Tag: Ames Research Center

NASA Ames Astrogram – March/April 2024

NeRD

Astrogram banner Advanced Composite Solar Sail System Successfully Launches On April 23, the Advanced Composite Solar Sail System CubeSat mission launched successfully aboard an Electron rocket launched by Rocket Lab and carried Ames’ payload from Māhia, New Zealand. The CubeSat was subsequently delivered to a Sun-synchronous orbit around Earth. Ames has pioneered the use of CubeSats and small satellites to run innovative, cost-effective missions and test technologies in space, providing leadership in cost-effective spaceflight missions for NASA. An artist’s concept of NASA’s Advanced Composite Solar Sail System spacecraft in orbit. NrediASA/Aero…

Read More

NASA Invites Media to Learn About New Tech Mission Powered by the Sun

NeRD

A new NASA mission is testing a new way to navigate our solar system by hoisting its sail into space – not to catch the wind, but the propulsive power of sunlight. NASA’s Advanced Composite Solar Sail System is led by the agency’s Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley. The microwave oven-sized CubeSat is scheduled to launch aboard a Rocket Lab Electron rocket from the company’s Launch Complex 1 on the Mahia Peninsula of New Zealand. The launch window opens at 3 p.m. PDT on Tuesday, April 23 (10 p.m. UTC). Successful deployment and operation…

Read More

NASA, FAA Partner to Develop New Wildland Fire Technologies 

NeRD

Artist’s rendering of remotely piloted aircraft providing fire suppression, monitoring and communications capabilities during a wildland fire. NASA NASA and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) have established a research transition team to guide the development of wildland fire technology.  Wildland fires are occurring more frequently and at a larger scale than in past decades, according to the U.S. Forest Service. Emergency responders will need a broader set of technologies to prevent, monitor, and fight these growing fires more effectively. Under this Wildland Fire Airspace Operations research transition team, NASA and…

Read More

NASA Noise Prediction Tool Supports Users in Air Taxi Industry

NeRD

1 min read Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater) The results from a NASA software tool called OVERFLOW, used to model the flow of air around aircraft, are shown in this image. NASA Several air taxi companies are using a NASA-developed computer software tool to predict aircraft noise and aerodynamic performance. This tool allows manufacturers working in fields related to NASA’s Advanced Air Mobility mission to see early in the aircraft development process how design elements like propellors or wings would perform. This saves the industry time and…

Read More

Luxembourg Leaders Focus on Lunar Exploration at Visit to NASA Ames

NeRD

Using the Lunar Lab and Regolith Testbeds at NASA’s Ames Research Center, a team created this simulated lunar environment to study lighting conditions experienced at the unexplored poles of the Moon.  NASA/Uland Wong The challenges of working on the surface of the Moon are at the center of a facility at NASA’s Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley. The Lunar Lab and Regolith Testbeds help scientists and engineers – from NASA and industry alike – study how well science instruments, robots, and people might be able to safely work,…

Read More

Into the Belly of the Rover: VIPER’s Final Science Instrument Installed 

NeRD

A team of engineers prepares to integrate TRIDENT – short for The Regolith Ice Drill for Exploring New Terrain – into the belly of NASA’s first robotic Moon rover, VIPER – short for the Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover. NASA/Bill Stafford A team of engineers prepares to integrate TRIDENT – short for The Regolith Ice Drill for Exploring New Terrain – into the belly of NASA’s first robotic Moon rover, VIPER (Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover).  TRIDENT, designed and developed by engineers at Honeybee Robotics in Altadena, California, is the fourth and…

Read More

BioNutrients: A Five-Year Experiment in Space Nears Completion

NeRD

Research scientists Sandra Vu, left, Natalie Ball, center, and Hiromi Kagawa, right, process BioNutrients production packs. NASA/Brandon Torres NASA’s bio-manufacturing experiment called BioNutrients is testing a way to use microorganisms to produce on-demand nutrients that will be critical for human health during future long-duration space missions. Launched to the International Space Station in 2019, the experiment assesses the stability and performance of a hand-held system – dubbed a production pack – to manufacture fresh vitamins and other nutrients in space over a five-year span. About once a year, scientists at NASA’s Ames…

Read More

NASA Awards Contract for Aviation, Railroad Safety Reporting Systems

NeRD

NASA NASA has awarded a contract to Booz Allen Hamilton Inc. of McLean, Virginia, for the maintenance and operation of incident reporting programs and continuing development to improve current and future reporting systems. The Aviation Safety Reporting System and Related Systems award is a cost-plus-fixed-fee indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract managed by the Human Systems Integration Division at NASA’s Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley. The contract will support NASA’s Aviation Safety Reporting System and the agency’s Confidential Close Call Reporting System (C3RS). The award for continuation of work includes a 60-day…

Read More

NASA, Lockheed Martin Reveal X-59 Quiet Supersonic Aircraft

NeRD

NASA’s X-59 quiet supersonic research aircraft sits on the apron outside Lockheed Martin’s Skunk Works facility at dawn in Palmdale, California. The X-59 is the centerpiece of NASA’s Quesst mission, which seeks to address one of the primary challenges to supersonic flight over land by making sonic booms quieter. Lockheed Martin Skunk Works NASA and Lockheed Martin formally debuted the agency’s X-59 quiet supersonic aircraft Friday. Using this one-of-a-kind experimental airplane, NASA aims to gather data that could revolutionize air travel, paving the way for a new generation of commercial…

Read More