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Casas, Joseph

Publications and source records attributed to Casas, Joseph.

At least 19 records
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS2017

The Scintillation Prediction Observations Research Task (SPORT): an International Science Mission Using a Cubesat

The Scintillation Prediction Observations Research Task (SPORT) is a 6U CubeSat mission to address the compelling but difficult problem of understanding the preconditions leading to equatorial plasma bubbles. The scientific literature describes the preconditions in both the plasma drifts and the density profiles related to bubble formations that occur several hours later in the evening. Most of the scientific discovery has resulted from observations at a single site, within a single longitude sector, from Jicamarca, Peru. SPORT will provide a systematic study of the state of the pre-bubble conditions at all longitudes sectors to enhance understanding between geography and magnetic geometry. SPORT is an international partnership between National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the Brazilian National Institute for Space Research (INPE), and the Technical Aeronautics Institute under the Brazilian Air Force Command Department (DCTA/ITA), and encouraged by U.S. Southern Command. This talk will present an overview of the SPORT mission, observation strategy, and science objectives to improve predictions of ionospheric disturbances that affect radio propagation of telecommunication signals. The science goals will be accomplished by a unique combination of satellite observations from a nearly circular middle inclination orbit and the extensive operation of ground based observations from South America near the magnetic equator.

Scintillation Prediction Observations↗
NASA NTRS2017

The Importance of Earth Observations and Data Collaboration within Environmental Intelligence Supporting Arctic Research

Within the IARPC Collaboration Team activities of 2016, Arctic in-situ and remote earth observations advanced topics such as :1) exploring the role for new and innovative autonomous observing technologies in the Arctic; 2) advancing catalytic national and international community based observing efforts in support of the National Strategy for the Arctic Region; and 3) enhancing the use of discovery tools for observing system collaboration such as the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Arctic Environmental Response Management Application (ERMA) and the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Arctic Collaborative Environment (ACE) project geo reference visualization decision support and exploitation internet based tools. Critical to the success of these earth observations for both in-situ and remote systems is the emerging of new and innovative data collection technologies and comprehensive modeling as well as enhanced communications and cyber infrastructure capabilities which effectively assimilate and dissemination many environmental intelligence products in a timely manner. The Arctic Collaborative Environment (ACE) project is well positioned to greatly enhance user capabilities for accessing, organizing, visualizing, sharing and producing collaborative knowledge for the Arctic.

Casas, Joseph↗
NASA NTRS2017

The Scintillation Prediction Observations Research Task (SPORT) Mission

SPORT is a science mission using a 6U CubeSat and integrated ground network that will (1) advance understanding and (2) enable improved predictions of scintillation occurrence that impact GPS signals and radio communications. This is the science of Space Weather. SPORT is an international partnership with NASA, U.S. institutions, the Brazilian National Institute for Space Research (INPE), and the Technical Aeronautics Institute under the Brazilian Air Force Command Department (DCTA/ITA).

SPORT↗
NASA NTRS2015

Tactically Extensible and Modular Communications - X-Band TEMCOM-X

This paper will discuss a proposed CubeSat size (3U) telemetry system concept being developed at Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) in cooperation with the U.S. Department of the Army and Dynetics Corporation. This telemetry system incorporates efficient, high-bandwidth communications by developing flight-ready, low-cost, Protoflight software defined radio (SDR) and Electronically Steerable Patch Array (ESPA) antenna subsystems for use on platforms as small as CubeSats and unmanned aircraft systems (UASs). The current telemetry system is slightly larger in dimension of footprint than required to fit within a 0.5U CubeSat volume. Extensible and modular communications for CubeSat technologies will partially mitigate current capability gaps between traditional strategic space platforms and lower-cost small satellite solutions. Higher bandwidth capacity will enable high-volume, low error-rate data transfer to and from tactical forces or sensors operating in austere locations (e.g., direct imagery download, unattended ground sensor data exfiltration, interlink communications), while also providing additional bandwidth and error correction margin to accommodate more complex encryption algorithms and higher user volume.

Sims, William Herbert↗
NASA NTRS2015

The Use of Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGA) in Small Satellite Communication Systems

This paper will describe the use of digital Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGA) to contribute to advancing the state-of-the-art in software defined radio (SDR) transponder design for the emerging SmallSat and CubeSat industry and to provide advances for NASA as described in the TAO5 Communication and Navigation Roadmap (Ref 4). The use of software defined radios (SDR) has been around for a long time. A typical implementation of the SDR is to use a processor and write software to implement all the functions of filtering, carrier recovery, error correction, framing etc. Even with modern high speed and low power digital signal processors, high speed memories, and efficient coding, the compute intensive nature of digital filters, error correcting and other algorithms is too much for modern processors to get efficient use of the available bandwidth to the ground. By using FPGAs, these compute intensive tasks can be done in parallel, pipelined fashion and more efficiently use every clock cycle to significantly increase throughput while maintaining low power. These methods will implement digital radios with significant data rates in the X and Ka bands. Using these state-of-the-art technologies, unprecedented uplink and downlink capabilities can be achieved in a 1/2 U sized telemetry system. Additionally, modern FPGAs have embedded processing systems, such as ARM cores, integrated inside the FPGA allowing mundane tasks such as parameter commanding to occur easily and flexibly. Potential partners include other NASA centers, industry and the DOD. These assets are associated with small satellite demonstration flights, LEO and deep space applications. MSFC currently has an SDR transponder test-bed using Hardware-in-the-Loop techniques to evaluate and improve SDR technologies.

Varnavas, Kosta↗
NASA NTRS2013

The Arctic Regional Communications Small SATellite (ARCSAT)

Traditional satellite missions are extremely complex and expensive to design, build, test, launch and operate. Consequently many complementary operational, exploration and research satellite missions are being formulated as a growing part of the future space community capabilities using formations of small, distributed, simple to launch and inexpensive highly capable small scale satellites. The Arctic Regional Communications small SATellite (ARCSAT) initiative would launch a Mini-Satellite "Mothership" into Polar or Sun Sync low-earth-orbit (LEO). Once on orbit, the Mothership would perform orbital insertion of four internally stored independently maneuverable nanosatellites, each containing electronically steerable antennas and reconfigurable software-defined radios. Unlike the traditional geostationary larger complex satellite communication systems, this LEO communications system will be comprised of initially a five small satellite formation that can be later incrementally increased in the total number of satellites for additional data coverage. ARCSAT will provide significant enabling capabilities in the Arctic for autonomous voice and data communications relay, Maritime Domain Awareness (MDA), data-extraction from unattended sensors, and terrestrial Search & Rescue (SAR) beacon detection missions throughout the "data starved desert" of the Arctic Region.

Casas, Joseph↗
NASA NTRS2012

FASTSAT a Mini-Satellite Mission...A Way Ahead

The Fast Affordable Science and Technology Spacecraft (FASTSAT) is a mini-satellite weighing less than 150 kg. FASTSAT was developed as government-industry collaborative research and development flight project targeting rapid access to space to provide an alternative, low cost platform for a variety of scientific, research, and technology payloads. The initial spacecraft was designed to carry six instruments and launch as a secondary rideshare payload. This design approach greatly reduced overall mission costs while maximizing the on-board payload accommodations. FASTSAT was designed from the ground up to meet a challenging short schedule using modular components with a flexible, configurable layout to enable a broad range of payloads at a lower cost and shorter timeline than scaling down a more complex spacecraft. The integrated spacecraft along with its payloads were readied for launch 15 months from authority to proceed. As an ESPA-class spacecraft, FASTSAT is compatible with many different launch vehicles, including Minotaur I, Minotaur IV, Delta IV, Atlas V, Pegasus, Falcon 1/1e, and Falcon 9. These vehicles offer an array of options for launch sites and provide for a variety of rideshare possibilities.

Boudreaux, Mark↗
NASA NTRS2011

Inside NanoSail-D: A Tiny Satellite with Big Ideas

"Small But Mighty" certainly describes the NanoSail-D experiment and mission. Its unique goals and designs were simple, but the implications of this technology are far reaching. From a tiny 3U CubeSat, NanoSail-D deployed a 10 square meter solar sail. This was the first sail vehicle to orbit the earth and was only the second time a sail was unfurled in space. The NanoSail-D team included: two NASA centers, Marshall and Ames, the universities of Alabama in Huntsville and Santa Clara in California, the Air Force Research Laboratory and many contractors including NeXolve, Gray Research and several others. The collaborative nature was imperative to the success of this project. In addition, the Army Space and Missile Defense Command, the Von Braun Center for Science and Innovation and Dynetics Inc. jointly sponsored the NanoSail-D project. This paper presents in-depth insight into the NanoSail-D development. Its design was a combination of left over space hardware coupled with cutting edge technology. Since this NanoSail-D mission was different from the first, several modifications were necessary for the second NanoSail-D unit. Unforeseen problems arose during refurbishment of the second unit and the team had to overcome these obstacles. Simple interfaces, clear responsibilities and division of effort allowed the team members to work independently on the common goal. This endeavor formed working relationships lasting well beyond the end of this mission. NanoSail-D pushed the technology envelop with future applications for all classes of satellites. NanoSail-D is truly a small but mighty satellite, which may cast a very big shadow for years to come.

Alhorn, Dean C.↗