Award Data

Numerous advances have been made in recent years in the areas of flight deck design, aircraft modeling, resilient control, and vehicle health management. The combination of these complementary technologies promises to revolutionize aircraft systems and operations safety in the decades ahead. However, the task of safely integrating these technologies is becoming increasingly difficult as their le ...

This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) project proposes the development of a computational software package to provide NASA with advanced materials development capabilities for existing and new ablative materials used in the next generation thermal protection systems (TPS) of space vehicles. This materials development software package (MDSAM) can be used to optimize properties (high streng ...

EDA, Inc., in partnership with Penn State, has shown previously that the concept of embedding fiber optics within ablative TPS material has merit and should yield a successful implementation of a spectrometer "window" during a Phase-II development program.Optical instrumentation, such as optical spectrometers would provide benchmark data for fundamental flow, radiation, and materials modeling as w ...

While past research has demonstrated the utility and benefits to be gained with the application of advanced rotor system control concepts, none have been implemented to date on a production military or commercial rotorcraft. A key contributor to this fact is the inherent cost associated with installation and maintenance of these control systems, since many system designs require the replacement o ...

NASA has been involved in extensive research efforts to develop advanced concepts and technologies, for the Next Generation Air Transportation System (NextGen) under different Research Focus Areas (RFAs). The Airspace Super Density Operations (ASDO) RFA seeks to develop efficient terminal area operations. It is expected that multiple ASDO concepts will be interacting with one another in a complex ...

Metron Aviation, Inc. proposes to design a system to support a marketplace in which flight operators can exchange arrival slots in traffic flow management (TFM) initiatives such as airspace flow programs (AFPs) and ground delay programs (GDPs) while requiring no changes in FAA automation or procedures. The advent of AFPs in 2006 has generated many more potentially exchangeable resources that would ...

Technological innovations have enabled a wide range of aerial vehicles that can be remotely operated. Viable applications include military missions, law enforcement, border patrol, weather data collection, telecommunications, land use imaging, and cargo transport. NASA and other organizations have invested heavily in this unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) research. UAVs can be flown in the National Ai ...

Recent advances in airport surface surveillance have motivated the creation of new tools for analysis of Air Traffic Control (ATC) operations, such as the Surface Operations Data Analysis and Adaptation (SODAA) tool, which is being used by NASA to conduct airport ATC operations analysis. What is missing from ATC operations analysis, however, is accessible and reliable data regarding the clearances ...

The major components of manmade aerosols are created by the burning of coal and oil. Aerosols are recognized to significantly impact the climate through their effects on solar and terrestrial radiation. Accurate speciation and measurement of aerosol composition is an important first step in understanding and managing these pollutants. This Phase II proposal continues development of a small, port ...

The search for organics on Mars remains a key objective for future missions. However current instruments for detailed organic analysis require complex sample handling and can process only a limited number of samples. To allow for rapid sample characterization, the in situ non-destructive Raman detection technique is a highly desirable sensing tool for both qualitative and quantitative analysis. ...