NASA Langley Keeping an Eye on Shuttle During Hubble Mission

Researchers at NASA's Langley Research Center have an added stake in this month's space shuttle mission. Not only are they part of the impact assessment and aerothermodynamic heating teams, one group will be watching Atlantis' return to earth, literally.

Space shuttle Atlantis' STS-125 crew is scheduled to launch Monday afternoon, May 11, and return May 22. It's rocketing to the Hubble Space Telescope to refurbish Hubble with state-of-the-art science instruments. After the astronauts' visit, the telescope's capabilities will be expanded and its lifetime extended through at least 2014.

To reach Hubble, Atlantis will fly in an orbit that has a slightly higher risk of orbital debris strike than usual. That's of great interest to NASA Langley researchers, who participate on damage assessment and impact dynamics teams during shuttle missions. Those teams identify and evaluate if there's any risk to the shuttle if the orbiter's fragile tiles get hit from debris.

Another group from Langley is keeping an eye specifically on the heat of the shuttle's re-entry into earth's atmosphere. They're working to improve computer models and designs for future spacecraft and they're using the space shuttle as a flying testbed.

"The Hypersonic Thermodynamic Infrared Measurements team is interested in capturing a thermal image of the shuttle," says aerospace engineer and principal investigator Tom Horvath in the Aerothermodynamics Branch at Langley. "We plan to have a Navy aircraft fly below the shuttle during re-entry so that systems on board can remotely monitor and record heating to the shuttle's lower surface using a long-range infrared camera."

The US Navy NP-3D Orion aircraft and the long-range infrared optical system are called "Cast Glance" and are operated by the NAVAIR Weapons Division, Pt. Mugu, Calif. The team says it's quite a challenge to focus on an object flying 15 times the speed of a bullet from an airplane in flight. They do a lot of intricate pre-mission planning.

"You only have one shot. It's not like you can ask them to go around again and give us another try at it and so that's why the planning is so important," said Steve Tack, Cast Glance flight operations lead. "It's a really exciting time... that 30-40 seconds when the shuttle is just screaming past us at Mach 15 and we're making a really hard turn to maintain tracking on it."

The NP-3D Orion, which can stay aloft for about 11 hours, stays over international waters until it's time for the shuttle to re-enter. At closest approach, the aircraft and its crew will be approximately 25-40 miles from the shuttle. Because the orbiter is banking on descent the plane will not be directly under it. Mission planners say the aircraft location and flight maneuvers proposed for the observation have been carefully planned to ensure safety to the orbiter and the respective crews.

A team from NASA Langley will be in mission control during re-entry to make recommendations to the flight crew regarding adjustments to the camera settings and aircraft position for optimal viewing. The data will be recorded and downloaded post-mission once the P-3 Orion returns back to its base of operations.

Cast Glance has a proven track record of acquiring high quality data during previous Space Shuttle missions, Langley officials say. The crew of the Cast Glance aircraft successfully captured imagery of the orbiter during re-entry during three previous missions. After STS-119, in March, the team managed to shoot almost nine minutes of Discovery on descent.

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NASA Plans Test of 'Electronic Nose' on International Space Station

NASA astronauts on space shuttle Endeavour's STS-126 mission will install an instrument on the International Space Station that can "smell" dangerous chemicals in the air. Designed to help protect crew members' health and safety, the experimental "ENose" will monitor the space station's environment for harmful chemicals such as ammonia, mercury, methanol and formaldehyde.

The ENose fills the long-standing gap between onboard alarms and complex analytical instruments. Air-quality problems have occurred before on the International Space Station, space shuttle and Russian Space Station Mir. In most cases, the chemicals were identified only after the crew had been exposed to them, if at all. The ENose, which will run continuously and autonomously, is the first instrument on the station that will detect and quantify chemical leaks or spills as they happen.

"The ENose is a 'first-responder' that will alert crew members of possible contaminants in the air and also analyze and quantify targeted changes in the cabin environment," says Margaret Ryan, principal investigator of the ENose project at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, or JPL, in Pasadena, Calif. JPL built and manages the device.

Station crew members will unpack the ENose on Dec. 9 to begin the instrument's six-month demonstration in the crew cabin. If the experiment is successful, the ENose might be used in future space missions as part of an automated system to monitor and control astronauts' in-space environments.

"This ENose is a very capable instrument that will increase crew awareness of the state of their air quality," says Carl Walz, an astronaut and director of NASA's Advanced Capabilities Division, part of the Exploration System Mission Directorate, which funds the ENose. "Having experienced an air-quality issue during my Expedition 4 mission on the space station, I wish I had the information that this ENose will provide future crews. This technology demonstration will provide important information for environmental control and life-support system designers for the future lunar outpost."

Specifically, the shoebox-sized ENose contains an array of 32 sensors that can identify and quantify several organic and inorganic chemicals, including organic solvents and marker chemicals that signal the start of electrical fires. The ENose sensors are polymer films that change their electrical conductivity in response to different chemicals. The pattern of the sensor array's response depends on the particular chemical types present in the air.

The instrument can analyze volatile aerosols and vapors, help monitor cleanup of chemical spills or leaks, and enable more intensive chemical analysis by collecting raw data and streaming it to a computer at JPL's ENose laboratory. The instrument has a wide range of chemical sensitivity, from fractional parts per million to 10,000 parts per million. For all of its capabilities, the ENose weighs less than nine pounds and requires only 20 watts of power.

The ENose is now in its third generation. The first ENose was tested during a six-day demonstration on the STS-95 shuttle mission in 1998. That prototype could detect 10 compounds, but could not analyze data immediately. The second-generation ENose could detect, identify and quantify 21 different chemicals. It was extensively ground-tested. The third-generation ENose includes data-analysis software to identify and quantify the release of chemicals within 40 minutes of detection. While it will look for 10 chemical types in this six-month experiment, the new ENose can be trained to detect many others.

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Astronaut Chooses Quincy Jones' 1969 Recording as Wake-Up Music

When the Space Shuttle Atlantis launches from Cape Canaveral, Florida on Thursday, Dec. 6 on its mission to deliver the European Space Agency's Columbus laboratory to the International Space Station, Astronaut Leland Melvin will have in tow a copy of Quincy Jones' 1969 Grammy Award winning recording "Walking in Space," which he will use as his wake-up music during the mission.

Says Melvin, "Quincy Jones is someone who I have a great deal of respect and admiration for and I couldn't think of a more appropriate selection to use as my wake-up music."

Melvin's duties on the Shuttle Atlantis mission will be to support three space walks using the robotic arm and install the Columbus laboratory from Atlantis' payload bay to its permanent home on the International Space Station.

Says Jones, "I am truly honored that Mr. Melvin has chosen one of my pieces of work for this momentous occasion. I was inspired to record the 'Walking in Space' album in 1969 after Buzz Aldrin told me that he had played my arrangement of Frank Sinatra's 'Fly Me To The Moon' during his space flight to the moon, so to have it come full circle like this is quite remarkable and very humbling."

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Orion Changes Add Years To Design Phase

NASA has modified its contract with Lockheed Martin Corp. of Littleton, Colo., to design, test and build the Orion crew exploration vehicle.

The updated contract contains three significant changes, NASA says. Two years have been added to the design phase. Two test flights of Orion's launch abort system have been added. And production of a pressurized cargo carrier for the International Space Station has been deleted from the initial design phase, the space agency says.

NASA says it continues work to ensure a smooth transition from the space shuttle program to the Constellation program. This is demonstrated in a fourth element of the contract modification that provides for use of surplus raw materials, such as aluminum-lithium ingots now used in the construction of space shuttle fuel tanks, for Orion, the agency says.

"NASA and Lockheed have been working together as a team during the past six months to iron out many critical design and schedule details," says Skip Hatfield, manager the Orion Project at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston. "This contract update will synchronize our spending plan with the rest of the Constellation Program."

NASA awarded the Orion prime contract to Lockheed Martin on Aug. 31, 2006. At that time, the development portion of the contract was valued at $3.9 billion with a period of performance through December 2011. This contract modification, in the amount of $385 million, brings the totalvalue to approximately $4.3 billion and adjusts the development period of performance through December 2013, the space agency says.

This update is the result of a NASA request for engineering change proposal issued on Dec. 15, 2006. Lockheed Martin's proposal was received on March 7. The contract modification was signed April 20, says NASA.

The modification reflects continuing progress on Orion's development, including program formulation and systems assessments addressing the rocket, ground infrastructure and all other elements necessary for a successful first launch. The period of performance now matches the evolving NASA budget landscape, the agency says.

"The Orion team has made some critical decisions that will maximize theperformance and flexibility of this spacecraft," says Jeff Hanley, manager of the Constellation program at Johnson. "This spacecraft will be a cornerstone of America's human exploration of the solar system by a new generation of explorers, and these changes and additional tests will ensure that it is robust enough to accomplish its missions."

Meanwhile, work progresses as planned on the contract. NASA and Lockheed Martin have completed Orion's systems requirements review and aremoving toward a systems design review scheduled in August, NASA says.

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Data-Driven Workforce Management Needed to Ensure NASA's Institutional Health

NASA is undergoing a fundamental mission shift that will require the agency to adopt aknowledge-based, data-driven strategy to better align its workforce, according to a National Academy of Public Administration report.

NASA is working to refocus many aeronautics and scientific programs, phase-out the Space Shuttle by 2010, and develop new vehicles to go to the Moon, Mars, and beyond. This fundamental mission shift requires significant workforce changes. But, Congress has banned permanent workforce cuts at the space agency. And, NASA has sought to ensure that every field center has a place in the new programs with funding to cover existing civil servants. This has resulted in workforce misalignments.

With its heavy reliance on a multisector workforce of civil servants and contractors, NASA has an opportunity to be at the forefront of the public sector, proving that federal agencies can respond effectively to changing mission requirements, says Academy Fellow Sallyanne Harper, who chaired the panel overseeing the study. The panel has developed a package of practical tools to help NASA ensure it has the right people, in theright place, at the right time.

In its report, the panel urged NASA to realign its workforce by making maximum use of its existing human capital flexibilities and pursuing a package of new ones. It also recommended that NASA adopt a workforce management strategy to ensure a flexible, optimally sized, and appropriately skilled workforce.

Specifically, the panel called on NASA to:

• Assess field centers annually and take corrective action based on a comprehensive framework and metrics.
• Integrate acquisition and workforce planning at the highest levels of the agency.
• Use a formal decision process and metrics to determine the appropriate distribution of work between civil servants and contractors.
• Use a similar approach to determine the most appropriate type of appointment for civil service hires.
• Maximize existing authorities for recruiting and retaining the best and brightest employees, and sharing talent with other federal agencies and levels of government.
• Seek statutory and regulatory authorization for modified reduction-in-force rules, buyout changes, and limited emergency retirement reform to remedy skill imbalances.

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