Data-Driven Software Framework for Web-Based ISS Telescience

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Tso, Kam S.

2005-01-01

Software that enables authorized users to monitor and control scientific payloads aboard the International Space Station (ISS) from diverse terrestrial locations equipped with Internet connections is undergoing development. This software reflects a data-driven approach to distributed operations. A Web-based software framework leverages prior developments in Java and Extensible Markup Language (XML) to create portable code and portable data, to which one can gain access via Web-browser software on almost any common computer. Open-source software is used extensively to minimize cost; the framework also accommodates enterprise-class server software to satisfy needs for high performance and security. To accommodate the diversity of ISS experiments and users, the framework emphasizes openness and extensibility. Users can take advantage of available viewer software to create their own client programs according to their particular preferences, and can upload these programs for custom processing of data, generation of views, and planning of experiments. The same software system, possibly augmented with a subset of data and additional software tools, could be used for public outreach by enabling public users to replay telescience experiments, conduct their experiments with simulated payloads, and create their own client programs and other custom software.

Development of Advanced Verification and Validation Procedures and Tools for the Certification of Learning Systems in Aerospace Applications

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Jacklin, Stephen; Schumann, Johann; Gupta, Pramod; Richard, Michael; Guenther, Kurt; Soares, Fola

2005-01-01

Adaptive control technologies that incorporate learning algorithms have been proposed to enable automatic flight control and vehicle recovery, autonomous flight, and to maintain vehicle performance in the face of unknown, changing, or poorly defined operating environments. In order for adaptive control systems to be used in safety-critical aerospace applications, they must be proven to be highly safe and reliable. Rigorous methods for adaptive software verification and validation must be developed to ensure that control system software failures will not occur. Of central importance in this regard is the need to establish reliable methods that guarantee convergent learning, rapid convergence (learning) rate, and algorithm stability. This paper presents the major problems of adaptive control systems that use learning to improve performance. The paper then presents the major procedures and tools presently developed or currently being developed to enable the verification, validation, and ultimate certification of these adaptive control systems. These technologies include the application of automated program analysis methods, techniques to improve the learning process, analytical methods to verify stability, methods to automatically synthesize code, simulation and test methods, and tools to provide on-line software assurance.

Development of advanced fermentor control applications for use in an industrial automation environment.

PubMed

Hamilton, Ryan; Tamminana, Krishna; Boyd, John; Sasaki, Gen; Toda, Alex; Haskell, Sid; Danbe, Elizabeth

2013-04-01

We present a software platform developed by Genentech and MathWorks Consulting Group that allows arbitrary MATLAB (MATLAB is a registered trademark of The MathWorks, Inc.) functions to perform supervisory control of process equipment (in this case, fermentors) via the OLE for process control (OPC) communication protocol, under the direction of an industrial automation layer. The software features automated synchronization and deployment of server control code and has been proven to be tolerant of OPC communication interruptions. Since deployment in the spring of 2010, this software has successfully performed supervisory control of more than 700 microbial fermentations in the Genentech pilot plant and has enabled significant reductions in the time required to develop and implement novel control strategies (months reduced to days). The software is available for download at the MathWorks File Exchange Web site at http://www.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/fileexchange/36866.

Enabling Disabled Persons to Gain Access to Digital Media

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Beach, Glenn; OGrady, Ryan

2011-01-01

A report describes the first phase in an effort to enhance the NaviGaze software to enable profoundly disabled persons to operate computers. (Running on a Windows-based computer equipped with a video camera aimed at the user s head, the original NaviGaze software processes the user's head movements and eye blinks into cursor movements and mouse clicks to enable hands-free control of the computer.) To accommodate large variations in movement capabilities among disabled individuals, one of the enhancements was the addition of a graphical user interface for selection of parameters that affect the way the software interacts with the computer and tracks the user s movements. Tracking algorithms were improved to reduce sensitivity to rotations and reduce the likelihood of tracking the wrong features. Visual feedback to the user was improved to provide an indication of the state of the computer system. It was found that users can quickly learn to use the enhanced software, performing single clicks, double clicks, and drags within minutes of first use. Available programs that could increase the usability of NaviGaze were identified. One of these enables entry of text by using NaviGaze as a mouse to select keys on a virtual keyboard.

SimBOX: a scalable architecture for aggregate distributed command and control of spaceport and service constellation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Prasad, Guru; Jayaram, Sanjay; Ward, Jami; Gupta, Pankaj

2004-08-01

In this paper, Aximetric proposes a decentralized Command and Control (C2) architecture for a distributed control of a cluster of on-board health monitoring and software enabled control systems called SimBOX that will use some of the real-time infrastructure (RTI) functionality from the current military real-time simulation architecture. The uniqueness of the approach is to provide a "plug and play environment" for various system components that run at various data rates (Hz) and the ability to replicate or transfer C2 operations to various subsystems in a scalable manner. This is possible by providing a communication bus called "Distributed Shared Data Bus" and a distributed computing environment used to scale the control needs by providing a self-contained computing, data logging and control function module that can be rapidly reconfigured to perform different functions. This kind of software-enabled control is very much needed to meet the needs of future aerospace command and control functions.

SimBox: a simulation-based scalable architecture for distributed command and control of spaceport and service constellations

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Prasad, Guru; Jayaram, Sanjay; Ward, Jami; Gupta, Pankaj

2004-09-01

In this paper, Aximetric proposes a decentralized Command and Control (C2) architecture for a distributed control of a cluster of on-board health monitoring and software enabled control systems called SimBOX that will use some of the real-time infrastructure (RTI) functionality from the current military real-time simulation architecture. The uniqueness of the approach is to provide a "plug and play environment" for various system components that run at various data rates (Hz) and the ability to replicate or transfer C2 operations to various subsystems in a scalable manner. This is possible by providing a communication bus called "Distributed Shared Data Bus" and a distributed computing environment used to scale the control needs by providing a self-contained computing, data logging and control function module that can be rapidly reconfigured to perform different functions. This kind of software-enabled control is very much needed to meet the needs of future aerospace command and control functions.

Computer Software Configuration Item-Specific Flight Software Image Transfer Script Generator

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bolen, Kenny; Greenlaw, Ronald

2010-01-01

A K-shell UNIX script enables the International Space Station (ISS) Flight Control Team (FCT) operators in NASA s Mission Control Center (MCC) in Houston to transfer an entire or partial computer software configuration item (CSCI) from a flight software compact disk (CD) to the onboard Portable Computer System (PCS). The tool is designed to read the content stored on a flight software CD and generate individual CSCI transfer scripts that are capable of transferring the flight software content in a given subdirectory on the CD to the scratch directory on the PCS. The flight control team can then transfer the flight software from the PCS scratch directory to the Electronically Erasable Programmable Read Only Memory (EEPROM) of an ISS Multiplexer/ Demultiplexer (MDM) via the Indirect File Transfer capability. The individual CSCI scripts and the CSCI Specific Flight Software Image Transfer Script Generator (CFITSG), when executed a second time, will remove all components from their original execution. The tool will identify errors in the transfer process and create logs of the transferred software for the purposes of configuration management.

Ground control station software design for micro aerial vehicles

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Walendziuk, Wojciech; Oldziej, Daniel; Binczyk, Dawid Przemyslaw; Slowik, Maciej

2017-08-01

This article describes the process of designing the equipment part and the software of a ground control station used for configuring and operating micro unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV). All the works were conducted on a quadrocopter model being a commonly accessible commercial construction. This article contains a characteristics of the research object, the basics of operating the micro aerial vehicles (MAV) and presents components of the ground control station model. It also describes the communication standards for the purpose of building a model of the station. Further part of the work concerns the software of the product - the GIMSO application (Generally Interactive Station for Mobile Objects), which enables the user to manage the actions and communication and control processes from the UAV. The process of creating the software and the field tests of a station model are also presented in the article.

A loosely coupled framework for terminology controlled distributed EHR search for patient cohort identification in clinical research.

PubMed

Zhao, Lei; Lim Choi Keung, Sarah N; Taweel, Adel; Tyler, Edward; Ogunsina, Ire; Rossiter, James; Delaney, Brendan C; Peterson, Kevin A; Hobbs, F D Richard; Arvanitis, Theodoros N

2012-01-01

Heterogeneous data models and coding schemes for electronic health records present challenges for automated search across distributed data sources. This paper describes a loosely coupled software framework based on the terminology controlled approach to enable the interoperation between the search interface and heterogeneous data sources. Software components interoperate via common terminology service and abstract criteria model so as to promote component reuse and incremental system evolution.

A New Look at NASA: Strategic Research In Information Technology

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Alfano, David; Tu, Eugene (Technical Monitor)

2002-01-01

This viewgraph presentation provides information on research undertaken by NASA to facilitate the development of information technologies. Specific ideas covered here include: 1) Bio/nano technologies: biomolecular and nanoscale systems and tools for assembly and computing; 2) Evolvable hardware: autonomous self-improving, self-repairing hardware and software for survivable space systems in extreme environments; 3) High Confidence Software Technologies: formal methods, high-assurance software design, and program synthesis; 4) Intelligent Controls and Diagnostics: Next generation machine learning, adaptive control, and health management technologies; 5) Revolutionary computing: New computational models to increase capability and robustness to enable future NASA space missions.

Security System Software

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

1993-01-01

C Language Integration Production System (CLIPS), a NASA-developed expert systems program, has enabled a security systems manufacturer to design a new generation of hardware. C.CURESystem 1 Plus, manufactured by Software House, is a software based system that is used with a variety of access control hardware at installations around the world. Users can manage large amounts of information, solve unique security problems and control entry and time scheduling. CLIPS acts as an information management tool when accessed by C.CURESystem 1 Plus. It asks questions about the hardware and when given the answer, recommends possible quick solutions by non-expert persons.

A Flexible Evolvable Architecture for Constellation Mission Systems User Applications

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Trimble, Jay P.; Crocker, Alan R.

2008-01-01

While simulating a complex set of repair tasks to be performed by EVA crewmembers on an upcoming mission, flight controllers and astronauts determine that the repair will take much longer than originally anticipated. All equipment in the vicinity of the worksite must be powered off to maintain a safe environment for the astronauts. Because heater power will be unavailable, several critical components will now be at risk of freezing and permanent damage. If an impending thermal violation is detected, Mission Control will have very limited time to react. Therefore, flight controllers must not only modify their procedures to account for these risks, they must also incorporate into their displays outputs from thermal models, alternate temperature measurements, new alarm limits, and emergency power-on commands to enable the detection and response to freezing conditions. Current software for mission control systems makes scenarios like this difficult to address. Given the time frame for modifying software, operations teams are left with labor-intensive operational workarounds as their only options. NASA Ames Research Center (ARC) and NASA Johnson Space Center (JSC) are collaborating on the development of a flexible software system for mission operations that will enable greater user flexibility than has been available to date. Using composable software, end users in the scenario described above could recompose procedures and command and control displays to allow flight controllers to monitor temperature measurements, identify time-critical conditions, and execute the procedures required to respond to these conditions before flight hardware is permanently damaged.

Generalizing the extensibility of a dynamic geometry software

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Herceg, Đorđe; Radaković, Davorka; Herceg, Dejana

2012-09-01

Plug-and-play visual components in a Dynamic Geometry Software (DGS) enable development of visually attractive, rich and highly interactive dynamic drawings. We are developing SLGeometry, a DGS that contains a custom programming language, a computer algebra system (CAS engine) and a graphics subsystem. The basic extensibility framework on SLGeometry supports dynamic addition of new functions from attribute annotated classes that implement runtime metadata registration in code. We present a general plug-in framework for dynamic importing of arbitrary Silverlight user interface (UI) controls into SLGeometry at runtime. The CAS engine maintains a metadata storage that describes each imported visual component and enables two-way communication between the expressions stored in the engine and the UI controls on the screen.

CyPhyTown

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

A series of software programs that enables students to progress from completely unsecured control of devices to control that protects network commands with authentication, integrity and confidentiality. The working example provided is for turning LED lights on and off on a Raspberry Pi computer.

Programming Language Software For Graphics Applications

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Beckman, Brian C.

1993-01-01

New approach reduces repetitive development of features common to different applications. High-level programming language and interactive environment with access to graphical hardware and software created by adding graphical commands and other constructs to standardized, general-purpose programming language, "Scheme". Designed for use in developing other software incorporating interactive computer-graphics capabilities into application programs. Provides alternative to programming entire applications in C or FORTRAN, specifically ameliorating design and implementation of complex control and data structures typifying applications with interactive graphics. Enables experimental programming and rapid development of prototype software, and yields high-level programs serving as executable versions of software-design documentation.

Solving Equations of Multibody Dynamics

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Jain, Abhinandan; Lim, Christopher

2007-01-01

Darts++ is a computer program for solving the equations of motion of a multibody system or of a multibody model of a dynamic system. It is intended especially for use in dynamical simulations performed in designing and analyzing, and developing software for the control of, complex mechanical systems. Darts++ is based on the Spatial-Operator- Algebra formulation for multibody dynamics. This software reads a description of a multibody system from a model data file, then constructs and implements an efficient algorithm that solves the dynamical equations of the system. The efficiency and, hence, the computational speed is sufficient to make Darts++ suitable for use in realtime closed-loop simulations. Darts++ features an object-oriented software architecture that enables reconfiguration of system topology at run time; in contrast, in related prior software, system topology is fixed during initialization. Darts++ provides an interface to scripting languages, including Tcl and Python, that enable the user to configure and interact with simulation objects at run time.

BioNet Digital Communications Framework

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Gifford, Kevin; Kuzminsky, Sebastian; Williams, Shea

2010-01-01

BioNet v2 is a peer-to-peer middleware that enables digital communication devices to talk to each other. It provides a software development framework, standardized application, network-transparent device integration services, a flexible messaging model, and network communications for distributed applications. BioNet is an implementation of the Constellation Program Command, Control, Communications and Information (C3I) Interoperability specification, given in CxP 70022-01. The system architecture provides the necessary infrastructure for the integration of heterogeneous wired and wireless sensing and control devices into a unified data system with a standardized application interface, providing plug-and-play operation for hardware and software systems. BioNet v2 features a naming schema for mobility and coarse-grained localization information, data normalization within a network-transparent device driver framework, enabling of network communications to non-IP devices, and fine-grained application control of data subscription band width usage. BioNet directly integrates Disruption Tolerant Networking (DTN) as a communications technology, enabling networked communications with assets that are only intermittently connected including orbiting relay satellites and planetary rover vehicles.

Software for Automated Testing of Mission-Control Displays

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

OHagan, Brian

2004-01-01

MCC Display Cert Tool is a set of software tools for automated testing of computerterminal displays in spacecraft mission-control centers, including those of the space shuttle and the International Space Station. This software makes it possible to perform tests that are more thorough, take less time, and are less likely to lead to erroneous results, relative to tests performed manually. This software enables comparison of two sets of displays to report command and telemetry differences, generates test scripts for verifying telemetry and commands, and generates a documentary record containing display information, including version and corrective-maintenance data. At the time of reporting the information for this article, work was continuing to add a capability for validation of display parameters against a reconfiguration file.

ROS Hexapod

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Davis, Kirsch; Bankieris, Derek

2016-01-01

As an intern project for NASA Johnson Space Center (JSC), my job was to familiarize myself and operate a Robotics Operating System (ROS). The project outcome converted existing software assets into ROS using nodes, enabling a robotic Hexapod to communicate to be functional and controlled by an existing PlayStation 3 (PS3) controller. Existing control algorithms and current libraries have no ROS capabilities within the Hexapod C++ source code when the internship started, but that has changed throughout my internship. Conversion of C++ codes to ROS enabled existing code to be compatible with ROS, and is now controlled using an existing PS3 controller. Furthermore, my job description was to design ROS messages and script programs that enabled assets to participate in the ROS ecosystem by subscribing and publishing messages. Software programming source code is written in directories using C++. Testing of software assets included compiling code within the Linux environment using a terminal. The terminal ran the code from a directory. Several problems occurred while compiling code and the code would not compile. So modifying code to where C++ can read the source code were made. Once the code was compiled and ran, the code was uploaded to Hexapod and then controlled by a PS3 controller. The project outcome has the Hexapod fully functional and compatible with ROS and operates using the PlayStation 3 controller. In addition, an open source software (IDE) Arduino board will be integrated into the ecosystem with designing circuitry on a breadboard to add additional behavior with push buttons, potentiometers and other simple elements in the electrical circuitry. Other projects with the Arduino will be a GPS module, digital clock that will run off 22 satellites to show accurate real time using a GPS signal and an internal patch antenna to communicate with satellites. In addition, this internship experience has led me to pursue myself to learn coding more efficiently and effectively to write, subscribe and publish my own source code in different programming languages. With some familiarity with software programming, it will enhance my skills in the electrical engineering field. In contrast, my experience here at JSC with the Simulation and Graphics Branch (ER7) has led me to take my coding skill to be more proficient to increase my knowledge in software programming, and also enhancing my skills in ROS. This knowledge will be taken back to my university to implement coding in a school project that will use source coding and ROS to work on the PR2 robot which is controlled by ROS software. My skills learned here will be used to integrate messages to subscribe and publish ROS messages to a PR2 robot. The PR2 robot will be controlled by an existing PS3 controller by changing C++ coding to subscribe and publish messages to ROS. Overall the skills that were obtained here will not be lost, but increased.

Agile deployment and code coverage testing metrics of the boot software on-board Solar Orbiter's Energetic Particle Detector

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Parra, Pablo; da Silva, Antonio; Polo, Óscar R.; Sánchez, Sebastián

2018-02-01

In this day and age, successful embedded critical software needs agile and continuous development and testing procedures. This paper presents the overall testing and code coverage metrics obtained during the unit testing procedure carried out to verify the correctness of the boot software that will run in the Instrument Control Unit (ICU) of the Energetic Particle Detector (EPD) on-board Solar Orbiter. The ICU boot software is a critical part of the project so its verification should be addressed at an early development stage, so any test case missed in this process may affect the quality of the overall on-board software. According to the European Cooperation for Space Standardization ESA standards, testing this kind of critical software must cover 100% of the source code statement and decision paths. This leads to the complete testing of fault tolerance and recovery mechanisms that have to resolve every possible memory corruption or communication error brought about by the space environment. The introduced procedure enables fault injection from the beginning of the development process and enables to fulfill the exigent code coverage demands on the boot software.

Simulation Control Graphical User Interface Logging Report

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hewling, Karl B., Jr.

2012-01-01

One of the many tasks of my project was to revise the code of the Simulation Control Graphical User Interface (SIM GUI) to enable logging functionality to a file. I was also tasked with developing a script that directed the startup and initialization flow of the various LCS software components. This makes sure that a software component will not spin up until all the appropriate dependencies have been configured properly. Also I was able to assist hardware modelers in verifying the configuration of models after they have been upgraded to a new software version. I developed some code that analyzes the MDL files to determine if any error were generated due to the upgrade process. Another one of the projects assigned to me was supporting the End-to-End Hardware/Software Daily Tag-up meeting.

A study of interactive control scheduling and economic assessment for robotic systems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

1982-01-01

A class of interactive control systems is derived by generalizing interactive manipulator control systems. Tasks of interactive control systems can be represented as a network of a finite set of actions which have specific operational characteristics and specific resource requirements, and which are of limited duration. This has enabled the decomposition of the overall control algorithm simultaneously and asynchronously. The performance benefits of sensor referenced and computer-aided control of manipulators in a complex environment is evaluated. The first phase of the CURV arm control system software development and the basic features of the control algorithms and their software implementation are presented. An optimal solution for a production scheduling problem that will be easy to implement in practical situations is investigated.

Design of Control Software for a High-Speed Coherent Doppler Lidar System for CO2 Measurement

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Vanvalkenburg, Randal L.; Beyon, Jeffrey Y.; Koch, Grady J.; Yu, Jirong; Singh, Upendra N.; Kavaya, Michael J.

2010-01-01

The design of the software for a 2-micron coherent high-speed Doppler lidar system for CO2 measurement at NASA Langley Research Center is discussed in this paper. The specific strategy and design topology to meet the requirements of the system are reviewed. In order to attain the high-speed digitization of the different types of signals to be sampled on multiple channels, a carefully planned design of the control software is imperative. Samples of digitized data from each channel and their roles in data analysis post processing are also presented. Several challenges of extremely-fast, high volume data acquisition are discussed. The software must check the validity of each lidar return as well as other monitoring channel data in real-time. For such high-speed data acquisition systems, the software is a key component that enables the entire scope of CO2 measurement studies using commercially available system components.

Hardware for dynamic quantum computing.

PubMed

Ryan, Colm A; Johnson, Blake R; Ristè, Diego; Donovan, Brian; Ohki, Thomas A

2017-10-01

We describe the hardware, gateware, and software developed at Raytheon BBN Technologies for dynamic quantum information processing experiments on superconducting qubits. In dynamic experiments, real-time qubit state information is fed back or fed forward within a fraction of the qubits' coherence time to dynamically change the implemented sequence. The hardware presented here covers both control and readout of superconducting qubits. For readout, we created a custom signal processing gateware and software stack on commercial hardware to convert pulses in a heterodyne receiver into qubit state assignments with minimal latency, alongside data taking capability. For control, we developed custom hardware with gateware and software for pulse sequencing and steering information distribution that is capable of arbitrary control flow in a fraction of superconducting qubit coherence times. Both readout and control platforms make extensive use of field programmable gate arrays to enable tailored qubit control systems in a reconfigurable fabric suitable for iterative development.

Web Implementation of Quality Assurance (QA) for X-ray Units in Balkanic Medical Institutions.

PubMed

Urošević, Vlade; Ristić, Olga; Milošević, Danijela; Košutić, Duško

2015-08-01

Diagnostic radiology is the major contributor to the total dose of the population from all artificial sources. In order to reduce radiation exposure and optimize diagnostic x-ray image quality, it is necessary to increase the quality and efficiency of quality assurance (QA) and audit programs. This work presents a web application providing completely new QA solutions for x-ray modalities and facilities. The software gives complete online information (using European standards) with which the corresponding institutions and individuals can evaluate and control a facility's Radiation Safety and QA program. The software enables storage of all data in one place and sharing the same information (data), regardless of whether the measured data is used by an individual user or by an authorized institution. The software overcomes the distance and time separation of institutions and individuals who take part in QA. Upgrading the software will enable assessment of the medical exposure level to ionizing radiation.

Configuring the Orion Guidance, Navigation, and Control Flight Software for Automated Sequencing

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Odegard, Ryan G.; Siliwinski, Tomasz K.; King, Ellis T.; Hart, Jeremy J.

2010-01-01

The Orion Crew Exploration Vehicle is being designed with greater automation capabilities than any other crewed spacecraft in NASA s history. The Guidance, Navigation, and Control (GN&C) flight software architecture is designed to provide a flexible and evolvable framework that accommodates increasing levels of automation over time. Within the GN&C flight software, a data-driven approach is used to configure software. This approach allows data reconfiguration and updates to automated sequences without requiring recompilation of the software. Because of the great dependency of the automation and the flight software on the configuration data, the data management is a vital component of the processes for software certification, mission design, and flight operations. To enable the automated sequencing and data configuration of the GN&C subsystem on Orion, a desktop database configuration tool has been developed. The database tool allows the specification of the GN&C activity sequences, the automated transitions in the software, and the corresponding parameter reconfigurations. These aspects of the GN&C automation on Orion are all coordinated via data management, and the database tool provides the ability to test the automation capabilities during the development of the GN&C software. In addition to providing the infrastructure to manage the GN&C automation, the database tool has been designed with capabilities to import and export artifacts for simulation analysis and documentation purposes. Furthermore, the database configuration tool, currently used to manage simulation data, is envisioned to evolve into a mission planning tool for generating and testing GN&C software sequences and configurations. A key enabler of the GN&C automation design, the database tool allows both the creation and maintenance of the data artifacts, as well as serving the critical role of helping to manage, visualize, and understand the data-driven parameters both during software development and throughout the life of the Orion project.

Simplified programming and control of automated radiosynthesizers through unit operations.

PubMed

Claggett, Shane B; Quinn, Kevin M; Lazari, Mark; Moore, Melissa D; van Dam, R Michael

2013-07-15

Many automated radiosynthesizers for producing positron emission tomography (PET) probes provide a means for the operator to create custom synthesis programs. The programming interfaces are typically designed with the engineer rather than the radiochemist in mind, requiring lengthy programs to be created from sequences of low-level, non-intuitive hardware operations. In some cases, the user is even responsible for adding steps to update the graphical representation of the system. In light of these unnecessarily complex approaches, we have created software to perform radiochemistry on the ELIXYS radiosynthesizer with the goal of being intuitive and easy to use. Radiochemists were consulted, and a wide range of radiosyntheses were analyzed to determine a comprehensive set of basic chemistry unit operations. Based around these operations, we created a software control system with a client-server architecture. In an attempt to maximize flexibility, the client software was designed to run on a variety of portable multi-touch devices. The software was used to create programs for the synthesis of several 18F-labeled probes on the ELIXYS radiosynthesizer, with [18F]FDG detailed here. To gauge the user-friendliness of the software, program lengths were compared to those from other systems. A small sample group with no prior radiosynthesizer experience was tasked with creating and running a simple protocol. The software was successfully used to synthesize several 18F-labeled PET probes, including [18F]FDG, with synthesis times and yields comparable to literature reports. The resulting programs were significantly shorter and easier to debug than programs from other systems. The sample group of naive users created and ran a simple protocol within a couple of hours, revealing a very short learning curve. The client-server architecture provided reliability, enabling continuity of the synthesis run even if the computer running the client software failed. The architecture enabled a single user to control the hardware while others observed the run in progress or created programs for other probes. We developed a novel unit operation-based software interface to control automated radiosynthesizers that reduced the program length and complexity and also exhibited a short learning curve. The client-server architecture provided robustness and flexibility.

Simplified programming and control of automated radiosynthesizers through unit operations

PubMed Central

2013-01-01

Background Many automated radiosynthesizers for producing positron emission tomography (PET) probes provide a means for the operator to create custom synthesis programs. The programming interfaces are typically designed with the engineer rather than the radiochemist in mind, requiring lengthy programs to be created from sequences of low-level, non-intuitive hardware operations. In some cases, the user is even responsible for adding steps to update the graphical representation of the system. In light of these unnecessarily complex approaches, we have created software to perform radiochemistry on the ELIXYS radiosynthesizer with the goal of being intuitive and easy to use. Methods Radiochemists were consulted, and a wide range of radiosyntheses were analyzed to determine a comprehensive set of basic chemistry unit operations. Based around these operations, we created a software control system with a client–server architecture. In an attempt to maximize flexibility, the client software was designed to run on a variety of portable multi-touch devices. The software was used to create programs for the synthesis of several 18F-labeled probes on the ELIXYS radiosynthesizer, with [18F]FDG detailed here. To gauge the user-friendliness of the software, program lengths were compared to those from other systems. A small sample group with no prior radiosynthesizer experience was tasked with creating and running a simple protocol. Results The software was successfully used to synthesize several 18F-labeled PET probes, including [18F]FDG, with synthesis times and yields comparable to literature reports. The resulting programs were significantly shorter and easier to debug than programs from other systems. The sample group of naive users created and ran a simple protocol within a couple of hours, revealing a very short learning curve. The client–server architecture provided reliability, enabling continuity of the synthesis run even if the computer running the client software failed. The architecture enabled a single user to control the hardware while others observed the run in progress or created programs for other probes. Conclusions We developed a novel unit operation-based software interface to control automated radiosynthesizers that reduced the program length and complexity and also exhibited a short learning curve. The client–server architecture provided robustness and flexibility. PMID:23855995

AGATE: Adversarial Game Analysis for Tactical Evaluation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Huntsberger, Terrance L.

2013-01-01

AGATE generates a set of ranked strategies that enables an autonomous vehicle to track/trail another vehicle that is trying to break the contact using evasive tactics. The software is efficient (can be run on a laptop), scales well with environmental complexity, and is suitable for use onboard an autonomous vehicle. The software will run in near-real-time (2 Hz) on most commercial laptops. Existing software is usually run offline in a planning mode, and is not used to control an unmanned vehicle actively. JPL has developed a system for AGATE that uses adversarial game theory (AGT) methods (in particular, leader-follower and pursuit-evasion) to enable an autonomous vehicle (AV) to maintain tracking/ trailing operations on a target that is employing evasive tactics. The AV trailing, tracking, and reacquisition operations are characterized by imperfect information, and are an example of a non-zero sum game (a positive payoff for the AV is not necessarily an equal loss for the target being tracked and, potentially, additional adversarial boats). Previously, JPL successfully applied the Nash equilibrium method for onboard control of an autonomous ground vehicle (AGV) travelling over hazardous terrain.

Software-Enabled Distributed Network Governance: The PopMedNet Experience.

PubMed

Davies, Melanie; Erickson, Kyle; Wyner, Zachary; Malenfant, Jessica; Rosen, Rob; Brown, Jeffrey

2016-01-01

The expanded availability of electronic health information has led to increased interest in distributed health data research networks. The distributed research network model leaves data with and under the control of the data holder. Data holders, network coordinating centers, and researchers have distinct needs and challenges within this model. The concerns of network stakeholders are addressed in the design and governance models of the PopMedNet software platform. PopMedNet features include distributed querying, customizable workflows, and auditing and search capabilities. Its flexible role-based access control system enables the enforcement of varying governance policies. Four case studies describe how PopMedNet is used to enforce network governance models. Trust is an essential component of a distributed research network and must be built before data partners may be willing to participate further. The complexity of the PopMedNet system must be managed as networks grow and new data, analytic methods, and querying approaches are developed. The PopMedNet software platform supports a variety of network structures, governance models, and research activities through customizable features designed to meet the needs of network stakeholders.

Enabling People with Developmental Disabilities to Actively Perform Designated Occupational Activities according to Simple Instructions with a Nintendo Wii Remote Controller by Controlling Environmental Stimulation

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Shih, Ching-Hsiang; Wang, Shu-Hui; Chang, Man-Ling; Shih, Ching-Hsiang

2012-01-01

The latest researches have adopted software technology, turning the Nintendo Wii Remote Controller into a high performance three-dimensional object orientation detector. This study extended Wii Remote Controller functionality to assess whether two people with developmental disabilities would be able to actively perform designated simple…

Measurement and Control of the Variability of Scanning Pressure Transducer Measurements

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Kuhl, David D.; Everhart, Joel L.; Hallissy, James B.

2003-01-01

This paper describes the new wall pressure measurement system and data-quality monitoring software installed at 14x22 Ft subsonic tunnel at the NASA Langley Research Center. The monitoring software was developed to enable measurement and control of the variability of the reference pressures and approximately 400 tunnel wall pressure measurements. Variability of the system, based upon data acquired over a year of wind tunnel tests and calibrations, is presented. The level of variation of the wall pressure measurements is shown to be predictable.

Development of Hardware-in-the-Loop Simulation Based on Gazebo and Pixhawk for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Nguyen, Khoa Dang; Ha, Cheolkeun

2018-04-01

Hardware-in-the-loop simulation (HILS) is well known as an effective approach in the design of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) systems, enabling engineers to test the control algorithm on a hardware board with a UAV model on the software. Performance of HILS is determined by performances of the control algorithm, the developed model, and the signal transfer between the hardware and software. The result of HILS is degraded if any signal could not be transferred to the correct destination. Therefore, this paper aims to develop a middleware software to secure communications in HILS system for testing the operation of a quad-rotor UAV. In our HILS, the Gazebo software is used to generate a nonlinear six-degrees-of-freedom (6DOF) model, sensor model, and 3D visualization for the quad-rotor UAV. Meanwhile, the flight control algorithm is designed and implemented on the Pixhawk hardware. New middleware software, referred to as the control application software (CAS), is proposed to ensure the connection and data transfer between Gazebo and Pixhawk using the multithread structure in Qt Creator. The CAS provides a graphical user interface (GUI), allowing the user to monitor the status of packet transfer, and perform the flight control commands and the real-time tuning parameters for the quad-rotor UAV. Numerical implementations have been performed to prove the effectiveness of the middleware software CAS suggested in this paper.

Lighting Control Systems

DTIC Science & Technology

2004-02-26

Shorter payback periods After 19 Cost Benefit of Powerlink Rule of Thumb for Powerlink: Powerlink becomes more cost effective beyond 16 controlled...web enabled control (and management software) Increase in level of integration between building systems Increase in new features, functions, benefits ...focus on reducing run-time via Scheduling, Sensing, Switching Growing focus on payback Direct energy cost (with demand) Additional maintenance benefits

Joint Measurement Operations Controller (JMOC)

DTIC Science & Technology

2011-01-01

This work included evaluation of electronic paper and handwriting recognition software. Neither of these technologies was sufficiently robust to...is header information saying this is the Dynamic Targeting Cell set of questions. <Module webEnabled="false" appName="DTC" displayGlobalPre="true...translation of their handwriting captures. The one exception is Logitech, which provides its own software but is also compatible with MyScript Notes

Workstation-Based Simulation for Rapid Prototyping and Piloted Evaluation of Control System Designs

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mansur, M. Hossein; Colbourne, Jason D.; Chang, Yu-Kuang; Aiken, Edwin W. (Technical Monitor)

1998-01-01

The development and optimization of flight control systems for modem fixed- and rotary-. wing aircraft consume a significant portion of the overall time and cost of aircraft development. Substantial savings can be achieved if the time required to develop and flight test the control system, and the cost, is reduced. To bring about such reductions, software tools such as Matlab/Simulink are being used to readily implement block diagrams and rapidly evaluate the expected responses of the completed system. Moreover, tools such as CONDUIT (CONtrol Designer's Unified InTerface) have been developed that enable the controls engineers to optimize their control laws and ensure that all the relevant quantitative criteria are satisfied, all within a fully interactive, user friendly, unified software environment.

Software for Collaborative Engineering of Launch Rockets

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Stanley, Thomas Troy

2003-01-01

The Rocket Evaluation and Cost Integration for Propulsion and Engineering software enables collaborative computing with automated exchange of information in the design and analysis of launch rockets and other complex systems. RECIPE can interact with and incorporate a variety of programs, including legacy codes, that model aspects of a system from the perspectives of different technological disciplines (e.g., aerodynamics, structures, propulsion, trajectory, aeroheating, controls, and operations) and that are used by different engineers on different computers running different operating systems. RECIPE consists mainly of (1) ISCRM a file-transfer subprogram that makes it possible for legacy codes executed in their original operating systems on their original computers to exchange data and (2) CONES an easy-to-use filewrapper subprogram that enables the integration of legacy codes. RECIPE provides a tightly integrated conceptual framework that emphasizes connectivity among the programs used by the collaborators, linking these programs in a manner that provides some configuration control while facilitating collaborative engineering tradeoff studies, including design to cost studies. In comparison with prior collaborative-engineering schemes, one based on the use of RECIPE enables fewer engineers to do more in less time.

Internet SCADA Utilizing API's as Data Source

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Robles, Rosslin John; Kim, Haeng-Kon; Kim, Tai-Hoon

An Application programming interface or API is an interface implemented by a software program that enables it to interact with other software. Many companies provide free API services which can be utilized in Control Systems. SCADA is an example of a control system and it is a system that collects data from various sensors at a factory, plant or in other remote locations and then sends this data to a central computer which then manages and controls the data. In this paper, we designed a scheme for Weather Condition in Internet SCADA Environment utilizing data from external API services. The scheme was designed to double check the weather information in SCADA.

Software-defined optical network for metro-scale geographically distributed data centers.

PubMed

Samadi, Payman; Wen, Ke; Xu, Junjie; Bergman, Keren

2016-05-30

The emergence of cloud computing and big data has rapidly increased the deployment of small and mid-sized data centers. Enterprises and cloud providers require an agile network among these data centers to empower application reliability and flexible scalability. We present a software-defined inter data center network to enable on-demand scale out of data centers on a metro-scale optical network. The architecture consists of a combined space/wavelength switching platform and a Software-Defined Networking (SDN) control plane equipped with a wavelength and routing assignment module. It enables establishing transparent and bandwidth-selective connections from L2/L3 switches, on-demand. The architecture is evaluated in a testbed consisting of 3 data centers, 5-25 km apart. We successfully demonstrated end-to-end bulk data transfer and Virtual Machine (VM) migrations across data centers with less than 100 ms connection setup time and close to full link capacity utilization.

Benefits of Matching Domain Structure for Planning Software: The Right Stuff

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Billman, Dorrit Owen; Arsintescu, Lucica; Feary, Michael S.; Lee, Jessica Chia-Rong; Smith, Asha Halima; Tiwary, Rachna

2011-01-01

We investigated the role of domain structure in software design. We compared 2 planning applications, for a Mission Control group (International Space Station), and measured users speed and accuracy. Based on our needs analysis, we identified domain structure and used this to develop new prototype software that matched domain structure better than the legacy system. We took a high-fidelity analog of the natural task into the laboratory and found (large) periformance differences, favoring the system that matched domain structure. Our task design enabled us to attribute better periormance to better match of domain structure. We ran through the whole development cycle, in miniature, from needs analysis through design, development, and evaluation. Doing so enabled inferences not just about the particular systems compared, but also provided evidence for the viability of the design process (particularly needs analysis) that we are exploring.

Open-source, community-driven microfluidics with Metafluidics.

PubMed

Kong, David S; Thorsen, Todd A; Babb, Jonathan; Wick, Scott T; Gam, Jeremy J; Weiss, Ron; Carr, Peter A

2017-06-07

Microfluidic devices have the potential to automate and miniaturize biological experiments, but open-source sharing of device designs has lagged behind sharing of other resources such as software. Synthetic biologists have used microfluidics for DNA assembly, cell-free expression, and cell culture, but a combination of expense, device complexity, and reliance on custom set-ups hampers their widespread adoption. We present Metafluidics, an open-source, community-driven repository that hosts digital design files, assembly specifications, and open-source software to enable users to build, configure, and operate a microfluidic device. We use Metafluidics to share designs and fabrication instructions for both a microfluidic ring-mixer device and a 32-channel tabletop microfluidic controller. This device and controller are applied to build genetic circuits using standard DNA assembly methods including ligation, Gateway, Gibson, and Golden Gate. Metafluidics is intended to enable a broad community of engineers, DIY enthusiasts, and other nontraditional participants with limited fabrication skills to contribute to microfluidic research.

Software-Enabled Project Management Techniques and Their Relationship to the Triple Constraints

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Elleh, Festus U.

2013-01-01

This study investigated the relationship between software-enabled project management techniques and the triple constraints (time, cost, and scope). There was the dearth of academic literature that focused on the relationship between software-enabled project management techniques and the triple constraints (time, cost, and scope). Based on the gap…

47 CFR 400.7 - Eligible uses for grant funds.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-10-01

... the acquisition and deployment of hardware and software that enables the implementation and operation of Phase II E-911 services, for the acquisition and deployment of hardware and software to enable the migration to an IP-enabled emergency network, for the training in the use of such hardware and software, or...

47 CFR 400.7 - Eligible uses for grant funds.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-10-01

... the acquisition and deployment of hardware and software that enables the implementation and operation of Phase II E-911 services, for the acquisition and deployment of hardware and software to enable the migration to an IP-enabled emergency network, for the training in the use of such hardware and software, or...

47 CFR 400.7 - Eligible uses for grant funds.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-10-01

... the acquisition and deployment of hardware and software that enables the implementation and operation of Phase II E-911 services, for the acquisition and deployment of hardware and software to enable the migration to an IP-enabled emergency network, for the training in the use of such hardware and software, or...

47 CFR 400.7 - Eligible uses for grant funds.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-10-01

... the acquisition and deployment of hardware and software that enables the implementation and operation of Phase II E-911 services, for the acquisition and deployment of hardware and software to enable the migration to an IP-enabled emergency network, for the training in the use of such hardware and software, or...

47 CFR 400.7 - Eligible uses for grant funds.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-10-01

... the acquisition and deployment of hardware and software that enables the implementation and operation of Phase II E-911 services, for the acquisition and deployment of hardware and software to enable the migration to an IP-enabled emergency network, for the training in the use of such hardware and software, or...

A Limb Action Detector Enabling People with Multiple Disabilities to Control Environmental Stimulation through Limb Action with a Nintendo Wii Remote Controller

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Shih, Ching-Hsiang; Chang, Man-Ling; Shih, Ching-Tien

2010-01-01

This study assessed whether two persons with multiple disabilities would be able to control environmental stimulation using limb action with a Nintendo Wii Remote Controller and a newly developed limb action detection program (LADP, i.e., a new software program that turns a Wii Remote Controller into a precise limb action detector). This study was…

Measurement of Software Project Management Effectiveness

DTIC Science & Technology

2008-12-01

with technical, financial, policy, and non -technical concerns of stakeholders, to develop and select suitable risk control actions, and implementation...not intervene in their projects and therefore affect their views. In most research experiments, researchers apply a controlled event, method or...enable a consistency check among the responses and for other research purposes. Therefore, for the risk control area model, only the responses from

FPGA-Based Efficient Hardware/Software Co-Design for Industrial Systems with Consideration of Output Selection

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Deliparaschos, Kyriakos M.; Michail, Konstantinos; Zolotas, Argyrios C.; Tzafestas, Spyros G.

2016-05-01

This work presents a field programmable gate array (FPGA)-based embedded software platform coupled with a software-based plant, forming a hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) that is used to validate a systematic sensor selection framework. The systematic sensor selection framework combines multi-objective optimization, linear-quadratic-Gaussian (LQG)-type control, and the nonlinear model of a maglev suspension. A robustness analysis of the closed-loop is followed (prior to implementation) supporting the appropriateness of the solution under parametric variation. The analysis also shows that quantization is robust under different controller gains. While the LQG controller is implemented on an FPGA, the physical process is realized in a high-level system modeling environment. FPGA technology enables rapid evaluation of the algorithms and test designs under realistic scenarios avoiding heavy time penalty associated with hardware description language (HDL) simulators. The HIL technique facilitates significant speed-up in the required execution time when compared to its software-based counterpart model.

Integration of analytical instruments with computer scripting.

PubMed

Carvalho, Matheus C

2013-08-01

Automation of laboratory routines aided by computer software enables high productivity and is the norm nowadays. However, the integration of different instruments made by different suppliers is still difficult, because to accomplish it, the user must have knowledge of electronics and/or low-level programming. An alternative approach is to control different instruments without an electronic connection between them, relying only on their software interface on a computer. This can be achieved through scripting, which is the emulation of user operations (mouse clicks and keyboard inputs) on the computer. The main advantages of this approach are its simplicity, which enables people with minimal knowledge of computer programming to employ it, and its universality, which enables the integration of instruments made by different suppliers, meaning that the user is totally free to choose the devices to be integrated. Therefore, scripting can be a useful, accessible, and economic solution for laboratory automation.

GNSS CORS hardware and software enabling new science

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Drummond, P.

2009-12-01

GNSS CORS networks are enabling new opportunities for science and public and private sector business. This paper will explore how the newest geodetic monitoring software and GNSS receiver hardware from Trimble Navigation Ltd are enabling new science. Technology trends and science opportunities will be explored. These trends include the installation of active GNSS control, automation of observations and processing, and the advantages of multi-observable and multi-constellation observations, all performed with the use of off the shelf products and industry standard open-source data formats. Also the possibilities with moving science from an after-the-fact postprocessed model to a real-time epoch-by-epoch solution will be explored. This presentation will also discuss the combination of existing GNSS CORS networks with project specific installations used for monitoring. Experience is showing GNSS is able to provide higher resolution data than previous methods, providing new tools for science, decision makers and financial planners.

TMT approach to observatory software development process

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Buur, Hanne; Subramaniam, Annapurni; Gillies, Kim; Dumas, Christophe; Bhatia, Ravinder

2016-07-01

The purpose of the Observatory Software System (OSW) is to integrate all software and hardware components of the Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) to enable observations and data capture; thus it is a complex software system that is defined by four principal software subsystems: Common Software (CSW), Executive Software (ESW), Data Management System (DMS) and Science Operations Support System (SOSS), all of which have interdependencies with the observatory control systems and data acquisition systems. Therefore, the software development process and plan must consider dependencies to other subsystems, manage architecture, interfaces and design, manage software scope and complexity, and standardize and optimize use of resources and tools. Additionally, the TMT Observatory Software will largely be developed in India through TMT's workshare relationship with the India TMT Coordination Centre (ITCC) and use of Indian software industry vendors, which adds complexity and challenges to the software development process, communication and coordination of activities and priorities as well as measuring performance and managing quality and risk. The software project management challenge for the TMT OSW is thus a multi-faceted technical, managerial, communications and interpersonal relations challenge. The approach TMT is using to manage this multifaceted challenge is a combination of establishing an effective geographically distributed software team (Integrated Product Team) with strong project management and technical leadership provided by the TMT Project Office (PO) and the ITCC partner to manage plans, process, performance, risk and quality, and to facilitate effective communications; establishing an effective cross-functional software management team composed of stakeholders, OSW leadership and ITCC leadership to manage dependencies and software release plans, technical complexities and change to approved interfaces, architecture, design and tool set, and to facilitate effective communications; adopting an agile-based software development process across the observatory to enable frequent software releases to help mitigate subsystem interdependencies; defining concise scope and work packages for each of the OSW subsystems to facilitate effective outsourcing of software deliverables to the ITCC partner, and to enable performance monitoring and risk management. At this stage, the architecture and high-level design of the software system has been established and reviewed. During construction each subsystem will have a final design phase with reviews, followed by implementation and testing. The results of the TMT approach to the Observatory Software development process will only be preliminary at the time of the submittal of this paper, but it is anticipated that the early results will be a favorable indication of progress.

STRS Radio Service Software for NASA's SCaN Testbed

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mortensen, Dale J.; Bishop, Daniel Wayne; Chelmins, David T.

2012-01-01

NASAs Space Communication and Navigation(SCaN) Testbed was launched to the International Space Station in 2012. The objective is to promote new software defined radio technologies and associated software application reuse, enabled by this first flight of NASAs Space Telecommunications Radio System(STRS) architecture standard. Pre-launch testing with the testbeds software defined radios was performed as part of system integration. Radio services for the JPL SDR were developed during system integration to allow the waveform application to operate properly in the space environment, especially considering thermal effects. These services include receiver gain control, frequency offset, IQ modulator balance, and transmit level control. Development, integration, and environmental testing of the radio services will be described. The added software allows the waveform application to operate properly in the space environment, and can be reused by future experimenters testing different waveform applications. Integrating such services with the platform provided STRS operating environment will attract more users, and these services are candidates for interface standardization via STRS.

STRS Radio Service Software for NASA's SCaN Testbed

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mortensen, Dale J.; Bishop, Daniel Wayne; Chelmins, David T.

2013-01-01

NASA's Space Communication and Navigation(SCaN) Testbed was launched to the International Space Station in 2012. The objective is to promote new software defined radio technologies and associated software application reuse, enabled by this first flight of NASA's Space Telecommunications Radio System (STRS) architecture standard. Pre-launch testing with the testbed's software defined radios was performed as part of system integration. Radio services for the JPL SDR were developed during system integration to allow the waveform application to operate properly in the space environment, especially considering thermal effects. These services include receiver gain control, frequency offset, IQ modulator balance, and transmit level control. Development, integration, and environmental testing of the radio services will be described. The added software allows the waveform application to operate properly in the space environment, and can be reused by future experimenters testing different waveform applications. Integrating such services with the platform provided STRS operating environment will attract more users, and these services are candidates for interface standardization via STRS.

ControlShell: A real-time software framework

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Schneider, Stanley A.; Chen, Vincent W.; Pardo-Castellote, Gerardo

1994-01-01

The ControlShell system is a programming environment that enables the development and implementation of complex real-time software. It includes many building tools for complex systems, such as a graphical finite state machine (FSM) tool to provide strategic control. ControlShell has a component-based design, providing interface definitions and mechanisms for building real-time code modules along with providing basic data management. Some of the system-building tools incorporated in ControlShell are a graphical data flow editor, a component data requirement editor, and a state-machine editor. It also includes a distributed data flow package, an execution configuration manager, a matrix package, and an object database and dynamic binding facility. This paper presents an overview of ControlShell's architecture and examines the functions of several of its tools.

A Closed-Loop Proportional-Integral (PI) Control Software for Fully Mechanically Controlled Automated Electron Microscopic Tomography

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

REN, GANG; LIU, JINXIN; LI, HONGCHANG

A closed-loop proportional-integral (PI) control software is provided for fully mechanically controlled automated electron microscopic tomography. The software is developed based on Gatan DigitalMicrograph, and is compatible with Zeiss LIBRA 120 transmission electron microscope. However, it can be expanded to other TEM instrument with modification. The software consists of a graphical user interface, a digital PI controller, an image analyzing unit, and other drive units (i.e.: image acquire unit and goniometer drive unit). During a tomography data collection process, the image analyzing unit analyzes both the accumulated shift and defocus value of the latest acquired image, and provides the resultsmore » to the digital PI controller. The digital PI control compares the results with the preset values and determines the optimum adjustments of the goniometer. The goniometer drive unit adjusts the spatial position of the specimen according to the instructions given by the digital PI controller for the next tilt angle and image acquisition. The goniometer drive unit achieves high precision positioning by using a backlash elimination method. The major benefits of the software are: 1) the goniometer drive unit keeps pre-aligned/optimized beam conditions unchanged and achieves position tracking solely through mechanical control; 2) the image analyzing unit relies on only historical data and therefore does not require additional images/exposures; 3) the PI controller enables the system to dynamically track the imaging target with extremely low system error.« less

Reconfigurable Software for Mission Operations

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Trimble, Jay

2014-01-01

We developed software that provides flexibility to mission organizations through modularity and composability. Modularity enables removal and addition of functionality through the installation of plug-ins. Composability enables users to assemble software from pre-built reusable objects, thus reducing or eliminating the walls associated with traditional application architectures and enabling unique combinations of functionality. We have used composable objects to reduce display build time, create workflows, and build scenarios to test concepts for lunar roving operations. The software is open source, and may be downloaded from https:github.comnasamct.

Ground Data System Analysis Tools to Track Flight System State Parameters for the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) and Beyond

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Allard, Dan; Deforrest, Lloyd

2014-01-01

Flight software parameters enable space mission operators fine-tuned control over flight system configurations, enabling rapid and dynamic changes to ongoing science activities in a much more flexible manner than can be accomplished with (otherwise broadly used) configuration file based approaches. The Mars Science Laboratory (MSL), Curiosity, makes extensive use of parameters to support complex, daily activities via commanded changes to said parameters in memory. However, as the loss of Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) in 2006 demonstrated, flight system management by parameters brings with it risks, including the possibility of losing track of the flight system configuration and the threat of invalid command executions. To mitigate this risk a growing number of missions have funded efforts to implement parameter tracking parameter state software tools and services including MSL and the Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP) mission. This paper will discuss the engineering challenges and resulting software architecture of MSL's onboard parameter state tracking software and discuss the road forward to make parameter management tools suitable for use on multiple missions.

Process and information integration via hypermedia

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hammen, David G.; Labasse, Daniel L.; Myers, Robert M.

1990-01-01

Success stories for advanced automation prototypes abound in the literature but the deployments of practical large systems are few in number. There are several factors that militate against the maturation of such prototypes into products. Here, the integration of advanced automation software into large systems is discussed. Advanced automation systems tend to be specific applications that need to be integrated and aggregated into larger systems. Systems integration can be achieved by providing expert user-developers with verified tools to efficiently create small systems that interface to large systems through standard interfaces. The use of hypermedia as such a tool in the context of the ground control centers that support Shuttle and space station operations is explored. Hypermedia can be an integrating platform for data, conventional software, and advanced automation software, enabling data integration through the display of diverse types of information and through the creation of associative links between chunks of information. Further, hypermedia enables process integration through graphical invoking of system functions. Through analysis and examples, researchers illustrate how diverse information and processing paradigms can be integrated into a single software platform.

Experimental demonstration of OpenFlow-enabled media ecosystem architecture for high-end applications over metro and core networks.

PubMed

Ntofon, Okung-Dike; Channegowda, Mayur P; Efstathiou, Nikolaos; Rashidi Fard, Mehdi; Nejabati, Reza; Hunter, David K; Simeonidou, Dimitra

2013-02-25

In this paper, a novel Software-Defined Networking (SDN) architecture is proposed for high-end Ultra High Definition (UHD) media applications. UHD media applications require huge amounts of bandwidth that can only be met with high-capacity optical networks. In addition, there are requirements for control frameworks capable of delivering effective application performance with efficient network utilization. A novel SDN-based Controller that tightly integrates application-awareness with network control and management is proposed for such applications. An OpenFlow-enabled test-bed demonstrator is reported with performance evaluations of advanced online and offline media- and network-aware schedulers.

Optimizing Flight Control Software With an Application Platform

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Smith, Irene Skupniewicz; Shi, Nija; Webster, Christopher

2012-01-01

Flight controllers in NASA s mission control centers work day and night to ensure that missions succeed and crews are safe. The IT goals of NASA mission control centers are similar to those of most businesses: to evolve IT infrastructure from basic to dynamic. This paper describes Mission Control Technologies (MCT), an application platform that is powering mission control today and is designed to meet the needs of future NASA control centers. MCT is an extensible platform that provides GUI components and a runtime environment. The platform enables NASA s IT goals through its use of lightweight interfaces and configurable components, which promote standardization and incorporate useful solution patterns. The MCT architecture positions mission control centers to reach the goal of dynamic IT, leading to lower cost of ownership, and treating software as a strategic investment.

Advanced Manufacturing of Superconducting Magnets

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Senti, Mark W.

1996-01-01

The development of specialized materials, processes, and robotics technology allows for the rapid prototype and manufacture of superconducting and normal magnets which can be used for magnetic suspension applications. Presented are highlights of the Direct Conductor Placement System (DCPS) which enables automatic design and assembly of 3-dimensional coils and conductor patterns using LTS and HTS conductors. The system enables engineers to place conductors in complex patterns with greater efficiency and accuracy, and without the need for hard tooling. It may also allow researchers to create new types of coils and patterns which were never practical before the development of DCPS. The DCPS includes a custom designed eight-axis robot, patented end effector, CoilCAD(trademark) design software, RoboWire(trademark) control software, and automatic inspection.

Software reliability through fault-avoidance and fault-tolerance

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Vouk, Mladen A.; Mcallister, David F.

1993-01-01

Strategies and tools for the testing, risk assessment and risk control of dependable software-based systems were developed. Part of this project consists of studies to enable the transfer of technology to industry, for example the risk management techniques for safety-concious systems. Theoretical investigations of Boolean and Relational Operator (BRO) testing strategy were conducted for condition-based testing. The Basic Graph Generation and Analysis tool (BGG) was extended to fully incorporate several variants of the BRO metric. Single- and multi-phase risk, coverage and time-based models are being developed to provide additional theoretical and empirical basis for estimation of the reliability and availability of large, highly dependable software. A model for software process and risk management was developed. The use of cause-effect graphing for software specification and validation was investigated. Lastly, advanced software fault-tolerance models were studied to provide alternatives and improvements in situations where simple software fault-tolerance strategies break down.

High performance bilateral telerobot control.

PubMed

Kline-Schoder, Robert; Finger, William; Hogan, Neville

2002-01-01

Telerobotic systems are used when the environment that requires manipulation is not easily accessible to humans, as in space, remote, hazardous, or microscopic applications or to extend the capabilities of an operator by scaling motions and forces. The Creare control algorithm and software is an enabling technology that makes possible guaranteed stability and high performance for force-feedback telerobots. We have developed the necessary theory, structure, and software design required to implement high performance telerobot systems with time delay. This includes controllers for the master and slave manipulators, the manipulator servo levels, the communication link, and impedance shaping modules. We verified the performance using both bench top hardware as well as a commercial microsurgery system.

Distributing Data to Hand-Held Devices in a Wireless Network

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hodges, Mark; Simmons, Layne

2008-01-01

ADROIT is a developmental computer program for real-time distribution of complex data streams for display on Web-enabled, portable terminals held by members of an operational team of a spacecraft-command-and-control center who may be located away from the center. Examples of such terminals include personal data assistants, laptop computers, and cellular telephones. ADROIT would make it unnecessary to equip each terminal with platform- specific software for access to the data streams or with software that implements the information-sharing protocol used to deliver telemetry data to clients in the center. ADROIT is a combination of middleware plus software specific to the center. (Middleware enables one application program to communicate with another by performing such functions as conversion, translation, consolidation, and/or integration.) ADROIT translates a data stream (voice, video, or alphanumerical data) from the center into Extensible Markup Language, effectuates a subscription process to determine who gets what data when, and presents the data to each user in real time. Thus, ADROIT is expected to enable distribution of operations and to reduce the cost of operations by reducing the number of persons required to be in the center.

Embedded Web Technology: Internet Technology Applied to Real-Time System Control

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Daniele, Carl J.

1998-01-01

The NASA Lewis Research Center is developing software tools to bridge the gap between the traditionally non-real-time Internet technology and the real-time, embedded-controls environment for space applications. Internet technology has been expanding at a phenomenal rate. The simple World Wide Web browsers (such as earlier versions of Netscape, Mosaic, and Internet Explorer) that resided on personal computers just a few years ago only enabled users to log into and view a remote computer site. With current browsers, users not only view but also interact with remote sites. In addition, the technology now supports numerous computer platforms (PC's, MAC's, and Unix platforms), thereby providing platform independence.In contrast, the development of software to interact with a microprocessor (embedded controller) that is used to monitor and control a space experiment has generally been a unique development effort. For each experiment, a specific graphical user interface (GUI) has been developed. This procedure works well for a single-user environment. However, the interface for the International Space Station (ISS) Fluids and Combustion Facility will have to enable scientists throughout the world and astronauts onboard the ISS, using different computer platforms, to interact with their experiments in the Fluids and Combustion Facility. Developing a specific GUI for all these users would be cost prohibitive. An innovative solution to this requirement, developed at Lewis, is to use Internet technology, where the general problem of platform independence has already been partially solved, and to leverage this expanding technology as new products are developed. This approach led to the development of the Embedded Web Technology (EWT) program at Lewis, which has the potential to significantly reduce software development costs for both flight and ground software.

Collaboration Between NASA Centers of Excellence on Autonomous System Software Development

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Goodrich, Charles H.; Larson, William E.; Delgado, H. (Technical Monitor)

2001-01-01

Software for space systems flight operations has its roots in the early days of the space program when computer systems were incapable of supporting highly complex and flexible control logic. Control systems relied on fast data acquisition and supervisory control from a roomful of systems engineers on the ground. Even though computer hardware and software has become many orders of magnitude more capable, space systems have largely adhered to this original paradigm In an effort to break this mold, Kennedy Space Center (KSC) has invested in the development of model-based diagnosis and control applications for ten years having broad experience in both ground and spacecraft systems and software. KSC has now partnered with Ames Research Center (ARC), NASA's Center of Excellence in Information Technology, to create a new paradigm for the control of dynamic space systems. ARC has developed model-based diagnosis and intelligent planning software that enables spacecraft to handle most routine problems automatically and allocate resources in a flexible way to realize mission objectives. ARC demonstrated the utility of onboard diagnosis and planning with an experiment aboard Deep Space I in 1999. This paper highlights the software control system collaboration between KSC and ARC. KSC has developed a Mars In-situ Resource Utilization testbed based on the Reverse Water Gas Shift (RWGS) reaction. This plant, built in KSC's Applied Chemistry Laboratory, is capable of producing the large amount of Oxygen that would be needed to support a Human Mars Mission. KSC and ARC are cooperating to develop an autonomous, fault-tolerant control system for RWGS to meet the need for autonomy on deep space missions. The paper will also describe how the new system software paradigm will be applied to Vehicle Health Monitoring, tested on the new X vehicles and integrated into future launch processing systems.

Optical network democratization.

PubMed

Nejabati, Reza; Peng, Shuping; Simeonidou, Dimitra

2016-03-06

The current Internet infrastructure is not able to support independent evolution and innovation at physical and network layer functionalities, protocols and services, while at same time supporting the increasing bandwidth demands of evolving and heterogeneous applications. This paper addresses this problem by proposing a completely democratized optical network infrastructure. It introduces the novel concepts of the optical white box and bare metal optical switch as key technology enablers for democratizing optical networks. These are programmable optical switches whose hardware is loosely connected internally and is completely separated from their control software. To alleviate their complexity, a multi-dimensional abstraction mechanism using software-defined network technology is proposed. It creates a universal model of the proposed switches without exposing their technological details. It also enables a conventional network programmer to develop network applications for control of the optical network without specific technical knowledge of the physical layer. Furthermore, a novel optical network virtualization mechanism is proposed, enabling the composition and operation of multiple coexisting and application-specific virtual optical networks sharing the same physical infrastructure. Finally, the optical white box and the abstraction mechanism are experimentally evaluated, while the virtualization mechanism is evaluated with simulation. © 2016 The Author(s).

Tcl as a Software Environment for a TCS

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Terrett, David L.

2002-12-01

This paper describes how the Tcl scripting language and C API has been used as the software environment for a telescope pointing kernel so that new pointing algorithms and software architectures can be developed and tested without needing a real-time operating system or real-time software environment. It has enabled development to continue outside the framework of a specific telescope project while continuing to build a system that is sufficiently complete to be capable of controlling real hardware but expending minimum effort on replacing the services that would normally by provided by a real-time software environment. Tcl is used as a scripting language for configuring the system at startup and then as the command interface for controlling the running system; the Tcl C language API is used to provided a system independent interface to file and socket I/O and other operating system services. The pointing algorithms themselves are implemented as a set of C++ objects calling C library functions that implement the algorithms described in [2]. Although originally designed as a test and development environment, the system, running as a soft real-time process on Linux, has been used to test the SOAR mount control system and will be used as the pointing kernel of the SOAR telescope control system

Open source hardware and software platform for robotics and artificial intelligence applications

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Liang, S. Ng; Tan, K. O.; Lai Clement, T. H.; Ng, S. K.; Mohammed, A. H. Ali; Mailah, Musa; Azhar Yussof, Wan; Hamedon, Zamzuri; Yussof, Zulkifli

2016-02-01

Recent developments in open source hardware and software platforms (Android, Arduino, Linux, OpenCV etc.) have enabled rapid development of previously expensive and sophisticated system within a lower budget and flatter learning curves for developers. Using these platform, we designed and developed a Java-based 3D robotic simulation system, with graph database, which is integrated in online and offline modes with an Android-Arduino based rubbish picking remote control car. The combination of the open source hardware and software system created a flexible and expandable platform for further developments in the future, both in the software and hardware areas, in particular in combination with graph database for artificial intelligence, as well as more sophisticated hardware, such as legged or humanoid robots.

A Standing Location Detector Enabling People with Developmental Disabilities to Control Environmental Stimulation through Simple Physical Activities with Nintendo Wii Balance Boards

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Shih, Ching-Hsiang

2011-01-01

This study evaluated whether two people with developmental disabilities would be able to actively perform simple physical activities by controlling their favorite environmental stimulation using Nintendo Wii Balance Boards with a newly developed standing location detection program (SLDP, i.e., a new software program turning a Nintendo Wii Balance…

An Object Location Detector Enabling People with Developmental Disabilities to Control Environmental Stimulation through Simple Occupational Activities with Battery-Free Wireless Mice

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Shih, Ching-Hsiang

2011-01-01

This study assessed whether two persons with developmental disabilities would be able to actively perform simple occupational activities by controlling their favorite environmental stimulation using battery-free wireless mice with a newly developed object location detection program (OLDP, i.e., a new software program turning a battery-free…

Open source IPSEC software in manned and unmanned space missions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Edwards, Jacob

Network security is a major topic of research because cyber attackers pose a threat to national security. Securing ground-space communications for NASA missions is important because attackers could endanger mission success and human lives. This thesis describes how an open source IPsec software package was used to create a secure and reliable channel for ground-space communications. A cost efficient, reproducible hardware testbed was also created to simulate ground-space communications. The testbed enables simulation of low-bandwidth and high latency communications links to experiment how the open source IPsec software reacts to these network constraints. Test cases were built that allowed for validation of the testbed and the open source IPsec software. The test cases also simulate using an IPsec connection from mission control ground routers to points of interest in outer space. Tested open source IPsec software did not meet all the requirements. Software changes were suggested to meet requirements.

Software package for performing experiments about the convolutionally encoded Voyager 1 link

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Cheng, U.

1989-01-01

A software package enabling engineers to conduct experiments to determine the actual performance of long constraint-length convolutional codes over the Voyager 1 communication link directly from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) has been developed. Using this software, engineers are able to enter test data from the Laboratory in Pasadena, California. The software encodes the data and then sends the encoded data to a personal computer (PC) at the Goldstone Deep Space Complex (GDSC) over telephone lines. The encoded data are sent to the transmitter by the PC at GDSC. The received data, after being echoed back by Voyager 1, are first sent to the PC at GDSC, and then are sent back to the PC at the Laboratory over telephone lines for decoding and further analysis. All of these operations are fully integrated and are completely automatic. Engineers can control the entire software system from the Laboratory. The software encoder and the hardware decoder interface were developed for other applications, and have been modified appropriately for integration into the system so that their existence is transparent to the users. This software provides: (1) data entry facilities, (2) communication protocol for telephone links, (3) data displaying facilities, (4) integration with the software encoder and the hardware decoder, and (5) control functions.

Observation Scheduling System

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Chien, Steve A.; Tran, Daniel Q.; Rabideau, Gregg R.; Schaffer, Steven R.

2011-01-01

Software has been designed to schedule remote sensing with the Earth Observing One spacecraft. The software attempts to satisfy as many observation requests as possible considering each against spacecraft operation constraints such as data volume, thermal, pointing maneuvers, and others. More complex constraints such as temperature are approximated to enable efficient reasoning while keeping the spacecraft within safe limits. Other constraints are checked using an external software library. For example, an attitude control library is used to determine the feasibility of maneuvering between pairs of observations. This innovation can deal with a wide range of spacecraft constraints and solve large scale scheduling problems like hundreds of observations and thousands of combinations of observation sequences.

Programmable ubiquitous telerobotic devices

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Doherty, Michael; Greene, Matthew; Keaton, David; Och, Christian; Seidl, Matthew L.; Waite, William; Zorn, Benjamin G.

1997-12-01

We are investigating a field of research that we call ubiquitous telepresence, which involves the design and implementation of low-cost robotic devices that can be programmed and operated from anywhere on the Internet. These devices, which we call ubots, can be used for academic purposes (e.g., a biologist could remote conduct a population survey), commercial purposes (e.g., a house could be shown remotely by a real-estate agent), and for recreation and education (e.g., someone could tour a museum remotely). We anticipate that such devices will become increasingly common due to recent changes in hardware and software technology. In particular, current hardware technology enables such devices to be constructed very cheaply (less than $500), and current software and network technology allows highly portable code to be written and downloaded across the Internet. In this paper, we present our prototype system architecture, and the ubot implementation we have constructed based on it. The hardware technology we use is the handy board, a 6811-based controller board with digital and analog inputs and outputs. Our software includes a network layer based on TCP/IP and software layers written in Java. Our software enables users across the Internet to program the behavior of the vehicle and to receive image feedback from a camera mounted on it.

Adapting Wireless Technology to Lighting Control and Environmental Sensing

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Dana Teasdale; Francis Rubinstein; Dave Watson

The high cost of retrofitting buildings with advanced lighting control systems is a barrier to adoption of this energy-saving technology. Wireless technology, however, offers a solution to mounting installation costs since it requires no additional wiring to implement. To demonstrate the feasibility of such a system, a prototype wirelessly-controlled advanced lighting system was designed and built. The system includes the following components: a wirelessly-controllable analog circuit module (ACM), a wirelessly-controllable electronic dimmable ballast, a T8 3-lamp fixture, an environmental multi-sensor, a current transducer, and control software. The ACM, dimmable ballast, multi-sensor, and current transducer were all integrated with SmartMesh{trademark} wirelessmore » mesh networking nodes, called motes, enabling wireless communication, sensor monitoring, and actuator control. Each mote-enabled device has a reliable communication path to the SmartMesh Manager, a single board computer that controls network functions and connects the wireless network to a PC running lighting control software. The ACM is capable of locally driving one or more standard 0-10 Volt electronic dimmable ballasts through relay control and a 0-10 Volt controllable output. The mote-integrated electronic dimmable ballast is designed to drive a standard 3-lamp T8 light fixture. The environmental multi-sensor measures occupancy, light level and temperature. The current transducer is used to measure the power consumed by the fixture. Control software was developed to implement advanced lighting algorithms, including daylight ramping, occupancy control, and demand response. Engineering prototypes of each component were fabricated and tested in a bench-scale system. Based on standard industry practices, a cost analysis was conducted. It is estimated that the installation cost of a wireless advanced lighting control system for a retrofit application is at least 30% lower than a comparable wired system for a typical 16,000 square-foot office building, with a payback period of less than 3 years.« less

The COMPASS Tokamak Plasma Control Software Performance

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Valcarcel, Daniel F.; Neto, André; Carvalho, Ivo S.; Carvalho, Bernardo B.; Fernandes, Horácio; Sousa, Jorge; Janky, Filip; Havlicek, Josef; Beno, Radek; Horacek, Jan; Hron, Martin; Panek, Radomir

2011-08-01

The COMPASS tokamak has began operation at the IPP Prague in December 2008. A new control system has been built using an ATCA-based real-time system developed at IST Lisbon. The control software is implemented on top of the MARTe real-time framework attaining control cycles as short as 50 μs, with a jitter of less than 1 μs. The controlled parameters, important for the plasma performance, are the plasma current, position of the plasma current center, boundary shape and horizontal and vertical velocities. These are divided in two control cycles: slow at 500 μs and fast at 50 μs. The project has two phases. First, the software implements a digital controller, similar to the analog one used during the COMPASS-D operation in Culham. In the slow cycle, the plasma current and position are measured and controlled with PID and feedforward controllers, respectively, the shaping magnetic field is preprogrammed. The vertical instability and horizontal equilibrium are controlled with the faster 50-μs cycle PID controllers. The second phase will implement a plasma-shape reconstruction algorithm and controller, aiming at optimized plasma performance. The system was designed to be as modular as possible by breaking the functional requirements of the control system into several independent and specialized modules. This splitting enabled tuning the execution of each system part and to use the modules in a variety of applications with different time constraints. This paper presents the design and overall performance of the COMPASS control software.

Software-codec-based full motion video conferencing on the PC using visual pattern image sequence coding

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Barnett, Barry S.; Bovik, Alan C.

1995-04-01

This paper presents a real time full motion video conferencing system based on the Visual Pattern Image Sequence Coding (VPISC) software codec. The prototype system hardware is comprised of two personal computers, two camcorders, two frame grabbers, and an ethernet connection. The prototype system software has a simple structure. It runs under the Disk Operating System, and includes a user interface, a video I/O interface, an event driven network interface, and a free running or frame synchronous video codec that also acts as the controller for the video and network interfaces. Two video coders have been tested in this system. Simple implementations of Visual Pattern Image Coding and VPISC have both proven to support full motion video conferencing with good visual quality. Future work will concentrate on expanding this prototype to support the motion compensated version of VPISC, as well as encompassing point-to-point modem I/O and multiple network protocols. The application will be ported to multiple hardware platforms and operating systems. The motivation for developing this prototype system is to demonstrate the practicality of software based real time video codecs. Furthermore, software video codecs are not only cheaper, but are more flexible system solutions because they enable different computer platforms to exchange encoded video information without requiring on-board protocol compatible video codex hardware. Software based solutions enable true low cost video conferencing that fits the `open systems' model of interoperability that is so important for building portable hardware and software applications.

DRIFTER Web App Development Support

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Davis, Derrick D.; Armstrong, Curtis D.

2015-01-01

During my 2015 internship at Stennis Space Center (SSC) I supported the development of a web based tool to enable user interaction with a low-cost environmental monitoring buoy called the DRIFTER. DRIFTERs are designed by SSC's Applied Science and Technology Projects branch and are used to measure parameters such as water temperature and salinity. Data collected by the buoys help verify measurements by NASA satellites, which contributes to NASA's mission to advance understanding of the Earth by developing technologies to improve the quality of life on or home planet. My main objective during this internship was to support the development of the DRIFTER by writing web-based software that allows the public to view and access data collected by the buoys. In addition, this software would enable DRIFTER owners to configure and control the devices.

SCaN Testbed Software Development and Lessons Learned

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Kacpura, Thomas J.; Varga, Denise M.

2012-01-01

National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has developed an on-orbit, adaptable, Software Defined Radio (SDR)Space Telecommunications Radio System (STRS)-based testbed facility to conduct a suite of experiments to advance technologies, reduce risk, and enable future mission capabilities on the International Space Station (ISS). The SCAN Testbed Project will provide NASA, industry, other Government agencies, and academic partners the opportunity to develop and field communications, navigation, and networking technologies in the laboratory and space environment based on reconfigurable, SDR platforms and the STRS Architecture.The SDRs are a new technology for NASA, and the support infrastructure they require is different from legacy, fixed function radios. SDRs offer the ability to reconfigure on-orbit communications by changing software for new waveforms and operating systems to enable new capabilities or fix any anomalies, which was not a previous option. They are not stand alone devices, but required a new approach to effectively control them and flow data. This requires extensive software to be developed to utilize the full potential of these reconfigurable platforms. The paper focuses on development, integration and testing as related to the avionics processor system, and the software required to command, control, monitor, and interact with the SDRs, as well as the other communication payload elements. An extensive effort was required to develop the flight software and meet the NASA requirements for software quality and safety. The flight avionics must be radiation tolerant, and these processors have limited capability in comparison to terrestrial counterparts. A big challenge was that there are three SDRs onboard, and interfacing with multiple SDRs simultaneously complicatesd the effort. The effort also includes ground software, which is a key element for both the command of the payload, and displaying data created by the payload. The verification of the software was an extensive effort. The challenges of specifying a suitable test matrix with reconfigurable systems that offer numerous configurations is highlighted. Since the flight system testing requires methodical, controlled testing that limits risk, a nearly identical ground system to the on-orbit flight system was required to develop the software and write verification procedures before it was installed and tested on the flight system. The development of the SCAN testbed was an accelerated effort to meet launch constraints, and this paper discusses tradeoffs made to balance needed software functionality and still maintain the schedule. Future upgrades are discussed that optimize the avionics and allow experimenters to utilize the SCAN testbed potential.

Robust, Flexible Motion Control for the Mars Explorer Rovers

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Maimone, Mark; Biesiadecki, Jeffrey

2007-01-01

The Mobility Flight Software, running on computers aboard the Mars Explorer Rover (MER) robotic vehicles Spirit and Opportunity, affords the robustness and flexibility of control to enable safe and effective operation of these vehicles in traversing natural terrain. It can make the vehicles perform specific maneuvers commanded from Earth, and/or can autonomously administer multiple aspects of mobility, including choice of motion, measurement of actual motion, and even selection of targets to be approached. Motion of a vehicle can be commanded by use of multiple layers of control, ranging from motor control at a low level, direct drive operations (e.g., motion along a circular arc, motion along a straight line, or turn in place) at an intermediate level to goal-position driving (that is, driving to a specified location) at a high level. The software can also perform high-level assessment of terrain and selection of safe paths across the terrain: this involves processing of the digital equivalent of a local traversability map generated from images acquired by stereoscopic pairs of cameras aboard the vehicles. Other functions of the software include interacting with the rest of the MER flight software and performing safety checks.

Soft control of scanning probe microscope with high flexibility.

PubMed

Liu, Zhenghui; Guo, Yuzheng; Zhang, Zhaohui; Zhu, Xing

2007-01-01

Most commercial scanning probe microscopes have multiple embedded digital microprocessors and utilize complex software for system control, which is not easily obtained or modified by researchers wishing to perform novel and special applications. In this paper, we present a simple and flexible control solution that just depends on software running on a single-processor personal computer with real-time Linux operating system to carry out all the control tasks including negative feedback, tip moving, data processing and user interface. In this way, we fully exploit the potential of a personal computer in calculating and programming, enabling us to manipulate the scanning probe as required without any special digital control circuits and related technical know-how. This solution has been successfully applied to a homemade ultrahigh vacuum scanning tunneling microscope and a multiprobe scanning tunneling microscope.

FOCU:S--future operator control unit: soldier

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

O'Brien, Barry J.; Karan, Cem; Young, Stuart H.

2009-05-01

The U.S. Army Research Laboratory's (ARL) Computational and Information Sciences Directorate (CISD) has long been involved in autonomous asset control, specifically as it relates to small robots. Over the past year, CISD has been making strides in the implementation of three areas of small robot autonomy, namely platform autonomy, Soldier-robot interface, and tactical behaviors. It is CISD's belief that these three areas must be considered as a whole in order to provide Soldiers with useful capabilities. In addressing the Soldier-robot interface aspect, CISD has begun development on a unique dismounted controller called the Future Operator Control Unit: Soldier (FOCU:S) that is based on an Apple iPod Touch. The iPod Touch's small form factor, unique touch-screen input device, and the presence of general purpose computing applications such as a web browser combine to give this device the potential to be a disruptive technology. Setting CISD's implementation apart from other similar iPod or iPhone-based devices is the ARL software that allows multiple robotic platforms to be controlled from a single OCU. The FOCU:S uses the same Agile Computing Infrastructure (ACI) that all other assets in the ARL robotic control system use, enabling automated asset discovery on any type of network. Further, a custom ad hoc routing implementation allows the FOCU:S to communicate with the ARL ad hoc communications system and enables it to extend the range of the network. This paper will briefly describe the current robotic control architecture employed by ARL and provide short descriptions of existing capabilities. Further, the paper will discuss FOCU:S specific software developed for the iPod Touch, including unique capabilities enabled by the device's unique hardware.

The 4MOST facility control software

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pramskiy, Alexander; Mandel, Holger; Rothmaier, Florian; Stilz, Ingo; Winkler, Roland; Hahn, Thomas

2016-07-01

The 4-m Multi-Object Spectrographic Telescope (4MOST) is one high-resolution (R 18000) and two lowresolution (R fi 5000) spectrographs covering the wavelength range between 390 and 950 nm. The spectrographs will be installed on ESO VISTA telescope and will be fed by approximately 2400 fibres. The instrument is capable to simultaneously obtain spectra of about 2400 objects distributed over an hexagonal field-of-view of four square degrees. This paper aims at giving an overview of the control software design, which is based on the standard ESO VLT software architecture and customised to fit the needs of the 4MOST instrument. In particular, the facility control software is intended to arrange the precise positioning of the fibres, to schedule and observe many surveys in parallel, and to combine the output from the three spectrographs. Moreover, 4MOST's software will include user-friendly graphical user interfaces that enable users to interact with the facility control system and to monitor all data-taking and calibration tasks of the instrument. A secondary guiding system will be implemented to correct for any fibre exure and thus to improve 4MOST's guiding performance. The large amount of fibres requires the custom design of data exchange to avoid performance issues. The observation sequences are designed to use spectrographs in parallel with synchronous points for data exchange between subsystems. In order to control hardware devices, Programmable Logic Controller (PLC) components will be used, the new standard for future instruments at ESO.

Autonomous Performance Monitoring System: Monitoring and Self-Tuning (MAST)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Peterson, Chariya; Ziyad, Nigel A.

2000-01-01

Maintaining the long-term performance of software onboard a spacecraft can be a major factor in the cost of operations. In particular, the task of controlling and maintaining a future mission of distributed spacecraft will undoubtedly pose a great challenge, since the complexity of multiple spacecraft flying in formation grows rapidly as the number of spacecraft in the formation increases. Eventually, new approaches will be required in developing viable control systems that can handle the complexity of the data and that are flexible, reliable and efficient. In this paper we propose a methodology that aims to maintain the accuracy of flight software, while reducing the computational complexity of software tuning tasks. The proposed Monitoring and Self-Tuning (MAST) method consists of two parts: a flight software monitoring algorithm and a tuning algorithm. The dependency on the software being monitored is mostly contained in the monitoring process, while the tuning process is a generic algorithm independent of the detailed knowledge on the software. This architecture will enable MAST to be applicable to different onboard software controlling various dynamics of the spacecraft, such as attitude self-calibration, and formation control. An advantage of MAST over conventional techniques such as filter or batch least square is that the tuning algorithm uses machine learning approach to handle uncertainty in the problem domain, resulting in reducing over all computational complexity. The underlying concept of this technique is a reinforcement learning scheme based on cumulative probability generated by the historical performance of the system. The success of MAST will depend heavily on the reinforcement scheme used in the tuning algorithm, which guarantees the tuning solutions exist.

Software feedback for monochromator tuning at UNICAT (abstract)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Jemian, Pete R.

2002-03-01

Automatic tuning of double-crystal monochromators presents an interesting challenge in software. The goal is to either maximize, or hold constant, the throughput of the monochromator. An additional goal of the software feedback is to disable itself when there is no beam and then, at the user's discretion, re-enable itself when the beam returns. These and other routine goals, such as adherence to limits of travel for positioners, are maintained by software controls. Many solutions exist to lock in and maintain a fixed throughput. Among these include a hardware solution involving a wave form generator, and a lock-in amplifier to autocorrelate the movement of a piezoelectric transducer (PZT) providing fine adjustment of the second crystal Bragg angle. This solution does not work when the positioner is a slow acting device such as a stepping motor. Proportional integral differential (PID) loops have been used to provide feedback through software but additional controls must be provided to maximize the monochromator throughput. Presented here is a software variation of the PID loop which meets the above goals. By using two floating point variables as inputs, representing the intensity of x rays measured before and after the monochromator, it attempts to maximize (or hold constant) the ratio of these two inputs by adjusting an output floating point variable. These floating point variables are connected to hardware channels corresponding to detectors and positioners. When the inputs go out of range, the software will stop making adjustments to the control output. Not limited to monochromator feedback, the software could be used, with beam steering positioners, to maintain a measure of beam position. Advantages of this software feedback are the flexibility of its various components. It has been used with stepping motors and PZTs as positioners. Various devices such as ion chambers, scintillation counters, photodiodes, and photoelectron collectors have been used as detectors. The software provides significant cost savings over hardware feedback methods. Presently implemented in EPICS, the software is sufficiently general to any automated instrument control system.

HERMES travels by CAN bus

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Waller, Lewis G.; Shortridge, Keith; Farrell, Tony J.; Vuong, Minh; Muller, Rolf; Sheinis, Andrew I.

2014-07-01

The new HERMES spectrograph represents the first foray by AAO into the use of commercial off-the-shelf industrial field bus technology for instrument control, and we regard the final system, with its relatively simple wiring requirements, as a great success. However, both software and hardware teams had to work together to solve a number of problems integrating the chosen CANopen/CAN bus system into our normal observing systems. A Linux system running in an industrial PC chassis ran the HERMES control software, using a PCI CAN bus interface connected to a number of distributed CANopen/CAN bus I/O devices and servo amplifiers. In the main, the servo amplifiers performed impressively, although some experimentation with homing algorithms was required, and we hit a significant hurdle when we discovered that we needed to disable some of the encoders used during observations; we learned a lot about how servo amplifiers respond when their encoders are turned off, and about how encoders react to losing power. The software was based around a commercial CANopen library from Copley Controls. Early worries about how this heavily multithreaded library would work with our standard data acquisition system led to the development of a very low-level CANopen software simulator to verify the design. This also enabled the software group to develop and test almost all the control software well in advance of the construction of the hardware. In the end, the instrument went from initial installation at the telescope to successful commissioning remarkably smoothly.

Flexible distributed architecture for semiconductor process control and experimentation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gower, Aaron E.; Boning, Duane S.; McIlrath, Michael B.

1997-01-01

Semiconductor fabrication requires an increasingly expensive and integrated set of tightly controlled processes, driving the need for a fabrication facility with fully computerized, networked processing equipment. We describe an integrated, open system architecture enabling distributed experimentation and process control for plasma etching. The system was developed at MIT's Microsystems Technology Laboratories and employs in-situ CCD interferometry based analysis in the sensor-feedback control of an Applied Materials Precision 5000 Plasma Etcher (AME5000). Our system supports accelerated, advanced research involving feedback control algorithms, and includes a distributed interface that utilizes the internet to make these fabrication capabilities available to remote users. The system architecture is both distributed and modular: specific implementation of any one task does not restrict the implementation of another. The low level architectural components include a host controller that communicates with the AME5000 equipment via SECS-II, and a host controller for the acquisition and analysis of the CCD sensor images. A cell controller (CC) manages communications between these equipment and sensor controllers. The CC is also responsible for process control decisions; algorithmic controllers may be integrated locally or via remote communications. Finally, a system server images connections from internet/intranet (web) based clients and uses a direct link with the CC to access the system. Each component communicates via a predefined set of TCP/IP socket based messages. This flexible architecture makes integration easier and more robust, and enables separate software components to run on the same or different computers independent of hardware or software platform.

Application of the Golden Software Surfer mapping software for automation of visualisation of meteorological and oceanographic data in IMGW Maritime Branch.

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Piliczewski, B.

2003-04-01

The Golden Software Surfer has been used in IMGW Maritime Branch for more than ten years. This tool provides ActiveX Automation objects, which allow scripts to control practically every feature of Surfer. These objects can be accessed from any Automation-enabled environment, such as Visual Basic or Excel. Several applications based on Surfer has been developed in IMGW. The first example is an on-line oceanographic service, which presents forecasts of the water temperature, sea level and currents originating from the HIROMB model and is automatically updated every day. Surfer was also utilised in MERMAID, an international project supported by EC under the 5th Framework Programme. The main aim of this project was to create a prototype of the Internet-based data brokerage system, which would enable to search, extract, buy and download datasets containing meteorological or oceanographic data. During the project IMGW developed an online application, called Mermaid Viewer, which enables communication with the data broker and automatic visualisation of the downloaded data using Surfer. Both the above mentioned applications were developed in Visual Basic. Currently it is considered to adopt Surfer for the monitoring service, which provides access to the data collected in the monitoring of the Baltic Sea environment.

78 FR 32169 - Facilitating the Deployment of Text-to-911 and Other Next Generation 911 Applications

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2013-05-29

... messaging services (i.e., all providers of software applications that enable a consumer to send text... messaging services (i.e., all providers of software applications that enable a consumer to send text... providers of interconnected text messaging services (i.e., all providers of software applications that...

Distributed Visualization Project

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Craig, Douglas; Conroy, Michael; Kickbusch, Tracey; Mazone, Rebecca

2016-01-01

Distributed Visualization allows anyone, anywhere to see any simulation at any time. Development focuses on algorithms, software, data formats, data systems and processes to enable sharing simulation-based information across temporal and spatial boundaries without requiring stakeholders to possess highly-specialized and very expensive display systems. It also introduces abstraction between the native and shared data, which allows teams to share results without giving away proprietary or sensitive data. The initial implementation of this capability is the Distributed Observer Network (DON) version 3.1. DON 3.1 is available for public release in the NASA Software Store (https://software.nasa.gov/software/KSC-13775) and works with version 3.0 of the Model Process Control specification (an XML Simulation Data Representation and Communication Language) to display complex graphical information and associated Meta-Data.

Space Telecommunications Radio System (STRS) Architecture Standard. Release 1.02.1

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Reinhart, Richard C.; Kacpura, Thomas J.; Handler, Louis M.; Hall, C. Steve; Mortensen, Dale J.; Johnson, Sandra K.; Briones, Janette C.; Nappier, Jennifer M.; Downey, Joseph A.; Lux, James P.

2012-01-01

This document contains the NASA architecture standard for software defined radios used in space- and ground-based platforms to enable commonality among radio developments to enhance capability and services while reducing mission and programmatic risk. Transceivers (or transponders) with functionality primarily defined in software (e.g., firmware) have the ability to change their functional behavior through software alone. This radio architecture standard offers value by employing common waveform software interfaces, method of instantiation, operation, and testing among different compliant hardware and software products. These common interfaces within the architecture abstract application software from the underlying hardware to enable technology insertion independently at either the software or hardware layer.

Software for Dosage Individualization of Voriconazole for Immunocompromised Patients

PubMed Central

VanGuilder, Michael; Donnelly, J. Peter; Blijlevens, Nicole M. A.; Brüggemann, Roger J. M.; Jelliffe, Roger W.; Neely, Michael N.

2013-01-01

The efficacy of voriconazole is potentially compromised by considerable pharmacokinetic variability. There are increasing insights into voriconazole concentrations that are safe and effective for treatment of invasive fungal infections. Therapeutic drug monitoring is increasingly advocated. Software to aid in the individualization of dosing would be an extremely useful clinical tool. We developed software to enable the individualization of voriconazole dosing to attain predefined serum concentration targets. The process of individualized voriconazole therapy was based on concepts of Bayesian stochastic adaptive control. Multiple-model dosage design with feedback control was used to calculate dosages that achieved desired concentration targets with maximum precision. The performance of the software program was assessed using the data from 10 recipients of an allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplant (HSCT) receiving intravenous (i.v.) voriconazole. The program was able to model the plasma concentrations with a high level of precision, despite the wide range of concentration trajectories and interindividual pharmacokinetic variability. The voriconazole concentrations predicted after the last dosages were largely concordant with those actually measured. Simulations provided an illustration of the way in which the software can be used to adjust dosages of patients falling outside desired concentration targets. This software appears to be an extremely useful tool to further optimize voriconazole therapy and aid in therapeutic drug monitoring. Further prospective studies are now required to define the utility of the controller in daily clinical practice. PMID:23380734

Upgrades to MINERVA control software

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wilson, Maurice; Eastman, Jason D.

2017-01-01

The MINiature Exoplanet Radial Velocity Array (MINERVA) is an array of four robotic telescopes located on Mt. Hopkins in Arizona that will find and characterize rocky planets around our nearest stars. We discuss the latest upgrades to the MINERVA robotic control software. Previously, our robotic control software was only capable of taking radial velocities or photometry for the entire night, but not both. We have recently increased the speed and ease of transitioning between photometry and radial velocity (RV) observations. We can now arbitrarily assign a subset of the telescopes to either photometric or spectroscopic observations. This capability enables us to monitor stellar activity while measuring the star’s RV, gather photometry on one star while continuing our RV survey of other targets and provide education and public outreach opportunities where others can observe with one or more telescopes while we continue using the remaining telescopes for research. This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Program under Grant No. 1144152.

MxCuBE: a synchrotron beamline control environment customized for macromolecular crystallography experiments

PubMed Central

Gabadinho, José; Beteva, Antonia; Guijarro, Matias; Rey-Bakaikoa, Vicente; Spruce, Darren; Bowler, Matthew W.; Brockhauser, Sandor; Flot, David; Gordon, Elspeth J.; Hall, David R.; Lavault, Bernard; McCarthy, Andrew A.; McCarthy, Joanne; Mitchell, Edward; Monaco, Stéphanie; Mueller-Dieckmann, Christoph; Nurizzo, Didier; Ravelli, Raimond B. G.; Thibault, Xavier; Walsh, Martin A.; Leonard, Gordon A.; McSweeney, Sean M.

2010-01-01

The design and features of a beamline control software system for macromolecular crystallography (MX) experiments developed at the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF) are described. This system, MxCuBE, allows users to easily and simply interact with beamline hardware components and provides automated routines for common tasks in the operation of a synchrotron beamline dedicated to experiments in MX. Additional functionality is provided through intuitive interfaces that enable the assessment of the diffraction characteristics of samples, experiment planning, automatic data collection and the on-line collection and analysis of X-ray emission spectra. The software can be run in a tandem client-server mode that allows for remote control and relevant experimental parameters and results are automatically logged in a relational database, ISPyB. MxCuBE is modular, flexible and extensible and is currently deployed on eight macromolecular crystallography beamlines at the ESRF. Additionally, the software is installed at MAX-lab beamline I911-3 and at BESSY beamline BL14.1. PMID:20724792

Integrated software health management for aerospace guidance, navigation, and control systems: A probabilistic reasoning approach

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Mbaya, Timmy

Embedded Aerospace Systems have to perform safety and mission critical operations in a real-time environment where timing and functional correctness are extremely important. Guidance, Navigation, and Control (GN&C) systems substantially rely on complex software interfacing with hardware in real-time; any faults in software or hardware, or their interaction could result in fatal consequences. Integrated Software Health Management (ISWHM) provides an approach for detection and diagnosis of software failures while the software is in operation. The ISWHM approach is based on probabilistic modeling of software and hardware sensors using a Bayesian network. To meet memory and timing constraints of real-time embedded execution, the Bayesian network is compiled into an Arithmetic Circuit, which is used for on-line monitoring. This type of system monitoring, using an ISWHM, provides automated reasoning capabilities that compute diagnoses in a timely manner when failures occur. This reasoning capability enables time-critical mitigating decisions and relieves the human agent from the time-consuming and arduous task of foraging through a multitude of isolated---and often contradictory---diagnosis data. For the purpose of demonstrating the relevance of ISWHM, modeling and reasoning is performed on a simple simulated aerospace system running on a real-time operating system emulator, the OSEK/Trampoline platform. Models for a small satellite and an F-16 fighter jet GN&C (Guidance, Navigation, and Control) system have been implemented. Analysis of the ISWHM is then performed by injecting faults and analyzing the ISWHM's diagnoses.

Performance verification of network function virtualization in software defined optical transport networks

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhao, Yongli; Hu, Liyazhou; Wang, Wei; Li, Yajie; Zhang, Jie

2017-01-01

With the continuous opening of resource acquisition and application, there are a large variety of network hardware appliances deployed as the communication infrastructure. To lunch a new network application always implies to replace the obsolete devices and needs the related space and power to accommodate it, which will increase the energy and capital investment. Network function virtualization1 (NFV) aims to address these problems by consolidating many network equipment onto industry standard elements such as servers, switches and storage. Many types of IT resources have been deployed to run Virtual Network Functions (vNFs), such as virtual switches and routers. Then how to deploy NFV in optical transport networks is a of great importance problem. This paper focuses on this problem, and gives an implementation architecture of NFV-enabled optical transport networks based on Software Defined Optical Networking (SDON) with the procedure of vNFs call and return. Especially, an implementation solution of NFV-enabled optical transport node is designed, and a parallel processing method for NFV-enabled OTN nodes is proposed. To verify the performance of NFV-enabled SDON, the protocol interaction procedures of control function virtualization and node function virtualization are demonstrated on SDON testbed. Finally, the benefits and challenges of the parallel processing method for NFV-enabled OTN nodes are simulated and analyzed.

Multiuser Collaboration with Networked Mobile Devices

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Tso, Kam S.; Tai, Ann T.; Deng, Yong M.; Becks, Paul G.

2006-01-01

In this paper we describe a multiuser collaboration infrastructure that enables multiple mission scientists to remotely and collaboratively interact with visualization and planning software, using wireless networked personal digital assistants(PDAs) and other mobile devices. During ground operations of planetary rover and lander missions, scientists need to meet daily to review downlinked data and plan science activities. For example, scientists use the Science Activity Planner (SAP) in the Mars Exploration Rover (MER) mission to visualize downlinked data and plan rover activities during the science meetings [1]. Computer displays are projected onto large screens in the meeting room to enable the scientists to view and discuss downlinked images and data displayed by SAP and other software applications. However, only one person can interact with the software applications because input to the computer is limited to a single mouse and keyboard. As a result, the scientists have to verbally express their intentions, such as selecting a target at a particular location on the Mars terrain image, to that person in order to interact with the applications. This constrains communication and limits the returns of science planning. Furthermore, ground operations for Mars missions are fundamentally constrained by the short turnaround time for science and engineering teams to process and analyze data, plan the next uplink, generate command sequences, and transmit the uplink to the vehicle [2]. Therefore, improving ground operations is crucial to the success of Mars missions. The multiuser collaboration infrastructure enables users to control software applications remotely and collaboratively using mobile devices. The infrastructure includes (1) human-computer interaction techniques to provide natural, fast, and accurate inputs, (2) a communications protocol to ensure reliable and efficient coordination of the input devices and host computers, (3) an application-independent middleware that maintains the states, sessions, and interactions of individual users of the software applications, (4) an application programming interface to enable tight integration of applications and the middleware. The infrastructure is able to support any software applications running under the Windows or Unix platforms. The resulting technologies not only are applicable to NASA mission operations, but also useful in other situations such as design reviews, brainstorming sessions, and business meetings, as they can benefit from having the participants concurrently interact with the software applications (e.g., presentation applications and CAD design tools) to illustrate their ideas and provide inputs.

UTM TCL2 Software Requirements

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Smith, Irene S.; Rios, Joseph L.; McGuirk, Patrick O.; Mulfinger, Daniel G.; Venkatesan, Priya; Smith, David R.; Baskaran, Vijayakumar; Wang, Leo

2017-01-01

The Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) Traffic Management (UTM) Technical Capability Level (TCL) 2 software implements the UTM TCL 2 software requirements described herein. These software requirements are linked to the higher level UTM TCL 2 System Requirements. Each successive TCL implements additional UTM functionality, enabling additional use cases. TCL 2 demonstrated how to enable expanded multiple operations by implementing automation for beyond visual line-of-sight, tracking operations, and operations flying over sparsely populated areas.

Identifying impact of software dependencies on replicability of biomedical workflows.

PubMed

Miksa, Tomasz; Rauber, Andreas; Mina, Eleni

2016-12-01

Complex data driven experiments form the basis of biomedical research. Recent findings warn that the context in which the software is run, that is the infrastructure and the third party dependencies, can have a crucial impact on the final results delivered by a computational experiment. This implies that in order to replicate the same result, not only the same data must be used, but also it must be run on an equivalent software stack. In this paper we present the VFramework that enables assessing replicability of workflows. It identifies whether any differences in software dependencies among two executions of the same workflow exist and whether they have impact on the produced results. We also conduct a case study in which we investigate the impact of software dependencies on replicability of Taverna workflows used in biomedical research of Huntington's disease. We re-execute analysed workflows in environments differing in operating system distribution and configuration. The results show that the VFramework can be used to identify the impact of software dependencies on the replicability of biomedical workflows. Furthermore, we observe that despite the fact that the workflows are executed in a controlled environment, they still depend on specific tools installed in the environment. The context model used by the VFramework improves the deficiencies of provenance traces and documents also such tools. Based on our findings we define guidelines for workflow owners that enable them to improve replicability of their workflows. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Software development kit for a compact cryo-refrigerator

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gardiner, J.; Hamilton, J.; Lawton, J.; Knight, K.; Wilson, A.; Spagna, S.

2017-12-01

This paper introduces a Software Development Kit (SDK) that enables the creation of custom software applications that automate the control of a cryo-refrigerator (Quantum Design model GA-1) in third party instruments. A remote interface allows real time tracking and logging of critical system diagnostics such as pressures, temperatures, valve states and run modes. The helium compressor scroll capsule speed and Gifford-McMahon (G-M) cold head speed can be manually adjusted over a serial communication line via a CAN interface. This configuration optimizes cooling power, while reducing wear on moving components thus extending service life. Additionally, a proportional speed control mode allows for automated throttling of speeds based on temperature or pressure feedback from a 3rd party device. Warm up and cool down modes allow 1st and 2nd stage temperatures to be adjusted without the use of external heaters.

Representation of Ice Geometry by Parametric Functions: Construction of Approximating NURBS Curves and Quantification of Ice Roughness--Year 1: Approximating NURBS Curves

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Dill, Loren H.; Choo, Yung K. (Technical Monitor)

2004-01-01

Software was developed to construct approximating NURBS curves for iced airfoil geometries. Users specify a tolerance that determines the extent to which the approximating curve follows the rough ice. The user can therefore smooth the ice geometry in a controlled manner, thereby enabling the generation of grids suitable for numerical aerodynamic simulations. Ultimately, this ability to smooth the ice geometry will permit studies of the effects of smoothing upon the aerodynamics of iced airfoils. The software was applied to several different types of iced airfoil data collected in the Icing Research Tunnel at NASA Glenn Research Center, and in all cases was found to efficiently generate suitable approximating NURBS curves. This method is an improvement over the current "control point formulation" of Smaggice (v.1.2). In this report, we present the relevant theory of approximating NURBS curves and discuss typical results of the software.

Adopting Open Source Software to Address Software Risks during the Scientific Data Life Cycle

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Vinay, S.; Downs, R. R.

2012-12-01

Software enables the creation, management, storage, distribution, discovery, and use of scientific data throughout the data lifecycle. However, the capabilities offered by software also present risks for the stewardship of scientific data, since future access to digital data is dependent on the use of software. From operating systems to applications for analyzing data, the dependence of data on software presents challenges for the stewardship of scientific data. Adopting open source software provides opportunities to address some of the proprietary risks of data dependence on software. For example, in some cases, open source software can be deployed to avoid licensing restrictions for using, modifying, and transferring proprietary software. The availability of the source code of open source software also enables the inclusion of modifications, which may be contributed by various community members who are addressing similar issues. Likewise, an active community that is maintaining open source software can be a valuable source of help, providing an opportunity to collaborate to address common issues facing adopters. As part of the effort to meet the challenges of software dependence for scientific data stewardship, risks from software dependence have been identified that exist during various times of the data lifecycle. The identification of these risks should enable the development of plans for mitigating software dependencies, where applicable, using open source software, and to improve understanding of software dependency risks for scientific data and how they can be reduced during the data life cycle.

EPICS as a MARTe Configuration Environment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Valcarcel, Daniel F.; Barbalace, Antonio; Neto, André; Duarte, André S.; Alves, Diogo; Carvalho, Bernardo B.; Carvalho, Pedro J.; Sousa, Jorge; Fernandes, Horácio; Goncalves, Bruno; Sartori, Filippo; Manduchi, Gabriele

2011-08-01

The Multithreaded Application Real-Time executor (MARTe) software provides an environment for the hard real-time execution of codes while leveraging a standardized algorithm development process. The Experimental Physics and Industrial Control System (EPICS) software allows the deployment and remote monitoring of networked control systems. Channel Access (CA) is the protocol that enables the communication between EPICS distributed components. It allows to set and monitor process variables across the network belonging to different systems. The COntrol and Data Acquisition and Communication (CODAC) system for the ITER Tokamak will be EPICS based and will be used to monitor and live configure the plant controllers. The reconfiguration capability in a hard real-time system requires strict latencies from the request to the actuation and it is a key element in the design of the distributed control algorithm. Presently, MARTe and its objects are configured using a well-defined structured language. After each configuration, all objects are destroyed and the system rebuilt, following the strong hard real-time rule that a real-time system in online mode must behave in a strictly deterministic fashion. This paper presents the design and considerations to use MARTe as a plant controller and enable it to be EPICS monitorable and configurable without disturbing the execution at any time, in particular during a plasma discharge. The solutions designed for this will be presented and discussed.

Baseline Assessment and Prioritization Framework for IVHM Integrity Assurance Enabling Capabilities

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Cooper, Eric G.; DiVito, Benedetto L.; Jacklin, Stephen A.; Miner, Paul S.

2009-01-01

Fundamental to vehicle health management is the deployment of systems incorporating advanced technologies for predicting and detecting anomalous conditions in highly complex and integrated environments. Integrated structural integrity health monitoring, statistical algorithms for detection, estimation, prediction, and fusion, and diagnosis supporting adaptive control are examples of advanced technologies that present considerable verification and validation challenges. These systems necessitate interactions between physical and software-based systems that are highly networked with sensing and actuation subsystems, and incorporate technologies that are, in many respects, different from those employed in civil aviation today. A formidable barrier to deploying these advanced technologies in civil aviation is the lack of enabling verification and validation tools, methods, and technologies. The development of new verification and validation capabilities will not only enable the fielding of advanced vehicle health management systems, but will also provide new assurance capabilities for verification and validation of current generation aviation software which has been implicated in anomalous in-flight behavior. This paper describes the research focused on enabling capabilities for verification and validation underway within NASA s Integrated Vehicle Health Management project, discusses the state of the art of these capabilities, and includes a framework for prioritizing activities.

A model-based approach for automated in vitro cell tracking and chemotaxis analyses.

PubMed

Debeir, Olivier; Camby, Isabelle; Kiss, Robert; Van Ham, Philippe; Decaestecker, Christine

2004-07-01

Chemotaxis may be studied in two main ways: 1) counting cells passing through an insert (e.g., using Boyden chambers), and 2) directly observing cell cultures (e.g., using Dunn chambers), both in response to stationary concentration gradients. This article promotes the use of Dunn chambers and in vitro cell-tracking, achieved by video microscopy coupled with automatic image analysis software, in order to extract quantitative and qualitative measurements characterizing the response of cells to a diffusible chemical agent. Previously, we set up a videomicroscopy system coupled with image analysis software that was able to compute cell trajectories from in vitro cell cultures. In the present study, we are introducing a new software increasing the application field of this system to chemotaxis studies. This software is based on an adapted version of the active contour methodology, enabling each cell to be efficiently tracked for hours and resulting in detailed descriptions of individual cell trajectories. The major advantages of this method come from an improved robustness with respect to variability in cell morphologies between different cell lines and dynamical changes in cell shape during cell migration. Moreover, the software includes a very small number of parameters which do not require overly sensitive tuning. Finally, the running time of the software is very short, allowing improved possibilities in acquisition frequency and, consequently, improved descriptions of complex cell trajectories, i.e. trajectories including cell division and cell crossing. We validated this software on several artificial and real cell culture experiments in Dunn chambers also including comparisons with manual (human-controlled) analyses. We developed new software and data analysis tools for automated cell tracking which enable cell chemotaxis to be efficiently analyzed. Copyright 2004 Wiley-Liss, Inc.

A New Standing Posture Detector to Enable People with Multiple Disabilities to Control Environmental Stimulation by Changing Their Standing Posture through a Commercial Wii Balance Board

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Shih, Ching-Hsiang; Shih, Ching-Tien; Chiang, Ming-Shan

2010-01-01

This study assessed whether two persons with multiple disabilities would be able to control environmental stimulation using body swing (changing standing posture) and a Wii Balance Board with a newly developed standing posture detection program (i.e. a new software program turns a Wii Balance Board into a precise standing posture detector). The…

A New Limb Movement Detector Enabling People with Multiple Disabilities to Control Environmental Stimulation through Limb Swing with a Gyration Air Mouse

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Shih, Ching-Hsiang; Chang, Man-Ling; Shih, Ching-Tien

2010-01-01

This study assessed whether two persons with multiple disabilities would be able to control environmental stimulation using limb swing with a gyration air mouse and a newly developed limb movement detection program (LMDP, i.e., a new software program that turns a gyration air mouse into a precise limb movement detector). The study was performed…

Use of CCSDS Packets Over SpaceWire to Control Hardware

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Haddad, Omar; Blau, Michael; Haghani, Noosha; Yuknis, William; Albaijes, Dennis

2012-01-01

For the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, the Command and Data Handling subsystem consisted of several electronic hardware assemblies that were connected with SpaceWire serial links. Electronic hardware would be commanded/controlled and telemetry data was obtained using the SpaceWire links. Prior art focused on parallel data buses and other types of serial buses, which were not compatible with the SpaceWire and the core flight executive (CFE) software bus. This innovation applies to anything that utilizes both SpaceWire networks and the CFE software. The CCSDS (Consultative Committee for Space Data Systems) packet contains predetermined values in its payload fields that electronic hardware attached at the terminus of the SpaceWire node would decode, interpret, and execute. The hardware s interpretation of the packet data would enable the hardware to change its state/configuration (command) or generate status (telemetry). The primary purpose is to provide an interface that is compatible with the hardware and the CFE software bus. By specifying the format of the CCSDS packet, it is possible to specify how the resulting hardware is to be built (in terms of digital logic) that results in a hardware design that can be controlled by the CFE software bus in the final application

Upgrading of data acquisition software for centralized radiation monitoring system in Malaysian Nuclear Agency

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yussup, F.; Ibrahim, M. M.; Haris, M. F.; Soh, S. C.; Hasim, H.; Azman, A.; Razalim, F. A. A.; Yapp, R.; Ramli, A. A. M.

2016-01-01

With the growth of technology, many devices and equipments can be connected to the network and internet to enable online data acquisition for real-time data monitoring and control from monitoring devices located at remote sites. Centralized radiation monitoring system (CRMS) is a system that enables area radiation level at various locations in Malaysian Nuclear Agency (Nuklear Malaysia) to be monitored centrally by using a web browser. The Local Area Network (LAN) in Nuclear Malaysia is utilized in CRMS as a communication media for data acquisition of the area radiation levels from radiation detectors. The development of the system involves device configuration, wiring, network and hardware installation, software and web development. This paper describes the software upgrading on the system server that is responsible to acquire and record the area radiation readings from the detectors. The recorded readings are called in a web programming to be displayed on a website. Besides the main feature which is acquiring the area radiation levels in Nuclear Malaysia centrally, the upgrading involves new features such as uniform time interval for data recording and exporting, warning system and dose triggering.

PDEMOD: Software for control/structures optimization

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Taylor, Lawrence W., Jr.; Zimmerman, David

1991-01-01

Because of the possibility of adverse interaction between the control system and the structural dynamics of large, flexible spacecraft, great care must be taken to ensure stability and system performance. Because of the high cost of insertion of mass into low earth orbit, it is prudent to optimize the roles of structure and control systems simultaneously. Because of the difficulty and the computational burden in modeling and analyzing the control structure system dynamics, the total problem is often split and treated iteratively. It would aid design if the control structure system dynamics could be represented in a single system of equations. With the use of the software PDEMOD (Partial Differential Equation Model), it is now possible to optimize structure and control systems simultaneously. The distributed parameter modeling approach enables embedding the control system dynamics into the same equations for the structural dynamics model. By doing this, the current difficulties involved in model order reduction are avoided. The NASA Mini-MAST truss is used an an example for studying integrated control structure design.

Implementation guide for turbidity threshold sampling: principles, procedures, and analysis

Treesearch

Jack Lewis; Rand Eads

2009-01-01

Turbidity Threshold Sampling uses real-time turbidity and river stage information to automatically collect water quality samples for estimating suspended sediment loads. The system uses a programmable data logger in conjunction with a stage measurement device, a turbidity sensor, and a pumping sampler. Specialized software enables the user to control the sampling...

Cloud-enabled microscopy and droplet microfluidic platform for specific detection of Escherichia coli in water.

PubMed

Golberg, Alexander; Linshiz, Gregory; Kravets, Ilia; Stawski, Nina; Hillson, Nathan J; Yarmush, Martin L; Marks, Robert S; Konry, Tania

2014-01-01

We report an all-in-one platform - ScanDrop - for the rapid and specific capture, detection, and identification of bacteria in drinking water. The ScanDrop platform integrates droplet microfluidics, a portable imaging system, and cloud-based control software and data storage. The cloud-based control software and data storage enables robotic image acquisition, remote image processing, and rapid data sharing. These features form a "cloud" network for water quality monitoring. We have demonstrated the capability of ScanDrop to perform water quality monitoring via the detection of an indicator coliform bacterium, Escherichia coli, in drinking water contaminated with feces. Magnetic beads conjugated with antibodies to E. coli antigen were used to selectively capture and isolate specific bacteria from water samples. The bead-captured bacteria were co-encapsulated in pico-liter droplets with fluorescently-labeled anti-E. coli antibodies, and imaged with an automated custom designed fluorescence microscope. The entire water quality diagnostic process required 8 hours from sample collection to online-accessible results compared with 2-4 days for other currently available standard detection methods.

Cloud-Enabled Microscopy and Droplet Microfluidic Platform for Specific Detection of Escherichia coli in Water

PubMed Central

Kravets, Ilia; Stawski, Nina; Hillson, Nathan J.; Yarmush, Martin L.; Marks, Robert S.; Konry, Tania

2014-01-01

We report an all-in-one platform – ScanDrop – for the rapid and specific capture, detection, and identification of bacteria in drinking water. The ScanDrop platform integrates droplet microfluidics, a portable imaging system, and cloud-based control software and data storage. The cloud-based control software and data storage enables robotic image acquisition, remote image processing, and rapid data sharing. These features form a “cloud” network for water quality monitoring. We have demonstrated the capability of ScanDrop to perform water quality monitoring via the detection of an indicator coliform bacterium, Escherichia coli, in drinking water contaminated with feces. Magnetic beads conjugated with antibodies to E. coli antigen were used to selectively capture and isolate specific bacteria from water samples. The bead-captured bacteria were co-encapsulated in pico-liter droplets with fluorescently-labeled anti-E. coli antibodies, and imaged with an automated custom designed fluorescence microscope. The entire water quality diagnostic process required 8 hours from sample collection to online-accessible results compared with 2–4 days for other currently available standard detection methods. PMID:24475107

Digital Multicasting of Multiple Audio Streams

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Macha, Mitchell; Bullock, John

2007-01-01

The Mission Control Center Voice Over Internet Protocol (MCC VOIP) system (see figure) comprises hardware and software that effect simultaneous, nearly real-time transmission of as many as 14 different audio streams to authorized listeners via the MCC intranet and/or the Internet. The original version of the MCC VOIP system was conceived to enable flight-support personnel located in offices outside a spacecraft mission control center to monitor audio loops within the mission control center. Different versions of the MCC VOIP system could be used for a variety of public and commercial purposes - for example, to enable members of the general public to monitor one or more NASA audio streams through their home computers, to enable air-traffic supervisors to monitor communication between airline pilots and air-traffic controllers in training, and to monitor conferences among brokers in a stock exchange. At the transmitting end, the audio-distribution process begins with feeding the audio signals to analog-to-digital converters. The resulting digital streams are sent through the MCC intranet, using a user datagram protocol (UDP), to a server that converts them to encrypted data packets. The encrypted data packets are then routed to the personal computers of authorized users by use of multicasting techniques. The total data-processing load on the portion of the system upstream of and including the encryption server is the total load imposed by all of the audio streams being encoded, regardless of the number of the listeners or the number of streams being monitored concurrently by the listeners. The personal computer of a user authorized to listen is equipped with special- purpose MCC audio-player software. When the user launches the program, the user is prompted to provide identification and a password. In one of two access- control provisions, the program is hard-coded to validate the user s identity and password against a list maintained on a domain-controller computer at the MCC. In the other access-control provision, the program verifies that the user is authorized to have access to the audio streams. Once both access-control checks are completed, the audio software presents a graphical display that includes audiostream-selection buttons and volume-control sliders. The user can select all or any subset of the available audio streams and can adjust the volume of each stream independently of that of the other streams. The audio-player program spawns a "read" process for the selected stream(s). The spawned process sends, to the router(s), a "multicast-join" request for the selected streams. The router(s) responds to the request by sending the encrypted multicast packets to the spawned process. The spawned process receives the encrypted multicast packets and sends a decryption packet to audio-driver software. As the volume or muting features are changed by the user, interrupts are sent to the spawned process to change the corresponding attributes sent to the audio-driver software. The total latency of this system - that is, the total time from the origination of the audio signals to generation of sound at a listener s computer - lies between four and six seconds.

Adapting Wireless Technology to Lighting Control and Environmental Sensing

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Dana Teasdale; Francis Rubinstein; David S. Watson

Although advanced lighting control systems offer significant energy savings, the high cost of retrofitting buildings with advanced lighting control systems is a barrier to adoption of this energy-saving technology. Wireless technology, however, offers a solution to mounting installation costs since it requires no additional wiring to implement. To demonstrate the feasibility of such a system, a prototype wirelessly-controlled advanced lighting system was designed and built. The system includes the following components: a wirelessly-controllable analog circuit module (ACM), a wirelessly-controllable electronic dimmable ballast, a T8 3-lamp fixture, an environmental multi-sensor, a current transducer, and control software. The ACM, dimmable ballast, multi-sensor,more » and current transducer were all integrated with SmartMesh{trademark} wireless mesh networking nodes, called motes, enabling wireless communication, sensor monitoring, and actuator control. Each mote-enabled device has a reliable communication path to the SmartMesh Manager, a single board computer that controls network functions and connects the wireless network to a PC running lighting control software. The ACM is capable of locally driving one or more standard 0-10 Volt electronic dimmable ballasts through relay control and a 0-10 Volt controllable output, in addition to 0-24 Volt and 0-10 Volt inputs. The mote-integrated electronic dimmable ballast is designed to drive a standard 3-lamp T8 light fixture. The environmental multisensor measures occupancy, light level and temperature. The current transducer is used to measure the power consumed by the fixture. Control software was developed to implement advanced lighting algorithms, including open and closed-loop daylight ramping, occupancy control, and demand response. Engineering prototypes of each component were fabricated and tested in a bench-scale system. Based on standard industry practices, a cost analysis was conducted. It is estimated that the installation cost of a wireless advanced lighting control system for a retrofit application is at least 20% lower than a comparable wired system for a typical 16,000 square-foot office building, with a payback period of less than 3 years. At 30% market penetration saturation, a cumulative 695 Billion kWh of energy could be saved through 2025, a cost savings of $52 Billion.« less

Design and development of control unit and software for the ADFOSC instrument of the 3.6 m Devasthal optical telescope

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kumar, T. S.

2016-08-01

In this paper, we describe the details of control unit and GUI software for positioning two filter wheels, a slit wheel and a grism wheel in the ADFOSC instrument. This is a first generation instrument being built for the 3.6 m Devasthal optical telescope. The control hardware consists of five electronic boards based on low cost 8-bit PIC microcontrollers and are distributed over I2C bus. The four wheels are controlled by four identical boards which are configured in I2C slave mode while the fifth board acts as an I2C master for sending commands to and receiving status from the slave boards. The master also communicates with the interfacing PC over TCP/IP protocol using simple ASCII commands. For moving the wheels stepper motors along with suitable amplifiers have been employed. Homing after powering ON is achieved using hall effect sensors. By implementing distributed control units having identical design modularity is achieved enabling easier maintenance and upgradation. A GUI based software for commanding the instrument is developed in Microsoft Visual C++. For operating the system during observations the user selects normal mode while the engineering mode is available for offering additional flexibility and low level control during maintenance and testing. A detailed time-stamped log of commands, status and errors are continuously generated. Both the control unit and the software have been successfully tested and integrated with the ADFOSC instrument.

Managing Information On Technical Requirements

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mauldin, Lemuel E., III; Hammond, Dana P.

1993-01-01

Technical Requirements Analysis and Control Systems/Initial Operating Capability (TRACS/IOC) computer program provides supplemental software tools for analysis, control, and interchange of project requirements so qualified project members have access to pertinent project information, even if in different locations. Enables users to analyze and control requirements, serves as focal point for project requirements, and integrates system supporting efficient and consistent operations. TRACS/IOC is HyperCard stack for use on Macintosh computers running HyperCard 1.2 or later and Oracle 1.2 or later.

Embedded control system for computerized franking machine

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Shi, W. M.; Zhang, L. B.; Xu, F.; Zhan, H. W.

2007-12-01

This paper presents a novel control system for franking machine. A methodology for operating a franking machine using the functional controls consisting of connection, configuration and franking electromechanical drive is studied. A set of enabling technologies to synthesize postage management software architectures driven microprocessor-based embedded systems is proposed. The cryptographic algorithm that calculates mail items is analyzed to enhance the postal indicia accountability and security. The study indicated that the franking machine is reliability, performance and flexibility in printing mail items.

Draper Station Analysis Tool

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bedrossian, Nazareth; Jang, Jiann-Woei; McCants, Edward; Omohundro, Zachary; Ring, Tom; Templeton, Jeremy; Zoss, Jeremy; Wallace, Jonathan; Ziegler, Philip

2011-01-01

Draper Station Analysis Tool (DSAT) is a computer program, built on commercially available software, for simulating and analyzing complex dynamic systems. Heretofore used in designing and verifying guidance, navigation, and control systems of the International Space Station, DSAT has a modular architecture that lends itself to modification for application to spacecraft or terrestrial systems. DSAT consists of user-interface, data-structures, simulation-generation, analysis, plotting, documentation, and help components. DSAT automates the construction of simulations and the process of analysis. DSAT provides a graphical user interface (GUI), plus a Web-enabled interface, similar to the GUI, that enables a remotely located user to gain access to the full capabilities of DSAT via the Internet and Webbrowser software. Data structures are used to define the GUI, the Web-enabled interface, simulations, and analyses. Three data structures define the type of analysis to be performed: closed-loop simulation, frequency response, and/or stability margins. DSAT can be executed on almost any workstation, desktop, or laptop computer. DSAT provides better than an order of magnitude improvement in cost, schedule, and risk assessment for simulation based design and verification of complex dynamic systems.

ICAROUS - Integrated Configurable Algorithms for Reliable Operations Of Unmanned Systems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Consiglio, María; Muñoz, César; Hagen, George; Narkawicz, Anthony; Balachandran, Swee

2016-01-01

NASA's Unmanned Aerial System (UAS) Traffic Management (UTM) project aims at enabling near-term, safe operations of small UAS vehicles in uncontrolled airspace, i.e., Class G airspace. A far-term goal of UTM research and development is to accommodate the expected rise in small UAS traffic density throughout the National Airspace System (NAS) at low altitudes for beyond visual line-of-sight operations. This paper describes a new capability referred to as ICAROUS (Integrated Configurable Algorithms for Reliable Operations of Unmanned Systems), which is being developed under the UTM project. ICAROUS is a software architecture comprised of highly assured algorithms for building safety-centric, autonomous, unmanned aircraft applications. Central to the development of the ICAROUS algorithms is the use of well-established formal methods to guarantee higher levels of safety assurance by monitoring and bounding the behavior of autonomous systems. The core autonomy-enabling capabilities in ICAROUS include constraint conformance monitoring and contingency control functions. ICAROUS also provides a highly configurable user interface that enables the modular integration of mission-specific software components.

VirtualPlant: A Software Platform to Support Systems Biology Research1[W][OA

PubMed Central

Katari, Manpreet S.; Nowicki, Steve D.; Aceituno, Felipe F.; Nero, Damion; Kelfer, Jonathan; Thompson, Lee Parnell; Cabello, Juan M.; Davidson, Rebecca S.; Goldberg, Arthur P.; Shasha, Dennis E.; Coruzzi, Gloria M.; Gutiérrez, Rodrigo A.

2010-01-01

Data generation is no longer the limiting factor in advancing biological research. In addition, data integration, analysis, and interpretation have become key bottlenecks and challenges that biologists conducting genomic research face daily. To enable biologists to derive testable hypotheses from the increasing amount of genomic data, we have developed the VirtualPlant software platform. VirtualPlant enables scientists to visualize, integrate, and analyze genomic data from a systems biology perspective. VirtualPlant integrates genome-wide data concerning the known and predicted relationships among genes, proteins, and molecules, as well as genome-scale experimental measurements. VirtualPlant also provides visualization techniques that render multivariate information in visual formats that facilitate the extraction of biological concepts. Importantly, VirtualPlant helps biologists who are not trained in computer science to mine lists of genes, microarray experiments, and gene networks to address questions in plant biology, such as: What are the molecular mechanisms by which internal or external perturbations affect processes controlling growth and development? We illustrate the use of VirtualPlant with three case studies, ranging from querying a gene of interest to the identification of gene networks and regulatory hubs that control seed development. Whereas the VirtualPlant software was developed to mine Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) genomic data, its data structures, algorithms, and visualization tools are designed in a species-independent way. VirtualPlant is freely available at www.virtualplant.org. PMID:20007449

Open Architecture Standard for NASA's Software-Defined Space Telecommunications Radio Systems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Reinhart, Richard C.; Johnson, Sandra K.; Kacpura, Thomas J.; Hall, Charles S.; Smith, Carl R.; Liebetreu, John

2008-01-01

NASA is developing an architecture standard for software-defined radios used in space- and ground-based platforms to enable commonality among radio developments to enhance capability and services while reducing mission and programmatic risk. Transceivers (or transponders) with functionality primarily defined in software (e.g., firmware) have the ability to change their functional behavior through software alone. This radio architecture standard offers value by employing common waveform software interfaces, method of instantiation, operation, and testing among different compliant hardware and software products. These common interfaces within the architecture abstract application software from the underlying hardware to enable technology insertion independently at either the software or hardware layer. This paper presents the initial Space Telecommunications Radio System (STRS) Architecture for NASA missions to provide the desired software abstraction and flexibility while minimizing the resources necessary to support the architecture.

An electronic registry for physiotherapists in Belgium.

PubMed

Buyl, Ronald; Nyssen, Marc

2008-01-01

This paper describes the results of the KINELECTRICS project. Since more and more clinical documents are stored and transmitted in an electronic way, the aim of this project was to design an electronic version of the registry that contains all acts of physiotherapists. The solution we present here, not only meets all legal constraints, but also enables to verify the traceability and inalterability of the generated documents, by means of SHA-256 codes. The proposed structure, using XML technology can also form a basis for the development of tools that can be used by the controlling authorities. By means of a certification procedure for software systems, we succeeded in developing a user friendly system that enables end-users that use a quality labeled software package, to automatically produce all the legally necessary documents concerning the registry. Moreover, we hope that this development will be an incentive for non-users to start working in an electronic way.

A General Overview of the Data Acquisition and Controls Systems (DACS) of the E-Complex at NASA's Stennis Space Center

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hughes, Mark S.; Hebert, Phillip W.; Davis, Dawn M.; Jensen, Scott L.; Abell, Frederick K., Jr.

2004-01-01

The John C. Stennis Space Center (SSC) provides test operations services to a variety of customers, including NASA, DoD, and commercial enterprises for the development of current and next-generation rocket propulsion systems. Many of these testing services are provided in the E-Complex test facilities composed of three active test stands (E1, E2, & E3) and 7 total test positions. Each test position is outfitted with unique sets of data acquisition and controls hardware and software that record both facility and test article data and enable safe operation of the test facility. This paper addresses each system in more detail including efforts to upgrade hardware and software.

Dataworks for GNSS: Software for Supporting Data Sharing and Federation of Geodetic Networks

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Boler, F. M.; Meertens, C. M.; Miller, M. M.; Wier, S.; Rost, M.; Matykiewicz, J.

2015-12-01

Continuously-operating Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) networks are increasingly being installed globally for a wide variety of science and societal applications. GNSS enables Earth science research in areas including tectonic plate interactions, crustal deformation in response to loading by tectonics, magmatism, water and ice, and the dynamics of water - and thereby energy transfer - in the atmosphere at regional scale. The many individual scientists and organizations that set up GNSS stations globally are often open to sharing data, but lack the resources or expertise to deploy systems and software to manage and curate data and metadata and provide user tools that would support data sharing. UNAVCO previously gained experience in facilitating data sharing through the NASA-supported development of the Geodesy Seamless Archive Centers (GSAC) open source software. GSAC provides web interfaces and simple web services for data and metadata discovery and access, supports federation of multiple data centers, and simplifies transfer of data and metadata to long-term archives. The NSF supported the dissemination of GSAC to multiple European data centers forming the European Plate Observing System. To expand upon GSAC to provide end-to-end, instrument-to-distribution capability, UNAVCO developed Dataworks for GNSS with NSF funding to the COCONet project, and deployed this software on systems that are now operating as Regional GNSS Data Centers as part of the NSF-funded TLALOCNet and COCONet projects. Dataworks consists of software modules written in Python and Java for data acquisition, management and sharing. There are modules for GNSS receiver control and data download, a database schema for metadata, tools for metadata handling, ingest software to manage file metadata, data file management scripts, GSAC, scripts for mirroring station data and metadata from partner GSACs, and extensive software and operator documentation. UNAVCO plans to provide a cloud VM image of Dataworks that would allow standing up a Dataworks-enabled GNSS data center without requiring upfront investment in server hardware. By enabling data creators to organize their data and metadata for sharing, Dataworks helps scientists expand their data curation awareness and responsibility, and enhances data access for all.

CASPER Version 2.0

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Chien, Steve; Rabideau, Gregg; Tran, Daniel; Knight, Russell; Chouinard, Caroline; Estlin, Tara; Gaines, Daniel; Clement, Bradley; Barrett, Anthony

2007-01-01

CASPER is designed to perform automated planning of interdependent activities within a system subject to requirements, constraints, and limitations on resources. In contradistinction to the traditional concept of batch planning followed by execution, CASPER implements a concept of continuous planning and replanning in response to unanticipated changes (including failures), integrated with execution. Improvements over other, similar software that have been incorporated into CASPER version 2.0 include an enhanced executable interface to facilitate integration with a wide range of execution software systems and supporting software libraries; features to support execution while reasoning about urgency, importance, and impending deadlines; features that enable accommodation to a wide range of computing environments that include various central processing units and random- access-memory capacities; and improved generic time-server and time-control features.

Protected transitional solution to transformational satellite communications

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Brand, Jerry C.

2005-06-01

As the Warfighter progresses into the next generation battlefield, transformational communications become evident as an enabling technology. Satellite communications become even more vital as the battles range over greater non-contiguous spaces. While current satellite communications provide suitable beyond line-of-sight communications and the Transformational Communications Architecture (TCA) sets the stage for sound information exchange, a realizable transition must occur to ensure successful succession to this higher level. This paper addresses the need for a planned escalation to the next generation satellite communications architecture and offers near-term alternatives. Commercial satellite systems continue to enable the Warfighter to reach back to needed information resources, providing a large majority of available bandwidth. Four areas of concentration for transition include encrypted Telemetry, Tracking and Control (or Command) (TT&C), encrypted and covered data, satellite attack detection and protection, and operational mobility. Solution methodologies include directly embedding COMSEC devices in the satellites and terminals, and supplementing existing terminals with suitable equipment and software. Future satellites planned for near-term launches can be adapted to include commercial grade and higher-level secure equipment. Alternately, the expected use of programmable modems (Software Defined Radios (SDR)) enables incorporation of powerful cipher methods approaching military standards as well as waveforms suitable for on-the-move operation. Minimal equipment and software additions on the satellites can provide reasonable attack detection and protection methods in concert with the planned satellite usage. Network management suite modifications enable cohesive incorporation of these protection schemes. Such transitional ideas offer a smooth and planned transition as the TCA takes life.

A wireless object location detector enabling people with developmental disabilities to control environmental stimulation through simple occupational activities with Nintendo Wii Balance Boards.

PubMed

Shih, Ching-Hsiang; Chang, Man-Ling

2012-01-01

The latest researches have adopted software technology, turning the Nintendo Wii Balance Board into a high performance standing location detector with a newly developed standing location detection program (SLDP). This study extended SLDP functionality to assess whether two people with developmental disabilities would be able to actively perform simple occupational activities by controlling their favorite environmental stimulation using Nintendo Wii Balance Boards and SLDP software. An ABAB design was adopted in this study to perform the tests. The test results showed that, during the intervention phases, both participants significantly increased their target response (i.e. simple occupational activity) to activate the control system to produce environmental stimulation. The practical and developmental implications of the findings are discussed. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Quality control, analysis and secure sharing of Luminex® immunoassay data using the open source LabKey Server platform

PubMed Central

2013-01-01

Background Immunoassays that employ multiplexed bead arrays produce high information content per sample. Such assays are now frequently used to evaluate humoral responses in clinical trials. Integrated software is needed for the analysis, quality control, and secure sharing of the high volume of data produced by such multiplexed assays. Software that facilitates data exchange and provides flexibility to perform customized analyses (including multiple curve fits and visualizations of assay performance over time) could increase scientists’ capacity to use these immunoassays to evaluate human clinical trials. Results The HIV Vaccine Trials Network and the Statistical Center for HIV/AIDS Research and Prevention collaborated with LabKey Software to enhance the open source LabKey Server platform to facilitate workflows for multiplexed bead assays. This system now supports the management, analysis, quality control, and secure sharing of data from multiplexed immunoassays that leverage Luminex xMAP® technology. These assays may be custom or kit-based. Newly added features enable labs to: (i) import run data from spreadsheets output by Bio-Plex Manager™ software; (ii) customize data processing, curve fits, and algorithms through scripts written in common languages, such as R; (iii) select script-defined calculation options through a graphical user interface; (iv) collect custom metadata for each titration, analyte, run and batch of runs; (v) calculate dose–response curves for titrations; (vi) interpolate unknown concentrations from curves for titrated standards; (vii) flag run data for exclusion from analysis; (viii) track quality control metrics across runs using Levey-Jennings plots; and (ix) automatically flag outliers based on expected values. Existing system features allow researchers to analyze, integrate, visualize, export and securely share their data, as well as to construct custom user interfaces and workflows. Conclusions Unlike other tools tailored for Luminex immunoassays, LabKey Server allows labs to customize their Luminex analyses using scripting while still presenting users with a single, graphical interface for processing and analyzing data. The LabKey Server system also stands out among Luminex tools for enabling smooth, secure transfer of data, quality control information, and analyses between collaborators. LabKey Server and its Luminex features are freely available as open source software at http://www.labkey.com under the Apache 2.0 license. PMID:23631706

Quality control, analysis and secure sharing of Luminex® immunoassay data using the open source LabKey Server platform.

PubMed

Eckels, Josh; Nathe, Cory; Nelson, Elizabeth K; Shoemaker, Sara G; Nostrand, Elizabeth Van; Yates, Nicole L; Ashley, Vicki C; Harris, Linda J; Bollenbeck, Mark; Fong, Youyi; Tomaras, Georgia D; Piehler, Britt

2013-04-30

Immunoassays that employ multiplexed bead arrays produce high information content per sample. Such assays are now frequently used to evaluate humoral responses in clinical trials. Integrated software is needed for the analysis, quality control, and secure sharing of the high volume of data produced by such multiplexed assays. Software that facilitates data exchange and provides flexibility to perform customized analyses (including multiple curve fits and visualizations of assay performance over time) could increase scientists' capacity to use these immunoassays to evaluate human clinical trials. The HIV Vaccine Trials Network and the Statistical Center for HIV/AIDS Research and Prevention collaborated with LabKey Software to enhance the open source LabKey Server platform to facilitate workflows for multiplexed bead assays. This system now supports the management, analysis, quality control, and secure sharing of data from multiplexed immunoassays that leverage Luminex xMAP® technology. These assays may be custom or kit-based. Newly added features enable labs to: (i) import run data from spreadsheets output by Bio-Plex Manager™ software; (ii) customize data processing, curve fits, and algorithms through scripts written in common languages, such as R; (iii) select script-defined calculation options through a graphical user interface; (iv) collect custom metadata for each titration, analyte, run and batch of runs; (v) calculate dose-response curves for titrations; (vi) interpolate unknown concentrations from curves for titrated standards; (vii) flag run data for exclusion from analysis; (viii) track quality control metrics across runs using Levey-Jennings plots; and (ix) automatically flag outliers based on expected values. Existing system features allow researchers to analyze, integrate, visualize, export and securely share their data, as well as to construct custom user interfaces and workflows. Unlike other tools tailored for Luminex immunoassays, LabKey Server allows labs to customize their Luminex analyses using scripting while still presenting users with a single, graphical interface for processing and analyzing data. The LabKey Server system also stands out among Luminex tools for enabling smooth, secure transfer of data, quality control information, and analyses between collaborators. LabKey Server and its Luminex features are freely available as open source software at http://www.labkey.com under the Apache 2.0 license.

iStethoscope: a demonstration of the use of mobile devices for auscultation.

PubMed

Bentley, Peter J

2015-01-01

iStethoscope Pro is the first piece of software (an "App") produced for iOS devices, which enabled users to exploit their smartphones, music players, or tablets as stethoscopes. The software exploits the built-in microphone (and supports externally added microphones) and performs real-time amplification and filtering to enable heart sounds to be heard with high fidelity. The software also enables the heart sounds to be recorded, analyzed using a spectrogram, and to be transmitted to others via e-mail. This chapter describes the motivation, functionality, and results from this work.

Climate tools in mainstream Linux distributions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

McKinstry, Alastair

2015-04-01

Debian/meterology is a project to integrate climate tools and analysis software into the mainstream Debian/Ubuntu Linux distributions. This work describes lessons learnt, and recommends practices for scientific software to be adopted and maintained in OS distributions. In addition to standard analysis tools (cdo,, grads, ferret, metview, ncl, etc.), software used by the Earth System Grid Federation was chosen for integraion, to enable ESGF portals to be built on this base; however exposing scientific codes via web APIs enables security weaknesses, normally ignorable, to be exposed. How tools are hardened, and what changes are required to handle security upgrades, are described. Secondly, to enable libraries and components (e.g. Python modules) to be integrated requires planning by writers: it is not sufficient to assume users can upgrade their code when you make incompatible changes. Here, practices are recommended to enable upgrades and co-installability of C, C++, Fortran and Python codes. Finally, software packages such as NetCDF and HDF5 can be built in multiple configurations. Tools may then expect incompatible versions of these libraries (e.g. serial and parallel) to be simultaneously available; how this was solved in Debian using "pkg-config" and shared library interfaces is described, and best practices for software writers to enable this are summarised.

Computer hardware and software for robotic control

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Davis, Virgil Leon

1987-01-01

The KSC has implemented an integrated system that coordinates state-of-the-art robotic subsystems. It is a sensor based real-time robotic control system performing operations beyond the capability of an off-the-shelf robot. The integrated system provides real-time closed loop adaptive path control of position and orientation of all six axes of a large robot; enables the implementation of a highly configurable, expandable testbed for sensor system development; and makes several smart distributed control subsystems (robot arm controller, process controller, graphics display, and vision tracking) appear as intelligent peripherals to a supervisory computer coordinating the overall systems.

Compact, Low-Overhead, MIL-STD-1553B Controller

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Katz, Richard; Barto, Rod

2009-01-01

A compact and flexible controller has been developed to provide MIL-STD- 1553B Remote Terminal (RT) communications and supporting and related functions with minimal demand on the resources of the system in which the controller is to be installed. (MIL-STD-1553B is a military standard that encompasses a method of communication and electrical-interface requirements for digital electronic subsystems connected to a data bus. MIL-STD-1553B is commonly used in defense and space applications.) Many other MIL-STD-1553B RT controllers are complicated, and to enable them to function, it is necessary to provide software and to use such ancillary separate hardware devices as microprocessors and dual-port memories. The present controller functions without need for software and any ancillary hardware. In addition, it contains a flexible system interface and extensive support hardware while including on-chip error-checking and diagnostic support circuitry. This controller is implemented within part of a modern field-programmable gate array.

A High-Speed, Real-Time Visualization and State Estimation Platform for Monitoring and Control of Electric Distribution Systems: Implementation and Field Results

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Lundstrom, Blake; Gotseff, Peter; Giraldez, Julieta

Continued deployment of renewable and distributed energy resources is fundamentally changing the way that electric distribution systems are controlled and operated; more sophisticated active system control and greater situational awareness are needed. Real-time measurements and distribution system state estimation (DSSE) techniques enable more sophisticated system control and, when combined with visualization applications, greater situational awareness. This paper presents a novel demonstration of a high-speed, real-time DSSE platform and related control and visualization functionalities, implemented using existing open-source software and distribution system monitoring hardware. Live scrolling strip charts of meter data and intuitive annotated map visualizations of the entire state (obtainedmore » via DSSE) of a real-world distribution circuit are shown. The DSSE implementation is validated to demonstrate provision of accurate voltage data. This platform allows for enhanced control and situational awareness using only a minimum quantity of distribution system measurement units and modest data and software infrastructure.« less

Thermal Analysis for Monitoring Effects of Shock-Induced Physical, Mechanical, and Chemical Changes in Materials

DTIC Science & Technology

2015-01-19

MS WINDOWS platform, which enables multitasking with simultaneous evaluation and operation 1. REPORT DATE (DD-MM-YYYY) 4. TITLE AND SUBTITLE 13...measurement and analysis software for data acquisition, storage and evaluation with MS WINDOWS platform, which enables multitasking with simultaneous...Proteus measurement and analysis software for data acquisition, storage and evaluation with MS WINDOWS platform, which enables multitasking with

FASTQ quality control dashboard

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

2016-07-25

FQCDB builds up existing open source software, FastQC, implementing a modern web interface for across parsed output of FastQC. In addition, FQCDB is extensible as a web service to include additional plots of type line, boxplot, or heatmap, across data formatted according to guidelines. The interface is also configurable via more readable JSON format, enabling customization by non-web programmers.

Systems Architecture for Fully Autonomous Space Missions

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Esper, Jamie; Schnurr, R.; VanSteenberg, M.; Brumfield, Mark (Technical Monitor)

2002-01-01

The NASA Goddard Space Flight Center is working to develop a revolutionary new system architecture concept in support of fully autonomous missions. As part of GSFC's contribution to the New Millenium Program (NMP) Space Technology 7 Autonomy and on-Board Processing (ST7-A) Concept Definition Study, the system incorporates the latest commercial Internet and software development ideas and extends them into NASA ground and space segment architectures. The unique challenges facing the exploration of remote and inaccessible locales and the need to incorporate corresponding autonomy technologies within reasonable cost necessitate the re-thinking of traditional mission architectures. A measure of the resiliency of this architecture in its application to a broad range of future autonomy missions will depend on its effectiveness in leveraging from commercial tools developed for the personal computer and Internet markets. Specialized test stations and supporting software come to past as spacecraft take advantage of the extensive tools and research investments of billion-dollar commercial ventures. The projected improvements of the Internet and supporting infrastructure go hand-in-hand with market pressures that provide continuity in research. By taking advantage of consumer-oriented methods and processes, space-flight missions will continue to leverage on investments tailored to provide better services at reduced cost. The application of ground and space segment architectures each based on Local Area Networks (LAN), the use of personal computer-based operating systems, and the execution of activities and operations through a Wide Area Network (Internet) enable a revolution in spacecraft mission formulation, implementation, and flight operations. Hardware and software design, development, integration, test, and flight operations are all tied-in closely to a common thread that enables the smooth transitioning between program phases. The application of commercial software development techniques lays the foundation for delivery of product-oriented flight software modules and models. Software can then be readily applied to support the on-board autonomy required for mission self-management. An on-board intelligent system, based on advanced scripting languages, facilitates the mission autonomy required to offload ground system resources, and enables the spacecraft to manage itself safely through an efficient and effective process of reactive planning, science data acquisition, synthesis, and transmission to the ground. Autonomous ground systems in turn coordinate and support schedule contact times with the spacecraft. Specific autonomy software modules on-board include mission and science planners, instrument and subsystem control, and fault tolerance response software, all residing within a distributed computing environment supported through the flight LAN. Autonomy also requires the minimization of human intervention between users on the ground and the spacecraft, and hence calls for the elimination of the traditional operations control center as a funnel for data manipulation. Basic goal-oriented commands are sent directly from the user to the spacecraft through a distributed internet-based payload operations "center". The ensuing architecture calls for the use of spacecraft as point extensions on the Internet. This paper will detail the system architecture implementation chosen to enable cost-effective autonomous missions with applicability to a broad range of conditions. It will define the structure needed for implementation of such missions, including software and hardware infrastructures. The overall architecture is then laid out as a common thread in the mission life cycle from formulation through implementation and flight operations.

Design and performance evaluation of an OpenFlow-based control plane for software-defined elastic optical networks with direct-detection optical OFDM (DDO-OFDM) transmission.

PubMed

Liu, Lei; Peng, Wei-Ren; Casellas, Ramon; Tsuritani, Takehiro; Morita, Itsuro; Martínez, Ricardo; Muñoz, Raül; Yoo, S J B

2014-01-13

Optical Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (O-OFDM), which transmits high speed optical signals using multiple spectrally overlapped lower-speed subcarriers, is a promising candidate for supporting future elastic optical networks. In contrast to previous works which focus on Coherent Optical OFDM (CO-OFDM), in this paper, we consider the direct-detection optical OFDM (DDO-OFDM) as the transport technique, which leads to simpler hardware and software realizations, potentially offering a low-cost solution for elastic optical networks, especially in metro networks, and short or medium distance core networks. Based on this network scenario, we design and deploy a software-defined networking (SDN) control plane enabled by extending OpenFlow, detailing the network architecture, the routing and spectrum assignment algorithm, OpenFlow protocol extensions and the experimental validation. To the best of our knowledge, it is the first time that an OpenFlow-based control plane is reported and its performance is quantitatively measured in an elastic optical network with DDO-OFDM transmission.

PC based PLCs and ethernet based fieldbus: the new standard platform for future VLT instrument control

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kiekebusch, Mario J.; Lucuix, Christian; Erm, Toomas M.; Chiozzi, Gianluca; Zamparelli, Michele; Kern, Lothar; Brast, Roland; Pirani, Werther; Reiss, Roland; Popovic, Dan; Knudstrup, Jens; Duchateau, Michel; Sandrock, Stefan; Di Lieto, Nicola

2014-07-01

ESO is currently in the final phase of the standardization process for PC-based Programmable Logical Controllers (PLCs) as the new platform for the development of control systems for future VLT/VLTI instruments. The standard solution used until now consists of a Local Control Unit (LCU), a VME-based system having a CPU and commercial and proprietary boards. This system includes several layers of software and many thousands of lines of code developed and maintained in house. LCUs have been used for several years as the interface to control instrument functions but now are being replaced by commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) systems based on BECKHOFF Embedded PCs and the EtherCAT fieldbus. ESO is working on the completion of the software framework that enables a seamless integration into the VLT control system in order to be ready to support upcoming instruments like ESPRESSO and ERIS, that will be the first fully VLT compliant instruments using the new standard. The technology evaluation and standardization process has been a long and combined effort of various engineering disciplines like electronics, control and software, working together to define a solution that meets the requirements and minimizes the impact on the observatory operations and maintenance. This paper presents the challenges of the standardization process and the steps involved in such a change. It provides a technical overview of how industrial standards like EtherCAT, OPC-UA, PLCOpen MC and TwinCAT can be used to replace LCU features in various areas like software engineering and programming languages, motion control, time synchronization and astronomical tracking.

Extracting data from figures with software was faster, with higher interrater reliability than manual extraction.

PubMed

Jelicic Kadic, Antonia; Vucic, Katarina; Dosenovic, Svjetlana; Sapunar, Damir; Puljak, Livia

2016-06-01

To compare speed and accuracy of graphical data extraction using manual estimation and open source software. Data points from eligible graphs/figures published in randomized controlled trials (RCTs) from 2009 to 2014 were extracted by two authors independently, both by manual estimation and with the Plot Digitizer, open source software. Corresponding authors of each RCT were contacted up to four times via e-mail to obtain exact numbers that were used to create graphs. Accuracy of each method was compared against the source data from which the original graphs were produced. Software data extraction was significantly faster, reducing time for extraction for 47%. Percent agreement between the two raters was 51% for manual and 53.5% for software data extraction. Percent agreement between the raters and original data was 66% vs. 75% for the first rater and 69% vs. 73% for the second rater, for manual and software extraction, respectively. Data extraction from figures should be conducted using software, whereas manual estimation should be avoided. Using software for data extraction of data presented only in figures is faster and enables higher interrater reliability. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Craniux: A LabVIEW-Based Modular Software Framework for Brain-Machine Interface Research

PubMed Central

Degenhart, Alan D.; Kelly, John W.; Ashmore, Robin C.; Collinger, Jennifer L.; Tyler-Kabara, Elizabeth C.; Weber, Douglas J.; Wang, Wei

2011-01-01

This paper presents “Craniux,” an open-access, open-source software framework for brain-machine interface (BMI) research. Developed in LabVIEW, a high-level graphical programming environment, Craniux offers both out-of-the-box functionality and a modular BMI software framework that is easily extendable. Specifically, it allows researchers to take advantage of multiple features inherent to the LabVIEW environment for on-the-fly data visualization, parallel processing, multithreading, and data saving. This paper introduces the basic features and system architecture of Craniux and describes the validation of the system under real-time BMI operation using simulated and real electrocorticographic (ECoG) signals. Our results indicate that Craniux is able to operate consistently in real time, enabling a seamless work flow to achieve brain control of cursor movement. The Craniux software framework is made available to the scientific research community to provide a LabVIEW-based BMI software platform for future BMI research and development. PMID:21687575

Craniux: a LabVIEW-based modular software framework for brain-machine interface research.

PubMed

Degenhart, Alan D; Kelly, John W; Ashmore, Robin C; Collinger, Jennifer L; Tyler-Kabara, Elizabeth C; Weber, Douglas J; Wang, Wei

2011-01-01

This paper presents "Craniux," an open-access, open-source software framework for brain-machine interface (BMI) research. Developed in LabVIEW, a high-level graphical programming environment, Craniux offers both out-of-the-box functionality and a modular BMI software framework that is easily extendable. Specifically, it allows researchers to take advantage of multiple features inherent to the LabVIEW environment for on-the-fly data visualization, parallel processing, multithreading, and data saving. This paper introduces the basic features and system architecture of Craniux and describes the validation of the system under real-time BMI operation using simulated and real electrocorticographic (ECoG) signals. Our results indicate that Craniux is able to operate consistently in real time, enabling a seamless work flow to achieve brain control of cursor movement. The Craniux software framework is made available to the scientific research community to provide a LabVIEW-based BMI software platform for future BMI research and development.

A software controllable modular RF signal generator with multichannel transmission capabilities.

PubMed

Shaw, Z; Feilner, W; Esser, B; Dickens, J C; Neuber, A A

2017-09-01

A software controllable system which generates and transmits user defined RF signals is discussed. The system is implemented with multiple, modular transmitting channels that allow the user to easily replace parts such as amplifiers or antennas. Each channel is comprised of a data pattern generator (DPG), a digital to analog converter (DAC), a power amplifier, and a transmitting antenna. All channels are controlled through a host PC and synchronized through a master clock signal provided to each DAC by an external clock source. Signals to be transmitted are generated through the DPG control software on the PC or can be created by the user in a numerical computing environment. Three experiments are discussed using a two- and four-channel antenna array incorporating Chebyshev tapered TEM horn antennas. Transmitting distinct sets of nonperiodic bipolar impulses through each of the antennas in the array enabled synthesizing a sinusoidal signal of specific frequency in free space. Opposite to the standard phased array approach, each antenna radiates a distinctly different signal rather than the same signal simply phase shifted. The presented approach may be employed as a physical layer of encryption dependent on the position of the receiving antenna.

An open architecture for hybrid force-visual servo control of robotic manipulators in unstructured environments

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hassanzadeh, Iraj; Janabi-Sharifi, Farrokh

2005-12-01

In this paper, a new open architecture for visual servo control tasks is illustrated. A Puma-560 robotic manipulator is used to prove the concept. This design enables doing hybrid forcehisual servo control in an unstructured environment in different modes. Also, it can be controlled through Internet in teleoperation mode using a haptic device. Our proposed structure includes two major parts, hardware and software. In terms of hardware, it consists of a master (host) computer, a slave (target) computer, a Puma 560 manipulator, a CCD camera, a force sensor and a haptic device. There are five DAQ cards, interfacing Puma 560 and a slave computer. An open architecture package is developed using Matlab (R), Simulink (R) and XPC target toolbox. This package has the Hardware-In-the-Loop (HIL) property, i.e., enables one to readily implement different configurations of force, visual or hybrid control in real time. The implementation includes the following stages. First of all, retrofitting of puma was carried out. Then a modular joint controller for Puma 560 was realized using Simulink (R). Force sensor driver and force control implementation were written, using sjknction blocks of Simulink (R). Visual images were captured through Image Acquisition Toolbox of Matlab (R), and processed using Image Processing Toolbox. A haptic device interface was also written in Simulink (R). Thus, this setup could be readily reconfigured and accommodate any other robotic manipulator and/or other sensors without the trouble of the external issues relevant to the control, interface and software, while providing flexibility in components modification.

Democratizing Neurorehabilitation: How Accessible are Low-Cost Mobile-Gaming Technologies for Self-Rehabilitation of Arm Disability in Stroke?

PubMed Central

Rinne, Paul; Mace, Michael; Nakornchai, Tagore; Zimmerman, Karl; Fayer, Susannah; Sharma, Pankaj; Liardon, Jean-Luc; Burdet, Etienne; Bentley, Paul

2016-01-01

Motor-training software on tablets or smartphones (Apps) offer a low-cost, widely-available solution to supplement arm physiotherapy after stroke. We assessed the proportions of hemiplegic stroke patients who, with their plegic hand, could meaningfully engage with mobile-gaming devices using a range of standard control-methods, as well as by using a novel wireless grip-controller, adapted for neurodisability. We screened all newly-diagnosed hemiplegic stroke patients presenting to a stroke centre over 6 months. Subjects were compared on their ability to control a tablet or smartphone cursor using: finger-swipe, tap, joystick, screen-tilt, and an adapted handgrip. Cursor control was graded as: no movement (0); less than full-range movement (1); full-range movement (2); directed movement (3). In total, we screened 345 patients, of which 87 satisfied recruitment criteria and completed testing. The commonest reason for exclusion was cognitive impairment. Using conventional controls, the proportion of patients able to direct cursor movement was 38–48%; and to move it full-range was 55–67% (controller comparison: p>0.1). By comparison, handgrip enabled directed control in 75%, and full-range movement in 93% (controller comparison: p<0.001). This difference between controllers was most apparent amongst severely-disabled subjects, with 0% achieving directed or full-range control with conventional controls, compared to 58% and 83% achieving these two levels of movement, respectively, with handgrip. In conclusion, hand, or arm, training Apps played on conventional mobile devices are likely to be accessible only to mildly-disabled stroke patients. Technological adaptations such as grip-control can enable more severely affected subjects to engage with self-training software. PMID:27706248

Excel2Genie: A Microsoft Excel application to improve the flexibility of the Genie-2000 Spectroscopic software.

PubMed

Forgács, Attila; Balkay, László; Trón, Lajos; Raics, Péter

2014-12-01

Excel2Genie, a simple and user-friendly Microsoft Excel interface, has been developed to the Genie-2000 Spectroscopic Software of Canberra Industries. This Excel application can directly control Canberra Multichannel Analyzer (MCA), process the acquired data and visualize them. Combination of Genie-2000 with Excel2Genie results in remarkably increased flexibility and a possibility to carry out repetitive data acquisitions even with changing parameters and more sophisticated analysis. The developed software package comprises three worksheets: display parameters and results of data acquisition, data analysis and mathematical operations carried out on the measured gamma spectra. At the same time it also allows control of these processes. Excel2Genie is freely available to assist gamma spectrum measurements and data evaluation by the interested Canberra users. With access to the Visual Basic Application (VBA) source code of this application users are enabled to modify the developed interface according to their intentions. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Analyzing Dynamics of Cooperating Spacecraft

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hughes, Stephen P.; Folta, David C.; Conway, Darrel J.

2004-01-01

A software library has been developed to enable high-fidelity computational simulation of the dynamics of multiple spacecraft distributed over a region of outer space and acting with a common purpose. All of the modeling capabilities afforded by this software are available independently in other, separate software systems, but have not previously been brought together in a single system. A user can choose among several dynamical models, many high-fidelity environment models, and several numerical-integration schemes. The user can select whether to use models that assume weak coupling between spacecraft, or strong coupling in the case of feedback control or tethering of spacecraft to each other. For weak coupling, spacecraft orbits are propagated independently, and are synchronized in time by controlling the step size of the integration. For strong coupling, the orbits are integrated simultaneously. Among the integration schemes that the user can choose are Runge-Kutta Verner, Prince-Dormand, Adams-Bashforth-Moulton, and Bulirsh- Stoer. Comparisons of performance are included for both the weak- and strongcoupling dynamical models for all of the numerical integrators.

Integrated System for Autonomous Science

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Chien, Steve; Sherwood, Robert; Tran, Daniel; Cichy, Benjamin; Davies, Ashley; Castano, Rebecca; Rabideau, Gregg; Frye, Stuart; Trout, Bruce; Shulman, Seth;

Upgrading of data acquisition software for centralized radiation monitoring system in Malaysian Nuclear Agency

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Yussup, F., E-mail: nolida@nm.gov.my; Ibrahim, M. M., E-mail: maslina-i@nm.gov.my; Soh, S. C.

With the growth of technology, many devices and equipments can be connected to the network and internet to enable online data acquisition for real-time data monitoring and control from monitoring devices located at remote sites. Centralized radiation monitoring system (CRMS) is a system that enables area radiation level at various locations in Malaysian Nuclear Agency (Nuklear Malaysia) to be monitored centrally by using a web browser. The Local Area Network (LAN) in Nuclear Malaysia is utilized in CRMS as a communication media for data acquisition of the area radiation levels from radiation detectors. The development of the system involves devicemore » configuration, wiring, network and hardware installation, software and web development. This paper describes the software upgrading on the system server that is responsible to acquire and record the area radiation readings from the detectors. The recorded readings are called in a web programming to be displayed on a website. Besides the main feature which is acquiring the area radiation levels in Nuclear Malaysia centrally, the upgrading involves new features such as uniform time interval for data recording and exporting, warning system and dose triggering.« less

Automated daily quality control analysis for mammography in a multi-unit imaging center.

PubMed

Sundell, Veli-Matti; Mäkelä, Teemu; Meaney, Alexander; Kaasalainen, Touko; Savolainen, Sauli

2018-01-01

Background The high requirements for mammography image quality necessitate a systematic quality assurance process. Digital imaging allows automation of the image quality analysis, which can potentially improve repeatability and objectivity compared to a visual evaluation made by the users. Purpose To develop an automatic image quality analysis software for daily mammography quality control in a multi-unit imaging center. Material and Methods An automated image quality analysis software using the discrete wavelet transform and multiresolution analysis was developed for the American College of Radiology accreditation phantom. The software was validated by analyzing 60 randomly selected phantom images from six mammography systems and 20 phantom images with different dose levels from one mammography system. The results were compared to a visual analysis made by four reviewers. Additionally, long-term image quality trends of a full-field digital mammography system and a computed radiography mammography system were investigated. Results The automated software produced feature detection levels comparable to visual analysis. The agreement was good in the case of fibers, while the software detected somewhat more microcalcifications and characteristic masses. Long-term follow-up via a quality assurance web portal demonstrated the feasibility of using the software for monitoring the performance of mammography systems in a multi-unit imaging center. Conclusion Automated image quality analysis enables monitoring the performance of digital mammography systems in an efficient, centralized manner.

Virtual Platform for See Robustness Verification of Bootloader Embedded Software on Board Solar Orbiter's Energetic Particle Detector

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Da Silva, A.; Sánchez Prieto, S.; Polo, O.; Parra Espada, P.

2013-05-01

Because of the tough robustness requirements in space software development, it is imperative to carry out verification tasks at a very early development stage to ensure that the implemented exception mechanisms work properly. All this should be done long time before the real hardware is available. But even if real hardware is available the verification of software fault tolerance mechanisms can be difficult since real faulty situations must be systematically and artificially brought about which can be imposible on real hardware. To solve this problem the Alcala Space Research Group (SRG) has developed a LEON2 virtual platform (Leon2ViP) with fault injection capabilities. This way it is posible to run the exact same target binary software as runs on the physical system in a more controlled and deterministic environment, allowing a more strict requirements verification. Leon2ViP enables unmanned and tightly focused fault injection campaigns, not possible otherwise, in order to expose and diagnose flaws in the software implementation early. Furthermore, the use of a virtual hardware-in-the-loop approach makes it possible to carry out preliminary integration tests with the spacecraft emulator or the sensors. The use of Leon2ViP has meant a signicant improvement, in both time and cost, in the development and verification processes of the Instrument Control Unit boot software on board Solar Orbiter's Energetic Particle Detector.

Development and integration of a LabVIEW-based modular architecture for automated execution of electrochemical catalyst testing.

PubMed

Topalov, Angel A; Katsounaros, Ioannis; Meier, Josef C; Klemm, Sebastian O; Mayrhofer, Karl J J

2011-11-01

This paper describes a system for performing electrochemical catalyst testing where all hardware components are controlled simultaneously using a single LabVIEW-based software application. The software that we developed can be operated in both manual mode for exploratory investigations and automatic mode for routine measurements, by using predefined execution procedures. The latter enables the execution of high-throughput or combinatorial investigations, which decrease substantially the time and cost for catalyst testing. The software was constructed using a modular architecture which simplifies the modification or extension of the system, depending on future needs. The system was tested by performing stability tests of commercial fuel cell electrocatalysts, and the advantages of the developed system are discussed. © 2011 American Institute of Physics

A UML Profile for State Analysis

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Murray, Alex; Rasmussen, Robert

2010-01-01

State Analysis is a systems engineering methodology for the specification and design of control systems, developed at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. The methodology emphasizes an analysis of the system under control in terms of States and their properties and behaviors and their effects on each other, a clear separation of the control system from the controlled system, cognizance in the control system of the controlled system's State, goal-based control built on constraining the controlled system's States, and disciplined techniques for State discovery and characterization. State Analysis (SA) introduces two key diagram types: State Effects and Goal Network diagrams. The team at JPL developed a tool for performing State Analysis. The tool includes a drawing capability, backed by a database that supports the diagram types and the organization of the elements of the SA models. But the tool does not support the usual activities of software engineering and design - a disadvantage, since systems to which State Analysis can be applied tend to be very software-intensive. This motivated the work described in this paper: the development of a preliminary Unified Modeling Language (UML) profile for State Analysis. Having this profile would enable systems engineers to specify a system using the methods and graphical language of State Analysis, which is easily linked with a larger system model in SysML (Systems Modeling Language), while also giving software engineers engaged in implementing the specified control system immediate access to and use of the SA model, in the same language, UML, used for other software design. That is, a State Analysis profile would serve as a shared modeling bridge between system and software models for the behavior aspects of the system. This paper begins with an overview of State Analysis and its underpinnings, followed by an overview of the mapping of SA constructs to the UML metamodel. It then delves into the details of these mappings and the constraints associated with them. Finally, we give an example of the use of the profile for expressing an example SA model.

Enabling New Operations Concepts for Lunar and Mars Exploration

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Jaap, John; Maxwell, Theresa

2005-02-01

The planning and scheduling of human space activities is an expensive and time-consuming task that seldom provides the crew with the control, flexibility, or insight that they need. During the past thirty years, scheduling software has seen only incremental improvements; however, software limitations continue to prevent even evolutionary improvements in the ``operations concept'' that is used for human space missions. Space missions are planned on the ground long before they are executed in space, and the crew has little input or influence on the schedule. In recent years the crew has been presented with a ``job jar'' of activities that they can do whenever they have time, but the contents of the jar is limited to tasks that do not use scarce shared resources and do not have external timing constraints. Consequently, the crew has no control over the schedule of the majority of their own tasks. As humans venture farther from earth for longer durations, it will become imperative that they have the ability to plan and schedule not only their own activities, but also the unattended activities of the systems, equipment, and robots on the journey with them. Significant software breakthroughs are required to enable the change in the operations concept. The crew does not have the time to build or modify the schedule by hand. They only need to issue a request to schedule a task and the system should automatically do the rest. Of course, the crew should not be required to build the complete schedule. Controllers on the ground should contribute the models and schedules where they have the better knowledge. The system must allow multiple simultaneous users, some on earth and some in space. The Mission Operations Laboratory at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center has been researching and prototyping a modeling schema, scheduling engine, and system architecture that can enable the needed paradigm shift - it can make the crew autonomous. This schema and engine can be the core of a planning and scheduling system that would enable multiple planners, some on the earth and some in space, to build one integrated timeline. Its modeling schema can capture all the task requirements; its scheduling engine can build the schedule automatically; and its architecture can allow those (on earth and in space) with the best knowledge of the tasks to schedule them. This paper describes the enabling technology and proposes an operations concept for astronauts autonomously scheduling their activities and the activities around them.

Enabling New Operations Concepts for Lunar and Mars Exploration

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Jaap, John; Maxwell, Theresa

2005-01-01

The planning and scheduling of human space activities is an expensive and time-consuming task that seldom provides the crew with the control, flexibility, or insight that they need. During the past thirty years, scheduling software has seen only incremental improvements; however, software limitations continue to prevent even evolutionary improvements in the operations concept that is used for human space missions. Space missions are planned on the ground long before they are executed in space, and the crew has little input or influence on the schedule. In recent years the crew has been presented with a job jar of activities that they can do whenever they have time, but the contents of the jar is limited to tasks that do not use scarce shared resources and do not have external timing constraints. Consequently, the crew has no control over the schedule of the majority of their own tasks. As humans venture farther from earth for longer durations, it will become imperative that they have the ability to plan and schedule not only their own activities, but also the unattended activities of the systems, equipment, and robots on the journey with them. Significant software breakthroughs are required to enable the change in the operations concept. The crew does not have the time to build or modify the schedule by hand. They only need to issue a request to schedule a task and the system should automatically do the rest. Of course, the crew should not be required to build the complete schedule. Controllers on the ground should contribute the models and schedules where they have the better knowledge. The system must allow multiple simultaneous users, some on earth and some in space. The Mission Operations Laboratory at NASA's Marshall Space flight Center has been researching and prototyping a modeling schema, scheduling engine, and system architecture that can enable the needed paradigm shift - it can make the crew autonomous. This schema and engine can be the core of a planning and scheduling system that would enable multiple planners, some on the earth and some in space, to build one integrated timeline. Its modeling schema can capture all the task requirements; its scheduling engine can build the schedule automatically, and its architecture can allow those (on earth and in space) with the best knowledge of the tasks to schedule them. This paper describes the enabling technology and proposes an operations concept for astronauts autonomously scheduling their activities and the activities around them.

Development of visual 3D virtual environment for control software

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hirose, Michitaka; Myoi, Takeshi; Amari, Haruo; Inamura, Kohei; Stark, Lawrence

1991-01-01

Virtual environments for software visualization may enable complex programs to be created and maintained. A typical application might be for control of regional electric power systems. As these encompass broader computer networks than ever, construction of such systems becomes very difficult. Conventional text-oriented environments are useful in programming individual processors. However, they are obviously insufficient to program a large and complicated system, that includes large numbers of computers connected to each other; such programming is called 'programming in the large.' As a solution for this problem, the authors are developing a graphic programming environment wherein one can visualize complicated software in virtual 3D world. One of the major features of the environment is the 3D representation of concurrent process. 3D representation is used to supply both network-wide interprocess programming capability (capability for 'programming in the large') and real-time programming capability. The authors' idea is to fuse both the block diagram (which is useful to check relationship among large number of processes or processors) and the time chart (which is useful to check precise timing for synchronization) into a single 3D space. The 3D representation gives us a capability for direct and intuitive planning or understanding of complicated relationship among many concurrent processes. To realize the 3D representation, a technology to enable easy handling of virtual 3D object is a definite necessity. Using a stereo display system and a gesture input device (VPL DataGlove), our prototype of the virtual workstation has been implemented. The workstation can supply the 'sensation' of the virtual 3D space to a programmer. Software for the 3D programming environment is implemented on the workstation. According to preliminary assessments, a 50 percent reduction of programming effort is achieved by using the virtual 3D environment. The authors expect that the 3D environment has considerable potential in the field of software engineering.

Towards a comprehensive framework for reuse: A reuse-enabling software evolution environment

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Basili, V. R.; Rombach, H. D.

1988-01-01

Reuse of products, processes and knowledge will be the key to enable the software industry to achieve the dramatic improvement in productivity and quality required to satisfy the anticipated growing demand. Although experience shows that certain kinds of reuse can be successful, general success has been elusive. A software life-cycle technology which allows broad and extensive reuse could provide the means to achieving the desired order-of-magnitude improvements. The scope of a comprehensive framework for understanding, planning, evaluating and motivating reuse practices and the necessary research activities is outlined. As a first step towards such a framework, a reuse-enabling software evolution environment model is introduced which provides a basis for the effective recording of experience, the generalization and tailoring of experience, the formalization of experience, and the (re-)use of experience.

Case Study: Test Results of a Tool and Method for In-Flight, Adaptive Control System Verification on a NASA F-15 Flight Research Aircraft

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Jacklin, Stephen A.; Schumann, Johann; Guenther, Kurt; Bosworth, John

2006-01-01

Adaptive control technologies that incorporate learning algorithms have been proposed to enable autonomous flight control and to maintain vehicle performance in the face of unknown, changing, or poorly defined operating environments [1-2]. At the present time, however, it is unknown how adaptive algorithms can be routinely verified, validated, and certified for use in safety-critical applications. Rigorous methods for adaptive software verification end validation must be developed to ensure that. the control software functions as required and is highly safe and reliable. A large gap appears to exist between the point at which control system designers feel the verification process is complete, and when FAA certification officials agree it is complete. Certification of adaptive flight control software verification is complicated by the use of learning algorithms (e.g., neural networks) and degrees of system non-determinism. Of course, analytical efforts must be made in the verification process to place guarantees on learning algorithm stability, rate of convergence, and convergence accuracy. However, to satisfy FAA certification requirements, it must be demonstrated that the adaptive flight control system is also able to fail and still allow the aircraft to be flown safely or to land, while at the same time providing a means of crew notification of the (impending) failure. It was for this purpose that the NASA Ames Confidence Tool was developed [3]. This paper presents the Confidence Tool as a means of providing in-flight software assurance monitoring of an adaptive flight control system. The paper will present the data obtained from flight testing the tool on a specially modified F-15 aircraft designed to simulate loss of flight control faces.

Data to Pictures to Data: Outreach Imaging Software and Metadata

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Levay, Z.

2011-07-01

A convergence between astronomy science and digital photography has enabled a steady stream of visually rich imagery from state-of-the-art data. The accessibility of hardware and software has facilitated an explosion of astronomical images for outreach, from space-based observatories, ground-based professional facilities and among the vibrant amateur astrophotography community. Producing imagery from science data involves a combination of custom software to understand FITS data (FITS Liberator), off-the-shelf, industry-standard software to composite multi-wavelength data and edit digital photographs (Adobe Photoshop), and application of photo/image-processing techniques. Some additional effort is needed to close the loop and enable this imagery to be conveniently available for various purposes beyond web and print publication. The metadata paradigms in digital photography are now complying with FITS and science software to carry information such as keyword tags and world coordinates, enabling these images to be usable in more sophisticated, imaginative ways exemplified by Sky in Google Earth and World Wide Telescope.

Qualification of Simulation Software for Safety Assessment of Sodium Cooled Fast Reactors. Requirements and Recommendations

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Brown, Nicholas R.; Pointer, William David; Sieger, Matt

2016-04-01

The goal of this review is to enable application of codes or software packages for safety assessment of advanced sodium-cooled fast reactor (SFR) designs. To address near-term programmatic needs, the authors have focused on two objectives. First, the authors have focused on identification of requirements for software QA that must be satisfied to enable the application of software to future safety analyses. Second, the authors have collected best practices applied by other code development teams to minimize cost and time of initial code qualification activities and to recommend a path to the stated goal.

Ultraino: An Open Phased-Array System for Narrowband Airborne Ultrasound Transmission.

PubMed

Marzo, Asier; Corkett, Tom; Drinkwater, Bruce W

2018-01-01

Modern ultrasonic phased-array controllers are electronic systems capable of delaying the transmitted or received signals of multiple transducers. Configurable transmit-receive array systems, capable of electronic steering and shaping of the beam in near real-time, are available commercially, for example, for medical imaging. However, emerging applications, such as ultrasonic haptics, parametric audio, or ultrasonic levitation, require only a small subset of the capabilities provided by the existing controllers. To meet this need, we present Ultraino, a modular, inexpensive, and open platform that provides hardware, software, and example applications specifically aimed at controlling the transmission of narrowband airborne ultrasound. Our system is composed of software, driver boards, and arrays that enable users to quickly and efficiently perform research in various emerging applications. The software can be used to define array geometries, simulate the acoustic field in real time, and control the connected driver boards. The driver board design is based on an Arduino Mega and can control 64 channels with a square wave of up to 17 Vpp and /5 phase resolution. Multiple boards can be chained together to increase the number of channels. The 40-kHz arrays with flat and spherical geometries are demonstrated for parametric audio generation, acoustic levitation, and haptic feedback.

A Wireless Object Location Detector Enabling People with Developmental Disabilities to Control Environmental Stimulation through Simple Occupational Activities with Nintendo Wii Balance Boards

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Shih, Ching-Hsiang; Chang, Man-Ling

2012-01-01

The latest researches have adopted software technology, turning the Nintendo Wii Balance Board into a high performance standing location detector with a newly developed standing location detection program (SLDP). This study extended SLDP functionality to assess whether two people with developmental disabilities would be able to actively perform…

Assisting People with Disabilities to Actively Improve Their Collaborative Physical Activities with Nintendo Wii Balance Boards by Controlling Environmental Stimulation

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Shih, Ching-Hsiang; Chen, Ling-Che; Shih, Ching-Tien

2012-01-01

The latest researches have adopted software technology to modify the Nintendo Wii Balance Board functionality and used it to enable two people with developmental disabilities to actively perform physical activities. This study extended the latest research of the Wii Balance Board application to assess whether four people (two groups) with…

Personalised and Self Regulated Learning in the Web 2.0 Era: International Exemplars of Innovative Pedagogy Using Social Software

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

McLoughlin, Catherine; Lee, Mark J. W.

2010-01-01

Research findings in recent years provide compelling evidence of the importance of encouraging student control over the learning process as a whole. The socially based tools and technologies of the Web 2.0 movement are capable of supporting informal conversation, reflexive dialogue and collaborative content generation, enabling access to a wide…

Web Program for Development of GUIs for Cluster Computers

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Czikmantory, Akos; Cwik, Thomas; Klimeck, Gerhard; Hua, Hook; Oyafuso, Fabiano; Vinyard, Edward

2003-01-01

WIGLAF (a Web Interface Generator and Legacy Application Facade) is a computer program that provides a Web-based, distributed, graphical-user-interface (GUI) framework that can be adapted to any of a broad range of application programs, written in any programming language, that are executed remotely on any cluster computer system. WIGLAF enables the rapid development of a GUI for controlling and monitoring a specific application program running on the cluster and for transferring data to and from the application program. The only prerequisite for the execution of WIGLAF is a Web-browser program on a user's personal computer connected with the cluster via the Internet. WIGLAF has a client/server architecture: The server component is executed on the cluster system, where it controls the application program and serves data to the client component. The client component is an applet that runs in the Web browser. WIGLAF utilizes the Extensible Markup Language to hold all data associated with the application software, Java to enable platform-independent execution on the cluster system and the display of a GUI generator through the browser, and the Java Remote Method Invocation software package to provide simple, effective client/server networking.

EPICS Controlled Collimator for Controlling Beam Sizes in HIPPO

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Napolitano, Arthur Soriano; Vogel, Sven C.

2017-08-03

Controlling the beam spot size and shape in a diffraction experiment determines the probed sample volume. The HIPPO - High-Pressure-Preferred Orientation– neutron time-offlight diffractometer is located at the Lujan Neutron Scattering Center in Los Alamos National Laboratories. HIPPO characterizes microstructural parameters, such as phase composition, strains, grain size, or texture, of bulk (cm-sized) samples. In the current setup, the beam spot has a 10 mm diameter. Using a collimator, consisting of two pairs of neutron absorbing boron-nitride slabs, horizontal and vertical dimensions of a rectangular beam spot can be defined. Using the HIPPO robotic sample changer for sample motion, themore » collimator would enable scanning of e.g. cylindrical samples along the cylinder axis by probing slices of such samples. The project presented here describes implementation of such a collimator, in particular the motion control software. We utilized the EPICS (Experimental Physics Interface and Control System) software interface to integrate the collimator control into the HIPPO instrument control system. Using EPICS, commands are sent to commercial stepper motors that move the beam windows.« less

A microcomputer controlled snow ski binding system--I. Instrumentation and field evaluation.

PubMed

MacGregor, D; Hull, M L; Dorius, L K

1985-01-01

This paper presents the design and field evaluation of the first microcomputer controlled ski binding system. This system incorporates an Intel 8086 microcomputer controller and an integral binding/dynamometer. This instrumentation system not only undertakes real time control, but also it records dynamometer data via a miniature digital cassette tape recorder. The integral binding/dynamometer offers the same operational and mounting convenience of commercially available mechanical bindings. The binding may be released either manually or electrically via the controller. Comprised of four octagonal half strain rings, the strain gage dynamometer measures the three moment load components at the boot. To enable the user to conveniently operate the computer, extensive operating software was developed. The operating software is discussed in relation to both the acquisition and storage of data from the dynamometer and the control of the electro-mechanical snow ski binding. The binding system has been used successfully to both record boot moment components and control ski binding release during actual skiing maneuvers. Moment histories typical of three common recreational skiing maneuvers are presented.

Realizing Autonomy via Intelligent Hybrid Control: Adaptable Autonomy for Achieving UxV RSTA Team Decision Superiority (also known as Intelligent Multi-UxV Planner with Adaptive Collaborative/Control Technologies (IMPACT))

DTIC Science & Technology

2018-01-30

algorithms. Due to this, Fusion was built with the goal of extensibility throughout the architecture. The Fusion infrastructure enables software...DISTRIBUTION STATEMENT A: Approved for public release. Cleared, 88PA, Case# 2018-0820. b. Trigger a Highly Mobile ...modes were developed in IMPACT (i.e., normal full coverage patrol (NFCP) and highly mobile (HM)). In both NFCP and HM, all UxVs patrol their assigned

openECA Platform and Analytics Alpha Test Results

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Robertson, Russell

The objective of the Open and Extensible Control and Analytics (openECA) Platform for Phasor Data project is to develop an open source software platform that significantly accelerates the production, use, and ongoing development of real-time decision support tools, automated control systems, and off-line planning systems that (1) incorporate high-fidelity synchrophasor data and (2) enhance system reliability while enabling the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) operating functions of reliability coordinator, transmission operator, and/or balancing authority to be executed more effectively.

openECA Platform and Analytics Beta Demonstration Results

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Robertson, Russell

The objective of the Open and Extensible Control and Analytics (openECA) Platform for Phasor Data project is to develop an open source software platform that significantly accelerates the production, use, and ongoing development of real-time decision support tools, automated control systems, and off-line planning systems that (1) incorporate high-fidelity synchrophasor data and (2) enhance system reliability while enabling the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) operating functions of reliability coordinator, transmission operator, and/or balancing authority to be executed more effectively.

Implementing Extreme Programming in Distributed Software Project Teams: Strategies and Challenges

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Maruping, Likoebe M.

Agile software development methods and distributed forms of organizing teamwork are two team process innovations that are gaining prominence in today's demanding software development environment. Individually, each of these innovations has yielded gains in the practice of software development. Agile methods have enabled software project teams to meet the challenges of an ever turbulent business environment through enhanced flexibility and responsiveness to emergent customer needs. Distributed software project teams have enabled organizations to access highly specialized expertise across geographic locations. Although much progress has been made in understanding how to more effectively manage agile development teams and how to manage distributed software development teams, managers have little guidance on how to leverage these two potent innovations in combination. In this chapter, I outline some of the strategies and challenges associated with implementing agile methods in distributed software project teams. These are discussed in the context of a study of a large-scale software project in the United States that lasted four months.

Unified Software Solution for Efficient SPR Data Analysis in Drug Research

PubMed Central

Dahl, Göran; Steigele, Stephan; Hillertz, Per; Tigerström, Anna; Egnéus, Anders; Mehrle, Alexander; Ginkel, Martin; Edfeldt, Fredrik; Holdgate, Geoff; O’Connell, Nichole; Kappler, Bernd; Brodte, Annette; Rawlins, Philip B.; Davies, Gareth; Westberg, Eva-Lotta; Folmer, Rutger H. A.; Heyse, Stephan

2016-01-01

Surface plasmon resonance (SPR) is a powerful method for obtaining detailed molecular interaction parameters. Modern instrumentation with its increased throughput has enabled routine screening by SPR in hit-to-lead and lead optimization programs, and SPR has become a mainstream drug discovery technology. However, the processing and reporting of SPR data in drug discovery are typically performed manually, which is both time-consuming and tedious. Here, we present the workflow concept, design and experiences with a software module relying on a single, browser-based software platform for the processing, analysis, and reporting of SPR data. The efficiency of this concept lies in the immediate availability of end results: data are processed and analyzed upon loading the raw data file, allowing the user to immediately quality control the results. Once completed, the user can automatically report those results to data repositories for corporate access and quickly generate printed reports or documents. The software module has resulted in a very efficient and effective workflow through saved time and improved quality control. We discuss these benefits and show how this process defines a new benchmark in the drug discovery industry for the handling, interpretation, visualization, and sharing of SPR data. PMID:27789754

A Security-façade Library for Virtual-observatory Software

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rixon, G.

2009-09-01

The security-façade library implements, for Java, IVOA's security standards. It supports the authentication mechanisms for SOAP and REST web-services, the sign-on mechanisms (with MyProxy, AstroGrid Accounts protocol or local credential-caches), the delegation protocol, and RFC3820-enabled HTTPS for Apache Tomcat. Using the façade, a developer who is not a security specialist can easily add access control to a virtual-observatory service and call secured services from an application. The library has been an internal part of AstroGrid software for some time and it is now offered for use by other developers.

The Logical Extension

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

2003-01-01

The same software controlling autonomous and crew-assisted operations for the International Space Station (ISS) is enabling commercial enterprises to integrate and automate manual operations, also known as decision logic, in real time across complex and disparate networked applications, databases, servers, and other devices, all with quantifiable business benefits. Auspice Corporation, of Framingham, Massachusetts, developed the Auspice TLX (The Logical Extension) software platform to effectively mimic the human decision-making process. Auspice TLX automates operations across extended enterprise systems, where any given infrastructure can include thousands of computers, servers, switches, and modems that are connected, and therefore, dependent upon each other. The concept behind the Auspice software spawned from a computer program originally developed in 1981 by Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Draper Laboratory for simulating tasks performed by astronauts aboard the Space Shuttle. At the time, the Space Shuttle Program was dependent upon paper-based procedures for its manned space missions, which typically averaged 2 weeks in duration. As the Shuttle Program progressed, NASA began increasing the length of manned missions in preparation for a more permanent space habitat. Acknowledging the need to relinquish paper-based procedures in favor of an electronic processing format to properly monitor and manage the complexities of these longer missions, NASA realized that Draper's task simulation software could be applied to its vision of year-round space occupancy. In 1992, Draper was awarded a NASA contract to build User Interface Language software to enable autonomous operations of a multitude of functions on Space Station Freedom (the station was redesigned in 1993 and converted into the international venture known today as the ISS)

Can your software engineer program your PLC?

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Borrowman, Alastair J.; Taylor, Philip

2016-07-01

The use of Programmable Logic Controllers (PLCs) in the control of large physics experiments is ubiquitous1, 2, 3. The programming of these controllers is normally the domain of engineers with a background in electronics, this paper introduces PLC program development from the software engineer's perspective. PLC programs provide the link between control software running on PC architecture systems and physical hardware controlled and monitored by digital and analog signals. The higher-level software running on the PC is typically responsible for accepting operator input and from this deciding when and how hardware connected to the PLC is controlled. The PLC accepts demands from the PC, considers the current state of its connected hardware and if correct to do so (based upon interlocks or other constraints) adjusts its hardware output signals appropriately for the PC's demands. A published ICD (Interface Control Document) defines the PLC memory locations available to be written and read by the PC to control and monitor the hardware. Historically the method of programming PLCs has been ladder diagrams that closely resemble circuit diagrams, however, PLC manufacturers nowadays also provide, and promote, the use of higher-level programming languages4. Based on techniques used in the development of high-level PC software to control PLCs for multiple telescopes, this paper examines the development of PLC programs to operate the hardware of a medical cyclotron beamline controlled from a PC using the Experimental Physics and Industrial Control System (EPICS), which is also widely used in telescope control5, 6, 7. The PLC used is the new generation Siemens S7-1200 programmed using Siemens Pascal based Structured Control Language (SCL), which is their implementation of Structured Text (ST). The approach described is that from a software engineer's perspective, utilising Siemens Totally Integrated Automation (TIA) Portal integrated development environment (IDE) to create modular PLC programs based upon reusable functions capable of being unit tested without the PLC connected to hardware. Emphasis has been placed on designing an interface between EPICS and SCL that enforces correct operation of hardware through stringent separation of PC accessible PLC memory and hardware I/O addresses used only by the PLC. The paper also introduces the method used to automate the creation, from the same source document, the PLC memory structure (tag) definitions (defining memory used to access hardware I/O and that accessed by the PC) and creation of the PC program data structures (EPICS database records) used to access the permitted PLC addresses. From direct experience this paper demonstrates the advantages of PLC program development being shared between electronic and software engineers, to enable use of the most appropriate processes from both the perspective of the hardware and the higher-level software used to control it.

A gesture-controlled projection display for CT-guided interventions.

PubMed

Mewes, A; Saalfeld, P; Riabikin, O; Skalej, M; Hansen, C

2016-01-01

The interaction with interventional imaging systems within a sterile environment is a challenging task for physicians. Direct physician-machine interaction during an intervention is rather limited because of sterility and workspace restrictions. We present a gesture-controlled projection display that enables a direct and natural physician-machine interaction during computed tomography (CT)-based interventions. Therefore, a graphical user interface is projected on a radiation shield located in front of the physician. Hand gestures in front of this display are captured and classified using a leap motion controller. We propose a gesture set to control basic functions of intervention software such as gestures for 2D image exploration, 3D object manipulation and selection. Our methods were evaluated in a clinically oriented user study with 12 participants. The results of the performed user study confirm that the display and the underlying interaction concept are accepted by clinical users. The recognition of the gestures is robust, although there is potential for improvements. The gesture training times are less than 10 min, but vary heavily between the participants of the study. The developed gestures are connected logically to the intervention software and intuitive to use. The proposed gesture-controlled projection display counters current thinking, namely it gives the radiologist complete control of the intervention software. It opens new possibilities for direct physician-machine interaction during CT-based interventions and is well suited to become an integral part of future interventional suites.

LK Scripting Language

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

The LK scripting language is a simple and fast computer programming language designed for easy integration with existing software to enable automation of tasks. The LK language is used by NREL’s System Advisor Model (SAM), the SAM Software Development Kit (SDK), and SolTrace products. LK is easy extensible and adaptable to new software due to its small footprint and is designed to be statically linked into other software. It is written in standard C++, is cross-platform (Windows, Linux, and OSX), and includes optional portions that enable direct integration with graphical user interfaces written in the open source C++ wxWidgets Versionmore » 3.0+ toolkit.« less

Integrated Design and Implementation of Embedded Control Systems with Scilab

PubMed Central

Ma, Longhua; Xia, Feng; Peng, Zhe

2008-01-01

Embedded systems are playing an increasingly important role in control engineering. Despite their popularity, embedded systems are generally subject to resource constraints and it is therefore difficult to build complex control systems on embedded platforms. Traditionally, the design and implementation of control systems are often separated, which causes the development of embedded control systems to be highly time-consuming and costly. To address these problems, this paper presents a low-cost, reusable, reconfigurable platform that enables integrated design and implementation of embedded control systems. To minimize the cost, free and open source software packages such as Linux and Scilab are used. Scilab is ported to the embedded ARM-Linux system. The drivers for interfacing Scilab with several communication protocols including serial, Ethernet, and Modbus are developed. Experiments are conducted to test the developed embedded platform. The use of Scilab enables implementation of complex control algorithms on embedded platforms. With the developed platform, it is possible to perform all phases of the development cycle of embedded control systems in a unified environment, thus facilitating the reduction of development time and cost. PMID:27873827

Integrated Design and Implementation of Embedded Control Systems with Scilab.

PubMed

Ma, Longhua; Xia, Feng; Peng, Zhe

2008-09-05

Embedded systems are playing an increasingly important role in control engineering. Despite their popularity, embedded systems are generally subject to resource constraints and it is therefore difficult to build complex control systems on embedded platforms. Traditionally, the design and implementation of control systems are often separated, which causes the development of embedded control systems to be highly timeconsuming and costly. To address these problems, this paper presents a low-cost, reusable, reconfigurable platform that enables integrated design and implementation of embedded control systems. To minimize the cost, free and open source software packages such as Linux and Scilab are used. Scilab is ported to the embedded ARM-Linux system. The drivers for interfacing Scilab with several communication protocols including serial, Ethernet, and Modbus are developed. Experiments are conducted to test the developed embedded platform. The use of Scilab enables implementation of complex control algorithms on embedded platforms. With the developed platform, it is possible to perform all phases of the development cycle of embedded control systems in a unified environment, thus facilitating the reduction of development time and cost.

Enabling People with Developmental Disabilities to Actively Follow Simple Instructions and Perform Designated Physical Activities According to Simple Instructions with Nintendo Wii Balance Boards by Controlling Environmental Stimulation

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Shih, Ching-Hsiang; Chung, Chiao-Chen; Shih, Ching-Tien; Chen, Ling-Che

2011-01-01

The latest researches have adopted software technology turning the Nintendo Wii Balance Board into a high performance standing location detector. This study extended Wii Balance Board functionality to assess whether two people with developmental disabilities would be able to actively perform designated physical activities according to simple…

Integration of enabling methods for the automated flow preparation of piperazine-2-carboxamide.

PubMed

Ingham, Richard J; Battilocchio, Claudio; Hawkins, Joel M; Ley, Steven V

2014-01-01

Here we describe the use of a new open-source software package and a Raspberry Pi(®) computer for the simultaneous control of multiple flow chemistry devices and its application to a machine-assisted, multi-step flow preparation of pyrazine-2-carboxamide - a component of Rifater(®), used in the treatment of tuberculosis - and its reduced derivative piperazine-2-carboxamide.

OntoSoft: A Software Registry for Geosciences

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Garijo, D.; Gil, Y.

2017-12-01

The goal of the EarthCube OntoSoft project is to enable the creation of an ecosystem for software stewardship in geosciences that will empower scientists to manage their software as valuable scientific assets. By sharing software metadata in OntoSoft, scientists enable broader access to that software by other scientists, software professionals, students, and decision makers. Our work to date includes: 1) an ontology for describing scientific software metadata, 2) a distributed scientific software repository that contains more than 750 entries that can be searched and compared across metadata fields, 3) an intelligent user interface that guides scientists to publish software and allows them to crowdsource its corresponding metadata. We have also developed a training program where scientists learn to describe and cite software in their papers in addition to data and provenance, and we are using OntoSoft to show them the benefits of publishing their software metadata. This training program is part of a Geoscience Papers of the Future Initiative, where scientists are reflecting on their current practices, benefits and effort for sharing software and data. This journal paper can be submitted to a Special Section of the AGU Earth and Space Science Journal.

Terra Harvest software architecture

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Humeniuk, Dave; Klawon, Kevin

2012-06-01

Under the Terra Harvest Program, the DIA has the objective of developing a universal Controller for the Unattended Ground Sensor (UGS) community. The mission is to define, implement, and thoroughly document an open architecture that universally supports UGS missions, integrating disparate systems, peripherals, etc. The Controller's inherent interoperability with numerous systems enables the integration of both legacy and future UGS System (UGSS) components, while the design's open architecture supports rapid third-party development to ensure operational readiness. The successful accomplishment of these objectives by the program's Phase 3b contractors is demonstrated via integration of the companies' respective plug-'n'-play contributions that include controllers, various peripherals, such as sensors, cameras, etc., and their associated software drivers. In order to independently validate the Terra Harvest architecture, L-3 Nova Engineering, along with its partner, the University of Dayton Research Institute, is developing the Terra Harvest Open Source Environment (THOSE), a Java Virtual Machine (JVM) running on an embedded Linux Operating System. The Use Cases on which the software is developed support the full range of UGS operational scenarios such as remote sensor triggering, image capture, and data exfiltration. The Team is additionally developing an ARM microprocessor-based evaluation platform that is both energy-efficient and operationally flexible. The paper describes the overall THOSE architecture, as well as the design decisions for some of the key software components. Development process for THOSE is discussed as well.

Improvement of Vivarium Biodecontamination through Data-acquisition Systems and Automation.

PubMed

Devan, Shakthi Rk; Vasu, Suresh; Mallikarjuna, Yogesha; Ponraj, Ramkumar; Kamath, Gireesh; Poosala, Suresh

2018-03-01

Biodecontamination is important for eliminating pathogens at research animal facilities, thereby preventing contamination within barrier systems. We enhanced our facility's standard biodecontamination method to replace the traditional foggers, and the new system was used effectively after creating bypass ducts in HVAC units so that individual rooms could be isolated. The entire system was controlled by inhouse-developed supervisory control and data-acquisition software that supported multiple cycles of decontamination by equipment, which had different decontamination capacities, operated in parallel, and used different agents, including H2O2 vapor and ClO2 gas. The process was validated according to facility mapping, and effectiveness was assessed by using biologic (Geobacillus stearothermophilus) and chemical indicator strips, which were positioned before decontamination, and by sampling contact plates after the completion of each cycle. The results of biologic indicators showed 6-log reduction in microbial counts after successful decontamination cycles for both agents and found to be compatible with clean-room panels including commonly used materials in vivarium such as racks, cages, trolleys, cage changing stations, biosafety cabinets, refrigerators and other equipment in both procedure and animal rooms. In conclusion, the automated process enabled users to perform effective decontamination through multiple cycles with realtime documentation and provided additional capability to deal with potential outbreaks. Enabling software integration of automation improved quality-control systems in our vivarium.

Development of a Web-Enabled Learning Platform for Geospatial Laboratories: Improving the Undergraduate Learning Experience

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Mui, Amy B.; Nelson, Sarah; Huang, Bruce; He, Yuhong; Wilson, Kathi

2015-01-01

This paper describes a web-enabled learning platform providing remote access to geospatial software that extends the learning experience outside of the laboratory setting. The platform was piloted in two undergraduate courses, and includes a software server, a data server, and remote student users. The platform was designed to improve the quality…

Policy Process Editor for P3BM Software

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

James, Mark; Chang, Hsin-Ping; Chow, Edward T.; Crichton, Gerald A.

2010-01-01

A computer program enables generation, in the form of graphical representations of process flows with embedded natural-language policy statements, input to a suite of policy-, process-, and performance-based management (P3BM) software. This program (1) serves as an interface between users and the Hunter software, which translates the input into machine-readable form; and (2) enables users to initialize and monitor the policy-implementation process. This program provides an intuitive graphical interface for incorporating natural-language policy statements into business-process flow diagrams. Thus, the program enables users who dictate policies to intuitively embed their intended process flows as they state the policies, reducing the likelihood of errors and reducing the time between declaration and execution of policy.

General Aviation Data Framework

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Blount, Elaine M.; Chung, Victoria I.

2006-01-01

The Flight Research Services Directorate at the NASA Langley Research Center (LaRC) provides development and operations services associated with three general aviation (GA) aircraft used for research experiments. The GA aircraft includes a Cessna 206X Stationair, a Lancair Colombia 300X, and a Cirrus SR22X. Since 2004, the GA Data Framework software was designed and implemented to gather data from a varying set of hardware and software sources as well as enable transfer of the data to other computers or devices. The key requirements for the GA Data Framework software include platform independence, the ability to reuse the framework for different projects without changing the framework code, graphics display capabilities, and the ability to vary the interfaces and their performance. Data received from the various devices is stored in shared memory. This paper concentrates on the object oriented software design patterns within the General Aviation Data Framework, and how they enable the construction of project specific software without changing the base classes. The issues of platform independence and multi-threading which enable interfaces to run at different frame rates are also discussed in this paper.

Symbolic Constraint Maintenance Grid

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

James, Mark

2006-01-01

Version 3.1 of Symbolic Constraint Maintenance Grid (SCMG) is a software system that provides a general conceptual framework for utilizing pre-existing programming techniques to perform symbolic transformations of data. SCMG also provides a language (and an associated communication method and protocol) for representing constraints on the original non-symbolic data. SCMG provides a facility for exchanging information between numeric and symbolic components without knowing the details of the components themselves. In essence, it integrates symbolic software tools (for diagnosis, prognosis, and planning) with non-artificial-intelligence software. SCMG executes a process of symbolic summarization and monitoring of continuous time series data that are being abstractly represented as symbolic templates of information exchange. This summarization process enables such symbolic- reasoning computing systems as artificial- intelligence planning systems to evaluate the significance and effects of channels of data more efficiently than would otherwise be possible. As a result of the increased efficiency in representation, reasoning software can monitor more channels and is thus able to perform monitoring and control functions more effectively.

Sensor Webs: Autonomous Rapid Response to Monitor Transient Science Events

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mandl, Dan; Grosvenor, Sandra; Frye, Stu; Sherwood, Robert; Chien, Steve; Davies, Ashley; Cichy, Ben; Ingram, Mary Ann; Langley, John; Miranda, Felix

2005-01-01

To better understand how physical phenomena, such as volcanic eruptions, evolve over time, multiple sensor observations over the duration of the event are required. Using sensor web approaches that integrate original detections by in-situ sensors and global-coverage, lower-resolution, on-orbit assets with automated rapid response observations from high resolution sensors, more observations of significant events can be made with increased temporal, spatial, and spectral resolution. This paper describes experiments using Earth Observing 1 (EO-1) along with other space and ground assets to implement progressive mission autonomy to identify, locate and image with high resolution instruments phenomena such as wildfires, volcanoes, floods and ice breakup. The software that plans, schedules and controls the various satellite assets are used to form ad hoc constellations which enable collaborative autonomous image collections triggered by transient phenomena. This software is both flight and ground based and works in concert to run all of the required assets cohesively and includes software that is model-based, artificial intelligence software.

OpenSatKit Enables Quick Startup for CubeSat Missions

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

McComas, David; Melton, Ryan

2017-01-01

The software required to develop, integrate, and operate a spacecraft is substantial regardless of whether its a large or small satellite. Even getting started can be a monumental task. To solve this problem, NASAs Core Flight System (cFS), NASA's 42 spacecraft dynamics simulator, and Ball Aerospaces COSMOS ground system have been integrated together into a kit called OpenSatKit that provides a complete and open source software solution for starting a new satellite mission. Users can have a working system with flight software, dynamics simulation, and a ground command and control system up and running within hours.Every satellite mission requires three primary categories of software to function. The first is Flight Software (FSW) which provides the onboard control of the satellites and its payload(s). NASA's cFS provides a great platform for developing this software. Second, while developing a satellite on earth, it is necessary to simulate the satellites orbit, attitude, and actuators, to ensure that the systems that control these aspects will work correctly in the real environment. NASAs 42 simulator provides these functionalities. Finally, the ground has to be able to communicate with the satellite, monitor its performance and health, and display its data. Additionally, test scripts have to be written to verify the system on the ground. Ball Aerospace's COSMOS command and control system provides this functionality. Once the OpenSatKit is up and running, the next step is to customize the platform and get it running on the end target. Starting from a fully working system makes porting the cFS from Linux to a users platform much easier. An example Raspberry Pi target is included in the kit so users can gain experience working with a low cost hardware target. All users can benefit from OpenSatKit but the greatest impact and benefits will be to SmallSat missions with constrained budgets and small software teams. This paper describes OpenSatKits system design, the steps necessary to run the system to target the Raspberry Pi, and future plans. OpenSatKit is a free fully functional spacecraft software system that we hope will greatly benefit the SmallSat community.

Interface Provides Standard-Bus Communication

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Culliton, William G.

1995-01-01

Microprocessor-controlled interface (IEEE-488/LVABI) incorporates service-request and direct-memory-access features. Is circuit card enabling digital communication between system called "laser auto-covariance buffer interface" (LVABI) and compatible personal computer via general-purpose interface bus (GPIB) conforming to Institute for Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Standard 488. Interface serves as second interface enabling first interface to exploit advantages of GPIB, via utility software written specifically for GPIB. Advantages include compatibility with multitasking and support of communication among multiple computers. Basic concept also applied in designing interfaces for circuits other than LVABI for unidirectional or bidirectional handling of parallel data up to 16 bits wide.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Germain, Shawn

Nuclear Power Plant (NPP) refueling outages create some of the most challenging activities the utilities face in both tracking and coordinating thousands of activities in a short period of time. Other challenges, including nuclear safety concerns arising from atypical system configurations and resource allocation issues, can create delays and schedule overruns, driving up outage costs. Today the majority of the outage communication is done using processes that do not take advantage of advances in modern technologies that enable enhanced communication, collaboration and information sharing. Some of the common practices include: runners that deliver paper-based requests for approval, radios, telephones, desktopmore » computers, daily schedule printouts, and static whiteboards that are used to display information. Many gains have been made to reduce the challenges facing outage coordinators; however; new opportunities can be realized by utilizing modern technological advancements in communication and information tools that can enhance the collective situational awareness of plant personnel leading to improved decision-making. Ongoing research as part of the Light Water Reactor Sustainability Program (LWRS) has been targeting NPP outage improvement. As part of this research, various applications of collaborative software have been demonstrated through pilot project utility partnerships. Collaboration software can be utilized as part of the larger concept of Computer-Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW). Collaborative software can be used for emergent issue resolution, Outage Control Center (OCC) displays, and schedule monitoring. Use of collaboration software enables outage staff and subject matter experts (SMEs) to view and update critical outage information from any location on site or off.« less

Online Planning Algorithm

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Rabideau, Gregg R.; Chien, Steve A.

2010-01-01

AVA v2 software selects goals for execution from a set of goals that oversubscribe shared resources. The term goal refers to a science or engineering request to execute a possibly complex command sequence, such as image targets or ground-station downlinks. Developed as an extension to the Virtual Machine Language (VML) execution system, the software enables onboard and remote goal triggering through the use of an embedded, dynamic goal set that can oversubscribe resources. From the set of conflicting goals, a subset must be chosen that maximizes a given quality metric, which in this case is strict priority selection. A goal can never be pre-empted by a lower priority goal, and high-level goals can be added, removed, or updated at any time, and the "best" goals will be selected for execution. The software addresses the issue of re-planning that must be performed in a short time frame by the embedded system where computational resources are constrained. In particular, the algorithm addresses problems with well-defined goal requests without temporal flexibility that oversubscribes available resources. By using a fast, incremental algorithm, goal selection can be postponed in a "just-in-time" fashion allowing requests to be changed or added at the last minute. Thereby enabling shorter response times and greater autonomy for the system under control.

Software Architecture to Support the Evolution of the ISRU RESOLVE Engineering Breadboard Unit 2 (EBU2)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Moss, Thomas; Nurge, Mark; Perusich, Stephen

2011-01-01

The In-Situ Resource Utilization (ISRU) Regolith & Environmental Science and Oxygen & Lunar Volatiles Extraction (RESOLVE) software provides operation of the physical plant from a remote location with a high-level interface that can access and control the data from external software applications of other subsystems. This software allows autonomous control over the entire system with manual computer control of individual system/process components. It gives non-programmer operators the capability to easily modify the high-level autonomous sequencing while the software is in operation, as well as the ability to modify the low-level, file-based sequences prior to the system operation. Local automated control in a distributed system is also enabled where component control is maintained during the loss of network connectivity with the remote workstation. This innovation also minimizes network traffic. The software architecture commands and controls the latest generation of RESOLVE processes used to obtain, process, and quantify lunar regolith. The system is grouped into six sub-processes: Drill, Crush, Reactor, Lunar Water Resource Demonstration (LWRD), Regolith Volatiles Characterization (RVC) (see example), and Regolith Oxygen Extraction (ROE). Some processes are independent, some are dependent on other processes, and some are independent but run concurrently with other processes. The first goal is to analyze the volatiles emanating from lunar regolith, such as water, carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, ammonia, hydrogen, and others. This is done by heating the soil and analyzing and capturing the volatilized product. The second goal is to produce water by reducing the soil at high temperatures with hydrogen. This is done by raising the reactor temperature in the range of 800 to 900 C, causing the reaction to progress by adding hydrogen, and then capturing the water product in a desiccant bed. The software needs to run the entire unit and all sub-processes; however, throughout testing, many variables and parameters need to be changed as more is learned about the system operation. The Master Events Controller (MEC) is run on a standard laptop PC using Windows XP. This PC runs in parallel to another laptop that monitors the GC, and a third PC that monitors the drilling/ crushing operation. These three PCs interface to the process through a CompactRIO, OPC Servers, and modems.

Features of free software packages in flow cytometry: a comparison between four non-commercial software sources.

PubMed

Sahraneshin Samani, Fazel; Moore, Jodene K; Khosravani, Pardis; Ebrahimi, Marzieh

2014-08-01

Flow cytometers designed to analyze large particles are enabling new applications in biology. Data analysis is a critical component of the process FCM. In this article we compare features of four free software packages including WinMDI, Cyflogic, Flowing software, and Cytobank.

ClusterControl: a web interface for distributing and monitoring bioinformatics applications on a Linux cluster.

PubMed

Stocker, Gernot; Rieder, Dietmar; Trajanoski, Zlatko

2004-03-22

ClusterControl is a web interface to simplify distributing and monitoring bioinformatics applications on Linux cluster systems. We have developed a modular concept that enables integration of command line oriented program into the application framework of ClusterControl. The systems facilitate integration of different applications accessed through one interface and executed on a distributed cluster system. The package is based on freely available technologies like Apache as web server, PHP as server-side scripting language and OpenPBS as queuing system and is available free of charge for academic and non-profit institutions. http://genome.tugraz.at/Software/ClusterControl

An Architecture to Enable Autonomous Control of Spacecraft

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

May, Ryan D.; Dever, Timothy P.; Soeder, James F.; George, Patrick J.; Morris, Paul H.; Colombano, Silvano P.; Frank, Jeremy D.; Schwabacher, Mark A.; Wang, Liu; LawLer, Dennis

2014-01-01

Autonomy is required for manned spacecraft missions distant enough that light-time communication delays make ground-based mission control infeasible. Presently, ground controllers develop a complete schedule of power modes for all spacecraft components based on a large number of factors. The proposed architecture is an early attempt to formalize and automate this process using on-vehicle computation resources. In order to demonstrate this architecture, an autonomous electrical power system controller and vehicle Mission Manager are constructed. These two components are designed to work together in order to plan upcoming load use as well as respond to unanticipated deviations from the plan. The communication protocol was developed using "paper" simulations prior to formally encoding the messages and developing software to implement the required functionality. These software routines exchange data via TCP/IP sockets with the Mission Manager operating at NASA Ames Research Center and the autonomous power controller running at NASA Glenn Research Center. The interconnected systems are tested and shown to be effective at planning the operation of a simulated quasi-steady state spacecraft power system and responding to unexpected disturbances.

Use of Mapping and Spatial and Space-Time Modeling Approaches in Operational Control of Aedes aegypti and Dengue

PubMed Central

Eisen, Lars; Lozano-Fuentes, Saul

2009-01-01

The aims of this review paper are to 1) provide an overview of how mapping and spatial and space-time modeling approaches have been used to date to visualize and analyze mosquito vector and epidemiologic data for dengue; and 2) discuss the potential for these approaches to be included as routine activities in operational vector and dengue control programs. Geographical information system (GIS) software are becoming more user-friendly and now are complemented by free mapping software that provide access to satellite imagery and basic feature-making tools and have the capacity to generate static maps as well as dynamic time-series maps. Our challenge is now to move beyond the research arena by transferring mapping and GIS technologies and spatial statistical analysis techniques in user-friendly packages to operational vector and dengue control programs. This will enable control programs to, for example, generate risk maps for exposure to dengue virus, develop Priority Area Classifications for vector control, and explore socioeconomic associations with dengue risk. PMID:19399163

Libration Orbit Mission Design: Applications of Numerical & Dynamical Methods

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bauer, Frank (Technical Monitor); Folta, David; Beckman, Mark

2002-01-01

Sun-Earth libration point orbits serve as excellent locations for scientific investigations. These orbits are often selected to minimize environmental disturbances and maximize observing efficiency. Trajectory design in support of libration orbits is ever more challenging as more complex missions are envisioned in the next decade. Trajectory design software must be further enabled to incorporate better understanding of the libration orbit solution space and thus improve the efficiency and expand the capabilities of current approaches. The Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) is currently supporting multiple libration missions. This end-to-end support consists of mission operations, trajectory design, and control. It also includes algorithm and software development. The recently launched Microwave Anisotropy Probe (MAP) and upcoming James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) and Constellation-X missions are examples of the use of improved numerical methods for attaining constrained orbital parameters and controlling their dynamical evolution at the collinear libration points. This paper presents a history of libration point missions, a brief description of the numerical and dynamical design techniques including software used, and a sample of future GSFC mission designs.

Controlling Distributed Planning

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Clement, Bradley; Barrett, Anthony

2004-01-01

A system of software implements an extended version of an approach, denoted shared activity coordination (SHAC), to the interleaving of planning and the exchange of plan information among organizations devoted to different missions that normally communicate infrequently except that they need to collaborate on joint activities and/or the use of shared resources. SHAC enables the planning and scheduling systems of the organizations to coordinate by resolving conflicts while optimizing local planning solutions. The present software provides a framework for modeling and executing communication protocols for SHAC. Shared activities are represented in each interacting planning system to establish consensus on joint activities or to inform the other systems of consumption of a common resource or a change in a shared state. The representations of shared activities are extended to include information on (1) the role(s) of each participant, (2) permissions (defined as specifications of which participant controls what aspects of shared activities and scheduling thereof), and (3) constraints on the parameters of shared activities. Also defined in the software are protocols for changing roles, permissions, and constraints during the course of coordination and execution.

The Five 'R's' for Developing Trusted Software Frameworks to increase confidence in, and maximise reuse of, Open Source Software.

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fraser, Ryan; Gross, Lutz; Wyborn, Lesley; Evans, Ben; Klump, Jens

2015-04-01

Recent investments in HPC, cloud and Petascale data stores, have dramatically increased the scale and resolution that earth science challenges can now be tackled. These new infrastructures are highly parallelised and to fully utilise them and access the large volumes of earth science data now available, a new approach to software stack engineering needs to be developed. The size, complexity and cost of the new infrastructures mean any software deployed has to be reliable, trusted and reusable. Increasingly software is available via open source repositories, but these usually only enable code to be discovered and downloaded. As a user it is hard for a scientist to judge the suitability and quality of individual codes: rarely is there information on how and where codes can be run, what the critical dependencies are, and in particular, on the version requirements and licensing of the underlying software stack. A trusted software framework is proposed to enable reliable software to be discovered, accessed and then deployed on multiple hardware environments. More specifically, this framework will enable those who generate the software, and those who fund the development of software, to gain credit for the effort, IP, time and dollars spent, and facilitate quantification of the impact of individual codes. For scientific users, the framework delivers reviewed and benchmarked scientific software with mechanisms to reproduce results. The trusted framework will have five separate, but connected components: Register, Review, Reference, Run, and Repeat. 1) The Register component will facilitate discovery of relevant software from multiple open source code repositories. The registration process of the code should include information about licensing, hardware environments it can be run on, define appropriate validation (testing) procedures and list the critical dependencies. 2) The Review component is targeting on the verification of the software typically against a set of benchmark cases. This will be achieved by linking the code in the software framework to peer review forums such as Mozilla Science or appropriate Journals (e.g. Geoscientific Model Development Journal) to assist users to know which codes to trust. 3) Referencing will be accomplished by linking the Software Framework to groups such as Figshare or ImpactStory that help disseminate and measure the impact of scientific research, including program code. 4) The Run component will draw on information supplied in the registration process, benchmark cases described in the review and relevant information to instantiate the scientific code on the selected environment. 5) The Repeat component will tap into existing Provenance Workflow engines that will automatically capture information that relate to a particular run of that software, including identification of all input and output artefacts, and all elements and transactions within that workflow. The proposed trusted software framework will enable users to rapidly discover and access reliable code, reduce the time to deploy it and greatly facilitate sharing, reuse and reinstallation of code. Properly designed it could enable an ability to scale out to massively parallel systems and be accessed nationally/ internationally for multiple use cases, including Supercomputer centres, cloud facilities, and local computers.

Smarter Software For Enhanced Vehicle Health Monitoring and Inter-Planetary Exploration

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Larson, William E.; Goodrich, Charles H.; Steinrock, Todd (Technical Monitor)

2001-01-01

The existing philosophy for space mission control was born in the early days of the space program when technology did not exist to put significant control responsibility onboard the spacecraft. NASA relied on a team of ground control experts to troubleshoot systems when problems occurred. As computing capability improved, more responsibility was handed over to the systems software. However, there is still a large contingent of both launch and flight controllers supporting each mission. New technology can update this philosophy to increase mission assurance and reduce the cost of inter-planetary exploration. The advent of model-based diagnosis and intelligent planning software enables spacecraft to handle most routine problems automatically and allocate resources in a flexible way to realize mission objectives. The manifests for recent missions include multiple subsystems and complex experiments. Spacecraft must operate at longer distances from earth where communications delays make earthbound command and control impractical. NASA's Ames Research Center (ARC) has demonstrated the utility of onboard diagnosis and planning with the Remote Agent experiment in 1999. KSC has pioneered model-based diagnosis and demonstrated its utility for ground support operations. KSC and ARC are cooperating in research to improve the state of the art of this technology. This paper highlights model-based reasoning applications for Moon and Mars missions including in-situ resource utilization and enhanced vehicle health monitoring.

Open cyberGIS software for geospatial research and education in the big data era

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wang, Shaowen; Liu, Yan; Padmanabhan, Anand

CyberGIS represents an interdisciplinary field combining advanced cyberinfrastructure, geographic information science and systems (GIS), spatial analysis and modeling, and a number of geospatial domains to improve research productivity and enable scientific breakthroughs. It has emerged as new-generation GIS that enable unprecedented advances in data-driven knowledge discovery, visualization and visual analytics, and collaborative problem solving and decision-making. This paper describes three open software strategies-open access, source, and integration-to serve various research and education purposes of diverse geospatial communities. These strategies have been implemented in a leading-edge cyberGIS software environment through three corresponding software modalities: CyberGIS Gateway, Toolkit, and Middleware, and achieved broad and significant impacts.

Software and the future of programming languages.

PubMed

Aho, Alfred V

2004-02-27

Although software is the key enabler of the global information infrastructure, the amount and extent of software in use in the world today are not widely understood, nor are the programming languages and paradigms that have been used to create the software. The vast size of the embedded base of existing software and the increasing costs of software maintenance, poor security, and limited functionality are posing significant challenges for the software R&D community.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Price, H.L.

Much of the polymer composites industry is built around the thermochemical conversion of raw material into useful composites. The raw materials (molding compound, prepreg) often are made up of thermosetting resins and small fibers or particles. While this conversion can follow a large number of paths, only a few paths are efficient, economical and lead to desirable composite properties. Processing instrument (P/I) technology enables a computer to sense and interpret changes taking place during the cure of prepreg or molding compound. P/I technology has been used to make estimates of gel time and cure time, thermal diffusivity measurements and transitionmore » temperature measurements. Control and sensing software is comparatively straightforward. The interpretation of results with appropriate software is under development.« less

An online database for plant image analysis software tools.

PubMed

Lobet, Guillaume; Draye, Xavier; Périlleux, Claire

2013-10-09

Recent years have seen an increase in methods for plant phenotyping using image analyses. These methods require new software solutions for data extraction and treatment. These solutions are instrumental in supporting various research pipelines, ranging from the localisation of cellular compounds to the quantification of tree canopies. However, due to the variety of existing tools and the lack of central repository, it is challenging for researchers to identify the software that is best suited for their research. We present an online, manually curated, database referencing more than 90 plant image analysis software solutions. The website, plant-image-analysis.org, presents each software in a uniform and concise manner enabling users to identify the available solutions for their experimental needs. The website also enables user feedback, evaluations and new software submissions. The plant-image-analysis.org database provides an overview of existing plant image analysis software. The aim of such a toolbox is to help users to find solutions, and to provide developers a way to exchange and communicate about their work.

MD-11 PCA - Research flight team photo

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

1995-01-01

On Aug. 30, 1995, a the McDonnell Douglas MD-11 transport aircraft landed equipped with a computer-assisted engine control system that has the potential to increase flight safety. In landings at NASA Dryden Flight Research Center, Edwards, California, on August 29 and 30, the aircraft demonstrated software used in the aircraft's flight control computer that essentially landed the MD-11 without a need for the pilot to manipulate the flight controls significantly. In partnership with McDonnell Douglas Aerospace (MDA), with Pratt & Whitney and Honeywell helping to design the software, NASA developed this propulsion-controlled aircraft (PCA) system following a series of incidents in which hydraulic failures resulted in the loss of flight controls. This new system enables a pilot to operate and land the aircraft safely when its normal, hydraulically-activated control surfaces are disabled. This August 29, 1995, photo shows the MD-11 team. Back row, left to right: Tim Dingen, MDA pilot; John Miller, MD-11 Chief pilot (MDA); Wayne Anselmo, MD-11 Flight Test Engineer (MDA); Gordon Fullerton, PCA Project pilot; Bill Burcham, PCA Chief Engineer; Rudey Duran, PCA Controls Engineer (MDA); John Feather, PCA Controls Engineer (MDA); Daryl Townsend, Crew Chief; Henry Hernandez, aircraft mechanic; Bob Baron, PCA Project Manager; Don Hermann, aircraft mechanic; Jerry Cousins, aircraft mechanic; Eric Petersen, PCA Manager (Honeywell); Trindel Maine, PCA Data Engineer; Jeff Kahler, PCA Software Engineer (Honeywell); Steve Goldthorpe, PCA Controls Engineer (MDA). Front row, left to right: Teresa Hass, Senior Project Management Analyst; Hollie Allingham (Aguilera), Senior Project Management Analyst; Taher Zeglum, PCA Data Engineer (MDA); Drew Pappas, PCA Project Manager (MDA); John Burken, PCA Control Engineer.

Software for the EVLA

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Butler, Bryan J.; van Moorsel, Gustaaf; Tody, Doug

2004-09-01

The Expanded Very Large Array (EVLA) project is the next generation instrument for high resolution long-millimeter to short-meter wavelength radio astronomy. It is currently funded by NSF, with completion scheduled for 2012. The EVLA will upgrade the VLA with new feeds, receivers, data transmission hardware, correlator, and a new software system to enable the instrument to achieve its full potential. This software includes both that required for controlling and monitoring the instrument and that involved with the scientific dataflow. We concentrate here on a portion of the dataflow software, including: proposal preparation, submission, and handling; observation preparation, scheduling, and remote monitoring; data archiving; and data post-processing, including both automated (pipeline) and manual processing. The primary goals of the software are: to maximize the scientific return of the EVLA; provide ease of use, for both novices and experts; exploit commonality amongst all NRAO telescopes where possible. This last point is both a bane and a blessing: we are not at liberty to do whatever we want in the software, but on the other hand we may borrow from other projects (notably ALMA and GBT) where appropriate. The software design methodology includes detailed initial use-cases and requirements from the scientists, intimate interaction between the scientists and the programmers during design and implementation, and a thorough testing and acceptance plan.

1998 IEEE Aerospace Conference. Proceedings.

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

The following topics were covered: science frontiers and aerospace; flight systems technologies; spacecraft attitude determination and control; space power systems; smart structures and dynamics; military avionics; electronic packaging; MEMS; hyperspectral remote sensing for GVP; space laser technology; pointing, control, tracking and stabilization technologies; payload support technologies; protection technologies; 21st century space mission management and design; aircraft flight testing; aerospace test and evaluation; small satellites and enabling technologies; systems design optimisation; advanced launch vehicles; GPS applications and technologies; antennas and radar; software and systems engineering; scalable systems; communications; target tracking applications; remote sensing; advanced sensors; and optoelectronics.

Bionic models for identification of biological systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gerget, O. M.

2017-01-01

This article proposes a clinical decision support system that processes biomedical data. For this purpose a bionic model has been designed based on neural networks, genetic algorithms and immune systems. The developed system has been tested on data from pregnant women. The paper focuses on the approach to enable selection of control actions that can minimize the risk of adverse outcome. The control actions (hyperparameters of a new type) are further used as an additional input signal. Its values are defined by a hyperparameter optimization method. A software developed with Python is briefly described.

Automated response matching for organic scintillation detector arrays

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Aspinall, M. D.; Joyce, M. J.; Cave, F. D.; Plenteda, R.; Tomanin, A.

2017-07-01

This paper identifies a digitizer technology with unique features that facilitates feedback control for the realization of a software-based technique for automatically calibrating detector responses. Three such auto-calibration techniques have been developed and are described along with an explanation of the main configuration settings and potential pitfalls. Automating this process increases repeatability, simplifies user operation, enables remote and periodic system calibration where consistency across detectors' responses are critical.

Integration of enabling methods for the automated flow preparation of piperazine-2-carboxamide

PubMed Central

Ingham, Richard J; Battilocchio, Claudio; Hawkins, Joel M

2014-01-01

Summary Here we describe the use of a new open-source software package and a Raspberry Pi® computer for the simultaneous control of multiple flow chemistry devices and its application to a machine-assisted, multi-step flow preparation of pyrazine-2-carboxamide – a component of Rifater®, used in the treatment of tuberculosis – and its reduced derivative piperazine-2-carboxamide. PMID:24778715

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Jonathan Helmus, Scott Collis

The Python-ARM Radar Toolkit (Py-ART) is a collection of radar quality control and retrieval codes which all work on two unifying Python objects: the PyRadar and PyGrid objects. By building ingests to several popular radar formats and then abstracting the interface Py-ART greatly simplifies data processing over several other available utilities. In addition Py-ART makes use of Numpy arrays as its primary storage mechanism enabling use of existing and extensive community software tools.

Progress in the Development of a Prototype Reuse Enablement System

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Marshall, J. J.; Downs, R. R.; Gilliam, L. J.; Wolfe, R. E.

2008-12-01

An important part of promoting software reuse is to ensure that reusable software assets are readily available to the software developers who want to use them. Through dialogs with the community, the NASA Earth Science Data Systems Software Reuse Working Group has learned that the lack of a centralized, domain- specific software repository or catalog system addressing the needs of the Earth science community is a major barrier to software reuse within the community. The Working Group has proposed the creation of such a reuse enablement system, which would provide capabilities for contributing and obtaining reusable software, to remove this barrier. The Working Group has recommended the development of a Reuse Enablement System to NASA and has performed a trade study to review systems with similar capabilities and to identify potential platforms for the proposed system. This was followed by an architecture study to determine an expeditious and cost-effective solution for this system. A number of software packages and systems were examined through both creating prototypes and examining existing systems that use the same software packages and systems. Based on the results of the architecture study, the Working Group developed a prototype of the proposed system using the recommended software package, through an iterative process of identifying needed capabilities and improving the system to provide those capabilities. Policies for the operation and maintenance of the system are being established for the system, and the identification of system policies also has contributed to the development process. Additionally, a test plan is being developed for formal testing of the prototype, to ensure that it meets all of the requirements previously developed by the Working Group. This poster summarizes the results of our work to date, focusing on the most recent activities.

Remote observing with the Nickel Telescope at Lick Observatory

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Grigsby, Bryant; Chloros, Konstantinos; Gates, John; Deich, William T. S.; Gates, Elinor; Kibrick, Robert

2008-07-01

We describe a project to enable remote observing on the Nickel 1-meter Telescope at Lick Observatory. The purpose was to increase the subscription rate and create more economical means for graduate- and undergraduate students to observe with this telescope. The Nickel Telescope resides in a 125 year old dome on Mount Hamilton. Remote observers may work from any of the University of California (UC) remote observing facilities that have been created to support remote work at both Keck Observatory and Lick Observatory. The project included hardware and software upgrades to enable computer control of all equipment that must be operated by the astronomer; a remote observing architecture that is closely modeled on UCO/Lick's work to implement remote observing between UC campuses and Keck Observatory; new policies to ensure safety of Observatory staff and equipment, while ensuring that the telescope subsystems would be suitably configured for remote use; and new software to enforce the safety-related policies. The results increased the subscription rate from a few nights per month to nearly full subscription, and has spurred the installation of remote observing sites at more UC campuses. Thanks to the increased automation and computer control, local observing has also benefitted and is more efficient. Remote observing is now being implemented for the Shane 3- meter telescope.

SUGAR: graphical user interface-based data refiner for high-throughput DNA sequencing.

PubMed

Sato, Yukuto; Kojima, Kaname; Nariai, Naoki; Yamaguchi-Kabata, Yumi; Kawai, Yosuke; Takahashi, Mamoru; Mimori, Takahiro; Nagasaki, Masao

2014-08-08

Next-generation sequencers (NGSs) have become one of the main tools for current biology. To obtain useful insights from the NGS data, it is essential to control low-quality portions of the data affected by technical errors such as air bubbles in sequencing fluidics. We develop a software SUGAR (subtile-based GUI-assisted refiner) which can handle ultra-high-throughput data with user-friendly graphical user interface (GUI) and interactive analysis capability. The SUGAR generates high-resolution quality heatmaps of the flowcell, enabling users to find possible signals of technical errors during the sequencing. The sequencing data generated from the error-affected regions of a flowcell can be selectively removed by automated analysis or GUI-assisted operations implemented in the SUGAR. The automated data-cleaning function based on sequence read quality (Phred) scores was applied to a public whole human genome sequencing data and we proved the overall mapping quality was improved. The detailed data evaluation and cleaning enabled by SUGAR would reduce technical problems in sequence read mapping, improving subsequent variant analysis that require high-quality sequence data and mapping results. Therefore, the software will be especially useful to control the quality of variant calls to the low population cells, e.g., cancers, in a sample with technical errors of sequencing procedures.

A tool to include gamma analysis software into a quality assurance program.

PubMed

Agnew, Christina E; McGarry, Conor K

2016-03-01

To provide a tool to enable gamma analysis software algorithms to be included in a quality assurance (QA) program. Four image sets were created comprising two geometric images to independently test the distance to agreement (DTA) and dose difference (DD) elements of the gamma algorithm, a clinical step and shoot IMRT field and a clinical VMAT arc. The images were analysed using global and local gamma analysis with 2 in-house and 8 commercially available software encompassing 15 software versions. The effect of image resolution on gamma pass rates was also investigated. All but one software accurately calculated the gamma passing rate for the geometric images. Variation in global gamma passing rates of 1% at 3%/3mm and over 2% at 1%/1mm was measured between software and software versions with analysis of appropriately sampled images. This study provides a suite of test images and the gamma pass rates achieved for a selection of commercially available software. This image suite will enable validation of gamma analysis software within a QA program and provide a frame of reference by which to compare results reported in the literature from various manufacturers and software versions. Copyright © 2015. Published by Elsevier Ireland Ltd.

Digitally-bypassed transducers: interfacing digital mockups to real-time medical equipment.

PubMed

Sirowy, Scott; Givargis, Tony; Vahid, Frank

2009-01-01

Medical device software is sometimes initially developed by using a PC simulation environment that executes models of both the device and a physiological system, and then later by connecting the actual medical device to a physical mockup of the physiological system. An alternative is to connect the medical device to a digital mockup of the physiological system, such that the device believes it is interacting with a physiological system, but in fact all interaction is entirely digital. Developing medical device software by interfacing with a digital mockup enables development without costly or dangerous physical mockups, and enables execution that is faster or slower than real time. We introduce digitally-bypassed transducers, which involve a small amount of hardware and software additions, and which enable interfacing with digital mockups.

DSC: software tool for simulation-based design of control strategies applied to wastewater treatment plants.

PubMed

Ruano, M V; Ribes, J; Seco, A; Ferrer, J

2011-01-01

This paper presents a computer tool called DSC (Simulation based Controllers Design) that enables an easy design of control systems and strategies applied to wastewater treatment plants. Although the control systems are developed and evaluated by simulation, this tool aims to facilitate the direct implementation of the designed control system to the PC of the full-scale WWTP (wastewater treatment plants). The designed control system can be programmed in a dedicated control application and can be connected to either the simulation software or the SCADA of the plant. To this end, the developed DSC incorporates an OPC server (OLE for process control) which facilitates an open-standard communication protocol for different industrial process applications. The potential capabilities of the DSC tool are illustrated through the example of a full-scale application. An aeration control system applied to a nutrient removing WWTP was designed, tuned and evaluated with the DSC tool before its implementation in the full scale plant. The control parameters obtained by simulation were suitable for the full scale plant with only few modifications to improve the control performance. With the DSC tool, the control systems performance can be easily evaluated by simulation. Once developed and tuned by simulation, the control systems can be directly applied to the full-scale WWTP.

SHINE Virtual Machine Model for In-flight Updates of Critical Mission Software

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Plesea, Lucian

2008-01-01

This software is a new target for the Spacecraft Health Inference Engine (SHINE) knowledge base that compiles a knowledge base to a language called Tiny C - an interpreted version of C that can be embedded on flight processors. This new target allows portions of a running SHINE knowledge base to be updated on a "live" system without needing to halt and restart the containing SHINE application. This enhancement will directly provide this capability without the risk of software validation problems and can also enable complete integration of BEAM and SHINE into a single application. This innovation enables SHINE deployment in domains where autonomy is used during flight-critical applications that require updates. This capability eliminates the need for halting the application and performing potentially serious total system uploads before resuming the application with the loss of system integrity. This software enables additional applications at JPL (microsensors, embedded mission hardware) and increases the marketability of these applications outside of JPL.

A History of Space Shuttle Main Engine (SSME) Redline Limits Management

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Arnold, Thomas M.

2011-01-01

The Space Shuttle Main Engine (SSME) has several "redlines", which are operational limits designated to preclude a catastrophic shutdown of the SSME. The Space Shuttle Orbiter utilizes a combination of hardware and software to enable or disable the automated redline shutdown capability. The Space Shuttle is launched with the automated SSME redline limits enabled, but there are many scenarios which may result in the manual disabling of the software by the onboard crew. The operational philosophy for manually enabling and disabling the redline limits software has evolved continuously throughout the history of the Space Shuttle Program, due to events such as SSME hardware changes and updates to Space Shuttle contingency abort software. In this paper, the evolution of SSME redline limits management will be fully reviewed, including the operational scenarios which call for manual intervention, and the events that triggered changes to the philosophy. Following this review, improvements to the management of redline limits for future spacecraft will be proposed.

The ESGF Software Stack: a Configurable and Extensible Framework for Enabling Access to Geospatial Data

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Cinquini, L.; Bell, G. M.; Williams, D.; Harney, J.

2012-12-01

The Earth System Grid Federation (ESGF) is a multi-agency, international collaboration that aims at developing state-of-the-art services for the management and access of Earth system data. ESGF is currently used to serve the totality of the model output used for the forthcoming IPCC 5th assessment report on climate change, as well as supporting observational and reanalysis datasets. Also, it is been adopted by several other projects that focus on global, regional and local climate modeling. The ESGF software stack is composed of several modular applications that cover related but disjoint areas of functionality: data publishing, data search and discovery, data access, user management, security, and federation. Overall, the ESGF infrastructure offers a configurable end-to-end solution to the problem of enabling web-based access to large amounts of geospatial data. This talk will present the architectural and configuration options that are available to a data provider leveraging ESGF to serve their data: which services to expose, how to scale to larger data collections, how to establish access control, how to customize the user interface, and others. Additionally, the framework provides extension points that allow each site to plug in custom functionality such as crawling of specific metadata repositories, exposing domain-specific analysis and visualization services, developing custom access clients that interact with the system APIs. These configuration and extension capabilities are based on simple but effective domain-specific object models, that underpin the software applications: the data model, the security model, and the federation model. The ESGF software stack is developed collaboratively by software engineers at many institutions around the world, and is made freely available to the community under an open source license to promote adoption, reuse, inspection and continuous improvement.

Instrumentino: An Open-Source Software for Scientific Instruments.

PubMed

Koenka, Israel Joel; Sáiz, Jorge; Hauser, Peter C

2015-01-01

Scientists often need to build dedicated computer-controlled experimental systems. For this purpose, it is becoming common to employ open-source microcontroller platforms, such as the Arduino. These boards and associated integrated software development environments provide affordable yet powerful solutions for the implementation of hardware control of transducers and acquisition of signals from detectors and sensors. It is, however, a challenge to write programs that allow interactive use of such arrangements from a personal computer. This task is particularly complex if some of the included hardware components are connected directly to the computer and not via the microcontroller. A graphical user interface framework, Instrumentino, was therefore developed to allow the creation of control programs for complex systems with minimal programming effort. By writing a single code file, a powerful custom user interface is generated, which enables the automatic running of elaborate operation sequences and observation of acquired experimental data in real time. The framework, which is written in Python, allows extension by users, and is made available as an open source project.

Distributed intelligent control and management (DICAM) applications and support for semi-automated development

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hayes-Roth, Frederick; Erman, Lee D.; Terry, Allan; Hayes-Roth, Barbara

1992-01-01

We have recently begun a 4-year effort to develop a new technology foundation and associated methodology for the rapid development of high-performance intelligent controllers. Our objective in this work is to enable system developers to create effective real-time systems for control of multiple, coordinated entities in much less time than is currently required. Our technical strategy for achieving this objective is like that in other domain-specific software efforts: analyze the domain and task underlying effective performance, construct parametric or model-based generic components and overall solutions to the task, and provide excellent means for specifying, selecting, tailoring or automatically generating the solution elements particularly appropriate for the problem at hand. In this paper, we first present our specific domain focus, briefly describe the methodology and environment we are developing to provide a more regular approach to software development, and then later describe the issues this raises for the research community and this specific workshop.

Quadrocopter Control Design and Flight Operation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Karwoski, Katherine

2011-01-01

A limiting factor in control system design and analysis for spacecraft is the inability to physically test new algorithms quickly and cheaply. Test flights of space vehicles are costly and take much preparation. As such, EV41 recently acquired a small research quadrocopter that has the ability to be a test bed for new control systems. This project focused on learning how to operate, fly, and maintain the quadrocopter, as well as developing and testing protocols for its use. In parallel to this effort, developing a model in Simulink facilitated the design and analysis of simple control systems for the quadrocopter. Software provided by the manufacturer enabled testing of the Simulink control system on the vehicle.

Software Verification of Orion Cockpit Displays

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Biswas, M. A. Rafe; Garcia, Samuel; Prado, Matthew; Hossain, Sadad; Souris, Matthew; Morin, Lee

2017-01-01

NASA's latest spacecraft Orion is in the development process of taking humans deeper into space. Orion is equipped with three main displays to monitor and control the spacecraft. To ensure the software behind the glass displays operates without faults, rigorous testing is needed. To conduct such testing, the Rapid Prototyping Lab at NASA's Johnson Space Center along with the University of Texas at Tyler employed a software verification tool, EggPlant Functional by TestPlant. It is an image based test automation tool that allows users to create scripts to verify the functionality within a program. A set of edge key framework and Common EggPlant Functions were developed to enable creation of scripts in an efficient fashion. This framework standardized the way to code and to simulate user inputs in the verification process. Moreover, the Common EggPlant Functions can be used repeatedly in verification of different displays.

Faster than Real-Time Dynamic Simulation for Large-Size Power System with Detailed Dynamic Models using High-Performance Computing Platform

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Huang, Renke; Jin, Shuangshuang; Chen, Yousu

This paper presents a faster-than-real-time dynamic simulation software package that is designed for large-size power system dynamic simulation. It was developed on the GridPACKTM high-performance computing (HPC) framework. The key features of the developed software package include (1) faster-than-real-time dynamic simulation for a WECC system (17,000 buses) with different types of detailed generator, controller, and relay dynamic models, (2) a decoupled parallel dynamic simulation algorithm with optimized computation architecture to better leverage HPC resources and technologies, (3) options for HPC-based linear and iterative solvers, (4) hidden HPC details, such as data communication and distribution, to enable development centered on mathematicalmore » models and algorithms rather than on computational details for power system researchers, and (5) easy integration of new dynamic models and related algorithms into the software package.« less

Simulation of Hazards and Poses for a Rocker-Bogie Rover

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Backes, Paul; Norris, Jeffrey; Powell, Mark; Tharp, Gregory

2004-01-01

Provisions for specification of hazards faced by a robotic vehicle (rover) equipped with a rocker-bogie suspension, for prediction of collisions between the vehicle and the hazards, and for simulation of poses of the vehicle at selected positions on the terrain have been incorporated into software that simulates the movements of the vehicle on planned paths across the terrain. The software in question is that of the Web Interface for Telescience (WITS), selected aspects of which have been described in a number of prior NASA Tech Briefs articles. To recapitulate: The WITS is a system of computer software that enables scientists, located at geographically dispersed computer terminals connected to the World Wide Web, to command instrumented robotic vehicles (rovers) during exploration of Mars and perhaps eventually of other planets. The WITS also has potential for adaptation to terrestrial use in telerobotics and other applications that involve computer-based remote monitoring, supervision, control, and planning.

NEDLite user's manual: forest inventory for Palm OS handheld computers

Treesearch

Peter D. Knopp; Mark J. Twery

2006-01-01

A user's manual for NEDLite, software that enables collection of forest inventory data on Palm OS handheld computers, with the option of transferring data into NED software for analysis and subsequent prescription development. NEDLite software is included. Download the NEDLite software at: http://www.fs.fed.us/ne/burlington/ned

31 CFR 538.533 - Exportation of certain services and software incident to Internet-based communications.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-07-01

... software incident to Internet-based communications. 538.533 Section 538.533 Money and Finance: Treasury....533 Exportation of certain services and software incident to Internet-based communications. (a) To the....S. persons, wherever located, to persons in Sudan of software necessary to enable the services...

31 CFR 560.540 - Exportation of certain services and software incident to Internet-based communications.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-07-01

... software incident to Internet-based communications. 560.540 Section 560.540 Money and Finance: Treasury... Licensing Policy § 560.540 Exportation of certain services and software incident to Internet-based... United States or by U.S. persons, wherever located, to persons in Iran of software necessary to enable...

31 CFR 538.533 - Exportation of certain services and software incident to Internet-based communications.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-07-01

... software incident to Internet-based communications. 538.533 Section 538.533 Money and Finance: Treasury....533 Exportation of certain services and software incident to Internet-based communications. (a) To the....S. persons, wherever located, to persons in Sudan of software necessary to enable the services...

31 CFR 560.540 - Exportation of certain services and software incident to Internet-based communications.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-07-01

... software incident to Internet-based communications. 560.540 Section 560.540 Money and Finance: Treasury....540 Exportation of certain services and software incident to Internet-based communications. (a) To the....S. persons, wherever located, to persons in Iran of software necessary to enable the services...

31 CFR 538.533 - Exportation of certain services and software incident to Internet-based communications.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-07-01

... software incident to Internet-based communications. 538.533 Section 538.533 Money and Finance: Treasury....533 Exportation of certain services and software incident to Internet-based communications. (a) To the....S. persons, wherever located, to persons in Sudan of software necessary to enable the services...

31 CFR 560.540 - Exportation of certain services and software incident to Internet-based communications.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-07-01

... software incident to Internet-based communications. 560.540 Section 560.540 Money and Finance: Treasury... Licensing Policy § 560.540 Exportation of certain services and software incident to Internet-based... United States or by U.S. persons, wherever located, to persons in Iran of software necessary to enable...

31 CFR 560.540 - Exportation of certain services and software incident to Internet-based communications.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-07-01

... software incident to Internet-based communications. 560.540 Section 560.540 Money and Finance: Treasury....540 Exportation of certain services and software incident to Internet-based communications. (a) To the....S. persons, wherever located, to persons in Iran of software necessary to enable the services...

31 CFR 538.533 - Exportation of certain services and software incident to Internet-based communications.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-07-01

... software incident to Internet-based communications. 538.533 Section 538.533 Money and Finance: Treasury....533 Exportation of certain services and software incident to Internet-based communications. (a) To the....S. persons, wherever located, to persons in Sudan of software necessary to enable the services...

31 CFR 560.540 - Exportation of certain services and software incident to Internet-based communications.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-07-01

....540 Exportation of certain services and software incident to Internet-based communications. (a) To the....S. persons, wherever located, to persons in Iran of software necessary to enable the services... indirect exportation of services or software with knowledge or reason to know that such services or...

31 CFR 538.533 - Exportation of certain services and software incident to Internet-based communications.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-07-01

....533 Exportation of certain services and software incident to Internet-based communications. (a) To the....S. persons, wherever located, to persons in Sudan of software necessary to enable the services... indirect exportation of services or software with knowledge or reason to know that such services or...

Mission Control Technologies: A New Way of Designing and Evolving Mission Systems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Trimble, Jay; Walton, Joan; Saddler, Harry

2006-01-01

Current mission operations systems are built as a collection of monolithic software applications. Each application serves the needs of a specific user base associated with a discipline or functional role. Built to accomplish specific tasks, each application embodies specialized functional knowledge and has its own data storage, data models, programmatic interfaces, user interfaces, and customized business logic. In effect, each application creates its own walled-off environment. While individual applications are sometimes reused across multiple missions, it is expensive and time consuming to maintain these systems, and both costly and risky to upgrade them in the light of new requirements or modify them for new purposes. It is even more expensive to achieve new integrated activities across a set of monolithic applications. These problems impact the lifecycle cost (especially design, development, testing, training, maintenance, and integration) of each new mission operations system. They also inhibit system innovation and evolution. This in turn hinders NASA's ability to adopt new operations paradigms, including increasingly automated space systems, such as autonomous rovers, autonomous onboard crew systems, and integrated control of human and robotic missions. Hence, in order to achieve NASA's vision affordably and reliably, we need to consider and mature new ways to build mission control systems that overcome the problems inherent in systems of monolithic applications. The keys to the solution are modularity and interoperability. Modularity will increase extensibility (evolution), reusability, and maintainability. Interoperability will enable composition of larger systems out of smaller parts, and enable the construction of new integrated activities that tie together, at a deep level, the capabilities of many of the components. Modularity and interoperability together contribute to flexibility. The Mission Control Technologies (MCT) Project, a collaboration of multiple NASA Centers, led by NASA Ames Research Center, is building a framework to enable software to be assembled from flexible collections of components and services.

Virtually Out of This World!

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

2002-01-01

Ames Research Center granted Reality Capture Technologies (RCT), Inc., a license to further develop NASA's Mars Map software platform. The company incorporated NASA#s innovation into software that uses the Virtual Plant Model (VPM)(TM) to structure, modify, and implement the construction sites of industrial facilities, as well as develop, validate, and train operators on procedures. The VPM orchestrates the exchange of information between engineering, production, and business transaction systems. This enables users to simulate, control, and optimize work processes while increasing the reliability of critical business decisions. Engineers can complete the construction process and test various aspects of it in virtual reality before building the actual structure. With virtual access to and simulation of the construction site, project personnel can manage, access control, and respond to changes on complex constructions more effectively. Engineers can also create operating procedures, training, and documentation. Virtual Plant Model(TM) is a trademark of Reality Capture Technologies, Inc.

7 Processes that Enable NASA Software Engineering Technologies: Value-Added Process Engineering

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Housch, Helen; Godfrey, Sally

2011-01-01

The presentation reviews Agency process requirements and the purpose, benefits, and experiences or seven software engineering processes. The processes include: product integration, configuration management, verification, software assurance, measurement and analysis, requirements management, and planning and monitoring.

Software augmented buildings: Exploiting existing infrastructure to improve energy efficiency and comfort in commercial buildings

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Balaji, Bharathan

Commercial buildings consume 19% of energy in the US as of 2010, and traditionally, their energy use has been optimized through improved equipment efficiency and retrofits. Beyond improved hardware and infrastructure, there exists a tremendous potential in reducing energy use through better monitoring and operation. We present several applications that we developed and deployed to support our thesis that building energy use can be reduced through sensing, monitoring and optimization software that modulates use of building subsystems including HVAC. We focus on HVAC systems as these constitute 48-55% of building energy use. Specifically, in case of sensing, we describe an energy apportionment system that enables us to estimate real-time zonal HVAC power consumption by analyzing existing sensor information. With this energy breakdown, we can measure effectiveness of optimization solutions and identify inefficiencies. Central to energy efficiency improvement is determination of human occupancy in buildings. But this information is often unavailable or expensive to obtain using wide scale sensor deployment. We present our system that infers room level occupancy inexpensively by leveraging existing WiFi infrastructure. Occupancy information can be used not only to directly control HVAC but also to infer state of the building for predictive control. Building energy use is strongly influenced by human behaviors, and timely feedback mechanisms can encourage energy saving behavior. Occupants interact with HVAC using thermostats which has shown to be inadequate for thermal comfort. Building managers are responsible for incorporating energy efficiency measures, but our interviews reveal that they struggle to maintain efficiency due to lack of analytical tools and contextual information. We present our software services that provide energy feedback to occupants and building managers, improves comfort with personalized control and identifies energy wasting faults. For wide scale deployment of such energy saving software, they need to be portable across multiple buildings. However, buildings consist of heterogeneous equipment and use inconsistent naming schema, and developers need extensive domain knowledge to map sensor information to a standard format. To enable portability, we present an active learning algorithm that automates mapping building sensor metadata to a standard naming schema.

Enabling people with developmental disabilities to actively perform designated occupational activities according to simple instructions with a Nintendo Wii Remote Controller by controlling environmental stimulation.

PubMed

Shih, Ching-Hsiang; Wang, Shu-Hui; Chang, Man-Ling; Shih, Ching-Hsiang

2012-01-01

The latest researches have adopted software technology, turning the Nintendo Wii Remote Controller into a high performance three-dimensional object orientation detector. This study extended Wii Remote Controller functionality to assess whether two people with developmental disabilities would be able to actively perform designated simple occupational activities according to simple instructions by controlling their favorite environmental stimulation using a Nintendo Wii Remote Controller. This study was conducted using ABAB designs. The data showed that both participants significantly increased their target response (performing a designated occupational activity) by activating the control system to produce their preferred environmental stimulation during the intervention phases. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Collaborative Software Development Approach Used to Deliver the New Shuttle Telemetry Ground Station

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Kirby, Randy L.; Mann, David; Prenger, Stephen G.; Craig, Wayne; Greenwood, Andrew; Morsics, Jonathan; Fricker, Charles H.; Quach, Son; Lechese, Paul

2003-01-01

United Space Alliance (USA) developed and used a new software development method to meet technical, schedule, and budget challenges faced during the development and delivery of the new Shuttle Telemetry Ground Station at Kennedy Space Center. This method, called Collaborative Software Development, enabled KSC to effectively leverage industrial software and build additional capabilities to meet shuttle system and operational requirements. Application of this method resulted in reduced time to market, reduced development cost, improved product quality, and improved programmer competence while developing technologies of benefit to a small company in California (AP Labs Inc.). Many modifications were made to the baseline software product (VMEwindow), which improved its quality and functionality. In addition, six new software capabilities were developed, which are the subject of this article and add useful functionality to the VMEwindow environment. These new software programs are written in C or VXWorks and are used in conjunction with other ground station software packages, such as VMEwindow, Matlab, Dataviews, and PVWave. The Space Shuttle Telemetry Ground Station receives frequency-modulation (FM) and pulse-code-modulated (PCM) signals from the shuttle and support equipment. The hardware architecture (see figure) includes Sun workstations connected to multiple PCM- and FM-processing VersaModule Eurocard (VME) chassis. A reflective memory network transports raw data from PCM Processors (PCMPs) to the programmable digital-to-analog (D/A) converters, strip chart recorders, and analysis and controller workstations.

Software for Automated Image-to-Image Co-registration

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Benkelman, Cody A.; Hughes, Heidi

2007-01-01

The project objectives are: a) Develop software to fine-tune image-to-image co-registration, presuming images are orthorectified prior to input; b) Create a reusable software development kit (SDK) to enable incorporation of these tools into other software; d) provide automated testing for quantitative analysis; and e) Develop software that applies multiple techniques to achieve subpixel precision in the co-registration of image pairs.

Reconfigurable Autonomy for Future Planetary Rovers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Burroughes, Guy

Extra-terrestrial Planetary rover systems are uniquely remote, placing constraints in regard to communication, environmental uncertainty, and limited physical resources, and requiring a high level of fault tolerance and resistance to hardware degradation. This thesis presents a novel self-reconfiguring autonomous software architecture designed to meet the needs of extraterrestrial planetary environments. At runtime it can safely reconfigure low-level control systems, high-level decisional autonomy systems, and managed software architecture. The architecture can perform automatic Verification and Validation of self-reconfiguration at run-time, and enables a system to be self-optimising, self-protecting, and self-healing. A novel self-monitoring system, which is non-invasive, efficient, tunable, and autonomously deploying, is also presented. The architecture was validated through the use-case of a highly autonomous extra-terrestrial planetary exploration rover. Three major forms of reconfiguration were demonstrated and tested: first, high level adjustment of system internal architecture and goal; second, software module modification; and third, low level alteration of hardware control in response to degradation of hardware and environmental change. The architecture was demonstrated to be robust and effective in a Mars sample return mission use-case testing the operational aspects of a novel, reconfigurable guidance, navigation, and control system for a planetary rover, all operating in concert through a scenario that required reconfiguration of all elements of the system.

A novel control software that improves the experimental workflow of scanning photostimulation experiments.

PubMed

Bendels, Michael H K; Beed, Prateep; Leibold, Christian; Schmitz, Dietmar; Johenning, Friedrich W

2008-10-30

Optical uncaging of caged compounds is a well-established method to study the functional anatomy of a brain region on the circuit level. We present an alternative approach to existing experimental setups. Using a low-magnification objective we acquire images for planning the spatial patterns of stimulation. Then high-magnification objectives are used during laser stimulation providing a laser spot between 2 microm and 20 microm size. The core of this system is a video-based control software that monitors and controls the connected devices, allows for planning of the experiment, coordinates the stimulation process and manages automatic data storage. This combines a high-resolution analysis of neuronal circuits with flexible and efficient online planning and execution of a grid of spatial stimulation patterns on a larger scale. The software offers special optical features that enable the system to achieve a maximum degree of spatial reliability. The hardware is mainly built upon standard laboratory devices and thus ideally suited to cost-effectively complement existing electrophysiological setups with a minimal amount of additional equipment. Finally, we demonstrate the performance of the system by mapping the excitatory and inhibitory connections of entorhinal cortex layer II stellate neurons and present an approach for the analysis of photo-induced synaptic responses in high spontaneous activity.

Cooperative fault-tolerant distributed computing U.S. Department of Energy Grant DE-FG02-02ER25537 Final Report

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Sunderam, Vaidy S.

2007-01-09

The Harness project has developed novel software frameworks for the execution of high-end simulations in a fault-tolerant manner on distributed resources. The H2O subsystem comprises the kernel of the Harness framework, and controls the key functions of resource management across multiple administrative domains, especially issues of access and allocation. It is based on a “pluggable” architecture that enables the aggregated use of distributed heterogeneous resources for high performance computing. The major contributions of the Harness II project result in significantly enhancing the overall computational productivity of high-end scientific applications by enabling robust, failure-resilient computations on cooperatively pooled resource collections.

Deployable Command and Control System for Over the Horizon Small Boat Operations

DTIC Science & Technology

2006-09-01

the HP iPAQ Navigation System bundle. There is no programmable Application Programming Interface (API), nor otherwise accessible methods to ...High Point Software which comes complete with a C# library to allow customized programs to access Bluetooth enabled GPS devices. GPSAccess...data could be displayed along with ownship’s positional data, but the program was designed to only work with the Ross radios and the MS Windows XP

Spitzer observatory operations: increasing efficiency in mission operations

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Scott, Charles P.; Kahr, Bolinda E.; Sarrel, Marc A.

2006-06-01

This paper explores the how's and why's of the Spitzer Mission Operations System's (MOS) success, efficiency, and affordability in comparison to other observatory-class missions. MOS exploits today's flight, ground, and operations capabilities, embraces automation, and balances both risk and cost. With operational efficiency as the primary goal, MOS maintains a strong control process by translating lessons learned into efficiency improvements, thereby enabling the MOS processes, teams, and procedures to rapidly evolve from concept (through thorough validation) into in-flight implementation. Operational teaming, planning, and execution are designed to enable re-use. Mission changes, unforeseen events, and continuous improvement have often times forced us to learn to fly anew. Collaborative spacecraft operations and remote science and instrument teams have become well integrated, and worked together to improve and optimize each human, machine, and software-system element. Adaptation to tighter spacecraft margins has facilitated continuous operational improvements via automated and autonomous software coupled with improved human analysis. Based upon what we now know and what we need to improve, adapt, or fix, the projected mission lifetime continues to grow - as does the opportunity for numerous scientific discoveries.

Mathematical and Statistical Software Index. Final Report.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Black, Doris E., Comp.

Brief descriptions are provided of general-purpose mathematical and statistical software, including 27 "stand-alone" programs, three subroutine systems, and two nationally recognized statistical packages, which are available in the Air Force Human Resources Laboratory (AFHRL) software library. This index was created to enable researchers…

Software-Reconfigurable Processors for Spacecraft

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Farrington, Allen; Gray, Andrew; Bell, Bryan; Stanton, Valerie; Chong, Yong; Peters, Kenneth; Lee, Clement; Srinivasan, Jeffrey

2005-01-01

A report presents an overview of an architecture for a software-reconfigurable network data processor for a spacecraft engaged in scientific exploration. When executed on suitable electronic hardware, the software performs the functions of a physical layer (in effect, acts as a software radio in that it performs modulation, demodulation, pulse-shaping, error correction, coding, and decoding), a data-link layer, a network layer, a transport layer, and application-layer processing of scientific data. The software-reconfigurable network processor is undergoing development to enable rapid prototyping and rapid implementation of communication, navigation, and scientific signal-processing functions; to provide a long-lived communication infrastructure; and to provide greatly improved scientific-instrumentation and scientific-data-processing functions by enabling science-driven in-flight reconfiguration of computing resources devoted to these functions. This development is an extension of terrestrial radio and network developments (e.g., in the cellular-telephone industry) implemented in software running on such hardware as field-programmable gate arrays, digital signal processors, traditional digital circuits, and mixed-signal application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs).

A PICKSC Science Gateway for enabling the common plasma physicist to run kinetic software

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hu, Q.; Winjum, B. J.; Zonca, A.; Youn, C.; Tsung, F. S.; Mori, W. B.

2017-10-01

Computer simulations offer tremendous opportunities for studying plasmas, ranging from simulations for students that illuminate fundamental educational concepts to research-level simulations that advance scientific knowledge. Nevertheless, there is a significant hurdle to using simulation tools. Users must navigate codes and software libraries, determine how to wrangle output into meaningful plots, and oftentimes confront a significant cyberinfrastructure with powerful computational resources. Science gateways offer a Web-based environment to run simulations without needing to learn or manage the underlying software and computing cyberinfrastructure. We discuss our progress on creating a Science Gateway for the Particle-in-Cell and Kinetic Simulation Software Center that enables users to easily run and analyze kinetic simulations with our software. We envision that this technology could benefit a wide range of plasma physicists, both in the use of our simulation tools as well as in its adaptation for running other plasma simulation software. Supported by NSF under Grant ACI-1339893 and by the UCLA Institute for Digital Research and Education.

BioSPICE: access to the most current computational tools for biologists.

PubMed

Garvey, Thomas D; Lincoln, Patrick; Pedersen, Charles John; Martin, David; Johnson, Mark

2003-01-01

The goal of the BioSPICE program is to create a framework that provides biologists access to the most current computational tools. At the program midpoint, the BioSPICE member community has produced a software system that comprises contributions from approximately 20 participating laboratories integrated under the BioSPICE Dashboard and a methodology for continued software integration. These contributed software modules are the BioSPICE Dashboard, a graphical environment that combines Open Agent Architecture and NetBeans software technologies in a coherent, biologist-friendly user interface. The current Dashboard permits data sources, models, simulation engines, and output displays provided by different investigators and running on different machines to work together across a distributed, heterogeneous network. Among several other features, the Dashboard enables users to create graphical workflows by configuring and connecting available BioSPICE components. Anticipated future enhancements to BioSPICE include a notebook capability that will permit researchers to browse and compile data to support model building, a biological model repository, and tools to support the development, control, and data reduction of wet-lab experiments. In addition to the BioSPICE software products, a project website supports information exchange and community building.

Whole earth modeling: developing and disseminating scientific software for computational geophysics.

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kellogg, L. H.

2016-12-01

Historically, a great deal of specialized scientific software for modeling and data analysis has been developed by individual researchers or small groups of scientists working on their own specific research problems. As the magnitude of available data and computer power has increased, so has the complexity of scientific problems addressed by computational methods, creating both a need to sustain existing scientific software, and expand its development to take advantage of new algorithms, new software approaches, and new computational hardware. To that end, communities like the Computational Infrastructure for Geodynamics (CIG) have been established to support the use of best practices in scientific computing for solid earth geophysics research and teaching. Working as a scientific community enables computational geophysicists to take advantage of technological developments, improve the accuracy and performance of software, build on prior software development, and collaborate more readily. The CIG community, and others, have adopted an open-source development model, in which code is developed and disseminated by the community in an open fashion, using version control and software repositories like Git. One emerging issue is how to adequately identify and credit the intellectual contributions involved in creating open source scientific software. The traditional method of disseminating scientific ideas, peer reviewed publication, was not designed for review or crediting scientific software, although emerging publication strategies such software journals are attempting to address the need. We are piloting an integrated approach in which authors are identified and credited as scientific software is developed and run. Successful software citation requires integration with the scholarly publication and indexing mechanisms as well, to assign credit, ensure discoverability, and provide provenance for software.

The Diabeo software enabling individualized insulin dose adjustments combined with telemedicine support improves HbA1c in poorly controlled type 1 diabetic patients: a 6-month, randomized, open-label, parallel-group, multicenter trial (TeleDiab 1 Study).

PubMed

Charpentier, Guillaume; Benhamou, Pierre-Yves; Dardari, Dured; Clergeot, Annie; Franc, Sylvia; Schaepelynck-Belicar, Pauline; Catargi, Bogdan; Melki, Vincent; Chaillous, Lucy; Farret, Anne; Bosson, Jean-Luc; Penfornis, Alfred

2011-03-01

To demonstrate that Diabeo software enabling individualized insulin dose adjustments combined with telemedicine support significantly improves HbA(1c) in poorly controlled type 1 diabetic patients. In a six-month open-label parallel-group, multicenter study, adult patients (n = 180) with type 1 diabetes (>1 year), on a basal-bolus insulin regimen (>6 months), with HbA(1c) ≥ 8%, were randomized to usual quarterly follow-up (G1), home use of a smartphone recommending insulin doses with quarterly visits (G2), or use of the smartphone with short teleconsultations every 2 weeks but no visit until point end (G3). Six-month mean HbA(1c) in G3 (8.41 ± 1.04%) was lower than in G1 (9.10 ± 1.16%; P = 0.0019). G2 displayed intermediate results (8.63 ± 1.07%). The Diabeo system gave a 0.91% (0.60; 1.21) improvement in HbA(1c) over controls and a 0.67% (0.35; 0.99) reduction when used without teleconsultation. There was no difference in the frequency of hypoglycemic episodes or in medical time spent for hospital or telephone consultations. However, patients in G1 and G2 spent nearly 5 h more than G3 patients attending hospital visits. The Diabeo system gives a substantial improvement to metabolic control in chronic, poorly controlled type 1 diabetic patients without requiring more medical time and at a lower overall cost for the patient than usual care.

CellSegm - a MATLAB toolbox for high-throughput 3D cell segmentation

PubMed Central

2013-01-01

The application of fluorescence microscopy in cell biology often generates a huge amount of imaging data. Automated whole cell segmentation of such data enables the detection and analysis of individual cells, where a manual delineation is often time consuming, or practically not feasible. Furthermore, compared to manual analysis, automation normally has a higher degree of reproducibility. CellSegm, the software presented in this work, is a Matlab based command line software toolbox providing an automated whole cell segmentation of images showing surface stained cells, acquired by fluorescence microscopy. It has options for both fully automated and semi-automated cell segmentation. Major algorithmic steps are: (i) smoothing, (ii) Hessian-based ridge enhancement, (iii) marker-controlled watershed segmentation, and (iv) feature-based classfication of cell candidates. Using a wide selection of image recordings and code snippets, we demonstrate that CellSegm has the ability to detect various types of surface stained cells in 3D. After detection and outlining of individual cells, the cell candidates can be subject to software based analysis, specified and programmed by the end-user, or they can be analyzed by other software tools. A segmentation of tissue samples with appropriate characteristics is also shown to be resolvable in CellSegm. The command-line interface of CellSegm facilitates scripting of the separate tools, all implemented in Matlab, offering a high degree of flexibility and tailored workflows for the end-user. The modularity and scripting capabilities of CellSegm enable automated workflows and quantitative analysis of microscopic data, suited for high-throughput image based screening. PMID:23938087

CellSegm - a MATLAB toolbox for high-throughput 3D cell segmentation.

PubMed

Hodneland, Erlend; Kögel, Tanja; Frei, Dominik Michael; Gerdes, Hans-Hermann; Lundervold, Arvid

2013-08-09

: The application of fluorescence microscopy in cell biology often generates a huge amount of imaging data. Automated whole cell segmentation of such data enables the detection and analysis of individual cells, where a manual delineation is often time consuming, or practically not feasible. Furthermore, compared to manual analysis, automation normally has a higher degree of reproducibility. CellSegm, the software presented in this work, is a Matlab based command line software toolbox providing an automated whole cell segmentation of images showing surface stained cells, acquired by fluorescence microscopy. It has options for both fully automated and semi-automated cell segmentation. Major algorithmic steps are: (i) smoothing, (ii) Hessian-based ridge enhancement, (iii) marker-controlled watershed segmentation, and (iv) feature-based classfication of cell candidates. Using a wide selection of image recordings and code snippets, we demonstrate that CellSegm has the ability to detect various types of surface stained cells in 3D. After detection and outlining of individual cells, the cell candidates can be subject to software based analysis, specified and programmed by the end-user, or they can be analyzed by other software tools. A segmentation of tissue samples with appropriate characteristics is also shown to be resolvable in CellSegm. The command-line interface of CellSegm facilitates scripting of the separate tools, all implemented in Matlab, offering a high degree of flexibility and tailored workflows for the end-user. The modularity and scripting capabilities of CellSegm enable automated workflows and quantitative analysis of microscopic data, suited for high-throughput image based screening.

Computer science: Key to a space program renaissance. The 1981 NASA/ASEE summer study on the use of computer science and technology in NASA. Volume 2: Appendices

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Freitas, R. A., Jr. (Editor); Carlson, P. A. (Editor)

1983-01-01

Adoption of an aggressive computer science research and technology program within NASA will: (1) enable new mission capabilities such as autonomous spacecraft, reliability and self-repair, and low-bandwidth intelligent Earth sensing; (2) lower manpower requirements, especially in the areas of Space Shuttle operations, by making fuller use of control center automation, technical support, and internal utilization of state-of-the-art computer techniques; (3) reduce project costs via improved software verification, software engineering, enhanced scientist/engineer productivity, and increased managerial effectiveness; and (4) significantly improve internal operations within NASA with electronic mail, managerial computer aids, an automated bureaucracy and uniform program operating plans.

Wallops Ship Surveillance System

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Smith, Donna C.

2011-01-01

Approved as a Wallops control center backup system, the Wallops Ship Surveillance Software is a day-of-launch risk analysis tool for spaceport activities. The system calculates impact probabilities and displays ship locations relative to boundary lines. It enables rapid analysis of possible flight paths to preclude the need to cancel launches and allow execution of launches in a timely manner. Its design is based on low-cost, large-customer- base elements including personal computers, the Windows operating system, C/C++ object-oriented software, and network interfaces. In conformance with the NASA software safety standard, the system is designed to ensure that it does not falsely report a safe-for-launch condition. To improve the current ship surveillance method, the system is designed to prevent delay of launch under a safe-for-launch condition. A single workstation is designated the controller of the official ship information and the official risk analysis. Copies of this information are shared with other networked workstations. The program design is divided into five subsystems areas: 1. Communication Link -- threads that control the networking of workstations; 2. Contact List -- a thread that controls a list of protected item (ocean vessel) information; 3. Hazard List -- threads that control a list of hazardous item (debris) information and associated risk calculation information; 4. Display -- threads that control operator inputs and screen display outputs; and 5. Archive -- a thread that controls archive file read and write access. Currently, most of the hazard list thread and parts of other threads are being reused as part of a new ship surveillance system, under the SureTrak project.

Development of a State Machine Sequencer for the Keck Interferometer: Evolution, Development and Lessons Learned using a CASE Tool Approach

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Rede, Leonard J.; Booth, Andrew; Hsieh, Jonathon; Summer, Kellee

2004-01-01

This paper presents a discussion of the evolution of a sequencer from a simple EPICS (Experimental Physics and Industrial Control System) based sequencer into a complex implementation designed utilizing UML (Unified Modeling Language) methodologies and a CASE (Computer Aided Software Engineering) tool approach. The main purpose of the sequencer (called the IF Sequencer) is to provide overall control of the Keck Interferometer to enable science operations be carried out by a single operator (and/or observer). The interferometer links the two 10m telescopes of the W. M. Keck Observatory at Mauna Kea, Hawaii. The IF Sequencer is a high-level, multi-threaded, Hare1 finite state machine, software program designed to orchestrate several lower-level hardware and software hard real time subsystems that must perform their work in a specific and sequential order. The sequencing need not be done in hard real-time. Each state machine thread commands either a high-speed real-time multiple mode embedded controller via CORB A, or slower controllers via EPICS Channel Access interfaces. The overall operation of the system is simplified by the automation. The UML is discussed and our use of it to implement the sequencer is presented. The decision to use the Rhapsody product as our CASE tool is explained and reflected upon. Most importantly, a section on lessons learned is presented and the difficulty of integrating CASE tool automatically generated C++ code into a large control system consisting of multiple infrastructures is presented.

Development of a state machine sequencer for the Keck Interferometer: evolution, development, and lessons learned using a CASE tool approach

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Reder, Leonard J.; Booth, Andrew; Hsieh, Jonathan; Summers, Kellee R.

2004-09-01

This paper presents a discussion of the evolution of a sequencer from a simple Experimental Physics and Industrial Control System (EPICS) based sequencer into a complex implementation designed utilizing UML (Unified Modeling Language) methodologies and a Computer Aided Software Engineering (CASE) tool approach. The main purpose of the Interferometer Sequencer (called the IF Sequencer) is to provide overall control of the Keck Interferometer to enable science operations to be carried out by a single operator (and/or observer). The interferometer links the two 10m telescopes of the W. M. Keck Observatory at Mauna Kea, Hawaii. The IF Sequencer is a high-level, multi-threaded, Harel finite state machine software program designed to orchestrate several lower-level hardware and software hard real-time subsystems that must perform their work in a specific and sequential order. The sequencing need not be done in hard real-time. Each state machine thread commands either a high-speed real-time multiple mode embedded controller via CORBA, or slower controllers via EPICS Channel Access interfaces. The overall operation of the system is simplified by the automation. The UML is discussed and our use of it to implement the sequencer is presented. The decision to use the Rhapsody product as our CASE tool is explained and reflected upon. Most importantly, a section on lessons learned is presented and the difficulty of integrating CASE tool automatically generated C++ code into a large control system consisting of multiple infrastructures is presented.

The Case for Open Source Software: The Interactional Discourse Lab

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Choi, Seongsook

2016-01-01

Computational techniques and software applications for the quantitative content analysis of texts are now well established, and many qualitative data software applications enable the manipulation of input variables and the visualization of complex relations between them via interactive and informative graphical interfaces. Although advances in…

Academic Web Authoring Mulitmedia Development and Course Management Tools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Halloran, Margaret E.

2005-01-01

Course management software enables faculty members to learn one software package for web-based curriculum, assessment, synchronous and asynchronous discussions, collaborative work, multimedia and interactive resource development. There are as many as 109 different course management software packages on the market and several studies have evaluated…

From a paper-based to an electronic registry in physiotherapy.

PubMed

Buyl, Ronald; Nyssen, Marc

2008-01-01

During the past decade the healthcare industry has evolved from paper-based storage of clinical data into the digital era. Electronic healthcare records play a crucial role to meet the growing need for integrated data-storage and data communication. In this context a new law was issued in Belgium on December 7th, 2005, which requires physiotherapists (but also nurses and speech therapists) to keep an electronic version of the registry. This (electronic) registry contains all physiotherapeutic acts, starting from January 1, 2007. Up until that day, a paper version of the registry had to be created every month.This article describes the development of an electronic version of the registry that not only meets all legal constraints, but also enables to verify the traceability and inalterability of the generated documents, by means of SHA-256 codes. One of the major concerns of the process was that the rationale behind the electronic registry would conform well to the common practice of the physiotherapist. Therefore we opted for a periodic recording of a standardized "image" of the controllable data, in the patient database of the software-system, into the XML registry messages. The proposed XSLT schema can also form a basis for the development of tools that can be used by the controlling authorities. Hopefully the electronic registry for physiotherapists will be a first step towards the future development of a fully integrated electronic physiotherapy record.By means of a certification procedure for the software systems, we succeeded in developing a user friendly system that enables end-users that use a quality labeled software package, to automatically produce all the legally necessary documents concerning the registry. Moreover, we hope that this development will be an incentive for non-users to start working in an electronic way.

From WSN towards WoT: Open API Scheme Based on oneM2M Platforms.

PubMed

Kim, Jaeho; Choi, Sung-Chan; Ahn, Il-Yeup; Sung, Nak-Myoung; Yun, Jaeseok

2016-10-06

Conventional computing systems have been able to be integrated into daily objects and connected to each other due to advances in computing and network technologies, such as wireless sensor networks (WSNs), forming a global network infrastructure, called the Internet of Things (IoT). To support the interconnection and interoperability between heterogeneous IoT systems, the availability of standardized, open application programming interfaces (APIs) is one of the key features of common software platforms for IoT devices, gateways, and servers. In this paper, we present a standardized way of extending previously-existing WSNs towards IoT systems, building the world of the Web of Things (WoT). Based on the oneM2M software platforms developed in the previous project, we introduce a well-designed open API scheme and device-specific thing adaptation software (TAS) enabling WSN elements, such as a wireless sensor node, to be accessed in a standardized way on a global scale. Three pilot services are implemented (i.e., a WiFi-enabled smart flowerpot, voice-based control for ZigBee-connected home appliances, and WiFi-connected AR.Drone control) to demonstrate the practical usability of the open API scheme and TAS modules. Full details on the method of integrating WSN elements into three example systems are described at the programming code level, which is expected to help future researchers in integrating their WSN systems in IoT platforms, such as oneM2M. We hope that the flexibly-deployable, easily-reusable common open API scheme and TAS-based integration method working with the oneM2M platforms will help the conventional WSNs in diverse industries evolve into the emerging WoT solutions.

From WSN towards WoT: Open API Scheme Based on oneM2M Platforms

PubMed Central

Kim, Jaeho; Choi, Sung-Chan; Ahn, Il-Yeup; Sung, Nak-Myoung; Yun, Jaeseok

2016-01-01

Conventional computing systems have been able to be integrated into daily objects and connected to each other due to advances in computing and network technologies, such as wireless sensor networks (WSNs), forming a global network infrastructure, called the Internet of Things (IoT). To support the interconnection and interoperability between heterogeneous IoT systems, the availability of standardized, open application programming interfaces (APIs) is one of the key features of common software platforms for IoT devices, gateways, and servers. In this paper, we present a standardized way of extending previously-existing WSNs towards IoT systems, building the world of the Web of Things (WoT). Based on the oneM2M software platforms developed in the previous project, we introduce a well-designed open API scheme and device-specific thing adaptation software (TAS) enabling WSN elements, such as a wireless sensor node, to be accessed in a standardized way on a global scale. Three pilot services are implemented (i.e., a WiFi-enabled smart flowerpot, voice-based control for ZigBee-connected home appliances, and WiFi-connected AR.Drone control) to demonstrate the practical usability of the open API scheme and TAS modules. Full details on the method of integrating WSN elements into three example systems are described at the programming code level, which is expected to help future researchers in integrating their WSN systems in IoT platforms, such as oneM2M. We hope that the flexibly-deployable, easily-reusable common open API scheme and TAS-based integration method working with the oneM2M platforms will help the conventional WSNs in diverse industries evolve into the emerging WoT solutions. PMID:27782058

Accessing microfluidics through feature-based design software for 3D printing.

PubMed

Shankles, Peter G; Millet, Larry J; Aufrecht, Jayde A; Retterer, Scott T

2018-01-01

Additive manufacturing has been a cornerstone of the product development pipeline for decades, playing an essential role in the creation of both functional and cosmetic prototypes. In recent years, the prospects for distributed and open source manufacturing have grown tremendously. This growth has been enabled by an expanding library of printable materials, low-cost printers, and communities dedicated to platform development. The microfluidics community has embraced this opportunity to integrate 3D printing into the suite of manufacturing strategies used to create novel fluidic architectures. The rapid turnaround time and low cost to implement these strategies in the lab makes 3D printing an attractive alternative to conventional micro- and nanofabrication techniques. In this work, the production of multiple microfluidic architectures using a hybrid 3D printing-soft lithography approach is demonstrated and shown to enable rapid device fabrication with channel dimensions that take advantage of laminar flow characteristics. The fabrication process outlined here is underpinned by the implementation of custom design software with an integrated slicer program that replaces less intuitive computer aided design and slicer software tools. Devices are designed in the program by assembling parameterized microfluidic building blocks. The fabrication process and flow control within 3D printed devices were demonstrated with a gradient generator and two droplet generator designs. Precise control over the printing process allowed 3D microfluidics to be printed in a single step by extruding bridge structures to 'jump-over' channels in the same plane. This strategy was shown to integrate with conventional nanofabrication strategies to simplify the operation of a platform that incorporates both nanoscale features and 3D printed microfluidics.

Accessing microfluidics through feature-based design software for 3D printing

PubMed Central

Shankles, Peter G.; Millet, Larry J.; Aufrecht, Jayde A.

2018-01-01

Additive manufacturing has been a cornerstone of the product development pipeline for decades, playing an essential role in the creation of both functional and cosmetic prototypes. In recent years, the prospects for distributed and open source manufacturing have grown tremendously. This growth has been enabled by an expanding library of printable materials, low-cost printers, and communities dedicated to platform development. The microfluidics community has embraced this opportunity to integrate 3D printing into the suite of manufacturing strategies used to create novel fluidic architectures. The rapid turnaround time and low cost to implement these strategies in the lab makes 3D printing an attractive alternative to conventional micro- and nanofabrication techniques. In this work, the production of multiple microfluidic architectures using a hybrid 3D printing-soft lithography approach is demonstrated and shown to enable rapid device fabrication with channel dimensions that take advantage of laminar flow characteristics. The fabrication process outlined here is underpinned by the implementation of custom design software with an integrated slicer program that replaces less intuitive computer aided design and slicer software tools. Devices are designed in the program by assembling parameterized microfluidic building blocks. The fabrication process and flow control within 3D printed devices were demonstrated with a gradient generator and two droplet generator designs. Precise control over the printing process allowed 3D microfluidics to be printed in a single step by extruding bridge structures to ‘jump-over’ channels in the same plane. This strategy was shown to integrate with conventional nanofabrication strategies to simplify the operation of a platform that incorporates both nanoscale features and 3D printed microfluidics. PMID:29596418

Plasma boundary shape control and real-time equilibrium reconstruction on NSTX-U

DOE PAGES

Boyer, M. D.; Battaglia, D. J.; Mueller, D.; ...

2018-01-25

Here, the upgrade to the National Spherical Torus eXperiment (NSTX-U) included two main improvements: a larger center-stack, enabling higher toroidal field and longer pulse duration, and the addition of three new tangentially aimed neutral beam sources, which increase available heating and current drive, and allow for flexibility in shaping power, torque, current, and particle deposition profiles. To best use these new capabilities and meet the high-performance operational goals of NSTX-U, major upgrades to the NSTX-U control system (NCS) hardware and software have been made. Several control algorithms, including those used for real-time equilibrium reconstruction and shape control, have been upgradedmore » to improve and extend plasma control capabilities. As part of the commissioning phase of first plasma operations, the shape control system was tuned to control the boundary in both inner-wall limited and diverted discharges. It has been used to accurately track the requested evolution of the boundary (including the size of the inner gap between the plasma and central solenoid, which is a challenge for the ST configuration), X-point locations, and strike point locations, enabling repeatable discharge evolutions for scenario development and diagnostic commissioning.« less

Plasma boundary shape control and real-time equilibrium reconstruction on NSTX-U

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Boyer, M. D.; Battaglia, D. J.; Mueller, D.

Here, the upgrade to the National Spherical Torus eXperiment (NSTX-U) included two main improvements: a larger center-stack, enabling higher toroidal field and longer pulse duration, and the addition of three new tangentially aimed neutral beam sources, which increase available heating and current drive, and allow for flexibility in shaping power, torque, current, and particle deposition profiles. To best use these new capabilities and meet the high-performance operational goals of NSTX-U, major upgrades to the NSTX-U control system (NCS) hardware and software have been made. Several control algorithms, including those used for real-time equilibrium reconstruction and shape control, have been upgradedmore » to improve and extend plasma control capabilities. As part of the commissioning phase of first plasma operations, the shape control system was tuned to control the boundary in both inner-wall limited and diverted discharges. It has been used to accurately track the requested evolution of the boundary (including the size of the inner gap between the plasma and central solenoid, which is a challenge for the ST configuration), X-point locations, and strike point locations, enabling repeatable discharge evolutions for scenario development and diagnostic commissioning.« less

Plasma boundary shape control and real-time equilibrium reconstruction on NSTX-U

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Boyer, M. D.; Battaglia, D. J.; Mueller, D.; Eidietis, N.; Erickson, K.; Ferron, J.; Gates, D. A.; Gerhardt, S.; Johnson, R.; Kolemen, E.; Menard, J.; Myers, C. E.; Sabbagh, S. A.; Scotti, F.; Vail, P.

2018-03-01

The upgrade to the National Spherical Torus eXperiment (NSTX-U) included two main improvements: a larger center-stack, enabling higher toroidal field and longer pulse duration, and the addition of three new tangentially aimed neutral beam sources, which increase available heating and current drive, and allow for flexibility in shaping power, torque, current, and particle deposition profiles. To best use these new capabilities and meet the high-performance operational goals of NSTX-U, major upgrades to the NSTX-U control system (NCS) hardware and software have been made. Several control algorithms, including those used for real-time equilibrium reconstruction and shape control, have been upgraded to improve and extend plasma control capabilities. As part of the commissioning phase of first plasma operations, the shape control system was tuned to control the boundary in both inner-wall limited and diverted discharges. It has been used to accurately track the requested evolution of the boundary (including the size of the inner gap between the plasma and central solenoid, which is a challenge for the ST configuration), X-point locations, and strike point locations, enabling repeatable discharge evolutions for scenario development and diagnostic commissioning.

Mission Simulation Toolkit

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Pisaich, Gregory; Flueckiger, Lorenzo; Neukom, Christian; Wagner, Mike; Buchanan, Eric; Plice, Laura

2007-01-01

The Mission Simulation Toolkit (MST) is a flexible software system for autonomy research. It was developed as part of the Mission Simulation Facility (MSF) project that was started in 2001 to facilitate the development of autonomous planetary robotic missions. Autonomy is a key enabling factor for robotic exploration. There has been a large gap between autonomy software (at the research level), and software that is ready for insertion into near-term space missions. The MST bridges this gap by providing a simulation framework and a suite of tools for supporting research and maturation of autonomy. MST uses a distributed framework based on the High Level Architecture (HLA) standard. A key feature of the MST framework is the ability to plug in new models to replace existing ones with the same services. This enables significant simulation flexibility, particularly the mixing and control of fidelity level. In addition, the MST provides automatic code generation from robot interfaces defined with the Unified Modeling Language (UML), methods for maintaining synchronization across distributed simulation systems, XML-based robot description, and an environment server. Finally, the MSF supports a number of third-party products including dynamic models and terrain databases. Although the communication objects and some of the simulation components that are provided with this toolkit are specifically designed for terrestrial surface rovers, the MST can be applied to any other domain, such as aerial, aquatic, or space.

The body electric 2.0: recent advances in developmental bioelectricity for regenerative and synthetic bioengineering.

PubMed

Mathews, Juanita; Levin, Michael

2018-04-20

Breakthroughs in biomedicine and synthetic bioengineering require predictive, rational control over anatomical structure and function. Recent successes in manipulating cellular and molecular hardware have not been matched by progress in understanding the patterning software implemented during embryogenesis and regeneration. A fundamental capability gap is driving desired changes in growth and form to address birth defects and traumatic injury. Here we review new tools, results, and conceptual advances in an exciting emerging field: endogenous non-neural bioelectric signaling, which enables cellular collectives to make global decisions and implement large-scale pattern homeostasis. Spatially distributed electric circuits regulate gene expression, organ morphogenesis, and body-wide axial patterning. Developmental bioelectricity facilitates the interface to organ-level modular control points that direct patterning in vivo. Cracking the bioelectric code will enable transformative progress in bioengineering and regenerative medicine. Copyright © 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Model-Based GN and C Simulation and Flight Software Development for Orion Missions beyond LEO

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Odegard, Ryan; Milenkovic, Zoran; Henry, Joel; Buttacoli, Michael

2014-01-01

For Orion missions beyond low Earth orbit (LEO), the Guidance, Navigation, and Control (GN&C) system is being developed using a model-based approach for simulation and flight software. Lessons learned from the development of GN&C algorithms and flight software for the Orion Exploration Flight Test One (EFT-1) vehicle have been applied to the development of further capabilities for Orion GN&C beyond EFT-1. Continuing the use of a Model-Based Development (MBD) approach with the Matlab®/Simulink® tool suite, the process for GN&C development and analysis has been largely improved. Furthermore, a model-based simulation environment in Simulink, rather than an external C-based simulation, greatly eases the process for development of flight algorithms. The benefits seen by employing lessons learned from EFT-1 are described, as well as the approach for implementing additional MBD techniques. Also detailed are the key enablers for improvements to the MBD process, including enhanced configuration management techniques for model-based software systems, automated code and artifact generation, and automated testing and integration.

Speech recognition technology: an outlook for human-to-machine interaction.

PubMed

Erdel, T; Crooks, S

2000-01-01

Speech recognition, as an enabling technology in healthcare-systems computing, is a topic that has been discussed for quite some time, but is just now coming to fruition. Traditionally, speech-recognition software has been constrained by hardware, but improved processors and increased memory capacities are starting to remove some of these limitations. With these barriers removed, companies that create software for the healthcare setting have the opportunity to write more successful applications. Among the criticisms of speech-recognition applications are the high rates of error and steep training curves. However, even in the face of such negative perceptions, there remains significant opportunities for speech recognition to allow healthcare providers and, more specifically, physicians, to work more efficiently and ultimately spend more time with their patients and less time completing necessary documentation. This article will identify opportunities for inclusion of speech-recognition technology in the healthcare setting and examine major categories of speech-recognition software--continuous speech recognition, command and control, and text-to-speech. We will discuss the advantages and disadvantages of each area, the limitations of the software today, and how future trends might affect them.

DA+ data acquisition and analysis software at the Swiss Light Source macromolecular crystallography beamlines.

PubMed

Wojdyla, Justyna Aleksandra; Kaminski, Jakub W; Panepucci, Ezequiel; Ebner, Simon; Wang, Xiaoqiang; Gabadinho, Jose; Wang, Meitian

2018-01-01

Data acquisition software is an essential component of modern macromolecular crystallography (MX) beamlines, enabling efficient use of beam time at synchrotron facilities. Developed at the Paul Scherrer Institute, the DA+ data acquisition software is implemented at all three Swiss Light Source (SLS) MX beamlines. DA+ consists of distributed services and components written in Python and Java, which communicate via messaging and streaming technologies. The major components of DA+ are the user interface, acquisition engine, online processing and database. Immediate data quality feedback is achieved with distributed automatic data analysis routines. The software architecture enables exploration of the full potential of the latest instrumentation at the SLS MX beamlines, such as the SmarGon goniometer and the EIGER X 16M detector, and development of new data collection methods.

FermiLib v0.1

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

MCCLEAN, JARROD; HANER, THOMAS; STEIGER, DAMIAN

FermiLib is an open source software package designed to facilitate the development and testing of algorithms for simulations of fermionic systems on quantum computers. Fermionic simulations represent an important application of early quantum devices with a lot of potential high value targets, such as quantum chemistry for the development of new catalysts. This software strives to provide a link between the required domain expertise in specific fermionic applications and quantum computing to enable more users to directly interface with, and develop for, these applications. It is an extensible Python library designed to interface with the high performance quantum simulator, ProjectQ,more » as well as application specific software such as PSI4 from the domain of quantum chemistry. Such software is key to enabling effective user facilities in quantum computation research.« less

NanoDesign: Concepts and Software for a Nanotechnology Based on Functionalized Fullerenes

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Globus, Al; Jaffe, Richard; Chancellor, Marisa K. (Technical Monitor)

1996-01-01

Eric Drexler has proposed a hypothetical nanotechnology based on diamond and investigated the properties of such molecular systems. While attractive, diamonoid nanotechnology is not physically accessible with straightforward extensions of current laboratory techniques. We propose a nanotechnology based on functionalized fullerenes and investigate carbon nanotube based gears with teeth added via a benzyne reaction known to occur with C60. The gears are single-walled carbon nanotubes with appended coenzyme groups for teeth. Fullerenes are in widespread laboratory use and can be functionalized in many ways. Companion papers computationally demonstrate the properties of these gears (they appear to work) and the accessibility of the benzyne/nanotube reaction. This paper describes the molecular design techniques and rationale as well as the software that implements these design techniques. The software is a set of persistent C++ objects controlled by TCL command scripts. The c++/tcl interface is automatically generated by a software system called tcl_c++ developed by the author and described here. The objects keep track of different portions of the molecular machinery to allow different simulation techniques and boundary conditions to be applied as appropriate. This capability has been required to demonstrate (computationally) our gear's feasibility. A new distributed software architecture featuring a WWW universal client, CORBA distributed objects, and agent software is under consideration. The software architecture is intended to eventually enable a widely disbursed group to develop complex simulated molecular machines.

Finite Control Set Model Predictive Control for Multiple Distributed Generators Microgrids

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Babqi, Abdulrahman Jamal

This dissertation proposes two control strategies for AC microgrids that consist of multiple distributed generators (DGs). The control strategies are valid for both grid-connected and islanded modes of operation. In general, microgrid can operate as a stand-alone system (i.e., islanded mode) or while it is connected to the utility grid (i.e., grid connected mode). To enhance the performance of a micrgorid, a sophisticated control scheme should be employed. The control strategies of microgrids can be divided into primary and secondary controls. The primary control regulates the output active and reactive powers of each DG in grid-connected mode as well as the output voltage and frequency of each DG in islanded mode. The secondary control is responsible for regulating the microgrid voltage and frequency in the islanded mode. Moreover, it provides power sharing schemes among the DGs. In other words, the secondary control specifies the set points (i.e. reference values) for the primary controllers. In this dissertation, Finite Control Set Model Predictive Control (FCS-MPC) was proposed for controlling microgrids. FCS-MPC was used as the primary controller to regulate the output power of each DG (in the grid-connected mode) or the voltage of the point of DG coupling (in the islanded mode of operation). In the grid-connected mode, Direct Power Model Predictive Control (DPMPC) was implemented to manage the power flow between each DG and the utility grid. In the islanded mode, Voltage Model Predictive Control (VMPC), as the primary control, and droop control, as the secondary control, were employed to control the output voltage of each DG and system frequency. The controller was equipped with a supplementary current limiting technique in order to limit the output current of each DG in abnormal incidents. The control approach also enabled smooth transition between the two modes. The performance of the control strategy was investigated and verified using PSCAD/EMTDC software platform. This dissertation also proposes a control and power sharing strategy for small-scale microgrids in both grid-connected and islanded modes based on centralized FCS-MPC. In grid-connected mode, the controller was capable of managing the output power of each DG and enabling flexible power regulation between the microgrid and the utility grid. In islanded mode, the controller regulated the microgrid voltage and frequency, and provided a precise power sharing scheme among the DGs. In addition, the power sharing can be adjusted flexibly by changing the sharing ratio. The proposed control also enabled plug-and-play operation. Moreover, a smooth transition between the two modes of operation was achieved without any disturbance in the system. Case studies were carried out in order to validate the proposed control strategy with the PSCAD/EMTDA software package.

The need for scientific software engineering in the pharmaceutical industry

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Luty, Brock; Rose, Peter W.

2017-03-01

Scientific software engineering is a distinct discipline from both computational chemistry project support and research informatics. A scientific software engineer not only has a deep understanding of the science of drug discovery but also the desire, skills and time to apply good software engineering practices. A good team of scientific software engineers can create a software foundation that is maintainable, validated and robust. If done correctly, this foundation enable the organization to investigate new and novel computational ideas with a very high level of efficiency.

The need for scientific software engineering in the pharmaceutical industry.

PubMed

Luty, Brock; Rose, Peter W

2017-03-01

Scientific software engineering is a distinct discipline from both computational chemistry project support and research informatics. A scientific software engineer not only has a deep understanding of the science of drug discovery but also the desire, skills and time to apply good software engineering practices. A good team of scientific software engineers can create a software foundation that is maintainable, validated and robust. If done correctly, this foundation enable the organization to investigate new and novel computational ideas with a very high level of efficiency.

ISS Solar Array Management

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Williams, James P.; Martin, Keith D.; Thomas, Justin R.; Caro, Samuel

2010-01-01

The International Space Station (ISS) Solar Array Management (SAM) software toolset provides the capabilities necessary to operate a spacecraft with complex solar array constraints. It monitors spacecraft telemetry and provides interpretations of solar array constraint data in an intuitive manner. The toolset provides extensive situational awareness to ensure mission success by analyzing power generation needs, array motion constraints, and structural loading situations. The software suite consists of several components including samCS (constraint set selector), samShadyTimers (array shadowing timers), samWin (visualization GUI), samLock (array motion constraint computation), and samJet (attitude control system configuration selector). It provides high availability and uptime for extended and continuous mission support. It is able to support two-degrees-of-freedom (DOF) array positioning and supports up to ten simultaneous constraints with intuitive 1D and 2D decision support visualizations of constraint data. Display synchronization is enabled across a networked control center and multiple methods for constraint data interpolation are supported. Use of this software toolset increases flight safety, reduces mission support effort, optimizes solar array operation for achieving mission goals, and has run for weeks at a time without issues. The SAM toolset is currently used in ISS real-time mission operations.

Dynamic optical resource allocation for mobile core networks with software defined elastic optical networking.

PubMed

Zhao, Yongli; Chen, Zhendong; Zhang, Jie; Wang, Xinbo

2016-07-25

Driven by the forthcoming of 5G mobile communications, the all-IP architecture of mobile core networks, i.e. evolved packet core (EPC) proposed by 3GPP, has been greatly challenged by the users' demands for higher data rate and more reliable end-to-end connection, as well as operators' demands for low operational cost. These challenges can be potentially met by software defined optical networking (SDON), which enables dynamic resource allocation according to the users' requirement. In this article, a novel network architecture for mobile core network is proposed based on SDON. A software defined network (SDN) controller is designed to realize the coordinated control over different entities in EPC networks. We analyze the requirement of EPC-lightpath (EPCL) in data plane and propose an optical switch load balancing (OSLB) algorithm for resource allocation in optical layer. The procedure of establishment and adjustment of EPCLs is demonstrated on a SDON-based EPC testbed with extended OpenFlow protocol. We also evaluate the OSLB algorithm through simulation in terms of bandwidth blocking ratio, traffic load distribution, and resource utilization ratio compared with link-based load balancing (LLB) and MinHops algorithms.

78 FR 43278 - Publication of Iran General License D

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2013-07-19

... D authorizes the exportation and reexportation to persons in Iran of certain services, software, and... Reexportation of Certain Services, Software, and Hardware Incident to the Exchange of Personal Communications (a... enable the services described in paragraph (a)(1), provided that such software is designated as EAR99...

MNE Scan: Software for real-time processing of electrophysiological data.

PubMed

Esch, Lorenz; Sun, Limin; Klüber, Viktor; Lew, Seok; Baumgarten, Daniel; Grant, P Ellen; Okada, Yoshio; Haueisen, Jens; Hämäläinen, Matti S; Dinh, Christoph

2018-06-01

Magnetoencephalography (MEG) and Electroencephalography (EEG) are noninvasive techniques to study the electrophysiological activity of the human brain. Thus, they are well suited for real-time monitoring and analysis of neuronal activity. Real-time MEG/EEG data processing allows adjustment of the stimuli to the subject's responses for optimizing the acquired information especially by providing dynamically changing displays to enable neurofeedback. We introduce MNE Scan, an acquisition and real-time analysis software based on the multipurpose software library MNE-CPP. MNE Scan allows the development and application of acquisition and novel real-time processing methods in both research and clinical studies. The MNE Scan development follows a strict software engineering process to enable approvals required for clinical software. We tested the performance of MNE Scan in several device-independent use cases, including, a clinical epilepsy study, real-time source estimation, and Brain Computer Interface (BCI) application. Compared to existing tools we propose a modular software considering clinical software requirements expected by certification authorities. At the same time the software is extendable and freely accessible. We conclude that MNE Scan is the first step in creating a device-independent open-source software to facilitate the transition from basic neuroscience research to both applied sciences and clinical applications. Copyright © 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

The OptIPuter microscopy demonstrator: enabling science through a transatlantic lightpath

PubMed Central

Ellisman, M.; Hutton, T.; Kirkland, A.; Lin, A.; Lin, C.; Molina, T.; Peltier, S.; Singh, R.; Tang, K.; Trefethen, A.E.; Wallom, D.C.H.; Xiong, X.

2009-01-01

The OptIPuter microscopy demonstrator project has been designed to enable concurrent and remote usage of world-class electron microscopes located in Oxford and San Diego. The project has constructed a network consisting of microscopes and computational and data resources that are all connected by a dedicated network infrastructure using the UK Lightpath and US Starlight systems. Key science drivers include examples from both materials and biological science. The resulting system is now a permanent link between the Oxford and San Diego microscopy centres. This will form the basis of further projects between the sites and expansion of the types of systems that can be remotely controlled, including optical, as well as electron, microscopy. Other improvements will include the updating of the Microsoft cluster software to the high performance computing (HPC) server 2008, which includes the HPC basic profile implementation that will enable the development of interoperable clients. PMID:19487201

The OptIPuter microscopy demonstrator: enabling science through a transatlantic lightpath.

PubMed

Ellisman, M; Hutton, T; Kirkland, A; Lin, A; Lin, C; Molina, T; Peltier, S; Singh, R; Tang, K; Trefethen, A E; Wallom, D C H; Xiong, X

2009-07-13

The OptIPuter microscopy demonstrator project has been designed to enable concurrent and remote usage of world-class electron microscopes located in Oxford and San Diego. The project has constructed a network consisting of microscopes and computational and data resources that are all connected by a dedicated network infrastructure using the UK Lightpath and US Starlight systems. Key science drivers include examples from both materials and biological science. The resulting system is now a permanent link between the Oxford and San Diego microscopy centres. This will form the basis of further projects between the sites and expansion of the types of systems that can be remotely controlled, including optical, as well as electron, microscopy. Other improvements will include the updating of the Microsoft cluster software to the high performance computing (HPC) server 2008, which includes the HPC basic profile implementation that will enable the development of interoperable clients.

Developing Confidence Limits For Reliability Of Software

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hayhurst, Kelly J.

1991-01-01

Technique developed for estimating reliability of software by use of Moranda geometric de-eutrophication model. Pivotal method enables straightforward construction of exact bounds with associated degree of statistical confidence about reliability of software. Confidence limits thus derived provide precise means of assessing quality of software. Limits take into account number of bugs found while testing and effects of sampling variation associated with random order of discovering bugs.

External Data and Attribute Hyperlink Programs for Promis*e(Registered Trademark)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Derengowski, Rich; Gruel, Andrew

2001-01-01

External Data and Attribute Hyperlink are computer programs that can be added to Promis*e(trademark) which is a commercial software system that automates routine tasks in the design (including drawing schematic diagrams) of electrical control systems. The programs were developed under the Stennis Space Center's (SSC) Dual Use Technology Development Program to provide capabilities for SSC's BMCS configuration management system which uses Promis*e(trademark). The External Data program enables the storage and management of information in an external database linked to a drawing. Changes can be made either in the database or on the drawing. Information that originates outside Promis*e(trademark) can be stored in custom fields that can be added to the database. Although this information is not available in Promis*e(trademark) printed drawings, it can be associated with symbols in the drawings, and can be retrieved through the drawings when the software is running. The Attribute Hyperlink program enables the addition of hyperlink information as attributes of symbols. This program enables the formation of a direct hyperlink between a schematic diagram and an Internet site or a file on a compact disk, on the user's hard drive, or on another computer on a network to which the user's computer is connected. The user can then obtain information directly related to the part (e.g., maintenance, or troubleshooting information) associated with the hyperlink.

A limb action detector enabling people with multiple disabilities to control environmental stimulation through limb action with a Nintendo Wii Remote Controller.

PubMed

Shih, Ching-Hsiang; Chang, Man-Ling; Shih, Ching-Tien

2010-01-01

This study assessed whether two persons with multiple disabilities would be able to control environmental stimulation using limb action with a Nintendo Wii Remote Controller and a newly developed limb action detection program (LADP, i.e., a new software program that turns a Wii Remote Controller into a precise limb action detector). This study was carried out according to an ABAB sequence in which A represented baseline and B represented intervention phases. Data showed that both participants significantly increased their target response, thus increasing the level of environmental stimulation by activating the control system through limb action, during the intervention phases. Practical and developmental implications of the findings are discussed. Copyright (c) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

General Mode Scanning Probe Microscopy

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Somnath, Suhas; Jesse, Stephen

A critical part of SPM measurements is the information transfer from the probe-sample junction to the measurement system. Current information transfer methods heavily compress the information-rich data stream by averaging the data over a time interval, or via heterodyne detection approaches such as lock-in amplifiers and phase-locked loops. As a consequence, highly valuable information at the sub-microsecond time scales or information from frequencies outside the measurement band is lost. We have developed a fundamentally new approach called General Mode (G-mode), where we can capture the complete information stream from the detectors in the microscope. The availability of the complete informationmore » allows the microscope operator to analyze the data via information-theory analysis or comprehensive physical models. Furthermore, the complete data stream enables advanced data-driven filtering algorithms, multi-resolution imaging, ultrafast spectroscropic imaging, spatial mapping of multidimensional variability in material properties, etc. Though we applied this approach to scanning probe microscopy, the general philosophy of G-mode can be applied to many other modes of microscopy. G-mode data is captured by completely custom software written in LabVIEW and Matlab. The software generates the waveforms to electrically, thermally, or mechanically excite the SPM probe. It handles real-time communications with the microscope software for operations such as moving the SPM probe position and also controls other instrumentation hardware. The software also controls multiple variants of high-speed data acquisition cards to excite the SPM probe with the excitation waveform and simultaneously measure multiple channels of information from the microscope detectors at sampling rates of 1-100 MHz. The software also saves the raw data to the computer and allows the microscope operator to visualize processed or filtered data during the experiment. The software performs all these features while offering a user-friendly interface.« less

DA+ data acquisition and analysis software at the Swiss Light Source macromolecular crystallography beamlines

PubMed Central

Wojdyla, Justyna Aleksandra; Kaminski, Jakub W.; Ebner, Simon; Wang, Xiaoqiang; Gabadinho, Jose; Wang, Meitian

2018-01-01

Data acquisition software is an essential component of modern macromolecular crystallography (MX) beamlines, enabling efficient use of beam time at synchrotron facilities. Developed at the Paul Scherrer Institute, the DA+ data acquisition software is implemented at all three Swiss Light Source (SLS) MX beamlines. DA+ consists of distributed services and components written in Python and Java, which communicate via messaging and streaming technologies. The major components of DA+ are the user interface, acquisition engine, online processing and database. Immediate data quality feedback is achieved with distributed automatic data analysis routines. The software architecture enables exploration of the full potential of the latest instrumentation at the SLS MX beamlines, such as the SmarGon goniometer and the EIGER X 16M detector, and development of new data collection methods. PMID:29271779

Leap Motion Gesture Control With Carestream Software in the Operating Room to Control Imaging: Installation Guide and Discussion.

PubMed

Pauchot, Julien; Di Tommaso, Laetitia; Lounis, Ahmed; Benassarou, Mourad; Mathieu, Pierre; Bernot, Dominique; Aubry, Sébastien

2015-12-01

Nowadays, routine cross-sectional imaging viewing during a surgical procedure requires physical contact with an interface (mouse or touch-sensitive screen). Such contact risks exposure to aseptic conditions and causes loss of time. Devices such as the recently introduced Leap Motion (Leap Motion Society, San Francisco, CA), which enables interaction with the computer without any physical contact, are of wide interest in the field of surgery, but configuration and ergonomics are key challenges for the practitioner, imaging software, and surgical environment. This article aims to suggest an easy configuration of Leap Motion on a PC for optimized use with Carestream Vue PACS v11.3.4 (Carestream Health, Inc, Rochester, NY) using a plug-in (to download at https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B_F4eBeBQc3yNENvTXlnY09qS00&authuser=0) and a video tutorial (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yVPTgxg-SIk). Videos of surgical procedure and discussion about innovative gesture control technology and its various configurations are provided in this article. © The Author(s) 2015.

Decentralized formation flying control in a multiple-team hierarchy.

PubMed

Mueller, Joseph B; Thomas, Stephanie J

2005-12-01

In recent years, formation flying has been recognized as an enabling technology for a variety of mission concepts in both the scientific and defense arenas. Examples of developing missions at NASA include magnetospheric multiscale (MMS), solar imaging radio array (SIRA), and terrestrial planet finder (TPF). For each of these missions, a multiple satellite approach is required in order to accomplish the large-scale geometries imposed by the science objectives. In addition, the paradigm shift of using a multiple satellite cluster rather than a large, monolithic spacecraft has also been motivated by the expected benefits of increased robustness, greater flexibility, and reduced cost. However, the operational costs of monitoring and commanding a fleet of close-orbiting satellites is likely to be unreasonable unless the onboard software is sufficiently autonomous, robust, and scalable to large clusters. This paper presents the prototype of a system that addresses these objectives-a decentralized guidance and control system that is distributed across spacecraft using a multiple team framework. The objective is to divide large clusters into teams of "manageable" size, so that the communication and computation demands driven by N decentralized units are related to the number of satellites in a team rather than the entire cluster. The system is designed to provide a high level of autonomy, to support clusters with large numbers of satellites, to enable the number of spacecraft in the cluster to change post-launch, and to provide for on-orbit software modification. The distributed guidance and control system will be implemented in an object-oriented style using a messaging architecture for networking and threaded applications (MANTA). In this architecture, tasks may be remotely added, removed, or replaced post launch to increase mission flexibility and robustness. This built-in adaptability will allow software modifications to be made on-orbit in a robust manner. The prototype system, which is implemented in Matlab, emulates the object-oriented and message-passing features of the MANTA software. In this paper, the multiple team organization of the cluster is described, and the modular software architecture is presented. The relative dynamics in eccentric reference orbits is reviewed, and families of periodic, relative trajectories are identified, expressed as sets of static geometric parameters. The guidance law design is presented, and an example reconfiguration scenario is used to illustrate the distributed process of assigning geometric goals to the cluster. Next, a decentralized maneuver planning approach is presented that utilizes linear-programming methods to enact reconfiguration and coarse formation keeping maneuvers. Finally, a method for performing online collision avoidance is discussed, and an example is provided to gauge its performance.

Leader Delegation and Trust in Global Software Teams

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Zhang, Suling

2008-01-01

Virtual teams are an important work structure in global software development. The distributed team structure enables access to a diverse set of expertise which is often not available in one location, to a cheaper labor force, and to a potentially accelerated development process that uses a twenty-four hour work structure. Many software teams…

Air Traffic Management Technology Demonstration-1 Concept of Operations (ATD-1 ConOps)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Baxley, Brian T.; Johnson, William C.; Swenson, Harry; Robinson, John E.; Prevot, Thomas; Callantine, Todd; Scardina, John; Greene, Michael

2012-01-01

The operational goal of the ATD-1 ConOps is to enable aircraft, using their onboard FMS capabilities, to fly Optimized Profile Descents (OPDs) from cruise to the runway threshold at a high-density airport, at a high throughput rate, using primarily speed control to maintain in-trail separation and the arrival schedule. The three technologies in the ATD-1 ConOps achieve this by calculating a precise arrival schedule, using controller decision support tools to provide terminal controllers with speeds for aircraft to fly to meet times at a particular meter points, and onboard software providing flight crews with speeds for the aircraft to fly to achieve a particular spacing behind preceding aircraft.

Modular programming for tuberculosis control, the "AuTuMN" platform.

PubMed

Trauer, James McCracken; Ragonnet, Romain; Doan, Tan Nhut; McBryde, Emma Sue

2017-08-07

Tuberculosis (TB) is now the world's leading infectious killer and major programmatic advances will be needed if we are to meet the ambitious new End TB Targets. Although mathematical models are powerful tools for TB control, such models must be flexible enough to capture the complexity and heterogeneity of the global TB epidemic. This includes simulating a disease that affects age groups and other risk groups differently, has varying levels of infectiousness depending upon the organ involved and varying outcomes from treatment depending on the drug resistance pattern of the infecting strain. We adopted sound basic principles of software engineering to develop a modular software platform for simulation of TB control interventions ("AuTuMN"). These included object-oriented programming, logical linkage between modules and consistency of code syntax and variable naming. The underlying transmission dynamic model incorporates optional stratification by age, risk group, strain and organ involvement, while our approach to simulating time-variant programmatic parameters better captures the historical progression of the epidemic. An economic model is overlaid upon this epidemiological model which facilitates comparison between new and existing technologies. A "Model runner" module allows for predictions of future disease burden trajectories under alternative scenario situations, as well as uncertainty, automatic calibration, cost-effectiveness and optimisation. The model has now been used to guide TB control strategies across a range of settings and countries, with our modular approach enabling repeated application of the tool without the need for extensive modification for each application. The modular construction of the platform minimises errors, enhances readability and collaboration between multiple programmers and enables rapid adaptation to answer questions in a broad range of contexts without the need for extensive re-programming. Such features are particularly important in simulating an epidemic as complex and diverse as TB.

AdapChem

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Oluwole, Oluwayemisi O.; Wong, Hsi-Wu; Green, William

2012-01-01

AdapChem software enables high efficiency, low computational cost, and enhanced accuracy on computational fluid dynamics (CFD) numerical simulations used for combustion studies. The software dynamically allocates smaller, reduced chemical models instead of the larger, full chemistry models to evolve the calculation while ensuring the same accuracy to be obtained for steady-state CFD reacting flow simulations. The software enables detailed chemical kinetic modeling in combustion CFD simulations. AdapChem adapts the reaction mechanism used in the CFD to the local reaction conditions. Instead of a single, comprehensive reaction mechanism throughout the computation, a dynamic distribution of smaller, reduced models is used to capture accurately the chemical kinetics at a fraction of the cost of the traditional single-mechanism approach.

Weighted Ensemble Simulation: Review of Methodology, Applications, and Software

PubMed Central

Zuckerman, Daniel M.; Chong, Lillian T.

2018-01-01

The weighted ensemble (WE) methodology orchestrates quasi-independent parallel simulations run with intermittent communication that can enhance sampling of rare events such as protein conformational changes, folding, and binding. The WE strategy can achieve superlinear scaling—the unbiased estimation of key observables such as rate constants and equilibrium state populations to greater precision than would be possible with ordinary parallel simulation. WE software can be used to control any dynamics engine, such as standard molecular dynamics and cell-modeling packages. This article reviews the theoretical basis of WE and goes on to describe successful applications to a number of complex biological processes—protein conformational transitions, (un)binding, and assembly processes, as well as cell-scale processes in systems biology. We furthermore discuss the challenges that need to be overcome in the next phase of WE methodological development. Overall, the combined advances in WE methodology and software have enabled the simulation of long-timescale processes that would otherwise not be practical on typical computing resources using standard simulation. PMID:28301772

OpenSim: open-source software to create and analyze dynamic simulations of movement.

PubMed

Delp, Scott L; Anderson, Frank C; Arnold, Allison S; Loan, Peter; Habib, Ayman; John, Chand T; Guendelman, Eran; Thelen, Darryl G

2007-11-01

Dynamic simulations of movement allow one to study neuromuscular coordination, analyze athletic performance, and estimate internal loading of the musculoskeletal system. Simulations can also be used to identify the sources of pathological movement and establish a scientific basis for treatment planning. We have developed a freely available, open-source software system (OpenSim) that lets users develop models of musculoskeletal structures and create dynamic simulations of a wide variety of movements. We are using this system to simulate the dynamics of individuals with pathological gait and to explore the biomechanical effects of treatments. OpenSim provides a platform on which the biomechanics community can build a library of simulations that can be exchanged, tested, analyzed, and improved through a multi-institutional collaboration. Developing software that enables a concerted effort from many investigators poses technical and sociological challenges. Meeting those challenges will accelerate the discovery of principles that govern movement control and improve treatments for individuals with movement pathologies.

Framework for End-User Programming of Cross-Smart Space Applications

PubMed Central

Palviainen, Marko; Kuusijärvi, Jarkko; Ovaska, Eila

2012-01-01

Cross-smart space applications are specific types of software services that enable users to share information, monitor the physical and logical surroundings and control it in a way that is meaningful for the user's situation. For developing cross-smart space applications, this paper makes two main contributions: it introduces (i) a component design and scripting method for end-user programming of cross-smart space applications and (ii) a backend framework of components that interwork to support the brunt of the RDFScript translation, and the use and execution of ontology models. Before end-user programming activities, the software professionals must develop easy-to-apply Driver components for the APIs of existing software systems. Thereafter, end-users are able to create applications from the commands of the Driver components with the help of the provided toolset. The paper also introduces the reference implementation of the framework, tools for the Driver component development and end-user programming of cross-smart space applications and the first evaluation results on their application. PMID:23202169

Weighted Ensemble Simulation: Review of Methodology, Applications, and Software.

PubMed

Zuckerman, Daniel M; Chong, Lillian T

2017-05-22

The weighted ensemble (WE) methodology orchestrates quasi-independent parallel simulations run with intermittent communication that can enhance sampling of rare events such as protein conformational changes, folding, and binding. The WE strategy can achieve superlinear scaling-the unbiased estimation of key observables such as rate constants and equilibrium state populations to greater precision than would be possible with ordinary parallel simulation. WE software can be used to control any dynamics engine, such as standard molecular dynamics and cell-modeling packages. This article reviews the theoretical basis of WE and goes on to describe successful applications to a number of complex biological processes-protein conformational transitions, (un)binding, and assembly processes, as well as cell-scale processes in systems biology. We furthermore discuss the challenges that need to be overcome in the next phase of WE methodological development. Overall, the combined advances in WE methodology and software have enabled the simulation of long-timescale processes that would otherwise not be practical on typical computing resources using standard simulation.

Real time imaging and infrared background scene analysis using the Naval Postgraduate School infrared search and target designation (NPS-IRSTD) system

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bernier, Jean D.

1991-09-01

The imaging in real time of infrared background scenes with the Naval Postgraduate School Infrared Search and Target Designation (NPS-IRSTD) System was achieved through extensive software developments in protected mode assembly language on an Intel 80386 33 MHz computer. The new software processes the 512 by 480 pixel images directly in the extended memory area of the computer where the DT-2861 frame grabber memory buffers are mapped. Direct interfacing, through a JDR-PR10 prototype card, between the frame grabber and the host computer AT bus enables each load of the frame grabber memory buffers to be effected under software control. The protected mode assembly language program can refresh the display of a six degree pseudo-color sector in the scanner rotation within the two second period of the scanner. A study of the imaging properties of the NPS-IRSTD is presented with preliminary work on image analysis and contrast enhancement of infrared background scenes.

Piezoelectrically Actuated Robotic System for MRI-Guided Prostate Percutaneous Therapy

PubMed Central

Su, Hao; Shang, Weijian; Cole, Gregory; Li, Gang; Harrington, Kevin; Camilo, Alexander; Tokuda, Junichi; Tempany, Clare M.; Hata, Nobuhiko; Fischer, Gregory S.

2014-01-01

This paper presents a fully-actuated robotic system for percutaneous prostate therapy under continuously acquired live magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) guidance. The system is composed of modular hardware and software to support the surgical workflow of intra-operative MRI-guided surgical procedures. We present the development of a 6-degree-of-freedom (DOF) needle placement robot for transperineal prostate interventions. The robot consists of a 3-DOF needle driver module and a 3-DOF Cartesian motion module. The needle driver provides needle cannula translation and rotation (2-DOF) and stylet translation (1-DOF). A custom robot controller consisting of multiple piezoelectric motor drivers provides precision closed-loop control of piezoelectric motors and enables simultaneous robot motion and MR imaging. The developed modular robot control interface software performs image-based registration, kinematics calculation, and exchanges robot commands and coordinates between the navigation software and the robot controller with a new implementation of the open network communication protocol OpenIGTLink. Comprehensive compatibility of the robot is evaluated inside a 3-Tesla MRI scanner using standard imaging sequences and the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) loss is limited to 15%. The image deterioration due to the present and motion of robot demonstrates unobservable image interference. Twenty-five targeted needle placements inside gelatin phantoms utilizing an 18-gauge ceramic needle demonstrated 0.87 mm root mean square (RMS) error in 3D Euclidean distance based on MRI volume segmentation of the image-guided robotic needle placement procedure. PMID:26412962

Telescience Support Center Data System Software

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Rahman, Hasan

2010-01-01

The Telescience Support Center (TSC) team has developed a databasedriven, increment-specific Data Require - ment Document (DRD) generation tool that automates much of the work required for generating and formatting the DRD. It creates a database to load the required changes to configure the TSC data system, thus eliminating a substantial amount of labor in database entry and formatting. The TSC database contains the TSC systems configuration, along with the experimental data, in which human physiological data must be de-commutated in real time. The data for each experiment also must be cataloged and archived for future retrieval. TSC software provides tools and resources for ground operation and data distribution to remote users consisting of PIs (principal investigators), bio-medical engineers, scientists, engineers, payload specialists, and computer scientists. Operations support is provided for computer systems access, detailed networking, and mathematical and computational problems of the International Space Station telemetry data. User training is provided for on-site staff and biomedical researchers and other remote personnel in the usage of the space-bound services via the Internet, which enables significant resource savings for the physical facility along with the time savings versus traveling to NASA sites. The software used in support of the TSC could easily be adapted to other Control Center applications. This would include not only other NASA payload monitoring facilities, but also other types of control activities, such as monitoring and control of the electric grid, chemical, or nuclear plant processes, air traffic control, and the like.

Quantitative evaluation of a thrust vector controlled transport at the conceptual design phase

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ricketts, Vincent Patrick

The impetus to innovate, to push the bounds and break the molds of evolutionary design trends, often comes from competition but sometimes requires catalytic political legislature. For this research endeavor, the 'catalyzing legislation' comes in response to the rise in cost of fossil fuels and the request put forth by NASA on aircraft manufacturers to show reduced aircraft fuel consumption of +60% within 30 years. This necessitates that novel technologies be considered to achieve these values of improved performance. One such technology is thrust vector control (TVC). The beneficial characteristic of thrust vector control technology applied to the traditional tail-aft configuration (TAC) commercial transport is its ability to retain the operational advantage of this highly evolved aircraft type like cabin evacuation, ground operation, safety, and certification. This study explores if the TVC transport concept offers improved flight performance due to synergistically reducing the traditional empennage size, overall resulting in reduced weight and drag, and therefore reduced aircraft fuel consumption. In particular, this study explores if the TVC technology in combination with the reduced empennage methodology enables the TAC aircraft to synergistically evolve while complying with current safety and certification regulation. This research utilizes the multi-disciplinary parametric sizing software, AVD Sizing, developed by the Aerospace Vehicle Design (AVD) Laboratory. The sizing software is responsible for visualizing the total system solution space via parametric trades and is capable of determining if the TVC technology can enable the TAC aircraft to synergistically evolve, showing marked improvements in performance and cost. This study indicates that the TVC plus reduced empennage methodology shows marked improvements in performance and cost.

Designing of a technological line in the context of controlling with the use of integration of the virtual controller with the mechatronics concept designer module of the PLM Siemens NX software

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Herbuś, K.; Ociepka, P.

2017-08-01

In the work is examined the sequential control system of a technological line in the form of the final part of a system of an internal transport. The process of designing this technological line using the computer-aided approach ran concurrently in two different program environments. In the Mechatronics Concept Designer module of the PLM Siemens NX software was developed the 3D model of the technological line prepared for verification the logic interrelations implemented in the control system. For this purpose, from the whole system of the technological line, it was distinguished the sub-system of actuators and sensors, because their correct operation determines the correct operation of the whole system. Whereas in the application of the virtual controller have been implemented the algorithms of work of the planned line. Then both program environments have been integrated using the OPC server, which enables the exchange of data between the considered systems. The data on the state of the object and the data defining the way and sequence of operation of the technological line are exchanged between the virtual controller and the 3D model of the technological line in real time.

Applications of Sentinel-2 data for agriculture and forest monitoring using the absolute difference (ZABUD) index derived from the AgroEye software (ESA)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

de Kok, R.; WeŻyk, P.; PapieŻ, M.; Migo, L.

2017-10-01

To convince new users of the advantages of the Sentinel_2 sensor, a simplification of classic remote sensing tools allows to create a platform of communication among domain specialists of agricultural analysis, visual image interpreters and remote sensing programmers. An index value, known in the remote sensing user domain as "Zabud" was selected to represent, in color, the essentials of a time series analysis. The color index used in a color atlas offers a working platform for an agricultural field control. This creates a database of test and training areas that enables rapid anomaly detection in the agricultural domain. The use cases and simplifications now function as an introduction to Sentinel_2 based remote sensing, in an area that before relies on VHR imagery and aerial data, to serve mainly the visual interpretation. The database extension with detected anomalies allows developers of open source software to design solutions for further agricultural control with remote sensing.

Augmented reality and haptic interfaces for robot-assisted surgery.

PubMed

Yamamoto, Tomonori; Abolhassani, Niki; Jung, Sung; Okamura, Allison M; Judkins, Timothy N

2012-03-01

Current teleoperated robot-assisted minimally invasive surgical systems do not take full advantage of the potential performance enhancements offered by various forms of haptic feedback to the surgeon. Direct and graphical haptic feedback systems can be integrated with vision and robot control systems in order to provide haptic feedback to improve safety and tissue mechanical property identification. An interoperable interface for teleoperated robot-assisted minimally invasive surgery was developed to provide haptic feedback and augmented visual feedback using three-dimensional (3D) graphical overlays. The software framework consists of control and command software, robot plug-ins, image processing plug-ins and 3D surface reconstructions. The feasibility of the interface was demonstrated in two tasks performed with artificial tissue: palpation to detect hard lumps and surface tracing, using vision-based forbidden-region virtual fixtures to prevent the patient-side manipulator from entering unwanted regions of the workspace. The interoperable interface enables fast development and successful implementation of effective haptic feedback methods in teleoperation. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Developing multimedia software and virtual reality worlds and their use in rehabilitation and psychology.

PubMed

Sik Lányi, Cecília; Laky, Viktória; Tilinger, Adám; Pataky, Ilona; Simon, Lajos; Kiss, Bernadett; Simon, Viktória; Szabó, Júlianna; Páll, Attila

2004-01-01

The multimedia and virtual reality projects performed at our laboratory during the last ten years can be grouped into the following groups: 1) tutorial and entertainment programs for handicapped children, 2) rehabilitation programs for stroke patients and patients with phobias. We have developed multimedia software for handicapped children with various impairments: partial vision, hearing difficulties, locomotive difficulties, mental retardation, dyslexia etc. In the present paper we show the advantages of using multimedia software to develop mental skills in handicapped people and deal with the special needs of handicapped children. For the rehabilitation of stroke patients we have developed a computer-controlled method, which enables - contrary to methods used internationally - not only the establishment of a diagnosis, but also measurement of therapy effectiveness: 1) it enables us to produce a database of patients, which contains not only their personal data but also test results, their drawings and audio recordings, 2) it is in itself an intensive therapeutic test and contains tutorial programs. We are currently collecting test results. We have also developed some virtual worlds for treating phobias: a virtual balcony and a ten-story building with an external glass elevator as well as an internal glass elevator in the virtual Atrium Hyatt hotel. We have developed a virtual environment for treating claustrophobia too: a closed lift and a room where the walls can move. For specific phobias (fear of travelling) we have modelled the underground railway system in Budapest. For autistic children, we have developed virtual shopping software too. In this paper we present the advantages of virtual reality in the investigation, evaluation and treatment of perception, behaviour and neuropsychological disorders.

Agent Based Software for the Autonomous Control of Formation Flying Spacecraft

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

How, Jonathan P.; Campbell, Mark; Dennehy, Neil (Technical Monitor)

2003-01-01

Distributed satellite systems is an enabling technology for many future NASA/DoD earth and space science missions, such as MMS, MAXIM, Leonardo, and LISA [1, 2, 3]. While formation flying offers significant science benefits, to reduce the operating costs for these missions it will be essential that these multiple vehicles effectively act as a single spacecraft by performing coordinated observations. Autonomous guidance, navigation, and control as part of a coordinated fleet-autonomy is a key technology that will help accomplish this complex goal. This is no small task, as most current space missions require significant input from the ground for even relatively simple decisions such as thruster burns. Work for the NMP DS1 mission focused on the development of the New Millennium Remote Agent (NMRA) architecture for autonomous spacecraft control systems. NMRA integrates traditional real-time monitoring and control with components for constraint-based planning, robust multi-threaded execution, and model-based diagnosis and reconfiguration. The complexity of using an autonomous approach for space flight software was evident when most of its capabilities were stripped off prior to launch (although more capability was uplinked subsequently, and the resulting demonstration was very successful).

Digital Camera Control for Faster Inspection

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Brown, Katharine; Siekierski, James D.; Mangieri, Mark L.; Dekome, Kent; Cobarruvias, John; Piplani, Perry J.; Busa, Joel

2009-01-01

Digital Camera Control Software (DCCS) is a computer program for controlling a boom and a boom-mounted camera used to inspect the external surface of a space shuttle in orbit around the Earth. Running in a laptop computer in the space-shuttle crew cabin, DCCS commands integrated displays and controls. By means of a simple one-button command, a crewmember can view low- resolution images to quickly spot problem areas and can then cause a rapid transition to high- resolution images. The crewmember can command that camera settings apply to a specific small area of interest within the field of view of the camera so as to maximize image quality within that area. DCCS also provides critical high-resolution images to a ground screening team, which analyzes the images to assess damage (if any); in so doing, DCCS enables the team to clear initially suspect areas more quickly than would otherwise be possible and further saves time by minimizing the probability of re-imaging of areas already inspected. On the basis of experience with a previous version (2.0) of the software, the present version (3.0) incorporates a number of advanced imaging features that optimize crewmember capability and efficiency.

Existing Fortran interfaces to Trilinos in preparation for exascale ForTrilinos development

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Evans, Katherine J.; Young, Mitchell T.; Collins, Benjamin S.

This report summarizes the current state of Fortran interfaces to the Trilinos library within several key applications of the Exascale Computing Program (ECP), with the aim of informing developers about strategies to develop ForTrilinos, an exascale-ready, Fortran interface software package within Trilinos. The two software projects assessed within are the DOE Office of Science's Accelerated Climate Model for Energy (ACME) atmosphere component, CAM, and the DOE Office of Nuclear Energy's core-simulator portion of VERA, a nuclear reactor simulation code. Trilinos is an object-oriented, C++ based software project, and spans a collection of algorithms and other enabling technologies such as uncertaintymore » quantification and mesh generation. To date, Trilinos has enabled these codes to achieve large-scale simulation results, however the simulation needs of CAM and VERA-CS will approach exascale over the next five years. A Fortran interface to Trilinos that enables efficient use of programming models and more advanced algorithms is necessary. Where appropriate, the needs of the CAM and VERA-CS software to achieve their simulation goals are called out specifically. With this report, a design document and execution plan for ForTrilinos development can proceed.« less

PointCom: semi-autonomous UGV control with intuitive interface

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rohde, Mitchell M.; Perlin, Victor E.; Iagnemma, Karl D.; Lupa, Robert M.; Rohde, Steven M.; Overholt, James; Fiorani, Graham

2008-04-01

Unmanned ground vehicles (UGVs) will play an important role in the nation's next-generation ground force. Advances in sensing, control, and computing have enabled a new generation of technologies that bridge the gap between manual UGV teleoperation and full autonomy. In this paper, we present current research on a unique command and control system for UGVs named PointCom (Point-and-Go Command). PointCom is a semi-autonomous command system for one or multiple UGVs. The system, when complete, will be easy to operate and will enable significant reduction in operator workload by utilizing an intuitive image-based control framework for UGV navigation and allowing a single operator to command multiple UGVs. The project leverages new image processing algorithms for monocular visual servoing and odometry to yield a unique, high-performance fused navigation system. Human Computer Interface (HCI) techniques from the entertainment software industry are being used to develop video-game style interfaces that require little training and build upon the navigation capabilities. By combining an advanced navigation system with an intuitive interface, a semi-autonomous control and navigation system is being created that is robust, user friendly, and less burdensome than many current generation systems. mand).

Model-Based Verification and Validation of Spacecraft Avionics

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Khan, M. Omair; Sievers, Michael; Standley, Shaun

2012-01-01

Verification and Validation (V&V) at JPL is traditionally performed on flight or flight-like hardware running flight software. For some time, the complexity of avionics has increased exponentially while the time allocated for system integration and associated V&V testing has remained fixed. There is an increasing need to perform comprehensive system level V&V using modeling and simulation, and to use scarce hardware testing time to validate models; the norm for thermal and structural V&V for some time. Our approach extends model-based V&V to electronics and software through functional and structural models implemented in SysML. We develop component models of electronics and software that are validated by comparison with test results from actual equipment. The models are then simulated enabling a more complete set of test cases than possible on flight hardware. SysML simulations provide access and control of internal nodes that may not be available in physical systems. This is particularly helpful in testing fault protection behaviors when injecting faults is either not possible or potentially damaging to the hardware. We can also model both hardware and software behaviors in SysML, which allows us to simulate hardware and software interactions. With an integrated model and simulation capability we can evaluate the hardware and software interactions and identify problems sooner. The primary missing piece is validating SysML model correctness against hardware; this experiment demonstrated such an approach is possible.

Bellerophon

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Lingerfelt, Eric J; Messer, II, Otis E

2017-01-02

The Bellerophon software system supports CHIMERA, a production-level HPC application that simulates the evolution of core-collapse supernovae. Bellerophon enables CHIMERA's geographically dispersed team of collaborators to perform job monitoring and real-time data analysis from multiple supercomputing resources, including platforms at OLCF, NERSC, and NICS. Its multi-tier architecture provides an encapsulated, end-to-end software solution that enables the CHIMERA team to quickly and easily access highly customizable animated and static views of results from anywhere in the world via a cross-platform desktop application.

Research on Generating Method of Embedded Software Test Document Based on Dynamic Model

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Qu, MingCheng; Wu, XiangHu; Tao, YongChao; Liu, Ying

2018-03-01

This paper provides a dynamic model-based test document generation method for embedded software that provides automatic generation of two documents: test requirements specification documentation and configuration item test documentation. This method enables dynamic test requirements to be implemented in dynamic models, enabling dynamic test demand tracking to be easily generated; able to automatically generate standardized, standardized test requirements and test documentation, improved document-related content inconsistency and lack of integrity And other issues, improve the efficiency.

Neural-Network-Development Program

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Phillips, Todd A.

1993-01-01

NETS, software tool for development and evaluation of neural networks, provides simulation of neural-network algorithms plus computing environment for development of such algorithms. Uses back-propagation learning method for all of networks it creates. Enables user to customize patterns of connections between layers of network. Also provides features for saving, during learning process, values of weights, providing more-precise control over learning process. Written in ANSI standard C language. Machine-independent version (MSC-21588) includes only code for command-line-interface version of NETS 3.0.

A CAD approach to magnetic bearing design

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Jeyaseelan, M.; Anand, D. K.; Kirk, J. A.

1988-01-01

A design methodology has been developed at the Magnetic Bearing Research Laboratory for designing magnetic bearings using a CAD approach. This is used in the algorithm of an interactive design software package. The package is a design tool developed to enable the designer to simulate the entire process of design and analysis of the system. Its capabilities include interactive input/modification of geometry, finding any possible saturation at critical sections of the system, and the design and analysis of a control system that stabilizes and maintains magnetic suspension.

Modular space vehicle boards, control software, reprogramming, and failure recovery

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Judd, Stephen; Dallmann, Nicholas; McCabe, Kevin

A space vehicle may have a modular board configuration that commonly uses some or all components and a common operating system for at least some of the boards. Each modular board may have its own dedicated processing, and processing loads may be distributed. The space vehicle may be reprogrammable, and may be launched without code that enables all functionality and/or components. Code errors may be detected and the space vehicle may be reset to a working code version to prevent system failure.

Spinoff 2015

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

2015-01-01

Topics covered include: 3D Endoscope to Boost Safety, Cut Cost of Surgery; Audio App Brings a Better Night's Sleep Liquid Cooling Technology Increases Exercise Efficiency; Algae-Derived Dietary Ingredients Nourish Animals; Space Grant Research Launches Rehabilitation Chair; Vision Trainer Teaches Focusing Techniques at Home; Aircraft Geared Architecture Reduces Fuel Cost and Noise; Ubiquitous Supercritical Wing Design Cuts Billions in Fuel Costs; Flight Controller Software Protects Lightweight Flexible Aircraft; Cabin Pressure Monitors Notify Pilots to Save Lives; Ionospheric Mapping Software Ensures Accuracy of Pilots' GPS; Water Mapping Technology Rebuilds Lives in Arid Regions; Shock Absorbers Save Structures and Lives during Earthquakes; Software Facilitates Sharing of Water Quality Data Worldwide; Underwater Adhesives Retrofit Pipelines with Advanced Sensors; Laser Imaging Video Camera Sees through Fire, Fog, Smoke; 3D Lasers Increase Efficiency, Safety of Moving Machines; Air Revitalization System Enables Excursions to the Stratosphere; Magnetic Fluids Deliver Better Speaker Sound Quality; Bioreactor Yields Extracts for Skin Cream; Private Astronaut Training Prepares Commercial Crews of Tomorrow; Activity Monitors Help Users Get Optimum Sun Exposure; LEDs Illuminate Bulbs for Better Sleep, Wake Cycles; Charged Particles Kill Pathogens and Round Up Dust; Balance Devices Train Golfers for a Consistent Swing; Landsat Imagery Enables Global Studies of Surface Trends; Ruggedized Spectrometers Are Built for Tough Jobs; Gas Conversion Systems Reclaim Fuel for Industry; Remote Sensing Technologies Mitigate Drought; Satellite Data Inform Forecasts of Crop Growth; Probes Measure Gases for Environmental Research; Cloud Computing Technologies Facilitate Earth Research; Software Cuts Homebuilding Costs, Increases Energy Efficiency; Portable Planetariums Teach Science; Schedule Analysis Software Saves Time for Project Planners; Sound Modeling Simplifies Vehicle Noise Management; Custom 3D Printers Revolutionize Space Supply Chain; Improved Calibration Shows Images' True Colors; Micromachined Parts Advance Medicine, Astrophysics, and More; Metalworking Techniques Unlock a Unique Alloy; Low-Cost Sensors Deliver Nanometer-Accurate Measurements; Electrical Monitoring Devices Save on Time and Cost; Dry Lubricant Smooths the Way for Space Travel, Industry; and Compact Vapor Chamber Cools Critical Components.

Software tools for interactive instruction in radiologic anatomy.

PubMed

Alvarez, Antonio; Gold, Garry E; Tobin, Brian; Desser, Terry S

2006-04-01

To promote active learning in an introductory Radiologic Anatomy course through the use of computer-based exercises. DICOM datasets from our hospital PACS system were transferred to a networked cluster of desktop computers in a medical school classroom. Medical students in the Radiologic Anatomy course were divided into four small groups and assigned to work on a clinical case for 45 minutes. The groups used iPACS viewer software, a free DICOM viewer, to view images and annotate anatomic structures. The classroom instructor monitored and displayed each group's work sequentially on the master screen by running SynchronEyes, a software tool for controlling PC desktops remotely. Students were able to execute the assigned tasks using the iPACS software with minimal oversight or instruction. Course instructors displayed each group's work on the main display screen of the classroom as the students presented the rationale for their decisions. The interactive component of the course received high ratings from the students and overall course ratings were higher than in prior years when the course was given solely in lecture format. DICOM viewing software is an excellent tool for enabling students to learn radiologic anatomy from real-life clinical datasets. Interactive exercises performed in groups can be powerful tools for stimulating students to learn radiologic anatomy.

SSVEP-based Experimental Procedure for Brain-Robot Interaction with Humanoid Robots.

PubMed

Zhao, Jing; Li, Wei; Mao, Xiaoqian; Li, Mengfan

2015-11-24

Brain-Robot Interaction (BRI), which provides an innovative communication pathway between human and a robotic device via brain signals, is prospective in helping the disabled in their daily lives. The overall goal of our method is to establish an SSVEP-based experimental procedure by integrating multiple software programs, such as OpenViBE, Choregraph, and Central software as well as user developed programs written in C++ and MATLAB, to enable the study of brain-robot interaction with humanoid robots. This is achieved by first placing EEG electrodes on a human subject to measure the brain responses through an EEG data acquisition system. A user interface is used to elicit SSVEP responses and to display video feedback in the closed-loop control experiments. The second step is to record the EEG signals of first-time subjects, to analyze their SSVEP features offline, and to train the classifier for each subject. Next, the Online Signal Processor and the Robot Controller are configured for the online control of a humanoid robot. As the final step, the subject completes three specific closed-loop control experiments within different environments to evaluate the brain-robot interaction performance. The advantage of this approach is its reliability and flexibility because it is developed by integrating multiple software programs. The results show that using this approach, the subject is capable of interacting with the humanoid robot via brain signals. This allows the mind-controlled humanoid robot to perform typical tasks that are popular in robotic research and are helpful in assisting the disabled.

SSVEP-based Experimental Procedure for Brain-Robot Interaction with Humanoid Robots

PubMed Central

Zhao, Jing; Li, Wei; Mao, Xiaoqian; Li, Mengfan

2015-01-01

Brain-Robot Interaction (BRI), which provides an innovative communication pathway between human and a robotic device via brain signals, is prospective in helping the disabled in their daily lives. The overall goal of our method is to establish an SSVEP-based experimental procedure by integrating multiple software programs, such as OpenViBE, Choregraph, and Central software as well as user developed programs written in C++ and MATLAB, to enable the study of brain-robot interaction with humanoid robots. This is achieved by first placing EEG electrodes on a human subject to measure the brain responses through an EEG data acquisition system. A user interface is used to elicit SSVEP responses and to display video feedback in the closed-loop control experiments. The second step is to record the EEG signals of first-time subjects, to analyze their SSVEP features offline, and to train the classifier for each subject. Next, the Online Signal Processor and the Robot Controller are configured for the online control of a humanoid robot. As the final step, the subject completes three specific closed-loop control experiments within different environments to evaluate the brain-robot interaction performance. The advantage of this approach is its reliability and flexibility because it is developed by integrating multiple software programs. The results show that using this approach, the subject is capable of interacting with the humanoid robot via brain signals. This allows the mind-controlled humanoid robot to perform typical tasks that are popular in robotic research and are helpful in assisting the disabled. PMID:26650051

Software system design for the non-null digital Moiré interferometer

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chen, Meng; Hao, Qun; Hu, Yao; Wang, Shaopu; Li, Tengfei; Li, Lin

2016-11-01

Aspheric optical components are an indispensable part of modern optics systems. With the development of aspheric optical elements fabrication technique, high-precision figure error test method of aspheric surfaces is a quite urgent issue now. We proposed a digital Moiré interferometer technique (DMIT) based on partial compensation principle for aspheric and freeform surface measurement. Different from traditional interferometer, DMIT consists of a real and a virtual interferometer. The virtual interferometer is simulated with Zemax software to perform phase-shifting and alignment. We can get the results by a series of calculation with the real interferogram and virtual interferograms generated by computer. DMIT requires a specific, reliable software system to ensure its normal work. Image acquisition and data processing are two important parts in this system. And it is also a challenge to realize the connection between the real and virtual interferometer. In this paper, we present a software system design for DMIT with friendly user interface and robust data processing features, enabling us to acquire the figure error of the measured asphere. We choose Visual C++ as the software development platform and control the ideal interferometer by using hybrid programming with Zemax. After image acquisition and data transmission, the system calls image processing algorithms written with Matlab to calculate the figure error of the measured asphere. We test the software system experimentally. In the experiment, we realize the measurement of an aspheric surface and prove the feasibility of the software system.

SCOPA and META-SCOPA: software for the analysis and aggregation of genome-wide association studies of multiple correlated phenotypes.

PubMed

Mägi, Reedik; Suleimanov, Yury V; Clarke, Geraldine M; Kaakinen, Marika; Fischer, Krista; Prokopenko, Inga; Morris, Andrew P

2017-01-11

Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) of single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) have been successful in identifying loci contributing genetic effects to a wide range of complex human diseases and quantitative traits. The traditional approach to GWAS analysis is to consider each phenotype separately, despite the fact that many diseases and quantitative traits are correlated with each other, and often measured in the same sample of individuals. Multivariate analyses of correlated phenotypes have been demonstrated, by simulation, to increase power to detect association with SNPs, and thus may enable improved detection of novel loci contributing to diseases and quantitative traits. We have developed the SCOPA software to enable GWAS analysis of multiple correlated phenotypes. The software implements "reverse regression" methodology, which treats the genotype of an individual at a SNP as the outcome and the phenotypes as predictors in a general linear model. SCOPA can be applied to quantitative traits and categorical phenotypes, and can accommodate imputed genotypes under a dosage model. The accompanying META-SCOPA software enables meta-analysis of association summary statistics from SCOPA across GWAS. Application of SCOPA to two GWAS of high-and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, triglycerides and body mass index, and subsequent meta-analysis with META-SCOPA, highlighted stronger association signals than univariate phenotype analysis at established lipid and obesity loci. The META-SCOPA meta-analysis also revealed a novel signal of association at genome-wide significance for triglycerides mapping to GPC5 (lead SNP rs71427535, p = 1.1x10 -8 ), which has not been reported in previous large-scale GWAS of lipid traits. The SCOPA and META-SCOPA software enable discovery and dissection of multiple phenotype association signals through implementation of a powerful reverse regression approach.

Applying a Framework to Evaluate Assignment Marking Software: A Case Study on Lightwork

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Heinrich, Eva; Milne, John

2012-01-01

This article presents the findings of a qualitative evaluation on the effect of a specialised software tool on the efficiency and quality of assignment marking. The software, Lightwork, combines with the Moodle learning management system and provides support through marking rubrics and marker allocations. To enable the evaluation a framework has…

AspectAssay: A Technique for Expanding the Pool of Available Aspect Mining Test Data Using Concern Seeding

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Moore, David G., Jr.

2013-01-01

Aspect-oriented software design (AOSD) enables better and more complete separation of concerns in software-intensive systems. By extracting aspect code and relegating crosscutting functionality to aspects, software engineers can improve the maintainability of their code by reducing code tangling and coupling of code concerns. Further, the number…

Propulsion Diagnostic Method Evaluation Strategy (ProDiMES) User's Guide

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Simon, Donald L.

2010-01-01

This report is a User's Guide for the Propulsion Diagnostic Method Evaluation Strategy (ProDiMES). ProDiMES is a standard benchmarking problem and a set of evaluation metrics to enable the comparison of candidate aircraft engine gas path diagnostic methods. This Matlab (The Mathworks, Inc.) based software tool enables users to independently develop and evaluate diagnostic methods. Additionally, a set of blind test case data is also distributed as part of the software. This will enable the side-by-side comparison of diagnostic approaches developed by multiple users. The Users Guide describes the various components of ProDiMES, and provides instructions for the installation and operation of the tool.

Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) work zone driver model software

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2016-11-01

FHWA and the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) Volpe Center are developing a work zone car-following model and simulation software that interfaces with existing microsimulation tools, enabling more accurate simulation of car-following through...

Enhanced CARES Software Enables Improved Ceramic Life Prediction

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Janosik, Lesley A.

1997-01-01

The NASA Lewis Research Center has developed award-winning software that enables American industry to establish the reliability and life of brittle material (e.g., ceramic, intermetallic, graphite) structures in a wide variety of 21st century applications. The CARES (Ceramics Analysis and Reliability Evaluation of Structures) series of software is successfully used by numerous engineers in industrial, academic, and government organizations as an essential element of the structural design and material selection processes. The latest version of this software, CARES/Life, provides a general- purpose design tool that predicts the probability of failure of a ceramic component as a function of its time in service. CARES/Life was recently enhanced by adding new modules designed to improve functionality and user-friendliness. In addition, a beta version of the newly-developed CARES/Creep program (for determining the creep life of monolithic ceramic components) has just been released to selected organizations.

Analyzing longitudinal data with the linear mixed models procedure in SPSS.

PubMed

West, Brady T

2009-09-01

Many applied researchers analyzing longitudinal data share a common misconception: that specialized statistical software is necessary to fit hierarchical linear models (also known as linear mixed models [LMMs], or multilevel models) to longitudinal data sets. Although several specialized statistical software programs of high quality are available that allow researchers to fit these models to longitudinal data sets (e.g., HLM), rapid advances in general purpose statistical software packages have recently enabled analysts to fit these same models when using preferred packages that also enable other more common analyses. One of these general purpose statistical packages is SPSS, which includes a very flexible and powerful procedure for fitting LMMs to longitudinal data sets with continuous outcomes. This article aims to present readers with a practical discussion of how to analyze longitudinal data using the LMMs procedure in the SPSS statistical software package.

Real-time development of data acquisition and analysis software for hands-on physiology education in neuroscience: G-PRIME.

PubMed

Lott, Gus K; Johnson, Bruce R; Bonow, Robert H; Land, Bruce R; Hoy, Ronald R

2009-01-01

We report on the real-time creation of an application for hands-on neurophysiology in an advanced undergraduate teaching laboratory. Enabled by the rapid software development tools included in the Matlab technical computing environment (The Mathworks, Natick, MA), a team, consisting of a neurophysiology educator and a biophysicist trained as an electrical engineer, interfaced to a course of approximately 15 students from engineering and biology backgrounds. The result is the powerful freeware data acquisition and analysis environment, "g-PRIME." The software was developed from week to week in response to curriculum demands, and student feedback. The program evolved from a simple software oscilloscope, enabling RC circuit analysis, to a suite of tools supporting analysis of neuronal excitability and synaptic transmission analysis in invertebrate model systems. The program has subsequently expanded in application to university courses, research, and high school projects in the US and abroad as free courseware.

Software for Acoustic Rendering

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Miller, Joel D.

2003-01-01

SLAB is a software system that can be run on a personal computer to simulate an acoustic environment in real time. SLAB was developed to enable computational experimentation in which one can exert low-level control over a variety of signal-processing parameters, related to spatialization, for conducting psychoacoustic studies. Among the parameters that can be manipulated are the number and position of reflections, the fidelity (that is, the number of taps in finite-impulse-response filters), the system latency, and the update rate of the filters. Another goal in the development of SLAB was to provide an inexpensive means of dynamic synthesis of virtual audio over headphones, without need for special-purpose signal-processing hardware. SLAB has a modular, object-oriented design that affords the flexibility and extensibility needed to accommodate a variety of computational experiments and signal-flow structures. SLAB s spatial renderer has a fixed signal-flow architecture corresponding to a set of parallel signal paths from each source to a listener. This fixed architecture can be regarded as a compromise that optimizes efficiency at the expense of complete flexibility. Such a compromise is necessary, given the design goal of enabling computational psychoacoustic experimentation on inexpensive personal computers.

Software for Automation of Real-Time Agents, Version 2

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Fisher, Forest; Estlin, Tara; Gaines, Daniel; Schaffer, Steve; Chouinard, Caroline; Engelhardt, Barbara; Wilklow, Colette; Mutz, Darren; Knight, Russell; Rabideau, Gregg;

A Software Architecture for Intelligent Synthesis Environments

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Filman, Robert E.; Norvig, Peter (Technical Monitor)

2001-01-01

The NASA's Intelligent Synthesis Environment (ISE) program is a grand attempt to develop a system to transform the way complex artifacts are engineered. This paper discusses a "middleware" architecture for enabling the development of ISE. Desirable elements of such an Intelligent Synthesis Architecture (ISA) include remote invocation; plug-and-play applications; scripting of applications; management of design artifacts, tools, and artifact and tool attributes; common system services; system management; and systematic enforcement of policies. This paper argues that the ISA extend conventional distributed object technology (DOT) such as CORBA and Product Data Managers with flexible repositories of product and tool annotations and "plug-and-play" mechanisms for inserting "ility" or orthogonal concerns into the system. I describe the Object Infrastructure Framework, an Aspect Oriented Programming (AOP) environment for developing distributed systems that provides utility insertion and enables consistent annotation maintenance. This technology can be used to enforce policies such as maintaining the annotations of artifacts, particularly the provenance and access control rules of artifacts-, performing automatic datatype transformations between representations; supplying alternative servers of the same service; reporting on the status of jobs and the system; conveying privileges throughout an application; supporting long-lived transactions; maintaining version consistency; and providing software redundancy and mobility.

Virtual Machine Language

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Grasso, Christopher; Page, Dennis; O'Reilly, Taifun; Fteichert, Ralph; Lock, Patricia; Lin, Imin; Naviaux, Keith; Sisino, John

2005-01-01

Virtual Machine Language (VML) is a mission-independent, reusable software system for programming for spacecraft operations. Features of VML include a rich set of data types, named functions, parameters, IF and WHILE control structures, polymorphism, and on-the-fly creation of spacecraft commands from calculated values. Spacecraft functions can be abstracted into named blocks that reside in files aboard the spacecraft. These named blocks accept parameters and execute in a repeatable fashion. The sizes of uplink products are minimized by the ability to call blocks that implement most of the command steps. This block approach also enables some autonomous operations aboard the spacecraft, such as aerobraking, telemetry conditional monitoring, and anomaly response, without developing autonomous flight software. Operators on the ground write blocks and command sequences in a concise, high-level, human-readable programming language (also called VML ). A compiler translates the human-readable blocks and command sequences into binary files (the operations products). The flight portion of VML interprets the uplinked binary files. The ground subsystem of VML also includes an interactive sequence- execution tool hosted on workstations, which runs sequences at several thousand times real-time speed, affords debugging, and generates reports. This tool enables iterative development of blocks and sequences within times of the order of seconds.

Method and system for enabling real-time speckle processing using hardware platforms

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Ortiz, Fernando E. (Inventor); Kelmelis, Eric (Inventor); Durbano, James P. (Inventor); Curt, Peterson F. (Inventor)

2012-01-01

An accelerator for the speckle atmospheric compensation algorithm may enable real-time speckle processing of video feeds that may enable the speckle algorithm to be applied in numerous real-time applications. The accelerator may be implemented in various forms, including hardware, software, and/or machine-readable media.

How Does Technology-Enabled Active Learning Affect Undergraduate Students' Understanding of Electromagnetism Concepts?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Dori, Yehudit Judy; Belcher, John

2005-01-01

Educational technology supports meaningful learning and enables the presentation of spatial and dynamic images, which portray relationships among complex concepts. The Technology-Enabled Active Learning (TEAL) Project at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) involves media-rich software for simulation and visualization in freshman…

AMO EXPRESS: A Command and Control Experiment for Crew Autonomy Onboard the International Space Station

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Stetson, Howard K.; Frank, Jeremy; Cornelius, Randy; Haddock, Angie; Wang, Lui; Garner, Larry

2015-01-01

NASA is investigating a range of future human spaceflight missions, including both Mars-distance and Near Earth Object (NEO) targets. Of significant importance for these missions is the balance between crew autonomy and vehicle automation. As distance from Earth results in increasing communication delays, future crews need both the capability and authority to independently make decisions. However, small crews cannot take on all functions performed by ground today, and so vehicles must be more automated to reduce the crew workload for such missions. NASA's Advanced Exploration Systems Program funded Autonomous Mission Operations (AMO) project conducted an autonomous command and control experiment on-board the International Space Station that demonstrated single action intelligent procedures for crew command and control. The target problem was to enable crew initialization of a facility class rack with power and thermal interfaces, and involving core and payload command and telemetry processing, without support from ground controllers. This autonomous operations capability is enabling in scenarios such as initialization of a medical facility to respond to a crew medical emergency, and representative of other spacecraft autonomy challenges. The experiment was conducted using the Expedite the Processing of Experiments for Space Station (EXPRESS) rack 7, which was located in the Port 2 location within the U.S Laboratory onboard the International Space Station (ISS). Activation and deactivation of this facility is time consuming and operationally intensive, requiring coordination of three flight control positions, 47 nominal steps, 57 commands, 276 telemetry checks, and coordination of multiple ISS systems (both core and payload). Utilization of Draper Laboratory's Timeliner software, deployed on-board the ISS within the Command and Control (C&C) computers and the Payload computers, allowed development of the automated procedures specific to ISS without having to certify and employ novel software for procedure development and execution. The procedures contained the ground procedure logic and actions as possible to include fault detection and recovery capabilities.

Subaperture metrology technologies extend capabilities in optics manufacturing

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tricard, Marc; Forbes, Greg; Murphy, Paul

2005-10-01

Subaperture polishing technologies have radically changed the landscape of precision optics manufacturing and enabled the production of higher precision optics with increasingly difficult figure requirements. However, metrology is a critical piece of the optics fabrication process, and the dependence on interferometry is especially acute for computer-controlled, deterministic finishing. Without accurate full-aperture metrology, figure correction using subaperture polishing technologies would not be possible. QED Technologies has developed the Subaperture Stitching Interferometer (SSI) that extends the effective aperture and dynamic range of a phase measuring interferometer. The SSI's novel developments in software and hardware improve the capacity and accuracy of traditional interferometers, overcoming many of the limitations previously faced. The SSI performs high-accuracy automated measurements of spheres, flats, and mild aspheres up to 200 mm in diameter by stitching subaperture data. The system combines a six-axis precision workstation, a commercial Fizeau interferometer of 4" or 6" aperture, and dedicated software. QED's software automates the measurement design, data acquisition, and mathematical reconstruction of the full-aperture phase map. The stitching algorithm incorporates a general framework for compensating several types of errors introduced by the interferometer and stage mechanics. These include positioning errors, viewing system distortion, the system reference wave error, etc. The SSI has been proven to deliver the accurate and flexible metrology that is vital to precision optics fabrication. This paper will briefly review the capabilities of the SSI as a production-ready, metrology system that enables costeffective manufacturing of precision optical surfaces.

OLS Client and OLS Dialog: Open Source Tools to Annotate Public Omics Datasets.

PubMed

Perez-Riverol, Yasset; Ternent, Tobias; Koch, Maximilian; Barsnes, Harald; Vrousgou, Olga; Jupp, Simon; Vizcaíno, Juan Antonio

2017-10-01

The availability of user-friendly software to annotate biological datasets and experimental details is becoming essential in data management practices, both in local storage systems and in public databases. The Ontology Lookup Service (OLS, http://www.ebi.ac.uk/ols) is a popular centralized service to query, browse and navigate biomedical ontologies and controlled vocabularies. Recently, the OLS framework has been completely redeveloped (version 3.0), including enhancements in the data model, like the added support for Web Ontology Language based ontologies, among many other improvements. However, the new OLS is not backwards compatible and new software tools are needed to enable access to this widely used framework now that the previous version is no longer available. We here present the OLS Client as a free, open-source Java library to retrieve information from the new version of the OLS. It enables rapid tool creation by providing a robust, pluggable programming interface and common data model to programmatically access the OLS. The library has already been integrated and is routinely used by several bioinformatics resources and related data annotation tools. Secondly, we also introduce an updated version of the OLS Dialog (version 2.0), a Java graphical user interface that can be easily plugged into Java desktop applications to access the OLS. The software and related documentation are freely available at https://github.com/PRIDE-Utilities/ols-client and https://github.com/PRIDE-Toolsuite/ols-dialog. © 2017 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

Bio-Docklets: virtualization containers for single-step execution of NGS pipelines.

PubMed

Kim, Baekdoo; Ali, Thahmina; Lijeron, Carlos; Afgan, Enis; Krampis, Konstantinos

2017-08-01

Processing of next-generation sequencing (NGS) data requires significant technical skills, involving installation, configuration, and execution of bioinformatics data pipelines, in addition to specialized postanalysis visualization and data mining software. In order to address some of these challenges, developers have leveraged virtualization containers toward seamless deployment of preconfigured bioinformatics software and pipelines on any computational platform. We present an approach for abstracting the complex data operations of multistep, bioinformatics pipelines for NGS data analysis. As examples, we have deployed 2 pipelines for RNA sequencing and chromatin immunoprecipitation sequencing, preconfigured within Docker virtualization containers we call Bio-Docklets. Each Bio-Docklet exposes a single data input and output endpoint and from a user perspective, running the pipelines as simply as running a single bioinformatics tool. This is achieved using a "meta-script" that automatically starts the Bio-Docklets and controls the pipeline execution through the BioBlend software library and the Galaxy Application Programming Interface. The pipeline output is postprocessed by integration with the Visual Omics Explorer framework, providing interactive data visualizations that users can access through a web browser. Our goal is to enable easy access to NGS data analysis pipelines for nonbioinformatics experts on any computing environment, whether a laboratory workstation, university computer cluster, or a cloud service provider. Beyond end users, the Bio-Docklets also enables developers to programmatically deploy and run a large number of pipeline instances for concurrent analysis of multiple datasets. © The Authors 2017. Published by Oxford University Press.

Bio-Docklets: virtualization containers for single-step execution of NGS pipelines

PubMed Central

Kim, Baekdoo; Ali, Thahmina; Lijeron, Carlos; Afgan, Enis

2017-01-01

Abstract Processing of next-generation sequencing (NGS) data requires significant technical skills, involving installation, configuration, and execution of bioinformatics data pipelines, in addition to specialized postanalysis visualization and data mining software. In order to address some of these challenges, developers have leveraged virtualization containers toward seamless deployment of preconfigured bioinformatics software and pipelines on any computational platform. We present an approach for abstracting the complex data operations of multistep, bioinformatics pipelines for NGS data analysis. As examples, we have deployed 2 pipelines for RNA sequencing and chromatin immunoprecipitation sequencing, preconfigured within Docker virtualization containers we call Bio-Docklets. Each Bio-Docklet exposes a single data input and output endpoint and from a user perspective, running the pipelines as simply as running a single bioinformatics tool. This is achieved using a “meta-script” that automatically starts the Bio-Docklets and controls the pipeline execution through the BioBlend software library and the Galaxy Application Programming Interface. The pipeline output is postprocessed by integration with the Visual Omics Explorer framework, providing interactive data visualizations that users can access through a web browser. Our goal is to enable easy access to NGS data analysis pipelines for nonbioinformatics experts on any computing environment, whether a laboratory workstation, university computer cluster, or a cloud service provider. Beyond end users, the Bio-Docklets also enables developers to programmatically deploy and run a large number of pipeline instances for concurrent analysis of multiple datasets. PMID:28854616

Evaluation of interaction dynamics of concurrent processes

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sobecki, Piotr; Białasiewicz, Jan T.; Gross, Nicholas

2017-03-01

The purpose of this paper is to present the wavelet tools that enable the detection of temporal interactions of concurrent processes. In particular, the determination of interaction coherence of time-varying signals is achieved using a complex continuous wavelet transform. This paper has used electrocardiogram (ECG) and seismocardiogram (SCG) data set to show multiple continuous wavelet analysis techniques based on Morlet wavelet transform. MATLAB Graphical User Interface (GUI), developed in the reported research to assist in quick and simple data analysis, is presented. These software tools can discover the interaction dynamics of time-varying signals, hence they can reveal their correlation in phase and amplitude, as well as their non-linear interconnections. The user-friendly MATLAB GUI enables effective use of the developed software what enables to load two processes under investigation, make choice of the required processing parameters, and then perform the analysis. The software developed is a useful tool for researchers who have a need for investigation of interaction dynamics of concurrent processes.

Connectivity-enhanced route selection and adaptive control for the Chevrolet Volt

DOE PAGES

Gonder, Jeffrey; Wood, Eric; Rajagopalan, Sai

2016-01-01

The National Renewable Energy Laboratory and General Motors evaluated connectivity-enabled efficiency enhancements for the Chevrolet Volt. A high-level model was developed to predict vehicle fuel and electricity consumption based on driving characteristics and vehicle state inputs. These techniques were leveraged to optimize energy efficiency via green routing and intelligent control mode scheduling, which were evaluated using prospective driving routes between tens of thousands of real-world origin/destination pairs. The overall energy savings potential of green routing and intelligent mode scheduling was estimated at 5% and 3%, respectively. Furthermore, these represent substantial opportunities considering that they only require software adjustments to implement.

'Tagger' - a Mac OS X Interactive Graphical Application for Data Inference and Analysis of N-Dimensional Datasets in the Natural Physical Sciences.

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Morse, P. E.; Reading, A. M.; Lueg, C.

2014-12-01

Pattern-recognition in scientific data is not only a computational problem but a human-observer problem as well. Human observation of - and interaction with - data visualization software can augment, select, interrupt and modify computational routines and facilitate processes of pattern and significant feature recognition for subsequent human analysis, machine learning, expert and artificial intelligence systems.'Tagger' is a Mac OS X interactive data visualisation tool that facilitates Human-Computer interaction for the recognition of patterns and significant structures. It is a graphical application developed using the Quartz Composer framework. 'Tagger' follows a Model-View-Controller (MVC) software architecture: the application problem domain (the model) is to facilitate novel ways of abstractly representing data to a human interlocutor, presenting these via different viewer modalities (e.g. chart representations, particle systems, parametric geometry) to the user (View) and enabling interaction with the data (Controller) via a variety of Human Interface Devices (HID). The software enables the user to create an arbitrary array of tags that may be appended to the visualised data, which are then saved into output files as forms of semantic metadata. Three fundamental problems that are not strongly supported by conventional scientific visualisation software are addressed:1] How to visually animate data over time, 2] How to rapidly deploy unconventional parametrically driven data visualisations, 3] How to construct and explore novel interaction models that capture the activity of the end-user as semantic metadata that can be used to computationally enhance subsequent interrogation. Saved tagged data files may be loaded into Tagger, so that tags may be tagged, if desired. Recursion opens up the possibility of refining or overlapping different types of tags, tagging a variety of different POIs or types of events, and of capturing different types of specialist observations of important or noticeable events. Other visualisations and modes of interaction will also be demonstrated, with the aim of discovering knowledge in large datasets in the natural, physical sciences. Fig.1 Wave height data from an oceanographic Wave Rider Buoy. Colors/radii are driven by wave height data.

Software For Computing Reliability Of Other Software

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Nikora, Allen; Antczak, Thomas M.; Lyu, Michael

1995-01-01

Computer Aided Software Reliability Estimation (CASRE) computer program developed for use in measuring reliability of other software. Easier for non-specialists in reliability to use than many other currently available programs developed for same purpose. CASRE incorporates mathematical modeling capabilities of public-domain Statistical Modeling and Estimation of Reliability Functions for Software (SMERFS) computer program and runs in Windows software environment. Provides menu-driven command interface; enabling and disabling of menu options guides user through (1) selection of set of failure data, (2) execution of mathematical model, and (3) analysis of results from model. Written in C language.

Software-Engineering Process Simulation (SEPS) model

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Lin, C. Y.; Abdel-Hamid, T.; Sherif, J. S.

1992-01-01

The Software Engineering Process Simulation (SEPS) model is described which was developed at JPL. SEPS is a dynamic simulation model of the software project development process. It uses the feedback principles of system dynamics to simulate the dynamic interactions among various software life cycle development activities and management decision making processes. The model is designed to be a planning tool to examine tradeoffs of cost, schedule, and functionality, and to test the implications of different managerial policies on a project's outcome. Furthermore, SEPS will enable software managers to gain a better understanding of the dynamics of software project development and perform postmodern assessments.

Problem-Solving Software

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

1992-01-01

CBR Express software solves problems by adapting sorted solutions to new problems specified by a user. It is applicable to a wide range of situations. The technology was originally developed by Inference Corporation for Johnson Space Center's Advanced Software Development Workstation. The project focused on the reuse of software designs, and Inference used CBR as part of the ACCESS prototype software. The commercial CBR Express is used as a "help desk" for customer support, enabling reuse of existing information when necessary. It has been adopted by several companies, among them American Airlines, which uses it to solve reservation system software problems.

The Stanford Automated Mounter: Enabling High-Throughput Protein Crystal Screening at SSRL

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Smith, C.A.; Cohen, A.E.

2009-05-26

The macromolecular crystallography experiment lends itself perfectly to high-throughput technologies. The initial steps including the expression, purification, and crystallization of protein crystals, along with some of the later steps involving data processing and structure determination have all been automated to the point where some of the last remaining bottlenecks in the process have been crystal mounting, crystal screening, and data collection. At the Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Laboratory, a National User Facility that provides extremely brilliant X-ray photon beams for use in materials science, environmental science, and structural biology research, the incorporation of advanced robotics has enabled crystals to be screenedmore » in a true high-throughput fashion, thus dramatically accelerating the final steps. Up to 288 frozen crystals can be mounted by the beamline robot (the Stanford Auto-Mounting System) and screened for diffraction quality in a matter of hours without intervention. The best quality crystals can then be remounted for the collection of complete X-ray diffraction data sets. Furthermore, the entire screening and data collection experiment can be controlled from the experimenter's home laboratory by means of advanced software tools that enable network-based control of the highly automated beamlines.« less

Integrated Test Approach

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Cotton, Will; Liechty, John

2015-01-01

This paper describes a testing methodology undertaken on the Facilities Development and Operations Contract (FDOC) by Lockheed Martin. The methodology was defined with the intent of reducing project schedule time to enable NASA's Johnson Space Center (JSC) to be able to deliver the Mission Control Center (MCC) 21 project as quickly as possible. 21 represents the 21st century where NASA JSC is updating its control center with new technology and operational concepts in order to support NASA customers wanting to use control center assets to support space vehicle operations. In collaboration with the NASA customer, a new test concept was conceived early during MCC21 project planning with the goal of reducing project delivery time. One enabler that could help reduce delivery time was testing. Within the project, testing was performed by two entities, software development responsible for subsystem testing and system test responsible for system integration testing. The MCC21 project took a deliberate review of testing to determine how it could be performed differently to realize an overall reduction in test time to support the goal of a more rapid project delivery.

Using interactive problem-solving techniques to enhance control systems education for non English-speakers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lamont, L. A.; Chaar, L.; Toms, C.

2010-03-01

Interactive learning is beneficial to students in that it allows the continual development and testing of many skills. An interactive approach enables students to improve their technical capabilities, as well as developing both verbal and written communicative ability. Problem solving and communication skills are vital for engineering students; in the workplace they will be required to communicate with people of varying technical abilities and from different linguistic and engineering backgrounds. In this paper, a case study is presented that discusses how the traditional method of teaching control systems can be improved. 'Control systems' is a complex engineering topic requiring students to process an extended amount of mathematical formulae. MATLAB software, which enables students to interactively compare a range of possible combinations and analyse the optimal solution, is used to this end. It was found that students became more enthusiastic and interested when given ownership of their learning objectives. As well as improving the students' technical knowledge, other important engineering skills are also improved by introducing an interactive method of teaching.

CILogon: An Integrated Identity and Access Management Platform for Science

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Basney, J.

2016-12-01

When scientists work together, they use web sites and other software to share their ideas and data. To ensure the integrity of their work, these systems require the scientists to log in and verify that they are part of the team working on a particular science problem. Too often, the identity and access verification process is a stumbling block for the scientists. Scientific research projects are forced to invest time and effort into developing and supporting Identity and Access Management (IAM) services, distracting them from the core goals of their research collaboration. CILogon provides an IAM platform that enables scientists to work together to meet their IAM needs more effectively so they can allocate more time and effort to their core mission of scientific research. The CILogon platform enables federated identity management and collaborative organization management. Federated identity management enables researchers to use their home organization identities to access cyberinfrastructure, rather than requiring yet another username and password to log on. Collaborative organization management enables research projects to define user groups for authorization to collaboration platforms (e.g., wikis, mailing lists, and domain applications). CILogon's IAM platform serves the unique needs of research collaborations, namely the need to dynamically form collaboration groups across organizations and countries, sharing access to data, instruments, compute clusters, and other resources to enable scientific discovery. CILogon provides a software-as-a-service platform to ease integration with cyberinfrastructure, while making all software components publicly available under open source licenses to enable re-use. Figure 1 illustrates the components and interfaces of this platform. CILogon has been operational since 2010 and has been used by over 7,000 researchers from more than 170 identity providers to access cyberinfrastructure including Globus, LIGO, Open Science Grid, SeedMe, and XSEDE. The "CILogon 2.0" platform, launched in 2016, adds support for virtual organization (VO) membership management, identity linking, international collaborations, and standard integration protocols, through integration with the Internet2 COmanage collaboration software.

Development of a PC-based ground support system for a small satellite instrument

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Deschambault, Robert L.; Gregory, Philip R.; Spenler, Stephen; Whalen, Brian A.

1993-11-01

The importance of effective ground support for the remote control and data retrieval of a satellite instrument cannot be understated. Problems with ground support may include the need to base personnel at a ground tracking station for extended periods, and the delay between the instrument observation and the processing of the data by the science team. Flexible solutions to such problems in the case of small satellite systems are provided by using low-cost, powerful personal computers and off-the-shelf software for data acquisition and processing, and by using Internet as a communication pathway to enable scientists to view and manipulate satellite data in real time at any ground location. The personal computer based ground support system is illustrated for the case of the cold plasma analyzer flown on the Freja satellite. Commercial software was used as building blocks for writing the ground support equipment software. Several levels of hardware support, including unit tests and development, functional tests, and integration were provided by portable and desktop personal computers. Satellite stations in Saskatchewan and Sweden were linked to the science team via phone lines and Internet, which provided remote control through a central point. These successful strategies will be used on future small satellite space programs.

An Enhanced Z39.50 Gateway to the WorldWideWeb.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cunningham, David; Sloan, Stephen

1994-01-01

Describes how a university library uses the WorldWideWeb (WWW) to enable users to access resources mounted on a local Z39.50 server and to order prints from articles stored on a CD-ROM jukebox. The software used in the construction of the system, necessary modifications to the software, and software ordering information are covered. (KRN)

Army technology development. IBIS query. Software to support the Image Based Information System (IBIS) expansion for mapping, charting and geodesy

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Friedman, S. Z.; Walker, R. E.; Aitken, R. B.

1986-01-01

The Image Based Information System (IBIS) has been under development at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) since 1975. It is a collection of more than 90 programs that enable processing of image, graphical, tabular data for spatial analysis. IBIS can be utilized to create comprehensive geographic data bases. From these data, an analyst can study various attributes describing characteristics of a given study area. Even complex combinations of disparate data types can be synthesized to obtain a new perspective on spatial phenomena. In 1984, new query software was developed enabling direct Boolean queries of IBIS data bases through the submission of easily understood expressions. An improved syntax methodology, a data dictionary, and display software simplified the analysts' tasks associated with building, executing, and subsequently displaying the results of a query. The primary purpose of this report is to describe the features and capabilities of the new query software. A secondary purpose of this report is to compare this new query software to the query software developed previously (Friedman, 1982). With respect to this topic, the relative merits and drawbacks of both approaches are covered.

MFV-class: a multi-faceted visualization tool of object classes.

PubMed

Zhang, Zhi-meng; Pan, Yun-he; Zhuang, Yue-ting

2004-11-01

Classes are key software components in an object-oriented software system. In many industrial OO software systems, there are some classes that have complicated structure and relationships. So in the processes of software maintenance, testing, software reengineering, software reuse and software restructure, it is a challenge for software engineers to understand these classes thoroughly. This paper proposes a class comprehension model based on constructivist learning theory, and implements a software visualization tool (MFV-Class) to help in the comprehension of a class. The tool provides multiple views of class to uncover manifold facets of class contents. It enables visualizing three object-oriented metrics of classes to help users focus on the understanding process. A case study was conducted to evaluate our approach and the toolkit.

The CARIBU EBIS control and synchronization system

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Dickerson, Clayton; Peters, Christopher

2015-01-01

The Californium Rare Isotope Breeder Upgrade (CARIBU) Electron Beam Ion Source (EBIS) charge breeder has been built and tested. The bases of the CARIBU EBIS electrical system are four voltage platforms on which both DC and pulsed high voltage outputs are controlled. The high voltage output pulses are created with either a combination of a function generator and a high voltage amplifier, or two high voltage DC power supplies and a high voltage solid state switch. Proper synchronization of the pulsed voltages, fundamental to optimizing the charge breeding performance, is achieved with triggering from a digital delay pulse generator. The control system is based on National Instruments realtime controllers and LabVIEW software implementing Functional Global Variables (FGV) to store and access instrument parameters. Fiber optic converters enable network communication and triggering across the platforms.

X-Band Acquisition Aid Software

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Britcliffe, Michael J.; Strain, Martha M.; Wert, Michael

2011-01-01

The X-band Acquisition Aid (AAP) software is a low-cost acquisition aid for the Deep Space Network (DSN) antennas, and is used while acquiring a spacecraft shortly after it has launched. When enabled, the acquisition aid provides corrections to the antenna-predicted trajectory of the spacecraft to compensate for the variations that occur during the actual launch. The AAP software also provides the corrections to the antenna-predicted trajectory to the navigation team that uses the corrections to refine their model of the spacecraft in order to produce improved antenna-predicted trajectories for each spacecraft that passes over each complex. The software provides an automated Acquisition Aid receiver calibration, and provides graphical displays to the operator and remote viewers via an Ethernet connection. It has a Web server, and the remote workstations use the Firefox browser to view the displays. At any given time, only one operator can control any particular display in order to avoid conflicting commands from more than one control point. The configuration and control is accomplished solely via the graphical displays. The operator does not have to remember any commands. Only a few configuration parameters need to be changed, and can be saved to the appropriate spacecraft-dependent configuration file on the AAP s hard disk. AAP automates the calibration sequence by first commanding the antenna to the correct position, starting the receiver calibration sequence, and then providing the operator with the option of accepting or rejecting the new calibration parameters. If accepted, the new parameters are stored in the appropriate spacecraft-dependent configuration file. The calibration can be performed on the Sun, greatly expanding the window of opportunity for calibration. The spacecraft traditionally used for calibration is in view typically twice per day, and only for about ten minutes each pass.

Automated Software System to Promote Anticoagulation and Reduce Stroke Risk: Cluster-Randomized Controlled Trial.

PubMed

Holt, Tim A; Dalton, Andrew; Marshall, Tom; Fay, Matthew; Qureshi, Nadeem; Kirkpatrick, Susan; Hislop, Jenny; Lasserson, Daniel; Kearley, Karen; Mollison, Jill; Yu, Ly-Mee; Hobbs, F D Richard; Fitzmaurice, David

2017-03-01

Oral anticoagulants (OAC) substantially reduce risk of stroke in atrial fibrillation, but uptake is suboptimal. Electronic health records enable automated identification of people at risk but not receiving treatment. We investigated the effectiveness of a software tool (AURAS-AF [Automated Risk Assessment for Stroke in Atrial Fibrillation]) designed to identify such individuals during routine care through a cluster-randomized trial. Screen reminders appeared each time the electronic health records of an eligible patient was accessed until a decision had been taken over OAC treatment. Where OAC was not started, clinicians were prompted to indicate a reason. Control practices continued usual care. The primary outcome was the proportion of eligible individuals receiving OAC at 6 months. Secondary outcomes included rates of cardiovascular events and reports of adverse effects of the software on clinical decision-making. Forty-seven practices were randomized. The mean proportion-prescribed OAC at 6 months was 66.3% (SD=9.3) in the intervention arm and 63.9% (9.5) in the control arm (adjusted difference 1.21% [95% confidence interval -0.72 to 3.13]). Incidence of recorded transient ischemic attack was higher in the intervention practices (median 10.0 versus 2.3 per 1000 patients with atrial fibrillation; P =0.027), but at 12 months, we found a lower incidence of both all cause stroke ( P =0.06) and hemorrhage ( P =0.054). No adverse effects of the software were reported. No significant change in OAC prescribing occurred. A greater rate of diagnosis of transient ischemic attack (possibly because of improved detection or overdiagnosis) was associated with a reduction (of borderline significance) in stroke and hemorrhage over 12 months. URL: http://www.isrctn.com. Unique Identifier: ISRCTN55722437. © 2017 American Heart Association, Inc.

Decentralized Formation Flying Control in a Multiple-Team Hierarchy

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mueller, Joseph .; Thomas, Stephanie J.

2005-01-01

This paper presents the prototype of a system that addresses these objectives-a decentralized guidance and control system that is distributed across spacecraft using a multiple-team framework. The objective is to divide large clusters into teams of manageable size, so that the communication and computational demands driven by N decentralized units are related to the number of satellites in a team rather than the entire cluster. The system is designed to provide a high-level of autonomy, to support clusters with large numbers of satellites, to enable the number of spacecraft in the cluster to change post-launch, and to provide for on-orbit software modification. The distributed guidance and control system will be implemented in an object-oriented style using MANTA (Messaging Architecture for Networking and Threaded Applications). In this architecture, tasks may be remotely added, removed or replaced post-launch to increase mission flexibility and robustness. This built-in adaptability will allow software modifications to be made on-orbit in a robust manner. The prototype system, which is implemented in MATLAB, emulates the object-oriented and message-passing features of the MANTA software. In this paper, the multiple-team organization of the cluster is described, and the modular software architecture is presented. The relative dynamics in eccentric reference orbits is reviewed, and families of periodic, relative trajectories are identified, expressed as sets of static geometric parameters. The guidance law design is presented, and an example reconfiguration scenario is used to illustrate the distributed process of assigning geometric goals to the cluster. Next, a decentralized maneuver planning approach is presented that utilizes linear-programming methods to enact reconfiguration and coarse formation keeping maneuvers. Finally, a method for performing online collision avoidance is discussed, and an example is provided to gauge its performance.

Field Testing of Telemetry for Demand Response Control of Small Loads

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Lanzisera, Steven; Weber, Adam; Liao, Anna

The electricity system in California, from generation through loads, must be prepared for high renewable penetration and increased electrification of end uses while providing increased resilience and lower operating cost. California has an aggressive renewable portfolio standard that is complemented by world-leading greenhouse gas goals. The goal of this project was to evaluate methods of enabling fast demand response (DR) signaling to small loads for low-cost site enablement. We used OpenADR 2.0 to meet telemetry requirements for providing ancillary services, and we used a variety of low-cost devices coupled with open-source software to enable an end-to-end fast DR. The devices,more » architecture, implementation, and testing of the system is discussed in this report. We demonstrate that the emerging Internet of Things (IoT) and Smart Home movements provide an opportunity for diverse small loads to provide fast, low-cost demand response. We used Internet-connected lights, thermostats, load interruption devices, and water heaters to demonstrate an ecosystem of controllable devices. The system demonstrated is capable of providing fast load shed for between 20 dollars and $300 per kilowatt (kW) of available load. The wide range results from some loads may have very low cost but also very little shed capability (a 10 watt [W] LED light can only shed a maximum of 10 W) while some loads (e.g., water heaters or air conditioners) can shed several kilowatts but have a higher initial cost. These costs, however, compare well with other fast demand response costs, with typically are over $100/kilowatt of shed. We contend these loads are even more attractive than their price suggests because many of them will be installed for energy efficiency or non-energy benefits (e.g., improved lighting quality or controllability), and the ability to use them for fast DR is a secondary benefit. Therefore the cost of enabling them for DR may approach zero if a software-only solution can be deployed to enable fast DR after devices are installed for other reasons. We recommend that the DR research community continue to engage with the IoT community to encourage the use of documented and open development interfaces. A library of device drivers and machine-readable interface specifications would significantly reduce the burden on users or system integrators for deploying systems in large numbers of buildings in California.« less

Using Mach threads to control DSN operational sequences

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Urista, Juan

1993-01-01

The Link Monitor and Control Operator Assistant prototype (LMCOA) is a state-of-the-art, semiautomated monitor and control system based on an object-oriented design. The purpose of the LMCOA prototyping effort is to both investigate new technology (such as artificial intelligence) to support automation and to evaluate advances in information systems toward developing systems that take advantage of the technology. The emergence of object-oriented design methodology has enabled a major change in how software is designed and developed. This paper describes how the object-oriented approach was used to design and implement the LMCOA and the results of operational testing. The LMCOA is implemented on a NeXT workstation using the Mach operating system and the Objective-C programming language.

A new standing posture detector to enable people with multiple disabilities to control environmental stimulation by changing their standing posture through a commercial Wii Balance Board.

PubMed

Shih, Ching-Hsiang; Shih, Ching-Tien; Chiang, Ming-Shan

2010-01-01

This study assessed whether two persons with multiple disabilities would be able to control environmental stimulation using body swing (changing standing posture) and a Wii Balance Board with a newly developed standing posture detection program (i.e. a new software program turns a Wii Balance Board into a precise standing posture detector). The study was performed according to an ABAB design, in which A represented baseline and B represented intervention phases. Both participants significantly increased their target response (body swing) to activate the control system to produce environmental stimulation during the intervention phases. Practical and developmental implications of the findings were discussed.

A standing location detector enabling people with developmental disabilities to control environmental stimulation through simple physical activities with Nintendo Wii Balance Boards.

PubMed

Shih, Ching-Hsiang

2011-01-01

This study evaluated whether two people with developmental disabilities would be able to actively perform simple physical activities by controlling their favorite environmental stimulation using Nintendo Wii Balance Boards with a newly developed standing location detection program (SLDP, i.e., a new software program turning a Nintendo Wii Balance Board into a standing location detector). This study was carried out using to an ABAB design. The data showed that both participants significantly increased their simple physical activity (target response) to activate the control system to produce environmental stimulation during the B (intervention) phases. The practical and developmental implications of the findings are discussed. Copyright © 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Formation Flying Design and Applications in Weak Stability Boundary Regions

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Folta, David

2003-01-01

Weak Stability regions serve as superior locations for interferometric scientific investigations. These regions are often selected to minimize environmental disturbances and maximize observing efficiency. Design of formations in these regions are becoming ever more challenging as more complex missions are envisioned. The development of algorithms to enable the capability for formation design must be further enabled to incorporate better understanding of WSB solution space. This development will improve the efficiency and expand the capabilities of current approaches. The Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) is currently supporting multiple formation missions in WSB regions. This end-to-end support consists of mission operations, trajectory design, and control. It also includes both algorithm and software development. The Constellation-X, Maxim, and Stellar Imager missions are examples of the use of improved numerical methods for attaining constrained formation geometries and controlling their dynamical evolution. This paper presents a survey of formation missions in the WSB regions and a brief description of the formation design using numerical and dynamical techniques.

Formation flying design and applications in weak stability boundary regions.

PubMed

Folta, David

2004-05-01

Weak stability regions serve as superior locations for interferomertric scientific investigations. These regions are often selected to minimize environmental disturbances and maximize observation efficiency. Designs of formations in these regions are becoming ever more challenging as more complex missions are envisioned. The development of algorithms to enable the capability for formation design must be further enabled to incorporate better understanding of weak stability boundary solution space. This development will improve the efficiency and expand the capabilities of current approaches. The Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) is currently supporting multiple formation missions in weak stability boundary regions. This end-to-end support consists of mission operations, trajectory design, and control. It also includes both algorithm and software development. The Constellation-X, Maxim, and Stellar Imager missions are examples of the use of improved numeric methods to attain constrained formation geometries and control their dynamical evolution. This paper presents a survey of formation missions in the weak stability boundary regions and a brief description of formation design using numerical and dynamical techniques.

System Engineering and Integration of Controls for Advanced Life Support

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Overland, David; Hoo, Karlene; Ciskowski, Marvin

2006-01-01

The Advanced Integration Matrix (AIM) project at the Johnson Space Center (JSC) was chartered to study and solve systems-level integration issues for exploration missions. One of the first issues identified was an inability to conduct trade studies on control system architectures due to the absence of mature evaluation criteria. Such architectures are necessary to enable integration of regenerative life support systems. A team was formed to address issues concerning software and hardware architectures and system controls.. The team has investigated what is required to integrate controls for the types of non-linear dynamic systems encountered in advanced life support. To this end, a water processing bioreactor testbed is being developed which will enable prototyping and testing of integration strategies and technologies. Although systems such as the water bioreactors exhibit the complexities of interactions between control schemes most vividly, it is apparent that this behavior and its attendant risks will manifest itself among any set of interdependent autonomous control systems. A methodology for developing integration requirements for interdependent and autonomous systems is a goal of this team and this testbed. This paper is a high-level summary of the current status of the investigation, the issues encountered, some tentative conclusions, and the direction expected for further research.

Implementation of gINT software at the Virginia Department of Transportation.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2008-01-01

A set of software tools was developed to enable staff of the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) and consultants to streamline processing of subsurface exploration data. Built around the gINT program (geotechnical database and graphics packa...

Automatic Commercial Permit Sets

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Grana, Paul

Final report for Folsom Labs’ Solar Permit Generator project, which has successfully completed, resulting in the development and commercialization of a software toolkit within the cloud-based HelioScope software environment that enables solar engineers to automatically generate and manage draft documents for permit submission.

Generation of a Database of Laboratory Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy (LIBS) Spectra and Associated Analysis Software

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Anderson, R. B.; Clegg, S. M.; Graff, T.; Morris, R. V.; Laura, J.

2015-06-01

We describe plans to generate a database of LIBS spectra of planetary analog materials and develop free, open-source software to enable the planetary community to analyze LIBS (and other spectral) data.

Google Glass-Directed Monitoring and Control of Microfluidic Biosensors and Actuators

PubMed Central

Zhang, Yu Shrike; Busignani, Fabio; Ribas, João; Aleman, Julio; Rodrigues, Talles Nascimento; Shaegh, Seyed Ali Mousavi; Massa, Solange; Rossi, Camilla Baj; Taurino, Irene; Shin, Su-Ryon; Calzone, Giovanni; Amaratunga, Givan Mark; Chambers, Douglas Leon; Jabari, Saman; Niu, Yuxi; Manoharan, Vijayan; Dokmeci, Mehmet Remzi; Carrara, Sandro; Demarchi, Danilo; Khademhosseini, Ali

2016-01-01

Google Glass is a recently designed wearable device capable of displaying information in a smartphone-like hands-free format by wireless communication. The Glass also provides convenient control over remote devices, primarily enabled by voice recognition commands. These unique features of the Google Glass make it useful for medical and biomedical applications where hands-free experiences are strongly preferred. Here, we report for the first time, an integral set of hardware, firmware, software, and Glassware that enabled wireless transmission of sensor data onto the Google Glass for on-demand data visualization and real-time analysis. Additionally, the platform allowed the user to control outputs entered through the Glass, therefore achieving bi-directional Glass-device interfacing. Using this versatile platform, we demonstrated its capability in monitoring physical and physiological parameters such as temperature, pH, and morphology of liver- and heart-on-chips. Furthermore, we showed the capability to remotely introduce pharmaceutical compounds into a microfluidic human primary liver bioreactor at desired time points while monitoring their effects through the Glass. We believe that such an innovative platform, along with its concept, has set up a premise in wearable monitoring and controlling technology for a wide variety of applications in biomedicine. PMID:26928456

Google Glass-Directed Monitoring and Control of Microfluidic Biosensors and Actuators

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhang, Yu Shrike; Busignani, Fabio; Ribas, João; Aleman, Julio; Rodrigues, Talles Nascimento; Shaegh, Seyed Ali Mousavi; Massa, Solange; Rossi, Camilla Baj; Taurino, Irene; Shin, Su-Ryon; Calzone, Giovanni; Amaratunga, Givan Mark; Chambers, Douglas Leon; Jabari, Saman; Niu, Yuxi; Manoharan, Vijayan; Dokmeci, Mehmet Remzi; Carrara, Sandro; Demarchi, Danilo; Khademhosseini, Ali

2016-03-01

Google Glass is a recently designed wearable device capable of displaying information in a smartphone-like hands-free format by wireless communication. The Glass also provides convenient control over remote devices, primarily enabled by voice recognition commands. These unique features of the Google Glass make it useful for medical and biomedical applications where hands-free experiences are strongly preferred. Here, we report for the first time, an integral set of hardware, firmware, software, and Glassware that enabled wireless transmission of sensor data onto the Google Glass for on-demand data visualization and real-time analysis. Additionally, the platform allowed the user to control outputs entered through the Glass, therefore achieving bi-directional Glass-device interfacing. Using this versatile platform, we demonstrated its capability in monitoring physical and physiological parameters such as temperature, pH, and morphology of liver- and heart-on-chips. Furthermore, we showed the capability to remotely introduce pharmaceutical compounds into a microfluidic human primary liver bioreactor at desired time points while monitoring their effects through the Glass. We believe that such an innovative platform, along with its concept, has set up a premise in wearable monitoring and controlling technology for a wide variety of applications in biomedicine.

Google Glass-Directed Monitoring and Control of Microfluidic Biosensors and Actuators.

PubMed

Zhang, Yu Shrike; Busignani, Fabio; Ribas, João; Aleman, Julio; Rodrigues, Talles Nascimento; Shaegh, Seyed Ali Mousavi; Massa, Solange; Baj Rossi, Camilla; Taurino, Irene; Shin, Su-Ryon; Calzone, Giovanni; Amaratunga, Givan Mark; Chambers, Douglas Leon; Jabari, Saman; Niu, Yuxi; Manoharan, Vijayan; Dokmeci, Mehmet Remzi; Carrara, Sandro; Demarchi, Danilo; Khademhosseini, Ali

2016-03-01

Google Glass is a recently designed wearable device capable of displaying information in a smartphone-like hands-free format by wireless communication. The Glass also provides convenient control over remote devices, primarily enabled by voice recognition commands. These unique features of the Google Glass make it useful for medical and biomedical applications where hands-free experiences are strongly preferred. Here, we report for the first time, an integral set of hardware, firmware, software, and Glassware that enabled wireless transmission of sensor data onto the Google Glass for on-demand data visualization and real-time analysis. Additionally, the platform allowed the user to control outputs entered through the Glass, therefore achieving bi-directional Glass-device interfacing. Using this versatile platform, we demonstrated its capability in monitoring physical and physiological parameters such as temperature, pH, and morphology of liver- and heart-on-chips. Furthermore, we showed the capability to remotely introduce pharmaceutical compounds into a microfluidic human primary liver bioreactor at desired time points while monitoring their effects through the Glass. We believe that such an innovative platform, along with its concept, has set up a premise in wearable monitoring and controlling technology for a wide variety of applications in biomedicine.

Enabling drug discovery project decisions with integrated computational chemistry and informatics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tsui, Vickie; Ortwine, Daniel F.; Blaney, Jeffrey M.

2017-03-01

Computational chemistry/informatics scientists and software engineers in Genentech Small Molecule Drug Discovery collaborate with experimental scientists in a therapeutic project-centric environment. Our mission is to enable and improve pre-clinical drug discovery design and decisions. Our goal is to deliver timely data, analysis, and modeling to our therapeutic project teams using best-in-class software tools. We describe our strategy, the organization of our group, and our approaches to reach this goal. We conclude with a summary of the interdisciplinary skills required for computational scientists and recommendations for their training.

Model development, testing and experimentation in a CyberWorkstation for Brain-Machine Interface research.

PubMed

Rattanatamrong, Prapaporn; Matsunaga, Andrea; Raiturkar, Pooja; Mesa, Diego; Zhao, Ming; Mahmoudi, Babak; Digiovanna, Jack; Principe, Jose; Figueiredo, Renato; Sanchez, Justin; Fortes, Jose

2010-01-01

The CyberWorkstation (CW) is an advanced cyber-infrastructure for Brain-Machine Interface (BMI) research. It allows the development, configuration and execution of BMI computational models using high-performance computing resources. The CW's concept is implemented using a software structure in which an "experiment engine" is used to coordinate all software modules needed to capture, communicate and process brain signals and motor-control commands. A generic BMI-model template, which specifies a common interface to the CW's experiment engine, and a common communication protocol enable easy addition, removal or replacement of models without disrupting system operation. This paper reviews the essential components of the CW and shows how templates can facilitate the processes of BMI model development, testing and incorporation into the CW. It also discusses the ongoing work towards making this process infrastructure independent.

Airborne Doppler Wind Lidar Post Data Processing Software DAPS-LV

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Kavaya, Michael J. (Inventor); Beyon, Jeffrey Y. (Inventor); Koch, Grady J. (Inventor)

2015-01-01

Systems, methods, and devices of the present invention enable post processing of airborne Doppler wind LIDAR data. In an embodiment, airborne Doppler wind LIDAR data software written in LabVIEW may be provided and may run two versions of different airborne wind profiling algorithms. A first algorithm may be the Airborne Wind Profiling Algorithm for Doppler Wind LIDAR ("APOLO") using airborne wind LIDAR data from two orthogonal directions to estimate wind parameters, and a second algorithm may be a five direction based method using pseudo inverse functions to estimate wind parameters. The various embodiments may enable wind profiles to be compared using different algorithms, may enable wind profile data for long haul color displays to be generated, may display long haul color displays, and/or may enable archiving of data at user-selectable altitudes over a long observation period for data distribution and population.

Activity-Centric Approach to Distributed Programming

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Levy, Renato; Satapathy, Goutam; Lang, Jun

2004-01-01

The first phase of an effort to develop a NASA version of the Cybele software system has been completed. To give meaning to even a highly abbreviated summary of the modifications to be embodied in the NASA version, it is necessary to present the following background information on Cybele: Cybele is a proprietary software infrastructure for use by programmers in developing agent-based application programs [complex application programs that contain autonomous, interacting components (agents)]. Cybele provides support for event handling from multiple sources, multithreading, concurrency control, migration, and load balancing. A Cybele agent follows a programming paradigm, called activity-centric programming, that enables an abstraction over system-level thread mechanisms. Activity centric programming relieves application programmers of the complex tasks of thread management, concurrency control, and event management. In order to provide such functionality, activity-centric programming demands support of other layers of software. This concludes the background information. In the first phase of the present development, a new architecture for Cybele was defined. In this architecture, Cybele follows a modular service-based approach to coupling of the programming and service layers of software architecture. In a service-based approach, the functionalities supported by activity-centric programming are apportioned, according to their characteristics, among several groups called services. A well-defined interface among all such services serves as a path that facilitates the maintenance and enhancement of such services without adverse effect on the whole software framework. The activity-centric application-program interface (API) is part of a kernel. The kernel API calls the services by use of their published interface. This approach makes it possible for any application code written exclusively under the API to be portable for any configuration of Cybele.

Linear Quadratic Gaussian Controller Design Using a Graphical User Interface: Application to the Beam-Waveguide Antennas

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Maneri, E.; Gawronski, W.

1999-10-01

The linear quadratic Gaussian (LQG) design algorithms described in [2] and [5] have been used in the controller design of JPL's beam-waveguide [5] and 70-m [6] antennas. This algorithm significantly improves tracking precision in a windy environment. This article describes the graphical user interface (GUI) software for the design LQG controllers. It consists of two parts: the basic LQG design and the fine-tuning of the basic design using a constrained optimization algorithm. The presented GUI was developed to simplify the design process, to make the design process user-friendly, and to enable design of an LQG controller for one with a limited control engineering background. The user is asked to manipulate the GUI sliders and radio buttons to watch the antenna performance. Simple rules are given at the GUI display.

Software systems for operation, control, and monitoring of the EBEX instrument

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Milligan, Michael; Ade, Peter; Aubin, François; Baccigalupi, Carlo; Bao, Chaoyun; Borrill, Julian; Cantalupo, Christopher; Chapman, Daniel; Didier, Joy; Dobbs, Matt; Grainger, Will; Hanany, Shaul; Hillbrand, Seth; Hubmayr, Johannes; Hyland, Peter; Jaffe, Andrew; Johnson, Bradley; Kisner, Theodore; Klein, Jeff; Korotkov, Andrei; Leach, Sam; Lee, Adrian; Levinson, Lorne; Limon, Michele; MacDermid, Kevin; Matsumura, Tomotake; Miller, Amber; Pascale, Enzo; Polsgrove, Daniel; Ponthieu, Nicolas; Raach, Kate; Reichborn-Kjennerud, Britt; Sagiv, Ilan; Tran, Huan; Tucker, Gregory S.; Vinokurov, Yury; Yadav, Amit; Zaldarriaga, Matias; Zilic, Kyle

2010-07-01

We present the hardware and software systems implementing autonomous operation, distributed real-time monitoring, and control for the EBEX instrument. EBEX is a NASA-funded balloon-borne microwave polarimeter designed for a 14 day Antarctic flight that circumnavigates the pole. To meet its science goals the EBEX instrument autonomously executes several tasks in parallel: it collects attitude data and maintains pointing control in order to adhere to an observing schedule; tunes and operates up to 1920 TES bolometers and 120 SQUID amplifiers controlled by as many as 30 embedded computers; coordinates and dispatches jobs across an onboard computer network to manage this detector readout system; logs over 3 GiB/hour of science and housekeeping data to an onboard disk storage array; responds to a variety of commands and exogenous events; and downlinks multiple heterogeneous data streams representing a selected subset of the total logged data. Most of the systems implementing these functions have been tested during a recent engineering flight of the payload, and have proven to meet the target requirements. The EBEX ground segment couples uplink and downlink hardware to a client-server software stack, enabling real-time monitoring and command responsibility to be distributed across the public internet or other standard computer networks. Using the emerging dirfile standard as a uniform intermediate data format, a variety of front end programs provide access to different components and views of the downlinked data products. This distributed architecture was demonstrated operating across multiple widely dispersed sites prior to and during the EBEX engineering flight.

A Hardware-in-the-Loop Testbed for Spacecraft Formation Flying Applications

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Leitner, Jesse; Bauer, Frank H. (Technical Monitor)

2001-01-01

The Formation Flying Test Bed (FFTB) at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) is being developed as a modular, hybrid dynamic simulation facility employed for end-to-end guidance, navigation, and control (GN&C) analysis and design for formation flying clusters and constellations of satellites. The FFTB will support critical hardware and software technology development to enable current and future missions for NASA, other government agencies, and external customers for a wide range of missions, particularly those involving distributed spacecraft operations. The initial capabilities of the FFTB are based upon an integration of high fidelity hardware and software simulation, emulation, and test platforms developed at GSFC in recent years; including a high-fidelity GPS simulator which has been a fundamental component of the Guidance, Navigation, and Control Center's GPS Test Facility. The FFTB will be continuously evolving over the next several years from a too[ with initial capabilities in GPS navigation hardware/software- in-the- loop analysis and closed loop GPS-based orbit control algorithm assessment to one with cross-link communications and relative navigation analysis and simulation capability. Eventually the FFT13 will provide full capability to support all aspects of multi-sensor, absolute and relative position determination and control, in all (attitude and orbit) degrees of freedom, as well as information management for satellite clusters and constellations. In this paper we focus on the architecture for the FFT13 as a general GN&C analysis environment for the spacecraft formation flying community inside and outside of NASA GSFC and we briefly reference some current and future activities which will drive the requirements and development.

Autonomous Rover Traverse and Precise Arm Placement on Remotely Designated Targets

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Nesnas, Issa A.; Pivtoraiko, Mihail N.; Kelly, Alonzo; Fleder, Michael

2012-01-01

This software controls a rover platform to traverse rocky terrain autonomously, plan paths, and avoid obstacles using its stereo hazard and navigation cameras. It does so while continuously tracking a target of interest selected from 10 20 m away. The rover drives and tracks the target until it reaches the vicinity of the target. The rover then positions itself to approach the target, deploys its robotic arm, and places the end effector instrument on the designated target to within 2-3-cm accuracy of the originally selected target. This software features continuous navigation in a fairly rocky field in an outdoor environment and the ability to enable the rover to avoid large rocks and traverse over smaller ones. Using point-and-click mouse commands, a scientist designates targets in the initial imagery acquired from the rover s mast cameras. The navigation software uses stereo imaging, traversability analysis, path planning, trajectory generation, and trajectory execution. It also includes visual target tracking of a designated target selected from 10 m away while continuously navigating the rocky terrain. Improvements in this design include steering while driving, which uses continuous curvature paths. There are also several improvements to the traversability analyzer, including improved data fusion of traversability maps that result from pose estimation uncertainties, dealing with boundary effects to enable tighter maneuvers, and handling a wider range of obstacles. This work advances what has been previously developed and integrated on the Mars Exploration Rovers by using algorithms that are capable of traversing more rock-dense terrains, enabling tight, thread-the-needle maneuvers. These algorithms were integrated on the newly refurbished Athena Mars research rover, and were fielded in the JPL Mars Yard. Forty-three runs were conducted with targets at distances ranging from 5 to 15 m, and a success rate of 93% was achieved for placement of the instrument within 2-3 cm of the target.

A Clinical Reasoning Tool for Virtual Patients: Design-Based Research Study.

PubMed

Hege, Inga; Kononowicz, Andrzej A; Adler, Martin

2017-11-02

Clinical reasoning is a fundamental process medical students have to learn during and after medical school. Virtual patients (VP) are a technology-enhanced learning method to teach clinical reasoning. However, VP systems do not exploit their full potential concerning the clinical reasoning process; for example, most systems focus on the outcome and less on the process of clinical reasoning. Keeping our concept grounded in a former qualitative study, we aimed to design and implement a tool to enhance VPs with activities and feedback, which specifically foster the acquisition of clinical reasoning skills. We designed the tool by translating elements of a conceptual clinical reasoning learning framework into software requirements. The resulting clinical reasoning tool enables learners to build their patient's illness script as a concept map when they are working on a VP scenario. The student's map is compared with the experts' reasoning at each stage of the VP, which is technically enabled by using Medical Subject Headings, which is a comprehensive controlled vocabulary published by the US National Library of Medicine. The tool is implemented using Web technologies, has an open architecture that enables its integration into various systems through an open application program interface, and is available under a Massachusetts Institute of Technology license. We conducted usability tests following a think-aloud protocol and a pilot field study with maps created by 64 medical students. The results show that learners interact with the tool but create less nodes and connections in the concept map than an expert. Further research and usability tests are required to analyze the reasons. The presented tool is a versatile, systematically developed software component that specifically supports the clinical reasoning skills acquisition. It can be plugged into VP systems or used as stand-alone software in other teaching scenarios. The modular design allows an extension with new feedback mechanisms and learning analytics algorithms. ©Inga Hege, Andrzej A Kononowicz, Martin Adler. Originally published in JMIR Medical Education (http://mededu.jmir.org), 02.11.2017.

USE OF COMPUTER-AIDED PROCESS ENGINEERING TOOL IN POLLUTION PREVENTION

EPA Science Inventory

Computer-Aided Process Engineering has become established in industry as a design tool. With the establishment of the CAPE-OPEN software specifications for process simulation environments. CAPE-OPEN provides a set of "middleware" standards that enable software developers to acces...

Graphical simulation for aerospace manufacturing

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Babai, Majid; Bien, Christopher

1994-01-01

Simulation software has become a key technological enabler for integrating flexible manufacturing systems and streamlining the overall aerospace manufacturing process. In particular, robot simulation and offline programming software is being credited for reducing down time and labor cost, while boosting quality and significantly increasing productivity.

Software for Classroom Music Making.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Ely, Mark C.

1992-01-01

Describes musical instrument digital interface (MIDI), a communication system that uses digital data to enable MIDI-equipped instruments to communicate with each other. Includes discussion of music editors, sequencers, compositional software, and commonly used computers. Suggests uses for the technology for students and teachers. Urges further…

Software Framework for Peer Data-Management Services

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hughes, John; Hardman, Sean; Crichton, Daniel; Hyon, Jason; Kelly, Sean; Tran, Thuy

2007-01-01

Object Oriented Data Technology (OODT) is a software framework for creating a Web-based system for exchange of scientific data that are stored in diverse formats on computers at different sites under the management of scientific peers. OODT software consists of a set of cooperating, distributed peer components that provide distributed peer-to-peer (P2P) services that enable one peer to search and retrieve data managed by another peer. In effect, computers running OODT software at different locations become parts of an integrated data-management system.

Seven Processes that Enable NASA Software Engineering Technologies

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Housch, Helen; Godfrey, Sally

2011-01-01

This slide presentation reviews seven processes that NASA uses to ensure that software is developed, acquired and maintained as specified in the NPR 7150.2A requirement. The requirement is to ensure that all software be appraised for the Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI). The enumerated processes are: (7) Product Integration, (6) Configuration Management, (5) Verification, (4) Software Assurance, (3) Measurement and Analysis, (2) Requirements Management and (1) Planning & Monitoring. Each of these is described and the group(s) that are responsible is described.

Software for simulation of a computed tomography imaging spectrometer using optical design software

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Spuhler, Peter T.; Willer, Mark R.; Volin, Curtis E.; Descour, Michael R.; Dereniak, Eustace L.

2000-11-01

Our Imaging Spectrometer Simulation Software known under the name Eikon should improve and speed up the design of a Computed Tomography Imaging Spectrometer (CTIS). Eikon uses existing raytracing software to simulate a virtual instrument. Eikon enables designers to virtually run through the design, calibration and data acquisition, saving significant cost and time when designing an instrument. We anticipate that Eikon simulations will improve future designs of CTIS by allowing engineers to explore more instrument options.

Technology for Manufacturing Efficiency

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

1995-01-01

The Ground Processing Scheduling System (GPSS) was developed by Ames Research Center, Kennedy Space Center and divisions of the Lockheed Company to maintain the scheduling for preparing a Space Shuttle Orbiter for a mission. Red Pepper Software Company, now part of PeopleSoft, Inc., commercialized the software as their ResponseAgent product line. The software enables users to monitor manufacturing variables, report issues and develop solutions to existing problems.

SMC: SCENIC Model Control

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Srivastava, Priyaka; Kraus, Jeff; Murawski, Robert; Golden, Bertsel, Jr.

2015-01-01

NASAs Space Communications and Navigation (SCaN) program manages three active networks: the Near Earth Network, the Space Network, and the Deep Space Network. These networks simultaneously support NASA missions and provide communications services to customers worldwide. To efficiently manage these resources and their capabilities, a team of student interns at the NASA Glenn Research Center is developing a distributed system to model the SCaN networks. Once complete, the system shall provide a platform that enables users to perform capacity modeling of current and prospective missions with finer-grained control of information between several simulation and modeling tools. This will enable the SCaN program to access a holistic view of its networks and simulate the effects of modifications in order to provide NASA with decisional information. The development of this capacity modeling system is managed by NASAs Strategic Center for Education, Networking, Integration, and Communication (SCENIC). Three primary third-party software tools offer their unique abilities in different stages of the simulation process. MagicDraw provides UMLSysML modeling, AGIs Systems Tool Kit simulates the physical transmission parameters and de-conflicts scheduled communication, and Riverbed Modeler (formerly OPNET) simulates communication protocols and packet-based networking. SCENIC developers are building custom software extensions to integrate these components in an end-to-end space communications modeling platform. A central control module acts as the hub for report-based messaging between client wrappers. Backend databases provide information related to mission parameters and ground station configurations, while the end user defines scenario-specific attributes for the model. The eight SCENIC interns are working under the direction of their mentors to complete an initial version of this capacity modeling system during the summer of 2015. The intern team is composed of four students in Computer Science, two in Computer Engineering, one in Electrical Engineering, and one studying Space Systems Engineering.

Data quality can make or break a research infrastructure

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pastorello, G.; Gunter, D.; Chu, H.; Christianson, D. S.; Trotta, C.; Canfora, E.; Faybishenko, B.; Cheah, Y. W.; Beekwilder, N.; Chan, S.; Dengel, S.; Keenan, T. F.; O'Brien, F.; Elbashandy, A.; Poindexter, C.; Humphrey, M.; Papale, D.; Agarwal, D.

2017-12-01

Research infrastructures (RIs) commonly support observational data provided by multiple, independent sources. Uniformity in the data distributed by such RIs is important in most applications, e.g., in comparative studies using data from two or more sources. Achieving uniformity in terms of data quality is challenging, especially considering that many data issues are unpredictable and cannot be detected until a first occurrence of the issue. With that, many data quality control activities within RIs require a manual, human-in-the-loop element, making it an expensive activity. Our motivating example is the FLUXNET2015 dataset - a collection of ecosystem-level carbon, water, and energy fluxes between land and atmosphere from over 200 sites around the world, some sites with over 20 years of data. About 90% of the human effort to create the dataset was spent in data quality related activities. Based on this experience, we have been working on solutions to increase the automation of data quality control procedures. Since it is nearly impossible to fully automate all quality related checks, we have been drawing from the experience with techniques used in software development, which shares a few common constraints. In both managing scientific data and writing software, human time is a precious resource; code bases, as Science datasets, can be large, complex, and full of errors; both scientific and software endeavors can be pursued by individuals, but collaborative teams can accomplish a lot more. The lucrative and fast-paced nature of the software industry fueled the creation of methods and tools to increase automation and productivity within these constraints. Issue tracking systems, methods for translating problems into automated tests, powerful version control tools are a few examples. Terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems research relies heavily on many types of observational data. As volumes of data collection increases, ensuring data quality is becoming an unwieldy challenge for RIs. Business as usual approaches to data quality do not work with larger data volumes. We believe RIs can benefit greatly from adapting and imitating this body of theory and practice from software quality into data quality, enabling systematic and reproducible safeguards against errors and mistakes in datasets as much as in software.

P1198: software for tracing decision behavior in lending to small businesses.

PubMed

Andersson, P

2001-05-01

This paper describes a process-tracing software program specially designed to capture decision behavior in lending to small businesses. The source code was written in Lotus Notes. The software runs in a Web browser and consists of two interacting systems: a database and a user interface. The database includes three realistic loan applications. The user interface consists of different but interacting screens that enable the participant to operate the software. Log files register the decision behavior of the participant. An empirical example is presented in order to show the software's potential in providing insights into judgment and decision making. The implications of the software are discussed.

LabVIEW Serial Driver Software for an Electronic Load

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Scullin, Vincent; Garcia, Christopher

2003-01-01

A LabVIEW-language computer program enables monitoring and control of a Transistor Devices, Inc., Dynaload WCL232 (or equivalent) electronic load via an RS-232 serial communication link between the electronic load and a remote personal computer. (The electronic load can operate at constant voltage, current, power consumption, or resistance.) The program generates a graphical user interface (GUI) at the computer that looks and acts like the front panel of the electronic load. Once the electronic load has been placed in remote-control mode, this program first queries the electronic load for the present values of all its operational and limit settings, and then drops into a cycle in which it reports the instantaneous voltage, current, and power values in displays that resemble those on the electronic load while monitoring the GUI images of pushbuttons for control actions by the user. By means of the pushbutton images and associated prompts, the user can perform such operations as changing limit values, the operating mode, or the set point. The benefit of this software is that it relieves the user of the need to learn one method for operating the electronic load locally and another method for operating it remotely via a personal computer.

Cosmetic and aesthetic skin photosurgery using a computer-assisted CO2 laser-scanning system

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Dutu, Doru C. A.; Dumitras, Dan C.; Nedelcu, Ioan; Ghetie, Sergiu D.

1997-12-01

Since the first application of CO2 laser in skin photosurgery, various techniques such as laser pulsing, beam scanning and computer-assisted laser pulse generator have been introduced for the purpose of reducing tissue carbonization and thermal necrosis. Using a quite simple XY optical scanner equipped with two galvanometric driven mirrors and an appropriate software to process the scanning data and control the interaction time and energy density in the scanned area, we have obtained a device which can improve CO2 laser application in cosmetic and aesthetic surgery. The opto-mechanical CO2 laser scanner based on two total reflecting flat mirrors placed at 90 degree(s) in respect to the XY scanning directions and independently driven through a magnetic field provides a linear movement of the incident laser beam in the operating field. A DA converter supplied with scanning data by the software enables a scanning with linearity better than 1% for a maximum angular deviation of 20 degree(s). Because the scanning quality of the laser beam in the operating field is given not only by the displacement function of the two mirrors, but also by the beam characteristics in the focal plane and the cross distribution in the laser beam, the surgeon can control through software either the scanning field dimensions or the distance between two consecutive points of the vertically and/or horizontally sweep line. The development of computer-assisted surgical scanning techniques will help control the surgical laser, to create either a reproducible incision with a controlled depth or a controlled incision pattern with minimal incision width, a long desired facility for plastic surgery, neurosurgery, ENT and dentistry.

In-network adaptation of SHVC video in software-defined networks

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Awobuluyi, Olatunde; Nightingale, James; Wang, Qi; Alcaraz Calero, Jose Maria; Grecos, Christos

2016-04-01

Software Defined Networks (SDN), when combined with Network Function Virtualization (NFV) represents a paradigm shift in how future networks will behave and be managed. SDN's are expected to provide the underpinning technologies for future innovations such as 5G mobile networks and the Internet of Everything. The SDN architecture offers features that facilitate an abstracted and centralized global network view in which packet forwarding or dropping decisions are based on application flows. Software Defined Networks facilitate a wide range of network management tasks, including the adaptation of real-time video streams as they traverse the network. SHVC, the scalable extension to the recent H.265 standard is a new video encoding standard that supports ultra-high definition video streams with spatial resolutions of up to 7680×4320 and frame rates of 60fps or more. The massive increase in bandwidth required to deliver these U-HD video streams dwarfs the bandwidth requirements of current high definition (HD) video. Such large bandwidth increases pose very significant challenges for network operators. In this paper we go substantially beyond the limited number of existing implementations and proposals for video streaming in SDN's all of which have primarily focused on traffic engineering solutions such as load balancing. By implementing and empirically evaluating an SDN enabled Media Adaptation Network Entity (MANE) we provide a valuable empirical insight into the benefits and limitations of SDN enabled video adaptation for real time video applications. The SDN-MANE is the video adaptation component of our Video Quality Assurance Manager (VQAM) SDN control plane application, which also includes an SDN monitoring component to acquire network metrics and a decision making engine using algorithms to determine the optimum adaptation strategy for any real time video application flow given the current network conditions. Our proposed VQAM application has been implemented and evaluated on an SDN allowing us to provide important benchmarks for video streaming over SDN and for SDN control plane latency.

Telerobot local-remote control architecture for space flight program applications

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Zimmerman, Wayne; Backes, Paul; Steele, Robert; Long, Mark; Bon, Bruce; Beahan, John

1993-01-01

The JPL Supervisory Telerobotics (STELER) Laboratory has developed and demonstrated a unique local-remote robot control architecture which enables management of intermittent communication bus latencies and delays such as those expected for ground-remote operation of Space Station robotic systems via the Tracking and Data Relay Satellite System (TDRSS) communication platform. The current work at JPL in this area has focused on enhancing the technologies and transferring the control architecture to hardware and software environments which are more compatible with projected ground and space operational environments. At the local site, the operator updates the remote worksite model using stereo video and a model overlay/fitting algorithm which outputs the location and orientation of the object in free space. That information is relayed to the robot User Macro Interface (UMI) to enable programming of the robot control macros. This capability runs on a single Silicon Graphics Inc. machine. The operator can employ either manual teleoperation, shared control, or supervised autonomous control to manipulate the intended object. The remote site controller, called the Modular Telerobot Task Execution System (MOTES), runs in a multi-processor VME environment and performs the task sequencing, task execution, trajectory generation, closed loop force/torque control, task parameter monitoring, and reflex action. This paper describes the new STELER architecture implementation, and also documents the results of the recent autonomous docking task execution using the local site and MOTES.

HETDEX tracker control system design and implementation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Beno, Joseph H.; Hayes, Richard; Leck, Ron; Penney, Charles; Soukup, Ian

2012-09-01

To enable the Hobby-Eberly Telescope Dark Energy Experiment, The University of Texas at Austin Center for Electromechanics and McDonald Observatory developed a precision tracker and control system - an 18,000 kg robot to position a 3,100 kg payload within 10 microns of a desired dynamic track. Performance requirements to meet science needs and safety requirements that emerged from detailed Failure Modes and Effects Analysis resulted in a system of 13 precision controlled actuators and 100 additional analog and digital devices (primarily sensors and safety limit switches). Due to this complexity, demanding accuracy requirements, and stringent safety requirements, two independent control systems were developed. First, a versatile and easily configurable centralized control system that links with modeling and simulation tools during the hardware and software design process was deemed essential for normal operation including motion control. A second, parallel, control system, the Hardware Fault Controller (HFC) provides independent monitoring and fault control through a dedicated microcontroller to force a safe, controlled shutdown of the entire system in the event a fault is detected. Motion controls were developed in a Matlab-Simulink simulation environment, and coupled with dSPACE controller hardware. The dSPACE real-time operating system collects sensor information; motor commands are transmitted over a PROFIBUS network to servo amplifiers and drive motor status is received over the same network. To interface the dSPACE controller directly to absolute Heidenhain sensors with EnDat 2.2 protocol, a custom communication board was developed. This paper covers details of operational control software, the HFC, algorithms, tuning, debugging, testing, and lessons learned.

Flight Hardware Fabricated for Combustion Science in Space

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

OMalley, Terence F.; Weiland, Karen J.

2005-01-01

NASA Glenn Research Center s Telescience Support Center (TSC) allows researchers on Earth to operate experiments onboard the International Space Station (ISS) and the space shuttles. NASA s continuing investment in the required software, systems, and networks provides distributed ISS ground operations that enable payload developers and scientists to monitor and control their experiments from the Glenn TSC. The quality of scientific and engineering data is enhanced while the long-term operational costs of experiments are reduced because principal investigators and engineering teams can operate their payloads from their home institutions.

Optical interconnect for large-scale systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Dress, William

2013-02-01

This paper presents a switchless, optical interconnect module that serves as a node in a network of identical distribution modules for large-scale systems. Thousands to millions of hosts or endpoints may be interconnected by a network of such modules, avoiding the need for multi-level switches. Several common network topologies are reviewed and their scaling properties assessed. The concept of message-flow routing is discussed in conjunction with the unique properties enabled by the optical distribution module where it is shown how top-down software control (global routing tables, spanning-tree algorithms) may be avoided.

Current Status of an Implementation of a System Monitoring for Seamless Auxiliary Data at the Geodetic Observatory Wettzell

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Neidhardt, Alexander; Kirschbauer, Katharina; Plötz, Christian; Schönberger, Matthias; Böer, Armin; Wettzell VLBI Team

2016-12-01

The first test implementation of an auxiliary data archive is tested at the Geodetic Observatory Wetttzell. It is software which follows on the Wettzell SysMon, extending the database and data sensors with the functionalities of a professional monitoring environment, named Zabbix. Some extensions to the remote control server on the NASA Field System PC enable the inclusion of data from external antennas. The presentation demonstrates the implementation and discusses the current possibilities to encourage other antennas to join the auxiliary archive.

Generic Software Architecture for Prognostics (GSAP) User Guide

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Teubert, Christopher Allen; Daigle, Matthew John; Watkins, Jason; Sankararaman, Shankar; Goebel, Kai

2016-01-01

The Generic Software Architecture for Prognostics (GSAP) is a framework for applying prognostics. It makes applying prognostics easier by implementing many of the common elements across prognostic applications. The standard interface enables reuse of prognostic algorithms and models across systems using the GSAP framework.

Statistical Reference Datasets

National Institute of Standards and Technology Data Gateway

Statistical Reference Datasets (Web, free access)   The Statistical Reference Datasets is also supported by the Standard Reference Data Program. The purpose of this project is to improve the accuracy of statistical software by providing reference datasets with certified computational results that enable the objective evaluation of statistical software.

Space Software Defined Radio Characterization to Enable Reuse

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mortensen, Dale J.; Bishop, Daniel W.; Chelmins, David

2012-01-01

NASA's Space Communication and Navigation Testbed is beginning operations on the International Space Station this year. The objective is to promote new software defined radio technologies and associated software application reuse, enabled by this first flight of NASA's Space Telecommunications Radio System architecture standard. The Space Station payload has three software defined radios onboard that allow for a wide variety of communications applications; however, each radio was only launched with one waveform application. By design the testbed allows new waveform applications to be uploaded and tested by experimenters in and outside of NASA. During the system integration phase of the testbed special waveform test modes and stand-alone test waveforms were used to characterize the SDR platforms for the future experiments. Characterization of the Testbed's JPL SDR using test waveforms and specialized ground test modes is discussed in this paper. One of the test waveforms, a record and playback application, can be utilized in a variety of ways, including new satellite on-orbit checkout as well as independent on-board testbed experiments.

Expecting the Unexpected: Radiation Hardened Software

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Penix, John; Mehlitz, Peter C.

2005-01-01

Radiation induced Single Event Effects (SEEs) are a serious problem for spacecraft flight software, potentially leading to a complete loss of mission. Conventional risk mitigation has been focused on hardware, leading to slow, expensive and outdated on-board computing devices, increased power consumption and launch mass. Our approach is to look at SEEs from a software perspective, and to explicitly design flight software so that it can detect and correct the majority of SEES. Radiation hardened flight software will reduce the significant residual residual risk for critical missions and flight phases, and enable more use of inexpensive and fast COTS hardware.

Software for Automated Reading of STEP Files by I-DEAS(trademark)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Pinedo, John

2003-01-01

A program called "readstep" enables the I-DEAS(tm) computer-aided-design (CAD) software to automatically read Standard for the Exchange of Product Model Data (STEP) files. (The STEP format is one of several used to transfer data between dissimilar CAD programs.) Prior to the development of "readstep," it was necessary to read STEP files into I-DEAS(tm) one at a time in a slow process that required repeated intervention by the user. In operation, "readstep" prompts the user for the location of the desired STEP files and the names of the I-DEAS(tm) project and model file, then generates an I-DEAS(tm) program file called "readstep.prg" and two Unix shell programs called "runner" and "controller." The program "runner" runs I-DEAS(tm) sessions that execute readstep.prg, while "controller" controls the execution of "runner" and edits readstep.prg if necessary. The user sets "runner" and "controller" into execution simultaneously, and then no further intervention by the user is required. When "runner" has finished, the user should see only parts from successfully read STEP files present in the model file. STEP files that could not be read successfully (e.g., because of format errors) should be regenerated before attempting to read them again.

Real-time Data Streams from ``e-RemoteCtrl'' to Central VLBI Network Status Monitoring Services Like IVS Live

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Neidhardt, Alexander; Collioud, Arnaud

2014-12-01

A central VLBI network status monitoring can be realized by using online status information about current VLBI sessions, real-time, and status data directly from each radio telescope. Such monitoring helps to organize sessions or to get immediate feedback from the active telescopes. Therefore the remote control software for VLBI radio telescopes ``e-RemoteCtrl'' (http://www.econtrol-software.de), which enables remote access as extension to the NASA Field System, realizes real-time data streams to dedicated data centers. The software has direct access to the status information about the current observation (e.g., schedule, scan, source) and the telescope (e.g., current state, temperature, pressure) in real-time. This information are directly sent to ``IVS Live''. ``IVS Live'' (http://ivslive.obs.u-bordeaux1.fr/) is a Web tool that can be used to follow the observing sessions, organized by the International VLBI Service for Geodesy and Astrometry (IVS), navigate through past or upcoming sessions, or search and display specific information about sessions, sources (like VLBI images), and stations, by using an Internet browser.

Estimation of water quality parameters of inland and coastal waters with the use of a toolkit for processing of remote sensing data

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Dekker, A.G.; Hoogenboom, H.J.; Rijkeboer, M.

1997-06-01

Deriving thematic maps of water quality parameters from a remote sensing image requires a number of processing steps, such as calibration, atmospheric correction, air/water interface correction, and application of water quality algorithms. A prototype software environment has recently been developed that enables the user to perform and control these processing steps. Main parts of this environment are: (i) access to the MODTRAN 3 radiative transfer code for removing atmospheric and air-water interface influences, (ii) a tool for analyzing of algorithms for estimating water quality and (iii) a spectral database, containing apparent and inherent optical properties and associated water quality parameters.more » The use of the software is illustrated by applying implemented algorithms for estimating chlorophyll to data from a spectral library of Dutch inland waters with CHL ranging from 1 to 500 pg 1{sup -1}. The algorithms currently implemented in the Toolkit software are recommended for optically simple waters, but for optically complex waters development of more advanced retrieval methods is required.« less

Tessera: Open source software for accelerated data science

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Sego, Landon H.; Hafen, Ryan P.; Director, Hannah M.

2014-06-30

Extracting useful, actionable information from data can be a formidable challenge for the safeguards, nonproliferation, and arms control verification communities. Data scientists are often on the “front-lines” of making sense of complex and large datasets. They require flexible tools that make it easy to rapidly reformat large datasets, interactively explore and visualize data, develop statistical algorithms, and validate their approaches—and they need to perform these activities with minimal lines of code. Existing commercial software solutions often lack extensibility and the flexibility required to address the nuances of the demanding and dynamic environments where data scientists work. To address this need,more » Pacific Northwest National Laboratory developed Tessera, an open source software suite designed to enable data scientists to interactively perform their craft at the terabyte scale. Tessera automatically manages the complicated tasks of distributed storage and computation, empowering data scientists to do what they do best: tackling critical research and mission objectives by deriving insight from data. We illustrate the use of Tessera with an example analysis of computer network data.« less

TReacLab: An object-oriented implementation of non-intrusive splitting methods to couple independent transport and geochemical software

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Jara, Daniel; de Dreuzy, Jean-Raynald; Cochepin, Benoit

2017-12-01

Reactive transport modeling contributes to understand geophysical and geochemical processes in subsurface environments. Operator splitting methods have been proposed as non-intrusive coupling techniques that optimize the use of existing chemistry and transport codes. In this spirit, we propose a coupler relying on external geochemical and transport codes with appropriate operator segmentation that enables possible developments of additional splitting methods. We provide an object-oriented implementation in TReacLab developed in the MATLAB environment in a free open source frame with an accessible repository. TReacLab contains classical coupling methods, template interfaces and calling functions for two classical transport and reactive software (PHREEQC and COMSOL). It is tested on four classical benchmarks with homogeneous and heterogeneous reactions at equilibrium or kinetically-controlled. We show that full decoupling to the implementation level has a cost in terms of accuracy compared to more integrated and optimized codes. Use of non-intrusive implementations like TReacLab are still justified for coupling independent transport and chemical software at a minimal development effort but should be systematically and carefully assessed.

The contaminant analysis automation robot implementation for the automated laboratory

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Younkin, J.R.; Igou, R.E.; Urenda, T.D.

1995-12-31

The Contaminant Analysis Automation (CAA) project defines the automated laboratory as a series of standard laboratory modules (SLM) serviced by a robotic standard support module (SSM). These SLMs are designed to allow plug-and-play integration into automated systems that perform standard analysis methods (SAM). While the SLMs are autonomous in the execution of their particular chemical processing task, the SAM concept relies on a high-level task sequence controller (TSC) to coordinate the robotic delivery of materials requisite for SLM operations, initiate an SLM operation with the chemical method dependent operating parameters, and coordinate the robotic removal of materials from the SLMmore » when its commands and events has been established to allow ready them for transport operations as well as performing the Supervisor and Subsystems (GENISAS) software governs events from the SLMs and robot. The Intelligent System Operating Environment (ISOE) enables the inter-process communications used by GENISAS. CAA selected the Hewlett-Packard Optimized Robot for Chemical Analysis (ORCA) and its associated Windows based Methods Development Software (MDS) as the robot SSM. The MDS software is used to teach the robot each SLM position and required material port motions. To allow the TSC to command these SLM motions, a hardware and software implementation was required that allowed message passing between different operating systems. This implementation involved the use of a Virtual Memory Extended (VME) rack with a Force CPU-30 computer running VxWorks; a real-time multitasking operating system, and a Radiuses PC compatible VME computer running MDS. A GENISAS server on The Force computer accepts a transport command from the TSC, a GENISAS supervisor, over Ethernet and notifies software on the RadiSys PC of the pending command through VMEbus shared memory. The command is then delivered to the MDS robot control software using a Windows Dynamic Data Exchange conversation.« less

Fault Detection and Correction for the Solar Dynamics Observatory Attitude Control System

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Starin, Scott R.; Vess, Melissa F.; Kenney, Thomas M.; Maldonado, Manuel D.; Morgenstern, Wendy M.

2007-01-01

The Solar Dynamics Observatory is an Explorer-class mission that will launch in early 2009. The spacecraft will operate in a geosynchronous orbit, sending data 24 hours a day to a devoted ground station in White Sands, New Mexico. It will carry a suite of instruments designed to observe the Sun in multiple wavelengths at unprecedented resolution. The Atmospheric Imaging Assembly includes four telescopes with focal plane CCDs that can image the full solar disk in four different visible wavelengths. The Extreme-ultraviolet Variability Experiment will collect time-correlated data on the activity of the Sun's corona. The Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager will enable study of pressure waves moving through the body of the Sun. The attitude control system on Solar Dynamics Observatory is responsible for four main phases of activity. The physical safety of the spacecraft after separation must be guaranteed. Fine attitude determination and control must be sufficient for instrument calibration maneuvers. The mission science mode requires 2-arcsecond control according to error signals provided by guide telescopes on the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly, one of the three instruments to be carried. Lastly, accurate execution of linear and angular momentum changes to the spacecraft must be provided for momentum management and orbit maintenance. In thsp aper, single-fault tolerant fault detection and correction of the Solar Dynamics Observatory attitude control system is described. The attitude control hardware suite for the mission is catalogued, with special attention to redundancy at the hardware level. Four reaction wheels are used where any three are satisfactory. Four pairs of redundant thrusters are employed for orbit change maneuvers and momentum management. Three two-axis gyroscopes provide full redundancy for rate sensing. A digital Sun sensor and two autonomous star trackers provide two-out-of-three redundancy for fine attitude determination. The use of software to maximize chances of recovery from any hardware or software fault is detailed. A generic fault detection and correction software structure is used, allowing additions, deletions, and adjustments to fault detection and correction rules. This software structure is fed by in-line fault tests that are also able to take appropriate actions to avoid corruption of the data stream.

Achieving AFRL Universal FADEC Vision With Open Architecture Addressing Capability and Obsolescence for Military and Commercial Applications (Preprint)

DTIC Science & Technology

2006-11-01

engines will involve a family of common components. It will consist of a real - time operating system and partitioned application software (AS...system will employ a standard hardware and software architecture. It will consist of a real time operating system and partitioned application...Inputs - Enables Large Cost Reduction 3. Software - FAA Certified Auto Code - Real Time Operating System - Commercial

The software-cycle model for re-engineering and reuse

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bailey, John W.; Basili, Victor R.

1992-01-01

This paper reports on the progress of a study which will contribute to our ability to perform high-level, component-based programming by describing means to obtain useful components, methods for the configuration and integration of those components, and an underlying economic model of the costs and benefits associated with this approach to reuse. One goal of the study is to develop and demonstrate methods to recover reusable components from domain-specific software through a combination of tools, to perform the identification, extraction, and re-engineering of components, and domain experts, to direct the applications of those tools. A second goal of the study is to enable the reuse of those components by identifying techniques for configuring and recombining the re-engineered software. This component-recovery or software-cycle model addresses not only the selection and re-engineering of components, but also their recombination into new programs. Once a model of reuse activities has been developed, the quantification of the costs and benefits of various reuse options will enable the development of an adaptable economic model of reuse, which is the principal goal of the overall study. This paper reports on the conception of the software-cycle model and on several supporting techniques of software recovery, measurement, and reuse which will lead to the development of the desired economic model.

RNA-SeQC: RNA-seq metrics for quality control and process optimization.

PubMed

DeLuca, David S; Levin, Joshua Z; Sivachenko, Andrey; Fennell, Timothy; Nazaire, Marc-Danie; Williams, Chris; Reich, Michael; Winckler, Wendy; Getz, Gad

2012-06-01

RNA-seq, the application of next-generation sequencing to RNA, provides transcriptome-wide characterization of cellular activity. Assessment of sequencing performance and library quality is critical to the interpretation of RNA-seq data, yet few tools exist to address this issue. We introduce RNA-SeQC, a program which provides key measures of data quality. These metrics include yield, alignment and duplication rates; GC bias, rRNA content, regions of alignment (exon, intron and intragenic), continuity of coverage, 3'/5' bias and count of detectable transcripts, among others. The software provides multi-sample evaluation of library construction protocols, input materials and other experimental parameters. The modularity of the software enables pipeline integration and the routine monitoring of key measures of data quality such as the number of alignable reads, duplication rates and rRNA contamination. RNA-SeQC allows investigators to make informed decisions about sample inclusion in downstream analysis. In summary, RNA-SeQC provides quality control measures critical to experiment design, process optimization and downstream computational analysis. See www.genepattern.org to run online, or www.broadinstitute.org/rna-seqc/ for a command line tool.

The changing nature of spacecraft operations: From the Vikings of the 1970's to the great observatories of the 1990's and beyond

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Ledbetter, Kenneth W.

1992-01-01

Four trends in spacecraft flight operations are discussed which will reduce overall program costs. These trends are the use of high-speed, highly reliable data communications systems for distributing operations functions to more convenient and cost-effective sites; the improved capability for remote operation of sensors; a continued rapid increase in memory and processing speed of flight qualified computer chips; and increasingly capable ground-based hardware and software systems, notably those augmented by artificial intelligence functions. Changes reflected by these trends are reviewed starting from the NASA Viking missions of the early 70s, when mission control was conducted at one location using expensive and cumbersome mainframe computers and communications equipment. In the 1980s, powerful desktop computers and modems enabled the Magellan project team to operate the spacecraft remotely. In the 1990s, the Hubble Space Telescope project uses multiple color screens and automated sequencing software on small computers. Given a projection of current capabilities, future control centers will be even more cost-effective.

High assurance SPIRAL

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Franchetti, Franz; Sandryhaila, Aliaksei; Johnson, Jeremy R.

2014-06-01

In this paper we introduce High Assurance SPIRAL to solve the last mile problem for the synthesis of high assurance implementations of controllers for vehicular systems that are executed in today's and future embedded and high performance embedded system processors. High Assurance SPIRAL is a scalable methodology to translate a high level specification of a high assurance controller into a highly resource-efficient, platform-adapted, verified control software implementation for a given platform in a language like C or C++. High Assurance SPIRAL proves that the implementation is equivalent to the specification written in the control engineer's domain language. Our approach scales to problems involving floating-point calculations and provides highly optimized synthesized code. It is possible to estimate the available headroom to enable assurance/performance trade-offs under real-time constraints, and enables the synthesis of multiple implementation variants to make attacks harder. At the core of High Assurance SPIRAL is the Hybrid Control Operator Language (HCOL) that leverages advanced mathematical constructs expressing the controller specification to provide high quality translation capabilities. Combined with a verified/certified compiler, High Assurance SPIRAL provides a comprehensive complete solution to the efficient synthesis of verifiable high assurance controllers. We demonstrate High Assurance SPIRALs capability by co-synthesizing proofs and implementations for attack detection and sensor spoofing algorithms and deploy the code as ROS nodes on the Landshark unmanned ground vehicle and on a Synthetic Car in a real-time simulator.

Mars Science Laboratory Workstation Test Set

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Henriquez, David A.; Canham, Timothy K.; Chang, Johnny T.; Villaume, Nathaniel

2009-01-01

The Mars Science Laboratory developed the Workstation TestSet (WSTS) is a computer program that enables flight software development on virtual MSL avionics. The WSTS is the non-real-time flight avionics simulator that is designed to be completely software-based and run on a workstation class Linux PC.

Tired of Teaching Software Applications?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Lippert, Susan K.; Granger, Mary J.

Many university business schools have an instructor-led course introducing computer software application packages. This course is often required for all undergraduates and is a prerequisite to other courses, such as accounting, finance, marketing, and operations management. Knowledge and skills gained in this course should enable students not only…

Software-Based Student Response Systems: An Interdisciplinary Initiative

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Fischer, Carol M.; Hoffman, Michael S.; Casey, Nancy C.; Cox, Maureen P.

2015-01-01

Colleagues from information technology and three academic departments collaborated on an instructional technology initiative to employ student response systems in classes in mathematics, accounting and education. The instructors assessed the viability of using software-based systems to enable students to use their own devices (cell phones,…

Improving Airline Safety

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

1998-01-01

Under a NASA-Ames Space Act Agreement, Coryphaeus Software and Simauthor, Inc., developed an Aviation Performance Measuring System (APMS). This software, developed for the aerospace and airline industry, enables the replay of Digital Flight Data Recorder (DFDR) data in a flexible, user-configurable, real-time, high fidelity 3D (three dimensional) environment.

C-Language Integrated Production System, Version 5.1

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Riley, Gary; Donnell, Brian; Ly, Huyen-Anh VU; Culbert, Chris; Savely, Robert T.; Mccoy, Daniel J.; Giarratano, Joseph

1992-01-01

CLIPS 5.1 provides cohesive software tool for handling wide variety of knowledge with support for three different programming paradigms: rule-based, object-oriented, and procedural. Rule-based programming provides representation of knowledge by use of heuristics. Object-oriented programming enables modeling of complex systems as modular components. Procedural programming enables CLIPS to represent knowledge in ways similar to those allowed in such languages as C, Pascal, Ada, and LISP. Working with CLIPS 5.1, one can develop expert-system software by use of rule-based programming only, object-oriented programming only, procedural programming only, or combinations of the three.

The CARIBU EBIS control and synchronization system

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Dickerson, Clayton, E-mail: cdickerson@anl.gov; Peters, Christopher, E-mail: cdickerson@anl.gov

2015-01-09

The Californium Rare Isotope Breeder Upgrade (CARIBU) Electron Beam Ion Source (EBIS) charge breeder has been built and tested. The bases of the CARIBU EBIS electrical system are four voltage platforms on which both DC and pulsed high voltage outputs are controlled. The high voltage output pulses are created with either a combination of a function generator and a high voltage amplifier, or two high voltage DC power supplies and a high voltage solid state switch. Proper synchronization of the pulsed voltages, fundamental to optimizing the charge breeding performance, is achieved with triggering from a digital delay pulse generator. Themore » control system is based on National Instruments realtime controllers and LabVIEW software implementing Functional Global Variables (FGV) to store and access instrument parameters. Fiber optic converters enable network communication and triggering across the platforms.« less

Development of a Platform to Enable Fully Automated Cross-Titration Experiments.

PubMed

Cassaday, Jason; Finley, Michael; Squadroni, Brian; Jezequel-Sur, Sylvie; Rauch, Albert; Gajera, Bharti; Uebele, Victor; Hermes, Jeffrey; Zuck, Paul

2017-04-01

In the triage of hits from a high-throughput screening campaign or during the optimization of a lead compound, it is relatively routine to test compounds at multiple concentrations to determine potency and maximal effect. Additional follow-up experiments, such as agonist shift, can be quite valuable in ascertaining compound mechanism of action (MOA). However, these experiments require cross-titration of a test compound with the activating ligand of the receptor requiring 100-200 data points, severely limiting the number tested in MOA assays in a screening triage. We describe a process to enhance the throughput of such cross-titration experiments through the integration of Hewlett Packard's D300 digital dispenser onto one of our robotics platforms to enable on-the-fly cross-titration of compounds in a 1536-well plate format. The process handles all the compound management and data tracking, as well as the biological assay. The process relies heavily on in-house-built software and hardware, and uses our proprietary control software for the platform. Using this system, we were able to automate the cross-titration of compounds for both positive and negative allosteric modulators of two different G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs) using two distinct assay detection formats, IP1 and Ca 2+ detection, on nearly 100 compounds for each target.

Peridigm summary report : lessons learned in development with agile components.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Salinger, Andrew Gerhard; Mitchell, John Anthony; Littlewood, David John

2011-09-01

This report details efforts to deploy Agile Components for rapid development of a peridynamics code, Peridigm. The goal of Agile Components is to enable the efficient development of production-quality software by providing a well-defined, unifying interface to a powerful set of component-based software. Specifically, Agile Components facilitate interoperability among packages within the Trilinos Project, including data management, time integration, uncertainty quantification, and optimization. Development of the Peridigm code served as a testbed for Agile Components and resulted in a number of recommendations for future development. Agile Components successfully enabled rapid integration of Trilinos packages into Peridigm. A cost of thismore » approach, however, was a set of restrictions on Peridigm's architecture which impacted the ability to track history-dependent material data, dynamically modify the model discretization, and interject user-defined routines into the time integration algorithm. These restrictions resulted in modifications to the Agile Components approach, as implemented in Peridigm, and in a set of recommendations for future Agile Components development. Specific recommendations include improved handling of material states, a more flexible flow control model, and improved documentation. A demonstration mini-application, SimpleODE, was developed at the onset of this project and is offered as a potential supplement to Agile Components documentation.« less

A Visual Basic program for analyzing oedometer test results and evaluating intergranular void ratio

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Monkul, M. Murat; Önal, Okan

2006-06-01

A visual basic program (POCI) is proposed and explained in order to analyze oedometer test results. Oedometer test results have vital importance from geotechnical point of view, since settlement requirements usually control the design of foundations. The software POCI is developed in order perform the necessary calculations for convential oedometer test. The change of global void ratio and stress-strain characteristics can be observed both numerically and graphically. It enables the users to calculate some parameters such as coefficient of consolidation, compression index, recompression index, and preconsolidation pressure depending on the type and stress history of the soil. Moreover, it adopts the concept of intergranular void ratio which may be important especially in the compression behavior of sandy soils. POCI shows the variation of intergranular void ratio and also enables the users to calculate granular compression index.

MRI-based dynamic tracking of an untethered ferromagnetic microcapsule navigating in liquid

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Dahmen, Christian; Belharet, Karim; Folio, David; Ferreira, Antoine; Fatikow, Sergej

2016-04-01

The propulsion of ferromagnetic objects by means of MRI gradients is a promising approach to enable new forms of therapy. In this work, necessary techniques are presented to make this approach work. This includes path planning algorithms working on MRI data, ferromagnetic artifact imaging and a tracking algorithm which delivers position feedback for the ferromagnetic objects, and a propulsion sequence to enable interleaved magnetic propulsion and imaging. Using a dedicated software environment, integrating path-planning methods and real-time tracking, a clinical MRI system is adapted to provide this new functionality for controlled interventional targeted therapeutic applications. Through MRI-based sensing analysis, this article aims to propose a framework to plan a robust pathway to enhance the navigation ability to reach deep locations in the human body. The proposed approaches are validated with different experiments.

Enabling people with developmental disabilities to actively follow simple instructions and perform designated physical activities according to simple instructions with Nintendo Wii Balance Boards by controlling environmental stimulation.

PubMed

Shih, Ching-Hsiang; Chung, Chiao-Chen; Shih, Ching-Tien; Chen, Ling-Che

2011-01-01

The latest researches have adopted software technology turning the Nintendo Wii Balance Board into a high performance standing location detector. This study extended Wii Balance Board functionality to assess whether two people with developmental disabilities would be able to actively perform designated physical activities according to simple instructions by controlling their favorite environmental stimulation using Nintendo Wii Balance Boards. This study was carried out according to an A-B-A-B design. Data showed that both participants significantly increased their target response (performing a designated physical activity) by activating the control system to produce their preferred environmental stimulation during the intervention phases. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Database Organisation in a Web-Enabled Free and Open-Source Software (foss) Environment for Spatio-Temporal Landslide Modelling

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Das, I.; Oberai, K.; Sarathi Roy, P.

2012-07-01

Landslides exhibit themselves in different mass movement processes and are considered among the most complex natural hazards occurring on the earth surface. Making landslide database available online via WWW (World Wide Web) promotes the spreading and reaching out of the landslide information to all the stakeholders. The aim of this research is to present a comprehensive database for generating landslide hazard scenario with the help of available historic records of landslides and geo-environmental factors and make them available over the Web using geospatial Free & Open Source Software (FOSS). FOSS reduces the cost of the project drastically as proprietary software's are very costly. Landslide data generated for the period 1982 to 2009 were compiled along the national highway road corridor in Indian Himalayas. All the geo-environmental datasets along with the landslide susceptibility map were served through WEBGIS client interface. Open source University of Minnesota (UMN) mapserver was used as GIS server software for developing web enabled landslide geospatial database. PHP/Mapscript server-side application serve as a front-end application and PostgreSQL with PostGIS extension serve as a backend application for the web enabled landslide spatio-temporal databases. This dynamic virtual visualization process through a web platform brings an insight into the understanding of the landslides and the resulting damage closer to the affected people and user community. The landslide susceptibility dataset is also made available as an Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) Web Feature Service (WFS) which can be accessed through any OGC compliant open source or proprietary GIS Software.

[Construction of educational software about personality disorders].

PubMed

Botti, Nadja Cristiane Lappann; Carneiro, Ana Luíza Marques; Almeida, Camila Souza; Pereira, Cíntia Braga Silva

2011-01-01

The study describes the experience of building educational software in the area of mental health. The software was developed to enable the nursing student identify personality disorders. In this process, we applied the pedagogical framework of Vygotsky and the theoretical framework of the diagnostic criteria defined by DSM-IV. From these references were identified personality disorders characters in stories and / or children's movies. The software development bank was built with multimedia graphics data, sound and explanatory. The software developed like educational game like questions with increasing levels of difficulty. The software was developed with Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2007. It is believed in the validity of this strategy for teaching-learning to the area of mental health nursing.

Small Business Innovations

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

1993-01-01

Under an Army Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grant, Symbiotics, Inc. developed a software system that permits users to upgrade products from standalone applications so they can communicate in a distributed computing environment. Under a subsequent NASA SBIR grant, Symbiotics added additional tools to the SOCIAL product to enable NASA to coordinate conventional systems for planning Shuttle launch support operations. Using SOCIAL, data may be shared among applications in a computer network even when the applications are written in different programming languages. The product was introduced to the commercial market in 1993 and is used to monitor and control equipment for operation support and to integrate financial networks. The SBIR program was established to increase small business participation in federal R&D activities and to transfer government research to industry. InQuisiX is a reuse library providing high performance classification, cataloging, searching, browsing, retrieval and synthesis capabilities. These form the foundation for software reuse, producing higher quality software at lower cost and in less time. Software Productivity Solutions, Inc. developed the technology under Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) projects funded by NASA and the Army and is marketing InQuisiX in conjunction with Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC). The SBIR program was established to increase small business participation in federal R&D activities and to transfer government research to industry.

Use of Dynamic Models and Operational Architecture to Solve Complex Navy Challenges

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Grande, Darby; Black, J. Todd; Freeman, Jared; Sorber, TIm; Serfaty, Daniel

2010-01-01

The United States Navy established 8 Maritime Operations Centers (MOC) to enhance the command and control of forces at the operational level of warfare. Each MOC is a headquarters manned by qualified joint operational-level staffs, and enabled by globally interoperable C41 systems. To assess and refine MOC staffing, equipment, and schedules, a dynamic software model was developed. The model leverages pre-existing operational process architecture, joint military task lists that define activities and their precedence relations, as well as Navy documents that specify manning and roles per activity. The software model serves as a "computational wind-tunnel" in which to test a MOC on a mission, and to refine its structure, staffing, processes, and schedules. More generally, the model supports resource allocation decisions concerning Doctrine, Organization, Training, Material, Leadership, Personnel and Facilities (DOTMLPF) at MOCs around the world. A rapid prototype effort efficiently produced this software in less than five months, using an integrated process team consisting of MOC military and civilian staff, modeling experts, and software developers. The work reported here was conducted for Commander, United States Fleet Forces Command in Norfolk, Virginia, code N5-0LW (Operational Level of War) that facilitates the identification, consolidation, and prioritization of MOC capabilities requirements, and implementation and delivery of MOC solutions.

Time-lapse microscopy and image processing for stem cell research: modeling cell migration

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gustavsson, Tomas; Althoff, Karin; Degerman, Johan; Olsson, Torsten; Thoreson, Ann-Catrin; Thorlin, Thorleif; Eriksson, Peter

2003-05-01

This paper presents hardware and software procedures for automated cell tracking and migration modeling. A time-lapse microscopy system equipped with a computer controllable motorized stage was developed. The performance of this stage was improved by incorporating software algorithms for stage motion displacement compensation and auto focus. The microscope is suitable for in-vitro stem cell studies and allows for multiple cell culture image sequence acquisition. This enables comparative studies concerning rate of cell splits, average cell motion velocity, cell motion as a function of cell sample density and many more. Several cell segmentation procedures are described as well as a cell tracking algorithm. Statistical methods for describing cell migration patterns are presented. In particular, the Hidden Markov Model (HMM) was investigated. Results indicate that if the cell motion can be described as a non-stationary stochastic process, then the HMM can adequately model aspects of its dynamic behavior.

Automating Mission Scheduling for Space-Based Observatories

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Pell, Barney; Muscettola, Nicola; Hansson, Othar; Mohan, Sunil

1998-01-01

In this paper we describe the use of our planning and scheduling framework, HSTS, to reduce the complexity of science mission planning. This work is part of an overall project to enable a small team of scientists to control the operations of a spacecraft. The present process is highly labor intensive. Users (scientists and operators) rely on a non-codified understanding of the different spacecraft subsystems and of their operating constraints. They use a variety of software tools to support their decision making process. This paper considers the types of decision making that need to be supported/automated, the nature of the domain constraints and the capabilities needed to address them successfully, and the nature of external software systems with which the core planning/scheduling engine needs to interact. HSTS has been applied to science scheduling for EUVE and Cassini and is being adapted to support autonomous spacecraft operations in the New Millennium initiative.

Tuberculosis control, and the where and why of artificial intelligence

PubMed Central

Falzon, Dennis; Thomas, Bruce V.; Temesgen, Zelalem; Sadasivan, Lal; Raviglione, Mario

2017-01-01

Countries aiming to reduce their tuberculosis (TB) burden by 2035 to the levels envisaged by the World Health Organization End TB Strategy need to innovate, with approaches such as digital health (electronic and mobile health) in support of patient care, surveillance, programme management, training and communication. Alongside the large-scale roll-out required for such interventions to make a significant impact, products must stay abreast of advancing technology over time. The integration of artificial intelligence into new software promises to make processes more effective and efficient, endowing them with a potential hitherto unimaginable. Users can benefit from artificial intelligence-enabled pattern recognition software for tasks ranging from reading radiographs to adverse event monitoring, sifting through vast datasets to personalise a patient's care plan or to customise training materials. Many experts forecast the imminent transformation of the delivery of healthcare services. We discuss how artificial intelligence and machine learning could revolutionise the management of TB. PMID:28656130

CT and MRI slice separation evaluation by LabView developed software.

PubMed

Acri, Giuseppe; Testagrossa, Barbara; Sestito, Angela; Bonanno, Lilla; Vermiglio, Giuseppe

2018-02-01

The efficient use of Computed Tomography (CT) and Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) equipment necessitates establishing adequate quality-control (QC) procedures. In particular, the accuracy of slice separation, during multislices acquisition, requires scan exploration of phantoms containing test objects. To simplify such procedures, a novel phantom and a computerised LabView-based procedure have been devised, enabling determination the midpoint of full width at half maximum (FWHM) in real time while the distance from the profile midpoint of two progressive images is evaluated and measured. The results were compared with those obtained by processing the same phantom images with commercial software. To validate the proposed methodology the Fisher test was conducted on the resulting data sets. In all cases, there was no statistically significant variation between the commercial procedure and the LabView one, which can be used on any CT and MRI diagnostic devices. Copyright © 2017. Published by Elsevier GmbH.

Implementing finite state machines in a computer-based teaching system

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hacker, Charles H.; Sitte, Renate

1999-09-01

Finite State Machines (FSM) are models for functions commonly implemented in digital circuits such as timers, remote controls, and vending machines. Teaching FSM is core in the curriculum of many university digital electronic or discrete mathematics subjects. Students often have difficulties grasping the theoretical concepts in the design and analysis of FSM. This has prompted the author to develop an MS-WindowsTM compatible software, WinState, that provides a tutorial style teaching aid for understanding the mechanisms of FSM. The animated computer screen is ideal for visually conveying the required design and analysis procedures. WinState complements other software for combinatorial logic previously developed by the author, and enhances the existing teaching package by adding sequential logic circuits. WinState enables the construction of a students own FSM, which can be simulated, to test the design for functionality and possible errors.

Human-Automation Integration: Principle and Method for Design and Evaluation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Billman, Dorrit; Feary, Michael

2012-01-01

Future space missions will increasingly depend on integration of complex engineered systems with their human operators. It is important to ensure that the systems that are designed and developed do a good job of supporting the needs of the work domain. Our research investigates methods for needs analysis. We included analysis of work products (plans for regulation of the space station) as well as work processes (tasks using current software), in a case study of Attitude Determination and Control Officers (ADCO) planning work. This allows comparing how well different designs match the structure of the work to be supported. Redesigned planning software that better matches the structure of work was developed and experimentally assessed. The new prototype enabled substantially faster and more accurate performance in plan revision tasks. This success suggests the approach to needs assessment and use in design and evaluation is promising, and merits investigatation in future research.

Perl Extension to the Bproc Library

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Grunau, Daryl W.

2004-06-07

The Beowulf Distributed process Space (Bproc) software stack is comprised of UNIX/Linux kernel modifications and a support library by which a cluster of machines, each running their own private kernel, can present itself as a unified process space to the user. A Bproc cluster contains a single front-end machine and many back-end nodes which receive and run processes given to them by the front-end. Any process which is migrated to a back-end node is also visible as a ghost process on the fron-end, and may be controlled there using traditional UNIX semantics (e.g. ps(1), kill(1), etc). This software is amore » Perl extension to the Bproc library which enables the Perl programmer to make direct calls to functions within the Bproc library. See http://www.clustermatic.org, http://bproc.sourceforge.net, and http://www.perl.org« less

PredGuid+A: Orion Entry Guidance Modified for Aerocapture

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Lafleur, Jarret

2013-01-01

PredGuid+A software was developed to enable a unique numerical predictor-corrector aerocapture guidance capability that builds on heritage Orion entry guidance algorithms. The software can be used for both planetary entry and aerocapture applications. Furthermore, PredGuid+A implements a new Delta-V minimization guidance option that can take the place of traditional targeting guidance and can result in substantial propellant savings. PredGuid+A allows the user to set a mode flag and input a target orbit's apoapsis and periapsis. Using bank angle control, the guidance will then guide the vehicle to the appropriate post-aerocapture orbit using one of two algorithms: Apoapsis Targeting or Delta-V Minimization (as chosen by the user). Recently, the PredGuid guidance algorithm was adapted for use in skip-entry scenarios for NASA's Orion multi-purpose crew vehicle (MPCV). To leverage flight heritage, most of Orion's entry guidance routines are adapted from the Apollo program.

Tuberculosis control, and the where and why of artificial intelligence.

PubMed

Doshi, Riddhi; Falzon, Dennis; Thomas, Bruce V; Temesgen, Zelalem; Sadasivan, Lal; Migliori, Giovanni Battista; Raviglione, Mario

2017-04-01

Countries aiming to reduce their tuberculosis (TB) burden by 2035 to the levels envisaged by the World Health Organization End TB Strategy need to innovate, with approaches such as digital health (electronic and mobile health) in support of patient care, surveillance, programme management, training and communication. Alongside the large-scale roll-out required for such interventions to make a significant impact, products must stay abreast of advancing technology over time. The integration of artificial intelligence into new software promises to make processes more effective and efficient, endowing them with a potential hitherto unimaginable. Users can benefit from artificial intelligence-enabled pattern recognition software for tasks ranging from reading radiographs to adverse event monitoring, sifting through vast datasets to personalise a patient's care plan or to customise training materials. Many experts forecast the imminent transformation of the delivery of healthcare services. We discuss how artificial intelligence and machine learning could revolutionise the management of TB.

Review of Software Tools for Design and Analysis of Large scale MRM Proteomic Datasets

PubMed Central

Colangelo, Christopher M.; Chung, Lisa; Bruce, Can; Cheung, Kei-Hoi

2013-01-01

Selective or Multiple Reaction monitoring (SRM/MRM) is a liquid-chromatography (LC)/tandem-mass spectrometry (MS/MS) method that enables the quantitation of specific proteins in a sample by analyzing precursor ions and the fragment ions of their selected tryptic peptides. Instrumentation software has advanced to the point that thousands of transitions (pairs of primary and secondary m/z values) can be measured in a triple quadrupole instrument coupled to an LC, by a well-designed scheduling and selection of m/z windows. The design of a good MRM assay relies on the availability of peptide spectra from previous discovery-phase LC-MS/MS studies. The tedious aspect of manually developing and processing MRM assays involving thousands of transitions has spurred to development of software tools to automate this process. Software packages have been developed for project management, assay development, assay validation, data export, peak integration, quality assessment, and biostatistical analysis. No single tool provides a complete end-to-end solution, thus this article reviews the current state and discusses future directions of these software tools in order to enable researchers to combine these tools for a comprehensive targeted proteomics workflow. PMID:23702368

A unifying framework for systems modeling, control systems design, and system operation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Dvorak, Daniel L.; Indictor, Mark B.; Ingham, Michel D.; Rasmussen, Robert D.; Stringfellow, Margaret V.

2005-01-01

Current engineering practice in the analysis and design of large-scale multi-disciplinary control systems is typified by some form of decomposition- whether functional or physical or discipline-based-that enables multiple teams to work in parallel and in relative isolation. Too often, the resulting system after integration is an awkward marriage of different control and data mechanisms with poor end-to-end accountability. System of systems engineering, which faces this problem on a large scale, cries out for a unifying framework to guide analysis, design, and operation. This paper describes such a framework based on a state-, model-, and goal-based architecture for semi-autonomous control systems that guides analysis and modeling, shapes control system software design, and directly specifies operational intent. This paper illustrates the key concepts in the context of a large-scale, concurrent, globally distributed system of systems: NASA's proposed Array-based Deep Space Network.

Integrated Control Modeling for Propulsion Systems Using NPSS

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Parker, Khary I.; Felder, James L.; Lavelle, Thomas M.; Withrow, Colleen A.; Yu, Albert Y.; Lehmann, William V. A.

2004-01-01

The Numerical Propulsion System Simulation (NPSS), an advanced engineering simulation environment used to design and analyze aircraft engines, has been enhanced by integrating control development tools into it. One of these tools is a generic controller interface that allows NPSS to communicate with control development software environments such as MATLAB and EASY5. The other tool is a linear model generator (LMG) that gives NPSS the ability to generate linear, time-invariant state-space models. Integrating these tools into NPSS enables it to be used for control system development. This paper will discuss the development and integration of these tools into NPSS. In addition, it will show a comparison of transient model results of a generic, dual-spool, military-type engine model that has been implemented in NPSS and Simulink. It will also show the linear model generator s ability to approximate the dynamics of a nonlinear NPSS engine model.

Near Real Time Review of Instrument Performance using the Airborne Data Processing and Analysis Software Package

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Delene, D. J.

2014-12-01

Research aircraft that conduct atmospheric measurements carry an increasing array of instrumentation. While on-board personnel constantly review instrument parameters and time series plots, there are an overwhelming number of items. Furthermore, directing the aircraft flight takes up much of the flight scientist time. Typically, a flight engineer is given the responsibility of reviewing the status of on-board instruments. While major issues like not receiving data are quickly identified during a flight, subtle issues like low but believable concentration measurements may go unnoticed. Therefore, it is critical to review data after a flight in near real time. The Airborne Data Processing and Analysis (ADPAA) software package used by the University of North Dakota automates the post-processing of aircraft flight data. Utilizing scripts to process the measurements recorded by data acquisition systems enables the generation of data files within an hour of flight completion. The ADPAA Cplot visualization program enables plots to be quickly generated that enable timely review of all recorded and processed parameters. Near real time review of aircraft flight data enables instrument problems to be identified, investigated and fixed before conducting another flight. On one flight, near real time data review resulted in the identification of unusually low measurements of cloud condensation nuclei, and rapid data visualization enabled the timely investigation of the cause. As a result, a leak was found and fixed before the next flight. Hence, with the high cost of aircraft flights, it is critical to find and fix instrument problems in a timely matter. The use of a automated processing scripts and quick visualization software enables scientists to review aircraft flight data in near real time to identify potential problems.

The Autonomous Sciencecraft and applications to future science missions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chien, S.

2006-05-01

The Autonomous Sciencecraft Software has operated the Earth Observing One (EO-1) Mission for over 5000 science observations [Chien et al. 2005a]. This software enables onboard analysis of data to drive: 1. production of rapid alerts summary products, 2. data editing, and 3. to inform subsequent observations. This methodology has been applied to more effectively study Volcano, Flooding, and Cryosphere processes on Earth. In this talk we discuss how this software enables new paradigms for science missions and discuss the types of science phenomena that can now be more readily studied (e.g. dynamic investigations, large scale searches for specific events). We also describe a range of Earth, Solar, and Space science applications under concept study for onboard autonomy. Finally, we describe ongoing work to link EO-1 with other spacecraft and in-situ sensor networks to enable a sensorweb for monitoring dynamic science events [Chien et al. 2005b]. S. Chien, R. Sherwood, D. Tran, B. Cichy, G. Rabideau, R. Castano, A. Davies, D. Mandl, S. Frye, B. Trout, S. Shulman, D. Boyer, "Using Autonomy Flight Software to Improve Science Return on Earth Observing One, Journal of Aerospace Computing, Information, & Communication, April 2005, AIAA. S. Chien, B. Cichy, A. Davies, D. Tran, G. Rabideau, R. Castano, R. Sherwood, D. Mandl, S. Frye, S. Shulman, J. Jones, S. Grosvenor, "An Autonomous Earth Observing Sensorweb," IEEE Intelligent Systems, May-June 2005, pp. 16- 24.

Customer Service Programming

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

1982-01-01

Use of computer program STRCMACS has enabled Illinois Bell Telephone, a subsidiary of American Telephone and Telegraph to cut software development costs about 10 percent by reducing program maintenance and by allowing the department to bring other software into operation more quickly. It has also been useful in company training of programming staff.

48 CFR 52.227-14 - Rights in Data-General.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-10-01

... database or database means a collection of recorded information in a form capable of, and for the purpose... enable the computer program to be produced, created, or compiled. (2) Does not include computer databases... databases and computer software documentation). This term does not include computer software or financial...

48 CFR 52.227-14 - Rights in Data-General.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-10-01

... database or database means a collection of recorded information in a form capable of, and for the purpose... enable the computer program to be produced, created, or compiled. (2) Does not include computer databases... databases and computer software documentation). This term does not include computer software or financial...

48 CFR 52.227-14 - Rights in Data-General.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-10-01

... database or database means a collection of recorded information in a form capable of, and for the purpose... enable the computer program to be produced, created, or compiled. (2) Does not include computer databases... databases and computer software documentation). This term does not include computer software or financial...

48 CFR 52.227-14 - Rights in Data-General.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-10-01

... database or database means a collection of recorded information in a form capable of, and for the purpose... enable the computer program to be produced, created, or compiled. (2) Does not include computer databases... databases and computer software documentation). This term does not include computer software or financial...

Security Code Red or Ready? Leaders Sharing--For Tech Leaders

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hall, Don; Kelly, Pat

2005-01-01

Increasingly, teachers rely on computer software and networks to both enhance curriculum management and provide engaging learning opportunities in instruction. New software is enabling more frequent formative assessments to better focus day-to-day lessons on the unique needs of individual learners. Administrators use increasingly complex data…

Cyber Strategic Inquiry: Enabling Change through a Strategic Simulation and Megacommunity Concept

DTIC Science & Technology

2009-02-01

malicious software embedded in thumb drives and CDs that thwarted protections, such as antivirus software , on computers. In the scenario, these...Executives for National Security • The Carlyle Group • Cassat Corporation • Cisco Systems, Inc. • Cyveillance • General Dynamics • General Motors

Next Generation Image-Based Phenotyping of Root System Architecture

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Davis, T. W.; Shaw, N. M.; Cheng, H.; Larson, B. G.; Craft, E. J.; Shaff, J. E.; Schneider, D. J.; Piñeros, M. A.; Kochian, L. V.

2016-12-01

The development of the Plant Root Imaging and Data Acquisition (PRIDA) hardware/software system enables researchers to collect digital images, along with all the relevant experimental details, of a range of hydroponically grown agricultural crop roots for 2D and 3D trait analysis. Previous efforts of image-based root phenotyping focused on young cereals, such as rice; however, there is a growing need to measure both older and larger root systems, such as those of maize and sorghum, to improve our understanding of the underlying genetics that control favorable rooting traits for plant breeding programs to combat the agricultural risks presented by climate change. Therefore, a larger imaging apparatus has been prototyped for capturing 3D root architecture with an adaptive control system and innovative plant root growth media that retains three-dimensional root architectural features. New publicly available multi-platform software has been released with considerations for both high throughput (e.g., 3D imaging of a single root system in under ten minutes) and high portability (e.g., support for the Raspberry Pi computer). The software features unified data collection, management, exploration and preservation for continued trait and genetics analysis of root system architecture. The new system makes data acquisition efficient and includes features that address the needs of researchers and technicians, such as reduced imaging time, semi-automated camera calibration with uncertainty characterization, and safe storage of the critical experimental data.

Enabling MPEG-2 video playback in embedded systems through improved data cache efficiency

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Soderquist, Peter; Leeser, Miriam E.

1999-01-01

Digital video decoding, enabled by the MPEG-2 Video standard, is an important future application for embedded systems, particularly PDAs and other information appliances. Many such system require portability and wireless communication capabilities, and thus face severe limitations in size and power consumption. This places a premium on integration and efficiency, and favors software solutions for video functionality over specialized hardware. The processors in most embedded system currently lack the computational power needed to perform video decoding, but a related and equally important problem is the required data bandwidth, and the need to cost-effectively insure adequate data supply. MPEG data sets are very large, and generate significant amounts of excess memory traffic for standard data caches, up to 100 times the amount required for decoding. Meanwhile, cost and power limitations restrict cache sizes in embedded systems. Some systems, including many media processors, eliminate caches in favor of memories under direct, painstaking software control in the manner of digital signal processors. Yet MPEG data has locality which caches can exploit if properly optimized, providing fast, flexible, and automatic data supply. We propose a set of enhancements which target the specific needs of the heterogeneous types within the MPEG decoder working set. These optimizations significantly improve the efficiency of small caches, reducing cache-memory traffic by almost 70 percent, and can make an enhanced 4 KB cache perform better than a standard 1 MB cache. This performance improvement can enable high-resolution, full frame rate video playback in cheaper, smaller system than woudl otherwise be possible.

A versatile LabVIEW and field-programmable gate array-based scanning probe microscope for in operando electronic device characterization.

PubMed

Berger, Andrew J; Page, Michael R; Jacob, Jan; Young, Justin R; Lewis, Jim; Wenzel, Lothar; Bhallamudi, Vidya P; Johnston-Halperin, Ezekiel; Pelekhov, Denis V; Hammel, P Chris

2014-12-01

Understanding the complex properties of electronic and spintronic devices at the micro- and nano-scale is a topic of intense current interest as it becomes increasingly important for scientific progress and technological applications. In operando characterization of such devices by scanning probe techniques is particularly well-suited for the microscopic study of these properties. We have developed a scanning probe microscope (SPM) which is capable of both standard force imaging (atomic, magnetic, electrostatic) and simultaneous electrical transport measurements. We utilize flexible and inexpensive FPGA (field-programmable gate array) hardware and a custom software framework developed in National Instrument's LabVIEW environment to perform the various aspects of microscope operation and device measurement. The FPGA-based approach enables sensitive, real-time cantilever frequency-shift detection. Using this system, we demonstrate electrostatic force microscopy of an electrically biased graphene field-effect transistor device. The combination of SPM and electrical transport also enables imaging of the transport response to a localized perturbation provided by the scanned cantilever tip. Facilitated by the broad presence of LabVIEW in the experimental sciences and the openness of our software solution, our system permits a wide variety of combined scanning and transport measurements by providing standardized interfaces and flexible access to all aspects of a measurement (input and output signals, and processed data). Our system also enables precise control of timing (synchronization of scanning and transport operations) and implementation of sophisticated feedback protocols, and thus should be broadly interesting and useful to practitioners in the field.

A versatile LabVIEW and field-programmable gate array-based scanning probe microscope for in operando electronic device characterization

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Berger, Andrew J., E-mail: berger.156@osu.edu; Page, Michael R.; Young, Justin R.

Understanding the complex properties of electronic and spintronic devices at the micro- and nano-scale is a topic of intense current interest as it becomes increasingly important for scientific progress and technological applications. In operando characterization of such devices by scanning probe techniques is particularly well-suited for the microscopic study of these properties. We have developed a scanning probe microscope (SPM) which is capable of both standard force imaging (atomic, magnetic, electrostatic) and simultaneous electrical transport measurements. We utilize flexible and inexpensive FPGA (field-programmable gate array) hardware and a custom software framework developed in National Instrument's LabVIEW environment to perform themore » various aspects of microscope operation and device measurement. The FPGA-based approach enables sensitive, real-time cantilever frequency-shift detection. Using this system, we demonstrate electrostatic force microscopy of an electrically biased graphene field-effect transistor device. The combination of SPM and electrical transport also enables imaging of the transport response to a localized perturbation provided by the scanned cantilever tip. Facilitated by the broad presence of LabVIEW in the experimental sciences and the openness of our software solution, our system permits a wide variety of combined scanning and transport measurements by providing standardized interfaces and flexible access to all aspects of a measurement (input and output signals, and processed data). Our system also enables precise control of timing (synchronization of scanning and transport operations) and implementation of sophisticated feedback protocols, and thus should be broadly interesting and useful to practitioners in the field.« less

Comparing Acquisition Strategies: Open Architecture versus Product Lines

DTIC Science & Technology

2010-04-30

software • New SOW language for accepting software deliveries – Enables third-party reuse • Additional SOW language regarding conducting software code walkthroughs and for using integrated development environments ...change the business environment must be the primary factor that drives the technical approach. Accordingly, there are business case decisions to be...elements of a system design should be made available to the customer to observe throughout the design process. Electronic access to the design environment

R4SA for Controlling Robots

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Aghazarian, Hrand

2009-01-01

The R4SA GUI mentioned in the immediately preceding article is a userfriendly interface for controlling one or more robot(s). This GUI makes it possible to perform meaningful real-time field experiments and research in robotics at an unmatched level of fidelity, within minutes of setup. It provides such powerful graphing modes as that of a digitizing oscilloscope that displays up to 250 variables at rates between 1 and 200 Hz. This GUI can be configured as multiple intuitive interfaces for acquisition of data, command, and control to enable rapid testing of subsystems or an entire robot system while simultaneously performing analysis of data. The R4SA software establishes an intuitive component-based design environment that can be easily reconfigured for any robotic platform by creating or editing setup configuration files. The R4SA GUI enables event-driven and conditional sequencing similar to those of Mars Exploration Rover (MER) operations. It has been certified as part of the MER ground support equipment and, therefore, is allowed to be utilized in conjunction with MER flight hardware. The R4SA GUI could also be adapted to use in embedded computing systems, other than that of the MER, for commanding and real-time analysis of data.

Web-Enabled Systems for Student Access.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Harris, Chad S.; Herring, Tom

1999-01-01

California State University, Fullerton is developing a suite of server-based, Web-enabled applications that distribute the functionality of its student information system software to external customers without modifying the mainframe applications or databases. The cost-effective, secure, and rapidly deployable business solution involves using the…

Design Considerations in Development of a Mobile Health Intervention Program: The TEXT ME and TEXTMEDS Experience

PubMed Central

Thakkar, Jay; Barry, Tony; Thiagalingam, Aravinda; Redfern, Julie; McEwan, Alistair L; Rodgers, Anthony

2016-01-01

Background Mobile health (mHealth) has huge potential to deliver preventative health services. However, there is paucity of literature on theoretical constructs, technical, practical, and regulatory considerations that enable delivery of such services. Objectives The objective of this study was to outline the key considerations in the development of a text message-based mHealth program; thus providing broad recommendations and guidance to future researchers designing similar programs. Methods We describe the key considerations in designing the intervention with respect to functionality, technical infrastructure, data management, software components, regulatory requirements, and operationalization. We also illustrate some of the potential issues and decision points utilizing our experience of developing text message (short message service, SMS) management systems to support 2 large randomized controlled trials: TEXT messages to improve MEDication adherence & Secondary prevention (TEXTMEDS) and Tobacco, EXercise and dieT MEssages (TEXT ME). Results The steps identified in the development process were: (1) background research and development of the text message bank based on scientific evidence and disease-specific guidelines, (2) pilot testing with target audience and incorporating feedback, (3) software-hardware customization to enable delivery of complex personalized programs using prespecified algorithms, and (4) legal and regulatory considerations. Additional considerations in developing text message management systems include: balancing the use of customized versus preexisting software systems, the level of automation versus need for human inputs, monitoring, ensuring data security, interface flexibility, and the ability for upscaling. Conclusions A merging of expertise in clinical and behavioral sciences, health and research data management systems, software engineering, and mobile phone regulatory requirements is essential to develop a platform to deliver and manage support programs to hundreds of participants simultaneously as in TEXT ME and TEXTMEDS trials. This research provides broad principles that may assist other researchers in developing mHealth programs. PMID:27847350

Collaborative data model and data base development for paleoenvironmental and archaeological domain using Semantic MediaWiki

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Willmes, C.

2017-12-01

In the frame of the Collaborative Research Centre 806 (CRC 806) an interdisciplinary research project, that needs to manage data, information and knowledge from heterogeneous domains, such as archeology, cultural sciences, and the geosciences, a collaborative internal knowledge base system was developed. The system is based on the open source MediaWiki software, that is well known as the software that enables Wikipedia, for its facilitation of a web based collaborative knowledge and information management platform. This software is additionally enhanced with the Semantic MediaWiki (SMW) extension, that allows to store and manage structural data within the Wiki platform, as well as it facilitates complex query and API interfaces to the structured data stored in the SMW data base. Using an additional open source software called mobo, it is possible to improve the data model development process, as well as automated data imports, from small spreadsheets to large relational databases. Mobo is a command line tool that helps building and deploying SMW structure in an agile, Schema-Driven Development way, and allows to manage and collaboratively develop the data model formalizations, that are formalized in JSON-Schema format, using version control systems like git. The combination of a well equipped collaborative web platform facilitated by Mediawiki, the possibility to store and query structured data in this collaborative database provided by SMW, as well as the possibility for automated data import and data model development enabled by mobo, result in a powerful but flexible system to build and develop a collaborative knowledge base system. Furthermore, SMW allows the application of Semantic Web technology, the structured data can be exported into RDF, thus it is possible to set a triple-store including a SPARQL endpoint on top of the database. The JSON-Schema based data models, can be enhanced into JSON-LD, to facilitate and profit from the possibilities of Linked Data technology.

Design Considerations in Development of a Mobile Health Intervention Program: The TEXT ME and TEXTMEDS Experience.

PubMed

Thakkar, Jay; Barry, Tony; Thiagalingam, Aravinda; Redfern, Julie; McEwan, Alistair L; Rodgers, Anthony; Chow, Clara K

2016-11-15

Mobile health (mHealth) has huge potential to deliver preventative health services. However, there is paucity of literature on theoretical constructs, technical, practical, and regulatory considerations that enable delivery of such services. The objective of this study was to outline the key considerations in the development of a text message-based mHealth program; thus providing broad recommendations and guidance to future researchers designing similar programs. We describe the key considerations in designing the intervention with respect to functionality, technical infrastructure, data management, software components, regulatory requirements, and operationalization. We also illustrate some of the potential issues and decision points utilizing our experience of developing text message (short message service, SMS) management systems to support 2 large randomized controlled trials: TEXT messages to improve MEDication adherence & Secondary prevention (TEXTMEDS) and Tobacco, EXercise and dieT MEssages (TEXT ME). The steps identified in the development process were: (1) background research and development of the text message bank based on scientific evidence and disease-specific guidelines, (2) pilot testing with target audience and incorporating feedback, (3) software-hardware customization to enable delivery of complex personalized programs using prespecified algorithms, and (4) legal and regulatory considerations. Additional considerations in developing text message management systems include: balancing the use of customized versus preexisting software systems, the level of automation versus need for human inputs, monitoring, ensuring data security, interface flexibility, and the ability for upscaling. A merging of expertise in clinical and behavioral sciences, health and research data management systems, software engineering, and mobile phone regulatory requirements is essential to develop a platform to deliver and manage support programs to hundreds of participants simultaneously as in TEXT ME and TEXTMEDS trials. This research provides broad principles that may assist other researchers in developing mHealth programs. ©Jay Thakkar, Tony Barry, Aravinda Thiagalingam, Julie Redfern, Alistair L McEwan, Anthony Rodgers, Clara K Chow. Originally published in JMIR Mhealth and Uhealth (http://mhealth.jmir.org), 15.11.2016.

Design Optimization Toolkit: Users' Manual

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Aguilo Valentin, Miguel Alejandro

The Design Optimization Toolkit (DOTk) is a stand-alone C++ software package intended to solve complex design optimization problems. DOTk software package provides a range of solution methods that are suited for gradient/nongradient-based optimization, large scale constrained optimization, and topology optimization. DOTk was design to have a flexible user interface to allow easy access to DOTk solution methods from external engineering software packages. This inherent flexibility makes DOTk barely intrusive to other engineering software packages. As part of this inherent flexibility, DOTk software package provides an easy-to-use MATLAB interface that enables users to call DOTk solution methods directly from the MATLABmore » command window.« less

Advanced communications technology satellite high burst rate link evaluation terminal power control and rain fade software test plan, version 1.0

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Reinhart, Richard C.

1993-01-01

The Power Control and Rain Fade Software was developed at the NASA Lewis Research Center to support the Advanced Communications Technology Satellite High Burst Rate Link Evaluation Terminal (ACTS HBR-LET). The HBR-LET is an experimenters terminal to communicate with the ACTS for various experiments by government, university, and industry agencies. The Power Control and Rain Fade Software is one segment of the Control and Performance Monitor (C&PM) Software system of the HBR-LET. The Power Control and Rain Fade Software automatically controls the LET uplink power to compensate for signal fades. Besides power augmentation, the C&PM Software system is also responsible for instrument control during HBR-LET experiments, control of the Intermediate Frequency Switch Matrix on board the ACTS to yield a desired path through the spacecraft payload, and data display. The Power Control and Rain Fade Software User's Guide, Version 1.0 outlines the commands and procedures to install and operate the Power Control and Rain Fade Software. The Power Control and Rain Fade Software Maintenance Manual, Version 1.0 is a programmer's guide to the Power Control and Rain Fade Software. This manual details the current implementation of the software from a technical perspective. Included is an overview of the Power Control and Rain Fade Software, computer algorithms, format representations, and computer hardware configuration. The Power Control and Rain Fade Test Plan provides a step-by-step procedure to verify the operation of the software using a predetermined signal fade event. The Test Plan also provides a means to demonstrate the capability of the software.

Wireless Infrastructure for Performing Monitoring, Diagnostics, and Control HVAC and Other Energy-Using Systems in Small Commercial Buildings

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Patrick O'Neill

This project focused on developing a low-cost wireless infrastructure for monitoring, diagnosing, and controlling building systems and equipment. End users receive information via the Internet and need only a web browser and Internet connection. The system used wireless communications for: (1) collecting data centrally on site from many wireless sensors installed on building equipment, (2) transmitting control signals to actuators and (3) transmitting data to an offsite network operations center where it is processed and made available to clients on the Web (see Figure 1). Although this wireless infrastructure can be applied to any building system, it was tested onmore » two representative applications: (1) monitoring and diagnostics for packaged rooftop HVAC units used widely on small commercial buildings and (2) continuous diagnosis and control of scheduling errors such as lights and equipment left on during unoccupied hours. This project developed a generic infrastructure for performance monitoring, diagnostics, and control, applicable to a broad range of building systems and equipment, but targeted specifically to small to medium commercial buildings (an underserved market segment). The proposed solution is based on two wireless technologies. The first, wireless telemetry, is used for cell phones and paging and is reliable and widely available. This risk proved to be easily managed during the project. The second technology is on-site wireless communication for acquiring data from sensors and transmitting control signals. The technology must enable communication with many nodes, overcome physical obstructions, operate in environments with other electrical equipment, support operation with on-board power (instead of line power) for some applications, operate at low transmission power in license-free radio bands, and be low cost. We proposed wireless mesh networking to meet these needs. This technology is relatively new and has been applied only in research and tests. This proved to be a major challenge for the project and was ultimately abandoned in favor of a directly wired solution for collecting sensor data at the building. The primary reason for this was the relatively short ranges at which we were able to effectively place the sensor nodes from the central receiving unit. Several different mesh technologies were attempted with similar results. Two hardware devices were created during the original performance period of the project. The first device, the WEB-MC, is a master control unit that has two radios, a CPU, memory, and serves as the central communications device for the WEB-MC System (Currently called the 'BEST Wireless HVAC Maintenance System' as a tentative commercial product name). The WEB-MC communicates with the local mesh network system via one of its antennas. Communication with the mesh network enables the WEB-MC to configure the network, send/receive data from individual motes, and serves as the primary mechanism for collecting sensor data at remote locations. The second antenna enables the WEB-MC to connect to a cellular network ('Long-Haul Communications') to transfer data to and from the NorthWrite Network Operations Center (NOC). A third 'all-in-one' hardware solution was created after the project was extended (Phase 2) and additional resources were provided. The project team leveraged a project funded by the State of Washington to develop a hardware solution that integrated the functionality of the original two devices. The primary reason for this approach was to eliminate the mesh network technical difficulties that severely limited the functionality of the original hardware approach. There were five separate software developments required to deliver the functionality needed for this project. These include the Data Server (or Network Operations Center), Web Application, Diagnostic Software, WEB-MC Embedded Software, Mote Embedded Software. Each of these developments was necessarily dependent on the others. This resulted in a challenging management task - requiring high bandwidth communications among all the team members. Fortunately, the project team performed exceptionally well together and was able to work through the various challenges that this presented - for example, when one software tool required a detailed description of the output of a second tool, before that tool had been fully designed.« less

A Test Bed for Detection of Botnet Infections in Low Data Rate Tactical Networks

DTIC Science & Technology

2009-09-01

perimeter, their effectiveness in preventing further proliferation within a LAN is almost non-existent. Conficker disables antivirus and firewall software...enable: Yes Disable “strict” capture filtering: no Fencelist location: /etc/fencelist.txt (IP addresses and CIDR blocks Enable Fencelist filtering

Terra Harvest Open Source Environment (THOSE): a universal unattended ground sensor controller

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gold, Joshua; Klawon, Kevin; Humeniuk, David; Landoll, Darren

2011-06-01

Under the Terra Harvest Program, the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) has the objective of developing a universal Controller for the Unattended Ground Sensor (UGS) community. The mission is to define, implement, and thoroughly document an open architecture that universally supports UGS missions, integrating disparate systems, peripherals, etc. The Controller's inherent interoperability with numerous systems enables the integration of both legacy and future Unattended Ground Sensor System (UGSS) components, while the design's open architecture supports rapid third-party development to ensure operational readiness. The successful accomplishment of these objectives by the program's Phase 3b contractors is demonstrated via integration of the companies' respective plug-'n-play contributions that include various peripherals, such as sensors, cameras, etc., and their associated software drivers. In order to independently validate the Terra Harvest architecture, L-3 Nova Engineering, along with its partner, the University of Dayton Research Institute (UDRI), is developing the Terra Harvest Open Source Environment (THOSE), a Java based system running on an embedded Linux Operating System (OS). The Use Cases on which the software is developed support the full range of UGS operational scenarios such as remote sensor triggering, image capture, and data exfiltration. The Team is additionally developing an ARM microprocessor evaluation platform that is both energyefficient and operationally flexible. The paper describes the overall THOSE architecture, as well as the implementation strategy for some of the key software components. Preliminary integration/test results and the Team's approach for transitioning the THOSE design and source code to the Government are also presented.

CASL Dakota Capabilities Summary

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Adams, Brian M.; Simmons, Chris; Williams, Brian J.

2017-10-10

The Dakota software project serves the mission of Sandia National Laboratories and supports a worldwide user community by delivering state-of-the-art research and robust, usable software for optimization and uncertainty quantification. These capabilities enable advanced exploration and riskinformed prediction with a wide range of computational science and engineering models. Dakota is the verification and validation (V&V) / uncertainty quantification (UQ) software delivery vehicle for CASL, allowing analysts across focus areas to apply these capabilities to myriad nuclear engineering analyses.

Asynchronous Education: A Blueprint for the Future of Adult Learning.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Krueger, Lyle L.; Porter, Cyndi Wilson; Burke, Daniel

While the distance learning curriculum at Lakeland College (Wisconsin) began 20 years ago, the idea for Lakeland Online was conceived about two and one-half years ago. A variety of delivery modes were considered before discovering Convene software. Since the communication process enabled by the Convene software is asynchronous and requires only a…

Empowering Teachers to Create Educational Software: A Constructivist Approach Utilizing Etoys, Pair Programming and Cognitive Apprenticeship

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Lee, Young-Jin

2011-01-01

This study investigates whether a visual programming environment called Etoys could enable teachers to create software applications meeting their own instructional needs. Twenty-four teachers who participated in the study successfully developed their own educational computer programs in the educational technology course employing cognitive…

Hardware and software improvements to a low-cost horizontal parallax holographic video monitor.

PubMed

Henrie, Andrew; Codling, Jesse R; Gneiting, Scott; Christensen, Justin B; Awerkamp, Parker; Burdette, Mark J; Smalley, Daniel E

2018-01-01

Displays capable of true holographic video have been prohibitively expensive and difficult to build. With this paper, we present a suite of modularized hardware components and software tools needed to build a HoloMonitor with basic "hacker-space" equipment, highlighting improvements that have enabled the total materials cost to fall to $820, well below that of other holographic displays. It is our hope that the current level of simplicity, development, design flexibility, and documentation will enable the lay engineer, programmer, and scientist to relatively easily replicate, modify, and build upon our designs, bringing true holographic video to the masses.

PHM Enabled Autonomous Propellant Loading Operations

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Walker, Mark; Figueroa, Fernando

2017-01-01

The utility of Prognostics and Health Management (PHM) software capability applied to Autonomous Operations (AO) remains an active research area within aerospace applications. The ability to gain insight into which assets and subsystems are functioning properly, along with the derivation of confident predictions concerning future ability, reliability, and availability, are important enablers for making sound mission planning decisions. When coupled with software that fully supports mission planning and execution, an integrated solution can be developed that leverages state assessment and estimation for the purposes of delivering autonomous operations. The authors have been applying this integrated, model-based approach to the autonomous loading of cryogenic spacecraft propellants at Kennedy Space Center.