Award Data

We propose to develop compact absolute wavelength references to weak molecular transitions, which is a challenge characteristic to space-based active sensing. The ASCENDS mission (Active Sensing of CO2 over Nights, Days, and Seasons) will be the first satellite-based mission employing precision laser spectroscopy for active sensing of molecules in space. Although ASCENDS will be first, it is exp ...

The technical objectives of A-DECK are:1)Flight Weight including rideshare payloads will be less than 500 Kg.2)First fundamental frequency of integrated A-DECK System including ESPA or Type C Adapter, payload(s), avionics and release mechanisms will be greater than 50 Hz.3)After initial qualification, A-DECK must not require additional EELV mission unique design or analysis.4)A-DECK delivery ICD a ...

NASA space exploration vehicles are trending to higher pulse power, energy capacity levels and cycle life in order to meet exponentially increasing performance and lifespan requirements. As the demand for on-board power and total energy-storage capacity has continued to increase, there has been an increasing trend towards the use of battery technologies with higher energy- and power-density potent ...

The development of new, robust, lightweight systems for CO2 removal during EVA is a crucial need for NASA. With current and anticipated space activities, mission times will need to be extended without increasing the size and weight of the portable life support system (PLSS). While much of the recent work on the development of new CO2 control strategies has centered on solid sorbents that can be ...

An operational optical particle counter will be built, extensively characterized and evaluated that measures the size and shape of aerosol particles with optical diameter from 0.1 to 10 μm. This instrument will distinguish different species of dust and volcanic ash from other types of aerosol particles, and provide an estimate of the aerosol optical properties and produce compositional informati ...

The Electroadhesive "Sticky Boom", an innovative method for rendezvous and docking, is proposed for the Orbiting Sample Capture (OSC) portion of the Mars Sample Return (MSR) mission. This technology carries the advantages of greatly reducing the probability of accidental colisions, high inherent reliability from mechanical and guidance simplicity, lower propellant consumption, avoidance of plume i ...

The concept of using SAR data to form 3D tomographic images has been developed over the last decade, but the enabling technology has been slow to progress. Current 3D tomographic data gathering techniques require multiple flight passes to gather data at different phase centers. The two technology advancements proposed enabling improvements in the collection of SAR data for ice-sounding and subsu ...

Instruments flown on board NASA missions often do not measure quantitiesof interest to scientists directly, but rather observable quantities. In addition,instruments often introduce artifacts into the data and techniques are needed toremove them. In both cases, scientifically relevant information can beinferred by simulating a parameterized model and adjusting the parameters tobest match observed ...

Our innovative reaction sphere (Doty pending patent application serial number 61/164,868) has the potential to provide much higher performance than a conventional reaction wheel with substantially fewer resources. Using our proposed technology, a single reaction sphere can control three axes, substantially reducing mass, power, and cost when compared to a three wheel system. This device has no bea ...

AOS has shown that it is feasible to use the combined NASA/SBIR resources from Phases I and II to:(i) Build a turn-key analyzer system that has the dual-band/differential architecture and is small, light and sensitive enough to be deployed in the smallest zone of the Global Hawk (GH);(ii) Demonstrate TRL 9 and flight readiness of the analyzer system for deployment on the GH and(iii) Validate the a ...