Magazine

A report presents a study of the efficacy of shot shifting for reducing stitching errors in diffraction gratings made by electron-beam (E-beam) lithography. Stitching errors arise from fabricating a grating as a mosaic of smaller gratings by frequently translating the grating blank....

The Automated SAR Ortho-rectification Software System enables users of synthetic-aperture-radar (SAR) data to form processed images that are free of the distortion caused by the SAR imaging geometry and topography. The software consists of four modules:

A solar-powered vapor-compression refrigeration system developed for Johnson Space Center operates without batteries. The design of this system will make the cost of solar-powered refrigeration systems competitive and enable the use of such systems in long-distance spaceflights, military field...

A technique based on the generation of highly localized thermal stresses has been devised as a means of cutting both flat and curved glass sheets of thicknesses between 30 and 600 µm. The technique is reliable, accurate, and economical. The technique can be used, for example, to cut thin glass...

Ferrate (VI) salts have been proposed for use in sterilizing water (perhaps also in sterilizing air). The iron in ferrate (VI) salts is in its highest oxidation state (VI), and these salts are extremely strong oxidants. In laboratory experiments, it was shown that treatment of DNA solutions with...

A report presents a computational study of the subcritical and supercritical behaviors of a drop of heptane surrounded by nitrogen, using the fluid-drop model described in "Model of a Drop of O2 Surrounded by H2 at High Pressure" (NPO-20220) and "The Lewis Number Under Supercritical...

A report presents a computational study of the subcritical and supercritical behaviors of a drop of heptane surrounded by nitrogen. The subject matter is basically same as that of the report described in the preceding article, except that the Lewis-number issue is not addressed in detail; however, this...

A report discusses the use of the Web Interface for Telescience (WITS) for visualization and command sequence generation in the Mars Polar Lander (MPL) mission. WITS, which has been described in prior articles in NASA Tech Briefs, is an Internet-based software system that enables...

An article discusses anticipated advances in the design of increasingly capable integrated circuits containing ever smaller electronic devices. The article emphasizes the emergence of technology computer-aided design (TCAD) — a discipline in which computer-aided design is combined with computational...

A report discusses multi-shock blankets, which are under investigation for use in protecting spacecraft against orbiting debris from prior spacecraft missions. Multi-shock blankets are described in comparison with early protective metallic "bumpers" and with a somewhat more recent invention called the...

A report presents a survey of the design engineering and scientific literature on airlocks and on planetary-exploration vehicles ("rovers"), from the perspective of evaluating existing and potential design concepts for airlocks for pressurized rovers. The airlocks are the key to designing a pressurized rover that...

A report describes experiments that were performed to isolate and characterize microbes that survive conditions of controlled circulation of air, desiccation, low nutrient concentrations, and moderately high temperatures in a spacecraft-assembly facility. These conditions are more severe...

This report describes an experimental study of thermal-stability, mechanical, and flammability properties of foams of several different densities made of three different polyimides. The study was performed because (1) prior such studies were performed on polyimide films rather than foams and (2) the...

This report presents an analysis of a database from computational simulations of a droplet-laden mixing layer (i.e., evaporating droplets of a liquid fuel in air) undergoing a transition to turbulence. The basic governing equations were those of transport of discrete droplets through a...

The report "A Validated All-Pressure Fluid Drop Model and Lewis Number Effects for a Binary Mixture" presents one in a series of theoretical and computational studies of the subcritical and subpercritical behaviors of a drop of fluid and, in particular, a drop of heptane surrounded by nitrogen The...

Johnson Space Center has been leading the development of a high-power, electrothermal plasma rocket — the variable- specific-impulse magnetoplasma rocket (VASIMR) — that is capable of exhaust modulation at constant power. An electrodeless design enables the rocket to operate at power densities much...