Engineering Papers⌕ Search

SEARCH · Engineering Papers

Results for “filter optimization”

Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

Quote a phrase for an exact phrase match. Source license links do not imply unrestricted reuse.

At least 163 records · Page 9

An Explicit Linear Filtering Solution for the Optimization of Guidance Systems with Statistical Inputs

The determination of optimum filtering characteristics for guidance system design is generally a tedious process which cannot usually be carried out in general terms. In this report a simple explicit solution is given which is applicable to many different types of problems. It is shown to be applicable to problems which involve optimization of constant-coefficient guidance systems and time-varying homing type systems for several stationary and nonstationary inputs. The solution is also applicable to off-design performance, that is, the evaluation of system performance for inputs for which the system was not specifically optimized. The solution is given in generalized form in terms of the minimum theoretical error, the optimum transfer functions, and the optimum transient response. The effects of input signal, contaminating noise, and limitations on the response are included. From the results given, it is possible in an interception problem, for example, to rapidly assess the effects on minimum theoretical error of such factors as target noise and missile acceleration. It is also possible to answer important questions regarding the effect of type of target maneuver on optimum performance.

Stewart, Elwood C.↗

Optimal interpolation and the Kalman filter

The estimation theory of stochastic-dynamic systems is described and used in a numerical study of optimal interpolation. The general form of data assimilation methods is reviewed. The Kalman-Bucy, KB filter, and optimal interpolation (OI) filters are examined for effectiveness in performance as gain matrices using a one-dimensional form of the shallow-water equations. Control runs in the numerical analyses were performed for a ten-day forecast in concert with the OI method. The effects of optimality, initialization, and assimilation were studied. It was found that correct initialization is necessary in order to localize errors, especially near boundary points. Also, the use of small forecast error growth rates over data-sparse areas was determined to offset inaccurate modeling of correlation functions near boundaries.

Cohn, S.↗

Improving reproducibility in synchrotron tomography using implementation-adapted filters

For reconstructing large tomographic datasets fast, filtered backprojection-type or Fourier-based algorithms are still the method of choice, as they have been for decades. These robust and computationally efficient algorithms have been integrated in a broad range of software packages. The continuous mathematical formulas used for image reconstruction in such algorithms are unambiguous. However, variations in discretization and interpolation result in quantitative differences between reconstructed images, and corresponding segmentations, obtained from different software. This hinders reproducibility of experimental results, making it difficult to ensure that results and conclusions from experiments can be reproduced at different facilities or using different software. In this paper, a way to reduce such differences by optimizing the filter used in analytical algorithms is proposed. These filters can be computed using a wrapper routine around a black-box implementation of a reconstruction algorithm, and lead to quantitatively similar reconstructions. Use cases for this approach are demonstrated by computing implementation-adapted filters for several open-source implementations and applying them to simulated phantoms and real-world data acquired at the synchrotron. Our contribution to a reproducible reconstruction step forms a building block towards a fully reproducible synchrotron tomography data processing pipeline.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗

Application of Statistical Filter Theory to the Optimal Estimation of Position and Velocity on Board a Circumlunar Vehicle

Concepts from statistical filter theory are applied to the problem of in-flight determination of the position and velocity of a space vehicle for the purposes of midcourse guidance. The source of information is assumed to be an arbitrary sequence of measurements of any desired set of "observables" (e.g., space angles), the measurements being corrupted by additive errors so that the position and velocity are never known perfectly. A state transition approach is employed which leads naturally to a computational scheme that is readily implemented by a digital computer. The scheme can be regarded as a dynamical time-varying filter which weights the incoming observations in an optimal sense for use in producing an up-to-date optimal estimate of position and velocity. The advantages of the scheme are (1) it provides the best possible estimate (minimum error) based upon ensemble statistics of injection conditions and measurement errors; (2) it is extremely versatile, not requiring adherence to a predetermined observation schedule or reference trajectory; and (3) the computations are sufficiently simple to be practical in an on-board computer. A digital computer simulation of the proposed system is employed to demonstrate the feasibility of an all on-board system and to illustrate the performance attainable in a hypothetical physical situation.

SPACE VEHICLE↗

Application of Statistical Filter Theory to the Optimal Estimation of Position and Velocity on Board a Circumlunar Vehicle

Statistical filter theory is employed to develop a method for determining the best possible estimate of the position and velocity of a space vehicle in the midcourse phase of flight. Results of a computer simulation are given to illustrate the performance attainable. An on-board system is visualized in which the source of information is an arbitrary sequence of observations of space angles, corrupted by measurement errors. The scheme is in effect a dynamical time-varying filter, implemented by a digital computer, which processes the incoming data to compute an up-to-date optimal estimate of position and velocity.

Smith, Gerald L.↗

Signal Analysis of Helicopter Blade-Vortex-Interaction Acoustic Noise Data

Blade-Vortex-Interaction (BVI) produces annoying high-intensity impulsive noise. NASA Ames collected several sets of BVI noise data during in-flight and wind tunnel tests. The goal of this work is to extract the essential features of the BVI signals from the in-flight data and examine the feasibility of extracting those features from BVI noise recorded inside a large wind tunnel. BVI noise generating mechanisms and BVI radiation patterns an are considered and a simple mathematical-physical model is presented. It allows the construction of simple synthetic BVI events that are comparable to free flight data. The boundary effects of the wind tunnel floor and ceiling are identified and more complex synthetic BVI events are constructed to account for features observed in the wind tunnel data. It is demonstrated that improved recording of BVI events can be attained by changing the geometry of the rotor hub, floor, ceiling and microphone. The Euclidean distance measure is used to align BVI events from each blade and improved BVI signals are obtained by time-domain averaging the aligned data. The differences between BVI events for individual blades are then apparent. Removal of wind tunnel background noise by optimal Wiener-filtering is shown to be effective provided representative noise-only data have been recorded. Elimination of wind tunnel reflections by cepstral and optimal filtering deconvolution is examined. It is seen that the cepstral method is not applicable but that a pragmatic optimal filtering approach gives encouraging results. Recommendations for further work include: altering measurement geometry, real-time data observation and evaluation, examining reflection signals (particularly those from the ceiling) and performing further analysis of expected BVI signals for flight conditions of interest so that microphone placement can be optimized for each condition.

Rogers, James C.↗

Flight data results of estimate fusion for spacecraft rendezvous navigation from shuttle mission STS-69

A recently developed rendezvous navigation fusion filter that optimally exploits existing distributed filters for rendezvous and GPS navigation to achieve the relative and inertial state accuracies of both in a global solution is utilized here to process actual flight data. Space Shuttle Mission STS-69 was the first mission to date which gathered data from both the rendezvous and Global Positioning System filters allowing, for the first time, a test of the fusion algorithm with real flight data. Furthermore, a precise best estimate of trajectory is available for portions of STS-69, making possible a check on the performance of the fusion filter. In order to successfully carry out this experiment with flight data, two extensions to the existing scheme were necessary: a fusion edit test based on differences between the filter state vectors, and an underweighting scheme to accommodate the suboptimal perfect target assumption made by the Shuttle rendezvous filter. With these innovations, the flight data was successfully fused from playbacks of downlinked and/or recorded measurement data through ground analysis versions of the Shuttle rendezvous filter and a GPS filter developed for another experiment. The fusion results agree with the best estimate of trajectory at approximately the levels of uncertainty expected from the fusion filter's covariance matrix.

Carpenter, J. Russell↗

Kalman Filter Constraint Tuning for Turbofan Engine Health Estimation

Kalman filters are often used to estimate the state variables of a dynamic system. However, in the application of Kalman filters some known signal information is often either ignored or dealt with heuristically. For instance, state variable constraints are often neglected because they do not fit easily into the structure of the Kalman filter. Recently published work has shown a new method for incorporating state variable inequality constraints in the Kalman filter, which has been shown to generally improve the filter s estimation accuracy. However, the incorporation of inequality constraints poses some risk to the estimation accuracy as the Kalman filter is theoretically optimal. This paper proposes a way to tune the filter constraints so that the state estimates follow the unconstrained (theoretically optimal) filter when the confidence in the unconstrained filter is high. When confidence in the unconstrained filter is not so high, then we use our heuristic knowledge to constrain the state estimates. The confidence measure is based on the agreement of measurement residuals with their theoretical values. The algorithm is demonstrated on a linearized simulation of a turbofan engine to estimate engine health.

Simon, Dan↗

Optimal washout for control of a moving base simulator

A general form of an optimal washout filter is derived using state-space linear optimal control theory, and this is applied to the design of washout filters of various types of moving base motion simulators, including the NASA's vertical motion simulator. Attention is given to the linear elements of a washout filter. One of the nonlinearities considered is braking which may be required near the end of the simulator excursion to prevent a crash. Although the general form of the optimal washout filter is applicable to time-variant system, the applications analyzed in the study are restricted to time-invariant cases.

Kurosaki, M.↗

Two examples of applications of Kalman filtering to integrated systems of navigation

Two applications of optimal stochastic filters to navigation systems are described. The first is an air navigation system consisting of an inertial device (INS) and a Loran, plus an altimeter. The second is an application to a system of submarine navigation consisting of an inertial device (SINS) and an Omega plus a depth sensor.

Ferraro, A.↗

Applying Particle Swarm Optimization and Extended Kalman Filtering to Model Kaplan Generation Dynamics for Hydropower Systems

Variable renewable generation is increasing the need for hydropower plants to provide fast and flexible grid support, which places new demands on plant-level dynamic models used for monitoring, control, and operational decision-making. This need is especially important for hydroelectric systems, where turbine and generator dynamics are strongly coupled, nonlinear, and time-varying, making accurate real-time representation difficult. To address this problem, this paper develops a digital twin (DT) framework for a synchronous generator–Kaplan turbine system using an explicit separation of slow turbine dynamics and fast generator dynamics. The turbine subsystem is represented by a six-coefficient model, whose parameters are identified offline using particle swarm optimization, while the generator subsystem is updated online through an extended Kalman filter for real-time state and parameter estimation. These models are integrated within a closed-loop simulation that includes a proportional–integral–derivative–double-derivative governor and excitation system, allowing the DT to track plant behavior under realistic operating conditions. Unlike prior studies that treat turbine and generator modeling separately or rely mainly on simulated inputs, the proposed framework is validated using real operational data from a hydropower plant. Results show that the DT reproduces terminal voltage, active power, and reactive power with a normalized root mean square error of approximately 5%. This hybrid offline–online formulation constitutes the main contribution of the work, providing an adaptive and practically deployable DT for hydropower systems with direct relevance to control improvement, performance monitoring, and grid-support applications under high renewable penetration.

13 HYDRO ENERGY↗

Computation of maximum gust loads in nonlinear aircraft using a new method based on the matched filter approach and numerical optimization

Time-correlated gust loads are time histories of two or more load quantities due to the same disturbance time history. Time correlation provides knowledge of the value (magnitude and sign) of one load when another is maximum. At least two analysis methods have been identified that are capable of computing maximized time-correlated gust loads for linear aircraft. Both methods solve for the unit-energy gust profile (gust velocity as a function of time) that produces the maximum load at a given location on a linear airplane. Time-correlated gust loads are obtained by re-applying this gust profile to the airplane and computing multiple simultaneous load responses. Such time histories are physically realizable and may be applied to aircraft structures. Within the past several years there has been much interest in obtaining a practical analysis method which is capable of solving the analogous problem for nonlinear aircraft. Such an analysis method has been the focus of an international committee of gust loads specialists formed by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration and was the topic of a panel discussion at the Gust and Buffet Loads session at the 1989 SDM Conference in Mobile, Alabama. The kinds of nonlinearities common on modern transport aircraft are indicated. The Statical Discrete Gust method is capable of being, but so far has not been, applied to nonlinear aircraft. To make the method practical for nonlinear applications, a search procedure is essential. Another method is based on Matched Filter Theory and, in its current form, is applicable to linear systems only. The purpose here is to present the status of an attempt to extend the matched filter approach to nonlinear systems. The extension uses Matched Filter Theory as a starting point and then employs a constrained optimization algorithm to attack the nonlinear problem.

Pototzky, Anthony S.↗

Optimizing photonic ring-resonator filters for OH-suppressed near-infrared astronomy

Near-infrared wavelength observations are crucial for understanding numerous fields of astrophysics, such as supernova cosmology and positronium annihilation detection. However, current ground-based observations suffer from an enormous background due to OH emission in the upper atmosphere. One promising way to solve this problem is to use ring-resonator filters to suppress OH emission lines. Here, we discuss our optimization of ring-resonator filter performance from five perspectives: resonance wavelength matching, polarization-independent operation, low insertion loss, low-loss coupling to astronomical instruments, and broadband operation. In the end, we discuss next steps needed for reliable supernova and positronium observations, thus providing a roadmap for future advances in near-infrared astronomy.

42 ENGINEERING↗

Wiener filtering of the COBE Differential Microwave Radiometer data

We derive an optimal linear filter to suppress the noise from the cosmic background explorer satellite (COBE) Differential Microwave Radiometer (DMR) sky maps for a given power spectrum. We then apply the filter to the first-year DMR data, after removing pixels within 20 deg of the Galactic plane from the data. We are able to identify particular hot and cold spots in the filtered maps at a level 2 to 3 times the noise level. We use the formalism of constrained realizations of Gaussian random fields to assess the uncertainty in the filtered sky maps. In addition to improving the signal-to-noise ratio of the map as a whole, these techniques allow us to recover some information about the cosmic microwave background anisotropy in the missing Galactic plane region. From these maps we are able to determine which hot and cold spots in the data are statistically significant, and which may have been produced by noise. In addition, the filtered maps can be used for comparison with other experiments on similar angular scales.

Bunn, Emory F.↗