Award Data

The proposed innovation is the replacement of existing test stand and parking lot fixtures with current SSL LED technology. The replacement fixtures will reduce energy consumption, generate less heat and provide maintenance free operation for over 50,000 hours. An explosion-proof fixture is capable of containing an internal combustion event without allowing flames or hot gasses to escape to the s ...

Future long-duration, crewed space habitat systems will be inflatable structures. This type of structure is advantageous in that it is not limited to the diameter of the launch vehicle and can therefore provide a greater volume of living and work space. Unlike conventional metal structures, however, softbody inflatables require support members to maintain their desired shapes. Despite their robust ...

Inflatable pressurized habitats are envisioned as a practical way to build shelters much larger than landing craft for astronauts and their scientific operations on Mars, the moon and elsewhere. These habitats maintain their inflated shape via high-strength Vectran webbing. The piezoresistive extensometers developed through this STTR program can be directly integrated into or onto Vectran webbing ...

Launch safety and efficiency requires timely and accurate wind, thermodynamic and pressure information from the surface to 20 km height, and lightning risk identification. A Doppler radar now provides wind measurements that satisfy this requirement at the Eastern Test Range. Thermodynamic soundings are provided by intermittent radiosondes on launch day. Typical intervals of an hour or more between ...

The proposed solution exploits recent advances in computer vision to conceive of a single-camera + gyro + accelerometer vision-based navigation solution such that the processing will be lightweight (requiring only a single optical flow sample per frame). Known landmarks (natural or artificial) will have absolute positions known to planetary exploration worker robots. The worker robot can identif ...

The tiltwing class of aircraft consists of vehicles with the ability to rotate the wing and propulsion system as a unit a full 90 degrees from the standard fixed wing configuration to one in which the wing and thrust axis become perpendicular to the body axis. This thrust vectoring capability allows the aircraft to utilize thrust borne flight for vertical takeoff and landing as well as the convent ...

The objective of this proposal is to develop 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 d ...

This proposal offers to provide NASA with an automatic mesh generator for the simulation of aerodynamic flows using Reynolds-Averages Navier-Stokes (RANS) models. The tools will be capable of generating high-quality, highly-stretched (anisotropic) grids in boundary layer regions and transition smoothly to inviscid flow regions even in an adaptive context. The objective of the work is to offer a un ...

This NASA sponsored STTR project will investigate methods for close-out of large, liquid rocket engine, nickel or stainless steel nozzle, coolant channels utilizing robotic laser and pulsed-arc additive manufacturing (AM)methods. Structural jacket to coolant channel land area interface strength will be quantified and metallurgical characterization completed. Process optimizations will be conducte ...

Small and micro-spacecrafts require the efficient, micro-propulsion systems. Chemical micro-propulsion is best suited for use as primary thrust, orbital insertion and attitude control because of its high energy density. When grouped into arrays for larger thrust applications, micro-propulsion devices provide high propulsive flexibility or can be used as igniters. The proposed effort will focus ...