Properties of nonaqueous electrolytes First quarterly report, 20 Jun. - 19 Sep. 1966
Solvent purification and water content determined by gas chromatography for nonaqueous electrolytes
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Solvent purification and water content determined by gas chromatography for nonaqueous electrolytes
Photon-coupled isolation switch to provide transistor output electrically isolated from driving sources and all other switch terminals
Gaseous electrolytes and electrode behavior at elevated temperatures evaluated for battery and fuel cell application
Space flight, space science, space applications, aeronautics, tracking and data acquisition, international programs, technology utilization, NASA installations, the NASA launch record, astronauts, and the fine arts program are reviewed in light of NASA's 25th anniversary.
Negative-limited sealed nickel-cadmium cells are a possible means toward increasing the life of nickel-cadmium cells to about a decade or more. The purpose of this program is to design, construct, and test 100, 20 Ah and 100, 30 Ah negative-limited sealed cells. The cell design was completed and hardware was ordered during the first quarter. Electrode fabrication was started in the first quarter and carried on through the second quarter. The fabrication and selection of the necessary electrodes has been completed during the third quarter. Cell construction has been completed and the preparatory cell cycling is underway. The preliminary testing to select the initial delivery cell has been started.
The origins and development of the NASA Aviation Safety Reporting System (ASRS) are briefly reviewed. The results of the first quarter's activity are summarized and discussed. Examples are given of bulletins describing potential air safety hazards, and the disposition of these bulletins. During the first quarter of operation, the ASRS received 1464 reports; 1407 provided data relevant to air safety. All reports are being processed for entry into the ASRS data base. During the reporting period, 130 alert bulletins describing possible problems in the aviation system were generated and disseminated. Responses were received from FAA and others regarding 108 of the alert bulletins. Action was being taken with respect to 70 of the 108 responses received. Further studies are planned of a number of areas, including human factors problems related to automation of the ground and airborne portions of the national aviation system.
In the second quarter the development of the two waverider design tools was continued, and the groundwork necessary for the incorporation of waverider technology into the realm of the High Speed Civil Transports (HSCT's) was laid out. Advances in each of these areas is summarized. Work on the WIPAR code included the addition of an upper surface geometry generator and characteristic flow solver and the inclusion of viscous analysis in the performance computations. Details of these changes are given. In the course of the second project quarter, much of the analysis performed during the first quarter was incorporated into a working computer code. To date, utilities were developed for the definition of arbitrary 3-D shock surfaces, the computation of post-shock flow conditions, and the marching of the solution in a roughly cross-stream direction away from the shock surface. These utilities are briefly described. During the second quarter groundwork for the analysis of complete configurations was initiated. This involved the development of computational utilities for the integration of powerplants with the waverider forebodies, and the acquisition of a number of configuration analysis software packages. Work in these areas is discussed.
A general theoretical overview for the sources, sinks, gas-surface interactions, and transport dynamics of sodium and potassium in the exospheric atmosphere of the Moon is given. These four factors, which control the spatial distribution of these two alkali-group gases about the Moon, are incorporated in numerical models. The spatial nature and relative importance of the initial source atoms atmosphere (which must be nonthermal to explain observational data) and the ambient (ballistic hopping) atom atmosphere are examined. The transport dynamics, atmospheric structure, and lunar escape of the nonthermal source atoms are time variable with season of the year and lunar phase because of their dependence on the radiation acceleration experienced by sodium and potassium atoms as they resonantly scatter solar photons. The dynamic transport time of fully thermally accomodated ambient atoms along the surface because of solar radiation acceleration (only several percent of surface gravity) is larger than the photoionization lifetimes and hence unimportant in determining the local density, although for potassium the situation is borderline. The sodium model was applied to analyze sodium observations of the sunward brightness profiles acquired near last quarter by Potter & Morgan (1988b) extending from the surface to an altitude of 1200 km, and near first quarter by Mendillo, Baumgardner, & Flynn (1991), extending in altitude from approximately 1430 to approximately 7000 km. The observations at larger altitudes could be fitted only for source atoms having a velocity distribution with a tail that is mildly nonthermal (like an approximately 1000 K Maxwell-Boltzmann distribution). Solar wind sputtering appears to a be a viable source atom mechanism for the sodium observations with photon-simulated desorption also possible but highly uncertain, although micrometeoroid impact vaporization appears to have a source that is too small and too hot, with likely an incorrect angular distribution about the Moon.
This is the second quarterly technical report on a program, the goal of which is to achieve high efficiency GaAs solar cells. Analysis was concerned with providing design information for use in experimentally determining optimum solar cell process parameters. The first quarterly report contained the results of those design calculations. Using those results as a guide, experimental work was initiated to determine optimum cell process parameters. The initial results on this phase of the program are reported.
This program is a study of the use of low energy hydrogen ion implantation for high efficiency crystalline silicon solar cells. The first quarterly report focuses on two tasks of this program: (1) an examination of the effects of low energy hydrogen implants on surface recombination speed; and (2) an examination of the effects of hydrogen on silicon regrowth and diffusion in silicon. The first part of the project focussed on the measurement of surface properties of hydrogen implanted silicon. Low energy hydrogen ions when bombarded on the silicon surface will create structural damage at the surface, deactivate dopants and introduce recombination centers. At the same time the electrically active centers such as dangling bonds will be passivated by these hydrogen ions. Thus hydrogen is expected to alter properties such as the surface recombination velocity, dopant profiles on the emitter, etc. In this report the surface recombination velocity of a hydrogen emplanted emitter was measured.
One of the most profound changes in our perspective of the solar system resulting from the first quarter century of planetary exploration by spacecraft is the recognition that planets, including Earth, were bombarded by cosmic projectiles for 4.5 aeons and continue to be bombarded today. Although the planetary cratering rate is much lower now than it was during the first 0.5 aeons, sizeable Earth-approaching asteroids and comets continue to hit the Earth at a rate that poses a finite risk to civilization. The evolution of this planetary perspective on impact cratering is gradual over the last two decades. It took explorations of Mars and Mercury by early Mariner spacecraft and of the outer solar system by the Voyagers to reveal the significance of asteroidal and cometary impacts in shaping the morphologies and even chemical compositions of the planets. An unsettling implication of the new perspective is addressed: the risk to human civilization. Serious scientific attention was given to this issue in July 1981 at a NASA-sponsored Spacewatch Workshop in Snowmass, Colorado. The basic conclusion of the 1981 NASA sponsored workshop still stands: the risk that civilization might be destroyed by impact with an as-yet-undiscovered asteroid or comet exceeds risk levels that are sometimes deemed unacceptable by modern societies in other contexts. Yet these impact risks have gone almost undiscussed and undebated. The tentative quantitative assessment by some members of the 1981 workshop was that each year, civilization is threatened with destruction with a probability of about 1 in 100,000. The enormous spread in risk levels deemed by the public to be at the threshold of acceptability derives from a host of psychological factors that were widely discussed in the risk assessment literature. Slovic shows that public fears of hazards are greatest for hazards that are uncontrollable, involuntary, fatal, dreadful, globally catastrophic, and which have consequences that seem inequitable, especially if they affect future generations.
The first quarter of a one-year program to investigate the production of patterned etch resistant wax coatings on solar cell substrates by printing is reported. Master molds for printing plates were produced for the plates. The resist wax is being studied to determine its relevant physical properties. A printing device is currently in design, and material costs are being compiled as first step in a cost analysis task. All phases of the project are proceeding according to schedule. No specific phases are yet completed.
This is the first Quarterly Report on Studies of Soundings and Imaging Measurements from Geostationary Satellites. The report covers work performed during the quarter on five related studies.
A space elevator is forecasted for the first quarter of the 21st century, that will consist of a cable attached at the earth's equator, suspended in space by an artificial satellite in geosynchronous orbit. It is stated that such a transport system will supplement rockets as the railway supplements aircraft. Specific aspects of the system are examined, including provisions for artificial gravity, the development special composite construction materials exhibiting high strength and low mass, and spacecraft launching from the elevator.
The first quarter of a one-year program designed to research and perfect a method of producing antireflective coatings on large glass sheets through the use of sodium silicate hardened by exposure to acid is reported. The requirements for a linear motion device used to produce uniform sodium silicate films were determined. A search for a commercially available device is underway. Sodium silicate solutions of varying concentrations were prepared. Determinations of the physical properties relevant to film thickness are in progress. In addition, material costs are being recorded for later use in a cost analysis of the method. All tasks of the project are proceeding according to schedule. Of the tasks, only the sodium silicate solution preparation is complete.
The SERT II spacecraft, launched in 1970, has been maintained in an operational, but intermittently active status since 1971. Periodic thruster status has been reported while waiting for normal orbit precession to return the spacecraft to continuous sunlight in 1979. Now, the thruster has been operated for 600 hours in the first quarter of 1979. Thruster startup and operation in 1979 is unchanged after 9 years in space. The ion thruster was gimbaled and used to maintain spin stabilization of the spacecraft. Minor components of the spacecraft have failed, but have not interfered with the functional status of the spacecraft.
The activities of the Deep Space Network in support of radio astronomy operations during the first quarter of 1981 are reported. Results of the use of a low noise maser are presented, as well as updates in DSN support of experiments sanctioned by the Radio Astronomy Experiment Selection Panel.
The radar astronomy activities supported by the Deep Space Network during the first quarter of 1981 are reported. The bodies observed include the asteroids Apollo and Toro, comet Bradfield, and the rings of Saturn.