Civil space technology initiative

The Civil Space Technology Initiative (CSTI) is a major, focused, space technology program of the Office of Aeronautics, Exploration and Technology (OAET) of NASA. The program was initiated to advance technology beyond basic research in order to expand and enhance system and vehicle capabilities for near-term missions. CSTI takes critical technologies to the point at which a user can confidently incorporate the new or expanded capabilities into relatively near-term, high-priority NASA missions. In particular, the CSTI program emphasizes technologies necessary for reliable and efficient access to and operation in Earth orbit as well as for support of scientific missions from Earth orbit

Requirements for implementing real-time control functional modules on a hierarchical parallel pipelined system

Analysis of a robot control system leads to a broad range of processing requirements. One fundamental requirement of a robot control system is the necessity of a microcomputer system in order to provide sufficient processing capability.The use of multiple processors in a parallel architecture is beneficial for a number of reasons, including better cost performance, modular growth, increased reliability through replication, and flexibility for testing alternate control strategies via different partitioning. A survey of the progression from low level control synchronizing primitives to higher level communication tools is presented. The system communication and control mechanisms of existing robot control systems are compared to the hierarchical control model. The impact of this design methodology on the current robot control systems is explored

Optimal performance of distributed simulation programs

Journal ArticleThis paper describes a technique to analyze the potential speedup of distributed simulation programs. A distributed simulation strategy is proposed which minimizes execution time through the use of an oracle to control the simulation. Because the strategy relies on an oracle, it cannot be used for practical simulations. However the strategy facilitates performance evaluations of distributed simulation strategies by providing a useful point of comparison and can be used to determine the suitability of specific applications for implementation on a parallel computer. Based on the proposed strategy, a tool has been developed to determine the maximum performance which can be achieved from a distributed simulation program. In this paper we describe the technique and its use in evaluating the parallelism available in distributed simulators of parallel computer systems

Advanced manned space flight simulation and training: An investigation of simulation host computer system concepts

The findings of a preliminary investigation by Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) in simulation host computer concepts is presented. It is designed to aid NASA in evaluating simulation technologies for use in spaceflight training. The focus of the investigation is on the next generation of space simulation systems that will be utilized in training personnel for Space Station Freedom operations. SwRI concludes that NASA should pursue a distributed simulation host computer system architecture for the Space Station Training Facility (SSTF) rather than a centralized mainframe based arrangement. A distributed system offers many advantages and is seen by SwRI as the only architecture that will allow NASA to achieve established functional goals and operational objectives over the life of the Space Station Freedom program. Several distributed, parallel computing systems are available today that offer real-time capabilities for time critical, man-in-the-loop simulation. These systems are flexible in terms of connectivity and configurability, and are easily scaled to meet increasing demands for more computing power

The Use of Parallel Processing in VLSI Computer-Aided Design Application

Coordinated Science Laboratory was formerly known as Control Systems LaboratorySemiconductor Research Corporation / 87-DP-10

Visual Information Display Systems. A Survey

Visual information display systems that are computer connected or updated with computer generated informatio

Design and Operation of a High Level Multicomputer Communications Package

Coordinated Science Laboratory was formerly known as Control Systems LaboratoryJoint Services Electronics Program / DAAB-07-72-C-025

Design, implementation, and evaluation of a shared-memory parellel processing system (SMPPS)

As technology reaches its limits of improvements in microprocessor processing speeds, scientists and engineers have to find viable solutions to meet ever-increasing demands for faster processing speed. One such solution is parallel processing. No longer does one have to wait on sequential operations. A specific task can be split in sub-tasks that can run simultaneously, thus reducing the overall execution time of the task. The design and implementation of these systems is crucial to the effectiveness of parallel systems. A dual-processor SMPPS was designed and implemented in order to demonstrate how multiple processors are a viable solution to increasing the speed of computer processing. Parallel algorithms were developed for this system and were used for performance analysis. The results show that SMPPS systems of a small scale can result in very significant increases in speed for problems characterized by fine-grain parallelism