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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 55 records · Page 3
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS1997

Dryden Flight Research Center Chemical Pharmacy Program

The Dryden Flight Research Center (DFRC) Chemical Pharmacy "Crib" is a chemical sharing system which loans chemicals to users, rather than issuing them or having each individual organization or group purchasing the chemicals. This cooperative system of sharing chemicals eliminates multiple ownership of the same chemicals and also eliminates stockpiles. Chemical management duties are eliminated for each of the participating organizations. The chemical storage issues, hazards and responsibilities are eliminated. The system also ensures safe storage of chemicals and proper disposal practices. The purpose of this program is to reduce the total releases and transfers of toxic chemicals. The initial cost of the program to DFRC was $585,000. A savings of $69,000 per year has been estimated for the Center. This savings includes the reduced costs in purchasing, disposal and chemical inventory/storage responsibilities. DFRC has chemicals stored in 47 buildings and at 289 locations. When the program is fully implemented throughout the Center, there will be three chemical locations at this facility. The benefits of this program are the elimination of chemical management duties; elimination of the hazard associated with chemical storage; elimination of stockpiles; assurance of safe storage; assurance of proper disposal practices; assurance of a safer workplace; and more accurate emissions reports.

Davis, Bette↗
NASA NTRS1991

The role of smart systems in rendezvous, close proximity operations and docking maneuvers

Various missions scenarios (Space Station logistics, LEO and GEO services, and SEI operation) will involve flexibility in mission management. This means operations will be one or a combination of the following: autonomous, supervised autonomous, and machine aided manual control. Smart Systems will likely play a significant role in making these missions successful from a safety/reliability perspective and less costly from an operations perspective. This does not imply that Smart Systems need to be super sophisticated. On the contrary, Smart Systems have been described as automated intelligence that if a person had done it wrong, it would be considered stupid. The first part of this paper will describe the types of Smart System techniques involved in AR and CC, their specifications, duties, and interactions. Next will be a discussion of the work performed under the auspice of the ALS Program to further Expert Systems applications imbedded in the control process, NASA/JSC CRAD, and other related IRAD projects. This will include issues pertaining to the following: integration, speed, knowledge encapsulation, and cooperative systems. Finally, a brief description will be offered to outline the major obstacles for the acceptance of Smart Systems in critical applications.

Szatkowski, Gerard P.↗
NASA NTRS1986

Using Ada to implement the operations management system in a community of experts

An architecture is described for the Space Station Operations Management System (OMS), consisting of a distributed expert system framework implemented in Ada. The motivation for such a scheme is based on the desire to integrate the very diverse elements of the OMS while taking maximum advantage of knowledge based systems technology. Part of the foundation of an Ada based distributed expert system was accomplished in the form of a proof of concept prototype for the KNOMES project (Knowledge-based Maintenance Expert System). This prototype successfully used concurrently active experts to accomplish monitoring and diagnosis for the Remote Manipulator System. The basic concept of this software architecture is named ACTORS for Ada Cognitive Task ORganization Scheme. It is when one considers the overall problem of integrating all of the OMS elements into a cooperative system that the AI solution stands out. By utilizing a distributed knowledge based system as the framework for OMS, it is possible to integrate those components which need to share information in an intelligent manner.

Frank, M. S.↗
DOE OSTI2024

Planning for Equitable Solar Deployment with Electric Cooperatives

The goal of the study was to understand how electric cooperatives can design equitable solar photovoltaic (PV) projects consistent with the goals of their organizations. To understand the possibilities for equitable solar deployment, the project team carefully defined cross-subsidy by delving into the multi-level structure of electric cooperatives. Understanding that utilities and analysts apply different cost-categorization perspectives was key to developing a transparent analytic model that traces the economic value flows of new solar PV projects across the tiers of a cooperative system.

14 SOLAR ENERGY↗
NASA NTRS1994

Design of a cooperative problem-solving system for en-route flight planning: An empirical evaluation

Both optimization techniques and expert systems technologies are popular approaches for developing tools to assist in complex problem-solving tasks. Because of the underlying complexity of many such tasks, however, the models of the world implicitly or explicitly embedded in such tools are often incomplete and the problem-solving methods fallible. The result can be 'brittleness' in situations that were not anticipated by the system designers. To deal with this weakness, it has been suggested that 'cooperative' rather than 'automated' problem-solving systems be designed. Such cooperative systems are proposed to explicitly enhance the collaboration of the person (or a group of people) and the computer system. This study evaluates the impact of alternative design concepts on the performance of 30 airline pilots interacting with such a cooperative system designed to support en-route flight planning. The results clearly demonstrate that different system design concepts can strongly influence the cognitive processes and resultant performances of users. Based on think-aloud protocols, cognitive models are proposed to account for how features of the computer system interacted with specific types of scenarios to influence exploration and decision making by the pilots. The results are then used to develop recommendations for guiding the design of cooperative systems.

Layton, Charles↗
NASA NTRS1994

Design of a cooperative problem-solving system for en-route flight planning: An empirical evaluation

Both optimization techniques and expert systems technologies are popular approaches for developing tools to assist in complex problem-solving tasks. Because of the underlying complexity of many such tasks, however, the models of the world implicitly or explicitly embedded in such tools are often incomplete and the problem-solving methods fallible. The result can be 'brittleness' in situations that were not anticipated by the system designers. To deal with this weakness, it has been suggested that 'cooperative' rather than 'automated' problem-solving systems be designed. Such cooperative systems are proposed to explicitly enhance the collaboration of the person (or a group of people) and the computer system. This study evaluates the impact of alternative design concepts on the performance of 30 airline pilots interacting with such a cooperative system designed to support enroute flight planning. The results clearly demonstrate that different system design concepts can strongly influence the cognitive processes and resultant performances of users. Based on think-aloud protocols, cognitive models are proposed to account for how features of the computer system interacted with specific types of scenarios to influence exploration and decision making by the pilots. The results are then used to develop recommendations for guiding the design of cooperative systems.

Layton, Charles↗
NASA NTRS1990

Building distributed rule-based systems using the AI Bus

The AI Bus software architecture was designed to support the construction of large-scale, production-quality applications in areas of high technology flux, running heterogeneous distributed environments, utilizing a mix of knowledge-based and conventional components. These goals led to its current development as a layered, object-oriented library for cooperative systems. This paper describes the concepts and design of the AI Bus and its implementation status as a library of reusable and customizable objects, structured by layers from operating system interfaces up to high-level knowledge-based agents. Each agent is a semi-autonomous process with specialized expertise, and consists of a number of knowledge sources (a knowledge base and inference engine). Inter-agent communication mechanisms are based on blackboards and Actors-style acquaintances. As a conservative first implementation, we used C++ on top of Unix, and wrapped an embedded Clips with methods for the knowledge source class. This involved designing standard protocols for communication and functions which use these protocols in rules. Embedding several CLIPS objects within a single process was an unexpected problem because of global variables, whose solution involved constructing and recompiling a C++ version of CLIPS. We are currently working on a more radical approach to incorporating CLIPS, by separating out its pattern matcher, rule and fact representations and other components as true object oriented modules.

Schultz, Roger D.↗
DOE OSTI2024

Ligand Noninnocence in β-Diketiminate and β-Diketimine Copper Complexes

Metal–ligand cooperative systems have a long precedent in catalysis, with the classification depending on the site of substrate bond cleavage and formation and on redox state changes. Recently, our group reported the participation of a β-diketiminate ligand in chemical bonding to heterocumulenes such as CO 2 and CS 2 by tricopper complexes, leading to cooperative catalysis. Herein, we report the reactivity of these copper clusters, [Cu 3 EL] – (E = S, Se; L = tris(β-diketiminate) cyclophane ligand), toward other electrophiles, viz. alkyl halides and Brønsted acids. We identified a family of ligand-functionalized complexes, Cu 3 EL (R) (R = primary alkyls), and a series of disubstituted products, Cu 3 EL (R) 2 , through single-crystal X-ray diffraction, mass spectrometry, and infrared and UV–visible spectroscopy. Furthermore, as part of mechanistic studies on these alkylation reactions, we evaluated the acid–base reactivity of these complexes and the influence of the backbone substitution on the reduction potential. Implications of these findings for ligand noninnocence and the relevance of the metal core as a cofactor for the ligand’s reactivity are discussed.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
NASA NTRS1987

Expert systems relations in space applications

The problem of expert systems relations as they pertain to space applications is discussed. First, these systems are categorized and the relationships between them are analyzed. Then, the expert systems cooperation paradigm is proposed. This paradigm addresses various types of communication and coordination issues in an attempt to create a general model applicable in a number of situations.

Brady, Michael↗
NASA NTRS1994

Scientific and technical photography at NASA Langley Research Center

As part of my assignment connected with the Scientific and Technical Photography & Lab (STPL) at the NASA Langley Research Center I conducted a series of interviews and observed the day to day operations of the STPL with the ultimate objective of becoming exposed first hand to a scientific and technical photo/imaging department for which my school prepares its graduates. I was also asked to share my observations with the staff in order that these comments and observations might assist the STPL to better serve its customers. Meetings with several individuals responsible for various wind tunnels and with a group that provides photo-optical instrumentation services at the Center gave me an overview of the services provided by the Lab and possible areas for development. In summary form these are some of the observations that resulted from the interviews and daily contact with the STPL facility. (1) The STPL is perceived as a valuable and almost indispensable service group within the organization. This comment was invariably made by everyone. Everyone also seemed to support the idea that the STPL continue to provide its current level of service and quality. (2) The STPL generally is not perceived to be a highly technically oriented group but rather as a provider of high quality photographic illustration and documentation services. In spite of the importance and high marks assigned to the STPL there are several observations that merit consideration and evaluation for possible inclusion into the STPL's scope of expertise and future operating practices. (1) While the care and concern for artistic rendition of subjects is seen as laudable and sometimes valuable, the time that this often requires is seen as interfering with keeping the tunnels operating at maximum productivity. Tunnel managers would like to shorten down-time due to photography, have services available during evening hours and on short notice. It may be of interest to the STPL that tunnel managers are incorporating ever greater imaging capabilities in their facilities. To some extent this could mean a reduced demand for traditional photographic services. (2) The photographic archive is seen as a Center resource. Archiving of images, as well as data, is a matter of concern to the investigators. The early holdings of the Photographic Archives are quickly deteriorating. The relative inaccessibility of the material held in the archives is problematic. (3) In certain cases delivery or preparation of digital image files instead of, or along with, hardcopy is already being perceived by the STPL's customers as desirable. The STPL should make this option available, and the fact that it has, or will have this capability widely known. (4) The STPL needs to continue to provide expert advice and technical imaging support in terms of application information to users of traditional photographic and new electronic imaging systems. Cooperative demo projects might be undertaken to maintain or improve the capabilities of the Lab. (5) STPL personnel do not yet have significant electronic imaging or electronic communication skills and improvements in this is an area could potentially have a positive impact on the Center. (6) High speed photographic or imaging services are often mentioned by the STPL as being of primary importance to their mission but the lab supports very few projects calling for high speed imaging services. Much high speed equipment is in poor state of repair. It is interesting to note that when the operation of lasers, digital imaging or quantitative techniques are requested these are directed to another NASA department. Could joint activities be initiated to solve problems? (7). The STPL could acquire more technical assignments if examples of the areas where they posses expertise would be circulated around the center. The fact that the STPL owns high speed video capability could be 'advertised' among its customer base if there truly was an interest in building up a customer base in this area. The STPL could participate in events like TOPS as an exhibitor, as well as a documenter, of the event.

Davidhazy, Andrew↗
NASA NTRS1984

An ER-2 aircraft airborne lidar as part of the development program of a spaceborne system: A potential NASA/CNES cooperative project

A lidar system for atmospheric investigations to fly aboard a high altitude aircraft is introduced. Scientific objectives of the program are reviewed in terms of the expected accuracy and temporal and/or spatial resolution of measurements such as ozone vertical profiles in the troposphere and stratosphere, cirrus clouds studies, tropospheric and stratospheric aerosol monitoring and water vapor measurements in the boundary layer and at the troposphere stratosphere interface. The instrument is conceived as an autonomous, space qualified system as a first step towards a fully automated system for spaceborne applications.

Megie, G.↗
DOE OSTI2021

Developing an Eco-Cooperative Automated Control System (Eco-CAC)

The goal of the project was to develop a novel Eco-Cooperative Automated Control (Eco-CAC) system that integrates vehicle dynamics (VD) control with connected and automated vehicle (CAV) applications. In particular, the team developed a novel integrated control system that (1) routes vehicles in a fuel/energy-efficient manner for internal combustion engine vehicles (ICEVs), battery-only electric vehicles (BEVs), and hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs); (2) selects vehicle speeds based on anticipated traffic network evolution; (3) minimizes vehicle fuel/energy consumption near signalized intersections; and (4) intelligently modulates the longitudinal motion of vehicles within a cooperative platoon to minimize its fuel/energy consumption.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗
NASA NTRS2000

Eighth Goddard Conference on Mass Storage Systems and Technologies in Cooperation with the Seventeenth IEEE Symposium on Mass Storage Systems

This document contains copies of those technical papers received in time for publication prior to the Eighth Goddard Conference on Mass Storage Systems and Technologies which is being held in cooperation with the Seventeenth IEEE Symposium on Mass Storage Systems at the University of Maryland University College Inn and Conference Center March 27-30, 2000. As one of an ongoing series, this Conference continues to provide a forum for discussion of issues relevant to the management of large volumes of data. The Conference encourages all interested organizations to discuss long term mass storage requirements and experiences in fielding solutions. Emphasis is on current and future practical solutions addressing issues in data management, storage systems and media, data acquisition, long term retention of data, and data distribution. This year's discussion topics include architecture, future of current technology, new technology with a special emphasis on holographic storage, performance, standards, site reports, vendor solutions. Tutorials will be available on stability of optical media, disk subsystem performance evaluation, I/O and storage tuning, functionality and performance evaluation of file systems for storage area networks.

Kobler, Benjamin↗
NASA NTRS2002

Tenth Goddard Conference on Mass Storage Systems and Technologies in Cooperation with the Nineteenth IEEE Symposium on Mass Storage Systems

This document contains copies of those technical papers received in time for publication prior to the Tenth Goddard Conference on Mass Storage Systems and Technologies which is being held in cooperation with the Nineteenth IEEE Symposium on Mass Storage Systems at the University of Maryland University College Inn and Conference Center April 15-18, 2002. As one of an ongoing series, this Conference continues to provide a forum for discussion of issues relevant to the ingest, storage, and management of large volumes of data. The Conference encourages all interested organizations to discuss long-term mass storage requirements and experiences in fielding solutions. Emphasis is on current and future practical solutions addressing issues in data management, storage systems and media, data acquisition, long-term retention of data, and data distribution. This year's discussion topics include architecture, future of current technology, storage networking with emphasis on IP storage, performance, standards, site reports, and vendor solutions. Tutorials will be available on perpendicular magnetic recording, object based storage, storage virtualization and IP storage.

Kobler, Benjamin↗
NASA NTRS1991

Distributed, cooperating knowledge-based systems

Some current research in the development and application of distributed, cooperating knowledge-based systems technology is addressed. The focus of the current research is the spacecraft ground operations environment. The underlying hypothesis is that, because of the increasing size, complexity, and cost of planned systems, conventional procedural approaches to the architecture of automated systems will give way to a more comprehensive knowledge-based approach. A hallmark of these future systems will be the integration of multiple knowledge-based agents which understand the operational goals of the system and cooperate with each other and the humans in the loop to attain the goals. The current work includes the development of a reference model for knowledge-base management, the development of a formal model of cooperating knowledge-based agents, the use of testbed for prototyping and evaluating various knowledge-based concepts, and beginning work on the establishment of an object-oriented model of an intelligent end-to-end (spacecraft to user) system. An introductory discussion of these activities is presented, the major concepts and principles being investigated are highlighted, and their potential use in other application domains is indicated.

Truszkowski, Walt↗
NASA NTRS1991

Validation of an expert system intended for research in distributed artificial intelligence

The expert system discussed in this paper is designed to function as a testbed for research on cooperating expert systems. Cooperating expert systems are members of an organization which dictates the manner in which the expert systems will interact when solving a problem. The Blackbox Expert described in this paper has been constructed using the C Language Integrated Production System (CLIPS), C++, and X windowing environment. CLIPS is embedded in a C++ program which provides objects that are used to maintain the state of the Blackbox puzzle. These objects are accessed by CLIPS rules through user-defined functions calls. The performance of the Blackbox Expert is validated by experimentation. A group of people are asked to solve a set of test cases for the Blackbox puzzle. A metric has been devised which evaluates the 'correctness' of a solution proposed for a test case of Blackbox. Using this metric and the solutions proposed by the humans, each person receives a rating for their ability to solve the Blackbox puzzle. The Blackbox Expert solves the same set of test cases and is assigned a rating for its ability. Then the rating obtained by the Blackbox Expert is compared with the ratings of the people, thus establishing the skill level of our expert system.

Grossner, C.↗
NASA NTRS1993

Cooperative answers in database systems

A major concern of researchers who seek to improve human-computer communication involves how to move beyond literal interpretations of queries to a level of responsiveness that takes the user's misconceptions, expectations, desires, and interests into consideration. At Maryland, we are investigating how to better meet a user's needs within the framework of the cooperative answering system of Gal and Minker. We have been exploring how to use semantic information about the database to formulate coherent and informative answers. The work has two main thrusts: (1) the construction of a logic formula which embodies the content of a cooperative answer; and (2) the presentation of the logic formula to the user in a natural language form. The information that is available in a deductive database system for building cooperative answers includes integrity constraints, user constraints, the search tree for answers to the query, and false presuppositions that are present in the query. The basic cooperative answering theory of Gal and Minker forms the foundation of a cooperative answering system that integrates the new construction and presentation methods. This paper provides an overview of the cooperative answering strategies used in the CARMIN cooperative answering system, an ongoing research effort at Maryland. Section 2 gives some useful background definitions. Section 3 describes techniques for collecting cooperative logical formulae. Section 4 discusses which natural language generation techniques are useful for presenting the logic formula in natural language text. Section 5 presents a diagram of the system.

Gaasterland, Terry↗
NASA NTRS2004

NASA/IEEE MSST 2004 Twelfth NASA Goddard Conference on Mass Storage Systems and Technologies in cooperation with the Twenty-First IEEE Conference on Mass Storage Systems and Technologies

MSST2004, the Twelfth NASA Goddard / Twenty-first IEEE Conference on Mass Storage Systems and Technologies has as its focus long-term stewardship of globally-distributed storage. The increasing prevalence of e-anything brought about by widespread use of applications based, among others, on the World Wide Web, has contributed to rapid growth of online data holdings. A study released by the School of Information Management and Systems at the University of California, Berkeley, estimates that over 5 exabytes of data was created in 2002. Almost 99 percent of this information originally appeared on magnetic media. The theme for MSST2004 is therefore both timely and appropriate. There have been many discussions about rapid technological obsolescence, incompatible formats and inadequate attention to the permanent preservation of knowledge committed to digital storage. Tutorial sessions at MSST2004 detail some of these concerns, and steps being taken to alleviate them. Over 30 papers deal with topics as diverse as performance, file systems, and stewardship and preservation. A number of short papers, extemporaneous presentations, and works in progress will detail current and relevant research on the MSST2004 theme.

Kobler, Ben↗