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Briefs: Physical Sciences
System for Hydrogen Sensing
A low-power, wireless gas-sensing system is designed to safeguard the apparatus to which it is attached, as well as associated personnel. It also ensures the efficiency and operational integrity of the hydrogen-powered apparatus. This sensing system can be operated with lower power consumption (less than 30 nanowatts),...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
A new space-qualified, high-power, high-efficiency, K-band traveling-wave tube amplifier (TWTA), shown in the figure, will provide high-rate, high-capacity, direct-to-Earth communications for science data...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Sideband-Separating, Millimeter-Wave Heterodyne Receiver
Researchers have demonstrated a sub-millimeter-wave spectrometer that combines extremely broad bandwidth with extremely high sensitivity and spectral resolution to enable future spacecraft to measure the composition of the Earth’s troposphere in three dimensions many times per day at...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
A simplified load-following control scheme has been proposed for a fuel cell power system. The scheme could be used to control devices that are important parts of a fuel cell system but...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Loosely Coupled GPS-Aided Inertial Navigation System for Range Safety
The Autonomous Flight Safety System (AFSS) aims to replace the human element of range safety operations, as well as reduce reliance on expensive, downrange assets for launches of expendable launch vehicles (ELVs). The system consists of multiple navigation sensors and flight...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Modified Phasemeter for a Heterodyne Laser Interferometer
Modifications have been made in the design of instruments of the type described in “Digital Averaging Phasemeter for Heterodyne Interferometry” (NPO-30866), NASA Tech Briefs, Vol. 28, No. 9 (September 2004), page 6a. To recapitulate: A phasemeter of this type measures the difference...
Briefs: Manufacturing & Prototyping
An improved design concept for coaxial propellant injectors for a rocket engine (or perhaps for a non-rocket combustion chamber) offers advantages of greater robustness, less...
Briefs: Manufacturing & Prototyping
Adaptable Diffraction Gratings With Wavefront Transformation
Diffraction gratings are optical components with regular patterns of grooves, which angularly disperse incoming light by wavelength. Traditional diffraction gratings have static planar, concave, or convex surfaces. However, if they could be made so that they can change the surface...
Briefs: Software
Natural-Language Parser for PBEM
A computer program called “Hunter” accepts, as input, a colloquial-English description of a set of policy-based-management rules, and parses that description into a form useable by policy-based enterprise management (PBEM) software.
Briefs: Software
Policy Process Editor for P³BM Software
A computer program enables generation, in the form of graphical representations of process flows with embedded natural-language policy statements, input to a suite of policy-, process-, and performance-based management (P3BM) software developed at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Like the program...
Briefs: Software
A Quality System Database
A quality system database (QSD), and software to administer the database, were developed to support recording of administrative nonconformance activities that involve requirements for documentation of corrective and/or preventive actions, which can include ISO 9000 internal quality audits and customer complaints. [“ISO...
Briefs: Software
Trajectory Optimization: OTIS 4
The latest release of the Optimal Trajectories by Implicit Simulation (OTIS4) allows users to simulate and optimize aerospace vehicle trajectories. With OTIS4, one can seamlessly generate optimal trajectories and parametric vehicle designs simultaneously. New features also allow OTIS4 to solve non-aerospace...
Briefs: Software
Computer Software Configuration Item-Specific Flight Software Image Transfer Script Generator
A K-shell UNIX script enables the International Space Station (ISS) Flight Control Team (FCT) operators in NASA’s Mission Control Center (MCC) in Houston to transfer an entire or partial computer software configuration item (CSCI) from a flight software...
Briefs: Materials
A systematic experimental study has been performed to determine the effects of each of the operating conditions in a double-pulse laser ablation process that is used to produce single-wall...
Briefs: Materials
Thermogravimetric Analysis of Single-Wall Carbon Nanotubes
An improved protocol for thermo-gravimetric analysis (TGA) of samples of single-wall carbon nanotube (SWCNT) material has been developed to increase the degree of consistency among results so that meaningful comparisons can be made among different samples. This improved TGA protocol is...
Briefs: Mechanical & Fluid Systems
The figure shows several aspects of an experimental robotic manipulator that includes a housing from which protrudes a tendril- or tentacle-like arm 1 cm thick and 1 m long. The arm consists of two...
Briefs: Mechanical & Fluid Systems
Foil Gas Thrust Bearings for High-Speed Turbomachinery
A methodology has been developed for the design and construction of simple foil thrust bearings intended for parametric performance testing and low marginal costs, supporting continued development of oil-free turbomachinery. A bearing backing plate is first machined and surface-ground to...
Briefs: Information Technology
Efficient Bit-to-Symbol Likelihood Mappings
This innovation is an efficient algorithm designed to perform bit-to-symbol and symbol-to-bit likelihood mappings that represent a significant portion of the complexity of an error-correction code decoder for high-order constellations. Recent implementation of the algorithm in hardware has yielded an...
Briefs: Information Technology
NASA’s planetary missions have collected, and continue to collect, massive volumes of orbital imagery. The volume is such that it is difficult to manually review all of the data...
Briefs: Information Technology
Some non-traditional signal constellations have been proposed for transmission of data over the Additive White Gaussian Noise (AWGN) channel using such channel-capacity-approaching codes as low-density...
Briefs: Photonics/Optics
Spurious interference limits the performance of many interferometric measurements. Digitally enhanced interferometry (DEI) improves measurement sensitivity by augmenting conventional heterodyne...
Briefs: Information Technology
Processing Images of Craters for Spacecraft Navigation
A crater-detection algorithm has been conceived to enable automation of what, heretofore, have been manual processes for utilizing images of craters on a celestial body as landmarks for navigating a spacecraft flying near or landing on that body. The images are acquired by an electronic camera...
Briefs: Energy
Luminescent materials were developed using aerosol processes, for making improved LED devices for solid-state lighting. In essence this means improving...
Briefs: Green Design & Manufacturing
Light Emitting Diode (LED) driver ICs associated with specific (uniquely operated) switching power supplies that optimize performance for High Brightness...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
Wide-Field-of-View, High-Resolution, Stereoscopic Imager
A device combines video feeds from multiple cameras to provide wide-field-of-view, high-resolution, stereoscopic video to the user. The prototype under development consists of two camera assemblies, one for each eye. One of these assemblies incorporates a mounting structure with multiple...
Briefs: Imaging
Algorithm for Lossless Compression of Calibrated Hyperspectral Imagery
A two-stage predictive method was developed for lossless compression of calibrated hyperspectral imagery. The first prediction stage uses a conventional linear predictor intended to exploit spatial and/or spectral dependencies in the data. The compressor tabulates counts of the...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
Polarization Imaging Apparatus
A polarization imaging apparatus has shown promise as a prototype of instruments for medical imaging with contrast greater than that achievable by use of non-polarized light. The underlying principles of design and operation are derived from observations that light interacts with tissue ultrastructures that affect...
Briefs: Lighting
SynDiTec Inc., San Jose, CA
This project developed new light emitting diode (LED) driver ICs associated with specific (uniquely operated) switching...
Briefs: Lighting
Cabot Corp., Boston, MA
The overarching goal of this project was to develop luminescent materials using aerosol processes for making improved LED devices...
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