Spinoff: Computer Technology

TetrUSS Stacks Up Building Blocks for Aircraft Design

Anyone who excelled at the Game Boy’s top-selling video game will recall the animated rocket liftoffs that celebrated high scores. In addition to simulated rocketry and the...

Spinoff: Industrial Productivity & Manufacturing Technology

Industry Opens a New Door to Space

Anyone who has gotten a sofa stuck in a doorway on moving day knows how frustrating it is when there’s no other way in or out. The doorways on the International Space Station, or airlocks, have...

Spinoff: Consumer, Home, and Recreation

Taking Out the Trash, NASA-Style

The space station doesn’t have curb-side trash pickup. Nor does it have a local landfill or recycling plant. What it does have is access to a naturally efficient incinerator – Earth’s...

Spinoff: Computer Technology

Debugging Code Is Rocket Science

Incorrect computer code can blow up rockets, as NASA learned from the first launch in the Ariane 5 rocket series. The 501 rocket used computer code written for the Ariane 4 series – but the change...

Spinoff: Consumer, Home, and Recreation

NASA Helps Optimize Air Purifiers with Modeling Expertise

Whether trapping microscopic germs or an abundance of pet hair, air filters help homes and offices alike maintain a clean environment. With any technology, research and...

Spinoff: Industrial Productivity & Manufacturing Technology

Now Anyone Can Make Electronics on Demand—Thanks to NASA Research

Chance Glenn traces the inspiration for his 3D electronics printer back to Star Trek, which he began watching in reruns in the late 1970s as a middle schooler.

Spinoff: Consumer, Home, and Recreation

Hot Water on Demand

The worst part of any shower, outside of getting soap in your eyes, is probably getting unexpectedly blasted with cold water. Traditional home water heaters mean you have to wait for the right temperature to come...

Spinoff: Transportation

NASA Helps Bring Airport Communications into the Digital Age

Some of the best entertainment at the airport is all the action outside the window. Loaded luggage carriers zip past on their way to planes. Fuel trucks come and go....

Spinoff: Public Safety

Answering the Call of Distress

As companies and other entities continue making use of NASA know-how, spinoffs from the space agency are bound to bump into each other now and then. That’s what happened as the lifesaving Search and...

Spinoff: Environmental and Agricultural Resources

Eagle Eyes in Treacherous Skies

Tornados can flip a car when the wind speed reaches 122 mph, making them unpredictability dangerous. Volcanic eruptions are as toxic as they are destructive. Researchers are working hard to improve...

Spinoff: Consumer, Home, and Recreation

NASA Investment in Small Businesses Helps Both Thrive

It’s as true in tech as it is in ancient fables: the little guys can get things done. A dehydrated gel to keep your drinks cool, a cooling system for supercomputers and a...

Spinoff: Public Safety

Wool Mask to Fight Fires in Space Inspires Fire Equipment on Earth

NASA Technology

A New Zealand-based company’s work to help astronauts fight fires in case of an anomaly on the Orion spacecraft is already informing its line...

Spinoff: Industrial Productivity & Manufacturing Technology

Zero-Leak Valve Holds Tight in Demanding Environments

NASA Technology

There’s no safe way to set anything substantial on fire on the space station to observe how spreading flames act in zero gravity, to test a fire...

Spinoff: Health and Medicine

Remote Monitoring Promotes Community Health beyond Hospitals

NASA Technology

Hospital rooms are full of sensors, screens, and beeps. Those sensors send signals not just to screens in that room but down the hall to the nurse’s...

Spinoff: Industrial Productivity & Manufacturing Technology

Printed Polymer Makes Integrated Airplane Parts

NASA Technology

Spacecraft fuel tanks have always been round, because they need to hold as much fuel as possible under as much pressure as possible with a minimum of material, and...

Spinoff: Industrial Productivity & Manufacturing Technology

Separation Device Launches New Science Payloads

NASA Technology

Rockets typically come in stages, each optimized for different parts of the launch. When each stage has finished its part, it drops away, allowing the smaller...

Spinoff: Transportation

Weight-Estimating Software Helps Design Urban Air Taxis

NASA Technology

Picture an airplane. What you imagine is probably what most commercial airliners look like, a design that has been improved and tweaked—but not really...

Spinoff: Transportation

Virtual Airspace Hosts a Training Program for Air Traffic Managers

NASA Technology

The skies are on the brink of major change. The number of U.S. aircraft flying through the national airspace is likely to multiply many times...

Spinoff: Public Safety

Smaller, Cheaper Lasers Can Detect Gas, Monitor Structures, Take Tissue Images

NASA Technology

Since the invention of lasers in 1960, engineers have found countless ways to create these coherent, monochromatic beams of light and...

Spinoff: Environmental and Agricultural Resources

Rocket Expertise Assists Transition to Green Energy

NASA Technology

Around the world, economic growth and prosperity is tied to the availability of cheap energy. Coal is abundant and cheap, but in developed countries the...

Spinoff: Health and Medicine

Space Station Research Platform Paves the Way for Zero-G Manufacturing

NASA Technology

Much of the research NASA does on the International Space Station is designed to better understand how to work and live in zero gravity to...

Spinoff: Transportation

Pressure Vessels Improve Transportation of Liquid Fuels

NASA Technology

Few people will ever pass a rocket on the freeway, but anyone could soon see the “gas tank” of a liquid propulsion engine outside the passenger window....

Spinoff: Industrial Productivity & Manufacturing Technology

Revolutionary Battery Replacement Leads to a New Humidity Sensor

NASA Technology

A lot can and does go wrong with technology, as Dr. Terry Rolin, an electronic systems failure analyst at Marshall Space Flight Center, knows well....

Spinoff: Industrial Productivity & Manufacturing Technology

Aerogel Insulations Save Millions in Industrial Applications

NASA Technology

It’s no surprise that some of NASA’s biggest breakthroughs and most popular spinoffs have been in the field of temperature management. The Space...

Spinoff: Industrial Productivity & Manufacturing Technology

New Imaging Technique Measures Unseen Flows

NASA Technology

Gravity draws water from a faucet into a cup. Air bubbles rise because they’re lighter than the water around them—gas and liquid effortlessly self-separating. In...

Spinoff: Transportation

Doppler Lidar Makes Self-Driving Cars Safer

NASA Technology

Lasers designed to help a lunar spacecraft land on a proverbial dime might help self-driving cars navigate rush hour traffic on this planet. The path from the Moon to...

Spinoff: Computer Technology

Data Visualization Platform Helps Missions Fly

NASA Technology

There are so many pieces to a successful mission in space, and keeping track of it all is no easy task. Software designed to simplify the interface between mission...

Spinoff: Public Safety

Polyimide Foam Offers Safer, Lighter Insulation

NASA Technology

Oxygen, which comprises just over a fifth of Earth’s atmosphere, is highly reactive and able to form compounds with nearly all other elements. Heat facilitates...

Spinoff: Computer Technology

Beowulf Clusters Make Supercomputing Accessible

NASA Technology

In the Old English epic Beowulf, the warrior Unferth, jealous of the eponymous hero’s bravery, openly doubts Beowulf’s odds of slaying the monster Grendel that...

Spinoff: Health and Medicine

Balance Scale Predicts, Helps Prevent Falls

NASA Technology

The inside of the International Space Station is designed to give astronauts the illusion of verticality in the weightlessness of orbit. The “floors” are relatively...