NASA Quiet Sonic Boom Research Effort Ends With a Whisper

NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center recently completed NASA’s latest quiet sonic boom research study at Edwards Air Force Base.

The Waveforms and Sonic boom Perception and Response, or WSPR, project gathered data from a select group of more than 100 volunteer Edwards Air Force Base residents on their individual attitudes toward sonic booms produced by aircraft in supersonic flight over Edwards.

NASA and industry are studying technology that will reduce the noise and annoyance associated with sonic booms to the point where aircraft flying over populated areas at supersonic speeds do not disturb the peace, and aviation and governmental authorities may consider lifting prohibitions. But before the current restrictions on supersonic flight over land can be changed, much research is needed to understand how individuals and communities react to low-noise sonic booms.

WSPR's primary purpose is to develop data collection methods and test protocols for future public perception studies in communities that do not usually experience sonic booms. The base's unique flight-test airspace puts Edwards residents in a position to experience loud booms regularly, so their reactions to low-noise booms will be a valuable guide for future work in sonic boom perception and response.

"Understanding the study participants' responses to sonic booms is very important to NASA," said Larry Cliatt, Dryden’s principal investigator for the research effort. “We’re pleased with their participation.”

Participants used a standard questionnaire to provide information every time they heard any sonic boom while at home. In keeping with the "there's an app for that" age, some participants responded using smart phones with apps supplied by the WSPR project. Other study participants used a web-based application, and some used paper forms.

For the supersonic flight portion of the research that occurred between Nov. 4 and Nov. 18, NASA F/A-18 aircraft flew specific flight profiles to generate booms, while NASA researchers monitored the flights, noting precise times and actual boom intensities recorded by ground instruments installed in the Edwards' base housing areas. Dryden conducted 22 flights during the test period, yielding 82 quiet sonic booms and five of normal intensity. The softest WSPR project boom was recorded at .08 pounds per square foot (psf) overpressure, while the loudest registered well within the normal range at 1.4 psf.

NASA Dryden takes great care to ensure that loud sonic booms do not impact residential communities, using preflight weather balloons and sonic boom analysis before every sonic boom research flight.

Dryden's partners in the WSPR effort include NASA’s Langley Research Center, Wyle Laboratories, Gulfstream Aerospace Corp., Fidell Associates Inc., Pennsylvania State University and Tetra Tech. The cooperation of Edwards Air Force Base personnel was crucial to the study’s success.

For more information visit http://www.nasa.gov/centers/dryden/Features/WSPR_research_complete.html

How Communication Influences SEO

Search Engine Optimization is one process that influences the position of a website in the search engines and the ideas we use to get it done is kept fresh with necessary updation. Every single SEO strategy is just a part but, when you try concentration on one and let go others, it means that you are missing the bigger picture.

We keep stressing on a few factors like quality content or latent semantic indexing for getting a website optimized properly and the ultimate aim behind it is to communicate well with the visitors or the potential customers. When you have a website with quality expert grade content and related products that interests the visitors, it means that you website is all set to be ranked pretty well.

Communication is one simple idea that is being followed by us for ages but, we still have problems in making effective communication. The main problem lies in encoding an idea or a message in a format that is easily understood by the other person.

As internet acts as the most influential intermediate between people these days we are in a position to use it as a platform to efficiently communicate to prospective customers. We know that search engines are not our intended receivers but we are supposed to satisfy this intermediary so that our message can reach the target. Search engines are frequently being rationalized so that they become more capable of decoding the meaning of our web pages and at the same time decode the search queries of the users so that they can play their role effectively by giving appropriate search results.

Here, our job as a communicator is to make sure that we keep our web pages easy for Search Engines to understand as well as user friendly. If we are capable of sending the right format of message that is clear-cut for the search Engines to grab, it means that you have done your job. Sounds easy, right? Anyway, hope you don’t miss to deal with the final part of this communication problem… Search Engines are not our final receivers and you will have to put necessary efforts to make people click on to your page, and make business with you.

Now, what is the use of being in the first few ranks and don’t communicate well with your visitors? You don’t get what you want- The business! When you are successful with the first part, you are half way there. Only when your website is presentable and looks like it has got stuff in it, you are through with the final part.  Your job as a webmaster is to provide enough support content about your product or process so that your customers feel it’s worth buying from you when there are thousands of providers out there. When you want business, you will have to build confidence in your customers about what you sell.

Getting feedbacks and keeping in touch will help you a lot in building your business whilst pulling it to the next level. When you get a sale it means you are successful about communicating with one person but, what about the others who had visited your page and had not made business with you.  This ring a bell saying that your way of communication has a few hitches and the best way to prevail over this is to follow the feedback method.

When you feel that your website is well equipped with what customers need and the one thing that you are missing is an effective communication with the search engines, you should get it done by the professionals. Search Engine Genie (SEG) is one qualified professional firm that you can rely for expert Search Engine optimization, promotion, marketing and ranking solutions.

Ready to Launch! A New Website Sharing Space Station Benefits For Humanity

When the International Space Station was first imagined, the idea was to create an unprecedented research platform to support microgravity investigations for the benefit of all humankind. That goal is now a reality, and researchers have not waited for completion to begin working on studies to build on our knowledge of science and technology in space. Because of this, we can already see some amazing breakthroughs.

So just what has the space station yielded to humankind? You can discover the benefits for yourself, thanks to another international collaborative effort. Working together, the station partners launched the International Space Station Benefits for Humanity website on March 1. This site enables readers to look at the global progress resulting from the knowledge and technologies of the orbiting laboratory.

Camille Alleyne, International Space Station assistant program scientist with NASA, explains the goals behind this new effort. "The website is a great resource for the general public and other stakeholders," Alleyne said. "It communicates the value of the International Space Station as a unique scientific and educational platform that enables discoveries that benefit all humanity."

The site will be featured on all of the partner agency websites, in both English and the applicable native languages. This includes the Canadian Space Agency, or CSA; the European Space Agency, or ESA; the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, or JAXA; the Russian Federal Space Agency, or Roscosmos; and NASA. The stories contributed were the work of writers from around the world, representing each of the agencies whose collaboration took the station from conception to reality.

"Working with the partners on this initiative was truly an extraordinary experience," Alleyne said. "This effort is a continued demonstration of the unprecedented achievement in international cooperation, which is one of the great values of the International Space Station."

Prompted by the International Space Station Multilateral Control Board, the site will feature stories that raise awareness to the station benefits already making a difference in our world. These accounts will be updated as additional accomplishments come to light and vary in topic from education to technology to telemedicine advancements.

"Users will find stories about station research that benefits humankind in the areas of human health, Earth observations and global education," Alleyne said. "Vaccine development research, station-generated images that assist in disaster relief and farming and educational projects that inspire future scientists, engineers and space explorers are some examples of research benefits. The resulting knowledge of these benefits will be extended to more countries and people for the betterment of humanity. They will be used to improve the quality of people's lives globally."

The site focuses primarily on findings that are making their way into general use here on Earth. For instance, doctors are already operating with space station robotics technology when they employ the neuroArm to perform delicate surgical procedures. There are also products with the potential for worldwide impact that are on the horizon, such as vaccines to inoculate against salmonella and even advanced delivery methods of microencapsulation for cancer treatments. These are just some of the developments derived from the work done aboard the space station highlighted as part of this humanitarian website.

As many efforts provide valuable conceptual and scientific data, however, researchers will continue to build upon the ever-growing body of space and microgravity knowledge. For results from specific investigations performed on the space station, readers can also visit NASA’s International Space Station Program Science Results Web page.

For more information visit http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/news/humanities_website.html

Space Station Team takes on 'EPIC' occasion

Expedition 30 Flight Engineer Don Pettit, operational in singing group with the International Space Station team in Houston’s Mission Control Center, inspects hardware as he install a set of Enhanced Processor and Integrated Communications (EPIC) processor cards in one of seven primary computers aboard. Anyone who has ever been concerned in a computer improve knows that they can be complex, and that you have to take your time, be cautious, and go step-by-step if you want to be winning.

That’s precisely what the journey 30 crew and International Space Station team in Mission Control are responsibility as they fit a set of Enhanced Processor and Integrated Communications (EPIC) computer cards in the seven main computers on the station.

EPIC is the shorthand name the team is using to explain this improve of the main processor cards. The seven computers, which are officially called Multiplexer/Demultiplexers, are second-hand for Guidance, Navigation, & Control; Command and Control; and Payload, or experiment, control. The innovative cards have faster processors, more memory, and an Ethernet connection for data output. Astronauts use laptop computers to control station systems from side to side these main computer.

Europe's automatic move Vehicle is incorporated on Ariane 5

The third European Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) for open by Arianespace was installing atop its Ariane 5 at the Spaceport, mark one of the final steps in arrangements for a March 9 liftoff on a service mission to the International Space Station.

Named after Italian physicist Edoardo Amaldi, the ATV will take dry cargo (including food, clothing, experiments and spare parts), along with water, gas and propellant for delivery to the crewed orbital ability.

This latest ATV flight in support of International Space Station operations will utilize an Ariane 5 ES version of Arianespace's heavy-lift workhorse, underscoring the launcher's suppleness in meeting a full range of mission requirements. The launch of ATV Edoardo Amaldi follows Arianespace missions with Europe's first two Automated Transfer Vehicles, perform in February 2011 and March 2008 from the Spaceport in French Guiana.

An industry consortium led by Astrium produces the ATVs in a program manage by the European Space Agency.

Mars Science Laboratory Mission rank account

Engineers have established the root reason of a computer rearrange that occur two months ago on NASA's Mars Science Laboratory and have strong-minded how to right it.

The fix involves altering how certain vacant data-holding locations, called registers, are configured in the memory management of the kind of computer chip used on the spacecraft. Billions of run on a test computer with the personalized register pattern yielded no repeat of the reset behavior. The assignment team made this software change on the spacecraft's PC last week and long-established this week that the update is winning.

Three days after launch, during use of the craft's star scanner. The cause has been recognized as a previously unknown design peculiarity in the memory organization unit of the Mars Science Laboratory computer processor. In rare set of situation unique to how this mission uses the processor, cache access errors could occur, resulting in instructions not being executed properly. This is what happen on the spacecraft.

"Good police officer work on thoughtful why the rearrange occurred has yielded a way to avert it from occurring again," said Mars Science Laboratory Deputy Project Manager Richard Cook of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. "The winning resolution of this difficulty was the ending of productive teamwork by engineers at the computer producer and JPL."

Vega rocket prepared for first flight

 The primary Vega launch campaigns begin in November with the fitting of the P80 first stage on the launch pad. The two solid-propellant second and third stages were additional to the vehicle; follow by the AVUM – Attitude & Vernier Upper component – liquid-propellant fourth stage.  

All four stages have undergone concluding acceptance, counting the difficult of the avionics, leadership, telemetry, propulsion, division pyrotechnics and safety systems.

These steps culminate on 13 January with Vega’s ‘mixture control checks’, where all systems were put into launch mode for the vehicle’s final acceptance. This included pressurising the AVUM propulsion systems that actuate the thruster valves.

The rocket’s elements were switch on from the manage bench to replicate the launch countdown. The onboard software then took in excess of and replicated the diverse stages of a flight. The interface between the vehicle and the control bench were also tested.

NASA's James Webb Space Telescope: A time of accomplishment and achievement

Manufacturing and difficult of all flight mirrors was finished in a final test at the X-ray and Calibration Facility at Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Ala. through these tests mirror segment were chilled to temperature similar to those Webb will see in space, around minus 400 degrees Fahrenheit.

It was the conclusion of work started in 2003. Heed lessons learned from the Hubble Space Telescope, the program adopted the plan of tackling the most difficult technical challenges first. That decision proved to be the right one. In June, all 18 flight main mirror segment, plus the secondary, tertiary and fine steering mirrors, were refined and coated soft beautiful surfaces that will enable Webb to image the most far-away galaxies.

Two of Webb's behind and leader structures were also completed. To assemble the flight telescope on the ground, a 139,000 pound structure will install the flight mirrors using an below track system supporting a robotic arm. The huge display place has been completed and assembled in the ultra-clean room used for telescope assembly at Goddard.

Also over was the pathfinder backplane, a full-scale engineering model of the middle section of the flight backplane. The backplane holds the mirror segment in place to form a single primary mirror. The full pathfinder constituent will consist of 12 of the 18 hexagonal cells (the center section of the primary mirror) of the telescope and contain a subset of two primary mirror segment assemblies, the secondary mirror, and the subsystem contain the tertiary and fine direction-finding mirrors. It will show integration and test actions that will be used on the flight reduce in size.

Webb's giant sunshield moved onward into a new testing phase last year, the last step before fabrication of the flight sunshield. Sunshield layer three became the first of five full-size flight-like layers stretched out in a fully replicated flight pattern. This enables engineers to make 3-D shape capacity that will tell them how the full-size sunshield layers will behave in space. Implementation this test is a critical step in the sunshield's progress and gives the engineers confidence and experience needed to manufacture the five flight layers.

An important sunshield use flight structure also completed fabrication in 2011. The space-qualified graphite composite tubes that will enable the sunshield to deploy in space have finished fabrication. The telescoping tube system was intended at Astro Aerospace, a industry unit of Northrop Grumman.

Capping the year's achievement, Webb's spacecraft also moved onward. The force system's 16 monopropellant rocket engine thrusters, which manage momentum and station-keeping on orbit, were upgraded to accept senior heat loading from the sunshield. Propulsion engineers also completed building four flight secondary combustion increased thrusters which maintain orbit after the launch vehicle finishes its burns. Engineers also established the flight software accountable for ground commands and science data liberation.

Successor to the Hubble Space Telescope, the James Webb Space Telescope is the world's next-generation space observatory. It is the most influential space telescope ever built. Webb will observe the most remote objects in the universe, provide images of the very first galaxies ever formed and study planets around distant stars. The Webb reduce in dimension is a joint project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Canadian Space Agency.