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At least 1,333 records · Page 74
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS1975

Remote sensing applications to hydrology in Minnesota

Development of low lying southeastern shore of Pike Lake is described as part of the Rice Creek watershed study. Several small wetlands in Arden Hills, Minnesota were incorporated into the drainage plans as pollutant and nutrient sinks rather than being infilled. Lake water quality in the St. Paul-Minneapolis metropolitan area was analyzed using Landsat images. In the same urban area, the inventory and seasonal change of the open water were also studied.

Brown, D.↗
NASA NTRS1975

A state-of-the-art review of transportation systems evaluation techniques relevant to air transportation, volume 1

Mathematical and philosophical approaches are presented for evaluation and implementation of ground and air transportation systems. Basic decision processes are examined that are used for cost analyses and planning (i.e, statistical decision theory, linear and dynamic programming, optimization, game theory). The effects on the environment and the community that a transportation system may have are discussed and modelled. Algorithmic structures are examined and selected bibliographic annotations are included. Transportation dynamic models were developed. Citizen participation in transportation projects (i.e, in Maryland and Massachusetts) is discussed. The relevance of the modelling and evaluation approaches to air transportation (i.e, airport planning) is examined in a case study in St. Louis, Missouri.

Haefner, L. E.↗
NASA NTRS1976

Technology and politics: The regional airport experience

The findings of a comparative study of the following six regional airports were presented: Dallas/Fort Worth, Kansas City, Washington, D.C., Montreal, Tampa, and St. Louis. Each case was approached as a unique historical entity, in order to investigate common elements such as: the use of predictive models in planning, the role of symbolism to heighten dramatic effects, the roles of community and professional elites, and design flexibility. Some of the factors considered were: site selection, consolidation of airline service, accessibility, land availability and cost, safety, nuisance, and pollution constraints, economic growth, expectation of regional growth, the demand forecasting conundrum, and design decisions. The hypotheses developed include the following: the effect of political, social, and economic conflicts, the stress on large capacity and dramatic, high-technology design, projections of rapid growth to explain the need for large capital outlays.

Starling, J. D.↗
NASA NTRS1975

The utility of Skylab photo-interpreted earth resources data in studies of marine geology and coastal processes in Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands

The author has identified the following significant results. Three Skylab earth resources passes over Puerto Rico and St. Croix on 6 June and 30 November 1973 and 18 January 1974 resulted in color photography and multispectral photography and scanner imagery. Bathymetric and turbid water features are differentiable by use of the multispectral data. Photography allows mapping of coral reefs, offshore sand deposits, areas of coastal erosion, and patterns of sediment transport. Bottom sediment types could not be differentiated. Patterns of bottom dwelling biologic communities are well portrayed but are difficult to differentiate from bathymetric detail. Effluent discharges and oil slicks are readily detected and are differentiated from other phenomena by the persistence of their images into the longer wavelength multispectral bands.

Trumbull, J. V. A.↗
NASA NTRS1976

A dynamic pressure source for the calibration of pressure transducers

A dynamic pressure source is described for producing sinusoidally varying pressures of up to 34 kPa zero to peak, over the frequency range of approximately 50 Hz to 2 kHz. The source is intended for the dynamic calibration of pressure transducers. The transducer to be calibrated is mounted near the base of the thick walled aluminum tube forming the vessel so that the pressure sensitive element is in contact with the liquid in the tube. A section of the tube is filled with small steel balls to damp the motion of the 10-St dimethyl siloxane working fluid in order to extend the useful frquency range to higher frequencies than would be provided by an undamped system. The dynamic response of six transducers provided by the sponsor was evaluated using the pressure sources; the results of these calibrations are given.

Vezzetti, C. F.↗
NASA NTRS1976

Remote sensing in Michigan for land resource management

The Environmental Research Institute of Michigan is conducting a program whose goal is the large-scale adoption, by both public agencies and private interests in Michigan, of NASA earth-resource survey technology as an important aid in the solution of current problems in resource management and environmental protection. During the period from June 1975 to June 1976, remote sensing techniques to aid Michigan government agencies were used to achieve the following major results: (1) supply justification for public acquisition of land to establish the St. John's Marshland Recreation Area; (2) recommend economical and effective methods for performing a statewide wetlands survey; (3) assist in the enforcement of state laws relating to sand and gravel mining, soil erosion and sedimentation, and shorelands protection; (4) accomplish a variety of regional resource management actions in the East Central Michigan Planning and Development Region. Other tasks on which remote sensing technology was used include industrial and school site selection, ice detachment in the Soo Harbor, grave detection, and data presentation for wastewater management programs.

Lowe, D. S.↗
NASA NTRS1976

Thermospheric winds and exospheric temperatures from incoherent scatter radar measurements in four seasons

The time-dependent equations of neutral air motion are solved subject to three constraints: two of them are the usual upper and lower boundary conditions and the third is the value of the wind-induced ion drift at any given height. Using incoherent radar data, this procedure leads to a fast, direct numerical integration of the two coupled differential equations describing the horizontal wind components and yields time dependent wind profiles and meridional exospheric neutral temperature gradients. The diurnal behavior of the neutral wind system and of the exospheric temperature is presented for two solstice and two equinox days. The data used were obtained by the St. Santin and the Millstone Hill incoherent scatter radars. The derived geographic distributions of the exospheric temperatures are compared with those predicted by the OGO-6 empirical thermospheric model.

Antoniadis, D. A.↗
NASA NTRS1976

On the calculation of cosmic-ray exposure ages of stone meteorites

Abundances of cosmic ray-produced noble gases and Al-26, including some new measurements, have been compiled for some 23 stone meteorites with exposure ages less than 3,000,000 yr. Concentrations of cosmogenic He, Ne, and Ar in these meteorites have been corrected for differences in target element abundances by normalization to L-chondrite chemistry. Combined noble gas measurements in depth samples of the Keyes and St. Severin chondrites are utilized to derive equations for normalizing the production rates of cosmogenic He-3, Ne-21, and Ar-38 in chondrites to an adopted 'average' shielding. The measured unsaturated AL-26 concentrations and the calculated equilibrium Al-26 for these meteorites are combined to estimate exposure ages. These exposure ages are statistically compared with chemistry- and shielding-corrected concentrations of cosmogenic He, Ne, and Ar to derive absolute production rates for these nuclides, which are found to be roughly 25% higher than production rates used in the past. From these production rates and relative chemical correction factors, production rates for other classes of stone meteorites are derived.

Cressy, P. J., Jr.↗
NASA NTRS1975

Preparation of tantalum-based alloys by a unique CVD process

The paper describes a sequential pulsing technique for deposition of refractory alloys and evaluates the technique for the deposition of the tantalum-base alloys Ta-10W (Ta-10 st% W) and T-111 (Ta-8 wt% W-2 wt% Hf). The deposition cycle for Ta-10W was chosen as alternate injections of TaCl5 plus hydrogen and WCl6 plus hydrogen. The cycle for T-111 was chosen as injections of TaCl5 plus hydrogen interspersed with injections of WCl6 plus hydrogen. A temperature range of 900-1300 C was chosen for both alloys. The ability of the pulse process to blanket a uniformly heated section of substrate with a mixture of gases, whose composition varies not with position on the substrate but instead with time of residence in the reactor, allows metal of uniform thickness to be deposited. It is shown that Ta and W can be deposited at high temperature with the formation of a dense columnar grain structure, so that the feasibility of preparing uniformly thick deposits of these elements by a 'pulsing' modification of CVD is demonstrated. A similar attempt to deposit T-111 was unsuccessful due to the difficulty in reducing HfCl4.

Bryant, W. A.↗
NASA NTRS1976

An observational program to search for radio signals from extraterrestrial intelligence through the use of existing facilities

It is argued that a substantial portion of the capability for detecting microwave signals from extraterrestrial civilizations lies not in the application of ever larger antenna collecting areas but rather in the application of millions or billions of simultaneous frequency-channel observations combined with rapid and powerful data processing techniques. The application of these methods to existing facilities is discussed in terms of a program of modest expense and duration which will seek to discover certain classes of extraterrestrial signals of intelligent origin while defining boundaries to the search problem throughout the range of interest. This program will investigate radio-astronomical phenomena of interest and simultaneously define the background of environmental radiation in order to determine physical limitations on both the search strategies and the potential for deep-space communications. Signal parameters that must be determined are examined along with the potential of existing radio-astronomical facilities for detecting narrow-band signals. A seven-year program is described which will carry out a search for extraterrestrial intelligence over 80% of the sky and over the entire frequency range from 1 to 25 GHz with a sensitivity limit varying from 10 to the -21st power W/sq cm at the lowest frequencies to 10 to the -19th power W/sq cm at the higher frequencies.

Edelson, R. E.↗
NASA NTRS1976

IBIS - A geographic information system based on digital image processing and image raster datatype

IBIS (Image Based Information System) is a geographic information system which makes use of digital image processing techniques to interface existing geocoded data sets and information management systems with thematic maps and remotely sensed imagery. The basic premise is that geocoded data sets can be referenced to a raster scan that is equivalent to a grid cell data set. The first applications (St. Tammany Parish, Louisiana, and Los Angeles County) have been restricted to the design of a land resource inventory and analysis system. It is thought that the algorithms and the hardware interfaces developed will be readily applicable to other Landsat imagery.

Bryant, N. A.↗
NASA NTRS1977

Electron and ion temperatures - A comparison of ground-based incoherent scatter and AE-C satellite measurements

The paper presents the results of comparisons of AE-C electron temperature of the ionosphere determined from the cylindrical electrostatic probe and the ion temperature of the ionosphere determined from the planar retarding potential analyzer with electron and ion temperatures determined from four incoherent scatter facilities: Arecibo, St. Santin, Millstone Hill, and Chatanika. Good agreement was obtained between the in situ and remote measurements of electron and ion temperatures. Longitudinal variations are found to be very important in the comparison of electron temperatures at some locations.

Benson, R. F.↗
NASA NTRS1977

Effects of air pollution on thermal structure and dispersion in an urban planetary boundary layer

The short-term effects of urbanization and air pollution on the transport processes in the urban planetary boundary layer (PBL) are studied. The investigation makes use of an unsteady two-dimensional transport model which has been developed by Viskanta et al., (1976). The model predicts pollutant concentrations and temperature in the PBL. The potential effects of urbanization and air pollution on the thermal structure in the urban PBL are considered, taking into account the results of numerical simulations modeling the St. Louis, Missouri metropolitan area.

Viskanta, R.↗
NASA NTRS1978

Evaluation of thallium-201 scanning for detection of latent coronary artery disease

The use of thallium imaging as a noninvasive method to accurately screen shuttle passengers for latent coronary artery disease was investigated. All radionuclide procedures were performed using an Anger type camera with a high resolution collimator. A minimum of 200,000 counts were collected for each image using a 20% window centered on the 69-83 keV X-rays. For the images obtained following injection with the patient at rest, the testing was begun 10 minutes after injection. Injections of TT during exercise were made at a point near the termination of the treadmill procedure as determined by either the appearance of ST segment changes on the electrocardiogram consistant with subendocardial ischemia, the appearance of angina-like chest pain in the patient or fatigue in the patient which required cessation of the test. The severity of heart disease was based on the medical history, physical exam, exercise electrocardiograms, chest X-rays and the coronary arteriogram.

Johnson, P. C.↗
NASA NTRS1977

Comparison of predicted and observed solar radiation in an urban area

Measurements of the downward solar radiant flux in the St. Louis area are compared with predictions from an approximate solution to the radiative transfer equation. The atmospheric aerosols were assumed to have a power size distribution and the refractive indices suggested by Fischer (1973) for an urban area. On a relatively clean day, the predictions compared well with observations. On a hazy day, the comparison was poor with the a priori choice of aerosol properties. The particles on the hazy day apparently had more submicron particles than those found in the assumed size distribution, and the particles were considerably less absorbing than those observed by Fischer. These changes could represent the effects of relative humidity and different air mass characteristics.

Bergstrom, R. W.↗
NASA NTRS1978

Commercial Fishing Port Development in North Florida

The author has identified the following significant results. Seven major counties were examined: Escambia, Bay, Gulf, Franklin, Wakulla, Nassau, and Duval. Population and economic activity were reviewed, along with commercial fishing and port facilities. Recommendations for five northwest Florida counties were based on interpretation of aerial photographs, satellite imagery, an aerial survey site visit, and published data. Major needs in Pensacola included docking, ice supply, and net and engine repair services. Costs for additional docks, an ice plant, and gear storage were estimated at $3,658,600. Port users in Panama City identified additional docking and gear storage as primary needs, along with gear repair and a marine railway. Estimated costs for dock and gear storage were $2,860,000. Added docking, gear storage, and ice supply, as well as gear electronics and diesel repair were needed in Port St. Joe. Costs were calculated at $1,231,500. Franklin County has three ports (Apalachicola - $1,107,000 for docks and gear storage, Eastpoint - $420,000 for additional docks, and Carrabella - $2,824,100 for docks, gear storage, and ice plant).

Mathis, K.↗
NASA NTRS1979

Preliminary results of SAR soil moisture experiment, November 1975

The experiment was performed using the Environmental Research Institute of Michigan's (ERIM) dual-frequency and dual-polarization side-looking SAR system on board a C-46 aircraft. For each frequency, horizontally polarized pulses were transmitted and both horizontally and vertically polarized return signals were recorded on the signal film simultaneously. The test sites were located in St. Charles, Missouri; Centralia, Missouri; and Lafayette, Indiana. Each test site was a 4.83 km by 8.05 km (3 mile by 5 mile) rectangular strip of terrain. Concurrent with SAR overflight, ground soil samples of 0-to-2.5 cm and 0-to-15 cm layers were collected for soil moisture estimation. The surface features were also noted. Hard-copy image films and the digital data produced via optical processing of the signal films are analyzed in this report to study the relationship of radar backscatter to the moisture content and the surface roughness. Many difficulties associated with processing and analysis of the SAR imagery are noted. In particular, major uncertainty in the quantitative analysis appeared due to the difficulty of quality reproduction of digital data from the signal films.

Choudhury, B. J.↗
NASA NTRS1979

Preliminary characterization of a one-axis acoustic system

The acoustic fields and levitation forces produced along the axis of a single-axis resonance system were measured. The system consisted of a St. Clair generator and a planar reflector. The levitation force was measured for bodies of various sizes and geometries (i.e., spheres, cylinders, and discs). The force was found to be roughly proportional to the volume of the body until the characteristic body radius reaches approximately 2/k (k = wave number). The acoustic pressures along the axis were modeled using Huygens principle and a method of imaging to approximate multiple reflections. The modeled pressures were found to be in reasonable agreement with those measured with a calibrated microphone.

Oran, W. A.↗