Results for “distributed resources” — Page 5

NASA NTRS2007

Strategies for Information Retrieval and Virtual Teaming to Mitigate Risk on NASA's Missions

Following the loss of NASA's Space Shuttle Columbia in 2003, it was determined that problems in the agency's organization created an environment that led to the accident. One component of the proposed solution resulted in the formation of the NASA Engineering Network (NEN), a suite of information retrieval and knowledge sharing tools. This paper describes the implementation of this set of search, portal, content management, and semantic technologies, including a unique meta search capability for data from distributed engineering resources. NEN's communities of practice are formed along engineering disciplines where users leverage their knowledge and best practices to collaborate and take informal learning back to their personal jobs and embed it into the procedures of the agency. These results offer insight into using traditional engineering disciplines for virtual teaming and problem solving.

communities of practices↗

NASA NTRS2007

ShareSync: A Solution for Deterministic Data Sharing over Ethernet

As part of upgrading the Contact Dynamics Simulation Laboratory (CDSL) at the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC), a simple, cost effective method was needed to communicate data among the networked simulation machines and I/O controllers used to run the facility. To fill this need and similar applicable situations, a generic protocol was developed, called ShareSync. ShareSync is a lightweight, real-time, publish-subscribe Ethernet protocol for simple and deterministic data sharing across diverse machines and operating systems. ShareSync provides a simple Application Programming Interface (API) for simulation programmers to incorporate into their code. The protocol is compatible with virtually all Ethernet-capable machines, is flexible enough to support a variety of applications, is fast enough to provide soft real-time determinism, and is a low-cost resource for distributed simulation development, deployment, and maintenance. The first design cycle iteration of ShareSync has been completed, and the protocol has undergone several testing procedures including endurance and benchmarking tests and approaches the 2001ts data synchronization design goal for the CDSL.

Dunn, Daniel J., II↗

NASA NTRS2007

NASA Tech Briefs, November 2007

Topics include: Wireless Measurement of Contact and Motion Between Contact Surfaces; Wireless Measurement of Rotation and Displacement Rate; Portable Microleak-Detection System; Free-to-Roll Testing of Airplane Models in Wind Tunnels; Cryogenic Shrouds for Testing Thermal-Insulation Panels; Optoelectronic System Measures Distances to Multiple Targets; Tachometers Derived From a Brushless DC Motor; Algorithm-Based Fault Tolerance for Numerical Subroutines; Computational Support for Technology- Investment Decisions; DSN Resource Scheduling; Distributed Operations Planning; Phase-Oriented Gear Systems; Freeze Tape Casting of Functionally Graded Porous Ceramics; Electrophoretic Deposition on Porous Non- Conductors; Two Devices for Removing Sludge From Bioreactor Wastewater; Portable Unit for Metabolic Analysis; Flash Diffusivity Technique Applied to Individual Fibers; System for Thermal Imaging of Hot Moving Objects; Large Solar-Rejection Filter; Improved Readout Scheme for SQUID-Based Thermometry; Error Rates and Channel Capacities in Multipulse PPM; Two Mathematical Models of Nonlinear Vibrations; Simpler Adaptive Selection of Golomb Power-of- Two Codes; VCO PLL Frequency Synthesizers for Spacecraft Transponders; Wide Tuning Capability for Spacecraft Transponders; Adaptive Deadband Synchronization for a Spacecraft Formation; Analysis of Performance of Stereoscopic-Vision Software; Estimating the Inertia Matrix of a Spacecraft; Spatial Coverage Planning for Exploration Robots; and Increasing the Life of a Xenon-Ion Spacecraft Thruster.

Source record↗

NASA NTRS2009

Geologic Mapping of the Lunar South Pole, Quadrangle LQ-30: Volcanic History and Stratigraphy of Schroedinger Basin

In this study we use recent images and topographic data to map the geology and geomorphology of the lunar South Pole quadrangle (LQ-30) at 1:2.5M scale [1-4] in accordance with the Lunar Geologic Mapping Program. Mapping of LQ-30 began during Mest's postdoctoral appointment and has continued under the PG&G Program, from which funding became available in February 2009. Preliminary map-ping and analyses have been done using base materials compiled by Mest, but properly mosaicked and spatially registered base materials are being compiled by the USGS and should be received by the end of June 2009. The overall objective of this research is to constrain the geologic evolution of the lunar South Pole (LQ-30: 60deg -90deg S, 0deg - +/-180deg ) with specific emphasis on evaluation of a) the regional effects of basin formation on the structure and composition of the crust and b) the spatial distribution of ejecta, in particular resulting from formation of the South Pole-Aitken (SPA) basin and other large basins. Key scientific objectives include: 1) Constraining the geologic history of the lunar South Pole and examining the spatial and temporal variability of geologic processes within the map area. 2) Constraining the vertical and lateral structure of the lunar regolith and crust, assessing the distribution of impact-generated materials, and determining the timing and effects of major basin-forming impacts on crustal structure and stratigraphy in the map area. And 3) assessing the distribution of resources (e.g., H, Fe, Th) and their relationships with surface materials.

Mest, S. C.↗

NASA NTRS2020

Artemis Curation: Preparing for Sample Return from the Lunar South Pole

Space Policy Directive-1 mandates that “the United States will lead the return of humans to the Moon for long-term exploration and utilization, followed by human missions to Mars and other destinations.” In addition, the Vice President stated that “It is the stated policy of this administration and the United States of America to return American astronauts to the Moon within the next five years,” that is, by 2024. These efforts, under the umbrella of the recently formed Artemis Program, include such historic goals as the flight of the first woman to the Moon and the exploration of the lunar south-polar region. Among the top priorities of the Artemis Program is the return of a suite of geologic samples, providing new and significant opportunities for progressing lunar science and human exploration. In particular, successful sample return is necessary for understanding the history of volatiles in the Solar System and the evolution of the Earth-Moon system, fully constraining the hazards of the lunar polar environment for astronauts, and providing the necessary data for constraining the abundance and distribution of resources for in-situ resource utilization (ISRU). Here we summarize the ef-forts of the Astromaterials Acquisition and Curation Office (hereafter referred to as the Curation Office) to ensure the success of Artemis sample return (per NASA Policy Directive (NPD) 7100.10E).

Mitchell, J. L.↗

NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Mapping Inundation from Hurricane Florence (2018) with L-Band Synthetic Aperture Radar, Commercial Imagery, and Ancillary Data via Machine Learning Classification

During and after flooding events, mapping the extent of floodwaters aids in the distribution of resources, recovery efforts, and damage assessment practices. Development of a land cover classification system focused on mapping inundation after major hurricane events using synthetic aperture radar (SAR) data could allow for the production of near-real-time inundation mapping, enabling government and emergency response entities to get a preliminary idea of a developing situation. Complimentary optical and SAR images from domestic and foreign entities are brought together through activations of the International Charter: Space and Major Disasters to support response efforts, from true-color, near-infrared, and thermal remote sensing data obtained by NASA, NOAA, and international satellites to the collection of high-resolution true color aerial photography by NOAA and the National Geodetic Survey. In response to Hurricane Florence of 2018, NASA JPL collected numerous swaths of quad-pol L-band SAR data with the Uninhabited Aerial Vehicle Synthetic Aperture Radar (UAVSAR) instrument observing the record-setting river stages across North and South Carolina. The resulting fully-polarized SAR images allow for mapping of inundation extent at a high spatial resolution with a unique advantage over optical imaging stemming from the sensor’s ability to penetrate cloud cover and dense vegetation. In this study, true-color NOAA aerial and commercial satellite imagery are used in conjunction with four UAVSAR data swaths centered on the Lumberton and Cape Fear River basins in southeastern North Carolina to develop a Random Forest classification model focused on mapping open water and floodwater otherwise obscured by vegetation or lingering cloud cover. Ancillary building footprint, transportation route, and population data will also be incorporated into the classification scheme to estimate the societal impacts of flooding based on the proximity of features to detected inundation. Preliminary results from the Hurricane Florence case study will be discussed in addition to the limitations of available validation data for assessment of the classifier’s accuracy.

Alexander M Melancon↗

NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Lunar Microgrid Trade Studies to Define Interface Converter Requirements

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) is interested in developing an incremental lunar power grid to support continuous human/robotic operations under the Artemis missions and can scale to global power utilization and industrial power levels. The initial lunar surface power system will be composed primarily of assets that contain their own power generation and energy storage. These assets can be connected to form a grid, which allows power to be shared between the system’s distributed energy resources. This grid can provide backup power to existing assets as well as primary power to future assets. A trade study was conducted for an Artemis scale grid, which has identified 3 kVAC as an ideal transmission voltage. This paper documents the analysis and findings from these trade studies. These studies were used to define the operating voltage and develop a common interface for connecting lunar surface assets to the power grid. The Universal Modular Interface Converter (UMIC) connects lunar surface assets to the high voltage grid. Products from this grid definition and UMIC development work will enable highly reliable and available power for Artemis and future planetary surface missions, which is key to achieving NASA’s long-term vision of space exploration.

Planetary surface power↗

NASA NTRS2023

Technical Note: NASAaccess – A Tool for Access, Reformatting, and Visualization of Remotely Sensed Earth Observation and Climate Data

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has launched a new initiative, the Open-Source Science Initiative (OSSI), to enable and support science towards openness. The OSSI supports open-source software development and dissemination. In this work, we present NASAaccess, which is an open-source software package and web-based environmental modeling application for earth observation data accessing, reformatting, and presenting quantitative data products. The main objective of developing the NASAaccess platform is to facilitate exploration, modeling, and understanding of earth data for scientists, stakeholders, and concerned citizens whose objectives align with the new OSSI goals. The NASAaccess platform is available as software packages (i.e., the R and conda packages) as well as an interactive-format web-based environmental modeling application for earth observation data developed with Tethys Platform. NASAaccess has been envisioned as lowering the technical barriers and simplifying the process of accessing scalable distributed computing resources and leveraging additional software for data and computationally intensive modeling frameworks. Specifically, NASAaccess has been developed to meet the need for seamless earth observation remote-sensing and climate data ingestion into various hydrological modeling frameworks. Moreover, NASAaccess is also contributing to keeping interested parties and stakeholders engaged with environmental modeling, accessing the information available in various remote-sensing products. NASAaccess' current capabilities cover various NASA datasets and products that include the Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) data products, the Global Land Data Assimilation System (GLDAS) land surface states and fluxes, and the NASA Earth Exchange Global Daily Downscaled Projections (NEX-GDDP) Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 5 (CMIP5) and Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 (CMIP6) climate change dataset products.

Ibrahim Nourein Mohammed↗

NASA NTRS1988

A shared-world conceptual model for integrating space station life sciences telescience operations

Mental models of the Space Station and its ancillary facilities will be employed by users of the Space Station as they draw upon past experiences, perform tasks, and collectively plan for future activities. The operational environment of the Space Station will incorporate telescience, a new set of operational modes. To investigate properties of the operational environment, distributed users, and the mental models they employ to manipulate resources while conducting telescience, an integrating shared-world conceptual model of Space Station telescience is proposed. The model comprises distributed users and resources (active elements); agents who mediate interactions among these elements on the basis of intelligent processing of shared information; and telescience protocols which structure the interactions of agents as they engage in cooperative, responsive interactions on behalf of users and resources distributed in space and time. Examples from the life sciences are used to instantiate and refine the model's principles. Implications for transaction management and autonomy are discussed. Experiments employing the model are described which the authors intend to conduct using the Space Station Life Sciences Telescience Testbed currently under development at Ames Research Center.

Johnson, Vicki↗

NASA NTRS1991

Effect of locus of resource control on operational efficiency in distributed operations

The following topics are presented in view graph form: space network control (SNC) usage in the Advanced Tracking and Data Relay Satellite (ATDRSS) era; an acronym and icon list; demands of the SNC; tightness of resources coupling; sharing information and sharing control; potential ways of distributing control; efficiency problems unrelated to distribution of control; efficiency problems related to distribution of control; and recommendations.

Geoffroy, A. L.↗

NASA NTRSDate not supplied

VIPER Rover: Flight Build and Environmental Test Status

The NASA Artemis Program plans to return humans to the Moon to stay. Extended human stays on the Moon will require substantial resources to sustain human presence, requiring continuous supplies delivered from the Earth. However, if some of the resources were indigenously available, Earth logistical requirements could be substantially reduced by “living off the land” with in-situ lunar resources. Local volatiles could be processed into propellants and human life-supporting needs, reducing risk of maintaining a permanent human presence on the Moon. LCROSS, LRO and other missions have confirmed the presence of lunar volatiles resources in polar regions, so the next step is to understand the physical distribution of those resources, as well as the scientific basis for how water got there, and why it is still there. The Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Resource (VIPER) is a surface mobility scientific platform, designed to spend ~100 days mapping and surveying four different Ice Stability Regions to understand the scientific nature and distribution of water and other volatiles. VIPER will also provide scientific mineralogical context of the lunar regolith, such as the presence of silicon and light metals in lunar regolith, providing a composite picture of resource availability and sustainment. This paper will discuss VIPER’s completion of the flight rover build, as well as current progress in environmental testing, preparedness for mission operations, and overall readying for launch integration with our CLPS partner. VIPER is managed within NASA’s Science Mission Directorate (SMD), utilizing the Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) lunar delivery model.

VIPER↗

NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Viper Rover: Flight Build and Environmental Test Status

The NASA Artemis Program plans to return humans to the Moon to stay. Extended human stays on the Moon will require substantial resources to sustain human presence, requiring continuous supplies delivered from the Earth. However, if some of the resources were indigenously available, Earth logistical requirements could be substantially reduced by “living off the land” with in-situ lunar resources. Local volatiles could be processed into propellants and human life-supporting needs, reducing risk of maintaining a permanent human presence on the Moon. LCROSS, LRO and other missions have confirmed the presence of lunar volatiles resources in polar regions, so the next step is to understand the physical distribution of those resources, as well as the scientific basis for how water got there, and why it is still there. The Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Resource (VIPER) is a surface mobility scientific platform, designed to spend ~100 days mapping and surveying four different Ice Stability Regions to understand the scientific nature and distribution of water and other volatiles. VIPER will also provide scientific mineralogical context of the lunar regolith, such as the presence of silicon and light metals in lunar regolith, providing a composite picture of resource availability and sustainment. This paper will discuss VIPER’s completion of the flight rover build, as well as current progress in environmental testing, preparedness for mission operations, and overall readying for launch integration with our CLPS partner. VIPER is managed within NASA’s Science Mission Directorate (SMD), utilizing the Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) lunar delivery model.

rover↗

NASA NTRSDate not supplied

VIPER Rover Flight Build and Environmental Test Status

The NASA Artemis Program plans to return humans to the Moon to stay. Extended human stays on the Moon will require substantial resources to sustain human presence, requiring continuous supplies delivered from the Earth. However, if some of the resources were indigenously available, Earth logistical requirements could be substantially reduced by “living off the land” with in-situ lunar resources. Local volatiles could be processed into propellants and human life-supporting needs, reducing risk of maintaining a permanent human presence on the Moon. LCROSS, LRO and other missions have confirmed the presence of lunar volatiles resources in polar regions, so the next step is to understand the physical distribution of those resources, as well as the scientific basis for how water got there, and why it is still there. The Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Resource (VIPER) is a surface mobility scientific platform, designed to spend ~100 days mapping and surveying four different Ice Stability Regions to understand the scientific nature and distribution of water and other volatiles. VIPER will also provide scientific mineralogical context of the lunar regolith, such as the presence of silicon and light metals in lunar regolith, providing a composite picture of resource availability and sustainment. This paper will discuss VIPER’s completion of the flight rover build, as well as current progress in environmental testing, preparedness for mission operations, and overall readying for launch integration with our CLPS partner. VIPER is managed within NASA’s Science Mission Directorate (SMD), utilizing the Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) lunar delivery model.

rover↗

NASA NTRS2000

Adaptive Management of Computing and Network Resources for Spacecraft Systems

It is likely that NASA's future spacecraft systems will consist of distributed processes which will handle dynamically varying workloads in response to perceived scientific events, the spacecraft environment, spacecraft anomalies and user commands. Since all situations and possible uses of sensors cannot be anticipated during pre-deployment phases, an approach for dynamically adapting the allocation of distributed computational and communication resources is needed. To address this, we are evolving the DeSiDeRaTa adaptive resource management approach to enable reconfigurable ground and space information systems. The DeSiDeRaTa approach embodies a set of middleware mechanisms for adapting resource allocations, and a framework for reasoning about the real-time performance of distributed application systems. The framework and middleware will be extended to accommodate (1) the dynamic aspects of intra-constellation network topologies, and (2) the complete real-time path from the instrument to the user. We are developing a ground-based testbed that will enable NASA to perform early evaluation of adaptive resource management techniques without the expense of first deploying them in space. The benefits of the proposed effort are numerous, including the ability to use sensors in new ways not anticipated at design time; the production of information technology that ties the sensor web together; the accommodation of greater numbers of missions with fewer resources; and the opportunity to leverage the DeSiDeRaTa project's expertise, infrastructure and models for adaptive resource management for distributed real-time systems.

Pfarr, Barbara↗

NASA NTRS2002

CICT Computing, Information, and Communications Technology Program

The CICT Program is part of the NASA Aerospace Technology Enterprise's fundamental technology thrust to develop tools. processes, and technologies that enable new aerospace system capabilities and missions. The CICT Program's four key objectives are: Provide seamless access to NASA resources- including ground-, air-, and space-based distributed information technology resources-so that NASA scientists and engineers can more easily control missions, make new scientific discoveries, and design the next-generation space vehicles, provide high-data delivery from these assets directly to users for missions, develop goal-oriented human-centered systems, and research, develop and evaluate revolutionary technology.

Larry Laufenberg↗

NASA NTRS1993

Population-based learning of load balancing policies for a distributed computer system

Effective load-balancing policies use dynamic resource information to schedule tasks in a distributed computer system. We present a novel method for automatically learning such policies. At each site in our system, we use a comparator neural network to predict the relative speedup of an incoming task using only the resource-utilization patterns obtained prior to the task's arrival. Outputs of these comparator networks are broadcast periodically over the distributed system, and the resource schedulers at each site use these values to determine the best site for executing an incoming task. The delays incurred in propagating workload information and tasks from one site to another, as well as the dynamic and unpredictable nature of workloads in multiprogrammed multiprocessors, may cause the workload pattern at the time of execution to differ from patterns prevailing at the times of load-index computation and decision making. Our load-balancing policy accommodates this uncertainty by using certain tunable parameters. We present a population-based machine-learning algorithm that adjusts these parameters in order to achieve high average speedups with respect to local execution. Our results show that our load-balancing policy, when combined with the comparator neural network for workload characterization, is effective in exploiting idle resources in a distributed computer system.

Mehra, Pankaj↗

NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Dynamic Channel Assignments for Efficient Use of Aviation Spectrum Allocations

The demand for voice and data communications continues to rise with the emergence of new aerial vehicles into the airspace and the continued growth of aviation operations throughout the National Airspace System (NAS). Recent studies have shown that the anticipated growing demand for spectrum resources will exceed the capacity of existing aviation spectrum allocations. Further, airspace configurations, via assignment of fixed channel allocations within standard service volumes, do not allow for the dynamic and efficient distribution of spectrum resources based on airspace demand; as a result, a new approach to aviation spectrum management is needed to support the forecasted needs of new airspace users. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) is investigating applications of artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML), and other advanced concepts to solve a dynamic constraint satisfaction problem which is analogous to the frequency assignment problem faced by aviation. Procedures and strategies for dynamic channel allocation can be borrowed from other large-scale mobile services (i.e., 4G/5G applications) and can provide a novel spectrum management approach that allows for the intelligent utilization of aviation spectrum throughout the airspace while maintaining the strict quality of service prescribed by aeronautical standards.

Communications↗

NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Dynamic Channel Assignments for Efficient Use of Aviation Spectrum Allocations

The demand for voice and data communications continues to rise with the emergence of new aerial vehicles into the airspace and the continued growth of aviation operations throughout the National Airspace System (NAS). Recent studies have shown that the anticipated growing demand for spectrum resources will exceed the capacity of existing aviation spectrum allocations. Further, airspace configurations, via assignment of fixed channel allocations within standard service volumes, do not allow for the dynamic and efficient distribution of spectrum resources based on airspace demand; as a result, a new approach to aviation spectrum management is needed to support the forecasted needs of new airspace users. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) is investigating applications of artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML), and other advanced concepts to solve a dynamic constraint satisfaction problem which is analogous to the frequency assignment problem faced by aviation. Procedures and strategies for dynamic channel allocation can be borrowed from other large-scale mobile services (i.e., 4G/5G applications) and can provide a novel spectrum management approach that allows for the intelligent utilization of aviation spectrum throughout the airspace while maintaining the strict quality of service prescribed by aeronautical standards.

communications↗