Award Data

Nanosatellites are receiving increased interest since they are proving reliable for surveillance, communication and other space missions. Also, the possibility of launching "constellations" of them offers unique capabilities for low-cost experimentation, sensing and communications in space. In comparison to larger spacecraft, their development time and costs have reduced and their launch costs a ...

A spacecraft thermal control system must keep the cabin (both air and its structure if manned) and electronic equipment within a narrow temperature range even though the environment may vary from very cold to warmer than room temperature. Since water is safe to use and an excellent coolant (other than its high freeze point and volumetric expansion during freeze), a water coolant loop often is use ...

The proposed innovation is a heterogeneous multi-robot team developed as a platform for effective subsurface planetary exploration. State-of-art robotic exploration is based on single-robot systems with human controllers augmented by limited automation. This system requires near-constant communication and a single failure results in the end of the mission. A multi-robot system offers more efficien ...

An opportunity to boost energy efficiency in homes and buildings exists through the design of functional radiative properties in glass and other building materials. Current surface materials ignore or take first-order approaches to complicated spectral behavior, leading to sub-optimal properties. The sensitivity of material properties to microscale surface structuring creates a design challenge ...

An orifice element is commonly used in liquid rocket engine test facilities to provide a large reduction in pressure over a very small distance in the piping system. Orifice elements are used in propellant lines, feed systems, plume suppression systems and steam ejector trains. While the orifice as a device is largely effective in stepping down pressure, it is also susceptible to a wake-vortex ty ...

ABSTRACT: The next generation of hypersonic and reentry vehicles being designed for the Department of Defense (DoD) applications will require advanced Thermal Protection System (TPS). While new TPS shields are under development, a key difficulty is the ability to predict and diagnose TPS performance. ElectroDynamic Applications (EDA) has been developing an optical diagnosticfor use during testi ...

ABSTRACT: This project will apply resonant infrared pulsed laser ablation techniques to deposit environmentally-durable, adherent and conformal anti-reflection (AR) coating on a plastic (polycarbonate) substrate. The proposed broadband AR coating is based on a multilayer architecture of low-refractive index polymer and high-refractive index polymer or polymer hybrid materials. High quality poly ...

ABSTRACT: Future hypersonic vehicles, like X-43 and X-51 derivatives and Falcon HTV-3, will require advanced strategies for thermal protection systems (TPS) and methods of structural integration. The goal in designing TPS for these types of high performance applications is to establish multi-mission reusable systems with reduced weight and increased performance that possess multifunctionality, e ...

ABSTRACT: Tech-X Corporation in partnership with the University of Washington will develop a commercial tool for modeling multi-fluid and single fluid plasmas including the ability to model problems using unstructured grids. An oracle will be developed to inform the user of the validity of plasma models in the regime of a given simulation. Algorithms developed at the University of Washington (i ...

ABSTRACT: The proposed Phase I efforts seek to develop a dual-mode Hybrid ChemicalElectric Propulsion thruster concept design based on the extensive microwave torch/arcjet experience of PSU and Hall and ion experience of EDA. The primary focus of the Phase I effort will be demonstrate the operation of an ionic liquid microwave thruster in the high-T/P regime and the basic operation of a Hall and ...