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NASA’s Advance Information Systems Technology (AIST) Program

NASA’s Earth Science Technology Office (ESTO) develops early-stage technologies to enhance scientific understanding. ESTO’s technologies can be reliably and confidently applied to a broad range of science measurements and missions, as well as facilitate practical applications to benefit society at large. As the lead technology office within the Earth Science Division of the NASA Science Mission Directorate, ESTO is focused on the technological challenges inherent to space-based investigations of our planet's dynamic, interrelated systems. Through flexible, science-driven technology strategies and a competitive selection process, ESTO-funded technologies have supported numerous Earth science missions as well as commercial applications. From next generation sensors and instruments to communication and information systems, ESTO technologies enable many NASA missions and data services. The Advanced Information Systems Technology (AIST) Program is one focal area of ESTO. AIST innovates information system technologies that enable the development of new observing systems as well as agile science investigations through data analytics and artificial intelligence tools and algorithms. AIST utilizes an end-to-end development approach with the goal of infusing mature technologies into future missions, measurements, and analysis. One thrust of AIST is data exploitation and analysis using an analytic center framework to make observational data and model output more accessible and usable to scientists conducting specific investigations as well as to extract higher-level science content and information from the data. The framework accelerates scientific discovery by harmonizing the data, tools, and computational resources. NASA’s upcoming Surface, Biology and Geology (SBG) mission is one such mission whose data architecture will leverage many of the technologies developed through the AIST program. This talk will highlight current and future program development goals.

Laura Rogers↗

Secondary Neutron Production from Space Radiation Interactions: Advances in Model and Experimental Data Base Development

For humans engaged in long-duration missions in deep space or near-Earth orbit, the risk from exposure to galactic and solar cosmic rays is an important factor in the design of spacecraft, spacesuits, and planetary bases. As cosmic rays are transported through shielding materials and human tissue components, a secondary radiation field is produced. Neutrons are an important component of that secondary field, especially in thickly-shielded environments. Calculations predict that 50% of the dose-equivalent in a lunar or Martian base comes from neutrons, and a recent workshop held at the Johnson Space Center concluded that as much as 30% of the dose in the International Space Station may come from secondary neutrons. Accelerator facilities provide a means for measuring the effectiveness of various materials in their ability to limit neutron production, using beams and energies that are present in cosmic radiation. The nearly limitless range of beams, energies, and target materials that are present in space, however, means that accelerator-based experiments will not provide a complete database of cross sections and thick-target yields that are necessary to plan and design long-duration missions. As such, accurate nuclear models of neutron production are needed, as well as data sets that can be used to compare with, and verify, the predictions from such models. Improvements in a model of secondary neutron production from heavy-ion interactions are presented here, along with the results from recent accelerator-based measurements of neutron-production cross sections. An analytical knockout-ablation model capable of predicting neutron production from high-energy hadron-hadron interactions (both nucleon-nucleus and nucleus-nucleus collisions) has been previously developed. In the knockout stage, the collision between two nuclei result in the emission of one or more nucleons from the projectile and/or target. The resulting projectile and target remnants, referred to as prefragments, then decay by the emission of nucleons, composites, and gamma rays. Recent improvements to the model have incorporated coalescence effects, which effectively tie up single nucleons in the formation of composites during final-state interactions. Comparison of the improved model s predictions with neutron production data near 0 deg in the CA-40+ H reaction at 357 and 565 MeV/nucleon show marked improvement.

Heilbronn, Lawrence H.↗

Experimental investigation of the landing dynamics of three-legged spacecraft models

An experimental investigation was conducted to obtain accurate data from two three-legged spacecraft landing systems for purposes of validating current and future computer programs for legged landers. Two landing-gear systems were investigated: an inverted tripod system and a cantilever system. Tests were conducted for eight landing conditions chosen to obtain stability data, maximum loads, and maximum strokes for correlation with analytical results. Data from the two models are not directly comparable because of geometry and mass differences, but both are considered to be typical models of the respective landing-gear systems. Results indicate that maximum accelerations for both models, which occurred during a nearly flat landing on a horizontal surface, were nearly the same (approximately minus 18g). Maximum primary strut forces occurred for landings into a 20 deg slope and were 40 kiloNewtons (9000 lbf) and 47 kiloNewtons (10 500 lbf) for the inverted tripod and cantilever models, respectively; and maximum primary strut strokes for both models were 19 cm (7.4 in.). The inverted tripod model was slightly more stable than the cantilever model because of a larger ratio of footpad radius to center-of-gravity height.

Stubbs, S. M.↗

Preconditioned upwind methods to solve 3-D incompressible Navier-Stokes equations for viscous flows

A computational method for calculating low-speed viscous flowfields is developed. The method uses the implicit upwind-relaxation finite-difference algorithm with a nonsingular eigensystem to solve the preconditioned, three-dimensional, incompressible Navier-Stokes equations in curvilinear coordinates. The technique of local time stepping is incorporated to accelerate the rate of convergence to a steady-state solution. An extensive study of optimizing the preconditioned system is carried out for two viscous flow problems. Computed results are compared with analytical solutions and experimental data.

Hsu, C.-H.↗

A Simple Theory of Capillary-Gravity Wave Turbulence

Employing a recently proposed 'multi-wave interaction' theory, inertial spectra of capillary gravity waves are derived. This case is characterized by a rather high degree of nonlinearity and a complicated dispersion law. The absence of scale invariance makes this and some other problems of wave turbulence (e.g., nonlinear inertia gravity waves) intractable by small-perturbation techniques, even in the weak-turbulence limit. The analytical solution obtained in the present work for an arbitrary degree of nonlinearity is shown to be in reasonable agreement with experimental data. The theory explains the dependence of the wave spectrum on wind input and describes the accelerated roll-off of the spectral density function in the narrow sub-range separating scale-invariant regimes of purely gravity and capillary waves, while the appropriate (long- and short-wave) limits yield power laws corresponding to the Zakharov-Filonenko and Phillips spectra.

Glazman, Roman E.↗

Orion MPCV Touchdown Detection Threshold Development and Testing

A robust method of detecting Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle (MPCV) splashdown is necessary to ensure crew and hardware safety during descent and after touchdown. The proposed method uses a triple redundant system to inhibit Reaction Control System (RCS) thruster firings, detach parachute risers from the vehicle, and transition to the post-landing segment of the Flight Software (FSW). An in-depth trade study was completed to determine optimal characteristics of the touchdown detection method resulting in an algorithm monitoring filtered, lever-arm corrected, 200 Hz Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU) vehicle acceleration magnitude data against a tunable threshold using persistence counter logic. Following the design of the algorithm, high fidelity environment and vehicle simulations, coupled with the actual vehicle FSW, were used to tune the acceleration threshold and persistence counter value to result in adequate performance in detecting touchdown and sufficient safety margin against early detection while descending under parachutes. An analytical approach including Kriging and adaptive sampling allowed for a sufficient number of finite element analysis (FEA) impact simulations to be completed using minimal computation time. The combination of a persistence counter of 10 and an acceleration threshold of approximately 57.3 ft/s2 resulted in an impact performance factor of safety (FOS) of 1.0 and a safety FOS of approximately 2.6 for touchdown declaration. An RCS termination acceleration threshold of approximately 53.1 ft/s(exp)2 with a persistence counter of 10 resulted in an increased impact performance FOS of 1.2 at the expense of a lowered under-parachutes safety factor of 2.2. The resulting tuned algorithm was then tested on data from eight Capsule Parachute Assembly System (CPAS) flight tests, showing an experimental minimum safety FOS of 6.1. The formulated touchdown detection algorithm will be flown on the Orion MPCV FSW during the Exploration Flight Test 1 (EFT-1) mission in the second half of 2014.

Daum, Jared↗

IN13B-1660: Analytics and Visualization Pipelines for Big Data on the NASA Earth Exchange (NEX) and OpenNEX

We are developing capabilities for an integrated petabyte-scale Earth science collaborative analysis and visualization environment. The ultimate goal is to deploy this environment within the NASA Earth Exchange (NEX) and OpenNEX in order to enhance existing science data production pipelines in both high-performance computing (HPC) and cloud environments. Bridging of HPC and cloud is a fairly new concept under active research and this system significantly enhances the ability of the scientific community to accelerate analysis and visualization of Earth science data from NASA missions, model outputs and other sources. We have developed a web-based system that seamlessly interfaces with both high-performance computing (HPC) and cloud environments, providing tools that enable science teams to develop and deploy large-scale analysis, visualization and QA pipelines of both the production process and the data products, and enable sharing results with the community. Our project is developed in several stages each addressing separate challenge - workflow integration, parallel execution in either cloud or HPC environments and big-data analytics or visualization. This work benefits a number of existing and upcoming projects supported by NEX, such as the Web Enabled Landsat Data (WELD), where we are developing a new QA pipeline for the 25PB system.

visualization↗

Capillary Flow in Containers of Polygonal Section: Theory and Experiment

An improved understanding of the large-length-scale capillary flows arising in a low-gravity environment is critical to that engineering community concerned with the design and analysis of spacecraft fluids management systems. Because a significant portion of liquid behavior in spacecraft is capillary dominated it is natural to consider designs that best exploit the spontaneous character of such flows. In the present work, a recently verified asymptotic analysis is extended to approximate spontaneous capillary flows in a large class of cylindrical containers of irregular polygonal section experiencing a step reduction in gravitational acceleration. Drop tower tests are conducted using partially-filled irregular triangular containers for comparison with the theoretical predictions. The degree to which the experimental data agree with the theory is a testament to the robustness of the basic analytical assumption of predominantly parallel flow. As a result, the closed form analytical expressions presented serve as simple, accurate tools for predicting bulk flow characteristics essential to practical low-g system design and analysis. Equations for predicting corner wetting rates, total container flow rates, and transient surfaces shapes are provided that are relevant also to terrestrial applications such as capillary flow in porous media.

Weislogel, Mark M.↗

Lunar Transient Accelerations White Paper

Recently, the United States announced a plan to return astronauts to the moon by 2024 [8]. Lunar landing (and subsequent Mars landing) architecture was not considered when the current NASA standards and vehicle design requirements for crew injury risk were developed. Therefore a gap exists in protecting the crew in planetary landing scenarios. One of the interesting aspects of this design reference mission (DRM)is the consideration of having the crew stand during dynamic phases of flight. Although this approach was contemplated for the Apollo Lunar Module, current NASA standards do not address design solutions that allow the crew to stand. Currently, NASA uses several tools and associated limits to mitigate crew injury because of dynamic loads. Some of these tools are the Brinkley Dynamic Response Criterion (BDRC) model and Hybrid III Anthropomorphic Test Devices (ATDs) [10]; and these have several limitations for assessing spaceflight loading environments, as well as specific underlying assumptions that may not be applicable in planetary landing vehicles. The BDRC is a simple lumped mass parameter model developed by the U.S. military, and has been used primarily to evaluate injury risk associated with aircraft ejection systems. The model evaluates seat accelerations in each axis to determine injury risk. Because the model treats the human-seat-restraint system as a single system, it is contingent on a restraint system and seat with similar characteristics of the original test data underlying the model. In particular, the model requires a rigid seat with a minimum natural frequency of 15Hz, minimal seat pan padding, side supports, and multipoint harness. The BDRC model uses undamped natural frequency and damping coefficients based on these requirements and any deviations may render the model injury predictions void. In lunar landing, one expects that a minimal or even no seat with minimal restraints will be employed. In this case, the original model parameters are likely to not be applicable. For capsule-based spacecraft returning crew to Earth, the Hybrid III ATD in various sizes also is used to supplement the BDRC. This analytical tool was added to address limitations in the BDRC related to spacecraft landings while wearing a pressure garment and helmet. Although the Hybrid III ATD has additional measurement capability; head, neck,and lumbar spine responses were the only metrics included because of the limitations imposed by the model.Lunar landing acceleration limits must assume the crew is standing during landing, an orientation for which we have limited data.Although the Apollo missions did employ a standing orientation for the crew, much of the data is lost. Therefore data from othersources havebeen examined to inform lunar landing acceleration limits.

Jeffrey T Somers↗

Constraints on Cosmic Rays, Magnetic Fields, and Dark Matter from Gamma-ray Observations of the Coma Cluster of Galaxies with VERITAS and FERMI

Observations of radio halos and relics in galaxy clusters indicate efficient electron acceleration. Protons should likewise be accelerated and, on account of weak energy losses, can accumulate, suggesting that clusters may also be sources of very high energy (VHE; E greater than100 GeV) gamma-ray emission. We report here on VHE gamma-ray observations of the Coma galaxy cluster with the VERITAS array of imaging Cerenkov telescopes, with complementing Fermi Large Area Telescope observations at GeV energies. No significant gamma-ray emission from the Coma Cluster was detected. Integral flux upper limits at the 99 confidence level were measured to be on the order of (2-5) x 10(sup -8) photons m(sup -2) s(sup -1) (VERITAS,greater than 220 GeV) and approximately 2 x 10(sup -6) photons m(sup -2) s(sup -1) (Fermi, 1-3 GeV), respectively. We use the gamma-ray upper limits to constrain cosmic rays (CRs) and magnetic fields in Coma. Using an analytical approach, the CR-to-thermal pressure ratio is constrained to be less than 16% from VERITAS data and less than 1.7% from Fermi data (averaged within the virial radius). These upper limits are starting to constrain the CR physics in self-consistent cosmological cluster simulations and cap the maximum CR acceleration efficiency at structure formation shocks to be 50. Alternatively, this may argue for non-negligible CR transport processes such as CR streaming and diffusion into the outer cluster regions. Assuming that the radio-emitting electrons of the Coma halo result from hadronic CR interactions, the observations imply a lower limit on the central magnetic field in Coma of approximately (2-5.5)microG, depending on the radial magnetic field profile and on the gamma-ray spectral index. Since these values are below those inferred by Faraday rotation measurements in Coma (for most of the parameter space), this renders the hadronic model a very plausible explanation of the Coma radio halo. Finally, since galaxy clusters are dark matter (DM) dominated, the VERITAS upper limits have been used to place constraints on the thermally averaged product of the total self-annihilation cross section and the relative velocity of the DM particles, (sigma upsilon)

cosmic↗

The dynamics of global positioning system orbits and the determination of precise ephemerides

The suggestion made on the basis of the analytical orbit perturbation theory that the errors in the ephemerides of the GPS satellites are due mostly to resonant effects that can be corrected by adjusting a few parameters in a empirical acceleration formula is tested using simulations and actual data analysis. Data from the Spring 1985 Experiment were used to calculate improved ephemerides, and these ephemerides were used in the estimation of the coordinates of GPS stations within the continental United States, previously positioned with VLBI. The results of this test support the idea that the errors are mostly of a resonant nature and can be corrected.

Colombo, Oscar L.↗

Low-frequency spectral representation of Space Shuttle flight data

The present digital processing of 18 accelerograms associated with Space Shuttle liftoffs splits each of the accelerograms into three time-slices, respectively representing (1) SSME thrust buildup, (2) the period immediately following the SRBs' ignition, and (3) the subsequent period of intense acoustical activity due to the exhaust plume's interactions with the launch pad. The spectral treatment of these data involve the use of autoregressive and autoregressive-moving-average filters that furnish analytical representations of the spectra for all three time-slices in terms of a set of coefficients; these coefficients are applicable to the synthesis of artificial acceleration time-histories.

Spanos, Pol D.↗

Fluid mechanics of dynamic stall. I - Unsteady flow concepts

Advanced military aircraft 'supermaneuverability' requirements entail the sustained operation of airfoils at stalled flow conditions. The present work addresses the effects of separated flow on vehicle dynamics; an analytic method is presented which employs static experimental data to predict the separated flow effect on incompressible unsteady aerodynamics. The key parameters in the analytic relationship between steady and nonsteady aerodynamics are the time-lag before a change of flow conditions can affect the separation-induced aerodynamic loads, the accelerated flow effect, and the moving wall effect.

Ericsson, L. E.↗

Unsteady Aerodynamic Force Sensing from Measured Strain

A simple approach for computing unsteady aerodynamic forces from simulated measured strain data is proposed in this study. First, the deflection and slope of the structure are computed from the unsteady strain using the two-step approach. Velocities and accelerations of the structure are computed using the autoregressive moving average model, on-line parameter estimator, low-pass filter, and a least-squares curve fitting method together with analytical derivatives with respect to time. Finally, aerodynamic forces over the wing are computed using modal aerodynamic influence coefficient matrices, a rational function approximation, and a time-marching algorithm. A cantilevered rectangular wing built and tested at the NASA Langley Research Center (Hampton, Virginia, USA) in 1959 is used to validate the simple approach. Unsteady aerodynamic forces as well as wing deflections, velocities, accelerations, and strains are computed using the CFL3D computational fluid dynamics (CFD) code and an MSC/NASTRAN code (MSC Software Corporation, Newport Beach, California, USA), and these CFL3D-based results are assumed as measured quantities. Based on the measured strains, wing deflections, velocities, accelerations, and aerodynamic forces are computed using the proposed approach. These computed deflections, velocities, accelerations, and unsteady aerodynamic forces are compared with the CFL3D/NASTRAN-based results. In general, computed aerodynamic forces based on the lifting surface theory in subsonic speeds are in good agreement with the target aerodynamic forces generated using CFL3D code with the Euler equation. Excellent aeroelastic responses are obtained even with unsteady strain data under the signal to noise ratio of -9.8dB. The deflections, velocities, and accelerations at each sensor location are independent of structural and aerodynamic models. Therefore, the distributed strain data together with the current proposed approaches can be used as distributed deflection, velocity, and acceleration sensors. This research demonstrates the feasibility of obtaining induced drag and lift forces through the use of distributed sensor technology with measured strain data. An active induced drag control system thus can be designed using the two computed aerodynamic forces, induced drag and lift, to improve the fuel efficiency of an aircraft. Interpolation elements between structural finite element grids and the CFD grids and centroids are successfully incorporated with the unsteady aeroelastic computation scheme. The most critical technology for the success of the proposed approach is the robust on-line parameter estimator, since the least-squares curve fitting method depends heavily on aeroelastic system frequencies and damping factors.

shape sensing↗

Analytic representation of the proton-proton and proton-nucleus cross-sections and its application to the sea-level spectrum and charge ratio of muons

We have calculated the sea-level differential muon momentum spectrum and their charge ratio from 1 GeV/c to 5000 GeV/c, using all of the available accelerator data. We find an excellent agreement between our calculation and the existing experimental data. We see no need, at present, to invoke any change either in the cosmic-ray chemical composition or in the nature of the hadron-nucleus interaction at hadron energies above 1500 GeV.

Badhwar, G. D.↗

Microgravity acceleration measurement environment characterization

The Space Acceleration Measurement System (SAMS) is a general-purpose instrumentation system designed to measure the accelerations onboard the shuttle Orbiter and shuttle/Spacelab vehicles. These measurements are used to support microgravity experiments and investigations into the microgravity environment of the vehicle. Acceleration measurement can be made at locations remote from the SAMS main instrumentation unit by the use of up to three remote triaxial sensor heads. The SAMS was developed by NASA's Lewis Research Center (LeRC) in support of NASA's microgravity science programs. In the past, numerous acceleration measurement systems have flown on various space missions. These systems were tailored to measure accelerations for a narrow set of requirements and were limited in bandwidth, dynamic range, and recording capability. In addition, these systems were mission-peculiar and not easily modified for other applications or missions. The result has been an inability to accurately assess the expected microgravity environment prior to a mission for a particular experiment and/or location. The prime science objective for SAMS on the SL-J mission will be to measure the accelerations experienced by a multitude of experiments in the two racks of the Japanese First Materials Processing Test (FMPT). The FMPT consists of a variety of materials science and life science experiments contained in racks no. 7 and no. 10. The SAMS data will be made available to the FMPT principal investigators after the mission for their analysis with the FMPT data. A secondary science objective for SAMS will be the characterization of the acceleration environment of the Spacelab module. This will include an analysis of the acceleration transfer function of the Spacelab module which will utilize the FMPT acceleration measurement along with measurements at the rack no. 9 structure. Another analytical effort to be undertaken is a general characterization of the acceleration environment of the Spacelab as an orbiting laboratory. These analysis efforts will be in conjunction with similar measurements and analyses on other SAMS Spacelab missions.

Delombard, Richard↗

Ulysses orbit determination at high declinations

The trajectory of the Ulysses spacecraft caused its geocentric declination to exceed 60 deg South for over two months during the Fall of 1994, permitting continuous tracking from a single site. During this time, spacecraft operations constraints allowed only Doppler tracking data to be collected, and imposed a high radial acceleration uncertainty on the orbit determination process. The unusual aspects of this situation have motivated a re-examination of the Hamilton-Melbourne results, which have been used before to estimate the information content of Doppler tracking for trajectories closer to the ecliptic. The addition of an acceleration term to this equation is found to significantly increase the declination uncertainty for symmetric passes. In addition, a simple means is described to transform the symmetric results when the tracking pass is non-symmetric. The analytical results are then compared against numerical studies of this tracking geometry and found to be in good agreement for the angular uncertainties. The results of this analysis are applicable to the Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous (NEAR) mission and to any other missions with high declination trajectories, as well as to missions using short tracking passes and/or one-way Doppler data.

Mcelrath, Timothy P.↗

The influence of environmental effects on the mechanical properties of graphite/epoxy laminates

The time dependent deformational and creep rupture processes in graphite/epoxy laminates are examined as a function of temperature and stress level. The role of accelerated characterization of design materials is discussed, and the use of a nonlinear time-temperature-stress-superposition principle in the determination of compliance master curves as a function of stress and temperature is considered. Creep rupture analytical models are discussed as applied to polymer-matrix composites, and the data is shown to be in general agreement with a logarithmic stress and temperature-dependent delayed fracture model. Comparisons between creep and rupture experiments and phenomenological models are presented.

Brinson, H. F.↗