dark current), in addition to maintaining a stable gain of approximately equal to 2.0 e-/DN. The e2v CCD57-10 detectors were coated with Lumogen-E to improve quantum efficiency (QE) at the Lyman- wavelength. A vacuum ultra-violet (VUV) monochromator and a NIST calibrated photodiode were employed to measure the QE of each camera. Four flight-like cameras were tested in a high-vacuum chamber, which was configured to operate several tests intended to verify the QE, gain, read noise, dark current and residual non-linearity of the CCD. We present and discuss the QE measurements performed on the CLASP cameras. We also discuss the high-vacuum system outfitted for testing of UV and EUV science cameras at MSFC.

Champey, Patrick↗

NASA NTRS2015

VUV Testing of Science Cameras at MSFC: QE Measurement of the CLASP Flight Cameras

Camera↗

NASA NTRS2015

NASA James Webb Space Telescope Engineering of the Primary Mirror Segment Assemblies (PMSA) and the Primary Mirror Backplane Support Structure (PMBSS)

The design, engineering tests of the PMSAs PMBSS show that we have a robust system that not only meets but exceeds (better than) the design requirements for these components. In the next 2 years the Telescope Observatory will be subjected to a simulated launch environment (sine vibeacoustics) and operations tests at cryogenic temperatures. Launch is schedule for the last quarter of 2018.

PMBSS↗

NASA NTRS2016

Fast Plasma Investigation for Magnetospheric Multiscale

The Fast Plasma Investigation (FPI) was developed for flight on the Magnetospheric Multiscale (MMS) mission to measure the differential directional flux of magnetospheric electrons and ions with unprecedented time resolution to resolve kinetic-scale plasma dynamics. This increased resolution has been accomplished by placing four dual 180-degree top hat spectrometers for electrons and four dual 180-degree top hat spectrometers for ions around the periphery of each of four MMS spacecraft. Using electrostatic field-of-view deflection, the eight spectrometers for each species together provide 4pi-sr-field-of-view with, at worst, 11.25-degree sample spacing. Energy/charge sampling is provided by swept electrostatic energy/charge selection over the range from 10 eVq to 30000 eVq. The eight dual spectrometers on each spacecraft are controlled and interrogated by a single block redundant Instrument Data Processing Unit, which in turn interfaces to the observatory's Instrument Suite Central Instrument Data processor. This paper described the design of FPI, its ground and in-flight calibration, its operational concept, and its data products.

Pollock, C.↗

NASA NTRS2016

The Athena X-ray Integral Field Unit (X-IFU)

The X-ray Integral Field Unit (X-IFU) on board the Advanced Telescope for High-ENergy Astrophysics (Athena) will provide spatially resolved high-resolution X-ray spectroscopy from 0.2 to 12 keV, with 5 pixels over a field of view of 5 arc minute equivalent diameter and a spectral resolution of 2.5 eV up to 7 keV. In this paper, we first review the core scientific objectives of Athena, driving the main performance parameters of the X-IFU, namely the spectral resolution, the field of view, the effective area, the count rate capabilities, the instrumental background. We also illustrate the breakthrough potential of the X-IFU for some observatory science goals. Then we brie y describe the X-IFU design as defined at the time of the mission consolidation review concluded in May 2016, and report on its predicted performance. Finally, we discuss some options to improve the instrument performance while not increasing its complexity and resource demands (e.g. count rate capability, spectral resolution). (2016) .

Space telescopes↗

NASA NTRS2018

Influence of Core and Hexapod Geometry, and Local Reinforcement on the Performance of Ultra-Lightweight ULE Mirror

The Habitable Exoplanet Observatory (HabEx) mission has unique optical performance requirements which drive the mirror design process beyond the traditional criteria. While mass and stiffness are still important, the response to inertia loading (expressed in terms of Zernike coefficients) to omni-directional excitation dominates the effort. While a Zerodur mirror is the current baseline, as mass budgets change, a ULE design is being studied as a potential alternative. This trade study looked at over 264 design variations using the Arnold Mirror Modeler and ANSYS(c) to investigate the influence of various design elements, including: substrate thickness, core cell size, hexapod geometry and local reinforcement. Design 'goodness' was evaluated based on the mirror's inertial deformation response to omni-directional input. This response was calculated via RSSing Zernike polynomial responses to (XYZ) accelerations.

Space Telescope Technology↗

NASA NTRS2019

Coronagraphic Observations of the Lunar Sodium Exosphere January-June, 2017

In order to observe the lunar sodium exosphere out to one-half degree around the Moon, we designed, built and installed a small robotically controlled coronagraph at the Winer Observatory in Sonoita, Arizona. Observations are obtained remotely every available clear night from our home base at Goddard Space Flight Center or from Prescott, Arizona. We employ an Andover temperature-controlled 1.5-angstrom-wide narrow-band filter centered on the sodium D2 line, and a similar 1.5-angstrom filter centered blueward of the D2 line by 3 angstroms for continuum observations. Our data encompass lunations in 2015, 2016, and 2017, thus we have a long baseline of sodium exospheric calibrated images. During the course of three years we have refined the observational sequence in many respects. Therefore this paper only presents the results of the spring, 2017, observing season. We present limb profiles from the south pole to the north pole for many lunar phases. Our data do not fit any power of cosine model as a function of lunar phase or with latitude. The extended Na exosphere has a characteristic temperature of about 2250–6750 degrees Kelvin, indicative of a partially escaping exosphere. The hot escaping component may be indicative of a mixture of impact vaporization and a sputtered component.

Moon↗

NASA NTRS2019

Coronagraphic Observations of the Lunar Sodium Exosphere January-June, 2017

In order to observe the lunar sodium exosphere out to one-half degree around the Moon, we designed, built and installed a small robotically controlled coronagraph at the Winer Observatory in Sonoita, Arizona. Observations are obtained remotely every available clear night from our home base at Goddard Space Flight Centeror from Prescott, Arizona. We employ an Andover temperature-controlled 1.5 Å wide narrow-band filter centered on the sodium D2line, and a similar 1.5 Å filter centered blueward of the D2line by 3Åfor continuum observations. Our data encompass lunations in 2015, 2016, and 2017, thus we have a long baseline of sodium exospheric calibrated images. During the course of three years we have refined the observational sequence in many respects. Therefore this paper only presents the results of the spring, 2017, observing season. We present limb profiles from the south pole to the north pole for many lunar phases.Our data do not fit any power of cosine model as a function of lunar phase or with latitude. The extended Na exosphere has a characteristic temperature of about 2250 -6750 K, indicative of a partially escaping exosphere. The hot escaping component may be indicative of a mixture of impact vaporization and a sputtered component.

Lunar exosphere composition↗

NASA NTRSDate not supplied

A UNIQUE APPROACH TO ACHIEVING SIZE-CONSTRAINED QUASI-HALO ORBITS FOR THE ROMAN SPACE TELESCOPE

The Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope (RST) is an infrared space observatory planned for launch in the mid-2020’s. The launch window design for RST is subject to a wide variety of simultaneous requirements that require careful consideration and control of mission orbits and the trajectories used to achieve them. This work describes an innovative methodology that blends classical methods with modern manifold approaches and numerical optimization to flexibly determine optimal transfers to desriable mission orbits for any day of the year.Solutions found with this highly automated strategy are gaurunteed to meet requirements by construction. Results show that RST can launch for 80% of the year using maneuvers that are well within the fuel budget, significantly reducing cost and risk to the mission

Lauren Schlenker↗

NASA NTRS2019

The Arctic-Boreal vulnerability experiment model benchmarking system

NASA's Arctic-Boreal Vulnerability Experiment (ABoVE) integrates field and airborne data into modeling and synthesis activities for understanding Arctic and Boreal ecosystem dynamics. The ABoVE Benchmarking System (ABS) is an operational software package to evaluate terrestrial biosphere models against key indicators of Arctic and Boreal ecosystem dynamics, i.e.: carbon biogeochemistry, vegetation, permafrost, hydrology, and disturbance. The ABS utilizes satellite remote sensing data, airborne data, and field data from ABoVE as well as collaborating research networks in the region, e.g.: the Permafrost Carbon Network, the International Soil Carbon Network, the Northern Circumpolar Soil Carbon Database, AmeriFlux sites, the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer, the Orbiting Carbon Observatory 2, and the Soil Moisture Active Passive mission. The ABS is designed to be interactive for researchers interested in having their models accurately represent observations of key Arctic indicators: a user submits model results to the system, the system evaluates the model results against a set of Arctic-Boreal benchmarks outlined in the ABoVE Concise Experiment Plan, and the user then receives a quantitative scoring of model strengths and deficiencies through a web interface. This interactivity allows model developers to iteratively improve their model for the Arctic-Boreal Region by evaluating results from successive model versions. We show here, for illustration, the improvement of the Lund–Potsdam–Jena-Wald Schnee und Landschaft (LPJwsl) version model through the ABoVE ABS as a new permafrost module is coupled to the existing model framework. The ABS will continue to incorporate new benchmarks that address indicators of Arctic-Boreal ecosystem dynamics as they become available.

ABoVE↗