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NASA NTRS1991

A nonlinear estimator for reconstructing the angular velocity of a spacecraft without rate gyros

A scheme for estimating the angular velocity of a spacecraft without rate gyros is presented. It is based upon a nonlinear estimator whose inputs are measured inertial vectors and their calculated time derivatives relative to vehicle axes. It works for all spacecraft attitudes and requires no knowledge of attitude. It can use measurements from a variety of onboard sensors like Sun sensors, star trackers, or magnetometers, and in concert. It can also use look angle measurements from onboard tracking antennas for tracking and data relay satellites or global positioning system satellites. In this paper, it is applied to a Sun point scheme on the Hubble Space Telescope assuming all or most of its onboard rate gyros have failed. Simulation results are presented for verification.

Polites, M. E.↗

NASA NTRS1991

Final STS-35 Columbia descent BET products and results for LaRC OEX investigations

Final STS-35 'Columbia' descent Best Estimate Trajectory (BET) products have been developed for Langley Research Center (LaRC) Orbiter Experiments (OEX) investigations. Included are the reconstructed inertial trajectory profile; the Extended BET, which combines the inertial data and, in this instance, the National Weather Service atmospheric information obtained via Johnson Space Center; and the Aerodynamic BET. The inertial BET utilized Inertial Measurement Unit 1 (IMU1) dynamic measurements for deterministic propagation during the ENTREE estimation process. The final estimate was based on the considerable ground based C-band tracking coverage available as well as Tracking Data and Relay Satellite System (TDRSS) Doppler data, a unique use of the latter for endo-atmospheric flight determinations. The actual estimate required simultaneous solutions for the spacecraft position and velocity, spacecraft attitude, and six IMU parameters - three gyro biases and three accelerometer scale factor correction terms. The anchor epoch for this analysis was 19,200 Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) seconds which corresponds to an initial Shuttle altitude of approximately 513 kft. The atmospheric data incorporated were evaluated based on Shuttle derived considerations as well as comparisons with other models. The AEROBET was developed based on the Extended BET, the measured spacecraft configuration information, final mass properties, and the final Orbiter preoperation databook. The latter was updated based on aerodynamic consensus incrementals derived by the latest published FAD. The rectified predictions were compared versus the flight computed values and the resultant differences were correlated versus ensemble results for twenty-two previous STS entry flights.

Oakes, Kevin F.↗

NASA NTRS2013

2011 Mars Science Laboratory Trajectory Reconstruction and Performance from Launch Through Landing

The Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) mission successfully launched on an Atlas V 541 Expendable Evolved Launch Vehicle (EELV) from the Eastern Test Range (ETR) at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station (CCAFS) in Florida at 15:02:00 UTC on November 26th, 2011. At 15:52:06 UTC, six minutes after the MSL spacecraft separated from the Centaur upper stage, the spacecraft transmitter was turned on and in less than 20 s spacecraft carrier lock was achieved at the Universal Space Network (USN) Dongara tracking station located in Western Australia. MSL, carrying the most sophisticated rover ever sent to Mars, entered the Martian atmosphere at 05:10:46 SpaceCraft Event Time (SCET) UTC, and landed inside Gale Crater at 05:17:57 SCET UTC on August 6th, 2012. Confirmation of nominal landing was received at the Deep Space Network (DSN) Canberra tracking station via the Mars Odyssey relay spacecraft at 05:31:45 Earth Received Time (ERT) UTC. This paper summarizes in detail the actual vs. predicted trajectory performance in terms of launch vehicle events, launch vehicle injection performance, actual DSN/USN spacecraft lockup, trajectory correction maneuver performance, Entry, Descent, and Landing events, and overall trajectory and geometry characteristics.

trajectory↗

NASA NTRS1993

Silhouettes - An automated three-dimensional plume visualization and tracking system for environmental monitoring

The method of silhouettes proceeds from the premise that the 3D location and shape of an arbitrary object can be approximated via the cross section of a series of conical volumes whose focal points are arranged at sites surrounding the object; the projection of each conical volume onto a picture plane at each focal point is identical to a projection of the outline of the object onto that picture plane. Attention is presently given to the use of the silhouettes method for gas plume dispersion monitoring through the 3D reconstruction of plumes from imagery acquired at strategically located stations in the plumes' path.

Cambridge, Vivien J.↗

NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Post-flight Reconstruction for a Mars Ascent Vehicle

As the design of a Mars Ascent Vehicle as part of the Mars Sample Return Campaign continues to mature, new focus is placed on the ability to reconstruct and validate the as-flown performance in post-flight analysis. This is increasingly important as the vehicle considers alternate design concepts that offer significant mass reductions at a cost of reduced onboard sensing capabilities. To understand architectural impacts to validate as-inserted vehicle conditions, the MAV team has assessed several options for capturing this data either on the vehicle or using external tracking options. This paper summarizes potential architectures, their associated performance, and integration challenges.

Evan Anzalone↗

NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Towards Physics Guided Optical Flow for Tracking Atmospheric Motion

Observations of atmospheric 3D winds are critical for improving short-range and long-range forecasting. Such advancement in forecasting directly applies to research in a number of areas including convective processes, wildfire plumes and tornado prediction. Atmospheric Motion Vectors (AMVs) provide a passively sensed approach to quantifying horizontal motion and cloud heights, which are typically sourced from geostationary sensors due to the availability of high frequency observations. Recent work has shown that estimating AMVs by tracking individual pixels with dense optical flow is a promising new direction. In this work, we compare state-of-the-art convolutional neural networks for optical flow in a physics-guided deep learning framework for predicting AMVs. The approach is semi-supervised and uses physically informed wind vectors from high-resolution numerical simulations for supervised learning followed by fine-tuning though warping and reconstruction of full-disk geostationary images (GOES-16). In the vertical direction, we use labels from the CALIPSO low-earth orbit satellite to predict cloud height from 16-band geostationary images with a neural network. We present results for both tasks on held-out time periods and secondary datasets.

Geostationary↗

NASA NTRS1990

Performance of three-way data types during Voyager's encounter with Neptune

Voyager's flyby of Neptune in August of 1989 was the most distant planetary encounter ever achieved. Round trip light travel time was more than eight hours, exceeding view periods at two of the three tracking station sites. Consequently, the majority of radiometric tracking was accomplished by transmitting the uplink from one station, and receiving the downlink at a different station. This procedure defines three-way data. Dependence on three-way data for orbit determination is one distinguishing element of Voyager's successful encounter with Neptune. This paper addresses the performance of three-way range and Doppler data supporting pre-encounter orbit determination and post-encounter orbit reconstruction. Also, calibrations which reduce systematic errors inherent to three-way data are described and analyzed.

Roth, D. C.↗

NASA NTRS1995

Category 5 problem solution using an unstructured finite volume algorithm

For the simulation of flows with complex geometries, unstructured finite volume methods have proven to be very popular, and simulations of a large number of flows have been done with good results using this approach. Since most of the simulations to date were done for steady flows, it is not clear that present unstructured finite volume algorithms can accurately track the unsteady propagation of acoustic waves in a computation. Therefore, there is a need to assess the accuracy of these methods for acoustic calculations. In this paper, we perform the numerical simulation of a very small amplitude acoustic wave incident on the non-uniform steady flow in a quasi- 1 D convergent-divergent nozzle using an unstructured finite volume algorithm with piece-wise linear, least square reconstruction, Roe flux difference splitting, and second-order MacCormack time marching. First, the spatial accuracy of the algorithm is evaluated for the steady flow by running the simulation with a sequence of successively finer meshes. Then the unsteady numerical solution with the acoustic perturbation is presented.

Bui, Trong T.↗

NASA NTRS2002

GPS-Based Navigation And Orbit Determination for the AMSAT AO-40 Satellite

The AMSAT OSCAR-40 (AO-40) spacecraft occupies a highly elliptical orbit (HEO) to support amateur radio experiments. An interesting aspect of the mission is the attempted use of GPS for navigation and attitude determination in HEO. Previous experiences with GPS tracking in such orbits have demonstrated the ability to acquire GPS signals, but very little data were produced for navigation and orbit determination studies. The AO-40 spacecraft, flying two Trimble Advanced Navigation Sensor (TANS) Vector GPS receivers for signal reception at apogee and at perigee, is the first to demonstrate autonomous tracking of GPS signals from within a HEO with no interaction from ground controllers. Moreover, over 11 weeks of total operations as of June 2002, the receiver has returned a continuous stream of code phase, Doppler, and carrier phase measurements useful for studying GPS signal characteristics and performing post-processed orbit determination studies in HEO. This paper presents the initial efforts to generate AO-40 navigation solutions from pseudorange data reconstructed from the TANS Vector code phase, as well as to generate a precise orbit solution for the AO-40 spacecraft using a batch filter.

Davis, George↗

NASA NTRS1982

Reconstruction of the 1st Space Shuttle (STS-1) entry trajectory

A discussion of the generation of the best estimate trajectory (BET) of the first Space Shuttle Orbiter entry flight is presented. The BET defines a time history of the state, attitude, and atmospheric relative parameters throughout the Shuttle entry from an altitude of approximately 183 km to rollout. The inertial parameters were estimated utilizing a weighted least squares batch filter algorithm. Spacecraft angular rate and acceleration data derived from the Inertial Measurement Unit were utilized to predict the state and attitude which was constrained in a weighted least squares process to fit external tracking data consisting of ground based S-band and C-band data. Refined spacecraft altitude and velocity during and post rollout were obtained by processing artificial altimeter and Doppler data. The BET generation process is discussed. Software and data interface discussions are included. The variables and coordinate systems utilized are defined. STS-1 mission peculiar inputs are summarized. A listing of the contents of the actual BET is provided.

Findlay, J. T.↗

NASA NTRS2024

A Floor in the Sun's Photospheric Magnetic Field: Implications for an Independent Small-scale Dynamo

Clette recently showed that F 10.7 systematically approaches a quiet Sun daily value of 67 solar flux units (sfu) at solar minima as the number of spotless days on the Sun increases. Previously, a floor of ∼2.8 nT had been proposed for the solar wind (SW) magnetic field strength (B). F 10.7 , which closely tracks the Sun's unsigned photospheric magnetic flux, and SW B exhibit different relationships to their floors at 11 yr solar minima during the last ∼50 yr. While F 10.7 approaches 67 sfu at each minimum, the corresponding SW B is offset above ∼2.8 nT by an amount approximately proportional to the solar polar field strength—which varied by a factor of ∼2.5 during this interval. This difference is substantiated by ∼130 yr of reconstructed F 10.7 (via the range of the diurnal variation of the East-component (rY) of the geomagnetic field) and SW B (based on the interdiurnal variability geomagnetic activity index). For the last ∼60 yr, the contribution of the slow SW to SW B has exhibited a floor-like behavior at ∼2 nT, in contrast to the contributions of coronal mass ejections and high-speed streams that vary with the solar cycle. These observations, as well as recent SW studies based on Parker Solar Probe and Solar Dynamics Observatory data, suggest that (1) the Sun has a small-scale turbulent dynamo that is independent of the 11 yr sunspot cycle; and (2) the small-scale magnetic fields generated by this nonvarying turbulent dynamo maintain a constant open flux carried to the heliosphere by the Sun's floor-like slow SW.

Solar magnetic fields↗

NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Towards Physics Guided Optical Flow for Tracking Atmospheric Motion

Atmospheric 3D winds in the horizontal and vertical directions are critical for improving short-range and long-range forecasting. Such advancement in forecasting directly applies to research in a number of areas including convective processes, wildfire plumes and tornado prediction. Atmospheric Motion Vectors (AMVs) provide a passively sensed approach to quantifying horizontal motion and cloud heights, which are typically sourced from geostationary sensors due to the availability of high frequency observations. Recent work has shown that estimating AMVs by tracking individual pixels with dense optical flow is a promising new direction. In this work, we use a state-of-the-art convolutional neural network for optical flow (FlowNetS) in a physics-guided deep learning framework for predicting AMVs in the horizontal direction. The approach is semi-supervised and uses physically informed wind vectors from high-resolution numerical simulations (DYAMOND) for supervised learning followed by fine-tuning though warping and reconstruction of full-disk geostationary images (GOES-16). In the vertical direction, we use labels from the CALIPSO low-earth orbit satellite to predict cloud height from 16-band geostationary images with a neural network. We present results for both tasks on held-out time periods and secondary datasets.

geostationary↗

NASA NTRS2013

Phylogenetic Conservatism in Plant Phenology

Phenological events defined points in the life cycle of a plant or animal have been regarded as highly plastic traits, reflecting flexible responses to various environmental cues. The ability of a species to track, via shifts in phenological events, the abiotic environment through time might dictate its vulnerability to future climate change. Understanding the predictors and drivers of phenological change is therefore critical. Here, we evaluated evidence for phylogenetic conservatism the tendency for closely related species to share similar ecological and biological attributes in phenological traits across flowering plants. We aggregated published and unpublished data on timing of first flower and first leaf, encompassing 4000 species at 23 sites across the Northern Hemisphere. We reconstructed the phylogeny for the set of included species, first, using the software program Phylomatic, and second, from DNA data. We then quantified phylogenetic conservatism in plant phenology within and across sites. We show that more closely related species tend to flower and leaf at similar times. By contrasting mean flowering times within and across sites, however, we illustrate that it is not the time of year that is conserved, but rather the phenological responses to a common set of abiotic cues. Our findings suggest that species cannot be treated as statistically independent when modelling phenological responses.Closely related species tend to resemble each other in the timing of their life-history events, a likely product of evolutionarily conserved responses to environmental cues. The search for the underlying drivers of phenology must therefore account for species' shared evolutionary histories.

phylogenetic conservatism↗

NASA NTRS2021

Mars 2020 Perseverance trajectory reconstruction and performance from launch through landing

The Mars 2020 (M2020) Mission carrying Perseverance, the most advanced rover ever sent to Mars, successfully launched on an Atlas V 541 (AV-088) launch vehicle from the Eastern Test Range (ETR) at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station (CCAFS) in Florida at 11:50:00 UTC (T-Zero time) on July 30, 2020. After some station reconfiguration, carrier/telemetry were locked at both Deep Space Network (DSN) Canberra and Goldstone stations. Perseverance entered the Martian atmosphere at 20:36:50 Spacecraft Event Time (SCET) UTC, and landed inside Jezero Crater at 20:43:49 SCET UTC on February 18, 2021. Confirmation of nominal landing was received at the DSN Goldstone and Madrid tracking stations via the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter at 20:55:11 Earth Received Time (ERT) UTC. This paper summarizes in detail the actual vs. predicted performance in terms of launch vehicle events, launch vehicle injection performance, actual DSN spacecraft lockup, trajectory correction maneuver performance, Entry, Descent, and Landing events, and overall trajectory and geometric characteristics.

Abilleira, Fernando↗

NASA NTRS2021

Mars 2020 Perseverance Trajectory Reconstruction and Performance from Launch through Landing

Wong, Mau↗

NASA NTRS2013

Aerodynamic Stability and Performance of Next-Generation Parachutes for Mars Descent

The Low Density Supersonic Decelerator Project is developing a next-generation supersonic parachute for use on future Mars missions. In order to determine the new parachute configuration, a wind tunnel test was conducted at the National Full-scale Aerodynamics Complex 80- by 120-foot Wind Tunnel at the NASA Ames Research Center. The goal of the wind tunnel test was to quantitatively determine the aerodynamic stability and performance of various canopy configurations in order to help select the design to be flown on the Supersonic Flight Dynamics tests. Parachute configurations included the diskgap- band, ringsail, and ringsail-variant designs referred to as a disksail and starsail. During the wind tunnel test, digital cameras captured synchronized image streams of the parachute from three directions. Stereo hotogrammetric processing was performed on the image data to track the position of the vent of the canopy throughout each run. The position data were processed to determine the geometric angular history of the parachute, which were then used to calculate the total angle of attack and its derivatives at each instant in time. Static and dynamic moment coefficients were extracted from these data using a parameter estimation method involving the one-dimensional equation of motion for a rotation of parachute. The coefficients were calculated over all of the available canopy states to reconstruct moment coefficient curves as a function of total angle of attack. From the stability curves, useful metrics such as the trim total angle of attack and pitch stiffness at the trim angle could be determined. These stability metrics were assessed in the context of the parachute's drag load and geometric porosity. While there was generally an inverse relationship between the drag load and the stability of the canopy, the data showed that it was possible to obtain similar stability properties as the disk-gap-band with slightly higher drag loads by appropriately tailoring the geometric porosity distribution.

Low Density Supersonic Decelerator (LDSD)↗

NASA NTRS2000

Shipboard Sunphotometer Measurements of Aerosol Optical Depth Spectra and Columnar Water Vapor During ACE-2 and Comparison with Selected Land, Ship, Aircraft, and Satellite Measurements

Analyses of aerosol optical depth (AOD) and colurnmn water vapor (CWV) measurements acquired with NASA Ames Research Center's 6-channel Airborne Tracking Sunphotometer (AATS-6) operated aboard the R/V Professor Vodyanitskiy during the 2nd Aerosol Characterization Experiment (ACE-2) are discussed. Data are compared with various in situ and remote measurements for selected cases. The focus is on 10 July, when the Pelican airplane flew within 70 km of the ship near the time of a NOAA-14/AVHRR satellite overpass and AOD measurements with the 14-channel Ames Airborne Tracking Sunphotometer (AATS-14) above the marine boundary layer (MBL) permitted calculation of AOD within the MBL from the AATS-6 measurements. A detailed column closure test is performed for MBL AOD on 10 July by comparing the AATS-6 MBL AODs with corresponding values calculated by combining shipboard particle size distribution measurements with models of hygroscopic growth and radiosonde humidity profiles (plus assumptions on the vertical profile of the dry particle size distribution and composition). Large differences (30-80% in the mid-visible) between measured and reconstructed AODs are obtained, in large part because of the high sensitivity of the closure methodology to hygroscopic growth models, which vary considerably and have not been validated over the necessary range of particle size/composition distributions. The wavelength dependence of AATS-6 AODs is compared with the corresponding dependence of aerosol extinction calculated from shipboard measurements of aerosol size distribution and of total scattering mearured by a shipboard integrating nephelometer for several days. Results are highly variable, illustrating further the great difficulty of deriving column values from point measurements. AATS-6 CWV values are shown to agree well with corresponding values derived from radiosonde measurements during 8 soundings on 7 days and also with values calculated from measurements taken on 10 July with the AATS-14 and the University of Washington Passive Humidigraph aboard the Pelican.

Livingston, John M.↗

NASA NTRS2000

Shipboard Sunphotometer Measurements of Aerosol Optical Depth Spectra and Columnar Water Vapor During ACE-2, and Comparison with Selected Land, Ship, Aircraft, and Satellite Measurements

Analyses of aerosol optical depth (AOD) and columnar water vapor (CWV) measurements acquired with NASA Ames Research Center's six-channel Airborne Tracking Sunphotometer (AATS-6) operated aboard the R/V (research vehicle) Professor Vodyanitskiy during the second Aerosol Characterization Experiment (ACE-2) are discussed. Data are compared with various in situ and remote measurements for selected cases. The focus is on 10 July, when the Pelican airplane flew within 70 km of the ship near the time of a NOAA (National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration)-14/AVHRR (Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer) satellite overpass and AOD measurements with the 14-channel Ames Airborne Tracking Sunphotometer (AATS-14) above the marine boundary layer (MBL) permitted calculation of AOD within the MBL from the AATS-6 measurements. A detailed column closure test is performed for MBL AOD on 10 July by comparing the AATS-6 MBL AODs with corresponding values calculated by combining shipboard particle size distribution measurements with models of hygroscopic growth and radiosonde humidity profiles (plus assumptions on the vertical profile of the dry particle size distribution and composition). Large differences (30-80% in the mid-visible) between measured and reconstructed AODs are obtained, in large part because of the high sensitivity of the closure methodology to hygroscopic growth models, which vary considerably and have not been validated over the necessary range of particle size/composition distributions. The wavelength dependence of AATS-6 AODs is compared with the corresponding dependence of aerosol extinction calculated from shipboard measurements of aerosol size distribution and of total scattering measured by a shipboard integrating nephelometer for several days. Results are highly variable, illustrating further the great difficulty of deriving column values from point measurements. AATS-6 CWV values are shown to agree well with corresponding values derived from radiosonde measurements during eight soundings on seven days and also with values calculated from measurements taken on 10 July with the AATS-14 and the University of Washington Passive Humidigraph aboard the Pelican.

Livingston, John M.↗