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Underwood, Mark

Publications and source records attributed to Underwood, Mark.

9 records
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS2017

Leveraging Heritage on the Mars 2020 Project

NASA’s Mars 2020 mission is charged with responding to the highest priority objectives of the 2011 planetary sciences decadal survey, conducting extensive in-situ science on the surface of the Red Planet, and carrying important cross-agency human precursor technologies. The mission concept was predicated on and enabled by leveraging the Curiosity rover engineering design, successful Sky Crane landing systems, and other elements from the Mars Science Laboratory project into a new mission with new payload elements. High-heritage paradigms are unusual for flagship science missions and can be difficult to execute as the realities of spacecraft development intervene. However the project has had good success to-date from concept through formulation and into early implementation. This paper will describe the general approaches developed and used by the Mars 2020 Project team at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL).

Wallace, Matthew↗
NASA NTRS2013

NASA's Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP) Observatory

The SMAP mission will produce high-resolution and accurate global maps of soil moisture and its freeze/thaw state using data from a non-imaging synthetic aperture radar and a radiometer, both operating at L-band.

Kellogg, Kent↗
NASA NTRS2007

JPL Power Systems for Current Planned Missions

The viewgraph presentation includes fact sheets, instrument lists, and mission parameters for 13 future missions. Those missions include Moon Mineralogy Mapping (MMM), Space Interferometry Mission (SIM), New Millennium--Space Technology-8 (ST-8), Ocean Salinity Mapping Orbiter (Aquarius), Ocean Surface Topology Mission (OSTM), Asteroid Rendezvous Mission-SEP (Dawn), Mars Scout Lander Mission (Phoenix), Solar Powered Jupiter Orbiter (Juno), Earth orbiting carbon observatory (OCO), planet finder observatory (Kepler), far infrared/sub-millimeter telescope (Hershel), Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE), and Mars Science Laboratory-Rover (MSL). The presentation also contains a table of current missions and instruments.

Phoenix↗
NASA NTRS2004

Genesis failure investigation report : JPL Failure Review Board, Avionics Sub-Team

On January 7, 2001, the Genesis spacecraft lifted off from Cape Canaveral. Its mission was to collect solar wind samples and return those samples to Earth for detailed analysis by scientists. The mission proceeded successfully for three-and-a-half years. On September 8, 2004, the spacecraft approached Earth, pointed the Sample Return Capsule (SRC) at its entry target, and then fired pyros that jettisoned the SRC. The SRC carried the valuable samples collected over the prior 29 months. The SRC also contained the requisite hardware (mechanisms, parachutes, and electronics) to manage the process of entry, descent, and landing (EDL). After entering Earthas atmosphere, the SRC was expected to open a drogue parachute. This should have been followed by a pyro event to release the drogue chute, and then by a pyro event to deploy the main parachute at an approximate elevation of 6.7 kilometers. As the SRC descended to the Utah landing site, helicopters were in position to capture the SRC before the capsule touched down. On September 8, 2004, observers of the SRCas triumphant return became concerned as the NASA announcer fell silent, and then became even more alarmed as they watched the spacecraft tumble as it streaked across the sky. Long-distance cameras clearly showed that the drogue parachute had not deployed properly. On September 9, 2004, General Eugene Tattini, Deputy Director of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory formed a Failure Review Board (FRB). This board was charged with investigating the cause of the Genesis mishap in close concert with the NASA Mishap Investigation Board (MIB). The JPL-FRB was populated with experts from within and external to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. The JPL-FRB participated with the NASA-MIB through all phases of the investigation, working jointly and concurrently as one team to discover the facts of the mishap.

solar wind↗
NASA NTRS1996

Improved Synthesis Of Potassium Beta' '-Alumina

Improved formulations of precursor materials synthesize nearly-phase-pure potassium beta' '-alumina solid electrolyte (K-BASE) powder. Materials are microhomogeneous powders (or, alternatively, gels) containing K(+,) Mg(2+), and Al(3+). K-BASE powder produced used in potassium-working-fluid alkali-metal thermal-to-electric conversion (K-AMTEC), in which heat-input and heat-rejection temperatures lower than sodium-working-fluid AMTEC (Na-AMTEC). Additional potential use lies in purification of pottassium by removal of sodium and calcium.

Williams, Roger M.↗
NASA NTRS1996

The New Millenium Program Microelectronics Systems Advanced Technology Development

Describes the New Millenium Program, including the scope of the Microelectronics Systems IPDT as well as its current membership. Also summarizes the results of the IPDT technology roadmapping process. They describe the technologies selected as well as the avionics architecture chosen for validation of the first NMP spacecraft, to be launched inJauary 1998.

new↗
NASA NTRS1993

The computation of supersonic combustor flows using multi-computers

An explicit CFD computer code with parallel processing is developed for the purpose of simulating internal high-speed reacting flows. The code solves the 3D Navier-Stokes equations for compressible flows. Preliminary results indicate that parallel processing should solve the resource and speed shortages presently encountered with sequential computers for problems of interest.

Underwood, Mark↗