NASA Tests Revolutionary Shape Changing Aircraft Flap for the First Time

NASA's green aviation project is one step closer to developing technology that could make future airliners quieter and more fuel-efficient with the successful flight test of a wing surface that can change shape in flight.

This past summer researchers replaced an airplane’s conventional aluminum flaps with advanced, shape-changing assemblies that form seamless bendable and twistable surfaces. Flight testing will determine whether flexible trailing-edge wing flaps are a viable approach to improve aerodynamic efficiency and reduce noise generated during takeoffs and landings.

The Adaptive Compliant Trailing Edge (ACTE) project is a joint effort between NASA and the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL), using flaps designed and built by FlexSys, Inc., of Ann Arbor, Michigan. With AFRL funding through the Air Force’s Small Business Innovative Research program, FlexSys developed a variable geometry airfoil system called FlexFoil that can be retrofitted to existing airplane wings or integrated into brand new airframes.

FlexFoil’s inventor, FlexSys founder and Chief Executive Officer Sridhar Kota hopes testing with the modified Gulfstream III will confirm the design’s flight worthiness and open doors to future applications and commercialization. ACTE is being flown at NASA's Armstrong Flight Research Center in Edwards, California.

“This flight test is one of the NASA Environmentally Responsible Aviation (ERA) Project’s eight large-scale integrated technology demonstrations to show design improvements in drag, weight, noise, emission and fuel reductions," said Fay Collier, ERA project manager at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia.

During the initial ACTE flight, the experimental control surfaces were locked at a specified setting. Different flap settings will be employed on subsequent flights to collect a variety of data demonstrating the capability of the flexible wings to withstand a real flight environment. The flaps have the potential to be retrofitted to existing airplane wings or integrated into new airframes.

“We have progressed from an innovative idea and matured the concept through multiple designs and wind tunnel tests, to a final demonstration that should prove to the aerospace industry that this technology is ready to dramatically improve aircraft efficiency,” said AFRL Program Manager Pete Flick, from Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio.

ACTE technology is expected to have far-reaching effects on future aviation. Advanced lightweight materials will reduce wing structural weight and give engineers the ability to aerodynamically tailor the wings to promote improved fuel economy and more efficient operations, while reducing environmental impacts.

“The first flight went as planned -- we validated many key elements of the experimental trailing edges,” said Thomas Rigney, ACTE Project Manager at Armstrong. “We expect this technology to make future aircraft lighter, more efficient, and quieter. It also has the potential to save hundreds of millions of dollars annually in fuel costs.”

For more information, visit:

http://go.nasa.gov/1Ai2YV4

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J.D. Harrington
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-5241
j.d.harrington@nasa.gov

Peter Merlin
Armstrong Flight Research Center, Edwards, Calif.
661-276-2679
peter.w.merlin@nasa.gov

Daryl Mayer
88th Air Base Wing Public Affairs, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio
937-522-3252
88abw.pa@wpafb.af.mil

Rodney Hill
FlexSys, Inc., Ann Arbor, Mich.
734-645-0864
rhill@flxsys.com

( http://www.nasa.gov/press/2014/november/nasa-tests-revolutionary-shape-changing-aircraft-flap-for-the-first-time/index.html#.VGNVPmjZFJ8 )

Rosetta Races Toward Comet Touchdown

This image of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, from Rosetta's OSIRIS scientific imaging system, shows two saturation levels. In the left image darkness hides the right half; the right image shows some surface structures. Image was taken 10/30/14 from about 18.6 miles (30 kilometers) away.

Image Credit: 

ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team

This image of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko was obtained on October 30, 2014 by the OSIRIS scientific imaging system on the Rosetta spacecraft. The right half is obscured by darkness. The image was taken from a distance of approximately 18.6 miles (30 kilometers).

Image Credit: 

ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team

This is a rare glance at the dark side of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. Light backscattered from dust particles in the comet’s coma reveals a hint of surface structures. This image was taken by OSIRIS, Rosetta’s scientific imaging system, on Sept. 29, 2014.

Image Credit: 

ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team

• Landing scheduled for Nov. 12
• Landing site gets a name
• Camera gets sneak peek of the comet's "dark side"

After sailing through space for more than 10 years, the European Space Agency's Rosetta spacecraft is now less than a week shy of landing a robotic probe on a comet.

The mission's Philae (fee-LAY) lander is scheduled to touch down on comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko on Wednesday, Nov. 12 at 7:35 a.m PST/10:35 a.m. EST.  A signal confirming the landing is expected about 8:02 a.m. PST/11:02 a.m. EST. If all goes as planned with this complex engineering feat, it will be the first-ever soft landing of a spacecraft on a comet.

The landing site, formerly known simply as Site J, now has an official name: Agilkia. The name, chosen after an ESA public essay competition, is in keeping with the mission's Egyptian theme. It refers to an island on the Nile where ancient buildings were relocated after the island Philae flooded. One hundred fifty people nominated Agilkia, including the overall winner, Alexandre Brouste from France. He has been invited to watch the landing activities at Rosetta's mission control in Darmstadt, Germany.

After touchdown on Nov. 12, the Philae lander will obtain the first images ever taken from a comet's surface. It will also drill into the surface to study the composition, and witness close up how a comet changes as its exposure to the sun varies. Philae can remain active on the surface for about two-and-a-half days. Its mothership, the Rosetta spacecraft, will remain in orbit around the comet through 2015. The orbiter will continue detailed studies of the comet as it approaches the sun and then moves away.

In addition to their well-deserved reputation as beautiful cosmic objects, comets hold vital clues about our solar system's history. They are considered primitive building blocks of the solar system that are literally frozen in time, and they may have played a part in "seeding" Earth with water and, possibly, the basic ingredients for life.

NASA provided three of the 16 instruments on board the Rosetta orbiter. The NASA instruments are:
 

• The Microwave Instrument for Rosetta Orbiter (MIRO) studies the process by which gas and dust leave the surface of the comet nucleus to form the tail and the coma. MIRO is capable of observing water, carbon monoxide, ammonia and methanol.
• Alice, an ultraviolet spectrometer, analyzes gases in the comet's coma and tail; measures how fast the comet produces water, carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide (clues to the surface composition of the nucleus); and measures argon levels. These measurements help determine the temperature of the solar system when the nucleus formed more than 4.6 billion years ago.
• Ion and Electron Sensor (IES) is part of a suite of five instruments to analyze the comet's plasma environment and measure charged particles in the sun's outer atmosphere as they interact with gas flowing from the comet during Rosetta's approach to the sun.

Rosetta launched in March 2004 and spent 957 days in "hibernation" as it zoomed through the darkness of space.  It was "brought back to life" in January 2014 to prepare for its August arrival in orbit around comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. Since August, Rosetta has been capturing sneak peeks of what lies ahead. Images have revealed stunning structures on the areas of the comet that are visible and illuminated. These features include steep ravines, sharp cliffs and numerous boulders.

New images from the spacecraft's scientific imaging system, OSIRIS, give us a first glimpse of the dark, southern side of the comet. This side has faced away from the sun for a while, hiding its shape and surface features. The new images take advantage of slight illumination from light scattered by dust particles in the comet's coma.

Rosetta is a European Space Agency mission with contributions from its member states and NASA. Rosetta's Philae lander is provided by a consortium led by the German Aerospace Center, Cologne; Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research, Gottingen; National Center of Space Studies of France (CNES), Paris; and the Italian Space Agency, Rome. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, a division of the California Institute of Technology, manages the U.S. participation in the Rosetta mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington.

For more information on the U.S. instruments aboard Rosetta, visit:

http://rosetta.jpl.nasa.gov

More information about Rosetta is available at:

http://www.esa.int/rosetta

DC Agle/Guy Webster
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-393-9011/354-6278
agle@jpl.nasa.gov / guy.webster@jpl.nasa.gov

Dwayne Brown
NASA Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1726
dwayne.c.brown@nasa.gov

Markus Bauer
European Space Agency, Noordwijk, Netherlands
011-31-71-565-6799
markus.bauer@esa.int

( http://www.nasa.gov/jpl/rosetta-races-toward-comet-touchdown/index.html#.VFxw22jZFJ8 )

NASA Rocket Experiment Finds the Universe Brighter Than We Thought

This is a time-lapse photograph of the Cosmic Infrared Background Experiment (CIBER) rocket launch, taken from NASA's Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia in 2013. The image is from the last of four launches.

Image Credit: 

T. Arai/University of Tokyo

Galaxies collide to form larger structures in our universe, kicking out stars. The CIBER rocket experiments have detected what appears to be an infrared glow from these stranded stars (appearing as yellow clouds) on large scales across our sky.

Observations from CIBER have shown a surprising surplus of infrared light filling the spaces between galaxies. To understand how scientists measured the amount of this mysterious light, imagine using the tips of icebergs to estimate their total volume of ice.

Image Credit: 

NASA/JPL-Caltech

Full image and caption

This graphic illustrates how CIBER team measures a diffuse glow of infrared light filling the spaces between galaxies.

Full image and caption

These images from CIBER show large patches of the sky at two different infrared wavelengths (1.1 microns and 1.6 microns) after all known galaxies have been subtracted out.

Full image and caption

This plot shows data from CIBER rockets launched in 2010 and 2012.

Full image and caption

A NASA sounding rocket experiment has detected a surprising surplus of infrared light in the dark space between galaxies, a diffuse cosmic glow as bright as all known galaxies combined. The glow is thought to be from orphaned stars flung out of galaxies.

The findings redefine what scientists think of as galaxies. Galaxies may not have a set boundary of stars, but instead stretch out to great distances, forming a vast, interconnected sea of stars.

Observations from the Cosmic Infrared Background Experiment, or CIBER, are helping settle a debate on whether this background infrared light in the universe, previously detected by NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope, comes from these streams of stripped stars too distant to be seen individually, or alternatively from the first galaxies to form in the universe.

"We think stars are being scattered out into space during galaxy collisions," said Michael Zemcov, lead author of a new paper describing the results from the rocket project and an astronomer at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) and NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California. "While we have previously observed cases where stars are flung from galaxies in a tidal stream, our new measurement implies this process is widespread."

Using suborbital sounding rockets, which are smaller than those that carry satellites to space and are ideal for short experiments, CIBER captured wide-field pictures of the cosmic infrared background at two infrared wavelengths shorter than those seen by Spitzer. Because our atmosphere itself glows brightly at these particular wavelengths of light, the measurements can only be done from space. 

"It is wonderfully exciting for such a small NASA rocket to make such a huge discovery," said Mike Garcia, program scientist from NASA Headquarters. “Sounding rockets are an important element in our balanced toolbox of missions from small to large.”

During the CIBER flights, the cameras launch into space, then snap pictures for about seven minutes before transmitting the data back to Earth. Scientists masked out bright stars and galaxies from the pictures and carefully ruled out any light coming from more local sources, such as our own Milky Way galaxy. What's left is a map showing fluctuations in the remaining infrared background light, with splotches that are much bigger than individual galaxies. The brightness of these fluctuations allows scientists to measure the total amount of background light.

To the surprise of the CIBER team, the maps revealed a dramatic excess of light beyond what comes from the galaxies.  The data showed that this infrared background light has a blue spectrum, which means it increases in brightness at shorter wavelengths. This is evidence the light comes from a previously undetected population of stars between galaxies. Light from the first galaxies would give a spectrum of colors that is redder than what was seen.

"The light looks too bright and too blue to be coming from the first generation of galaxies," said James Bock, principal investigator of the CIBER project from Caltech and JPL. "The simplest explanation, which best explains the measurements, is that many stars have been ripped from their galactic birthplace, and that the stripped stars emit on average about as much light as the galaxies themselves."

Future experiments can test whether stray stars are indeed the source of the infrared cosmic glow. If the stars were tossed out from their parent galaxies, they should still be located in the same vicinity. The CIBER team is working on better measurements using more infrared colors to learn how stripping of stars happened over cosmic history.

Results from two of four CIBER flights, both of which launched from White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico in 2010 and 2012, appear Friday, Nov. 7 in the journal Science.

Caltech manages JPL for NASA. The work was supported by NASA, with initial support provided by JPL's Director's Research and Development Fund. Japanese participation in CIBER was supported by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science and the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology. Korean participation in CIBER was supported by the Korean Astronomy and Space Science Institute." 

For more information on NASA’s sounding rocket experiments, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/sounding-rockets/

For more information about CIBER, visit:

http://ciber.caltech.edu/rocket.html

› Media teleconference - archived recording on Ustream and visuals

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Felicia Chou
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-0257
felicia.chou@nasa.gov

Whitney Clavin
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-354-4673
whitney.clavin@jpl.nasa.gov

( http://www.nasa.gov/press/2014/november/nasa-rocket-experiment-finds-the-universe-brighter-than-we-thought/index.html#.VFxwOGjZFJ8 )