Search NASA⌕ Search

SEARCH · Search NASA

Results for “Visualization Systems”

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.

Quote a phrase for an exact phrase match. Source license links do not imply unrestricted reuse.

At least 1,225 records · Page 68

Visual Image Sensor Organ Replacement

This innovation is a system that augments human vision through a technique called "Sensing Super-position" using a Visual Instrument Sensory Organ Replacement (VISOR) device. The VISOR device translates visual and other sensors (i.e., thermal) into sounds to enable very difficult sensing tasks. Three-dimensional spatial brightness and multi-spectral maps of a sensed image are processed using real-time image processing techniques (e.g. histogram normalization) and transformed into a two-dimensional map of an audio signal as a function of frequency and time. Because the human hearing system is capable of learning to process and interpret extremely complicated and rapidly changing auditory patterns, the translation of images into sounds reduces the risk of accidentally filtering out important clues. The VISOR device was developed to augment the current state-of-the-art head-mounted (helmet) display systems. It provides the ability to sense beyond the human visible light range, to increase human sensing resolution, to use wider angle visual perception, and to improve the ability to sense distances. It also allows compensation for movement by the human or changes in the scene being viewed.

Maluf, David A.↗

Evolving Our Evaluation of Luminous Environments

The advance in solid state light emitting technologies and optics for lighting and visual communication necessitates the evaluation of how NASA envisions spacecraft lighting architectures and how NASA uses industry standards for the design and evaluation of lighting systems. Current NASA lighting standards and requirements for existing architectures focus on the separate ability of a lighting system to throw light against a surface or the ability of a display system to provide the appropriate visual contrast. This project investigated large luminous surface lamps as an alternative or supplement to overhead lighting. The efficiency of the technology was evaluated for uniformity and power consumption.

Clark, Toni↗

Models Extracted from Text for System-Software Safety Analyses

This presentation describes extraction and integration of requirements information and safety information in visualizations to support early review of completeness, correctness, and consistency of lengthy and diverse system safety analyses. Software tools have been developed and extended to perform the following tasks: 1) extract model parts and safety information from text in interface requirements documents, failure modes and effects analyses and hazard reports; 2) map and integrate the information to develop system architecture models and visualizations for safety analysts; and 3) provide model output to support virtual system integration testing. This presentation illustrates the methods and products with a rocket motor initiation case.

Malin, Jane T.↗

NASA GIBS and Worldview: Leveraging FOSS for NASA Earth Science Data Visualizations

The NASA Global Imagery Browse Services (GIBS) and Worldview interactive mapping site leverage scientific and community best practices, open source software, and public standards to provide a scalable, compliant, and authoritative source for NASA Earth Observing System (EOS) Earth science data visualizations. GIBS and Worldview allow end users to easily and quickly interact with more than 800 full resolution pre-generated raster- and vector-based visualizations. This interactive discovery approach relies on visual observation and identification of phenomena that are not as simply identified otherwise. This eLightning presentation will exhibit the broad set of capabilities and visualization layers made possible through the GIBS and Worldview open source software. Specific dependencies on, and contributions to, open source software will be highlighted. Additionally, opportunities for future improvements for better interoperability and reuse through open source software will be discussed.

NASA Global Imagery Browse Services (GIBS)↗

Remarkable long-term changes in the small Magellanic Cloud Wolf-Rayet system HD 5980

In this paper we report the remarkable changes which occured in the Small Magellanic Cloud W-R system HD5980 = AB5 between 1978 and 1991. Within this timescale, there has been a systematic enhancement (by factors of 2-10 depending on the line) in the equivalent widths of all emission lines, and a change in the relative strengths of N III, N IV, and N V lines. Currently, the W-R spectrum is more typical of a WN6 star than a WN3 or WN4, as it was originally classified. The terminal speed of the wind has diminished by approximately 600 km/s, while the system has brightened in the visual by 0.45 mag. The UV (1850 A) continuum changed by less than 0.13 mag. The change from WN3 or WN4 to WN6 is unprecedented. The system appears to be composed at least three stars: two WNs in mutual 19.266 day orbit and an O-type supergiant. We propose that the changes observed in HD 5980 are related to an increase in wind density of one (or both?) of the W-R components, where the brighter WN6 component will dominate the W-R spectrum after the change, and we speculate that this modification of the wind structure is driven by tidal interaction induced by a possible current periastron passage of the third component in the system.

Koenigsberger, G.↗

Integrated Locomotor Function Tests for Countermeasure Evaluation

Following spaceflight crewmembers experience locomotor dysfunction due to inflight adaptive alterations in sensorimotor function. Countermeasures designed to mitigate these postflight gait alterations need to be assessed with a new generation of tests that evaluate the interaction of various sensorimotor sub-systems central to locomotor control. The goal of the present study was to develop new functional tests of locomotor control that could be used to test the efficacy of countermeasures. These tests were designed to simultaneously examine the function of multiple sensorimotor systems underlying the control of locomotion and be operationally relevant to the astronaut population. Traditionally, gaze stabilization has been studied almost exclusively in seated subjects performing target acquisition tasks requiring only the involvement of coordinated eye-head movements. However, activities like walking involve full-body movement and require coordination between lower limbs and the eye-head-trunk complex to achieve stabilized gaze during locomotion. Therefore the first goal of this study was to determine how the multiple, interdependent, full-body sensorimotor gaze stabilization subsystems are functionally coordinated during locomotion. In an earlier study we investigated how alteration in gaze tasking changes full-body locomotor control strategies. Subjects walked on a treadmill and either focused on a central point target or read numeral characters. We measured: temporal parameters of gait, full body sagittal plane segmental kinematics of the head, trunk, thigh, shank and foot, accelerations along the vertical axis at the head and the shank, and the vertical forces acting on the support surface. In comparison to the point target fixation condition, the results of the number reading task showed that compensatory head pitch movements increased, peak head acceleration was reduced and knee flexion at heel-strike was increased. In a more recent study we investigated the adaptive remodeling of the full-body gaze control systems following exposure to visual-vestibular conflict. Subjects walked on a treadmill before and after a 30- minute exposure to 0.5X minifying during which self-generated sinusoidal vertical head rotations were performed while seated. Following exposure to visual-vestibular conflict subjects showed a restriction in compensatory head movements, increased knee and ankle flexion after heel-strike and a decrease in the rate of body loading during the rapid weight transfer phase after the heel strike event. Taken together, results from both studies provide evidence that the full body contributes to gaze stabilization during locomotion, and that different functional elements are responsive to changes in visual task constraints and are subject to adaptive alterations following exposure to visual-vestibular conflict. This information provides the basis for the design of a new generation of integrative tests that incorporate the evaluation of multiple neural control systems relevant to astronaut operational performance.

Bloomberg, J. J.↗

Program Aids Visualization Of Data

Living Color Frame System (LCFS) computer program developed to solve some problems that arise in connection with generation of real-time graphical displays of numerical data and of statuses of systems. Need for program like LCFS arises because computer graphics often applied for better understanding and interpretation of data under observation and these graphics become more complicated when animation required during run time. Eliminates need for custom graphical-display software for application programs. Written in Turbo C++.

Truong, L. V.↗

Help for the Visually Impaired

The Low Vision Enhancement System (LVES) is a video headset that offers people with low vision a view of their surroundings equivalent to the image on a five-foot television screen four feet from the viewer. It will not make the blind see but for many people with low vision, it eases everyday activities such as reading, watching TV and shopping. LVES was developed over almost a decade of cooperation between Stennis Space Center, the Wilmer Eye Institute of the Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions, the Department of Veteran Affairs, and Visionics Corporation. With the aid of Stennis scientists, Wilmer researchers used NASA technology for computer processing of satellite images and head-mounted vision enhancement systems originally intended for the space station. The unit consists of a head-mounted video display, three video cameras, and a control unit for the cameras. The cameras feed images to the video display in the headset.

Source record↗

Aid for the Visually Impaired

Viewstar is a video system that magnifies and focuses words so partially sighted people can read or type from printed or written copy. Invented by Dr. Leonard Weinstein, a Langley engineer, the device enables Sandra Raven, Weinstein's stepdaughter, who is legally blind, to work as a clerk typist. Weinstein has also developed other magnification systems for individual needs.

Source record↗

An Integrated Approach To Payload System Simulation

This paper describes a payload system simulation implemented at JPL as part of a comprehensive mission simulation facility. The flight software function includes communication with other process modules, instrument control, and data management. The payload system simulation software consists of: a camera subsystem, a virtual world, and a mission visualization toolset.

dynamics model photometric model geological model ↗

Cardiology Mannequin

Education of medical students in cardiology requires access to patients having a variety of different forms of heart disease. But bringing together student, instructor and patient is a difficult and expensive process that does not benefit the patient. An alternate approach is substitution of a lifelike mannequin capable of simulating many conditions of heart disease. The mannequin pictured below, together with a related information display, is an advanced medical training system whose development benefited from NASA visual display technology and consultative input from NASA's Kennedy Space Center. The mannequin system represents more than 10 years of development effort by Dr. Michael S. Gordon, professor of cardiology at the University of Miami (Florida) School of Medicine.

Source record↗

PARAGRAPH: A graphics tool for performance and reliability analysis

PARAGRAPH is an animated graphics display package. It consists of two parts: an interface to CSIM (a process based simulation language) and a graphic display system. When a simulation model is executed on CSIM the interface collects pertinent performance analysis data and writes them to a file. This file is then fed to the graphic display system which depicts the execution of the simulation model visually. This report focuses on the graphical display system. Specifically it describes the user interface and features of the display system. It also explains how Interviews (which is based on X-windows) is used as the basis for the design of PARAGRAPH. The last section contains an example in which a basic load balancing simulation model is used to demonstrate the features and the capability of PARAGRAPH.

Lee, Kevin Douglas↗

Design parameters for a stereoptic television system based on direct vision depth perception cues

Remotely controlled systems which use television for visual feedback require that depth cues be available to the operator. A number of techniques have been developed to provide stereoptic video. An analysis of parameters of such systems as related to the depth cues of convergence and retinal disparity was carried out. Parameter requirements were determined for the provision of natural and exaggerated stereoptic cues and expressions were developed for range resolution limits based on the retinal disparity threshold. An empirical study was conducted using a stereoptic video system to determine threshold values

Shields, N. L., Jr.↗

Remote sensing data applied to the evaluation of soil erosion caused by land-use. Ribeirao Anhumas Basin Area: A case study

Formerly covered by a tropical forest, the study area was deforested in the early 40's for coffee plantation and cattle raising, which caused intense gully erosion problems. To develop a method to analyze the relationship between land use and soil erosion, visual interpretations of aerial photographs (scale 1:25.000), MSS-LANDSAT imagery (scale 1:250,000), as well as automatic interpretation of computer compatible tapes by IMAGE-100 system were carried out. From visual interpretation the following data were obtained: land use and cover tapes, slope classes, ravine frequency, and a texture sketch map. During field work, soil samples were collected for texture and X-ray analysis. The texture sketch map indicate that the areas with higher slope angles have a higher susceptibilty to the development of gullies. Also, the over carriage of pastureland, together with very friable lithologies (mainly sandstone) occuring in that area, seem to be the main factors influencing the catastrophic extension of ravines in the study site.

Dejesusparada, N.↗

How Human Factors Drove the Design and Implementation of the Virtual Windtunnel

This viewgraph presentation describes decisions made at the NASA Ames Research Center during its development of a virtual windtunnel to assist humans in visualizing computational fluid dynamics simulations. User requirements for the system include the simulation of vortical structure, pressure distribution, and overall sense of flow. In addition, the system needs to support a variety of interfaces, excluding head mounts, and needs to use an object oriented approach. Direct manipulation of the system is most user-friendly when limited to only grab and point gestures. 'Visualization control tools' (vtools) improve the realism of the system. The necessary object oriented programming is in C++ and openGL. Users interact with objects called 'tools', which include vtools and tools which control the virtual wind tunnel environment. Other objects include data objects accessed by the visualizations. Visualizations can be added to the system by the user. The presentation includes a discussion of run-time architecture, and issues related to computation and implementation.

Bryson, Steve↗

Holistic energy analysis method for thermal management architectures of data centers

Modern high-performance computing (HPC) data centers (DCs), particularly those supporting energy-intensive artificial intelligence (AI) workloads, face escalating thermal management challenges that degrade performance through thermal throttling and drive up cooling power consumption and operational costs. To address this challenge, many have developed a wide variety of thermal management solutions (single-phase, two-phase, direct, indirect, hybrid, and more) which attempt to cool HPC DCs effectively while attempting to minimize overall system power consumption. However, the analysis of these solutions and methods to effectively compare one with another is lacking. Overall power usage effectiveness (PUE) and total-power usage effectiveness (TUE) provide a metric to quantify power consumption but fail to identify components in the system which require further optimization. To address this, we propose a holistic analytical framework – the waterfall diagram (WFD) – which leverages a waterfall chart methodology, offering a comprehensive visualization of both the thermal management system loop and heat flow pathways from individual server components to the outdoor ambient. Use of the WFD enables graphical estimations of power efficiency and cooling performance across each component of a DC cooling system and complements Sankey-style energy flow visualizations by additionally resolving stage-wise temperature changes and incremental TUE contributions. The framework is used in conjunction with simulation-based approaches, to conduct a detailed pressure drop and flow distribution analysis aimed at identifying the optimal coolant distribution architecture for a single-phase direct-to-chip water-cooled DC, which serves as the baseline for subsequent WFD analysis. Among the evaluated architectures, the 3 U modular coolant distribution architecture is found to demonstrate the best performance, considering minimal pressure drop and uniform flow distribution. In addition, TUE is calculated for each cooling loop component based on its associated pressure drop and corresponding pumping power, which are integrated into the WFD. This correlation between TUE and local temperature offers immediate insight into the power efficiency and thermal performance contributions of individual components, facilitating further development and optimization. Examples of WFD applications are presented under varying thermal loads and ambient conditions, demonstrating reasonable cooling strategies. Notably, the 3 U modular architecture maintains a consistent chip case temperature of 85°C, achieving a TUE of 1.016 at ambient temperature of 47°C, and a TUE of 1.026 at ambient temperature of 52°C. The WFD methodology provides an efficient, holistic, and streamlined framework for DC thermal management architecture assessment and enables design optimization which is important for addressing the thermal-fluidic energy challenges of current and next-generation DCs.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗

Laser Sheet Flow Visualization Developed for Lewis' Icing Research Tunnel

A new flow-visualization technique has been developed for use in the NASA Lewis Research Center's Icing Research Tunnel (IRT). This technique uses a sheet of light shining across the wind tunnel to illuminate a mist of water droplets in the air and display any organized flow patterns. Since the IRT already has the special water spray system required for aircraft icing experiments, no special visualization seeding material is required. The system has been used to visualize the changes in tip and leading edge vortices caused by ice accretion. Because the IRT's icing spray is used as part of the visualization technique, changes in the flow patterns about a wing can be observed and measured during the ice accretion process.

Source record↗