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NASA NTRS1990

MIT Space Engineering Research Center

The Space Engineering Research Center (SERC) at MIT, started in Jul. 1988, has completed two years of research. The Center is approaching the operational phase of its first testbed, is midway through the construction of a second testbed, and is in the design phase of a third. We presently have seven participating faculty, four participating staff members, ten graduate students, and numerous undergraduates. This report reviews the testbed programs, individual graduate research, other SERC activities not funded by the Center, interaction with non-MIT organizations, and SERC milestones. Published papers made possible by SERC funding are included at the end of the report.

Crawley, Edward F.↗
NASA NTRS1993

The Center of Excellence for Hypersonics Training and Research at the University of Texas at Austin

Over the period of this grant (1986-92), 23 graduate students were supported by the Center and received education and training in hypersonics through MS and Ph.D. programs. An additional 8 Ph.D. candidates and 2 MS candidates, with their own fellowship support, were attracted to The University of Texas and were recruited into the hypersonics program because of the Center. Their research, supervised by the 10 faculty involved in the Center, resulted in approximately 50 publications and presentations in journals and at national and international technical conferences. To provide broad-based training, a new hypersonics curriculum was created, enabling students to take 8 core classes in theoretical, computational, and experimental hypersonics, and other option classes over a two to four semester period. The Center also developed an active continuing education program. The Hypersonics Short Course was taught 3 times, twice in the USA and once in Europe. Approximately 300 persons were attracted to hear lectures by more than 25 of the leading experts in the field. In addition, a hypersonic aerodynamics short course was offered through AIAA, as well as short courses on computational fluid dynamics (CFD) and advanced CFD. The existence of the Center also enabled faculty to leverage a substantial volume of additional funds from other agencies, for research and graduate student training. Overall, this was a highly successful and highly visible program.

Dolling, David S.↗
NASA NTRS1989

Overview of the Center for Space Construction

The purpose of this overview is to outline the position of the Center for Space Construction within the context of space-related programs at the University of Colorado. the University's historically strong research and graduate programs in space science and its strong undergraduate aerospace engineering program were the starting point in 1984 for a major expansion of space-related education and research programs at the Boulder campus. This initiative has resulted in a tripling of space-related research as well as a large increase in the enrollment of high quality engineering students, particularly at the graduate level. The Center for Space Construction is a major element of this initiative, since it represents a mechanism for interdisciplinary and system level research and education within the Engineering College, thus filling a major need. Seventeen faculty members and 37 students from 7 academic units are associated with the Center and are interacting with each other and with the CSC Associates (a group of industrial organizations and government laboratories). The first Ph.D. has been awarded to a student working in the Center; the second Ph.D. is expected later this year. Several new courses have been introduced in the College. Finally, excellent research is being conducted and Center participants are publishing in the open literature.

Hearth, Donald P.↗
NASA NTRS1993

Scanning tunneling microscopy studies of diamond films and optoelectronic materials

In this report, we report on progress achieved from 12/1/92 to 10/1/93 under the grant entitled 'Scanning Tunneling Microscopy Studies of Diamond Films and Optoelectronic Materials'. We have set-up a chemical vapor deposition (CVD) diamond film growth system and a Raman spectroscopy system to study the nucleation and growth of diamond films with atomic resolution using scanning tunneling microscopy (STM). A unique feature of the diamond film growth system is that diamond films can be transferred directly to the ultrahigh vacuum (UHV) chamber of a scanning tunneling microscope without contaminating the films by exposure to air. The University of North Texas (UNT) provided $20,000 this year as matching funds for the NASA grant to purchase the diamond growth system. In addition, UNT provided a Coherent Innova 90S Argon ion laser, a Spex 1404 double spectrometer, and a Newport optical table costing $90,000 to set-up the Raman spectroscopy system. The CVD diamond growth system and Raman spectroscopy system will be used to grow and characterize diamond films with atomic resolution using STM as described in our proposal. One full-time graduate student and one full-time undergraduate student are supported under this grant. In addition, several graduate and undergraduate students were supported during the summer to assist in setting-up the diamond growth and Raman spectroscopy systems. We have obtained research results concerning STM of the structural and electronic properties of CVD grown diamond films, and STM and scanning tunneling spectroscopy of carbon nanotubes. In collaboration with the transmission electron microscopy (TEM) group at UNT, we have also obtained results concerning the optoelectronic material siloxene. These results were published in refereed scientific journals, submitted for publication, and presented as invited and contributed talks at scientific conferences.

Perez, Jose M.↗
NASA NTRS1993

Turbulence modeling for high speed compressible flows

The following grant objectives were delineated in the proposal to NASA: to offer course work in computational fluid dynamics (CFD) and related areas to enable mechanical engineering students at North Carolina A&T State University (N.C. A&TSU) to pursue M.S. studies in CFD, and to enable students and faculty to engage in research in high speed compressible flows. Since no CFD-related activity existed at N.C. A&TSU before the start of the NASA grant period, training of students in the CFD area and initiation of research in high speed compressible flows were proposed as the key aspects of the project. To that end, graduate level courses in CFD, boundary layer theory, and fluid dynamics were offered. This effort included initiating a CFD course for graduate students. Also, research work was performed on studying compressibility effects in high speed flows. Specifically, a modified compressible dissipation model, which included a fourth order turbulent Mach number term, was incorporated into the SPARK code and verified for the air-air mixing layer case. The results obtained for this case were compared with a wide variety of experimental data to discern the trends in the mixing layer growth rates with varying convective Mach numbers. Comparison of the predictions of the study with the results of several analytical models was also carried out. The details of the research study are described in the publication entitled 'Compressibility Effects in Modeling Turbulent High Speed Mixing Layers,' which is attached to this report.

Chandra, Suresh↗
NASA NTRS1993

NASA Propulsion Engineering Research Center, volume 1

Over the past year, the Propulsion Engineering Research Center at The Pennsylvania State University continued its progress toward meeting the goals of NASA's University Space Engineering Research Centers (USERC) program. The USERC program was initiated in 1988 by the Office of Aeronautics and Space Technology to provide an invigorating force to drive technology advancements in the U.S. space industry. The Propulsion Center's role in this effort is to provide a fundamental basis from which the technology advances in propulsion can be derived. To fulfill this role, an integrated program was developed that focuses research efforts on key technical areas, provides students with a broad education in traditional propulsion-related science and engineering disciplines, and provides minority and other under-represented students with opportunities to take their first step toward professional careers in propulsion engineering. The program is made efficient by incorporating government propulsion laboratories and the U.S. propulsion industry into the program through extensive interactions and research involvement. The Center is comprised of faculty, professional staff, and graduate and undergraduate students working on a broad spectrum of research issues related to propulsion. The Center's research focus encompasses both current and advanced propulsion concepts for space transportation, with a research emphasis on liquid propellant rocket engines. The liquid rocket engine research includes programs in combustion and turbomachinery. Other space transportation modes that are being addressed include anti-matter, electric, nuclear, and solid propellant propulsion. Outside funding supports a significant fraction of Center research, with the major portion of the basic USERC grant being used for graduate student support and recruitment. The remainder of the USERC funds are used to support programs to increase minority student enrollment in engineering, to maintain Center infrastructure, and to develop research capability in key new areas. Significant research programs in propulsion systems for air and land transportation complement the space propulsion focus. The primary mission of the Center is student education. The student program emphasizes formal class work and research in classical engineering and science disciplines with applications to propulsion.

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NASA NTRS1994

Transformation of two and three-dimensional regions by elliptic systems

Several reports are attached to this document which contain the results of our research at the end of this contract period. Three of the reports deal with our work on generating surface grids. One is a preprint of a paper which will appear in the journal Applied Mathematics and Computation. Another is the abstract from a dissertation which has been prepared by Ahmed Khamayseh, a graduate student who has been supported by this grant for the last two years. The last report on surface grids is the extended abstract of a paper to be presented at the 14th IMACS World Congress in July. This report contains results on conformal mappings of surfaces, which are closely related to elliptic methods for surface grid generation. A preliminary report is included on new methods for dealing with block interfaces in multiblock grid systems. The development work is complete and the methods will eventually be incorporated into the National Grid Project (NGP) grid generation code. Thus, the attached report contains only a simple grid system which was used to test the algorithms to prove that the concepts are sound. These developments will greatly aid grid control when using elliptic systems and prevent unwanted grid movement. The last report is a brief summary of some timings that were obtained when the multiblock grid generation code was run on the Intel IPSC/860 hypercube. Since most of the data in a grid code is local to a particular block, only a small fraction of the total data must be passed between processors. The data is also distributed among the processors so that the total size of the grid can be increase along with the number of processors. This work is only in a preliminary stage. However, one of the ERC graduate students has taken an interest in the project and is presently extending these results as a part of his master's thesis.

Mastin, C. Wayne↗
NASA NTRS1995

Methodologies to determine forces on bones and muscles of body segments during exercise, employing compact sensors suitable for use in crowded space vehicles

Work under this grant was carried out by the author and by a graduate research assistant. An instrumented bicycle ergometer was implemented focusing on the stated objective: to estimate the forces exerted by each muscle of the feet, calf, and thigh of an individual while bicycling. The sensors used were light and compact. These were probes to measure muscle EMG activity, miniature accelerometers, miniature load sensors, and small encoders to measure angular positions of the pedal. A methodology was developed and implemented to completely describe the kinematics of the limbs using data from the sensors. This work has been published as a Master's Thesis by the Graduate student supported by the grant. The instrumented ergometer along with the sensors and instrumentation were tested during a KC-135 Zero-Gravity flight in July, 1994. A complete description of the system and the tests performed have been published as a report submitted to NASA Johnson Space Center. The data collected during the KC-135 flight is currently being processed so that a kinematic description of the bicycling experiment will be soon determined. A methodology to estimate the muscle forces has been formulated based on previous work. The methodology involves the use of optimization concepts so that the individual muscle forces that represent variables in dynamic equations of motion may be estimated. Optimization of a criteria (goal) function such as minimization of energy will be used along with constraint equations defined by rigid body equations of motion. Use of optimization principles is necessary, because the equations of motion alone constitute an indeterminate system of equations with respect to the large amount of muscle forces which constitute the variables in these equations. The number of variables is reduced somewhat by using forces measured by the load cells installed on the pedal. These load cells measure pressure and shear forces on the foot. The author and his collaborators at NASA and at the University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, are continuing the work of reducing the experimental data from the KC-135 flight, and the implementation of the optimization methods to estimate muscle forces. As soon as results from these efforts are available, they will be published in reputable journals. Results of this work will impact studies addressing bone density loss and development of countermeasures to minimize bone loss in zero gravity conditions. By analyzing muscle forces on Earth and in Space during exercise, scientists could eventually formulate new exercises and machines to help maintain bone density. On Earth, this work will impact studies concerning arthritis, and will provide the means to study possible exercise countermeasures to minimize arthritis problems.

Figueroa, Fernando↗
NASA NTRS1994

Design and implementation of two two-week Teacher Enhancement Institutes

During this summer, I have been part of a four team effort that planned and executed two two-week Teacher Enhancement Institutes (TEI) for 40 K-8 teachers from this area. The TEI was designed to enhance teachers' background in aeronautics and technology so that they would be better equipped to encourage and to train students in the mathematics, science, and technology fields. The teachers were given a stipend and three graduate credits from Christopher Newport University for their participation in this program. The four ASEE fellows worked together to develop objectives and a schedule of activities for each two-week session based on the program outline given in the grants that were funding this effort. We divided the responsibilities in coordinating and implementing each part of the TEI based on the specific strengths and background of each ASEE fellow. My specific responsibilities were: (1) to develop the course syllabus and generally handle all matters involved with the graduate course; (2) coordinate the follow-up sessions; and (3) design and manage half of the technology sessions that we had scheduled (approximately 30% of the TEI was devoted to technology). Because the first two responsibilities were primarily administrative in nature, I will address only the last. The technology sessions were divided into computer-only and other technologies (e.g., television and digital technology including scanning, digital photography and CD-ROM). I had responsibility for the computer-only technology sessions. The emphasis of these sessions was on use of the Internet specifically to locate and use educational resources. To maximize learning, these sessions were hands-on with two teachers at each computer. Each teacher received instruction in, and actually used, the most popular tools available on the Internet: email (they were given temporary accounts at NASA LaRC), anonymous ftp and archie, gopher and veronica, mosaic, and telnet. Teachers participated in hands-on workshops to learn about these programs, but were also given time during the two-week session to explore on their own and to find resources on the Net that specifically met their needs. In order to ensure that Internet access continues after their return to the classroom, aIl teachers who did not have them also applied for Learning Link accounts (from WHRO, the local public television station) and Virginia Pen accounts (from the Department of Education of Virginia), both of which allow textbased access to Internet. In addition to getting exposure to and practice with Internet tools, teachers were aIso given a hands-on seminar (and also given practice time) on ClarisWorks, an integrated word processing, spreadsheet, database, and paint package. The technology sessions (and TEI as a whole) were enthusiastically received by both new and more experienced teachers as extremely helpful in improving their ability to use technology in developing lesson pIans.

Lambert, Lynn↗
NASA NTRS1995

SPARTNIK: Engineering catalyst for government and industry

Industrial demands for highly motivated and competent technical personnel to carry forward with the technological goals of the US has posed a significant challenge to graduating engineers. While curricula has improved and diversified over time to meet these industry demands, relevant industry experience is not always available to undergraduates. The microsatellite development program at San Jose State University (SJSU) has allowed an entire undergraduate senior class to utilize a broad range of training and education to refine their engineering skills, bringing them closer to becoming engineering professionals. Close interaction with industry mentors and manufacturers on a real world project provides a significant advantage to educators and students alike. With support from companies and government agencies, the students have designed and manufactured a microsatellite, designed to be launched into a low Earth orbit. This satellite will gather telemetry for characterizing the state of the spacecraft. This will enable the students to have a physical check on their predicted value of spacecraft subsystem performance. Additional experiments will also be undertaken during the two year lifetime, including micro-meteorite impact sensing and capturing digital color images of the Earth. This paper will detail the process whereby students designed, prototype and manufactured a small satellite in a large team environment, along with the experiments that will be performed on board. With the project's limited funds, it needed the support of many industry companies to help with technical issues and hardware acquisition. Among the many supporting companies, NASA's space shuttle small payloads program could be used for an affordable launch vehicle for the student project. The paper address these collaborations between the student project and industry support, as well as explaining the benefits to both. The paper draws conclusion on how these types of student projects can be used by industry as a feasible resource for developing small platforms for space based experiments, as well as increasing the practical experience and engineering knowledge of graduating students. These benefits to industry and universities, can lead to a close working relationship between the two. These types of projects can facilitate the development of low-cost space rated parts to be used by the industry and university projects. It can also help with the understanding and use of acceptable risk non-space rated parts reducing the cost of the spacecraft. This will lead to the development of low cost platforms for space based experiments, providing research companies an inexpensive, long duration platform to conduct their in-space experiments, while better preparing engineering undergraduates for their transition into the work force.

Prass, James D.↗
NASA NTRS1996

NASA-UVA Light Aerospace Alloy and Structures Technology Program (LA2ST)

The NASA-UVA Light Aerospace Alloy and Structures Technology (LA2ST) Program was initiated in 1986 and continues with a high level of activity. The objective of the LA2ST Program is to conduct interdisciplinary graduate student research on the performance of next generation, light-weight aerospace alloys, composites and thermal gradient structures in collaboration with NASA-Langley researchers. Specific technical objectives are presented for each research project. We generally aim to produce relevant data and basic understanding of material mechanical response, environmental/corrosion behavior, and microstructure; new monolithic and composite alloys; advanced processing methods; new solid and fluid mechanics analyses; measurement and modeling advances; and a pool of educated graduate students for aerospace technologies. Three research areas are being actively investigated, including: (1) Mechanical and environmental degradation mechanisms in advanced light metals, (2) Aerospace materials science, and (3) Mechanics of materials for light aerospace structures.

Scully, John R.↗
NASA NTRS1997

NASA-UVA Light Aerospace Alloy and Structures Technology Program (LA2ST)

The NASA-UVA Light Aerospace Alloy and Structures Technology (LA2ST) Program was initiated in 1986 and continues with a high level of activity. Here, we report on progress achieved between July I and December 31, 1996. The objective of the LA2ST Program is to conduct interdisciplinary graduate student research on the performance of next generation, light-weight aerospace alloys, composites and thermal gradient structures in collaboration with NASA-Langley researchers. Specific technical objectives are presented for each research project. We generally aim to produce relevant data and basic understanding of material mechanical response, environmental/corrosion behavior, and microstructure; new monolithic and composite alloys; advanced processing methods; new solid and fluid mechanics analyses; measurement and modeling advances; and a pool of educated graduate students for aerospace technologies. The accomplishments presented in this report are summarized as follows. Three research areas are being actively investigated, including: (1) Mechanical and Environmental Degradation Mechanisms in Advanced Light Metals, (2) Aerospace Materials Science, and (3) Mechanics of Materials for Light Aerospace Structures.

Gangloff, Richard P.↗
NASA NTRS1997

NASA/DOD Aerospace Knowledge Diffusion Research Project. Paper 61: The Technical Communications Practices of ESL Aerospace Engineering Students in the United States: Results of a National Survey

When engineering students graduate and enter the world of work, they make the transition from an academic to a professional community of knowledge. The importance of oral and written communication to the professional success and advancement of engineers is well documented. For example, studies such as those conducted by Mailloux (1989) indicate that communicating data, information, and knowledge takes up as much as 80% of an engineer's time. However, these same studies also indicate that many engineering graduates cannot (a) write technical reports that effectively inform and influence decisionmaking, (b) present their ideas persuasively, and (c) communicate with their peers. If these statements are true, how is learning to communicate effectively in their professional knowledge community different for engineering students educated in the United States but who come from other cultures-cultures in which English is not the primary language of communication? Answering this question requires adequate and generalizable data about these students' communications abilities, skills, and competencies. To contribute to the answer, we undertook a national (mail) survey of 1,727 student members of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA). The focus of our analysis and this paper is a comparison of the responses of 297 student members for whom English is a second language with the responses of 1,430 native English speaking students to queries regarding career choice, bilingualism and language fluency, communication skills, collaborative writing, computer use, and the use of electronic (computer) networks.

Webb, John R.↗
NASA NTRS1997

Testing the Pairs-Reflection Model with X-Ray Spectral Variability and X-Ray Properties of Complete Samples of Radio-Selected BL Lacertae Objects

This grant was awarded to Dr. C. Megan Urry of the Space Telescope Science Institute in response to two successful ADP proposals to use archival Ginga and Rosat X-ray data for 'Testing the Pairs-Reflection model with X-Ray Spectral Variability' (in collaboration with Paola Grandi, now at the University of Rome) and 'X-Ray Properties of Complete Samples of Radio-Selected BL Lacertae Objects' (in collaboration with then-graduate student Rita Sambruna, now a post-doc at Goddard Space Flight Center). In addition, post-docs Joseph Pesce and Elena Pian, and graduate student Matthew O'Dowd, have worked on several aspects of these projects. The grant was originally awarded on 3/01/94; this report covers the full period, through May 1997. We have completed our project on the X-ray properties of radio-selected BL Lacs.

Urry, C. Megan↗
NASA NTRS1996

RCOP: Research Center for Optical Physics

During the five years since its inception, Research Center for Optical Physics (RCOP) has excelled in the goals stated in the original proposal: 1) training of the scientists and engineers needed for the twenty-first century with special emphasis on underrepresented citizens and 2) research and technological development in areas of relevance to NASA. In the category of research training, there have been 16 Bachelors degrees and 9 Masters degrees awarded to African American students working in RCOP during the last five years. RCOP has also provided research experience to undergraduate and high school students through a number of outreach programs held during the summer and the academic year. RCOP has also been instrumental in the development of the Ph.D. program in physics which is in its fourth year at Hampton. There are currently over 40 graduate students in the program and 9 African American graduate students, working in RCOP, that have satisfied all of the requirements for Ph.D. candidancy and are working on their dissertation research. At least three of these students will be awarded their doctoral degrees during 1997. RCOP has also excelled in research and technological development. During the first five years of existence, RCOP researchers have generated well over $3 M in research funding that directly supports the Center. Close ties with NASA Langley and NASA Lewis have been established, and collaborations with NASA scientists, URC's and other universities as well as with industry have been developed. This success is evidenced by the rate of publishing research results in refereed journals, which now exceeds that of the goals in the original proposal (approx. 2 publications per faculty per year). Also, two patents have been awarded to RCOP scientists.

Tabibi, Bagher M.↗
NASA NTRS1996

The Study of the Relationship between Probabilistic Design and Axiomatic Design Methodology

This program report is the final report covering all the work done on this project. The goal of this project is technology transfer of methodologies to improve design process. The specific objectives are: 1. To learn and understand the Probabilistic design analysis using NESSUS. 2. To assign Design Projects to either undergraduate or graduate students on the application of NESSUS. 3. To integrate the application of NESSUS into some selected senior level courses in Civil and Mechanical Engineering curricula. 4. To develop courseware in Probabilistic Design methodology to be included in a graduate level Design Methodology course. 5. To study the relationship between the Probabilistic design methodology and Axiomatic design methodology.

Onwubiko, Chinyere↗
NASA NTRS1996

Observations and Analysis of Atmospheric Hydroxyl

Ground-based measurements of sunlight absorption at the OH P(sub 1)(l) resonance line at 308 nm have been made on a continuous basis at Fritz Peak, Colorado. The derived OH vertical column abundances show the persistence of a new seasonal regime which began in 1991. The fall minimum has been consistently depressed about 10-15% below the 1980-1990 average fall values. While the initial onset of depressed fall abundances occurred a few months after the Pinatubo eruption, there has been no fall OH recovery correlating with decreased amounts of volcanic aerosol found since spring 1993. The Colorado data also continues to exhibit an AM-PM asymmetry which varies seasonally, approximately in phase with local total ozone. These observations were presented at the Front Range AGU meeting in February 1996 and were published in Geophysical Research Letters in July 1996 (preprint enclosed). An update through the fall of 1996, when morning abundances were found to be extremely low, was presented at the Fall 1996 AGU meeting (abstract attached). A PEPSIOS instrument of identical design is currently operational and has been used since April 1996 for OH column measurements at New Mexico Tech, Socorro, NM. Title for both instruments was transferred from Florida Atlantic University to New Mexico Tech in February of 1996. Comparative measurements from the two instruments for April-July 1996 indicate small differences in OH column abundances, with New Mexico (34 deg N) abundances about 10% above Colorado (40 deg N) values for comparable solar zenith angles. A more detailed comparison will require at least one full year of data from both locations. New Mexico measurements were obtained on June 10, 1996, concurrently with a balloon launch of the NASA STRAT mission from Fort Sumner, New Mexico. We hope to make use of STRAT measurements H2O, CH4, and O3 which are particularly relevant to OH photochemistry. Additional work at New Mexico Tech involves a comparison of P(sub 1)(1) and Q(sub 1)(3) absorption by the method of Doppler shift of solar limb spectra. These are being used to infer path weighted temperatures and for validations studies on the standard method of analysis using the single P(sub 1)(1) line. Results were presented at the Fall 1996 AGU meeting (abstract attached). A graduate student in the Physics Department at New Mexico Tech has been supported since August 1996. The student is investigating column OH behavior using the NCAR 2-D model of the middle atmosphere. Graduate student support was not available until the start of the second year (Nov. 15, 1996), therefore funds have been transferred from the allocation for the research associate, who resigned from the project July 1, 1996.

Minschwaner, Ken R.↗
NASA NTRS1997

The Gaseous Content of the Universe at Zeta less than 1.6

Together with graduate student Hsiao-Wen Chen, I have measured and analyzed structural and morphological parameters of 38 galaxies in eight fields for which sensitive measurements of corresponding Ly(alpha) absorption toward background QSOs are available. These measurements are based on Wide Field Planetary Camera 2 (WFPC2) observations obtained with the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) and provide a first look at how the incidence and extent of tenuous gas around galaxies depends on galaxy luminosity, size, and morphological type and on geometry of the impact. The primary result of the analysis is that the amount of gas encountered along the line of sight depends on the galaxy impact parameter and B-band luminosity but does not depend strongly on the galaxy average surface brightness, disk-to-bulge ratio, or redshift. This result confirms and improves upon an anti-correlation between Ly(alpha) absorption equivalent width and galaxy impact parameter found previously. More importantly, this result provides the first quantitative means of relating statistics of faint galaxies to statistics of Ly(alpha) absorption systems. which we plan to exploit to constrain the luminosity function of galaxies beyond the realm of current surveys. Results have been submitted for publication and will greatly improve our statistical conclusions . Together with graduate student Noriaki Yahata. I have measured and classified spectral properties of over 1000 faint galaxies and stars obtained in our low-resolution spectroscopic survey. The goal of this project is two-fold: (1) to exhaustively characterize the spectral properties of all faint galaxies that comprise our current survey, and (2) to gain experience with our measurement and classification code. which ultimately will be used on a data base of 20,000 galaxies to be obtained with the Two-Degree Field (2df) spectrograph at the Anglo-Australian Telescope (AAT). The results will ultimately be used for many goals, but so far we have concentrated on using the results to make a binary classification of the galaxies (i.e. early type versus late type) and to then exploit the density-morphology relationship to obtain a crude density indicator. The primary result of the analysis is that the incidence and extent of tenuous gas around galaxies shows no strong preference for local galaxy environment, at least over the range of densities spanned by the current observations. Along similar lines, two instances of Ly(alpha) absorption lines that arise in groups or clusters were examined. Analysis demonstrates that some can produce corresponding absorption lines and that LY(alpha) absorption lines do not avoid a high-density environment. A new measure of the galaxy-absorber cross-correlation function defines the statistical criterion by which galaxies and absorber pairs are to be matched. I have identified a damped Ly(alpha) absorption system at redshift z equals approximately 0.16, the lowest redshift confirmed to date. The most important results of the analysis are learning that the metal abundances of the absorption system are less than 10 percent of the solar metal abundance and that the absorbing gas is not rotating with the galaxy disk.

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