Neural controllers for systems with unknown dynamics

This study presents a methodology for specifying a neural controller for a system about which no a priori model information is available. The neural design presumes that a finite duration input/output (I/O) histogram on the system is available. The design procedure extracts from the histogram sufficient information to specify the neural feedback controller. The resultant controller will drive the system along a general output reference profile (unknown during the design). The resultant controller also exhibits the capability of disturbance rejection and the capacity to stabilize unstable plants     

Chemical Composition of Rocks and Soils at the Pathfinder Site

As Viking Landers did not measure rock compositions, Pathfinder (PF) data are the first in this respect. This review gives no proof yet whether the PF rocks are igneous or sedimentary, but for petrogenetic reasons they could be igneous. We suggest a model in which Mars is covered by about 50% basaltic and 50% andesitic igneous rocks. The soils are a mixture of the two with addition of Mg-sulfate and -chloride plus iron compounds possibly derived from the hematite deposits.     

The Time-of-Flight Energy,Angle, Mass Spectrograph (Teams) Experiment for Fast

The Time-of-flight Energy Angle Mass Spectrograph (TEAMS) is being flown on the FAST Small Explorer mission to measure the 3-dimensional distribution function of the major ion species present in the lower magnetosphere. The instrument is similar to time-of-flight plasma analyzer systems that have been designed and planned for flight as CODIF (COmposition and DIstribution Function analyzer) on the four European Space Agency Cluster-II spacecraft and, as ESIC (Equator-S Ion Composition instrument) on Equator-S. This instrument allows the 3-dimensional distribution functions of individual ion species to be determined within spin period (2.5 s). Two-dimensional distributions are measured in 80 ms. These capabilities are crucial for the study of selective energization processes in the auroral regions of the magnetosphere. The design, operational characteristics, and test and calibration results for this instrument are presented. The sensor consists of a toroidal top-hat electrostatic analyzer with instantaneous acceptance of ions over 360° in polar angle. After post-acceleration of the incoming ions by up to 25 kV, a time-of-flight mass spectrograph discriminates the individual species. It has been demonstrated through calibration that the instrument can easily separate H⁺, He²⁺, He⁺, O⁺ and, for energies after post-acceleration of > 20 keV, even O₂ ⁺ molecules. On-board mass discrimination and the internal accumulation of several distinct data quantities combined with the spacecraft's flexible telemetry formatting allow for instrument data rates from 7.8 kb s^–1 to 315 kb s^–1 to be telemetered to ground through the FAST centralized Instrument Data Processor.     

Ring Currents and Internal Plasma Sources

The discovery of terrestrial O⁺ and other heavy ions in magnetospheric hot plasmas, combined with the association of energetic ionospheric outflows with geomagnetic activity, led to the conclusion that increasing geomagnetic activity is responsible for filling the magnetosphere with ionospheric plasma. Recently it has been discovered that a major source of ionospheric heavy ion plasma outflow is responsive to the earliest impact of coronal mass ejecta upon the dayside ionosphere. Thus a large increase in ionospheric outflows begins promptly during the initial phase of geomagnetic storms, and is already present during the main phase development of such storms. We hypothesize that enhancement of the internal source of plasma actually supports the transition from substorm enhancements of aurora to storm-time ring current development in the inner magnetosphere. Other planets known to have ring current-like plasmas also have substantial internal sources of plasma, notably Jupiter and Saturn. One planet having a small magnetosphere, but very little internal source of plasma, is Mercury. Observations suggest that Mercury has substorms, but are ambiguous with regard to the possibility of magnetic storms of the planet. The Messenger mission to Mercury should provide an interesting test of our hypothesis. Mercury should support at most a modest ring current if its internal plasma source is as small as is currently believed. If substantiated, this hypothesis would support a general conclusion that the magnetospheric inflationary response is a characteristic of magnetospheres with substantial internal plasma sources. We quantitatively define this hypothesis and pose it as a problem in comparative magnetospheres.     

Estimation techniques for GMSK using linear detectors in satellite communications

This paper describes data-aided signal level and noise variance estimators for Gaussian minimum shift keying (GMSK) when the observations are limited to the output of a filter matched to the first pulse-amplitude modulation (PAM) pulse in the equivalent PAM representation. The estimators are based on the maximum likelihood (ML) principle and assume burst-mode transmission with known timing and a block of L₀ known bits. While it is well known that ML estimators are asymptotically unbiased and efficient, the analysis quantifies the rate at which the estimators approach these asymptotic properties. It is shown that the carrier phase, amplitude, and noise variance estimators are unbiased and can achieve their corresponding Cramer-Rao bounds with modest combinations of signal-to-noise ratio and observation length. The estimates are used to estimate the signal-to-noise ratio. It is shown that the mean squared error performance of the ratio increases with signal-to-noise ratio while the mean squared error performance of the ratio in decibels decreases with signal-to-noise ratio. Simulation results are provided to confirm the accuracy of the analytic results.     

An approach to knowledge-aided covariance estimation

This paper introduces a parametric covariance estimation scheme for use with space-time adaptive processing (STAP) methods operating in heterogeneous clutter environments. The approach blends both a priori knowledge and data observations within a parameterized model to capture instantaneous characteristics of the cell under test (CUT) and reduce covariance errors leading to detection performance loss. We justify this method using both measured and synthetic data. Performance potential for the specific operating conditions examined herein include: 1) averaged behavior within roughly 2 dB of the optimal filter, 2) 1 dB improvement in exceedance characteristic relative to the optimal filter, highlighting improved instantaneous capability, and 3) impervious ness to corruptive target-like signals in the secondary data (no additional signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINK) loss, compared with 10 dB or greater loss for the standard STAP implementation), with corresponding detections comparable to the optimal filter case     

Longitudinal variation of the equatorial ionosphere: Modeling and experimental results

We describe a new version of the Parameterized Regional Ionospheric Model (PARIM) which has been modified to include the longitudinal dependences. This model has been reconstructed using multidimensional Fourier series. To validate PARIM results, the South America maps of critical frequencies for the E (foE) and F (foF2) regions were compared with the values calculated by Sheffield Plasmasphere-Ionosphere Model (SUPIM) and IRI representations. PARIM presents very good results, the general characteristics of both regions, mainly the presence of the equatorial ionization anomaly, were well reproduced for equinoctial conditions of solar minimum and maximum. The values of foF2 and hmF2 recorded over Jicamarca (12°S; 77°W; dip lat. 1°N; mag. declination 0.3°) and sites of the conjugate point equatorial experiment (COPEX) campaign Boa Vista (2.8°N; 60.7°W; dip lat. 11.4°; mag. declination −13.1°), Cachimbo (9.5°S; 54.8°W; dip lat. −1.8°; mag. declination −15.5°), and Campo Grande (20.4°S; 54.6°W; dip lat. −11.1°; mag. declination −14.0°) have been used in this work. foF2 calculated by PARIM show good agreement with the observations, except during morning over Boa Vista and midnight-morning over Campo Grande. Some discrepancies were also found for the F-region peak height (hmF2) near the geomagnetic equator during times of F₃ layer occurrences. IRI has underestimated both foF2 and hmF2 over equatorial and low latitude sectors during evening-nighttimes, except for Jicamarca where foF2 values were overestimated.     

Vertical motions in Thailand after the 2004 Sumatra–Andaman Earthquake from GPS observations and its geophysical modelling

Following previous findings from ongoing GPS research in Thailand since 2004 we continue to exploit the GPS technique to monitor and model land motions induced by the Sumatra–Andaman Earthquake. Our latest results show that up to the end of 2010, Thailand has been co-seismically displaced and is subsequently undergoing a post-seismic horizontal deformation with total displacements (co-seismic plus post-seismic) ranging from 10.5 to 74.7 cm. We observed the largest horizontal displacements in the southern part of Thailand and moderate and small displacements in the central and northern parts. In addition to horizontal displacements throughout Thailand, continuous GPS measurements show that large parts of Thailand are subsiding at rates up to 1 cm/yr. It is the first time that such vertical post-seismic deformations at large distances (650–1500 km away from the Earthquake’s epicentre) have been recorded. We have investigated the physical processes leading to the observed subsidence. While after-slip on the subduction interface induces negligible or even slightly positive vertical motions, relaxation in the asthenosphere is associated with a sizable subsidence. Predictions from a 3D finite element model feature an asthenosphere with an effective viscosity of the order of 3 * 10¹⁸ Pas, fit the horizontal post-seismic data and the observed subsidence well. This model is then used to predict the subsidence over the whole seismic cycle. The subsidence should go on with a diminishing rate through the next two decades and its final magnitude should not exceed 10 cm in the Bangkok area.     

The effect of geocenter motion on Jason-2 orbits and the mean sea level

We compute a series of Jason-2 GPS and SLR/DORIS-based orbits using ITRF2005 and the std0905 standards ( Lemoine et al., 2010). Our GPS and SLR/DORIS orbit data sets span a period of 2 years from cycle 3 (July 2008) to cycle 74 (July 2010). We extract the Jason-2 orbit frame translational parameters per cycle by the means of a Helmert transformation between a set of reference orbits and a set of test orbits. We compare the annual terms of these time-series to the annual terms of two different geocenter motion models where biases and trends have been removed. Subsequently, we include the annual terms of the modeled geocenter motion as a degree-1 loading displacement correction to the GPS and SLR/DORIS tracking network of the POD process. Although the annual geocenter motion correction would reflect a stationary signal in time, under ideal conditions, the whole geocenter motion is a non-stationary process that includes secular trends. Our results suggest that our GSFC Jason-2 GPS-based orbits are closely tied to the center of mass (CM) of the Earth consistent with our current force modeling, whereas GSFC’s SLR/DORIS-based orbits are tied to the origin of ITRF2005, which is the center of figure (CF) for sub-secular scales. We quantify the GPS and SLR/DORIS orbit centering and how this impacts the orbit radial error over the globe, which is assimilated into mean sea level (MSL) error, from the omission of the annual term of the geocenter correction. We find that for the SLR/DORIS std0905 orbits, currently used by the oceanographic community, only the negligence of the annual term of the geocenter motion correction results in a – 4.67 ± 3.40 mm error in the Z-component of the orbit frame which creates 1.06 ± 2.66 mm of systematic error in the MSL estimates, mainly due to the uneven distribution of the oceans between the North and South hemisphere.