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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 829 records · Page 46
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2025

WHOC (Wind Hybrid Open Controller) [SWR-25-54]

The Wind Hybrid Open Controller (WHOC) is a python-based tool for real-time plant-level wind farm control and wind-based hybrid plant control. WHOC is primarily run in simulation, although we intend that it could be used for physical plants in future. WHOC provides simple farm-level (and hybrid plant-level) controls such as wake steering control, spatial filtering/consensus, active power control, and coordinated control of hybrid power plant assets; and creates an entry point for the development of more advanced controllers.

Sinner, Michael (Misha) [National Renewable Energy↗
NASA NTRS1992

Automating simulator operations

A set of requirements are defined for an operations support system for automating operations in the Space Station Training Facility (SSTF). An operations concept is described based on utilization studies and facility-operations plans with specific attention given to the SSTF components. The Operations Support System (OSS) is designed to have an integrated set of tools for system configuration and realtime data monitoring, analysis, and control. The concept relies on a system configuration tool for connecting and verifying hardware and software components, and a status-and-control monitor is envisaged to collect data. The SSTF OSS is expected to enhance the effectiveness of simulator training by configuring the components for training, monitoring and controlling components, and conducting all operations in real time.

Jacobs, Rebecca J.↗
NASA NTRS2001

The Development of the Multi-Center Traffic Management Advisor (MCTMA): Traffic Flow Management Research in a Multi-Facility Environment

The Traffic Management Advisor (TMA) is a decision-support tool for traffic managers and air traffic controllers that provides traffic flow visualization and other flow management tools. TMA creates an efficiently sequenced and safely spaced schedule for arrival traffic that meets but does not exceed specified airspace system constraints. TMA is being deployed at selected facilities throughout the National Airspace System in the US as part of the FAA's Free Flight Phase 1 program. TMA development and testing, and its current deployment, focuses on managing the arrival capacity for single major airports within single terminal areas and single en route centers. The next phase of development for this technology is the expansion of the TMA capability to complex facilities in which a terminal area or airport is fed by multiple en route centers, thus creating a multicenter TMA functionality. The focus of the multi-center TMA (McTMA) development is on the busy facilities in the Northeast comdor of the US. This paper describes the planning and development of McTMA and the challenges associated with adapting a successful traffic flow management tool for a very complex airspace.

Lee, Katharine K.↗
NASA NTRS2007

Enhanced Master Controller Unit Tester

The Enhanced Master Controller Unit Tester (EMUT) software is a tool for development and testing of software for a master controller (MC) flight computer. The primary function of the EMUT software is to simulate interfaces between the MC computer and external analog and digital circuitry (including other computers) in a rack of equipment to be used in scientific experiments. The simulations span the range of nominal, off-nominal, and erroneous operational conditions, enabling the testing of MC software before all the equipment becomes available.

Benson, Patricia↗
NASA NTRS1987

Lunar hand tools

Tools useful for operations and maintenance tasks on the lunar surface were determined and designed. Primary constraints are the lunar environment, the astronaut's space suit and the strength limits of the astronaut on the moon. A multipurpose rotary motion tool and a collapsible tool carrier were designed. For the rotary tool, a brushless motor and controls were specified, a material for the housing was chosen, bearings and lubrication were recommended and a planetary reduction gear attachment was designed. The tool carrier was designed primarily for ease of access to the tools and fasteners. A material was selected and structural analysis was performed on the carrier. Recommendations were made about the limitations of human performance and about possible attachments to the torque driver.

Bentz, Karl F.↗
DOE OSTI2025

Safe Physics-Informed Machine Learning for Dynamics and Control

This tutorial paper focuses on safe physics-informed machine learning in the context of dynamics and control, providing a comprehensive overview of how to integrate physical models and safety guarantees. As machine learning techniques enhance the modeling and control of complex dynamical systems, ensuring safety and stability remains a critical challenge, especially in safety-critical applications like autonomous vehicles, robotics, medical decision-making, and energy systems. We explore various approaches for embedding and ensuring safety constraints, including structural priors, Lyapunov and Control Barrier Functions, predictive control, projections, and robust optimization techniques. Additionally, we delve into methods for uncertainty quantification and safety verification, including reachability analysis and neural network verification tools, which help validate that control policies remain within safe operating bounds even in uncertain environments. The paper includes illustrative examples demonstrating the implementation aspects of safe learning frameworks that combine the strengths of data-driven approaches with the rigor of physical principles, offering a path toward the safe control of complex dynamical systems.

Drgona, Jan↗
NASA NTRS1999

Development and Implementation of a Load-Controlled Friction Stir Welder

Lockheed Martin Michoud Space Systems, under contract to NASA/MSFC, has developed and implemented a friction stir weld tool that uses the magnitude of the spindle axial load to control the weld process. This tool was used during the process development phase and the assembly of a full-scale External Tank barrel section. Both position and load transducers are incorporated into the welder. The control algorithm allows either the position or load transducer to provide the command variable in a closed loop system. Initially, the position transducer was used to actively control the weld process and the axial load on the spindle was monitored and collected via data acquisition hardware. As part of the process development, the axial load was implemented as the command variable in the closed loop. The spindle position is monitored and used to set limits on spindle travel. A zero set point algorithm has also been developed for establishing the spindle position at the start of the weld process. In its current state, the welder operates in a dual mode in which the position control is used to plunge the pin tool to a specified depth at the initiation of the weld. The load control is then used to control the weld process. This control algorithm has been used to assemble a 27.5-ft diameter, 2195-T8 barrel using hardware designed for NASA's Space Transportation System External Tank.

Loftus, Z.↗
NASA NTRS1999

Use of the MATRIXx Integrated Toolkit on the Microwave Anisotropy Probe Attitude Control System

Recent advances in analytical software tools allow the analysis, simulation, flight code, and documentation of an algorithm to be generated from a single source, all within one integrated analytical design package. NASA's Microwave Anisotropy Probe project has used one such package, Integrated Systems' MATRIXx suite, in the design of the spacecraft's Attitude Control System. The project's experience with the linear analysis, simulation, code generation, and documentation tools will be presented and compared with more traditional development tools. In particular, the quality of the flight software generated will be examined in detail. Finally, lessons learned on each of the tools will be shared.

Ward, David K.↗
NASA NTRS2006

A Tool Measuring Remaining Thickness of Notched Acoustic Cavities in Primary Reaction Control Thruster NDI Standards

Stress corrosion cracking in the relief radius area of a space shuttle primary reaction control thruster is an issue of concern. The current approach for monitoring of potential crack growth is nondestructive inspection (NDI) of remaining thickness (RT) to the acoustic cavities using an eddy current or remote field eddy current probe. EDM manufacturers have difficulty in providing accurate RT calibration standards. Significant error in the RT values of NDI calibration standards could lead to a mistaken judgment of cracking condition of a thruster under inspection. A tool based on eddy current principle has been developed to measure the RT at each acoustic cavity of a calibration standard in order to validate that the standard meets the sample design criteria.

Sun, Yushi↗
DOE OSTI2023

Turbine-based Power System Tool

Advanced research tools are essential to illustrate the effects of turbine-based power system operations on the electric grid network. This paper presents the development of an open-source tool to visualize the operation of turbine-based electricity generation. The tool exposes power system models, control parameters, and corresponding values of the turbine model and its electrical system, allowing them to customize the simulation according to their needs. The developed tool enables users to simulate power profiles for different turbinebased energy generation such as wind, tidal, and gas turbines. It allows users to investigate the details of the generated profiles of various types of turbine systems at various scales. It can provide valuable insights into model development and facilitate the analysis of integrated power systems. By enabling access to turbine-based operations visualization, the tool aims to bridge the gap between advanced research tools and users, facilitating broader adoption of renewable energy technologies and aiding in developing sustainable power systems.

Kini, Roshan L.↗
NASA NTRS2014

Development of a Route Crossing Tool for Shared Airspace Environments

In current-day Terminal Radar Approach Control (TRACON) operations, departure and arrival controllers maintain separate and dedicated airspace for their respective traffic flows. Although this practice has obvious safety features, it also leads to inefficiencies; for example, departure aircraft may be routinely capped beneath arrival airspace. With the right decision-support and coordination tools, departures could continue to climb through arrival airspace when sufficient gaps exist. Previous studies of ‘shared airspace’ have examined pre-arranged coordination procedures, as well as tools that gave feedback to the controllers on where gaps between arrivals were located and whether the departure aircraft could be scheduled to fly through those gaps [1, 2, 3, 4]. Since then, the Route Crossing Tool (RCT) has been developed to allow controllers to assess multiple pre-defined route options at points where the arrivals and departures cross, thereby increasing the possibility of climbing a departure through an arrival gap.The RCT aids in ensuring lateral separation between departure and arrival aircraft that pass through the same altitude. Since the RCT can be applied tactically, it can enable aircraft to fly through arrival flows even if these aircraft depart outside scheduled times. The RCT makes use of a set of predefined parallel departure routes crossing the arrival flow at equidistant intersecting points on the arrival route. The RCT uses the Estimated Time of Arrival (ETA) of the departure aircraft at each intersecting point to calculate the lateral separation with the neighboring arrivals when it crosses that point; this information is graphically displayed to the controller. Additionally, the RCT incorporates forecast winds in its ETA predictions.Multiple prototypes of the RCT have been iteratively developed with feedback from Subject Matter Experts (SMEs). This paper presents the final design, the design process, and lessons learned. Initial results from a simulation suggest that the tool was successful in helping controllers to safely climb more aircraft. Controller feedback on the tool was also positive.

shared airspace↗
DOE OSTI2021

225 Ac/ 213 Bi Generator Based on Millifluidics Controlled Electrodeposition

Radioisotopes provide both diagnostic tools and therapeutic treatments for cancer and other diseases. In the US, millions of radioisotope doses are given to patients per year. Radiopharmaceutical generators are widely used to provide such short-lived medical radioisotopes in a clinical setting. These generators work by exploiting chemical differences in a parent/daughter isotope relationship. Actinium-225 (half-life 10 d) is used to provide clinically useful amounts of daughter isotopes 213 Bi (46 m). An integrated millifluidic 225 Ac/ 213 Bi radiopharmaceutical generator device was engineered to produce 213 Bi labeled biomolecules. Using recent LANL successes in additive manufacturing of small-scale fluidic devices, a disposable device was developed that integrates three steps for the production of 213 Bi labeled antibodies: 1) 213 Bi separation from 225 Ac parent, 2) 213 Bi antibody labeling, and 3) purification of the labelled antibody.

213Bi↗
NASA NTRS1971

Information quality-control model

Model serves as graphic tool for estimating complete product objectives from limited input information, and is applied to cost estimations, product-quality evaluations, and effectiveness measurements for manpower resources allocation. Six product quality levels are defined.

Vincent, D. A.↗
NASA NTRS1980

Applications of NASTRAN in Gust Response Analysis at Northrop

A comprehensive gust response analysis was performed on a complete model of an airplane using the NASTRAN aeroelastic package. The analysis investigated random response to atmospheric turbulence and transient response to a discrete gust, including control system dynamics in both cases. It is shown that NASTRAN is an effective tool for aeroelastic analysis and active control system design.

Singh, A. K.↗
NASA NTRS2006

Conflict Detection Using Variable Four-Dimensional Uncertainty Bounds to Control Missed Alerts

Decision-support tools for maintaining pairwise aircraft separation rely on conflict detection to alert the operator when the predicted trajectories of aircraft will result in a loss of separation. But aircraft frequently do not follow their predicted trajectories exactly. This can cause missed alerts and the failure of strategic separation procedures. We present a technique for modeling a bounded region of uncertainty around a four-dimensional predicted trajectory and an algorithm for detecting conflicts between trajectories modeled in this way that avoids missed alerts as long as the aircraft remain within the specified regions of uncertainty. In addition, we present an algorithm for detecting the intrusion of a trajectory modeled in this way into an area hazard modeled as a polygonal region. The size of the region of uncertainty can vary along the trajectory continually and independently in the along-path, cross-track, and vertical dimensions, providing an opportunity to reduce the likelihood of false alerts while protecting against typical prediction errors. The algorithm has been implemented in the Autonomous Operations Planner, a NASA Langley prototype decision support tool for airborne self-separation.

Karr, David A.↗
DOE OSTI2019

Numerical Oscillation Prevention for PV Inverter Controllers in Quasi-Steady-State Simulators

Droop-based PV inverter control methods are popular for preventing overvoltage in low voltage networks with high installations of PV solar. Quasi-steady-state simulators (QSTS) can be used to reduce the computational burden of conducting long-term techno-economic analyses of such PV inverter controllers. If dynamic models for droop-based controllers are directly implemented in QSTS, numerical oscillation occurs and the controllers fail to converge to their steady-state operation. In this paper, a power network sensitivity-based algorithm is proposed for preventing numerical oscillation while implementing active and reactive droop-based PV inverter controllers in quasisteady state simulation tool (e.g. in GridLAB-D). Convergence of the sensitivity-based algorithm is verified using a typical radial distribution feeder. It is found that all three controllers reached converged state in less than 15 iterations.

GridLAB-D, PV inverter control, quasi-steady-state↗