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Briefs: Materials
Treating Fibrous Insulation To Reduce Thermal Conductivity
A chemical treatment reduces the convective and radiative contributions to the effective thermal conductivity of porous fibrous thermal-insulation tile. The net effect of the treatment is to coat the surfaces of fibers with a mixture of transition-metal oxides (TMOs) without filling the...
Briefs: Materials
Silica-Aerogel Composites Opacified With La0.7Sr0.3MnO3
As part of an effort to develop improved lightweight thermal-insulation tiles to withstand temperatures up to 1,000 °C, silica aerogel/fused-quartz- fiber composite materials containing La0.7Sr0.3MnO3 particles as opacifiers have been investigated as potentially offering thermal...
Briefs: Materials
Biologically Inspired Purification and Dispersion of SWCNTs
A biologically inspired method has been developed for (1) separating single-wall carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs) from other materials (principally, amorphous carbon and metal catalysts) in raw production batches and (2) dispersing the SWCNTs as individual particles (in contradistinction to ropes...
Briefs: Materials
Quantifying Airborne Hydrogen in Nearly Real Time
An indirect method of measuring small concentrations of hydrogen gas in air in nearly real time has been devised to circumvent the difficulty of performing such measurements directly. In this method, a sample of air suspected of containing hydrogen is first enclosed in a suitable container, and its...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
A Technique for Adjusting Eigenfrequencies of WGM Resonators
A simple technique has been devised for making small, permanent changes in the eigenfrequencies (resonance frequencies) of whispering-gallery-mode (WGM) dielectric optical resonators that have high values of the resonance quality factor (Q). The essence of the technique is to coat the...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
A small mass spectrometer utilizing a miniature field ionization source is now undergoing development. It is designed for use in a variety of applications in which there are requirements for a...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
Modifying Operating Cycles To Increase Stability in a LITS
The short-term instability in the frequency of a linear-ion-trap frequency standard (LITS) can be reduced by modifying two cycles involved in its operation: (1) the bimodal (bright/dim) cycle of a plasma discharge lamp used for state preparation and detection and (2) a...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
An apparatus for simulating the environment at the surface of Mars has been developed. Within the apparatus, the pressure, gas composition, and temperature of the atmosphere; the...
Briefs: Information Technology
Algorithm for Detecting a Bright Spot in an Image
An algorithm processes the pixel intensities of a digitized image to detect and locate a circular bright spot, the approximate size of which is known in advance. The algorithm is used to find images of the Sun in cameras aboard the Mars Exploration Rovers. (The images are used in estimating...
Briefs: Information Technology
Extreme Programming: Maestro Style
“Extreme Programming: Maestro Style” is the name of a computer-programming methodology that has evolved as a custom version of a methodology, called “extreme programming” that has been practiced in the software industry since the late 1990s. The name of this version reflects its origin in the work of the...
Briefs: Information Technology
The term “System for Mobility and Access to Rough Terrain” (SMART) denotes a theoretical framework, a control architecture, and an algorithm that implements the framework and architecture, for enabling a...
Briefs: Information Technology
An application-layer protocol and a network architecture have been proposed for data communications among multiple autonomous spacecraft that are required to fly in a precise formation...
Briefs: Information Technology
Planning Complex Sequences Using Compressed Representations
A method that notably includes the use of compressed representations interleaved with non-compressed (time-line) representations of a general scheduling problem has been conceived as a means of increasing, by orders of magnitude, the speeds of computations needed for scheduling complex...
Briefs: Information Technology
Self-Supervised Learning of Terrain Traversability From Proprioceptive Sensors
Robust and reliable autonomous navigation in unstructured, off-road terrain is a critical element in making unmanned ground vehicles a reality. Existing approaches tend to rely on evaluating the traversability of terrain based on fixed parameters obtained via testing in...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
Figure 1 shows damage to the space shuttle’s external tank (ET) that was likely caused by a pea-sized hailstone. Because of the potential damage to the ET while exposed to the weather, it is important to remotely monitor...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
Dual Cryogenic Capacitive Density Sensor
A dual cryogenic capacitive density sensor has been developed. The device contains capacitive sensors that monitor two-phase cryogenic flow density to within ±1% accuracy, which, if temperature were known, could be used to determine the ratio of liquid to gas in the line. Two of these density sensors,...
Briefs: Manufacturing & Prototyping
Improved Blackbody Temperature Sensors for a Vacuum Furnace
Some improvements have been made in the design and fabrication of blackbody sensors (BBSs) used to measure the temperature of a heater core in a vacuum furnace. Each BBS consists of a ring of thermally conductive, high-melting-temperature material with two tantalum-sheathed thermocouples...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Miniature Six-Axis Load Sensor for Robotic Fingertip
A miniature load sensor has been developed as a prototype of tactile sensors that could fit within fingertips of anthropomorphic robot hands. The sensor includes a force-and-torque transducer in the form of a spring instrumented with at least six semiconductor strain gauges. The strain-gauge...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
Wide-Range Temperature Sensors With High-Level Pulse Train Output
Two types of temperature sensors have been developed for wide-range temperature applications. The two sensors measure temperature in the range of –190 to +200 °C and utilize a thin-film platinum RTD (resistance temperature detector) as the temperature-sensing element. Other parts...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Wrap-Around Out-the-Window Sensor Fusion System
The Advanced Cockpit Evaluation System (ACES) includes communication, computing, and display subsystems, mounted in a van, that synthesize out-the-window views to approximate the views of the outside world as it would be seen from the cockpit of a crewed spacecraft, aircraft, or remote control of a...
Briefs: Software
Terminal Descent Sensor Simulation
Sulcata software simulates the operation of the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) radar terminal descent sensor (TDS). The program models TDS radar antennas, RF hardware, and digital processing, as well as the physics of scattering from a coherent ground surface. This application is specific to this sensor and is...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
A Robust Mechanical Sensing System for Unmanned Sea Surface Vehicles
The need for autonomous navigation and intelligent control of unmanned sea surface vehicles requires a mechanically robust sensing architecture that is watertight, durable, and insensitive to vibration and shock loading. The sensing system developed here comprises four black and...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Some progress has been reported in continuing research on the use of anion-receptor compounds as electrolyte additives to increase the sustainable rates of discharge and, hence, the...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Li/CFₓ Cells Optimized for Low-Temperature Operation
Several prior developments are combined.
Some developments reported in prior NASA Tech Briefs articles on primary electrochemical power cells containing lithium anodes and fluorinated carbonaceous (CFx) cathodes have been combined to yield a product line of cells optimized for...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
A method of encoding and reading numbers incorporates some of the features of conventional optical bar coding and radio-frequency identification (RFID) tagging, but overcomes some of...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Networks of passive radio beacons spanning moderate-sized terrain areas have been proposed to aid navigation of small robotic aircraft that would be used to explore Saturn’s moon...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Optical Injection Locking of a VCSEL in an OEO
Optical injection locking has been demonstrated to be effective as a means of stabilizing the wavelength of light emitted by a vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser (VCSEL) that is an active element in the frequency-control loop of an opto-electronic oscillator (OEO) designed to implement an atomic...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
A superconducting hot-electron bolometer has been built and tested as a prototype of high-sensitivity, rapid-response detectors of submillimeter-wavelength radiation. There are diverse...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Measuring Multiple Resistances Using Single-Point Excitation
In a proposed method of determining the resistances of individual DC electrical devices (e.g., batteries or fuel-cell stacks containing multiple electrochemical cells) connected in a series or parallel string, no attempt would be made to perform direct measurements on individual devices....
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