Award Data

The objective of this proposal is to integrate three unique energy harvesting technologies utilizing our existing research strengths that will be of interest and utility to NASA applications and environmental conditions. By developing multiple technologies, NASA will be able to harvest energy from multiple waste energy sources, namely environmental vibrations, thermal energy, and solar flux. These ...

Launch vehicles experience extreme acoustic loads during liftoff driven by the interaction of rocket plumes and plume-generated acoustic waves with ground structures. Currently employed predictive capabilities are too dissipative to accurately resolve the propagation of waves throughout the launch environment. Higher fidelity non-dissipative analysis tools are critically needed to design mitigatio ...

Systima in collaboration with University of Washington is developing a high performance injection system for advanced green monopropellant AF-M315E micropropulsion systems (0.1 – 1.0 N) for small- and micro-satellites and cubesats (100 kg-500 kg and

Advances in structured heterogeneity together with nanomaterials tailoring has made it possible to create thermoelectrics using high temperature, polymer composites. While such thermoelectrics do not have the capability to approach the efficiency of top performing ceramic modules such as BiTe, they do provide two unique aspects of use in energy scavenging: the ability to conform to irregular large ...

The liberation of particles induced by rocket plume flow from spacecraft landing on unprepared regolith of the Moon, Mars, and other destinations poses high mission risks for robotic and human exploration activities. This process occurs in a combination of "extreme environments" that combine low gravity, little or no atmosphere, rocket exhaust gas flow that is supersonic and partially rarefied, an ...

Legacy refractory materials that have origins dating to the original Saturn program are commonly used in current launch facilities. Although they fail to meet the target requirements, they are the only approved material. Our research team has demonstrated a baseline system during the Phase I effort that combines a non-cement binder, a high temperature macro aggregate, and reactive nano aggregates ...

Passive microwave sensors aboard satellites provide valuable information regarding weather conditions by measuring atmospheric attenuation over a broad range of frequencies from 0-200 GHz. Additional ground-based sensors are desirable to provide complementary upward looking measurements that can be used to refine existing attenuation models. Operating over such a large bandwidth, however, places ...

The overall technical objective of this multi-phase project is to develop and validate a so-called 'AAW-Process' that consists of (i) the Active Aeroelastic Wing (AAW) technology of employing multiple control surfaces in tandem for achieving loads alleviation and drag minimization using the over-determined trim capability of ZONA Euler Unsteady Solver (ZEUS), and (ii) the aeroelastic tailoring tec ...

The proposed innovation is a low-cost, retrievable and reusable, autonomously guided dropsonde capable of deploying from a host aircraft and performing in-situ atmospheric measurements. We have decided to name this platform the NavSonde−an autonomously navigable sonde-glider. The proposed effort focuses on the engineering work involved with the retrieval of high altitude volcanic ash plume samp ...

The goal of the proposed effort is to use selective laser melting (SLM, an additive manufacturing technique) to manufacture a hot fire-capable, water-cooled spool piece that features an advanced regenerative cooling technique that combines high heat flux performance with low pressure drop. SLM enables us to "print" the spool piece in days, despite the complexity of the regenerative liner's inheren ...