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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 1,045 records · Page 58

Route to the cosmodrome

Photograph of Soviet spacecraft ready for launching with group of eleven cosmonauts alongside

ASTRONAUT↗

On the use of space photography for identifying transportation routes: A summary of problems

It has been widely suggested that space photography may be used for updating maps of transportation networks. Proponents of the argument have suggested that color space photographs of the resolution obtained with Hasselblad 80 mm lenses (about 300 feet) contain enough useful information to update the extensions of major U. S. highways. The present study systematically documents for the Dallas-Fort Worth area the potential of such space photography in detecting, and to a lesser degree identifying, the existing road networks. Color separation plates and an enlargement of the color photograph were produced and all visible roads traced onto transparencies for study. Major roads and roads under construction were the most visible while lower class roads and roads in urban areas had the poorest return. Road width and classification were found to be the major determinant in visibility, varying from 100 per cent visible for divided highways to 15 per cent visible of bladed earth roads. In summary, space photographs of this resolution proved to be difficult to use for accurate road delineation. Only super highways in rural areas with the greatest road-width were completely identifiable, the width being about 1/3 that of the resolution cell.

Simonett, D. S.↗

Northwest passage: Trade route for large air cushion vehicles

A conceptual vehicle and powerplant (10,000-ton) nuclear-powered air-cushion vehicle (ACV) that could open the Northwest Passage and other Arctic passages to commercial traffic is identified. The report contains a description of the conceptual vehicle, including the powerplant and operations, an assessment of technical feasibility, estimates of capital and operating costs, and identification of eligible cargo and markets. A comparison of the nuclear ACV freighter with nuclear container ships shows that for containerized or roll-on/roll-off cargo the ACV would provide greatly reduced transit time between North Atlantic and North Pacific ports at a competitive cost.

Anderson, J. L.↗

An algorithm for a general class of routing problems derived from Huygens' principle

If a set of N points or nodes with a nonnegative cost associated with each ordered pair is known, it is desired to find a path from one given node to another given node which minimizes the cost sum. An algorithm is presented which yields a global minimum solution after at most N - 1 iterations or on a typical large third-generation computer, after 1 hour of computation time for a 10,000-node problem. The rapid-access data storage capacity demanded by the algorithm is approximately 3N words for costs read in from slow-access storage or 2N words for calculable costs. The time-storage requirements of the algorithm known to the authors. When the problem is viewed as a discretized optimal control problem, after N-1 iterations, an optimal control or node transition is established for each of the N nodes or states; thus, the algorithm can be applied to situations were there may be errors in the control that necessitate a closed loop control that necessitate a closed loop control philosophy.

Avis, L. M.↗

Simulator evaluation of optimal thrust management/fuel conservation strategies for airbus aircraft on short haul routes

The feasibility of incorporating optimal concepts into a practical system was determined. Various earlier theoretical analyses were confirmed, and insight was gained into the sensitivity of fuel conservation strategies to nonlinear and second order aerodynamic and engine characteristics. In addition to the investigation of optimal trajectories the study ascertained combined fuel savings by utilizing various procedure-oriented improvements such as delayed flap/decelerating approaches and great circle navigation.

Bochem, J. H.↗

Results of thin-route satellite communication system analyses including estimated service costs

A variety of cost and performance tradeoffs are addressed and the preliminary design of a communications satellite system capable of meeting isolated rural users' needs is presented. Small inexpensive rural earth stations are linked via the satellite to a nation wide network of large earth stations which are, in turn, interconnected to the switching exchanges of the conventional telephone network. Optimum earth station EIRP and G/T and satellite transponder power are defined as a function of a wide variety of system options.

Wright, D. L.↗

Results of thin-route satellite communication system analyses including estimated service costs

Ways for determining optimum satellite and terrestrial system architectures and parameters for providing the most economical telephone service to remote areas of the U.S. are explored. Several configurations for an isolated rural telephone system, covering all the states plus Alaska, employing satellites is considered. Both direct-to-the-user and community-type of systems are evaluated using UHF and Ku-band RF equipment for the rural/satellite links. The effect of multiple spot beams, outage, signal quality, modulation method, satellite accessing, forward error correction, and the number of users are also evaluated. The total cost for a 5-minute call from an isolated rural user to a TELCO user was shown to be as low as $1.30 for a system with 1.8 X 10 to the sixth rural users.

Wright, D. L.↗

ATC contingency operations in the en-route flight regime

Air traffic control (ATC) operations were examined to learn what factors of controller performance should be given consideration in the design and development of future automation systems enhancing ATC. Contingencies were of two types: those constraining airspace usage or traffic flow (i.e., weather); and those related to system and equipment usage (i.e., radar/radio status). Examination of controller response to contingencies and workload pressures showed differing effects on controller allocations of effort among the three primary function of planning, monitoring, and informaton transfer. Automation advancements oriented towards aiding the controller in performing monitoring tasks may offer the most substantial safety benefit.

Lyman, E. G.↗

On-board processing for future satellite communications systems: Satellite-Routed FDMA

A frequency division multiple access (FDMA) 30/20 GHz satellite communications architecture without on-board baseband processing is investigated. Conceptual system designs are suggested for domestic traffic models totaling 4 Gb/s of customer premises service (CPS) traffic and 6 Gb/s of trunking traffic. Emphasis is given to the CPS portion of the system which includes thousands of earth terminals with digital traffic ranging from a single 64 kb/s voice channel to hundreds of channels of voice, data, and video with an aggregate data rate of 33 Mb/s. A unique regional design concept that effectively smooths the non-uniform traffic distribution and greatly simplifies the satellite design is employed. The satellite antenna system forms thirty-two 0.33 deg beam on both the uplinks and the downlinks in one design. In another design matched to a traffic model with more dispersed users, there are twenty-four 0.33 deg beams and twenty-one 0.7 deg beams. Detailed system design techniques show that a single satellite producing approximately 5 kW of dc power is capable of handling at least 75% of the postulated traffic. A detailed cost model of the ground segment and estimated system costs based on current information from manufacturers are presented.

Berk, G.↗

Application of fuel/time minimization techniques to route planning and trajectory optimization

Rising fuel costs combined with other economic pressures have resulted in industry requirements for more efficient air traffic control and airborne operations. NASA has responded with an on-going research program to investigate the requirements and benefits of using new airborne guidance and pilot procedures that are compatible with advanced air traffic control systems and that will result in more fuel efficient flight. The results of flight testing an airborne computer algorithm designed to provide either open-loop or closed-loop guidance for fuel efficient descents while satisfying time constraints imposed by the air traffic control system is summarized. Some of the potential cost and fuel savings that are obtained with sophisticated vertical path optimization capabilities are described.

Knox, C. E.↗

Thin Route Project

An overview of NASA efforts to improve on the number of carriers for satellite communication systems is presented. A brief history of satellite telecommunication systems and their use in linking underdeveloped areas, along with a brief explanation of the necessary hardware is also given.

Felix, S. G.↗

Meteorites may follow a chaotic route to earth

A numerical integration was employed to show that the 3/1 Kirkwood gap region between Jupiter and the sun can serve as the source for asteroidal debris that strikes the earth as chondrites. A previous study by Wetherill (1968) considered planetary close encounters, secular resonances, collisional destruction in space and subsequent atmospheric abrasion of the chondrites. The factors would have resulted in chaotic trajectories for asteroids in the asteroid belt, i.e., eccentricities large enough to make the objects earth-crossing. A sampling of trajectories which could reach large eccentricities is integrated in terms of deterministic solutions of Hamiltonian systems of equations which behave erratically and are dependent on the initial conditions. The examinations successfully predicted a trajectory with a peak eccentricity of 0.652, a time interval of 340,000 yr, and a semimajor axis between 2.4-2.53 AU that was earth-crossing.

Wisdom, J.↗