Award Data

The gas sensor in the PLSS of the ISS EMU will meet its projected life in 2020, and NASA is planning to replace it. At present, only high TRL devices based on infrared absorption are candidate replacements, because of their proven long-term stability, despite their size and power consumption and failures in the presence of liquid water. No current compact sensor has the tolerance for liquid water ...

Future human extraterrestrial missions will require export and landing of countless payloads on the lunar and Martian surfaces. Such a quantity and rate of payload delivery will require cost-effective and rapid manufacturing of many large Thermal Protection Systems (TPS). IOS proposes to develop a modular system for in-situ bonding and curing of thermoset resin to the spacecraft structure to facil ...

HJ ScienceTechnology (HJST) and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) propose a highly integrated, programmable, and miniaturized microfluidic automation platform capable of running rapid and complex synthetic biology and bioengineering processes for engineering life supporting microbes in space exploration missions. Our approach combines the microfluidic automation technology of HJST with ...

Solar cells are the critical power source for the majority of space missions. The advancement from single junction silicon cells to current, state-of-the-art, triple junction, germanium cells enabled greater mission power per weight, stowed volume and deployed area. Near-term, advanced solar cell technologies will range from 4 to 6 junctions, and include a variety of band gaps.Solar cell testing ...

A spacecraft thermal control system must keep the vehicle, avionics and atmosphere (if crewed) within a defined temperature range. Since water is non-toxic and good for heat transport, it is typically used as the coolant that circulates within the crew cabin boundary. This loop then interfaces with another low freeze point fluid, such as ammonia, for transport of heat to a radiator where the tempe ...

Fly-by-feel uses distributed sensing of forces along the lifting surfaces of an aircraft. Whether such measurements are made via hot films, pressure sensors, or strain gauges, all can provide distributed force information that must be intelligently fused and utilized to achieve performance goals. Fly-by-feel will be used to achieve robust disturbance rejection, mass property augmentation, and aero ...

Technology currently used for terrestrial navigation is extremely limited in the challenging environments on icy moons and ocean worlds such as Europa. Autonomous platforms used to collect data from beneath these ice and ocean surfaces cannot depend on access to satellite or any other electromagnetic communication. Autonomous systems in these environments are required to perform highly-complex tas ...

During the proposed Phase II research and development effort, the project team will complete the integration of previously demonstrated technologies into an upper stage propulsion system for a Small Launch Vehicle (SLV).nbsp; The resulting stage will meet launch vehicle requirements for Mass Fraction and Specific Impulse. The Phase II project will result in the hot-fire qualification of a flight-w ...

Opterus proposes to develop braided thin ply composite tapes. The tapes will be braided from ultra-thin spread-tow unidirectional carbon and glass ribbons and will enable a new source and form factor for thin-ply textiles. The resulting tapes will be especially useful for thin high strain composite space deployable structures where they will allow bias plies in long parts without requiring seams. ...

Here we propose developing a spectrometer where the light is separated and channelized by an photonic integrated circuit (PIC) and is then detected by an energy-resolving superconducting detector. nbsp;nbsp;Thenbsp; instrument would be a radical new type of high resolution spectrograph applicable for both multi-object and integral field unit (IFU) nbsp;spectroscopy and other fiber-fed light applic ...