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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.

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All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS1998

Flight Testing of an Airport Surface Guidance, Navigation, and Control System

This document describes operations associated with a set of flight experiments and demonstrations using a Boeing-757-200 (B-757) research aircraft as part of low visibility landing and surface operations (LVLASO) research activities. To support this experiment, the B-757 performed flight and taxi operations at the Hartsfield-Atlanta International Airport (ATL) in Atlanta, GA. The B-757 was equipped with experimental displays that were designed to provide flight crews with sufficient information to enable safe, expedient surface operations in any weather condition down to a runway visual range (RVR) of 300 feet. In addition to flight deck displays and supporting equipment onboard the B-757, there was also a ground-based component of the system that provided for ground controller inputs and surveillance of airport surface movements. The integrated ground and airborne components resulted in a system that has the potential to significantly improve the safety and efficiency of airport surface movements particularly as weather conditions deteriorate. Several advanced technologies were employed to show the validity of the operational concept at a major airport facility, to validate flight simulation findings, and to assess each of the individual technologies performance in an airport environment. Results show that while the maturity of some of the technologies does not permit immediate implementation, the operational concept is valid and the performance is more than adequate in many areas.

Young, Steven D.↗
NASA NTRS2012

GeoLab 2011: New Instruments and Operations Tested at Desert RATS

GeoLab is a geological laboratory and testbed designed for supporting geoscience activities during NASA's analog demonstrations. Scientists at NASA's Johnson Space Center built GeoLab as part of a technology project to aid the development of science operational concepts for future planetary surface missions [1, 2, 3]. It is integrated into NASA's Habitat Demonstration Unit, a first generation exploration habitat test article. As a prototype workstation, GeoLab provides a high fidelity working space for analog mission crewmembers to perform in-situ characterization of geologic samples and communicate their findings with supporting scientists. GeoLab analog operations can provide valuable data for assessing the operational and scientific considerations of surface-based geologic analyses such as preliminary examination of samples collected by astronaut crews [4, 5]. Our analog tests also feed into sample handling and advanced curation operational concepts and procedures that will, ultimately, help ensure that the most critical samples are collected during future exploration on a planetary surface, and aid decisions about sample prioritization, sample handling and return. Data from GeoLab operations also supports science planning during a mission by providing additional detailed geologic information to supporting scientists, helping them make informed decisions about strategies for subsequent sample collection opportunities.

Evans, Cindy A.↗
NASA NTRS2009

The Habitat Demonstration Unit Project

This paper will describe an overview of the NASA-led multi-center Habitat Demonstration Unit (HDU) Project. The HDU project is a technology-pull project that integrates technologies and innovations from numerous NASA centers. This project will be used to investigate and validate surface architectures, operations concepts, and requirements definition. The HDU project will be part of the 2010 Desert Research and Technologies Simulations (DRATS). The purpose of this project is to develop, integrate, test, and evaluate a HDU in the context of the mission architectures and surface operation concepts. This HDU is based on the Constellation Architecture Scenario 12.1 concept of a vertically oriented habitat module. A multi-center approach with be utilized to build, integrate, and test the HDU project through a shared collaborative effort of multiple NASA centers. This project is part of the strategic plan from the ESMD Directorate Integration Office (DIO) and the Lunar Surface Systems Project Office (LSSPO) to test surface elements in a surface analog environment which includes two Lunar Electric Rovers and the HDU during the 2010 analog field test. This paper will describe the overall objectives, its various configurations, strategic plan, and technology integration as it pertains to the 2010 and 2011 field analog tests.

Kennedy, Kriss J.↗
NASA NTRS1987

The Space Station overview

This paper is an overview of the Space Station status and activities being undertaken by NASA in cooperation with Canada, the European Space Agency and Japan. A review of the progress within the past year including user requirements, design baseline, operations concept and program planning is covered. Discussion of design decisions and recent changes in the management organization are highlighted. Of special importance is discussion of the Space Station utilization with focus on insuring that the design requirements are responsive to user needs and consistent with life cycle cost. A preliminary operations concept is explored, and options for evolving the Space Station identified.

Hodge, John D.↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Medicine in the Final Frontier Technologies to Enable Autonomous Prolonged (Field) Care in Space

N: The planning and execution of comprehensive “Prolonged Care” strategies are increasingly considered as fundamental operational concepts within the spheres of both military and non-military expeditionary medicine. Numerous advances in recent years have enabled the decentralization of health-related technology that has empowered medical - and even non-medical providers - to offer quality care farther afield and for increasingly extended periods of separation from traditional support structures. However, the operational concepts behind today’s Prolonged Care paradigms are still largely dependent upon external support, including high-bandwidth telemedicine communications technologies (that allow ready access to centralized expertise), robust resupply pathways, and ultimately, on the timely evacuation of the sick and injured. What would happen if none of these support systems were readily available? Extremely remote Prolonged Care is one of the most significant challenges that the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) faces when preparing to expand human space exploration beyond the International Space Station (ISS) to deep space including the Moon and Mars. Continuous human presence on the International Space Station (ISS) in low Earth orbit for the past 20 years has demonstrated that indeed medical operations can be successfully executed with continuous real-time communications, frequent resupply missions, and the availability of rapid evacuation options. However, as time-distance factors from Earth increase with our pursuit and changing focus towards deep space missions, these resources and capabilities will no longer be available. As a result, space medicine operations will need to become more autonomous and less dependent upon mission support from Earth – requiring our attention and efforts to build robust capabilities that support the ultimate expression of the term “Prolonged Field Care.”

K R Lehnhardt↗
NASA NTRS2013

Traffic Aware Strategic Aircrew Requests (TASAR) Concept of Operations

Aircrews submit trajectory change requests to air traffic control (ATC) to better achieve the operator's preferred business trajectory. Requests are currently made with limited information and are often denied because the change is not compatible with traffic. Also, request opportunities can be overlooked due to lack of automation that advises aircrews of trajectory changes that improve flight time, fuel burn, and other objectives. The Traffic Aware Strategic Aircrew Requests (TASAR) concept leverages Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B) surveillance information to advise the aircrew of beneficial trajectory changes that are probed for traffic compatibility prior to issuing the request to ATC. This document describes the features, benefits, and limitations of TASAR automation hosted on an Electronic Flight Bag. TASAR has two modes: (1) auto mode that continuously assesses opportunities for improving the performance of the flight and (2) manual mode that probes trajectory changes entered by aircrews for conflicts and performance objectives. The roles and procedures of the aircrew and ATC remain unchanged under TASAR.

Henderson, Jeffrey↗
NASA NTRS1992

Space Network Interoperability Panel (SNIP) study

The Space Network Interoperability Panel (SNIP) is described in terms of the panel's composition, purpose, history, and ongoing activities. SNIP is a consortium comprising NASA, ESA, and NASDA that is dedicated to the study of interoperability of the data-relay satellite (DRS) systems of the three groups. S-band and Ka-band interoperability are addressed by the SNIP study program by means of defining operations concepts, technical subjects, and other matters relevant to international DRS system compatibility. The potential users of the interoperability scheme are listed, cross-support techniques are described, and the load situations of the three agencies are characterized. A common 'interoperability frequency framework' is proposed, and both left-and right-hand circular polarization are incorporated to enhance flexibility and minimize interference. An operations concept is outlined based on these and other recommendations as developed by the international SNIP study.

Ryan, Thomas↗
NASA NTRS2004

Linking Satellites Via Earth "Hot Spots" and the Internet to Form Ad Hoc Constellations

As more assets are placed in orbit, opportunities emerge to combine various sets of satellites in temporary constellations to perform collaborative image collections. Often, new operations concepts for a satellite or set of satellites emerge after launch. To the degree with which new space assets can be inexpensively and rapidly integrated into temporary or "ad hoc" constellations, will determine whether these new ideas will be implemented or not. On the Earth Observing 1 (EO-1) satellite, a New Millennium Program mission, a number of experiments were conducted and are being conducted to demonstrate various aspects of an architecture that, when taken as a whole, will enable progressive mission autonomy. In particular, the target architecture will use adaptive ground antenna arrays to form, as close as possible, the equivalent of wireless access points for low earth orbiting satellites. Coupled with various ground and flight software and the Internet. the architecture enables progressive mission autonomy. Thus, new collaborative sensing techniques can be implemented post-launch. This paper will outline the overall operations concept and highlight details of both the research effort being conducted in <he area of adaptive antenna arrays and some of the related successful autonomy software that has been implemented using EO-1 and other operational satellites. Keywords: collaborative remote sensing smart antennas, adaptive antenna arrays, sensor webs. ad hoc constellations, mission autonomy and

Mandl, Dan↗
NASA NTRS2010

Human in the Loop Simulation Measures of Pilot Response Delay in a Self-Separation Concept of Operations

A human-in-the-loop (HITL) simulation experiment was conducted by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to assess airline transport pilots performance and reported acceptance of the use of procedures relying on airborne separation assistance and trajectory management tools. This study was part of a larger effort involving two NASA centers that includes multiple HITL experiments planned over the next few years to evaluate the use of automated separation assurance (SA) tools by both air traffic controllers and pilots. This paper presents results of measured pilot response delay that subject pilots incurred when interacting with cockpit tools for SA and discusses possible implications for future concept and procedures design.

Consiglio, Maria C.↗
NASA NTRS2016

Utilizing the ISS Mission as a Testbed to Develop Cognitive Communications Systems

The ISS provides an excellent opportunity for pioneering artificial intelligence software to meet the challenges of real-time communications (comm) link management. This opportunity empowers the ISS Program to forge a testbed for developing cognitive communications systems for the benefit of the ISS mission, manned Low Earth Orbit (LEO) science programs and future planetary exploration programs. In November, 1998, the Flight Operations Directorate (FOD) started the ISS Antenna Manager (IAM) project to develop a single processor supporting multiple comm satellite tracking for two different antenna systems. Further, the processor was developed to be highly adaptable as it supported the ISS mission through all assembly stages. The ISS mission mandated communications specialists with complete knowledge of when the ISS was about to lose or gain comm link service. The current specialty mandated cognizance of large sun-tracking solar arrays and thermal management panels in addition to the highly-dynamic satellite service schedules and rise/set tables. This mission requirement makes the ISS the ideal communications management analogue for future LEO space station and long-duration planetary exploration missions. Future missions, with their precision-pointed, dynamic, laser-based comm links, require complete autonomy for managing high-data rate communications systems. Development of cognitive communications management systems that permit any crew member or payload science specialist, regardless of experience level, to control communications is one of the greater benefits the ISS can offer new space exploration programs. The IAM project met a new mission requirement never previously levied against US space-born communications systems management: process and display the orientation of large solar arrays and thermal control panels based on real-time joint angle telemetry. However, IAM leaves the actual communications availability assessment to human judgment, which introduces unwanted variability because each specialist has a different core of experience with comm link performance. Because the ISS utilizes two different frequency bands, dynamic structure can be occasionally translucent at one frequency while it can completely interdict service at the other frequency. The impact of articulating structure on the comm link can depend on its orientation at the time it impinges on the link. It can become easy for a human specialist to cross-associate experience at one frequency with experience at the other frequency. Additionally, the specialist's experience is incremental, occurring one nine-hour shift at a time. Only the IAM processor experiences the complete 24x7x365 communications link performance for both communications links but, it has no "learning capability." If the IAM processor could be endowed with a cognitive ability to remember past structure-induced comm link outages, based on its knowledge of the ISS position, attitude, communications gear, array joint angles and tracking accuracy, it could convey such experience to the human operator. It could also use its learned communications link behaviors to accurately convey the availability of future communications sessions. Further, the tool could remember how accurately or inaccurately it predicted availability and correct future predictions based on past performance. The IAM tool could learn frequency-specific impacts due to spacecraft structures and pass that information along as "experience." Such development would provide a single artificial intelligence processor that could provide two different experience bases. If it also "knew" the satellite service schedule, it could distinguish structure blockage from schedule or planet blockage and then quickly switch to another satellite. Alternatively, just as a human operator could judge, a cognizant comm system based on the IAM model could "know" that the blockage is not going to last very long and continue tracking a comm satellite, waiting for it to track away from structure. Ultimately, once this capability was fully developed and tested in the Mission Control Center, it could be transferred on-orbit to support development of operations concepts that include more advanced cognitive communications systems. Future applications of this capability are easily foreseen because even more dynamic satellite constellations with more nodes and greater capability are coming. Currently, the ISS fully employs a 300 million bit-per-second (Mbps) return link for harvesting payload science. In the coming eighteen months, it will step up to 600 Mbps. Already there is talk of a 1.2 billion bit-per-second (Gbps) upgrade for the ISS and laser comm links have already been tested from the ISS. Every data rate upgrade mandates more complicated and sensitive communications equipment which implies greater expertise invested in the human operator. Future on-orbit cognizant comm systems will be needed to meet greater performance demands aboard larger, far more complicated spacecraft. In the LEO environment, the old-style one-satellite-per-spacecraft operations concept will give way to a new concept of a single customer spacecraft simultaneously using multiple comm satellites. Much more highly-dynamic manned LEO missions with decades of crew members potentially increase the demand for communications link performance. A cognizant on-board communications system will meet advanced communications demands from future LEO missions and future planetary missions. The ISS has fledgling components of future exploration programs, both LEO and planetary. Further, the Flight Operations Directorate, through the IAM project, has already begun to develop a communications management system that attempts to solve advanced problems ideally represented by dynamic structure impacting scheduled satellite service. With an earnest project to integrate artificial intelligence into the IAM processor, the ISS Program could develop a cognizant communications system that could be adapted and transferred to future on-orbit avionics designs.

Jackson, Dan↗
NASA NTRS2016

Utilizing the ISS Mission as a Testbed to Develop Cognitive Communications Systems

The ISS provides an excellent opportunity for pioneering artificial intelligence software to meet the challenges of real-time communications (comm) link management. This opportunity empowers the ISS Program to forge a testbed for developing cognitive communications systems for the benefit of the ISS mission, manned Low Earth Orbit (LEO) science programs and future planetary exploration programs. In November, 1998, the Flight Operations Directorate (FOD) started the ISS Antenna Manager (IAM) project to develop a single processor supporting multiple comm satellite tracking for two different antenna systems. Further, the processor was developed to be highly adaptable as it supported the ISS mission through all assembly stages. The ISS mission mandated communications specialists with complete knowledge of when the ISS was about to lose or gain comm link service. The current specialty mandated cognizance of large sun-tracking solar arrays and thermal management panels in addition to the highly-dynamic satellite service schedules and rise/set tables. This mission requirement makes the ISS the ideal communications management analogue for future LEO space station and long-duration planetary exploration missions. Future missions, with their precision-pointed, dynamic, laser-based comm links, require complete autonomy for managing high-data rate communications systems. Development of cognitive communications management systems that permit any crew member or payload science specialist, regardless of experience level, to control communications is one of the greater benefits the ISS can offer new space exploration programs. The IAM project met a new mission requirement never previously levied against US space-born communications systems management: process and display the orientation of large solar arrays and thermal control panels based on real-time joint angle telemetry. However, IAM leaves the actual communications availability assessment to human judgement, which introduces unwanted variability because each specialist has a different core of experience with comm link performance. Because the ISS utilizes two different frequency bands, dynamic structure can be occasionally translucent at one frequency while it can completely interdict service at the other frequency. The impact of articulating structure on the comm link can depend on its orientation at the time it impinges on the link. It can become easy for a human specialist to cross-associate experience at one frequency with experience at the other frequency. Additionally, the specialist's experience is incremental, occurring one nine-hour shift at a time. Only the IAM processor experiences the complete 24x7x365 communications link performance for both communications links but, it has no "learning capability." If the IAM processor could be endowed with a cognitive ability to remember past structure-induced comm link outages, based on its knowledge of the ISS position, attitude, communications gear, array joint angles and tracking accuracy, it could convey such experience to the human operator. It could also use its learned communications link behaviors to accurately convey the availability of future communications sessions. Further, the tool could remember how accurately or inaccurately it predicted availability and correct future predictions based on past performance. The IAM tool could learn frequency-specific impacts due to spacecraft structures and pass that information along as "experience." Such development would provide a single artificial intelligence processor that could provide two different experience bases. If it also "knew" the satellite service schedule, it could distinguish structure blockage from schedule or planet blockage and then quickly switch to another satellite. Alternatively, just as a human operator could judge, a cognizant comm system based on the IAM model could "know" that the blockage is not going to last very long and continue tracking a comm satellite, waiting for it to track away from structure. Ultimately, once this capability was fully developed and tested in the Mission Control Center, it could be transferred on-orbit to support development of operations concepts that include more advanced cognitive communications systems. Future applications of this capability are easily foreseen because even more dynamic satellite constellations with more nodes and greater capability are coming. Currently, the ISS fully employs its high-data-rate return link for harvesting payload science. In the coming months, it will double that data rate and is forecast to fully utilize that capability. Already there is talk of an upgrade that quadruples the current data rate allocated to ISS payload science before the end of its mission and laser comm links have already been tested from the ISS. Every data rate upgrade mandates more complicated and sensitive communications equipment which implies greater expertise invested in the human operator. Future on-orbit cognizant comm systems will be needed to meet greater performance demands aboard larger, far more complicated spacecraft. In the LEO environment, the old-style one-satellite-per-spacecraft operations concept will give way to a new concept of a single customer spacecraft simultaneously using multiple comm satellites. Much more highly-dynamic manned LEO missions with decades of crew members potentially increase the demand for communications link performance. A cognizant on-board communications system will meet advanced communications demands from future LEO missions and future planetary missions. The ISS has fledgling components of future exploration programs, both LEO and planetary. Further, the Flight Operations Directorate, through the IAM project, has already begun to develop a communications management system that attempts to solve advanced problems ideally represented by dynamic structure impacting scheduled satellite service. With an earnest project to integrate artificial intelligence into the IAM processor, the ISS Program could develop a cognizant communications system that could be adapted and transferred to future on-orbit avionics designs.

Jackson, Dan↗
NASA NTRS2007

Reducing Development and Operations Costs using NASA's "GMSEC" Systems Architecture

This viewgraph presentation reviews the role of Goddard Mission Services Evolution Center (GMSEC) in reducing development and operation costs in handling the massive data from NASA missions. The goals of GMSEC systems architecture development are to (1) Simplify integration and development, (2)Facilitate technology infusion over time, (3) Support evolving operational concepts, and (4) All for mix of heritage, COTS and new components. First 3 missions (i.e., Tropical Rainforest Measuring Mission (TRMM), Small Explorer (SMEX) missions - SWAS, TRACE, SAMPEX, and ST5 3-Satellite Constellation System) each selected a different telemetry and command system. These results show that GMSEC's message-bus component-based framework architecture is well proven and provides significant benefits over traditional flight and ground data system designs. The missions benefit through increased set of product options, enhanced automation, lower cost and new mission-enabling operations concept options .

Smith, Dan↗
NASA NTRS2017

Increasing Crew Autonomy for Long Duration Exploration Missions: Self-Scheduling

Over the last three years, we have been investigating the operational concept of crew self-scheduling as a method of increasing crew autonomy for future exploration missions. Through Playbook, a planning and scheduling software tool, we have incrementally increased the ability for Earth analog mission crews to modify their schedules. Playbook allows the crew to add new activities from scratch, add new activities or groups of activities through a Task List, and reschedule or reassign flexible activities. The crew is also able to identify if plan modifications create violations, i.e., plan constraints not being met. This paper summarizes our observations with qualitative evidence from four NASA Extreme Environment Mission Operations (NEEMO) analog missions that supported self-scheduling as a feasible operational concept.

crew autonomy↗
NASA NTRS2017

Increasing Crew Autonomy for Long Duration Exploration Missions: Self-Scheduling

Over the last three years, we have been investigating the operational concept of crew self-scheduling as a method of increasing crew autonomy for future exploration missions. Through Playbook, a planning and scheduling software tool, we have incrementally increased the ability for Earth analog mission crews to modify their schedules. Playbook allows the crew to add new activities from scratch, add new activities or groups of activities through a Task List, and reschedule or reassign flexible activities. The crew is also able to identify if plan modifications create violations, i.e., plan constraints not being met. This paper summarizes our observations with qualitative evidence from four NASA Extreme Environment Mission Operations (NEEMO) analog missions that supported self-scheduling as a feasible operational concept.

planning and scheduling↗
NASA NTRS2011

Deep-Space Optical Communications: Visions, Trends, and Prospects

Current key initiatives in deep-space optical communications are treated in terms of historical context, contemporary trends, and prospects for the future. An architectural perspective focusing on high-level drivers, systems, and related operations concepts is provided. Detailed subsystem and component topics are not addressed. A brief overview of past ideas and architectural concepts sets the stage for current developments. Current requirements that might drive a transition from radio frequencies to optical communications are examined. These drivers include mission demand for data rates and/or data volumes; spectrum to accommodate such data rates; and desired power, mass, and cost benefits. As is typical, benefits come with associated challenges. For optical communications, these include atmospheric effects, link availability, pointing, and background light. The paper describes how NASA's Space Communication and Navigation Office will respond to the drivers, achieve the benefits, and mitigate the challenges, as documented in its Optical Communications Roadmap. Some nontraditional architectures and operations concepts are advanced in an effort to realize benefits and mitigate challenges as quickly as possible. Radio frequency communications is considered as both a competitor to and a partner with optical communications. The paper concludes with some suggestions for two affordable first steps that can yet evolve into capable architectures that will fulfill the vision inherent in optical communications.

space communication↗
NASA NTRS2012

A Sounding Rocket Mission Concept to Acquire High-Resolution Radiometric Spectra Spanning the 9 nm - 31 nm Wavelength Range

When studying Solar Extreme Ultraviolet (EUV) emissions, both single-wavelength, two- dimensional (2D) spectroheliograms and multi-wavelength, one-dimensional (1D) line spectra are important, especially for a thorough understanding of the complex processes in the solar magnetized plasma from the base of the chromosphere through the corona. 2D image data are required for a detailed study of spatial structures, whereas radiometric (i.e., spectral) data provide information on relevant atomic excitation/ionization state densities (and thus temperature). Using both imaging and radiometric techniques, several satellite missions presently study solar dynamics in the EUV, including the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO), Hinode, and the Solar-Terrestrial Relations Observatory (STEREO). The EUV wavelengths of interest typically span 9 nm to 31 nm, with the shorter wavelengths being associated with the hottest features (e.g., intense flares and bright points) and the longer wavelengths associated with cooler features (e.g., coronal holes and filaments). Because the optical components of satellite instruments degrade over time, it is not uncommon to conduct sounding rocket underflights for calibration purposes. The authors have designed a radiometric sounding rocket payload that could serve as both a calibration underflight for and a complementary scientific mission to the upcoming Solar Ultraviolet Imager (SUVI) mission aboard the GOES-R satellite (scheduled for a 2015 launch). The challenge to provide quality radiometric line spectra over the 9-31 nm range covered by SUVI was driven by the multilayer coatings required to make the optical components, including mirrors and gratings, reflective over the entire range. Typically, these multilayers provide useful EUV reflectances over bandwidths of a few nm. Our solution to this problem was to employ a three-telescope system in which the optical components were coated with multilayers that spanned three wavelength ranges to cover the three pairs of SUVI bands. The complete system was designed to fit within the Black Brandt-IX 22.-diameter payload skin envelope. The basic optical path is that of a simple parabolic telescope in which EUV light is focused onto a slit and shutter assembly and imaged onto a normal-incidence diffraction grating, which then disperses the light onto a 2048 2048 CCD sensor. The CCD thus records 1D spatial information along one axis and spectral information along the other. The slit spans 40 arc-minutes in length, thus covering a solar diameter out to +/- 1.3 solar radii. Our operations concept includes imaging at three distinct positions: the north-south meridian, the northeast-southwest diagonal, and real-time pointing at an active region. Six 10-second images will be obtained at each position. Fine pointing is provided by the SPARCS-VII attitude control system typically employed on Black Brandt solar missions. Both before and after launch, all three telescopes will be calibrated with the EUV line emission source and monochromater system at NASA's Stray Light Facility at Marshall Spaceflight Center. Details of the payload design, operations concept, and data application will be presented.

Krause, L. Habash↗