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Briefs: Photonics/Optics
Fiber-Coupled Planar Light-Wave Circuit for Seed Laser Control in High Spectral Resolution Lidar Systems
Precise laser remote sensing of aerosol extinction and backscatter in the atmosphere requires a high-power, pulsed, frequency doubled Nd:YAG laser that is wavelength-stabilized to a narrow absorption line such as found in iodine vapor. One...
Briefs: Mechanical & Fluid Systems
A bladderless water tank (see figure) has been developed that contains capillary devices that allow it to be filled and emptied, as needed, in microgravity. When filled with water, the tank...
Briefs: Mechanical & Fluid Systems
Metering Gas Strut for Separating Rocket Stages
A proposed gas strut system would separate a liquid-fueled second rocket stage from a solid-fueled first stage using an array of pre-charged struts. The strut would be a piston-and-cylinder mechanism containing a compressed gas. Adiabatic expansion of the gas would drive the extension of the strut....
Briefs: Mechanical & Fluid Systems
Counterflowing Jet Subsystem Design
A counterflowing jet design (a spacecraft and trans-atmospheric subsystem) employs centrally located, supersonic cold gas jets on the face of the vehicle, ejecting into the oncoming free stream. Depending on the supersonic free-stream conditions and the ejected mass flow rate of the counterflowing jets, the bow...
Briefs: Mechanical & Fluid Systems
Mass balances usually use a strain gauge that requires an impedance measurement and is susceptible to noise and thermal drift. A piezoelectric balance can be used to measure mass directly by monitoring...
Briefs: Mechanical & Fluid Systems
Acoustic Liner for Turbomachinery Applications
The purpose of this innovation is to reduce aircraft noise in the communities surrounding airports by significantly attenuating the noise generated by the turbomachinery, and enhancing safety by providing a containment barrier for a blade failure. Acoustic liners are used in today’s turbofan engines...
Briefs: Mechanical & Fluid Systems
Large-Flow-Area Flow-Selective Liquid/Gas Separator
This liquid/gas separator provides the basis for a first stage of a fuel cell product water/oxygen gas phase separator. It can separate liquid and gas in bulk in multiple gravity environments. The system separates fuel cell product water entrained with circulating oxygen gas from the outlet of a...
Briefs: Information Technology
3D GeoWall Analysis System for Shuttle External Tank Foreign Object Debris Events
An analytical, advanced imaging method has been developed for the initial monitoring and identification of foam debris and similar anomalies that occur post-launch in reference to the space shuttle’s external tank (ET). Remote sensing technologies have been used to...
Briefs: Information Technology
Determining Atmospheric-Density Profile of Titan
A method was developed for measuring the atmospheric density of Titan, the largest moon of Saturn, to create an accurate density profile as a function of altitude. This will allow mission planners to select safe flyby altitudes, and for navigation engineers to accurately predict the delta-v...
Briefs: Information Technology
Hidden Statistics Approach to Quantum Simulations
Recent advances in quantum information theory have inspired an explosion of interest in new quantum algorithms for solving hard computational (quantum and non-quantum) problems. The basic principle of quantum computation is that the quantum properties can be used to represent structure data, and...
Briefs: Materials
Functionalization of Single-Wall Carbon Nanotubes by Photo-Oxidation
A new technique for carbon nanotube oxidation was developed based upon the photo-oxidation of organic compounds. The resulting method is more benign than conventional oxidation approaches and produces single-wall carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs) with higher levels of oxidation.
Briefs: Materials
Products and manufacturing processes can be sensitive to outgassed chemical compounds, resulting in the use of adhesives, encapsulants, and sealants that have been specially formulated for low-outgassing performance....
Briefs: Software
World Wide Web Metaphors for Search Mission Data
A software program that searches and browses mission data emulates a Web browser, containing standard metaphors for Web browsing. By taking advantage of back-end URLs, users may save and share search states. Also, since a Web interface is familiar to users, training time is reduced. Familiar back and...
Briefs: Software
Numerical Mean Element Orbital Analysis With Morbiter
The Morbiter software numerically averages an osculating orbit’s equations of motion (EOM) to arrive at the mean orbit’s EOMs, which are then numerically propagated to obtain the long-term orbital ephemerides. The long-term evolution characteristics, and stability, of an orbit are best...
Briefs: Software
Phenological Parameters Estimation Tool
The Phenological Parameters Estimation Tool (PPET) is a set of algorithms implemented in MATLAB that estimates key vegetative phenological parameters. For a given year, the PPET software package takes in temporally processed vegetation index data (3D spatio-temporal arrays) generated by the time series...
Briefs: Manufacturing & Prototyping
Plasma pyrolysis of methane has been investigated for utility as a process for producing hydrogen. This process was conceived as a means of recovering hydrogen from methane produced as a...
Briefs: Manufacturing & Prototyping
Self-Deployable Membrane Structures
Currently existing approaches for deployment of large, ultra-lightweight gossamer structures in space rely typically upon electromechanical mechanisms and mechanically expandable or inflatable booms for deployment and to maintain them in a fully deployed, operational configuration. These support structures, with...
Briefs: Manufacturing & Prototyping
Reactivation of a Tin-Oxide-Containing Catalyst
The electrons in electric-discharge CO2 lasers cause dissociation of some CO2 into O2 and CO, and attach themselves to electronegative molecules such as O2, forming negative O2 ions, as well as larger negative ion clusters by collisions with CO or other molecules. The decrease in CO2 concentration due...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
Multi-Axis Accelerometer Calibration System
A low-cost, portable, and simplified system has been developed that is suitable for in-situ calibration and/or evaluation of multi-axis inertial measurement instruments (e.g., accelerometers). This system overcomes facility restrictions and maintains or improves the calibration quality for users of...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
Autonomous System for Monitoring the Integrity of Composite Fan Housings
A low-cost and reliable system assesses the integrity of composite fan-containment structures. The system utilizes a network of miniature sensors integrated with the structure to scan the entire structural area for any impact events and resulting structural damage, and to...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
Focusing Diffraction Grating Element With Aberration Control
Diffraction gratings are optical components with regular patterns of grooves, which angularly disperse incoming light by wavelength in a single plane, called dispersion plane. Traditional gratings on flat substrates do not perform wavefront transformation in the plane perpendicular to the...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
Universal Millimeter-Wave Radar Front End
A quasi-optical front end allows any arbitrary polarization to be transmitted by controlling the timing, amplitude, and phase of the two input ports. The front end consists of two independent channels — horizontal and vertical. Each channel has two ports — transmit and receive. The transmit signal is...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
Instrument for Measuring Thermal Conductivity of Materials at Low Temperatures
With the advance of polymer and other non-metallic material sciences, whole new series of polymeric materials and composites are being created. These materials are being optimized for many different applications including cryogenic and low-temperature industrial...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
A system for wirelessly measuring the volume of fluid in tanks at non-horizontal orientation is predicated upon two technologies developed...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
Pupil Alignment Measuring Technique and Alignment Reference for Instruments or Optical Systems
A technique was created to measure the pupil alignment of instruments in situ by measuring calibrated pupil alignment references (PARs) in instruments. The PAR can also be measured using an alignment telescope or an imaging system. PAR allows the...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
True Shear Parallel Plate Viscometer
This viscometer (which can also be used as a rheometer) is designed for use with liquids over a large temperature range. The device consists of horizontally disposed, similarly sized, parallel plates with a precisely known gap. The lower plate is driven laterally with a motor to apply shear to the liquid in the...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
An improved magnetic levitation apparatus (“Maglev Facility”) has been built for use in experiments in which there are requirements to impose variable gravity (including zero gravity) in order...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Advanced Flip Chips in Extreme Temperature Environments
The use of underfill materials is necessary with flip-chip interconnect technology to redistribute stresses due to mismatching coefficients of thermal expansion (CTEs) between dissimilar materials in the overall assembly. Underfills are formulated using organic polymers and possibly inorganic...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Adaptation of the Camera Link Interface for Flight-Instrument Applications
COTS (commercial-off-the-shelf) hardware using an industry-standard Camera Link interface is proposed to accomplish the task of designing, building, assembling, and testing electronics for an airborne spectrometer that would be low-cost, but sustain the required data speed...
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