Marshall Space Flight Center Research and Technology Report 2019

Today, our calling to explore is greater than ever before, and here at Marshall Space Flight Centerwe make human deep space exploration possible. A key goal for Artemis is demonstrating and perfecting capabilities on the Moon for technologies needed for humans to get to Mars. This years report features 10 of the Agencys 16 Technology Areas, and I am proud of Marshalls role in creating solutions for so many of these daunting technical challenges. Many of these projects will lead to sustainable in-space architecture for human space exploration that will allow us to travel to the Moon, on to Mars, and beyond. Others are developing new scientific instruments capable of providing an unprecedented glimpse into our universe. NASA has led the charge in space exploration for more than six decades, and through the Artemis program we will help build on our work in low Earth orbit and pave the way to the Moon and Mars. At Marshall, we leverage the skills and interest of the international community to conduct scientific research, develop and demonstrate technology, and train international crews to operate further from Earth for longer periods of time than ever before first at the lunar surface, then on to our next giant leap, human exploration of Mars. While each project in this report seeks to advance new technology and challenge conventions, it is important to recognize the diversity of activities and people supporting our mission. This report not only showcases the Centers capabilities and our partnerships, it also highlights the progress our people have achieved in the past year. These scientists, researchers and innovators are why Marshall and NASA will continue to be a leader in innovation, exploration, and discovery for years to come

Advancing automation and robotics technology for the space station and for the US economy: Submitted to the United States Congress October 1, 1987

In April 1985, as required by Public Law 98-371, the NASA Advanced Technology Advisory Committee (ATAC) reported to Congress the results of its studies on advanced automation and robotics technology for use on the space station. This material was documented in the initial report (NASA Technical Memorandum 87566). A further requirement of the Law was that ATAC follow NASA's progress in this area and report to Congress semiannually. This report is the fifth in a series of progress updates and covers the period between 16 May 1987 and 30 September 1987. NASA has accepted the basic recommendations of ATAC for its space station efforts. ATAC and NASA agree that the mandate of Congress is that an advanced automation and robotics technology be built to support an evolutionary space station program and serve as a highly visible stimulator affecting the long-term U.S. economy

Demonstration of Automated DNA Assembly on a Digital Microfluidic Device

The rapid manufacturing of highly accurate synthetic DNA is crucial for its use as a molecular tool, the understanding and engineering of regulatory elements, protein engineering, genetic refactoring, engineered genetic networks and metabolic pathways, and whole-genome syntheses [1,2]. Recent efforts in the development of enzyme mediated oligonucleotide synthesis have shown much potential to benefit conventional DNA synthesis [3–5]. With its success in applications as chemical microreactors [6–10], biological assays [8–14], and clinical diagnostic tools [10,15–19], digital microfluidic (DMF) devices are an attractive platform to apply the promising benefits of enzymatic oligonucleotide synthesis to the manufacturing of synthetic DNA. This thesis work aims to demonstrate automated DNA assembly using oligonucleotides on a DMF device through the demonstration and validation of an automated DNA assembly protocol. The prototyping process performed through this work revealed various important design considerations for the reliability of fluid handling performance and the mitigation of failure modes. To prevent dielectric breakdown or electrolysis, a relatively thick SU-8 3005 dielectric is used to remove the sensitivity of the device to variances in dielectric thickness and quality. To enable droplet creation, the gap distance between the DMF chip and top-plate is created and minimized using a thick SU-8 2100 layer. Reliable droplet creation is achieved through the use of electrode geometry that targets predictable fluid delivery and cutting. Reliable droplet transport is achieved through the use of a electrode interdigitation geometry that targets lower total electrode surface area and higher interdigitation contact area. The testing of DNA laden fluids revealed that biofouling can be a large concern for the demonstration of DNA assembly on a DMF device if droplets are moved through an air medium. To mitigate its effects, the final DMF device design featured the use of a permanently bonded top-plate with bored inlet/outlet ports as well as a silicone oil medium. The final DMF device design was used to demonstrate automated DNA assembly. This demonstration involved the creation, transport, and mixing of DNA brick samples. These samples are subsequently incubated on a chemical bench or on the DMF chip to create recombinant DNA containing genetic information. DNA gel imaging of DNA assembly products from on-chip protocols compared to protocols performed on a chemical benchtop revealed comparable results. Through the course of this work, the applicability of automated DNA assembly on a DMF device was validated to provide preliminary results in the ultimate goal of DNA synthesis using enzymatic oligonucleotide synthesis

Automated sequence and motion planning for robotic spatial extrusion of 3D trusses

While robotic spatial extrusion has demonstrated a new and efficient means to fabricate 3D truss structures in architectural scale, a major challenge remains in automatically planning extrusion sequence and robotic motion for trusses with unconstrained topologies. This paper presents the first attempt in the field to rigorously formulate the extrusion sequence and motion planning (SAMP) problem, using a CSP encoding. Furthermore, this research proposes a new hierarchical planning framework to solve the extrusion SAMP problems that usually have a long planning horizon and 3D configuration complexity. By decoupling sequence and motion planning, the planning framework is able to efficiently solve the extrusion sequence, end-effector poses, joint configurations, and transition trajectories for spatial trusses with nonstandard topologies. This paper also presents the first detailed computation data to reveal the runtime bottleneck on solving SAMP problems, which provides insight and comparing baseline for future algorithmic development. Together with the algorithmic results, this paper also presents an open-source and modularized software implementation called Choreo that is machine-agnostic. To demonstrate the power of this algorithmic framework, three case studies, including real fabrication and simulation results, are presented.Comment: 24 pages, 16 figure

NASA space station automation: AI-based technology review

Research and Development projects in automation for the Space Station are discussed. Artificial Intelligence (AI) based automation technologies are planned to enhance crew safety through reduced need for EVA, increase crew productivity through the reduction of routine operations, increase space station autonomy, and augment space station capability through the use of teleoperation and robotics. AI technology will also be developed for the servicing of satellites at the Space Station, system monitoring and diagnosis, space manufacturing, and the assembly of large space structures

Robotic Training for the Integration of Material Performances in Timber Manufacturing

The research focuses on testing a series of material-sensitive robotic training methods that flexibly extend the range of subtractive manufacturing processes available to designers based on the integration of manufacturing knowledge at an early design stage. In current design practices, the lack of feedback information between the different steps of linear design workflows forces designers to engage with only a limited range of standard materials and manufacturing techniques, leading to wasteful and inefficient solutions. With a specific focus on timber subtractive manufacturing, the work presented in this thesis addresses the main issue hindering the utilisation of non-standard tools and heterogeneous materials in design processes which is the significant deviation between what is prescribed in the digital design environment and the respective fabrication outcome. To begin, it has been demonstrated the extent to which the heterogeneous properties of timber affect the outcome of the robotic carving process beyond the acceptable tolerance thresholds for design purposes. Resting on this premise, the devised strategy to address such a material variance involved capturing, transferring, augmenting and integrating manufacturing knowledge through the collection of real- world fabrication data, both by human experts and robotic sessions, and training of machine learning models (i.e. Artificial Neural Networks) to achieve an accurate simulation of the robotic manufacturing task informed by specific sets of tools affordances and material behaviours. The results of the training process have demonstrated that it is possible to accurately simulate the carving process to a degree sufficient for design applications, anticipating the influence of material and tool properties on the carved geometry. The collaborations with the industry partners of the project, ROK Architects (Zürich) and BIG (Copenhagen), provided the opportunity to assess the different practical uses and related implications of the tools in a real-world scenario following an open-ended and explorative approach based on several iterations of the full design-to-production cycle. The findings have shown that the devised strategy supports decision-making procedures at an early stage of the design process and enables the exploration of novel, previously unavailable, solutions informed by material and tool affordances