Portfolios of promise: A review of R&D investment techniques and how they apply to technology development in space agencies

Despite a rich legacy of impressive technological accomplishments, the government acquisition of advanced space systems is increasingly synonymous with schedule slips and cost overruns. Program reviews have suggested that investing more in centralized and strategic research and development outside particular programs will reduce technical uncertainties and improve cost and schedule outcomes. This paper suggests roles for a centralized technology office by examining the methods available in the literature for managing portfolios of research projects.     

Applications of tuned mass dampers to improve performance of large space mirrors

In order for future imaging spacecraft to meet higher resolution imaging capability, it will be necessary to build large space telescopes with primary mirror diameters that range from 10 m to 20 m and do so with nanometer surface accuracy. Due to launch vehicle mass and volume constraints, these mirrors have to be deployable and lightweight, such as segmented mirrors using active optics to correct mirror surfaces with closed loop control. As a part of this work, system identification tests revealed that dynamic disturbances inherent in a laboratory environment are significant enough to degrade the optical performance of the telescope. Research was performed at the Naval Postgraduate School to identify the vibration modes most affecting the optical performance and evaluate different techniques to increase damping of those modes. Based on this work, tuned mass dampers (TMDs) were selected because of their simplicity in implementation and effectiveness in targeting specific modes. The selected damping mechanism was an eddy current damper where the damping and frequency of the damper could be easily changed. System identification of segments was performed to derive TMD specifications. Several configurations of the damper were evaluated, including the number and placement of TMDs, damping constant, and targeted structural modes. The final configuration consisted of two dampers located at the edge of each segment and resulted in 80% reduction in vibrations. The WFE for the system without dampers was 1.5 waves, with one TMD the WFE was 0.9 waves, and with two TMDs the WFE was 0.25 waves. This paper provides details of some of the work done in this area and includes theoretical predictions for optimum damping which were experimentally verified on a large aperture segmented system.     

Effects of uncertainties and flexible dynamic contributions on the control of a spacecraft full-coupled model

One of the most important problems for performing a good design of the spacecraft attitude control law is connected to its robustness when some uncertainty parameters are present on the inertial and/or on the elastic characteristics of a satellite. These uncertainties are generally intrinsic on the modeling of complex structures and in the case of large flexible structures they can be also attributed to secondary effects associated to the elasticity. One of the most interesting issues in modeling large flexible space structures is associated to the evaluation of the inertia tensor which in general depends not only on the geometric ‘fixed’ characteristic of the satellite but also on its elastic displacements which of course in turn modify the ‘shape’ of the satellite. Usually these terms can be considered of a second order of magnitude if compared with the ones associated to the rigid part of a structure. However the increasing demand on the dimension of satellites due to the presence for instance of very large solar arrays (necessary to generate power) and/or large antennas has the necessity to investigate their effects on their global dynamic behavior in more details as a consequence. In the present paper a methodology based on classical Lagrangian approach coupled with a standard Finite Element tool has been used to derive the full dynamic equations of an orbiting flexible satellite under the actions of gravity, gravity gradient forces and attitude control. A particular attention has been paid to the study of the effects of flexibility on the inertial terms of the spacecraft which, as well known, influence its attitude dynamic behavior. Furthermore the effects of the attitude control authority and its robustness to the uncertainties on inertial and elastic parameters has been investigated and discussed.     

Observations of non-migrating tides and ionospheric perturbations of O(D) airglow by ISUAL instrument

In this paper, we present the spatial variations of O(¹D) airglow observed by the ISUAL (Imager of Sprites and Upper Atmospheric Lightning) instrument on board the FORMOSAT-2 satellite. With a CCD camera and a 630 nm filter, ISUAL can measure global atmospheric emissions lying between the heights of 80 and 300 km. In days of 3–6 September 2008 and 25–27 February 2009, ISUAL has measured the emissions of O(¹D) airglow with results showing strong longitudinal peak-3 and peak-4 structures. The Lomb-Scargle analyses for these two cases show periods of longitudes of 120° and 90° supporting the DE2 and DE3 non-migrating tides. The 630 nm emissions are enhanced in equatorial regions and are lying along the equator. Over Africa its intensity can sometimes increase up to 80% relative to other longitudes. The perturbation is so strong that non-migrating tides are erased. A case of bimodal distribution with strong emissions at latitudes in equator and mid-latitude in geographic coordinates was observed.     

Alternative transfer to the Earth–Moon Lagrangian points L4 and L5 using lunar gravity assist

Lagrangian points L4 and L5 lie at 60° ahead of and behind the Moon in its orbit with respect to the Earth. Each one of them is a third point of an equilateral triangle with the base of the line defined by those two bodies. These Lagrangian points are stable for the Earth–Moon mass ratio. As so, these Lagrangian points represent remarkable positions to host astronomical observatories or space stations. However, this same distance characteristic may be a challenge for periodic servicing mission. This paper studies elliptic trajectories from an Earth circular parking orbit to reach the Moon’s sphere of influence and apply a swing-by maneuver in order to re-direct the path of a spacecraft to a vicinity of the Lagrangian points L4 and L5. Once the geocentric transfer orbit and the initial impulsive thrust have been determined, the goal is to establish the angle at which the geocentric trajectory crosses the lunar sphere of influence in such a way that when the spacecraft leaves the Moon’s gravitational field, its trajectory and velocity with respect to the Earth change in order to the spacecraft arrives at L4 and L5. In this work, the planar Circular Restricted Three Body Problem approximation is used and in order to avoid solving a two boundary problem, the patched-conic approximation is considered.     

基于纹理的活动轮廓三维图像分割研究

对具高噪声和低对比度三维图像的识别和分割算法进行了研究。基于活动轮廓模型,用Gabor变换提取图像的纹理特征,根据统计学信息假设,通过偏微分方程水平集和窄带方法求解,获得较基本活动轮廓的算法分割更光滑精确的物体轮廓。实验结果表明:改进模型算法的效率和准确度达到预期效果。     

3D雷达对3D雷达的引导提示性能分析

分析了不同位置关系3D雷达对3D雷达的成功引导概率及引导误差,讨论了成功引导概率随参数特征变化的性质,仿真分析目标到提示雷达不同斜距时目标在被提示雷达中的角度分布及引导误差变化。研究对雷达组网中3D雷达对3D雷达引导提示系统设计有一定的参考价值。     

3D-Cf / Mg 复合材料的热残余应力研究

采用随动硬化有限元模型,研究了三维碳纤维增强镁基复合材料(3D-Cf/Mg)基体热残余应力的大小、分布以及不同工艺处理对热残余应力的影响。同时,对复合材料进行了高、低温处理,利用XRD定性分析了处理前后复合材料基体热残余应力的变化。计算结果表明:经过-196℃低温处理后,复合材料基体的平均Mises热残余应力由169.06 MPa减小至55.29 MPa;高温处理后,基体平均热残余应力几乎不变。该结果与实验结果吻合,证明了低温处理能明显降低复合材料基体的热残余应力。     

机身上壁板复合材料蒙皮数字化成型工艺

为解决树脂基复合材料复杂结构件工艺难以实现问题,采用三维工艺模型设计、铺层工艺仿真、铺层样片排版与数控下料、激光投影铺层定位等数字化技术,不但从根本上改变了传统的复合材料构件生产方式,解决了工艺技术难题,而且在缩短研制周期、提高产品质量,降低研制成本等方面都取得了显著的应用效果。