Tech Briefs

A comprehensive library of technical briefs from engineering experts at NASA and major government, university, and commercial laboratories covering all aspects of innovations in electronics, software, photonics, imaging, motion control, automation, sensors, test, materials, manufacturing, mechanical, and mechatronics.

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Briefs: Sensors/Data Acquisition
A growing safety concern for pilots and aircraft passengers is laser strikes, or the aiming of high-power laser pointers at aircraft. To address the present lack of effective laser...
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Briefs: Lighting
Spectral images, which contain more color information than is obtainable with a typical camera, reveal characteristics of tissue and other biological samples that can't be seen by the...
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Briefs: Photonics/Optics
A transfer technique based on thin sacrificial layers of boron nitride could allow high-performance gallium nitride gas sensors to be grown on sapphire substrates and then...
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Briefs: Photonics/Optics
A new form of compact cooling technology developed for space astronomy could pave the way for use of advanced superconducting detectors for better cancer treatments, driverless cars,...
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Briefs: Energy
A well-designed thermal management system is critical to the life and performance of electric-drive vehicles (EDVs), hybrids (HEVs), plug-in hybrids (PHEVs), and all-electric vehicles (EVs). Temperature and...
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Briefs: Manufacturing & Prototyping
A new method for digital design and printing of stretchable, flexible electronics, called Hybrid 3D printing, was developed to integrate soft, conductive inks with a material substrate to...
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Briefs: Data Acquisition
Infectious diseases remain the world’s top contributors to human death and disability, and with recent outbreaks of Zika virus infections, there is a keen need for simple,...
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Briefs: Electronics & Computers
A new approach was developed that overcomes the limitation of conventional chip-testing methods on 3D chips, which include many thin horizontal “floors” connected to one another by vertical...
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Briefs: Robotics, Automation & Control
To date, it has been difficult or impossible for most robotic and prosthetic hands to accurately sense the vibrations and shear forces that occur, for example, when a finger is sliding along a tabletop, or...
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Briefs: Imaging
Stereoscopic Imaging in Hypersonic Boundary Layers Using Planar Laser-Induced Fluorescence
Stereoscopic time-resolved visualization of three-dimensional structures in a hypersonic flow was performed for the first time in NASA Langley Research Center’s 31-inch Mach 10 Air Tunnel. Nitric oxide (NO) was seeded into hypersonic boundary layer flows...
Briefs: Imaging
Color-Changing Surface Tunable Through Electrical Voltage
Video screens are made up of hundreds of thousands of pixels that display different colors to form the images. With current technology, each of these pixels contains three subpixels — one red, one green, and one blue. A new method was developed to tune the color of the subpixels. The new...
Briefs: Test & Measurement
Non-Destructive Additive Manufacturing Characterization Coupon
Additive manufacturing (AM) material assurance has relied upon traditional test coupons and testing methods that work well for wrought materials, but fail to address the unique and not as well-known characteristics of AM parts. A new standardized, integrated test coupon was designed...
Briefs: Research Lab
Methods for Characterizing Nonlinear Fields of a High-Intensity Focused Ultrasound Source
Minimally invasive and non-invasive therapeutic ultrasound treatments can be used to ablate, necrotize, and/or otherwise damage tissue. High-intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU), for example, is used to thermally or mechanically damage tissue. HIFU thermal...
Briefs: Software
AMMOS-PDS Pipeline Service (APPS)
APPS provides a multi-mission instrument data and metadata (i.e. label) transformation service that interfaces local or remote Mission Data provider’s data processing pipeline/end-products and the PDS (Planetary Data System) data archive to ensure compliance to standards in a schedule/cost-efficient manner (i.e....
Briefs: Imaging
Optical coherence tomography (OCT) is a high-resolution live imaging technique that can be used for early detection of retinal diseases such as age-related macular degeneration,...
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Briefs: Manufacturing & Prototyping
Additive Manufacturing Facility for Utilization Primarily in Microgravity Environments
The purpose of this innovation is to create the ability to manufacture off Earth, primarily in a microgravity environment. This additive manufacturing facility (AMF) will have the capability to build tools, parts, experimental hardware, and upgrade hardware while...
Briefs: Manufacturing & Prototyping
Joining of Ti, Mo, and Ni Terminated Thermoelectric Segments via Brazing
The joining of low- and high-temperature thermoelectric materials (with ZT optimized to specific temperature ranges) to each other in a segmented configuration can lead to enhanced device efficiency. The resulting joints between these materials must be both chemically and...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Engineers have invented a new architecture for quantum computing based on novel “flip-flop” qubits. The new chip design allows for a silicon quantum processor that can be scaled...
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Briefs: Robotics, Automation & Control
A software system was developed that helps robots more effectively act on spoken instructions — no matter how abstract or specific those instructions may be — from people who by...
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Briefs: Materials
Process Turns Carbon Dioxide into 3D Graphene with Microporous Surface
The conversion of carbon dioxide to useful materials usually requires high energy input due to its ultrahigh stability. A heat-releasing reaction between carbon dioxide and sodium was developed to take carbon dioxide and turn it into 3D graphene with micropores across its...
Briefs: Software
From phone camera snapshots to life-saving medical scans, digital images play an important role in the way humans communicate information. But digital images are subject to a range of...
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Briefs: Manufacturing & Prototyping
As 3D printing has become a mainstream technology, studies have investigated printable structures that will fold themselves into useful three-dimensional shapes when heated or...
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Briefs: Photonics/Optics
Dual-Field-of-View Multiband Optics
Multi-spectral-band systems are steadily emerging as a desired feature in a camera system. Each spectral band offers different image characteristics. Shorter-wavelength spectral bands provide the potential for better resolution due to the smaller impact of diffraction on the size of the optics blur. This means...
Briefs: Motion Control
Researchers at the Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne (EPFL) have created the first functional robot powered entirely by vacuum. It is made of soft building blocks that move by having air sucked out...
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Briefs: Motion Control
An engineering team at the University of California San Diego has designed and built a gripper that can pick up and manipulate objects without needing to see them and without being...
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Briefs: Motion Control
Scientists at Disney Research have developed a modular, reconfigurable legged robot named Snapbot that can move forward, interact with its environment, and perform other tasks based on a number of...
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Briefs: Motion Control
Origami has once again inspired engineers at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). Besides aesthetic beauty, the Japanese tradition of paper-folding addresses a persistent problem faced...
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Briefs: Motion Control
The James Webb Space Telescope will be the most powerful space telescope ever built. With a 21-foot diameter, the telescope’s primary mirror is six times larger than the one used by the...
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Briefs: Imaging
Fine-grained human motion tracing — the ability to trace the trajectory of a moving human hand or leg, or even the whole body — is a general capability that is useful in a wide variety of...
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