CELSS nutrition system utilizing snails

At the 40th IAF Congress in Malaga, a nutrition system for a lunar base CELSS was presented. A lunar base with a total of eight crew members was envisaged. In this paper, four species of plants--rice, soybean, lettuce and strawberry--were introduced to the system. These plants were sufficient to satisfy fundamental nutritional needs of the crew members. The supply of nutrition from plants and the human nutritional requirements could almost be balanced. Our study revealed that the necessary plant cultivation area per crew member would be nearly 40 m3 in the lunar base. The sources of nutrition considered in the study were energy, sugar, fat, amino acids, inorganic salt and vitamins; however, calcium, vitamin B2, vitamin A and sodium were found to be lacking. Therefore, a subsystem to supply these elements is of considerable value. In this paper, we report on a study for breeding snails and utilizing meat as food. Nutrients supplied from snails are shown to compensate for the above mentioned lacking elements. We evaluate the snail breeder and the associated food supply system as a subsystem of closed ecological life support system.     

Leg venous hemodynamics and leg volumes during a 42 day -6 degrees head-down bedrest

Seven healthy subjects were submitted to a 42-day head down bedrest, where leg venous compliance (venous distensibity index VDI) and leg volumes were assessed by mercury strain gauge plethysmography with venous occlusion and optoelectronic plethysmography, respectively. Plethysmographic and volometric measurements were made, before, during (at days 1, 4, 7, 14, 21, 26, 34 and 41), and after bedrest (days 1, 4, 7, 11 and 30 of the recovery period). Results showed a continuous decrease in leg volumes throughout bedrest, when VDI increased until day 26 of bedrest, and then decreased afterwards. The recovery period was characterized by a rapid return of VDI to prebedrest levels while leg volumes progressively normalised. These results showed that leg venous compliance changes are not always dependant upon skeletal muscle changes, and that factors other than size of muscle compartment are able to determine increases in leg venous compliance during long-term bedrest.     

Spatial orientation during locomotion [correction of locomation] following space flight

To investigate changes in spatial orientation ability and walking performance following space flight, 7 astronaut subjects were asked pre- and post-flight to perform a goal directed locomotion paradigm which consisted of walking a triangular path with and without vision. This new paradigm, involving inputs from different sensory systems, allows quantification of several critical parameters, like orientation performance, walking velocities and postural stability, in a natural walking task. The paper presented here mainly focusses on spatial orientation performance quantified by the errors in walking the previously seen path without vision. Errors in length and reaching the corners did not change significantly from pre- to post-flight, while absolute angular errors slightly increased post-flight. The significant decrease in walking velocity and a change in head-trunk coordination while walking around the corners of the path observed post-flight may suggest that during re-adaptation to gravity the mechanisms which are necessary to perform the task have to be re-accomplished.     

Influence of graviceptives cues at different level of visual information processing: the effect of prolonged weightlessness

We evaluated the influence of prolonged weightlessness on the performance of visual tasks in the course of the Russian-French missions ANTARES, Post-ANTARES and ALTAIR aboard the MIR station. Eight cosmonauts were subjects in two experiments executed pre-flight, in-flight and post-flight sessions.

In the first experiment, cosmonauts performed a task of symmetry detection in 2-D polygons. The results indicate that this detection is locked in a head retinal reference frame rather than in an environmentally defined one as meridional orientations of symmetry axis (vertical and horizontal) elicited faster response times than oblique ones. However, in weightlessness the saliency of a retinally vertical axis of symmetry is no longer significantly different from an horizontal axis. In the second experiment, cosmonauts performed a mental rotation task in which they judged whether two 3-D objects presented in different orientations were identical. Performance on this task is basically identical in weightlessness and normal gravity.     

Lower body negative pressure (LBNP) as a countermeasure for long term spaceflight

The article presents the current status of lower body negative pressure (LBNP) as a countermeasure for preventing orthostatic intolerance after space flight or bed rest. Devices discussed include the Chibis vacuum suit, the Anthrorack device, a collapsible device, and an inflatable device. Two bed rest studies examined the effect of LBNP and exercise on orthostatic tolerance; plasma volume; vasopressin, plasma renin activity, and catecholamines; and side effects.     

高水平的MD-95驾驶舱

麦道公司将用6个一排的平板显示器来提高其MD-95运输机标准驾驶舱的技术水平,以便提高其调度可靠性、降低维修费用及减少航空公司所需的备件。新系统基于霍尼韦尔公司的通用综合航空电子系统(VIA2000)结构,将把显示、飞行管理、中央声音告警和飞行数据采集功能综合在一对VIA计算机中。     

气固紊流剪切流中颗粒弥散的拉格朗日模拟

本文提出了一种对于气固两相紊流剪切流中圆形固体颗粒弥散的拉格朗日拟计算方法，其中考虑了颗粒间的磁撞对流体相和颗料相的影响，应用该方法对一气固紊流剪切流场进行了模拟计算，并对有、无颗粒间磁撞情况下的模拟计算结果与Lavieville用大涡模拟方法的研究结果进行了比较，并进行了讨论。     

实用计算机流体力学在外挂物分离方面的应用—状态报告

文章叙述了实用计算流体力学在外挂物分离方面的应用。内容包括：1．评估轨迹所使用的计算流体力学和轨迹综合方法；2．生成计算网格的方法和所需资源；3．评估挂架载荷和在计算的轨迹上的外挂物的位置和姿态、以及离机距离与时间的关系；4．评估计算流体动力学过程所使用的参数，包括收敛速率、人工－小时和网格生成所需时间、所使用的计算机资源和对复制结果所需的人员技能。     

中国飞机维修业职业培训

众所周知,中国的航空运输业正呈现飞速发展之势.中国民用航空总局(CAAC)给出的数据显示,今后5年中国的航空公司将引进650架飞机.今后20年,为满足不断扩张的机队对维修服务的需求,以及承接越来越多来自其他国家的飞机维修和大修业务,如客改货项目,整个民航业将需要至少24万名受过专业培训的维修人员,而现实是目前拥有的有飞机维修资质的人员离需求相去甚远,维修人员的严重短缺将对维修人员的培训提出严峻挑战.     

发动机故障诊断技术的拓展应用

由发动机监控和诊断系统衍生的技术,在未来可为航空公司节省大量的资金。现在,一些发动机制造商和独立的维修供应商已将此技术应用到发动机辅助动力装置,并扩展到更广的范围。例如,美国西南航空公司最近选择SmartSignal公司监控其波音737-700的CFM56-7发动机,原因之一是除发动机以外,该公司有望能提供飞机的状态管理,如监控辅助动力装置(APU)、飞行控制或其他能采集电子数据的系统。SmartSignal公司称,已对波音777的环境控制系统、波音757和新一代737的APU进行监控试验。该公司所开展的试验是针对常规情况的,而不仅仅是针对西南航空公…