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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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NASA NTRS2003

Spontaneous Raman Scattering (SRS) System for Calibrating High-Pressure Flames Became Operational

A high-performance spontaneous Raman scattering (SRS) system for measuring quantitative species concentration and temperature in high-pressure flames is now operational. The system is located in Glenn s Engine Research Building. Raman scattering is perhaps the only optical diagnostic technique that permits the simultaneous (single-shot) measurement of all major species (N2, O2, CO2, H2O, CO, H2, and CH4) as well as temperature in combustion systems. The preliminary data acquired with this new system in a 20-atm hydrogen-air (H2-air) flame show excellent spectral coverage, good resolution, and a signal-to-noise ratio high enough for the data to serve as a calibration standard. This new SRS diagnostic system is used in conjunction with the newly developed High- Pressure Gaseous Burner facility (ref. 1). The main purpose of this diagnostic system and the High-Pressure Gaseous Burner facility is to acquire and establish a comprehensive Raman-scattering spectral database calibration standard for the combustion diagnostic community. A secondary purpose of the system is to provide actual measurements in standardized flames to validate computational combustion models. The High-Pressure Gaseous Burner facility and its associated SRS system will provide researchers throughout the world with new insights into flame conditions that simulate the environment inside the ultra-high-pressure-ratio combustion chambers of tomorrow s advanced aircraft engines.

Nguyen, Quang-Viet↗
NASA NTRS2005

High Resolution Aerospace Applications using the NASA Columbia Supercomputer

This paper focuses on the parallel performance of two high-performance aerodynamic simulation packages on the newly installed NASA Columbia supercomputer. These packages include both a high-fidelity, unstructured, Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes solver, and a fully-automated inviscid flow package for cut-cell Cartesian grids. The complementary combination of these two simulation codes enables high-fidelity characterization of aerospace vehicle design performance over the entire flight envelope through extensive parametric analysis and detailed simulation of critical regions of the flight envelope. Both packages. are industrial-level codes designed for complex geometry and incorpor.ats. CuStomized multigrid solution algorithms. The performance of these codes on Columbia is examined using both MPI and OpenMP and using both the NUMAlink and InfiniBand interconnect fabrics. Numerical results demonstrate good scalability on up to 2016 CPUs using the NUMAIink4 interconnect, with measured computational rates in the vicinity of 3 TFLOP/s, while InfiniBand showed some performance degradation at high CPU counts, particularly with multigrid. Nonetheless, the results are encouraging enough to indicate that larger test cases using combined MPI/OpenMP communication should scale well on even more processors.

Mavriplis, Dimitri J.↗
NASA NTRS2007

High-Performance, Radiation-Hardened Electronics for Space Environments

The Radiation Hardened Electronics for Space Environments (RHESE) project endeavors to advance the current state-of-the-art in high-performance, radiation-hardened electronics and processors, ensuring successful performance of space systems required to operate within extreme radiation and temperature environments. Because RHESE is a project within the Exploration Technology Development Program (ETDP), RHESE's primary customers will be the human and robotic missions being developed by NASA's Exploration Systems Mission Directorate (ESMD) in partial fulfillment of the Vision for Space Exploration. Benefits are also anticipated for NASA's science missions to planetary and deep-space destinations. As a technology development effort, RHESE provides a broad-scoped, full spectrum of approaches to environmentally harden space electronics, including new materials, advanced design processes, reconfigurable hardware techniques, and software modeling of the radiation environment. The RHESE sub-project tasks are: SelfReconfigurable Electronics for Extreme Environments, Radiation Effects Predictive Modeling, Radiation Hardened Memory, Single Event Effects (SEE) Immune Reconfigurable Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) (SIRF), Radiation Hardening by Software, Radiation Hardened High Performance Processors (HPP), Reconfigurable Computing, Low Temperature Tolerant MEMS by Design, and Silicon-Germanium (SiGe) Integrated Electronics for Extreme Environments. These nine sub-project tasks are managed by technical leads as located across five different NASA field centers, including Ames Research Center, Goddard Space Flight Center, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Langley Research Center, and Marshall Space Flight Center. The overall RHESE integrated project management responsibility resides with NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC). Initial technology development emphasis within RHESE focuses on the hardening of Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGA)s and Field Programmable Analog Arrays (FPAA)s for use in reconfigurable architectures. As these component/chip level technologies mature, the RHESE project emphasis shifts to focus on efforts encompassing total processor hardening techniques and board-level electronic reconfiguration techniques featuring spare and interface modularity. This phased approach to distributing emphasis between technology developments provides hardened FPGA/FPAAs for early mission infusion, then migrates to hardened, board-level, high speed processors with associated memory elements and high density storage for the longer duration missions encountered for Lunar Outpost and Mars Exploration occurring later in the Constellation schedule.

Keys, Andrew S.↗
NASA NTRS2008

Providing Internet Access to High-Resolution Lunar Images

The OnMoon server is a computer program that provides Internet access to high-resolution Lunar images, maps, and elevation data, all suitable for use in geographical information system (GIS) software for generating images, maps, and computational models of the Moon. The OnMoon server implements the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) Web Map Service (WMS) server protocol and supports Moon-specific extensions. Unlike other Internet map servers that provide Lunar data using an Earth coordinate system, the OnMoon server supports encoding of data in Moon-specific coordinate systems. The OnMoon server offers access to most of the available high-resolution Lunar image and elevation data. This server can generate image and map files in the tagged image file format (TIFF) or the Joint Photographic Experts Group (JPEG), 8- or 16-bit Portable Network Graphics (PNG), or Keyhole Markup Language (KML) format. Image control is provided by use of the OGC Style Layer Descriptor (SLD) protocol. Full-precision spectral arithmetic processing is also available, by use of a custom SLD extension. This server can dynamically add shaded relief based on the Lunar elevation to any image layer. This server also implements tiled WMS protocol and super-overlay KML for high-performance client application programs.

Plesea, Lucian↗
NASA NTRS2008

Providing Internet Access to High-Resolution Mars Images

The OnMars server is a computer program that provides Internet access to high-resolution Mars images, maps, and elevation data, all suitable for use in geographical information system (GIS) software for generating images, maps, and computational models of Mars. The OnMars server is an implementation of the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) Web Map Service (WMS) server. Unlike other Mars Internet map servers that provide Martian data using an Earth coordinate system, the OnMars WMS server supports encoding of data in Mars-specific coordinate systems. The OnMars server offers access to most of the available high-resolution Martian image and elevation data, including an 8-meter-per-pixel uncontrolled mosaic of most of the Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) Mars Observer Camera Narrow Angle (MOCNA) image collection, which is not available elsewhere. This server can generate image and map files in the tagged image file format (TIFF), Joint Photographic Experts Group (JPEG), 8- or 16-bit Portable Network Graphics (PNG), or Keyhole Markup Language (KML) format. Image control is provided by use of the OGC Style Layer Descriptor (SLD) protocol. The OnMars server also implements tiled WMS protocol and super-overlay KML for high-performance client application programs.

Plesea, Lucian↗
NASA NTRS2009

Modeling and Simulation of Variable Mass, Flexible Structures

The advent of the new Ares I launch vehicle has highlighted the need for advanced dynamic analysis tools for variable mass, flexible structures. This system is composed of interconnected flexible stages or components undergoing rapid mass depletion through the consumption of solid or liquid propellant. In addition to large rigid body configuration changes, the system simultaneously experiences elastic deformations. In most applications, the elastic deformations are compatible with linear strain-displacement relationships and are typically modeled using the assumed modes technique. The deformation of the system is approximated through the linear combination of the products of spatial shape functions and generalized time coordinates. Spatial shape functions are traditionally composed of normal mode shapes of the system or even constraint modes and static deformations derived from finite element models of the system. Equations of motion for systems undergoing coupled large rigid body motion and elastic deformation have previously been derived through a number of techniques [1]. However, in these derivations, the mode shapes or spatial shape functions of the system components were considered constant. But with the Ares I vehicle, the structural characteristics of the system are changing with the mass of the system. Previous approaches to solving this problem involve periodic updates to the spatial shape functions or interpolation between shape functions based on system mass or elapsed mission time. These solutions often introduce misleading or even unstable numerical transients into the system. Plus, interpolation on a shape function is not intuitive. This paper presents an approach in which the shape functions are held constant and operate on the changing mass and stiffness matrices of the vehicle components. Each vehicle stage or component finite element model is broken into dry structure and propellant models. A library of propellant models is used to describe the distribution of mass in the fuel tank or Solid Rocket Booster (SRB) case for various propellant levels. Based on the mass consumed by the liquid engine or SRB, the appropriate propellant model is coupled with the dry structure model for the stage. Then using vehicle configuration data, the integrated vehicle model is assembled and operated on by the constant system shape functions. The system mode shapes and frequencies can then be computed from the resulting generalized mass and stiffness matrices for that mass configuration. The rigid body mass properties of the vehicle are derived from the integrated vehicle model. The coupling terms between the vehicle rigid body motion and elastic deformation are also updated from the constant system shape functions and the integrated vehicle model. This approach was first used to analyze variable mass spinning beams and then prototyped into a generic dynamics simulation engine. The resulting code was tested against Crew Launch Vehicle (CLV-)class problems worked in the TREETOPS simulation package and by Wilson [2]. The Ares I System Integration Laboratory (SIL) is currently being developed at the Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) to test vehicle avionics hardware and software in a hardware-in-the-loop (HWIL) environment and certify that the integrated system is prepared for flight. The Ares I SIL utilizes the Ares Real-Time Environment for Modeling, Integration, and Simulation (ARTEMIS) tool to simulate the launch vehicle and stimulate avionics hardware. Due to the presence of vehicle control system filters and the thrust oscillation suppression system, which are tuned to the structural characteristics of the vehicle, ARTEMIS must incorporate accurate structural models of the Ares I launch vehicle. The ARTEMIS core dynamics simulation models the highly coupled nature of the vehicle flexible body dynamics, propellant slosh, and vehicle nozzle inertia effects combined with mass and flexible body properties that vary significant with time during the flight. All forces that act on the vehicle during flight must be simulated, including deflected engine thrust force, spatially distributed aerodynamic forces, gravity, and reaction control jet thrust forces. These forces are used to excite an integrated flexible vehicle, slosh, and nozzle dynamics model for the vehicle stack that simulates large rigid body translations and rotations along with small elastic deformations. Highly effective matrix math operations on a distributed, threaded high-performance simulation node allow ARTEMIS to retain up to 30 modes of flex for real-time simulation. Stage elements that separate from the stack during flight are propagated as independent rigid six degrees of freedom (6DOF) bodies. This paper will present the formulation of the resulting equations of motion, solutions to example problems, and describe the resulting dynamics simulation engine within ARTEMIS.

Tobbe, Patrick A.↗
NASA NTRS2009

NASA Tech Briefs, December 2009

Topics include: A Deep Space Network Portable Radio Science Receiver; Detecting Phase Boundaries in Hard-Sphere Suspensions; Low-Complexity Lossless and Near-Lossless Data Compression Technique for Multispectral Imagery; Very-Long-Distance Remote Hearing and Vibrometry; Using GPS to Detect Imminent Tsunamis; Stream Flow Prediction by Remote Sensing and Genetic Programming; Pilotless Frame Synchronization Using LDPC Code Constraints; Radiometer on a Chip; Measuring Luminescence Lifetime With Help of a DSP; Modulation Based on Probability Density Functions; Ku Telemetry Modulator for Suborbital Vehicles; Photonic Links for High-Performance Arraying of Antennas; Reconfigurable, Bi-Directional Flexfet Level Shifter for Low-Power, Rad-Hard Integration; Hardware-Efficient Monitoring of I/O Signals; Video System for Viewing From a Remote or Windowless Cockpit; Spacesuit Data Display and Management System; IEEE 1394 Hub With Fault Containment; Compact, Miniature MMIC Receiver Modules for an MMIC Array Spectrograph; Waveguide Transition for Submillimeter-Wave MMICs; Magnetic-Field-Tunable Superconducting Rectifier; Bonded Invar Clip Removal Using Foil Heaters; Fabricating Radial Groove Gratings Using Projection Photolithography; Gratings Fabricated on Flat Surfaces and Reproduced on Non-Flat Substrates; Method for Measuring the Volume-Scattering Function of Water; Method of Heating a Foam-Based Catalyst Bed; Small Deflection Energy Analyzer for Energy and Angular Distributions; Polymeric Bladder for Storing Liquid Oxygen; Pyrotechnic Simulator/Stray-Voltage Detector; Inventions Utilizing Microfluidics and Colloidal Particles; RuO2 Thermometer for Ultra-Low Temperatures; Ultra-Compact, High-Resolution LADAR System for 3D Imaging; Dual-Channel Multi-Purpose Telescope; Objective Lens Optimized for Wavefront Delivery, Pupil Imaging, and Pupil Ghosting; CMOS Camera Array With Onboard Memory; Quickly Approximating the Distance Between Two Objects; Processing Images of Craters for Spacecraft Navigation; Adaptive Morphological Feature-Based Object Classifier for a Color Imaging System; Rover Slip Validation and Prediction Algorithm; Safety and Quality Training Simulator; Supply-Chain Optimization Template; Algorithm for Computing Particle/Surface Interactions; Cryogenic Pupil Alignment Test Architecture for Aberrated Pupil Images; and Thermal Transport Model for Heat Sink Design.

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NASA NTRS2007

NASA Tech Briefs, September 2007

Topics covered include; Rapid Fabrication of Carbide Matrix/Carbon Fiber Composites; Coating Thermoelectric Devices To Suppress Sublimation; Ultrahigh-Temperature Ceramics; Improved C/SiC Ceramic Composites Made Using PIP; Coating Carbon Fibers With Platinum; Two-Band, Low-Loss Microwave Window; MCM Polarimetric Radiometers for Planar Arrays; Aperture-Coupled Thin-Membrane L-Band Antenna; WGM-Based Photonic Local Oscillators and Modulators; Focal-Plane Arrays of Quantum-Dot Infrared Photodetectors; Laser Range and Bearing Finder With No Moving Parts; Microrectenna: A Terahertz Antenna and Rectifier on a Chip; Miniature L-Band Radar Transceiver; Robotic Vision-Based Localization in an Urban Environment; Programs for Testing an SSME-Monitoring System; Cathodoluminescent Source of Intense White Light; Displaying and Analyzing Antenna Radiation Patterns; Payload Operations Support Team Tools; Space-Shuttle Emulator Software; Soft Real-Time PID Control on a VME Computer; Analyzing Radio-Frequency Coverage for the ISS; Nanorod-Based Fast-Response Pressure-Sensitive Paints; Capacitors Would Help Protect Against Hypervelocity Impacts; Diaphragm Pump With Resonant Piezoelectric Drive; Improved Quick-Release Pin Mechanism; Designing Rolling-Element Bearings; Reverse-Tangent Injection in a Centrifugal Compressor; Inertial Measurements for Aero-assisted Navigation (IMAN); Analysis of Complex Valve and Feed Systems; Improved Path Planning Onboard the Mars Exploration Rovers; Robust, Flexible Motion Control for the Mars Explorer Rovers; Solar Sail Spaceflight Simulation; Fluorine-Based DRIE of Fused Silica; Mechanical Alloying for Making Thermoelectric Compounds; Process for High-Rate Fabrication of Alumina Nanotemplates; Electroform/Plasma-Spray Laminates for X-Ray Optics; An Automated Flying-Insect Detection System; Calligraphic Poling of Ferroelectric Material; Blackbody Cavity for Calibrations at 200 to 273 K; KML Super Overlay to WMS Translator; High-Performance Tiled WMS and KML Web Server; Modeling of Radiative Transfer in Protostellar Disks; Composite Pulse Tube; Photometric Calibration of Consumer Video Cameras; Criterion for Identifying Vortices in High- Pressure Flows; Amplified Thermionic Cooling Using Arrays of Nanowires; Delamination-Indicating Thermal Barrier Coatings; Preventing Raman Lasing in High-Q WGM Resonators; Procedures for Tuning a Multiresonator Photonic Filter; Robust Mapping of Incoherent Fiber-Optic Bundles; Extended-Range Ultrarefractive 1D Photonic Crystal Prisms; Rapid Analysis of Mass Distribution of Radiation Shielding; Modeling Magnetic Properties in EZTB; Deep Space Network Antenna Logic Controller; Modeling Carbon and Hydrocarbon Molecular Structures in EZTB; BigView Image Viewing on Tiled Displays; and Imaging Sensor Flight and Test Equipment Software.

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NASA NTRS2011

Fundamental Aeronautics Program: Overview of Project Work in Supersonic Cruise Efficiency

The Supersonics Project, part of NASA?s Fundamental Aeronautics Program, contains a number of technical challenge areas which include sonic boom community response, airport noise, high altitude emissions, cruise efficiency, light weight durable engines/airframes, and integrated multi-discipline system design. This presentation provides an overview of the current (2011) activities in the supersonic cruise efficiency technical challenge, and is focused specifically on propulsion technologies. The intent is to develop and validate high-performance supersonic inlet and nozzle technologies. Additional work is planned for design and analysis tools for highly-integrated low-noise, low-boom applications. If successful, the payoffs include improved technologies and tools for optimized propulsion systems, propulsion technologies for a minimized sonic boom signature, and a balanced approach to meeting efficiency and community noise goals. In this propulsion area, the work is divided into advanced supersonic inlet concepts, advanced supersonic nozzle concepts, low fidelity computational tool development, high fidelity computational tools, and improved sensors and measurement capability. The current work in each area is summarized.

Castner, Raymond↗
NASA NTRS2011

NASA Tech Briefs, February 2011

Topics covered include: Multi-Segment Radius Measurement Using an Absolute Distance Meter Through a Null Assembly; Fiber-Optic Magnetic-Field-Strength Measurement System for Lightning Detection; Photocatalytic Active Radiation Measurements and Use; Computer Generated Hologram System for Wavefront Measurement System Calibration; Non-Contact Thermal Properties Measurement with Low-Power Laser and IR Camera System; SpaceCube 2.0: An Advanced Hybrid Onboard Data Processor; CMOS Imager Has Better Cross-Talk and Full-Well Performance; High-Performance Wireless Telemetry; Telemetry-Based Ranging; JWST Wavefront Control Toolbox; Java Image I/O for VICAR, PDS, and ISIS; X-Band Acquisition Aid Software; Antimicrobial-Coated Granules for Disinfecting Water; Range 7 Scanner Integration with PaR Robot Scanning System; Methods of Antimicrobial Coating of Diverse Materials; High-Operating-Temperature Barrier Infrared Detector with Tailorable Cutoff Wavelength; A Model of Reduced Kinetics for Alkane Oxidation Using Constituents and Species for N-Heptane; Thermally Conductive Tape Based on Carbon Nanotube Arrays; Two Catalysts for Selective Oxidation of Contaminant Gases; Nanoscale Metal Oxide Semiconductors for Gas Sensing; Lightweight, Ultra-High-Temperature, CMC-Lined Carbon/Carbon Structures; Sample Acquisition and Handling System from a Remote Platform; Improved Rare-Earth Emitter Hollow Cathode; High-Temperature Smart Structures for Engine Noise Reduction and Performance Enhancement; Cryogenic Scan Mechanism for Fourier Transform Spectrometer; Piezoelectric Rotary Tube Motor; Thermoelectric Energy Conversion Technology for High-Altitude Airships; Combustor Computations for CO2-Neutral Aviation; Use of Dynamic Distortion to Predict and Alleviate Loss of Control; Cycle Time Reduction in Trapped Mercury Ion Atomic Frequency Standards; and A (201)Hg+ Comagnetometer for (199)Hg+ Trapped Ion Space Atomic Clocks.

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NASA NTRS2005

High-Performance Satellite/Terrestrial-Network Gateway

A gateway has been developed to enable digital communication between (1) the high-rate receiving equipment at NASA's White Sands complex and (2) a standard terrestrial digital communication network at data rates up to 622 Mb/s. The design of this gateway can also be adapted for use in commercial Earth/satellite and digital communication networks, and in terrestrial digital communication networks that include wireless subnetworks. Gateway as used here signifies an electronic circuit that serves as an interface between two electronic communication networks so that a computer (or other terminal) on one network can communicate with a terminal on the other network. The connection between this gateway and the high-rate receiving equipment is made via a synchronous serial data interface at the emitter-coupled-logic (ECL) level. The connection between this gateway and a standard asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) terrestrial communication network is made via a standard user network interface with a synchronous optical network (SONET) connector. The gateway contains circuitry that performs the conversion between the ECL and SONET interfaces. The data rate of the SONET interface can be either 155.52 or 622.08 Mb/s. The gateway derives its clock signal from a satellite modem in the high-rate receiving equipment and, hence, is agile in the sense that it adapts to the data rate of the serial interface.

Beering, David R.↗
NASA NTRS2005

NASA Tech Briefs, September 2005

Topivs include: Diamond-Coated Carbon Nanotubes for Efficient Field Emission; Improved Anode Coatings for Direct Methanol Fuel Cells; Advanced Ablative Insulators and Methods of Making Them; PETIs as High-Temperature Resin-Transfer-Molding Materials; Stable Polyimides for Terrestrial and Space Uses; Low-Density, Aerogel-Filled Thermal-Insulation Tiles; High-Performance Polymers Having Low Melt Viscosities; Nonflammable, Hydrophobic Aerogel Composites for Insulation; Front-Side Microstrip Line Feeding a Raised Antenna Patch; Medium-Frequency Pseudonoise Georadar; Facilitating Navigation Through Large Archives; Program for Weibull Analysis of Fatigue Data; Comprehensive Micromechanics-Analysis Code - Version 4.0; Component-Based Visualization System; Software for Engineering Simulations of a Spacecraft; LabVIEW Interface for PCI-SpaceWire Interface Card; Path Following with Slip Compensation for a Mars Rover; International Space Station Electric Power System Performance Code-SPACE; Software for Automation of Real-Time Agents, Version 2; Software for Optimizing Plans Involving Interdependent Goals; Computing Gravitational Fields of Finite-Sized Bodies; Custom Sky-Image Mosaics from NASA's Information Power Grid; ANTLR Tree Grammar Generator and Extensions; Generic Kalman Filter Software; Alignment Stage for a Cryogenic Dilatometer; Rugged Iris Mechanism; Treatments To Produce Stabilized Aluminum Mirrors for Cryogenic Uses; Making AlNx Tunnel Barriers Using a Low-Energy Nitrogen-Ion Beam; Making Wide-IF SIS Mixers with Suspended Metal-Beam Leads; Sol-Gel Glass Holographic Light-Shaping Diffusers; Automated Counting of Particles To Quantify Cleanliness; Phase Correction for GPS Antenna with Nonunique Phase Center; Compact Infrasonic Windscreen; Broadband External-Cavity Diode Laser; High-Efficiency Solar Cells Using Photonic-Bandgap Materials; Generating Solid Models from Topographical Data; Computationally Lightweight Air-Traffic-Control Simulation; Spool Valve for Switching Air Flows Between Two Beds; Partial Model of Insulator/ Insulator Contact Charging; Asymmetric Electrostatic Radiation Shielding for Spacecraft; and Reusable Hybrid Propellant Modules for Outer-Space Transport.

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NASA NTRS2004

NASA Tech Briefs, February 2004

Topics include: Simulation Testing of Embedded Flight Software; Improved Indentation Test for Measuring Nonlinear Elasticity; Ultraviolet-Absorption Spectroscopic Biofilm Monitor; Electronic Tongue for Quantitation of Contaminants in Water; Radar for Measuring Soil Moisture Under Vegetation; Modular Wireless Data-Acquisition and Control System; Microwave System for Detecting Ice on Aircraft; Routing Algorithm Exploits Spatial Relations; Two-Finger EKG Method of Detecting Evasive Responses; Updated System-Availability and Resource-Allocation Program; Routines for Computing Pressure Drops in Venturis; Software for Fault-Tolerant Matrix Multiplication; Reproducible Growth of High-Quality Cubic-SiC Layers; Nonlinear Thermoelastic Model for SMAs and SMA Hybrid Composites; Liquid-Crystal Thermosets, a New Generation of High-Performance Liquid-Crystal Polymers; Formulations for Stronger Solid Oxide Fuel-Cell Electrolytes; Simulation of Hazards and Poses for a Rocker-Bogie Rover; Autonomous Formation Flight; Expandable Purge Chambers Would Protect Cryogenic Fittings; Wavy-Planform Helicopter Blades Make Less Noise; Miniature Robotic Spacecraft for Inspecting Other Spacecraft; Miniature Ring-Shaped Peristaltic Pump; Compact Plasma Accelerator; Improved Electrohydraulic Linear Actuators; A Software Architecture for Semiautonomous Robot Control; Fabrication of Channels for Nanobiotechnological Devices; Improved Thin, Flexible Heat Pipes; Miniature Radioisotope Thermoelectric Power Cubes; Permanent Sequestration of Emitted Gases in the Form of Clathrate Hydrates; Electrochemical, H2O2-Boosted Catalytic Oxidation System; Electrokinetic In Situ Treatment of Metal-Contaminated Soil; Pumping Liquid Oxygen by Use of Pulsed Magnetic Fields; Magnetocaloric Pumping of Liquid Oxygen; Tailoring Ion-Thruster Grid Apertures for Greater Efficiency; and Lidar for Guidance of a Spacecraft or Exploratory Robot.

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NASA NTRS2004

Digital Radar-Signal Processors Implemented in FPGAs

High-performance digital electronic circuits for onboard processing of return signals in an airborne precipitation- measuring radar system have been implemented in commercially available field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs). Previously, it was standard practice to downlink the radar-return data to a ground station for postprocessing a costly practice that prevents the nearly-real-time use of the data for automated targeting. In principle, the onboard processing could be performed by a system of about 20 personal- computer-type microprocessors; relative to such a system, the present FPGA-based processor is much smaller and consumes much less power. Alternatively, the onboard processing could be performed by an application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC), but in comparison with an ASIC implementation, the present FPGA implementation offers the advantages of (1) greater flexibility for research applications like the present one and (2) lower cost in the small production volumes typical of research applications. The generation and processing of signals in the airborne precipitation measuring radar system in question involves the following especially notable steps: The system utilizes a total of four channels two carrier frequencies and two polarizations at each frequency. The system uses pulse compression: that is, the transmitted pulse is spread out in time and the received echo of the pulse is processed with a matched filter to despread it. The return signal is band-limited and digitally demodulated to a complex baseband signal that, for each pulse, comprises a large number of samples. Each complex pair of samples (denoted a range gate in radar terminology) is associated with a numerical index that corresponds to a specific time offset from the beginning of the radar pulse, so that each such pair represents the energy reflected from a specific range. This energy and the average echo power are computed. The phase of each range bin is compared to the previous echo by complex conjugate multiplication to obtain the mean Doppler shift (and hence the mean and variance of the velocity of precipitation) of the echo at that range.

Berkun, Andrew↗
NASA NTRS2012

NASA Center for Climate Simulation (NCCS) Presentation

The NASA Center for Climate Simulation (NCCS) offers integrated supercomputing, visualization, and data interaction technologies to enhance NASA's weather and climate prediction capabilities. It serves hundreds of users at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, as well as other NASA centers, laboratories, and universities across the US. Over the past year, NCCS has continued expanding its data-centric computing environment to meet the increasingly data-intensive challenges of climate science. We doubled our Discover supercomputer's peak performance to more than 800 teraflops by adding 7,680 Intel Xeon Sandy Bridge processor-cores and most recently 240 Intel Xeon Phi Many Integrated Core (MIG) co-processors. A supercomputing-class analysis system named Dali gives users rapid access to their data on Discover and high-performance software including the Ultra-scale Visualization Climate Data Analysis Tools (UV-CDAT), with interfaces from user desktops and a 17- by 6-foot visualization wall. NCCS also is exploring highly efficient climate data services and management with a new MapReduce/Hadoop cluster while augmenting its data distribution to the science community. Using NCCS resources, NASA completed its modeling contributions to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCG) Fifth Assessment Report this summer as part of the ongoing Coupled Modellntercomparison Project Phase 5 (CMIP5). Ensembles of simulations run on Discover reached back to the year 1000 to test model accuracy and projected climate change through the year 2300 based on four different scenarios of greenhouse gases, aerosols, and land use. The data resulting from several thousand IPCC/CMIP5 simulations, as well as a variety of other simulation, reanalysis, and observationdatasets, are available to scientists and decision makers through an enhanced NCCS Earth System Grid Federation Gateway. Worldwide downloads have totaled over 110 terabytes of data.

Webster, William P.↗
NASA NTRS2013

SpaceCube Version 1.5

SpaceCube 1.5 is a high-performance and low-power system in a compact form factor. It is a hybrid processing system consisting of CPU (central processing unit), FPGA (field-programmable gate array), and DSP (digital signal processor) processing elements. The primary processing engine is the Virtex- 5 FX100T FPGA, which has two embedded processors. The SpaceCube 1.5 System was a bridge to the SpaceCube 2.0 and SpaceCube 2.0 Mini processing systems. The SpaceCube 1.5 system was the primary avionics in the successful SMART (Small Rocket/Spacecraft Technology) Sounding Rocket mission that was launched in the summer of 2011. For SMART and similar missions, an avionics processor is required that is reconfigurable, has high processing capability, has multi-gigabit interfaces, is low power, and comes in a rugged/compact form factor. The original SpaceCube 1.0 met a number of the criteria, but did not possess the multi-gigabit interfaces that were required and is a higher-cost system. The SpaceCube 1.5 was designed with those mission requirements in mind. The SpaceCube 1.5 features one Xilinx Virtex-5 FX100T FPGA and has excellent size, weight, and power characteristics [4×4×3 in. (approx. = 10×10×8 cm), 3 lb (approx. = 1.4 kg), and 5 to 15 W depending on the application]. The estimated computing power of the two PowerPC 440s in the Virtex-5 FPGA is 1100 DMIPS each. The SpaceCube 1.5 includes two Gigabit Ethernet (1 Gbps) interfaces as well as two SATA-I/II interfaces (1.5 to 3.0 Gbps) for recording to data drives. The SpaceCube 1.5 also features DDR2 SDRAM (double data rate synchronous dynamic random access memory); 4- Gbit Flash for storing application code for the CPU, FPGA, and DSP processing elements; and a Xilinx Platform Flash XL to store FPGA configuration files or application code. The system also incorporates a 12 bit analog to digital converter with the ability to read 32 discrete analog sensor inputs. The SpaceCube 1.5 design also has a built-in accelerometer. In addition, the system has 12 receive and transmit RS- 422 interfaces for legacy support. The SpaceCube 1.5 processor card represents the first NASA Goddard design in a compact form factor featuring the Xilinx Virtex- 5. The SpaceCube 1.5 incorporates backward compatibility with the Space- Cube 1.0 form factor and stackable architecture. It also makes use of low-cost commercial parts, but is designed for operation in harsh environments.

Geist, Alessandro↗
NASA NTRS2014

Designing Liquid Rocket Engine Injectors for Performance, Stability, and Cost

NASA is developing the Space Launch System (SLS) for crewed exploration missions beyond low Earth orbit. Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) is designing rocket engines for the SLS Advanced Booster (AB) concepts being developed to replace the Shuttle-derived solid rocket boosters. One AB concept uses large, Rocket-Propellant (RP)-fueled engines that pose significant design challenges. The injectors for these engines require high performance and stable operation while still meeting aggressive cost reduction goals for access to space. Historically, combustion stability problems have been a critical issue for such injector designs. Traditional, empirical injector design tools and methodologies, however, lack the ability to reliably predict complex injector dynamics that often lead to combustion stability. Reliance on these tools alone would likely result in an unaffordable test-fail-fix cycle for injector development. Recently at MSFC, a massively parallel computational fluid dynamics (CFD) program was successfully applied in the SLS AB injector design process. High-fidelity reacting flow simulations were conducted for both single-element and seven-element representations of the full-scale injector. Data from the CFD simulations was then used to significantly augment and improve the empirical design tools, resulting in a high-performance, stable injector design.

Westra, Douglas G.↗
NASA NTRS2012

Fundamental Aeronautics Program: Overview of Propulsion Work in the Supersonic Cruise Efficiency Technical Challenge

The Supersonics Project, part of NASA's Fundamental Aeronautics Program, contains a number of technical challenge areas which include sonic boom community response, airport noise, high altitude emissions, cruise efficiency, light weight durable engines/airframes, and integrated multi-discipline system design. This presentation provides an overview of the current (2012) activities in the supersonic cruise efficiency technical challenge, and is focused specifically on propulsion technologies. The intent is to develop and validate high-performance supersonic inlet and nozzle technologies. Additional work is planned for design and analysis tools for highly-integrated low-noise, low-boom applications. If successful, the payoffs include improved technologies and tools for optimized propulsion systems, propulsion technologies for a minimized sonic boom signature, and a balanced approach to meeting efficiency and community noise goals. In this propulsion area, the work is divided into advanced supersonic inlet concepts, advanced supersonic nozzle concepts, low fidelity computational tool development, high fidelity computational tools, and improved sensors and measurement capability. The current work in each area is summarized.

Castner, Ray↗