AC/DC converter topologies for the Space Station

A new class of AC/DC converter topologies (Type-1 converters) is described, suitable for use in an advanced single-phase sine-wave voltage, high-frequency power distribution system, of the type that was proposed for a 20 kHz Space Station primary electrical power distribution system. The converter comprises a transformer, a resonant network, a current controller, a diode rectifier, and an output filter. The input AC voltage source is converted into a sinusoidal current source using the resonant network. The output of this current source is rectified by the diode rectifier and is controlled by the current controller. The controlled rectified current is then filtered by the output filter to obtain a constant voltage across the load. Three distinct converter topologies, Type-1A, Type-1B, and Type 1-C, are described, and their performance characteristics are presented. All three types have a close-to-unity rated power factor (greater than 0.98), low total harmonic distortion in input current (less than 5%), and high conversion efficiency (greater than 96%)     

The Galileo Dust Detector

The Galileo Dust Detector is intended to provide direct observations of dust grains with masses between 10^-19 and 10^-9 kg in interplanetary space and in the Jovian system, to investigate their physical and dynamical properties as functions of the distances to the Sun, to Jupiter and to its satellites, to study its interaction with the Galilean satellites and the Jovian magnetosphere. Surface phenomena of the satellites (like albedo variations), which might be effects of meteoroid impacts will be compared with the dust environment. Electric charges of particulate matter in the magnetosphere and its consequences will be studied; e.g., the effects of the magnetic field on the trajectories of dust particles and fragmentation of particles due to electrostatic disruption. The investigation is performed with an instrument that measures the mass, speed, flight direction and electric charge of individual dust particles. It is a multicoincidence detector with a mass sensitivity 10⁶ times higher than that of previous in-situ experiments which measured dust in the outer solar system. The instrument weighs 4.2 kg, consumes 2.4 W, and has a normal data transmission rate of 24 bits s^-1 in nominal spacecraft tracking mode. On December 29, 1989 the instrument was switched-on. After the instrument had been configured to flight conditions cruise science data collection started immediately. In the period to May 18, 1990 at least 168 dust impacts have been recorded. For 81 of these dust grains masses and impact speeds have been determined. First flux values are given.     

Stochastic Dynamic System Suboptimal Control with Uncertain Parameters

The control of a linear system with random coefficients is studied here. The cost function is of a quadratic form and the random coefficients are assumed to be partially observable by the controller. By means of the stochastic Bellman equation, the optimal control of stochastic dynamic models with partially observable coefficients is derived. The optimal control is shown to be a linear function of the observable states and a nonlinear function of random parameters. The theory is applied to an optimal control design of an aircraft landing in wind gust.     

On-Line Computer for Transient Turbine Cascade Instrumentation

A 32-channel computer based data acquisition and processing system em has been developed for use with the new type of transient cascade facility at Oxford. This is used for testing turbine blades and nozzle guide vanes at full-scale engine Reynolds and Mach numbers ers with correct wallto-flow temperature ratios. A novel technique for processing transient heat transfer data from thin film surface resistance thermometers has been developed. Measurements of surface ace pressure around blades, and of the upstream turbulence level have been made. The cascade and instrumentation are shown to have advantages both in cost and effectiveness over continuous running cascades.     

9. The venus ionosphere and solar wind interaction

The current state of knowledge of the chemistry, dynamics and energetics of the upper atmosphere and ionosphere of Venus is reviewed together with the nature of the solar wind-Venus interaction. Because of the weak, though perhaps not negligible, intrinsic magnetic field of Venus, the mutual effects between these regions are probably strong and unique in the solar system. The ability of the Pioneer Venus Bus and Orbiter experiments to provide the required data to answer the questions outstanding is discussed in detail.     

Nitrogen Isotopes on the Moon: Archives of the Solar and Planetary Contributions to the Inner Solar System

Space Science Reviews - The two isotopes of nitrogen, 14N and 15N, have relative abundances extremely variable among solar system reservoirs such as planets and their atmospheres, primitive and...     

Medium PRF radar PRF selection using evolutionary algorithms

Evolutionary algorithms are applied to the optimization of pulse repetition frequency (PRF), for both eight-and nine PRFs, in medium PRF radar while considering the detailed effects of sidelobe clutter and many other technical factors. The algorithm presented also ensures that all the solutions produced are fully decodable and have no blind velocities. The evolutionary algorithm was able to identify near-optimum PRF sets for a realistic radar system with only a modest computational effort.     

Observational Manifestation of Chaos in the Gaseous Disk of the Grand Design Spiral Galaxy NGC 3631

The main goal of the paper is to demonstrate the presence of chaotic trajectories in the gaseous disk of a real spiral galaxy. As an example we have chosen NGC 3631. First, we show the stationarity of the 3-D velocity field restored from the observed line-of-sight velocity field of the gaseous disk. That allows to analyse behaviour of the trajectories of the fluid particles (gas clouds) in the disk, calculating the corresponding observed streamlines. We estimate the Lyapunov characteristic numbers using their independence of the metrics and show the existence of chaotic trajectories outside the vortices which are present in the velocity field, and in the vicinity of the saddle point. Related spectra of the stretching numbers for some trajectories are also calculated.     

Receiver operating characteristics for the coherent UWB randomnoise radar

An ultrawideband (UWB) random-noise radar operating in the 1-2 GHz frequency band has been developed and held-tested at a 200 m range at the University of Nebraska. A unique heterodyne correlation technique based on a delayed transmitted waveform using a photonic delay line has been used to inject coherence within this system. The performance of this radar, assuming a point target, has been investigated from a statistical point of view by developing the theoretical basis for the system's receiver operating characteristics (ROC). Explicit analytical expressions for the joint probability density function (pdf) of the in-phase (I) and quadrature (Q) components of the receiver output have been derived under the assumption that the input signals are partially correlated Gaussian processes. The pdf and the complementary cumulative distribution function (cdf) for the envelope of the receiver output are also derived. These expressions are used to relate the probability of detection (P_d) to the probability of false alarm (P_f ) for different numbers of integrated samples, and the results are analyzed     

Optimum gain control for A/D conversion using digitized I/Q data inquadrature sampling

Calculation of optimum gain for minimum distortion due to A/D (analog-to-digital) conversion requires the estimation of the input signal strength. To use a common AGC (automatic gain control) for both the I/Q (in-phase and quadrature) signals, it is efficient to estimate the input signal strength using the quantized A/D output from both channels. Assuming a Gaussian input, the relationship between σ of the input of the A/D converter and E(|x|+|y|) and E(max(|x|,|y|)+1/2 min (|x|,|y|)) for t quantized I/Q output x and y is derived. Numerical results obtained using the derived expression and the statistical data obtained through simulation show excellent agreement. It is concluded that, because of its simplicity, the cubic equation obtained by fitting the numerical results should be useful