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Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Low-voltage high-current loads requiring precision voltage regulation are served by power systems that sense voltage remotely at the load. This creates the risk of an overvoltage (OV) condition at the load...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
A microwave-cavity applicator has been developed for coating multiple fibers by chemical vapor deposition (CVD). A prototype of the applicator was used to deposit silicon carbide onto...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
A seven-element microstrip patch antenna is designed to operate with circular polarization and high gain at a frequency of 2.2875 GHz. The antenna was developed in the early 1990s as a potential...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Monolithic microwave integrated-circuit (MMIC) frequency converters have been developed for use in satellite- and ground-based communications (see figure) at frequencies from about 18 to about...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Integrated Environmental Monitoring System for Clean Rooms
A system of electronic monitoring equipment under central computer control records and displays the readouts of environmental-quality instrumentation in clean rooms in the Space Station Processing Facility at Kennedy Space Center. The instruments include airborne-particle counters,...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Improved successive-approximation analog-to-digital converter (ADC) circuits are undergoing development for eventual incorporation into focal-plane arrays of photodetectors. These...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
A series-connected boost regulator (SCBR) is, as its name suggests, an electronic circuit for boosting a power-supply voltage to a higher and regulated value. The distinguishing feature of an SCBR is an...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Redundant fiber-optic transceivers have been incorporated into the High Speed Data Acquisition System (HSDAS) at Stennis Space Center, where they are used to communicate data acquired by...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Improved circuits that generate high-voltage pulses for driv-ing Q-switched lasers have been devised. To extract maximum energy from a laser cavity in the form of consistent laser pulses, the Q-switch pulses must rise...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
A complementary metal oxide/semiconductor (CMOS) integrated-circuit video image detector of the active-pixel-sensor (APS) type has been designed to implement programmable...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Relatively inexpensive, lightweight biplates for methanol fuel cells have been proposed. The reductions in weight and cost, relative to biplates now used in methanol fuel cells, would be...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
The Shuttle Projects Information Frontier (SPIF) Telemetry and Command Processor (TAC) is a personal-computer-based data-handling system that serves as part of an interface for transfer...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Vespel parts are made from a unique polymer by DuPont that has been called a problem solver for the semiconductor industry. Vespel SPC is a new generation of Vespel polyimide...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Transmissive light valves based on voltage-tunable color-selective absorption of light in surface plasmons are undergoing development. Like other surface-plasmon-based devices reported in a number of...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
The South Pole TDRSS Relay (SPTR) is a satellite radio relay communication system that provides an Internet link for a station at the South Pole. As the name of the system suggests, the...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
A rectangular integrated-circuit focal-plane array of 640 × 486 GaAs/AlxGa1 -xAs quantum-well infrared photodetectors (QWIPs) constitutes the image sensor in an experimental long-wavelength...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Sensor Products has recently filed two patents for, and introduced, the ASET® sensor for measuring interfacial stresses in real time. The sensor does not measure force, but rather the amount of surface...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Basic research on ion-trap mass spectrometry (IT/MS) in the Environmental Molecular Sciences Laboratory (EMSL) at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory has resulted in a new...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Improved Ultrasonic Imaging of Microscopic Devices
Advances in time gating of ultrasonic signals in scanning acoustic microscopes have been proposed to enable detailed nondestructive examination of bonds and other interfaces deep within the interiors of such micromachined objects as high-density integrated electronic circuits and...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Researchers at Johnson Space Center (JSC) recently demonstrated that the resonant microstrip patch antenna (RMPA), which has been proven in commercial applications, can be applied with...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
A proposed Global Positioning System (GPS) sensor would give information on approximate attitude as well as on position. Unlike other GPS-based attitude sensors, this attitude sensor would not depend on...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
A biotelemetric system for monitoring key physiological parameters of a fetus and its uterine environment is undergoing development. The main purpose of the monitoring is to detect...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Studies of physical and chemical effects in the hydride-forming electrodes of rechargeable nickel/metal hydride electrochemical cells have yielded results that now guide...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Compact, low-power-consumption magnetic-sensor units called "integrated sensor system" (ISS) units are being developed for detecting buried mines and arsenals without exposing human searchers to...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
The upper part of Figure 1 illustrates an antenna derived by widening the middle strip conductor of a finite-width coplanar waveguide (FCPW) to form a rectangular patch. An FCPW offers all the...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
A proposed multilayer metal-film/dielectric-plate laminate would serve as a passive radio-frequency (RF) interlayer stripline transition. This device is designed to provide RF coupling from (a) an input...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Circuit for Automatic Tunneling-Controlled Golay Cell
An automatic tunneling-controlled, micromachined Golay cell has been implemented in a multichip integrated-circuit module. The module is designed specifically for sensing infrared radiation indicative of the concentration of glucose in blood, but its low noise, high gain, and low power...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Vertical-Bloch-line (VBL) memory devices of a proposed type would include stacks of VBL memory chips plus other components (see figure on next page). Each chip would be square, approximately...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
Segmented-Aperture Michelson Interferometer
In a proposed modification of the basic design of a Michelson interferometer, the beam aperture would be split into a number (N ≧ 2) of smaller areas and the optics arranged so that the beam in each area would generate a distinct segment of the overall desired interferogram. Each segment of the...
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