Spinoff: Consumer, Home, and Recreation

Air Revitalization System Enables Excursions to the Stratosphere

NASA Technology

In order to test a parachute system for surviving high-altitude bailouts, from 1959 to 1960 the US Air Force commenced Project Excelsior. It...

Spinoff: Health and Medicine

Liquid Cooling Technology Increases Exercise Efficiency

NASA Technology

The human body in space is as vulnerable as a fish out of water. Beyond a spacecraft’s protective environment, there is no oxygen to breathe and nothing...

Spinoff: Industrial Productivity & Manufacturing Technology

Electrical Monitoring Devices Save on Time and Cost

NASA Technology

The sun requires no introduction. Earth orbits it; life happens because of it; we schedule our lives around its rhythmic risings and settings. Yet, despite its...

Spinoff: Computer Technology

Portable Planetariums Teach Science

NASA Technology

By the mid-1990s, NASA was collecting an enormous amount of information about Earth and the universe. For example, the Earth Observing System, comprising a fleet of...

Spinoff: Transportation

Cabin Pressure Monitors Notify Pilots to Save Lives

NASA Technology

Typical cruising altitudes for business and commercial aircraft are up to 50,000 feet or more. At such altitudes, the oxygen concentrations in the air are much...

Spinoff: Health and Medicine

Patient Simulators Train Emergency Caregivers

NASA Technology

Medical training is one of the most important aspects of preparing astronauts for space. Every crewmember must become proficient in basic emergency skills, such as...

Spinoff: Health and Medicine

Miniaturized, Portable Sensors Monitor Metabolic Health

NASA Technology

On Earth, gravity might weigh you down, but it also builds you up. For astronauts working in space for long durations, the weightless environment can cause...

Spinoff: Health and Medicine

Solar Refrigerators Store Life-Saving Vaccines

NASA Technology

Over the years, NASA has advanced photovoltaic (PV) technology in order to advance many of its missions. This renewable source of energy is produced when certain...

Spinoff: Health and Medicine

Innovative Software Tools Measure Behavioral Alertness

NASA Technology

For astronauts working aboard the International Space Station (ISS) in low-Earth orbit, getting adequate sleep is a challenge. For one, there’s that...

Spinoff: Public Safety

Cloud-Based Data Sharing Connects Emergency Managers

NASA Technology

In a world that’s increasingly interconnected, the effects of even smaller-scale natural disasters or other emergencies are often felt far and wide. Not all...

Spinoff: Industrial Productivity & Manufacturing Technology

Smart Sensors Gather Information for Machine Diagnostics

NASA Technology

Surrounded by electronics and hovering over a work bench in the Data Acquisition and Control Systems (DACS) Laboratory, Scott Jensen startles when he hears...

Spinoff: Transportation

Interfaces Visualize Data for Airline Safety, Efficiency

NASA Technology

It was Henry Ford who said, “Anyone who stops learning is old, whether at 20 or 80. Anyone who keeps learning stays young.” Following such an adage,...

Spinoff: Transportation

Heat Shield Paves the Way for Commercial Space

NASA Technology

Comets are beautiful, and apparently it’s a youthful kind of beauty, because they look about the same from the time they were born. Often referred to as dirty...

Spinoff: Environmental and Agricultural Resources

Open Source Initiative Powers Real-Time Data Streams

NASA Technology

Let’s say you are an academic researcher who needs to collect data over a long period of time, on a site hundreds of miles from your base of operation. You...

Spinoff: Transportation

Experiments Result in Safer, Spin-Resistant Aircraft

NASA Technology

James M. Patton Jr. completed a whopping 8,000 spin turns throughout his career at NASA. As a research pilot at Langley Research Center, Patton and his...

Spinoff: Industrial Productivity & Manufacturing Technology

Cameras Monitor Spacecraft Integrity to Prevent Failures

NASA Technology

Is there—or was there ever—life on Mars? In August 2012 NASA’s Curiosity rover touched down on the surface of Mars in an attempt to answer what has...

Spinoff: Industrial Productivity & Manufacturing Technology

Deformable Mirrors Capture Exoplanet Data, Reflect Lasers

NASA Technology

We have always wondered: Is there other life out there? Are there other planets like our own, orbiting other stars like our Sun? In the early 1990s,...

Spinoff: Public Safety

Air Systems Provide Life Support to Miners

NASA Technology

On July 21, 2011, the Space Shuttle Atlantis, having successfully completed a 13-day mission to ferry supplies and spare parts to the International Space Station (ISS),...

Spinoff: Computer Technology

Processor Units Reduce Satellite Construction Costs

NASA Technology

In December 2008, NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center entered into an agreement with the Department of Defense and the Van Braun Center for Space Innovation...

Spinoff: Consumer, Home, and Recreation

Thermal Materials Drive Professional Apparel Line

NASA Technology

From the time he was a Boy Scout, Gihan Amarasiriwardena had a fascination with performance materials. While growing up in the northeastern United States, he...

Spinoff: Environmental and Agricultural Resources

Procedure-Authoring Tool Improves Safety on Oil Rigs

NASA Technology

On May 11, 2013, two astronauts emerged from the interior of the International Space Station (ISS) and worked their way toward the far end of spacecraft. Over...

Spinoff: Environmental and Agricultural Resources

Shuttle Engine Designs Revolutionize Solar Power

NASA Technology

One of the hottest solar energy plants in the world was developed with engineering expertise derived from one of the hottest space technologies ever engineered:...

Spinoff: Transportation

Data Mining Tools Make Flights Safer, More Efficient

NASA Technology

When an aircraft experiences catastrophic failure, it’s not difficult to tell that something has gone wrong. But even if an airplane reaches its destination...

Spinoff: Computer Technology

Software Simplifies the Sharing of Numerical Models

NASA Technology

Scientists at NASA not only focus on advancing space exploration; they study what is happening in the Earth’s atmosphere as well. The Global Climate...

Spinoff: Consumer, Home, and Recreation

Radiant Barriers Save Energy in Buildings

NASA Technology

It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s—a satelloon?

Spinoff: Computer Technology

Software Accelerates Computing Time for Complex Math

NASA Technology

The 19th century mathematician Carl Friedrich Gauss, the astronomer par excellence of his day, called mathematics “the queen of the sciences.” If Gauss...

Spinoff: Transportation

NASA Standards Inform Comfortable Car Seats

NASA Technology

In the beginning, safety trumped comfort in spacecraft designs for human space travel. Mihriban Whitmore, a manager in the Human Research Program at NASA’s Johnson...

Spinoff: Computer Technology

Virtual Machine Language Controls Remote Devices

NASA Technology

Virtually all of Chris Grasso’s academic and professional career has been built on NASA technology. “I’ve been working with NASA since college,” he...

Spinoff: Consumer, Home, and Recreation

Thermal Materials Protect Priceless, Personal Keepsakes

NASA Technology

Most of us cannot comprehend the task of building something to withstand temperatures over 4,000 °F—but NASA can. The space shuttles endured such...

Spinoff: Public Safety

Catalytic Converters Maintain Air Quality in Mines

NASA Technology

In the 1980s, Langley Research Center teamed up with the Federal Aviation Administration to develop a technology for the space-based detection of wind shears,...