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: Electronics & Computers
A new sensor (see figure) provides an absolute position measurement. The figure presents a schematic view of a motorized linear- translation stage that contains, at each end, an electronic...
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Briefs: Materials
Strong, Lightweight, Porous Materials
A new class of strong, lightweight, porous materials has been invented as an outgrowth of an effort to develop reinforced silica aerogels. The new material, called X-Aerogel is less hygroscopic, but no less porous and of similar density to the corresponding unmodified aerogels. However, the property that sets...
Briefs: Materials
Nanowicks are dense mats of nanoscale fibers that are expected to enable the development of a variety of novel capillary pumps, filters, and fluidic control devices. Nanowicks make it possible obtain a variety of novel effects,...
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Briefs: Materials
TUFROC (Toughened Uni-piece Fibrous Reinforced Oxidation- resistant Composite) has been developed as a new thermal protection system (TPS) material for wing leading edge and nose cap...
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Briefs: Manufacturing & Prototyping
The figure depicts selected aspects of the rapid and quiet drill (RAQD), which is a prototype apparatus for drilling concrete or bricks. The design and basic principle of operation of the RAQD overlap, in several respects,...
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Briefs: Manufacturing & Prototyping
A relatively simple and economical process and apparatus for concentrating hydrogen peroxide from aqueous solution at the point of use have been invented. The need for this or a similar invention arises for the...
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Briefs: Semiconductors & ICs
The figure shows two monolithic microwave integrated-circuit (MMIC) amplifier chips optimized to function in the frequency range of 90 to 130 GHz, covering nearly all of F-band (90 – 140 GHz). These...
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Briefs: Electronics & Computers
A printed, folded, Hilbert-curve fractal microwave antenna has been designed and built to offer advantages of compactness and low mass, relative to other antennas designed for the...
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Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Panoramic detection systems (PDSs) are developmental video monitoring and image-data processing systems that, as their name indicates, acquire panoramic views. More specifically, a PDS acquires images...
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Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Electronic circuitry has been developed to serve as an interface between an electronic tongue and digital input/output boards in a laptop computer that is used to control the tongue and...
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Briefs: Electronics & Computers
An inexpensive wall clock has been devised for displaying solar time or sidereal time as it would be perceived on a planet other than the Earth, or for displaying sidereal time on the...
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Briefs: Electronics & Computers
An efficient arrangement of four switches has been conceived for coupling, to four output ports, the output powers of any subset of four devices that are members of a redundant set of...
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Briefs: Electronics & Computers
A lightweight reflectarray antenna that would enable simultaneous operation at frequencies near 7.115 GHz and frequencies near 32 GHz is undergoing development. More precisely, what is being...
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Briefs: Information Technology
C Namelist Facility
C Namelist Facility (CNL) is a package of software that supports the development of data-driven programs that utilize relatively free-form input files (e.g., text files) to control complex operations. The only comparable prior namelist facility is built into Fortran and does not support arrays or records. Newer computing...
Briefs: Information Technology
Software Framework for Peer Data-Management Services
Object Oriented Data Technology (OODT) is a software framework for creating a Web-based system for exchange of scientific data that are stored in diverse formats on computers at different sites under the management of scientific peers. OODT software consists of a set of cooperating, distributed...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
The figure is a simplified diagram of a relatively inexpensive controller for a DiCon VX (or equivalent) fiber-optic switch — an electromechanically actuated switch for optically connecting one...
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Briefs: Software
Designing Rolling-Element Bearings
Bearing Analysis Tool (BAT) is a computer program for designing rolling-element bearings for cryogenic turbomachines. BAT provides a graphical user interface (GUI) that guides the entry of data to develop mathematical models of bearings. The GUI breaks model data into logical subsets that are entered through...
Briefs: Software
DSS-Prototyper is an open-source, real-time 3D virtual environment software that supports design simulation for the new Vision for Space Exploration (VSE). This is a simulation of NASA's proposed Robotic...
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Briefs: Software
Patented in 1991, friction stir welding (FSW) has since been used widely to create strong joints in aluminum alloys. The aircraft industry has started to adapt this...
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Briefs: Software
Computational analysis of fluid-structure interactions (FSI) represents a considerable challenge for most computational analysis codes. Simple one-way coupled problems, in...
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Briefs: Software
Solving Equations of Multibody Dynamics
Darts++ is a computer program for solving the equations of motion of a multibody system or of a multibody model of a dynamic system. It is intended especially for use in dynamical simulations performed in designing and analyzing, and developing software for the control of, complex mechanical systems. Darts++...
Briefs: Software
Analysis of Complex Valve and Feed Systems
A numerical framework for analysis of complex valve systems supports testing of propulsive systems by simulating key valve and control system components in the test loop. In particular, it is designed to enhance the analysis capability in terms of identifying system transients and quantifying the valve...
Briefs: Software
Programs for Testing an SSME-Monitoring System
A suite of computer programs has been developed for special test equipment (STE) that is used in verification testing of the Health Management Computer Integrated Rack Assembly (HMC-IRA), a ground- based system of analog and digital electronic hardware and software for "flight-like" testing for...
Briefs: Software
Radiant Energy Display and Analysis Software Package (REDAP) is a computer program for processing antenna-radiation- pattern data that have been preprocessed by a data-collection program and...
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Briefs: Software
Payload Operations Support Team Tools is a software system that assists in (1) development and testing of software for payloads to be flown aboard the space shuttles and (2) training of payload customers,...
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Briefs: Software
The Interactive Coverage Analysis Tool (iCAT) is an interactive desktopcomputer program serving to (1) support planning of coverage, and management of usage of frequencies, of current and proposed...
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Briefs: Software
Soft Real-Time PID Control on a VME Computer
microPID (μPID) is a computer program for real-time proportional + integral + derivative (PID) control of a translation stage in a Fourier-transform ultraviolet spectrometer. μPID implements a PID control loop over a position profile at sampling rate of 8 kHz (sampling period 125 μs). The...
Briefs: Software
A package of software has been developed to execute a raw binary image of the space shuttle flight software for simulation of the computational effects of operation of space shuttle avionics. This software can be...
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Briefs: Software
Robust, Flexible Motion Control for the Mars Explorer Rovers
The Mobility Flight Software, running on computers aboard the Mars Explorer Rover (MER) robotic vehicles Spirit and Opportunity, affords the robustness and flexibility of control to enable safe and effective operation of these vehicles in traversing natural terrain. It can make the...

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