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Two new classes of solutions of the d = 11 supergravity equations are obtained in which the internal space is a U(1) bundle over a six-dimensional Kaehler manifold. The 4-index field strength is nonzero both in space-time and in the internal space.
This assessment had two Phases. Phase I captured NASA Centers’ current practices for commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) Electrical, Electronic, and Electromechanical (EEE) parts 1 used in spaceflight systems and ground support equipment (available at https://ntrs.nasa.gov/citations/20205011579) [ref. 1]. The Phase II report provides guidance for selecting and using COTS parts in NASA missions. The approaches proposed in this report differ from current agency practices. This top-level executive summary touches on these new approaches for using COTS parts but does not provide the detailed information that is critical in understanding the rationale behind these new approaches. Readers will need to read the entire report to gain full understanding and effectively use the recommendations herein. NASA’s historical approach to selecting and applying parts has been to define certain parts, primarily specific classes of military specification (MIL-SPEC) parts, as “standard”, leaving all others, including COTS parts, as nonstandard. Standard parts typically are used without further testing (“use-as-is”). Nonstandard parts are subjected to initial screening and subsequent lot acceptance testing of representative samples from each procured lot per MIL-SPEC or similar requirements. Decades later, top-tier commercial part manufacturers have evolved significant manufacturing, statistical control, and technological improvements that can now provide parts as reliable or more reliable than MIL-SPEC parts, when used within their datasheet limits. Concurrently, the space science and exploration community’s needs demand technological advances unavailable with MIL-SPEC parts. This ongoing change necessitates using COTS parts for space missions. Properly selected COTS parts in appropriate applications can offer performance and supply availability advantages compared to MIL-SPEC parts. Their utility and demonstrated reliability result from large volumes and automated production and testing processes. However, careful review and a thorough understanding of their specifications (i.e., datasheet limitations) is needed, and verifying that manufacturer specifications and reliability meet space hardware application needs are necessary. This report recommends MIL-SPEC screening and non-radiation-related lot acceptance testing be reduced or eliminated in cases where evidence of sufficient quality and reliability exists for COTS parts. The extent of NASA's insight into COTS manufacturers and the amount and nature of the needed evidence will differ by mission and will likely be driven by a mission's resources and associated risk posture. To facilitate this goal, two new terminologies have been defined and described: “Industry Leading Parts Manufacturer (ILPM)” and “Established COTS parts.” An ILPM is a COTS manufacturer that produces high quality and reliable parts. Some parts produced by ILPMs, defined as Established COTS parts, do not need any additional MIL-SPEC or NASA screening and lot acceptance testing to be used in space applications. This report provides guidance for selecting, procuring, and applying COTS parts and for performing part-, board-, and system-level COTS parts verification. The recommendation to select Established COTS parts from ILPMs will assure those COTS parts will have comparable quality to corresponding MIL-SPEC parts. Selecting, applying, and verifying Established COTS parts from ILPMs requires a holistic team approach, engaging parts engineers, circuit designers, quality, reliability, and systems engineers, procurement specialists, radiation specialists, avionics leads, and program/project managers. A mission-specific approach tailored to a project’s Mission, Environment, Applications and Lifetime (MEAL) [ref. 2] requirements should be developed and approved by program/project managers. Any associated risks should be clearly identified, quantified, mitigated, and/or accepted. Different approaches are recommended according to program/project Risk Classes A, B, C, and D [ref. 3] and human-rated missions [ref. 4]: 1. Recommend Classes A and B and human-rated missions consider a “MIL-SPEC parts- based design” approach. ”MIL-SPEC parts-based design” approach is one in which most parts are MIL-SPEC parts and Established COTS parts from ILPMs are used only when an equivalent MIL-SPEC part does not meet functional or size, weight, and power (SWaP) or performance requirements, or is not available. 2. Recommend Classes D and Sub-D missions consider a “System of COTS” approach. “System of COTS” approach is one which most parts are Established COTS parts from ILPMs. 3. Recommend Class C missions determine which approach is the best for their projects; that is, use either a “MIL-SPEC parts-based design” approach, “System of COTS” approach, or a combined approach utilizing elements of both. This report intends to provide guidance in using COTS parts for NASA missions with risk classifications of A through D and human-rated missions; but it does not address the costs of using COTS parts. Costs of using COTS parts in different NASA mission classes can vary significantly even if the same parts are used in different risk postures, due to differing verification levels needed. The guidance does not distinguish between critical or non-critical systems, and a given project will need to apply the appropriate guidance based on their risk posture. The intended audience of this report are NASA personnel and commercial practitioners who support NASA’s spaceflight missions, including spaceflight program or project managers, parts engineers, parts manufacturers, radiation engineers, avionics engineers, system engineers, circuit design engineers, reliability engineers, safety and mission assurance (SMA) personnel, and parts procurement specialists. The NEPP Program will perform a pathfinder study to explore implementing the guidance in this NESC report. An ILPM verification process is not the same as conventional vendor qualification processes performed according to military standards and specifications. This NESC report intends to provide guidance in utilizing available parts data from ILPM manufacturers for parts assurance assessments needed for NASA missions. The report also captured the current practices from DoD and Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) in Section 10. Note each DoD and FAA report was provided by the corresponding agencies regarding their practices, which are independent from the NESC recommendations in the report.
Early observations (1985 Feb.) of P/Halley were made with broadband BVJK filters when a substantial fraction of the light came from the nucleus; the resulting colors appear red, but with signal-to-noise ratios less than or = 5. More recent observations were made with the narrower International Halley Watch continuum filters when the light from the comet is dominated by the coma. The colors over the wavelength range 0.3 to 0.7 microns are more neutral. Continuum colors were also observed for other comets. All show moderately red to very red colors that can be best matched by asteroids of the P and D spectral classes, suggesting that the refractory component of comets is similar to that of the more distant asteroids.
In this paper, we present a performance comparison of several combined error correcting/run-lenth limited (ECC/RLL) codes created by concatenating a convolutional code with a run-length limited code. In each case, encoding and decoding are accomplished using a single trellis based on the combined code. Half of the codes under investigation use conventionally (d,k) run-length limited codes, where d is the minimum and k is the maximum allowable run of 0's between 1's. The other half of the combined codes use a special class of (d,k) codes known as distance preserving codes. These codes have the property that pairwise Hamming distances out of the (d,k) encoder are at least as large as the corresponding distances into the encoder (i.e., the codes preserve distance). Thus a combined code, created using a convolutional code concatenated with a distance preserving (d,k) code, will have a free distance (dfree) no smaller than the free distance of the original convolutional code. It should be noted that this does not hold if the (d,k) code was not distance preserving. A computer simulation is used to compare the performance of these two types of codes over the binary symmetric channel for various (d,k) constraints, rates, free distances, and numbers of states. Of particular interest for magnetic recording applications are codes with run-length constraints (1,3), (1,7), and (2,7).
Perhaps the most reliable indicator of non-radiative heating/momentum in a stellar atmosphere is the presence of nonthermal radio emission. To date, 77 normal stellar objects have been detected and identified as nonthermal sources. These stellar objects are tabulated herein. It is apparent that non-thermal radio emission is not ubiquitous across the HR diagram. This is clearly the case for the single stars; it is not as clear for the binaries unless the radio emission is associated with their late-type components. Choosing to make this association, the single stars and the late-type components are plotted together. The following picture emerges: (1) there are four locations on the HR diagram where non-thermal radio stars are found; (2) the peak incoherent 5 GHz luminosities show a suprisingly small range for stars within each class; (3) the fraction of stellar energy that escapes as radio emission can be estimated by comparing the integrated maximum radio luminosity to the bolometric luminosity; (4) there are no apparent differences in L sub R between binaries with two cool components, binaries with one hot and one cool component, and single stars for classes C and D; and (5) The late-type stars (classes B, C, and D) are located in parts of the HR diagram where there is reason to suspect that the surfaces of the stars are being braked with respect to their interiors.
Didymopanax pittieri is a common shade-intolerant tree colonizing treefall gaps in the elfin forests on windswept ridgecrests in the lower montane rain forests of the Cordillera de Tilarain, Costa Rica. All D. pittieri taller than > 0.5 m in a 5.2-ha elfin forested portion of a gridded study watershed in the Monteverde Cloud Forest Preserve were located, mapped, and measured. This local population of D. pittieri is spatially inhomogeneous, in that density increases with increasing wind exposure; D. pittieri are more abundant near ridge crests than lower on windward slopes. The important and ubiquitous phenomenon of spatial inhomogeneity in population density is addressed and corrected for in spatial analyses by the application of the inhomogeneous version of Ripley's K. The spatial patterns of four size classes of D. pittieri (<5 cm dbh, 5-10 cm dbh, 10-20 cm dbh, and> 20 cm dbh) were investigated. Within the large-scale trend in density driven by wind exposure, D. pittieri saplings are clumped at the scale of treefall gaps and at the scale of patches of aggregated gaps. D. pittieri 5-10 cm dbh are randomly distributed, apparently due to competitive thinning of sapling clumps during the early stages of gap-phase regeneration. D. pittieri larger than 10 cm dbh are overdispersed at a scale larger than that of patches of gaps. Natural disturbance can influence the distribution of shade intolerant tree populations at several different spatial scales, and can have discordant effects at different life history stages.
Second order forced nonlinear oscillation differential equation with time-dependent term not even, having infinity of periodic solutions
The goal of this work is, through computational simulations, to provide statistically-based evidence to convince the testing community that a distributed testing approach is superior to a clustered testing approach for most situations. For clustered testing, numerous, repeated test points are acquired at a limited number of test conditions. For distributed testing, only one or a few test points are requested at many different conditions. The statistical techniques of Analysis of Variance (ANOVA), Design of Experiments (DOE) and Response Surface Methods (RSM) are applied to enable distributed test planning, data analysis and test augmentation. The D-Optimal class of DOE is used to plan an optimally efficient single- and multi-factor test. The resulting simulated test data are analyzed via ANOVA and a parametric model is constructed using RSM. Finally, ANOVA can be used to plan a second round of testing to augment the existing data set with new data points. The use of these techniques is demonstrated through several illustrative examples. To date, many thousands of comparisons have been performed and the results strongly support the conclusion that the distributed testing approach outperforms the clustered testing approach.
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The presentation provides guidance and recommendations for the implementation of quality practices for space system development projects that have constraints, such that the full suite of traditional or "best" standard practices cannot be applied.
The angular autocorrelation and cross-correlation functions of the D = 1 ... 4, D = 5, and D = 6 distance class Abell clusters are estimated. There is a strong anticorrelation between the most distant D = 6 and the closest D = 1 ... 4 subsamples. It is suggested that an artifact of the cluster identification process presumably due to the finite angular size of the cluster. This anticorrelation seems to contradict some recent estimations of projection contaminations in the Abell catalog. The angular proximity of a foreground cluster may have caused a background cluster not to be counted as it was thought to be a subcluster or it was erroneously assigned to a nearer distance class.
NASA is well acquainted with and skilled in conducting Risk Class A Safety and Mission Assurance (SMA). Class A missions are characterized as having highly specific performance with an ultra-low risk tolerance for risk and mission failure. But space is rapidly changing, and the space enterprise is challenged to pursue faster more agile mission developments with fewer resources and directed schedules. To meet this demand mission development teams face accepting more risk and trading performance within strict cost and schedule constraints. In responding to this challenge, The Aerospace Corporation has evolved the Adaptive Mission Assurance (AMA) approach. The benefit of an “adaptive” approach is most realized for smaller Research and Development (R&D), or Science and Technology (S&T) demonstration missions constrained by significantly smaller budgets and directed schedules. The challenge for these “risk tolerant, constraints-driven” missions is how to identify the most valuable mission assurance tasks that will fit within strict budgetary and schedule constraints for “gracefully” accepting risk that still achieves an agreeable expectation of mission success. AMA can respond to this challenge with little to no impact to team staffing or existing workload. This conceptual guide introduces AMA as a potential implementation for NASA Risk Class D and Sub-Class D missions.
A method for determining an optimal path with a weighted distance-safety criterion is developed. The goal is to strike a compromise between the shortest path and the centerline path, which is safer. The method is composed of three parts: (i) construction of a region map by dividing the workspace, (ii) interregion optimization to determine the entry and departure points of the path in each region, and (iii) intraregion optimization for determining the (optimal) path segment within each region. The region map is generated by using an approximate Voronoi diagram, and region optimization is achieved using variational dynamic programming. Although developed for 2-D problems, the method can be easily extended to a class of 3-D problems. Numerical examples are presented to demonstrate the method.
This slide set has been prepared for the 2022 Federal UxS Workshop to be held at NASA Ames Research Center. The presentation is designed to present the Upper Class E Traffic Management concept and work structure that it falls under and provide the audience with an update on recent progress, ongoing work, and future plans for research and testing.
A neutral functional differential equation is defined as d/dt(Dx sub t) = f(x sub t), with D linear, continuous, atomic at zero. The solution generally is no smoother than the initial data after any finite number of steps. A more restrictive class of D-operators for which some smoothing takes place after an infinite number of steps is defined. This result indicates that a solution can be in an omega-limit set only if it corresponds to initial data which are smooth. A space which can be considered as a Banach space with the topology of uniform convergence is also defined.
General conceptual requirements for standard levels of documentation and for application of these requirements to intended usages. These standards encourage the policy to produce only those forms of documentation that are needed and adequate for the purpose. Documentation standards are defined with respect to detail and format quality. Classes A through D range, in order, from the most definitive down to the least definitive, and categories 1 through 4 range, in order, from high-quality typeset down to handwritten material. Criteria for each of the classes and categories, as well as suggested selection guidelines for each are given.
Set partitioning to multi-dimensional signal spaces over GF(q), particularly GF sup q-1(q) and GF sup q (q), and show how to construct both multi-level block codes and multi-level trellis codes over GF(q). Two classes of multi-level (n, k, d) block codes over GF(q) with block length n, number of information symbols k, and minimum distance d sub min greater than or = d, are presented. These two classes of codes use Reed-Solomon codes as component codes. They can be easily decoded as block length q-1 Reed-Solomon codes or block length q or q + 1 extended Reed-Solomon codes using multi-stage decoding. Many of these codes have larger distances than comparable q-ary block codes, as component codes. Low rate q-ary convolutional codes, work error correcting convolutional codes, and binary-to-q-ary convolutional codes can also be used to construct multi-level trellis codes over GF(q) or binary-to-q-ary trellis codes, some of which have better performance than the above block codes. All of the new codes have simple decoding algorithms based on hard decision multi-stage decoding.