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At least 1,189 records · Page 66

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NASA NTRS1983

A large-area gamma-ray imaging telescope system

The concept definition of using the External Tank (ET) of the Space Shuttle as the basis for constructing a large area gamma ray imaging telescope in space is detailed. The telescope will be used to locate and study cosmic sources of gamma rays of energy greater than 100 MeV. Both the telescope properties and the means whereby an ET is used for this purpose are described. A parallel is drawn between those systems that would be common to both a Space Station and this ET application. In addition, those systems necessary for support of the telescope can form the basis for using the ET as part of the Space Station. The major conclusions of this concept definition are that the ET is ideal for making into a gamma ray telescope, and that this telescope will provide a substantial increase in collecting area.

Koch, D. G.↗

NASA NTRS1985

Results of a study to build a gamma-ray telescope in an external tank

In response to the ever-present need for a very large gamma-ray detector for energies greater than 100 MeV, a concept to build a telescope of 250,000 sq cm sensitive area using a Space Shuttle External Tank (ET) is presented. In the Space Station era, for the first time, large detectors can be constructed on-orbit which would otherwise be limited in size by the launch vehicle. The ET will serve both as the spacecraft and the Cherenkov pressure vessel. The significant feature is that the sensitive area will be forty times that of the high energy detector on GRO and will be able to locate even the faintest sources from the GRO survey to a few arc minutes. The detection technique is based upon that originally proposed by Greisen.

Koch, D.↗

NASA NTRS1985

Gamma-ray bursts from remnant neutron star disks

The consequences of a disk of matter orbiting an old neutron star are examined. When the inner edge of the disk approaches close to the star, due to internal viscous drag, runaway ionization of the disk occurs and the resulting plasma is precipitated to the surface of the neutron star, thereby producing a gamma-ray burst. Rough numerical estimates of the occurrence rate are given and found to be consistent with gamma-ray burst observations. The estimates indicate that energies of 10 to the 39th ergs or more could be released with rise times as fast as 0.3 ms. Consideration is given to explanations of the March 5, 1979 event (Cline et al., 1980). Some possible observational searches for optical or IR emission from such disks at the locations of known burst sources and pulsars are discussed.

Michel, F. C.↗

NASA NTRS1986

International Halley Watch: Discipline specialists for near-nucleus studies

The purpose of the Near-Nucleus Studies Net is to study the processes taking place in the near-nucleus environment as they relate to the nature of nucleus. This is accomplisghed by measuring the spatial and temporal distribution of dust, gases and ions in the coma on high resolution images taken from many observatories around the world. By modeling the motions of discrete dust features in Comet Halley, it is often possible to determine the locations of the emission sources on the surface and learn about the nucleus structure. In addition to the general goals shared by all IHW nets, the scientific goals of the net has been to determine (1)the gross surface structure of the nucleus, (2)the nucleus spin vector, (3)the distribution and evolution of jet sources and (4)the interrelationships between the gas, dust and ion components of the coma. An additional Comet Giacobini-Zinner watch was carried out by the NNSN in support of the NASA International Cometary Explorer flyby.

Larson, S.↗

NASA NTRS1987

Propagation of electrons emitting weak type III bursts in coronal streamers

The observations of weak type III bursts at 73.8, 57.5, 50.0, and 38.5 MHz from Clark Lake Radio Observatory on four days are reported and their characteristics are discussed. In addition to Clark Lake data, the magnetogram and sunspot/active region data and the coronal streamer data obtained by HAO's Coronagraph/Polarimeter aboard SMM satellite are used to study the location of the burst sources with respect to the coronal streamers emanating from active regions. It is shown that the bursts occur within or close to the edge of dense coronal streamers implying that the coronal streamers contain open magnetic field lines along which the electrons generating the bursts propagate. The positional analysis of the bursts is used to estimate the variation of coronal electron density with radial distance.

Gopalswamy, N.↗

NASA NTRS1988

Very large Arecibo-type telescopes

The Arecibo-type radio telescope, based on a fixed spherical reflector, is a very effective design for a large radio telescope on the Moon. In such telescopes, major structural members are provided by the ground on which they are built, and thus are provided at no cost in materials or transportation. The strong compression members, the tall towers which support the suspended platform, are an expensive part of the Arecibo telescope. The need for such towers can be eliminated if a suitable valley or crater can be found wherein the rim of the depression can be used as the support point for the cables which support the suspended platform. With an Arecibo-type radio telescope on the Moon, there are no changing gravity loads because of the design and no changing wind loads because of the location; therefore, the only source of time variation in the telescope geometry is thermal changes. Calculations show that with conventional materials, such as steel, it should be possible to construct an Arecibo-type telescope with a reflector diameter of some 30 km on the Moon, and with a reflector diameter of some 60 to 90 km if materials of high specific strength are used.

Drake, Frank D.↗

NASA NTRS1989

Acoustic test of a model rotor and tail rotor: Results for the isolated rotors and combined configuration

Acoustic data from a model scale main rotor and tail rotor experiment in the NASA Langley 14 by 22 Foot Subsonic Tunnel are presented for the main rotor and trail rotor in isolation and for the two rotors operating together. Results for the isolated main rotor show the importance of the rotor flapping conditions on mid-frequency noise content. High levels of main rotor retreating side blade-vortex interaction noise are shown to radiate downstream of the model. The isolated tail rotor noise results show the dominance of harmonic noise in the thrusting direction. The occurrence of tail rotor broadband noise is seen by the broadening of the tail rotor harmonics and is attributed to fuselage wake turbulence. The combined main and tail rotor data are presented to show the dominance of each rotor's different noise sources at different directivity locations.

Martin, R. M.↗

NASA NTRS1990

Asymptotic modal analysis and statistical energy analysis

The sound field of a structural-acoustic enclosure was subject to experimental analysis and theoretical description in order to develop an efficient and accurate method for predicting sound pressure levels in enclosures such as aircraft fuselages. Asymptotic Modal Analysis (AMA) is the method under investigation. AMA is derived from classical modal analysis (CMA) by considering the asymptotic limit of the sound pressure level as the number of acoustic and/or structural modes approaches infinity. Using AMA, results identical to those of Statistical Energy Analysis (SEA) were obtained for the spatially-averaged sound pressure levels in the interior. AMA is systematically derived from CMA and therefore the degree of generality of the end result can be adjusted through the choice of appropriate simplifying assumptions. For example, AMA can be used to obtain local sound pressure levels at particular points inside the enclosure, or to include the effects of varying the size and/or location of the sound source. AMA theoretical results were compared with CMA theory and also with experiment for the case where the structural-acoustic enclosure is a rectangular cavity with part of one wall flexible and vibrating, while the rest of the cavity is rigid.

Dowell, Earl H.↗

NASA NTRS1991

Anisotropic inverse Compton emission

The angular distribution of the power and spectrum of Compton-scattered radiation in the case of an anisotropic distribution of soft photons is considered. Results obtained show that both the intensity and spectrum of the scattered radiation are a function of the Lorentz factor of the electrons, the geometry of the soft X-ray source and the viewing angle. The intensity of the hard X-rays scattered back into the bowl can be significantly greater (by a factor of up to 5.5) than that scattered toward the observer for an isotropic distribution of relativistic electrons at the center of a hemispherical bowl of soft X-ray emission. This factor is increased as the solid angle of the soft X-ray source subtended at the location of the electrons is reduced. The results obtained here have inmplications for models invoking a further 'reflection' of the resultant hard X-rays from the surface of a disk.

Ghisellini, G.↗

NASA NTRS1992

A comparison of shuttle vernier engine plume contamination with CONTAM 3.4 code predictions

In 1985, using the CONTAM 3.2 code, it was predicted that the shuttle Primary Reaction Control System (PRCS) and Vernier Reaction Control System (VRCS) engines could be potential contamination sources to sensitive surfaces located within the shuttle payload bay. Spaceflight test data on these engines is quite limited. Shuttle mission STS-32, the Long Duration Exposure Facility retrieval mission, was instrumented with an experiment that provided the design engineer with evidence that contaminant species from the VRCS engines can enter the payload bay. More recently, the most recent version of the analysis code, CONTAM 3.4, has re-examined the contamination potential of these engines.

Maag, Carl R.↗

NASA NTRS1991

Computer graphics testbed to simulate and test vision systems for space applications

A system was developed for displaying computer graphics images of space objects and the use of the system was demonstrated as a testbed for evaluating vision systems for space applications. In order to evaluate vision systems, it is desirable to be able to control all factors involved in creating the images used for processing by the vision system. Considerable time and expense is involved in building accurate physical models of space objects. Also, precise location of the model relative to the viewer and accurate location of the light source require additional effort. As part of this project, graphics models of space objects such as the Solarmax satellite are created that the user can control the light direction and the relative position of the object and the viewer. The work is also aimed at providing control of hue, shading, noise and shadows for use in demonstrating and testing imaging processing techniques. The simulated camera data can provide XYZ coordinates, pitch, yaw, and roll for the models. A physical model is also being used to provide comparison of camera images with the graphics images.

Cheatham, John B.↗

NASA NTRS1991

Waveform effects of a metastable olivine tongue in subducting slabs

Velocity models of subducting slabs with a kinetically-depressed olivine to beta- and gamma-spinel transition are constructed, and the effect that such structures would have on teleseismic P waveforms are examined using a full-wave finite-difference method. These 2D calculations yielded waveforms at a range of distances in the downdip direction. The slab models included a wedge-shaped, low-velocity metastable olivine tongue (MOTO) to a depth of 670 km, as well as a plausible thermal anomaly; one model further included a 10-km-thick fast layer on the surface of the slab. The principal effect of MOTO is to produce grazing reflections at wide angles off the phase boundary, generating a secondary arrival 0 to 4 seconds after the initial arrival depending on the take-off angle. The amplitude and timing of this feature vary with the lateral location of the seismic source within the slab cross-section.

Vidale, John E.↗

NASA NTRS1992

On the origin of variable 511 keV line emission from the Galactic center region

Variable narrow-line emission at 511 keV, due to positron annihilation, has been observed from the region of the Galactic center for over a decade with high-resolution Ge spectrometers. The variable nature of this emission suggests that a significant fraction of the observed radiation is produced by a single source in the central region of the Galaxy. Recent observations with an imaging gamma-ray spectrometer of low energy resolution have revealed a daylong burst of annihilation radiation from the X-ray source 1E 1740.7-2042 located at an angular distance of 0.9 deg from the Galactic center and aligned with a dense molecular cloud. It is proposed that the variable narrow 511 keV line emission is due to positrons released impulsively (time scale of about 1 day) from 1E 1740.7-2942 into the molecular cloud where they slow down and annihilate on a longer time scale of up to a year.

Ramaty, R.↗

NASA NTRS1994

Io's heat flow from infrared radiometry: 1983-1993

We report the following results from a decade of infrared radiometry of Io: (1) The average global heat flow is more than approx. 2.5 W/sq.m, (2) large warm (less than or equal to 200 K) volcanic regions dominate the global heat flow, (3) smal high-temperature (greater than or = 300 K) 'hotspots' contribute little to the average heat flow, (4) thermal anomalies on the leading hemisphere contribute about half of the heat flow, (5) a substantial amount of heat is radiated during Io's night, (6) high-temperature (greater than or = 600 K) 'outbursts' occurred during approx. 4% of the nights we observed, (7) 'Loki' is the brightest, persistent, infrared emission feature, and (8) some excess emission is always present at the longitude of Loki, but its intensity and other characteristics change between apparitions. Observations of Io at M(4.8 micrometer), 8.7 micrometer, N(10 micrometer), and Q(20 micrometer) with the Infrared Telescope Facility presented here were collected during nine apparitions between 1983 and 1993. These measurements provide full longitudinal coveraged as well as an eclipse observation and the detection of two outbursts. Reflected sunlight, passive thermal emission, and radiation from thermal anomalies all contribute to the observed flux densities. We find that a new thermophysical model is required to match all the data. Two key elements of this model are (1) a 'thermal reservoir' unit which lowers daytime temperatures, and (2) the 'thermal pedestal effect' which shifts to shorter wavelengths the spectral emission due to the reradiation of solar energy absorbed by the thermal anomalies. The thermal anomalies are modeled with a total of 10 source components at five locations. Io's heat flow is the sum of the power from these components.

Veeder, Glenn J.↗

NASA NTRS1995

Actuator placement for active sound and vibration control of cylinders

Active structural acoustic control is a method in which the control inputs (used to reduce interior noise) are applied directly to a vibrating structural acoustic system. The control concept modeled in this work is the application of in-plane force inputs to piezoceramic patches bonded to the wall of a vibrating cylinder. The cylinder is excited by an exterior noise source -- an acoustic monopole -- located near the outside of the cylinder wall. The goal is to determine the force inputs and sites for the piezoelectric actuators so that (1) the interior noise is effectively damped; (2) the level of vibration of the cylinder shell is not increased; and (3) the power requirements needed to drive the actuators are not excessive. We studied external monopole excitations at two frequencies. A cylinder resonance of 100 Hz, where the interior acoustic field is driven in multiple, off-resonance cylinder cavity modes, and a cylinder resonance of 200 Hz are characterized by both near and off-resonance cylinder vibration modes which couple effectively with a single, dominant, low-order acoustic cavity mode at resonance. Previous work has focused almost exclusively on meeting objective (1) and solving a complex least-squares problem to arrive at an optimal force vector for a given set of actuator sites. In addition, it has been noted that when the cavity mode couples with cylinder vibration modes (our 200 Hz case) control spillover may occur in higher order cylinder shell vibrational modes. How to determine the best set of actuator sites to meet objectives (1)-(3) is the main contribution of our research effort. The selection of the best set of actuator sites from a set of potential sites is done via two metaheuristics -- simulated annealing and tabu search. Each of these metaheuristics partitions the set of potential actuator sites into two disjoint sets: those that are selected to control the noise (on) and those that are not (off). Next, each metaheuristic attempts to improve this initial solution by calculating the change in the objective value when one selected actuator site is turned off and one actuator site that previously was not selected is turned on. All such pairwise exchanges are performed and the exchange that improves the objective the most is made. Eventually the search is unable to improve the objective value and a local optimum (with respect to pairwise exchanges) is reached. Both simulated annealing and tabu search provide mechanisms to escape local optima and allow the search to continue until (hopefully) a global optimum is found. Our experiments with the 100 Hz and 200 Hz cases confirm that both metaheuristics are able to uncover better solutions than those selected based upon engineering judgement alone. In addition, the high quality solutions generated by these metaheuristics, when minimizing interior noise, do not further excite the cylinder shell. Thus, we are able to meet objective (2) without imposing an additional constraint or forming a multiobjective performance measure. An additional observation is that in many cases the amplitude and phase values for several chosen actuator sites were nearly identical. This natural grouping means that fewer control channels are needed and the resulting control system is simpler. Currently no power requirements have been set, so objective (3) cannot be addressed. A set of experiments is planned with a laboratory test article (a cylinder). For these experiments the transfer matrices will be generated experimentally. It is hoped that the predicted performance of the best actuator sites found by our metaheuristics will correlate well with the measured performance.

Kincaid, Rex K.↗

NASA NTRS1996

The Martian Dust Cycle: Investigation of the Surface Lifting Component

We have investigated the nature of the annual cycle of suspended dust in the martian atmosphere. This has been undertaken to understand the dynamical processes responsible for lifting dust from the surface, locations where dust is preferentially lifted, and preferred sites for dust deposition upon the surface. Our efforts have involved carrying out a number of numerical simulations with the Ames Mars General Circulation Model (GCM) interactively coupled with an aerosol transport/ micro-physical model. The model generates an annual dust cycle similar to that observed. Various feedbacks are present in the atmosphere/ surface system which enter into the generation of the cycle. Several locations are primary surface sources of dust, while much of the remaining planet's surface acts a sink for suspended dust.

Murphy, James R.↗

NASA NTRS1999

Principles in Remote Sensing of Aerosol from MODIS Over Land and Ocean

The well-calibrated spectral radiances measured by MODIS will be processed to retrieve daily aerosol properties that include optical thickness and mass loading over land and optical thickness, the mean particle size of the dominant mode and the ratio between aerosol modes over ocean. In addition, after launch, aerosol single scattering albedo will be calculated as an experimental product. The retrieval process over land is based on a dark target method that identifies appropriate targets in the mid-IR channels and uses an empirical relationship found between the mid-ER and the visible channels to estimate surface reflectance in the visible from the mid-HZ reflectance measured by satellite. The method employs new aerosol models for industrial, smoke and dust aerosol. The process for retrieving aerosol over the ocean makes use of the wide spectral band from 0.55-2.13 microns and a look-up table constructed from combinations of five accumulation modes and five coarse modes. Both the over land and over ocean algorithms have been validated with satellite and airborne radiance measurements. We estimate that MODIS will be able to measure aerosol optical thickness (t) to within 0.05 +/- 0.2t over land and to within 0.05 +/- 0.05t over ocean. Much of the earth's surface is located far from aerosol sources and experience very low aerosol optical thickness. Will the accuracy expected from MODIS retrievals be sufficient to measure the global aerosol direct and indirect forcing? We are attempting to answer this question using global model results and cloud climatology.

Remer, L. A.↗

NASA NTRS2001

Observations of Circumstellar Material Around Evolved Stars With the ISI

The U.C. Berkeley Infrared Spatial Interferometer (ISI) is a stellar interferometer operating in the 9-12 micron region and has been in operation from 1988 until the present. It utilizes heterodyne detection using CO2 laser local oscillators and currently includes two 1.65 m movable telescopes mounted in semi-trailers and baselines up to about 65 m in length. A third telescope is being integrated with the other two and within the next year will operate as an imaging interferometer providing data with three simultaneous baselines and a closure phase, and baselines up to about 75 m. During the past twelve years the ISI has been used extensively for studies of circumstellar material around evolved stars. Multi-epoch observations of a sample of prototypical sources have elucidated the location and time scales for dust formation around these stars. These time scales can be as short as approx.10 years for Mira stars and as long as approx. 100 years for supergiants. For stars like Mira itself there is evidence for departure from spherical symmetry and episodes of dust formation and destruction. For some stars motion of dust has been observed -- IK Tau is one example, and NML Cyg is another. The molecules Silane and Ammonia were observed for the extreme carbon star IRC +10216 and the supergiant VY CMa pinpointing their location relative to the inner radius of the dust shell. Somewhat surprisingly, these molecules were found to form many stellar radii away from the inner radius of the dust shell, implying that they form by interactions with the surfaces of dust grains. Last year observations with the longest baselines lead to new precision diameters of $o$ Ceti and $\alpha$ Orionis, and are continuing on a somewhat larger set of Mira variable and supergiant stars.

Danchi, W. C.↗