Award Data

Space Micro and its partner research institution, the University of Arizona bring together innovations in channelization and network protocol development. Together, these innovations will provide improved hopping radios (with digital, rapidly reconfigurable implementation, wider bandwidth and reduced overhead penalty for hopping) and improved spectrum and link quality sensing. We will demonstrate ...

Blended wing body (BWB) aircraft provide an aerodynamically superior solution over traditional tube-and-wing designs for a number of mission profiles. These platforms provide an all-lifting surface with a reduced wetted area, which lead to significant aerodynamic improvements over their conventional counterparts. However, due to their lack of a conventional tail surface with which to trim in pitch ...

High Altitude Long Endurance (HALE) aircraft have garnered increased interest in recent years as they can serve several purposes, including many of the objectives of satellites while incurring a fraction of the cost to deploy. Examples applications include Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance, communications relay systems, and environmental and atmospheric sensing. The requirements for H ...

We propose the development of a modern panel code for calculation of steady and unsteady aerodynamic loads needed for dynamic servoelastic (DSE) analysis of flight vehicles. The code will be especially tailored to be robust, reliable, and integrated with the NASA Object Oriented Optimization (O3) system through selection of analysis methods, file formats, and computing environment, allowing it to ...

In response to NASA's solicitation for light-weight and power efficient instruments that enable in situ compositional analysis, Q-Peak in partnership with the University of Hawaii proposes to develop a compact, robust, and efficient instrument to combine all laser based spectroscopies capable of performing imaging, Raman, Laser Induced Breakdown, Laser Induced Fluorescence and LIDAR The main adva ...

Solar Particle Events (SPEs) represent a major hazard for extravehicular maneuvers by astronauts in Earth orbit, and for eventual manned interplanetary space travel. They can also harm aircraft avionics, communication and navigation. We propose to develop a system to aid forecasters in the prediction of such events, and in the identification/lengthening of "all clear" time periods when there is a ...

Advanced space suits require lightweight, low-power, durable sensors for monitoring critical life support materials. No current compact sensors have the tolerance for liquid water that is specifically required for portable life support systems (PLSS). Intelligent Optical Systems (IOS) will develop a luminescence-based optical sensor probe to monitor carbon dioxide, oxygen, and humidity, and select ...

The proposed innovation is a spacecraft that could be used for lunar or asteroid prospecting missions. The mission plan would involve sending the spacecraft to an asteroid or other target, and analyzing the regolith for traces of water and other elements to be mined later for in-situ resource utilization. The system features multiple innovations. One is game-changing high delta V solar electric p ...

The technical innovation proposed here is the design during Phase I of a high performance upper stage for a two-stage "20 / 450" Nanosat Launch Vehicle (NLV) that is configured to deliver up to 20 kg to a 450 km low Earth orbit (Figure 1). Parallel tasks prepare for the Phase II development and sub-orbital flight testing of a prototype vehicle that is directly traceable to the orbital-capable ...

Parabilis Space Technologies, Inc. (Parabilis), in collaboration with Utah State University (USU), proposes a low cost, high performance launch vehicle upper stage using oxygen and a novel additively manufactured polymer fuel grain as propellants in response to solicitation T1.01, Affordable Nano/Micro Launch Propulsion Stages. This technology will fulfill the ever-growing mission demands of the C ...