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Briefs: Medical
Surface Bacterial-Spore Assay Using Tb³⁺ /DPA Luminescence
Equipment and a method for rapidly assaying solid surfaces for contamination by bacterial spores are undergoing development. The method would yield a total (nonviable plus viable) spore count of a surface within minutes and a viable-spore count in about one hour. In this method, spores...
Briefs: Medical
Two simplified methods of identifying messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA), and compact, low-power apparatuses to implement the methods, are at the proof-of-concept stage of...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
A proposed telescope would afford high resolution over a narrow field of view (<0.10°) while scanning over a total field of view nominally 16° wide without need to slew the entire...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
Figure 1 schematically depicts an improved multispectral imaging system of the type that utilizes a filter wheel that contains multiple discrete narrow-band-pass filters and that is...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
A method of compensation for the polarization-dependent phase anisotropy of a metal reflector has been proposed. The essence of the method is to coat the reflector with multiple thin...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
Integral Radiator and Storage Tank
A simplified, lightweight system for dissipating heat of a regenerative fuel- cell system would include a heat pipe with its evaporator end placed at the heat source and its condenser end integrated into the wall of the regenerative fuel cell system gas-storage tanks. The tank walls act as heat-radiating surfaces...
Briefs: Information Technology
Integrated Hardware and Software for No-Loss Computing
When an algorithm is distributed across multiple threads executing on many distinct processors, a loss of one of those threads or processors can potentially result in the total loss of all the incremental results up to that point. When implementation is massively hardware distributed, then the...
Briefs: Information Technology
Decision-Tree Formulation With Order-1 Lateral Execution
A compact symbolic formulation enables mapping of an arbitrarily complex decision tree of a certain type into a highly computationally efficient multidimensional software object. The type of decision trees to which this formulation applies is that known in the art as the Boolean class of...
Briefs: Information Technology
GIS Methodology for Planning Planetary-Rover Operations
A document describes a methodology for utilizing image data downlinked from cameras aboard a robotic ground vehicle (rover) on a remote planet for analyzing and planning operations of the vehicle and of any associated spacecraft. Traditionally, the cataloging and presentation of large numbers...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
Optimal Calibration of the Spitzer Space Telescope
A document discusses the focal-plane calibration of the Spitzer Space Telescope by use of the instrument pointing frame (IPF) Kalman filter, which was described in "Kalman Filter for Calibrating a Telescope Focal Plane" (NPO-40798), NASA Tech Briefs, Vol. 30, No. 9 (September 2006), page 62. To...
Briefs: Information Technology
Automated Detection of Events of Scientific Interest
A report presents a slightly different perspective of the subject matter of "Fusing Symbolic and Numerical Diagnostic Computations" (NPO-42512), which appears elsewhere in this issue of NASA Tech Briefs. Briefly, the subject matter is the X-2000 Anomaly Detection Language, which is a...
Briefs: Information Technology
Representation-Independent Iteration of Sparse Data Arrays
An approach is defined that describes a method of iterating over massively large arrays containing sparse data using an approach that is implementation independent of how the contents of the sparse arrays are laid out in memory. What is unique and important here is the decoupling of the...
Briefs: Information Technology
Mission Operations of the Mars Exploration Rovers
A document describes a system of processes involved in planning, commanding, and monitoring operations of the rovers Spirit and Opportunity of the Mars Exploration Rover mission. The system is designed to minimize command turnaround time, given that inherent uncertainties in terrain conditions and...
Briefs: Information Technology
More About Software for No-Loss Computing
A document presents some additional information on the subject matter of "Integrated Hardware and Software for No-Loss Computing" (NPO-42554), which appears elsewhere in this issue of NASA Tech Briefs. To recapitulate: The hardware and software designs of a developmental parallel computing system are...
NASA Spinoff: Manufacturing & Prototyping
Originating Technology/NASA Contribution
With retirement of the space shuttle imminent, and the commercial space industry burgeoning, NASA is searching for safe and innovative methods...
Briefs: Materials
Some wholly aromatic ether-imides consisting of rod-shaped, relatively-low-mass molecules that can form liquid crystals have been investigated for potential utility as electron-donor-type...
Briefs: Mechanical & Fluid Systems
Atomic Energy of Canada, Ltd., a subcontractor of Societatea Nationala Nucleoelectrica S.A. (SNN) of Romania, contracted Badger Meter to model, test, and produce a set of precision valves...
Briefs: Manufacturing & Prototyping
The pulse-flow microencapsulation system (PFMS) is an automated system that continuously produces a stream of liquid-filled microcapsules for delivery of therapeutic agents to target tissues. Prior...
Briefs: Manufacturing & Prototyping
Automated Low-Gravitation Facility Would Make Optical Fibers
A report describes a proposed automated facility that would be operated in outer space to produce high-quality optical fibers from fluoride-based glasses, free of light-scattering crystallites that form during production in normal Earth gravitation. Before launch, glass preforms would be...
Briefs: Physical Sciences
Viscosity is a measure of the resistance of a liquid to flow, and is an important measurement requirement in industrial process control and OEM applications. Viscosity describes the...
Briefs: Photonics/Optics
An enhanced alignment cube has been invented for use in a confined setting (e.g., a cryogenic chamber) in which optical access may be limited to a single line of sight. Whereas traditional alignment-cube...
Briefs: Mechanical & Fluid Systems
Graphite Composite Booms With Integral Hinges
A document discusses lightweight instrument booms under development for use aboard spacecraft. A boom of this type comprises a thin-walled graphite-fiber/matrix composite tube with an integral hinge that can be bent for stowage and later allowed to spring back to straighten the boom for deployment in...
Briefs: Mechanical & Fluid Systems
Tool for Sampling Permafrost on a Remote Planet
A report discusses the robotic arm tool for rapidly acquiring permafrost (RATRAP), which is being developed for acquiring samples of permafrost on Mars or another remote planet and immediately delivering the samples to adjacent instruments for analysis. The prototype RATRAP includes a rasp that...
Briefs: Information Technology
Special Semaphore Scheme for UHF Spacecraft Communications
A semaphore scheme has been devised to satisfy a requirement to enable ultrahigh- frequency (UHF) radio communication between a spacecraft descending from orbit to a landing on Mars and a spacecraft, in orbit about Mars, that relays communications between Earth and the lander spacecraft....
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Coating MCPs With AlN and GaN
A development effort underway at the time of reporting the information for this article is devoted to increasing the sensitivity of microchannel plates (MCPs) as detectors of photons and ions by coating the MCPs with nitrides of elements in period III of the periodic table. Conventional MCPs are relatively insensitive...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
An electronic system adjusts the frequency of a tunable laser, eventually locking the frequency to a peak in the optical absorption spectrum of a gas (or of a Fabry-Perot cavity that...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
A correlated-noise source has been developed for use in calibrating an airborne or spaceborne Earth-observing correlation microwave polarimeter that operates in a pass band that includes a nominal...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Robust lithium/solid electrolyte/iodine electrochemical cells that offer significant advantages over commercial lithium/ iodine cells have been developed. At room temperature, these cells...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Hybrid deployable radio antennas and reflectors of a proposed type would feature rigid narrower apertures plus wider adjoining apertures comprising reflective surfaces supported by open-cell...
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