Sensors & Test

As remote sensing for scientific purposes has transitioned from an experimental technology to an operational one, the selection of instruments has become more coordinated, so that the scientific community can exploit complementary measurements. However, technological and scientific heterogeneity across devices...

There is a need to acquire autonomously cryogenic hydrocarbon liquid sample from remote planetary locations such as the lakes of Titan for instruments such as mass spectrometers. There are several problems that had to be solved relative to collecting the right amount of...

The conventional method for integrating a radiometer into radar hardware is to share the RF front end between the instruments, and to have separate IF receivers that take data at separate times. Alternatively, the radar and radiometer...

A document discusses the CCD97 from e2v technologies as it is being evaluated at Goddard Space Flight Center’s Detector Characterization Laboratory (DCL) for possible use in ultra-low background noise space astronomy applications, such as Terrestrial Planet Finder Coronagraph...

The GEO-CAPE mission described in NASA’s Earth Science and Applications Decadal Survey requires high spatial, temporal, and spectral resolution measurements to monitor and characterize the rapidly changing chemistry of the troposphere over North and South Americas. High-frame-rate focal...

A system was developed to measure the sway of the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) at Kennedy Space Center. This system was installed in the VAB and gathered more than one total year of data. The building movement was correlated with measurements provided by three wind towers in order...

Ammonia leaks are a significant concern for the International Space Station (ISS). The ISS has external transport lines that direct liquid ammonia to radiator panels where the ammonia is cooled and then brought back to thermal control units. These transport lines and radiator panels are subject...

The optical extinction of a laser due to scattering of particles is a well-known phenomenon. In a laboratory environment, this physical principle is known as the Beer-Lambert law, and is often used to measure the concentration of scattering particles in a fluid or...

NASA is one of the top research entities in the world, producing technologies that range from electronics and new materials, to state-of-the-art robotics and sensors. Readers of NASA Tech Briefs get a firsthand look at these new technologies every month. But how many of you have had the chance to go behind the scenes at...

Carbon nanotubes and magnetic molecules are considered building blocks of future nanoelectronic systems. Researchers of Karlsruhe Institute of Technology and French colleagues have combined both components on the atomic level and to build a quantum mechanical system with novel properties.

U.S. Army Research Laboratory scientists in the Sensors and Electron Devices Directorate are currently exploring the field of quantum sensing and are discovering ways in which the Army can benefit from innovations that were once thought impossible.

Scientists from the University of Lincoln and Newcastle University in the U.K. have created a computerized system that allows for autonomous navigation of mobile robots based on the locust’s unique visual system. The work could provide the blueprint for the development of highly...

A team of neuroengineers based at Brown University has developed a fully implantable and rechargeable wireless brain sensor capable of relaying real-time broadband signals from up to 100 neurons in freely moving subjects. Several copies of the novel low-power device, described in the Journal of...