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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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At least 397 records · Page 22
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NASA NTRS2000

The Gossamer Initiative

The Gossamer Spacecraft Initiative is a new NASA program to begin long-range development of enabling technologies for very large, ultra-lightweight structures and apertures. Large apertures include optical, infrared and submillimeter telescopes, "photon buckets" for optical communications and "non-coherent" imaging, solar concentrators, and radio frequency antennas. Developments in the very large ultra-light structures will be forces on one of their most challenging applications-solar sails. The sail structures will include both 3-axis stabilizing and spinning. Gossamer spacecraft technology will eventually allow NASA to undertake bold new missions of discovery, such as searching for the signs of life on planets orbiting nearby stars and sailing through space on beams of light of places beyond our solar system.

Chmielewski, Artur B.↗
NASA NTRS1998

A Stirling Idea

Stirling Technology Company developed the components for its BeCOOL line of Cryocoolers with the help of a series of NASA SBIRs (Small Business Innovative Research), through Goddard Space Flight Center and Marshall Space Flight Center. Features include a hermetically sealed design, compact size, and silent operation. The company has already placed several units with commercial customers for computer applications and laboratory use.

Source record↗
NASA NTRS2007

Stirling Isotope Power Systems for Stationary and Mobile Lunar Applications

The NASA Exploration Systems Architecture Study (ESAS) places a significant emphasis on the development of a wide range of capabilities on the lunar surface as a stepping-stone to further space exploration. An important aspect of developing these capabilities will be the availability of reliable, efficient, and low-mass power systems to support both stationary and mobile applications. One candidate system to provide electrical power is made by coupling the General Purpose Heat Source (GPHS) with a high-performance Stirling convertor. In this paper we explore the practical power range of GPHS/Stirling convertor systems all with conductively coupled hot-end designs for use on the lunar surface. Design and off-design operations during the life of the convertor are studied in addition to considering these varying conditions on system. Unique issues concerning Stirling convertor configurations, integration of the GPHS with the Stirling convertor, controller operation, waste heat rejection, and thermal protection are explored. Of particular importance in the evaluation process is a thorough understanding of the interactions between the wide range of unique lunar environments and the selection of key systems operating characteristics and the power systems design. Additionally, as power levels rise the interface between the GPHS and Stirling and the Stirling and the radiator begins to dominate system mass and material selection becomes more important.

Schmitz, Paul C.↗
NASA NTRS2007

Stirling Isotope Power Systems for Stationary and Mobile Lunar Applications

The NASA Exploration Systems Architecture Study (ESAS) places a significant emphasis on the development of a wide range of capabilities on the lunar surface as a stepping-stone to further space exploration. An important aspect of developing these capabilities will be the availability of reliable, efficient, and low-mass power systems to support both stationary and mobile applications. One candidate system to provide electrical power is made by coupling the General Purpose Heat Source (GPHS) with a high-performance Stirling convertor. In this paper we explore the practical power range of GPHS/Stirling convertor systems all with conductively coupled hot-end designs for use on the lunar surface. Design and off-design operations during the life of the convertor are studied in addition to considering these varying conditions on system. Unique issues concerning Stirling convertor configurations, integration of the GPHS with the Stirling convertor, controller operation, waste heat rejection, and thermal protection are explored. Of particular importance in the evaluation process is a thorough understanding of the interactions between the wide range of unique lunar environments and the selection of key systems operating characteristics and the power systems design. Additionally, as power levels rise the interface between the GPHS and Stirling and the Stirling and the radiator begins to dominate system mass and material selection becomes more important.

Schmitz, Paul C.↗
NASA NTRS2007

Stirling Isotope Power Systems for Stationary and Mobile Lunar Applications

The NASA Exploration Systems Architecture Study (ESAS) places a significant emphasis on the development of a wide range of capabilities on the lunar surface as a stepping-stone to further space exploration. An important aspect of developing these capabilities will be the availability of reliable, efficient, and low-mass power systems to support both stationary and mobile applications. One candidate system to provide electrical power is made by coupling the General Purpose Heat Source (GPHS) with a high-performance Stirling convertor. In this paper we explore the practical power range of GPHS/Stirling convertor systems all with conductively coupled hot-end designs for use on the lunar surface. Design and off-design operations during the life of the convertor are studied in addition to considering these varying conditions on system. Unique issues concerning Stirling convertor configurations, integration of the GPHS with the Stirling convertor, controller operation, waste heat rejection, and thermal protection are explored. Of particular importance in the evaluation process is a thorough understanding of the interactions between the wide range of unique lunar environments and the selection of key systems operating characteristics and the power systems design. Additionally, as power levels rise the interface between the GPHS and Stirling and the Stirling and the radiator begins to dominate system mass and material selection becomes more important.

Schmitz, Paul C.↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Plume Impingement Studies in Space Environments for NASA Deep Space Logistics

NASA’s Artemis program is preparing to return Americans to the moon, in preparation for future deep space missions to Mars and beyond. The Lunar Gateway – a space station to be placed in orbit around the moon – serves as a critical component of the Artemis program, and will be the launchpad for future astronauts to visit the lunar surface and for humanity to learn how to live in a deep space environment. Much like the ISS, during operations and visiting vehicles approaches, the Lunar Gateway structures will be impinged upon from various plume sources: reaction control system rocket engine plumes, wastewater venting plumes, and plasma plumes from electric thrusters for station keeping. This presentation will describe the engineering challenges associated with each of these plume impingement scenarios and will detail the physical models and simulation approaches to predict the thermomechanical loading, contamination accretion, and erosion of station components due to plume impingement in space environments.

computational fluid dynamics↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Plume Impingement Studies in Space Environments for NASA Deep Space Logistics

NASA’s Artemis program is preparing to return Americans to the moon, in preparation for future deep space missions to Mars and beyond. The Lunar Gateway – a space station to be placed in orbit around the moon – serves as a critical component of the Artemis program, and will be the launchpad for future astronauts to visit the lunar surface and for humanity to learn how to live in a deep space environment. Much like the ISS, during operations and visiting vehicles approaches, the Lunar Gateway structures will be impinged upon from various plume sources: reaction control system rocket engine plumes, wastewater venting plumes, and plasma plumes from electric thrusters for station keeping. This presentation will describe the engineering challenges associated with each of these plume impingement scenarios and will detail the physical models and simulation approaches to predict the thermomechanical loading, contamination accretion, and erosion of station components due to plume impingement in space environments.

Plume Impingement↗
NASA NTRS2021

AIAA Ascend 2021 Conference On Demand Manufacturing of Electronics Panel Abstract

1. Session Proposal o Session Title NASA’s In Space Manufacturing and the On Demand Manufacturing of Electronics o Session Topic Primary -- Space Logistics, Autonomy, and Robotics; Secondary – Transformative Research and Technologies o Session Format: Panel Discussion. o Requested Session Duration: 60 minutes o Short Session Description: The goal of NASA’s On Demand Manufacturing of Electronics project is to develop and demonstrate the feasibility of a low-gravity, on-demand manufacturing system for flexible hybrid electronic devices on the International Space Station. This panel will feature several key collaborators and team members from the commercial sector, academia, and internal to NASA, each of which are contributing an unique and vital role to the design and implementation of this new technology system. o Extended Session Description (Please describe in detail the activity proposed, including how you intend to use the requested session duration. This session description will be provided to the reviewers for consideration and will not be displayed in the online agenda.): The session will be moderated by Curtis Hill, the Project Lead for the On Demand Manufacturing of Electronics (ODME), and he will start by giving a brief introduction to the ODME project which is working to produce a demo system for the manufacturing of electronic devices on the International Space Station. Panelists consisting of collaborators and team members to the ODME project will then give a brief (~5 min) introduction highlighting their contributions to the project, followed by time for Q&A from the audience. The panel will consist of: 1. Kenneth Church, nScrypt. nScrypt is a leader in multi-material printing with a modular system that incorporates a direct write thick film print head, a polymer fused filament fabrication print head, a laser sintering attachment, a drill head attachment for milling, and a pick and place. The system can print a layer and scan for accuracy of prints. The combination of multiple print heads and scanning allows for the on-demand production of intricate electronic components. 2. Andy Kurk, TechShot, Inc. Techshot, Inc. has collaborated extensively with NASA on the in space manufacturing of both printed electronics and fused metal materials. They are currently working to develop and integrate a test system for printed electronics, and a flight demonstration on the International Space Station is anticipated in 2024. 3. Ed Hendricks, NextFlex. NextFlex has the goal of advancing the manufacture of flexible hybrid electronics in the U.S. They are working with ODME on the development of AstroSense, an additively manufactured, wireless, flexible, and wearable health sensor. 4. Dr. Pradeep Lall, Auburn University. Professor Lall is the MacFarlane Endowed Distinguished Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering with a Courtesy Joint Appointment in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering and a Courtesy Joint Appointment in the Department of Finance. He is collaborating with NASA’s ODME project to develop multilayer printable devices and to develop techniques to test the quality of a printed electronic device. 5. Dr. Wei Gao, California Institute of Technology. Professor Gao is an Assistant Professor of Medical Engineering. His group is developing fully printed, flexible, and wearable biosensors for crew health monitoring in collaboration with NASA’s ODME project. In addition, they are working on using sweat to power biofuel cells for wearable, self-powered electronic devices. 6. Beth Paquette, NASA Goddard. The ODME branch at NASA Goddard is spearheading a sounding rocket flight demo to prove the capability of a printed electronic device with multiple sensors. In addition, they focus on thin film and flexible energy storage evaluations. o Session Goal(s)/Outcome(s): Please list the learning objectives and/or tangible outcomes (technical paper or other publication). The goal of this session is to highlight the internal and collaborative efforts of NASA’s On Demand Manufacturing of Electronics project to develop a system for printing electronics that will be tested on the International Space Station in 2024. In addition, the session with facilitate discussion with the community on the state of the art of printable electronics, current challenges, and new avenues for collaboration.

Jennifer McInnis Jones↗
NASA NTRS2007

The Autonomous Precision Landing and Hazard Detection and Avoidance Technology (ALHAT)

As NASA plans to send humans back to the Moon and develop a lunar outpost, technologies must be developed to place humans and cargo safely, precisely, repeatedly, on the lunar surface with the capability to avoid surface hazards. Exploration Space Architecture Study requirements include the need for global lunar surface access with safe, precise landing without lighting constraints on terrain that may have landing hazards for human scale landing vehicles. Landing accuracies of perhaps 1,000 meters for sortie crew missions to 10 s of meters for Outpost class missions are required. The Autonomous precision Landing Hazard Avoidance Technology (ALHAT) project will develop the new and unique descent and landing Guidance, Navigation and Control (GNC) hardware and software technologies necessary for these capabilities. The ALHAT project will qualify a lunar descent and landing GNC system to a Technology Readiness Level (TRL) of 6 capable of supporting lunar crewed, cargo, and robotic missions. The (ALHAT) development project was chartered by NASA Headquarters in October 2006. The initial effort to write a project plan and define an ALHAT Team was followed by a fairly aggressive research and analysis effort to determine what technologies existed that could be developed and applied to the lunar landing problems indicated above. This paper describes the project development, research, analysis and concept evolution that has occurred since the assignment of the project. This includes the areas of systems engineering, GNC, sensors, sensor algorithms, simulations, fielding testing, laboratory testing, Hardware-In-The-Loop testing, system avionics and system certification concepts.

Epp, Chirold D.↗
NASA NTRS2011

Cryogenic Thermal Distortion Performance Characterization for the JWST ISIM Structure

The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) Integrated Science Instrument Module (ISIM) Structure is a precision optical metering structure for the JWST science instruments. Optomechanical performance requirements place stringent limits on the allowable thermal distortion of the metering structure between ambient and cryogenic operating temperature (~35 K). This paper focuses on thermal distortion testing and successful verification of performance requirements for the flight ISIM Structure. The ISIM Structure Cryoset Test was completed in Spring 2010 at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in the Space Environment Simulator Chamber. During the test, the ISIM Structure was thermal cycled twice between ambient and cryogenic (~35 K) temperatures. Photogrammetry was used to measure the Structure in the ambient and cryogenic states for each cycle to assess both cooldown thermal distortion and repeatability. This paper will provide details on the post-processing of the metrology datasets completed to compare measurements with performance requirements.

Johnston, John D.↗
NASA NTRS1992

Long Duration Exposure Facility: A general overview

The Long Duration Exposure Facility (LDEF) is a large, low-cost, reusable, unmanned, free-flying spacecraft which accommodates technology, science, and applications experiments for long-term exposure to the space environment. The LDEF was designed and built by the NASA Langley Research Center (LaRC) for NASA's Office of Aeronautics and Space Technology. Specifically, the LDEF was designed to transport experiments into space via the Space Shuttle, to free fly in Earth orbit for an extended period, and be retrieved on a later Space Shuttle flight allowing experiments to be returned to Earth for postflight analysis in the laboratory. The LDEF with a full complement of experiments was placed in Earth orbit in April 1984 by Challenger and retrieved from orbit in January 1990 by Columbia. A general overview of the LDEF, its mission, systems, experiments, and operations is presented. Excerpts from various NASA documents are extensively used.

Robert L O'Neal↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

NASA’s Efforts to Pursue Commercial Communications Services for Missions in Near Space

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Space Communications and Navigation (SCaN) Program enables high speed, robust, secure, and cost-effective space communications and navigation services to current and future science and exploration missions. Consistent with National Space Policy, NASA is seeking commercial services for all its future near-Earth requirements by incorporating additional direct to Earth (DTE) providers and introducing commercial satellite relay communications (SATCOM) vendors as NASA’s Tracking and Data Relay Satellites (TDRS) begin to decline. Through the progression of these efforts, SCaN is also integrating commercial services in the cislunar domain. The overarching objective is to satisfy the demands from the mission community – both in terms of capacity and capability – in a robust, reliable, and cost-effective way, leveraging the strong and growing commercial space sector. For near earth space relay, six SATCOM vendors were awarded Funded Space Act Agreements in June of 2022 to demonstrate the ability to serve near-Earth missions with space-based communication relay services. All six vendors are working through their committed milestones with end-to-end service demonstrations tacking place throughout the mid-2020’s. The failure of TDRS Flight-9 (F9) in late 2022 prompted an increased tempo of mission engagement to identify driving user needs that commercial SATCOM can meet in the near-term. NASA has set a course to accelerate a decision to terminate offering TDRS services to new missions and is developing a plan to execute validation and risk reduction efforts with early adopter “pathfinder” missions, paving the way to operational services. As the Artemis Program matures and builds on the successful Artemis I flight in November-December of 2022, the definition of the supporting communications and navigation architecture has further been refined. Although NASA government assets will continue to play a key role in provision of services, such as through the Deep Space Network, SCaN is pursuing commercial services offerings to expand ground network capability and implement lunar relay services. In February of 2023, SCaN released solicitation for services that include DTE services to missions near-Earth and in cislunar space, as well as lunar relay services. Further, SCaN is seeking opportunities to integrate commercial capability into lunar surface communications infrastructure. NASA is also advocating for standards that promote interoperability and strategic technology investments in the commercial sector. This paper addresses the recent progress and future plans in the near-Earth space and lunar regimes, discusses the unified approach for industry engagement, and highlights both the common and unique challenges of commercialization efforts in the two regimes.

commercial services↗
NASA NTRS1987

International cooperation in planetary exploration - Past success and future prospects

A review is given of the ways in which the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has participated in international efforts to explore the solar system. Past examples of successful international cooperative programs are described. Prospects for future cooperative efforts are discussed with emphasis placed on current events, issues, and trends which are likely to affect possibilities for cooperation over the next 5 to 10 years. Key factors which will play a major role in shaping future prospects for cooperation include the move towards balancing the budget in the United States and the impact of the Challenger accident on the NASA program.

Rosendhal, Jeffrey D.↗
NASA NTRS1993

NASA aerospace database subject scope: An overview

Outlined here is the subject scope of the NASA Aerospace Database, a publicly available subset of the NASA Scientific and Technical (STI) Database. Topics of interest to NASA are outlined and placed within the framework of the following broad aerospace subject categories: aeronautics, astronautics, chemistry and materials, engineering, geosciences, life sciences, mathematical and computer sciences, physics, social sciences, space sciences, and general. A brief discussion of the subject scope is given for each broad area, followed by a similar explanation of each of the narrower subject fields that follow. The subject category code is listed for each entry.

Source record↗
NASA NTRS2005

Invasive Species Forecasting System: A Decision Support Tool for the U.S. Geological Survey: FY 2005 Benchmarking Report v.1.6

The National Institute of Invasive Species Science (NIISS), through collaboration with NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC), recently began incorporating NASA observations and predictive modeling tools to fulfill its mission. These enhancements, labeled collectively as the Invasive Species Forecasting System (ISFS), are now in place in the NIISS in their initial state (V1.0). The ISFS is the primary decision support tool of the NIISS for the management and control of invasive species on Department of Interior and adjacent lands. The ISFS is the backbone for a unique information services line-of-business for the NIISS, and it provides the means for delivering advanced decision support capabilities to a wide range of management applications. This report describes the operational characteristics of the ISFS, a decision support tool of the United States Geological Survey (USGS). Recent enhancements to the performance of the ISFS, attained through the integration of observations, models, and systems engineering from the NASA are benchmarked; i.e., described quantitatively and evaluated in relation to the performance of the USGS system before incorporation of the NASA enhancements. This report benchmarks Version 1.0 of the ISFS.

Stohlgren, Tom↗
NASA NTRS1998

Human Mars Missions: Cost Driven Architecture Assessments

This report investigates various methods of reducing the cost in space transportation systems for human Mars missions. The reference mission for this task is a mission currently under study at NASA. called the Mars Design Reference Mission, characterized by In-Situ propellant production at Mars. This study mainly consists of comparative evaluations to the reference mission with a view to selecting strategies that would reduce the cost of the Mars program as a whole. One of the objectives is to understand the implications of certain Mars architectures, mission modes, vehicle configurations, and potentials for vehicle reusability. The evaluations start with year 2011-2014 conjunction missions which were characterized by their abort-to-the-surface mission abort philosophy. Variations within this mission architecture, as well as outside the set to other architectures (not predicated on an abort to surface philosophy) were evaluated. Specific emphasis has been placed on identifying and assessing overall mission risk. Impacts that Mars mission vehicles might place upon the Space Station, if it were to be used as an assembly or operations base, were also discussed. Because of the short duration of this study only on a few propulsion elements were addressed (nuclear thermal, cryogenic oxygen-hydrogen, cryogenic oxygen-methane, and aerocapture). Primary ground rules and assumptions were taken from NASA material used in Marshall Space Flight Center's own assessment done in 1997.

Interplanetary Mission↗
NASA NTRS1982

Electron lithography STAR design guidelines. Part 2: The design of a STAR for space applications

The STAR design system developed by NASA enables any user with a logic diagram to design a semicustom digital MOS integrated circuit. The system is comprised of a library of standard logic cells and computr programs to place, route, and display designs implemented with cells from the library. Also described is the development of a radiation-hard array designed for the STAR system. The design is based on the CMOS silicon gate technology developed by SANDIA National Laboratories. The design rules used are given as well as the model parameters developed for the basic array element. Library cells of the CMOS metal gate and CMOS silicon gate technologies were simulated using SPICE, and the results are shown and compared.

Trotter, J. D.↗