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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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Continuous-coal-mining machine maneuverable. Hydraulic coal excavator combined with chock, or roof-support structure, in self-contained unit that moves itself forward as it removes coal from seam. Unlike previous such units, new machine compact enough to be easily maneuverable; even makes small-radius right-angle turns.
The principal industrial users of land observation satellite systems are the geological industries; oil/gas, mining, and engineering/environmental companies. The primary system used is LANDSAT/MSS. Currently, use is also being made of the limited amounts of SKYLAB photography, SEASAT and SIR-A radar, and the new LANDSAT/TM data available. Although considered experimental, LANDSAT data is now used operationally by several hundred exploration and engineering companies worldwide as a vastly improved geological mapping tool to help direct more expensive geophysical and drilling phases, leading to more efficient decision-making and results. Future needs include global LANDSAT/TM; higher spatial resolution; stereo and radar; improved data handling, processing distribution and archiving systems, and integrated geographical information systems (GIS). For a promising future, governments must provide overall continuity (government and/or private sector) of such systems, insure continued government R and D, and commit to operating internationally under the civil Open Skies policy.
The use of remote sensing multispectral systems in urban/suburban land use, and environmental impact from surface mines is discussed. The classification system used in conjunction with the land use/land cover data is included.
Several digital data processing techniques were evaluated in an effort to identify and map active/abandoned, partially reclaimed, and fully revegetated surface mine areas in the central portion of Logan County. The TM data were first subjected to various enhancement procedures, including a linear contrast stretch, principal components and canonical analysis transformations. At the same time, four general procedures were followed to produce six classifications as a means of comparing the techniques involved. Preliminary results show that various feature extraction/data reduction techniques provide classification results equal or superior to the more straightforward unsupervised clustering technique. Analyst interaction time for labelling clusters is reduced using the canonical analysis and principal components procedures, though the canonical technique has clearly produced better results to date.
Early silicon solar cells were made of metallurgical-grade silicon with very low efficiency. The single-crystal silicon introduced in the mid-50's increased the efficiency to the 5% to 10% region. Throughout the 1960s the technology of the 2 x 2 cm or 2 x 4 cm space solar cell with 10% efficiency was established. In the early 1970s work related to the violet cell upset the status quo and space solar cells and cells in general became more efficient. The rest of the decade became characterized by establishing a terrestrial photovoltaic technology to support the development of a new industry. Costs per watt became the dominant consideration and frequently the efficiency was compromised. The introduction of materials and other forms of silicon dropped the efficiency and it is now a state of mine that accomplishing 10% efficiency with some alternative combination is regarded as success. Silicon solar cells are capable of delivering efficiences much greater than 10%.
Two new detectors are currently under construction at the Homestake Gold Mine a 140-ton Large Area Scintillation Detector (LASD) with an upper surface area of 130 square meters, a geometry factor (for an isotropic flux) of 1200 square meters, sr, and a depth of 4200 m.w.e.; and a surface air shower array consisting of 100 scintillator elements, each 3 square meters, spanning an area of approximately square kilometers. Underground, half of the LASD is currently running and collecting muon data; on the surface, the first section of the air shower array will begin operation in the spring of 1985. The detectors and their capabilities are described.
Progress in the construction of the Soudan 2 nucleon decay detector which is being built at the Soudan iron mine in Minnesota is discussed. The expected event rate and characteristics of low energy neutrino events, muon events, multiple muon events, and other cosmic ray phenomena are discussed.
Normal incidence, specular reflectance spectra of three samples of optical black coatings have been measured in 10 filter passbands at effective wavelengths between 12 and 700 microns. Strong absorption, due to amorphous silicate material in the coatings, is found in the 15-50 micron region of each spectrum. Reflecting-layer model calculations are fitted by a nonlinear least-squares routine to the spectra at wavelengths beyond the absorption band to determine far-infrared optical parameters. It is found that, with a similar wavelength dependence, the absorption coefficient of a new black coating (ECP 2200) made by the Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Company (3M) is less than 1/10 that of the discontinued coating, 3M Black Velvet Nextel. It is also shown that the extinction effect of a very rough substrate is negligible compared with the effects of increased upper surface roughness and coating thickness attendant upon fully covering a very rough substrate.
Feeding several slurry pipes into main pipeline reduces congestion in coal mines. System based on manifold concept: feeder pipelines from each working entry joined to main pipeline that carries coal slurry out of panel and onto surface. Manifold concept makes coal-slurry haulage much simpler than existing slurry systems.
Ring nozzle helps to prevent choking of coal-slurry pipelines. Intended originally for use in coal mines, nozzle concept generally applicable to short-haul slurry pipelines where high-pressure water (or other slurry fluid) available. Extra water injected into flow near wall of slurry pipe to keep slurry particles from setting and blocking pipe.
Three flight lines of Airborne Imaging Spectrometer (AIS) data were collected in 128 bands between 1.2 and 2.4 microns in the Hot Creek Range, Nevada on July 25, 1984. The flight lines are underlain by hydrothermally altered and unaltered Paleozoic carbonates and Tertiary rhyolitic to latitic volcanics in the Tybo mining district. The original project objectives were to discriminate carbonate rocks from other rock types, to distinguish limestone from dolomite, and to discriminate carbonate units from each other using AIS imagery. Because of high cloud cover over the prime carbonate flight line and because of the acquisition of another flight line in altered and unaltered volcanics, the study has been extended to the discrimination of alteration products. In an area of altered and unaltered rhyolites and latites in Red Rock Canyon, altered and unaltered rock could be discriminated from each other using spectral features in the 1.16 to 2.34 micron range. The altered spectral signatures resembled montmorillonite and kaolinite. Field samples were gathered and the presence of montmorillonite was confirmed by X-ray analysis.
Topics discussed include: lunar transportation system, Mars rover, lunar fiberglass production, geosynchronous space stations, regenerative system for growing plants, lunar mining devices, lunar oxygen transporation system, mobile remote manipulator system, Mars exploration, launch/landing facility for a lunar base, and multi-megawatt nuclear power system.
The experiment involved observing Pn arrivals on an areal array of 7 seismic stations located in the transition zone and along the Jemez lineament. Explosions in coal and copper mines in New Mexico and Arizona were used as energy sources as well as military detonations at White Sands Missile Range, New Mexico, Yuma, Arizona, and the Nevada Test Site. Very preliminary results suggest a Pn velocity of 7.94 km/s (with a fairly large uncertainty) beneath the study area. The Pn delay times, which can be converted to estimates of crustal thickness given knowledge of the velocity structure of the crust increase both to the north and east of Springerville, Arizona. As a constraint on the velocity of Pn, researchers analyzed the reversed refraction line GNOME-HARDHAT which passes through Springerville oriented NW to SE. This analysis resulted in a Pn velocity of 7.9-8.0 km/s for the transition zone. These preliminary results suggest that a normal Pn velocity might persist even though the crust thins (from north to south) by 15 km along the length of the Arizona-New Mexico border. If the upper mantle is currently hot anywhere in western New Mexico or eastern Arizona then the dimensions of the heat source (or sources) might be small compared to the intra-station distances of the seismic arrays used to estimate the velocity of Pn.
The first 70 tons of the 140-ton Large Area Scintillation Detector (LASD) have been operating since Jan. 1985 at a depth of 4850 ft. (4200 m.w.e.) in the Homestake Gold Mine, Lead, S.D. A total of 4 x 10(4) high-energy muons (E sub mu is approx. 2.7 TeV at the surface) have been detected. The remainder of the detector is scheduled to be in operation by the Fall of 1985. In addition, a surface air shower array is under construction. The first 27 surface counters, spaced out over an area of 270' x 500', began running in June, 1985. The LASD performance, the potential of the combined shower array and underground muon experiment for detecting point sources, and the initial results of a search for periodic emission from Cygnus X-3 are discussed.
It is pointed out that the world population expansion and resulting shortages of food, minerals, and fuel have focused additional attention on the world's oceans. In this context, aspects of weather prediction and the monitoring/prediction of long-range climatic anomalies become more important. In spite of technological advances, the commercial ocean industry and the naval forces suffer now from inadequate data and forecast products related to the oceans. The Seasat Program and the planned Navy-Remote Oceanographic Satellite System (N-ROSS) represent major contributions to improved observational coverage and the processing needed to achieve better forecasts. The Seasat Program was initiated to evaluate the effectiveness of the remote sensing of oceanographic phenomena from a satellite platform. Possible oceanographic satellite applications are presented in a table, and the impact of Seasat data on industry sectors is discussed. Attention is given to offshore oil development, deep-ocean mining, fishing, and marine transportation.
The theoretical evaluation of the lunar regolith fines as a primary source of hydrogen reveals that a minimum order of magnitude increase in hydrogen content is possible in beneficiated fines because both particle size and particle shape play a significant role in the relationship of volume percent of surface coating to grain size. The lunar regolith fines meet the basic requirement for beneficiation because a major portion (minimum two-thirds) of the hydrogen occurs in the less than 20-micron-size fraction, a relatively small part of the fines. Beneficiation should be accomplished by a combination of vibratory screening followed by cyclone and/or possibly electrostatic separation. Early exploitation of the lunar regolith fines for hydrogen probably will be limited to hydrogen obtained as a by-product or co-product from the mining and processing for other elements or materials because a minimum of about 13,600 tons to about 19,600 tons of 100 ppm hydrogen-bearing lunar regolith fines will have to be processed with about 3,100 tons to about 4,500 tons, respectively, of concentrate heated to supply 1 ton of hydrogen, yielding a recovery of about 74 percent to about 51 percent respectively, of the hydrogen.
The Airborne Imaging Spectrometer (AIS) was flown over granitic, volcanic, and calc-silicate terrain around the Mary Kathleen Uranium Mine in Queensland, in a test of its mineralocial mapping capabilities. An analysis strategy and restoration and enhancement techniques were developed to process the 128 band AIS data. A preliminary analysis of one of three AIS flight lines shows that the data contains considerable spectral variation but that it is also contaminated by second-order leakage of radiation from the near-infrared region. This makes the recognition of expected spectral absorption shapes very difficult. The effect appears worst in terrains containing considerable vegetation. Techniques that try to predict this supplementary radiation coupled with the log residual analytical technique show that expected mineral absorption spectra can be derived. The techniques suggest that with additional refinement correction procedures, the Australian AIS data may be revised. Application of the log residual analysis method has proved very successful on the cuprite, Nevada data set, and for highlighting the alunite, linite, and SiOH mineralogy.
The Moon is of special interest among the many and diverse bodies of the solar system because it serves as a scientific baseline for understanding the terrestrial planets, its origin is closely tied to the early history of the Earth, and its proximity permits a variety of space applications such as mining and establishment of bases and colonies. Data acquisition and analysis have enabled advances to be made and the remaining questions in many fields of lunar geoscience to be identified. The status and unresolved problems of lunar science are discussed. Immediate needs, new unmanned missions, and a return to the Moon (a lunar base) are examined.