A Target Class Ligandability Evaluation of WD40 Repeat-Containing Proteins
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Engineering topics
Publications and source records attributed to Thompson, James.
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Carbon-Carbon Advanced Technologies, Inc. (C-CAT), has developed a high-melt coating for use in nozzle extensions in next-generation spacecraft. The coating is composed primarily of carbon-carbon, a carbon-fiber and carbon-matrix composite material that has gained a spaceworthy reputation due to its ability to withstand ultrahigh temperatures. C-CAT's high-melt coating embeds hafnium carbide (HfC) and zirconium diboride (ZrB2) within the outer layers of a carbon-carbon structure. The coating demonstrated enhanced high-temperature durability and suffered no erosion during a test in NASA's Arc Jet Complex. (Test parameters: stagnation heat flux=198 BTD/sq ft-sec; pressure=.265 atm; temperature=3,100 F; four cycles totaling 28 minutes) In Phase I of the project, C-CAT successfully demonstrated large-scale manufacturability with a 40-inch cylinder representing the end of a nozzle extension and a 16-inch flanged cylinder representing the attach flange of a nozzle extension. These demonstrators were manufactured without spalling or delaminations. In Phase II, C-CAT worked with engine designers to develop a nozzle extension stub skirt interfaced with an Aerojet Rocketdyne RL10 engine. All objectives for Phase II were successfully met. Additional nonengine applications for the coating include thermal protection systems (TPS) for next-generation spacecraft and hypersonic aircraft.
Carbon-carbon (C-C) composite nozzle extensions are of interest for use on a variety of launch vehicle upper stage engines and in-space propulsion systems. The C-C nozzle extension technology and test capabilities being developed are intended to support National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and United States Air Force (USAF) requirements, as well as broader industry needs. Recent and on-going efforts at the Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) are aimed at both (a) further developing the technology and databases for nozzle extensions fabricated from specific CC materials, and (b) developing and demonstrating low-cost capabilities for testing composite nozzle extensions. At present, materials development work is concentrating on developing a database for lyocell-based C-C that can be used for upper stage engine nozzle extension design, modeling, and analysis efforts. Lyocell-based C-C behaves in a manner similar to rayon-based CC, but does not have the environmental issues associated with the use of rayon. Future work will also further investigate technology and database gaps and needs for more-established polyacrylonitrile- (PAN-) based C-C's. As a low-cost means of being able to rapidly test and screen nozzle extension materials and structures, MSFC has recently established and demonstrated a test rig at MSFC's Test Stand (TS) 115 for testing subscale nozzle extensions with 3.5-inch inside diameters at the attachment plane. Test durations of up to 120 seconds have been demonstrated using oxygen/hydrogen propellants. Other propellant combinations, including the use of hydrocarbon fuels, can be used if desired. Another test capability being developed will allow the testing of larger nozzle extensions (13.5- inch inside diameters at the attachment plane) in environments more similar to those of actual oxygen/hydrogen upper stage engines. Two C-C nozzle extensions (one lyocell-based, one PAN-based) have been fabricated for testing with the larger-scale facility.
The Application Programming Interface (API) for the Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV) Aerodynamic Database has been developed to provide the developers of software an easily implemented, fully self-contained method of accessing the CEV Aerodynamic Database for use in their analysis and simulation tools. The API is programmed in C and provides a series of functions to interact with the database, such as initialization, selecting various options, and calculating the aerodynamic data. No special functions (file read/write, table lookup) are required on the host system other than those included with a standard ANSI C installation. It reads one or more files of aero data tables. Previous releases of aerodynamic databases for space vehicles have only included data tables and a document of the algorithm and equations to combine them for the total aerodynamic forces and moments. This process required each software tool to have a unique implementation of the database code. Errors or omissions in the documentation, or errors in the implementation, led to a lengthy and burdensome process of having to debug each instance of the code. Additionally, input file formats differ for each space vehicle simulation tool, requiring the aero database tables to be reformatted to meet the tool s input file structure requirements. Finally, the capabilities for built-in table lookup routines vary for each simulation tool. Implementation of a new database may require an update to and verification of the table lookup routines. This may be required if the number of dimensions of a data table exceeds the capability of the simulation tools built-in lookup routines. A single software solution was created to provide an aerodynamics software model that could be integrated into other simulation and analysis tools. The highly complex Orion aerodynamics model can then be quickly included in a wide variety of tools. The API code is written in ANSI C for ease of portability to a wide variety of systems. The input data files are in standard formatted ASCII, also for improved portability. The API contains its own implementation of multidimensional table reading and lookup routines. The same aerodynamics input file can be used without modification on all implementations. The turnaround time from aerodynamics model release to a working implementation is significantly reduced