A unified approach to computer analysis and modeling of spacecraft environmental interactions

A new, coordinated, unified approach to the development of spacecraft plasma interaction models is proposed. The objective is to eliminate the unnecessary duplicative work in order to allow researchers to concentrate on the scientific aspects. By streamlining the developmental process, the interchange between theories and experimentalists is enhanced, and the transfer of technology to the spacecraft engineering community is faster. This approach is called the UNIfied Spacecraft Interaction Model (UNISIM). UNISIM is a coordinated system of software, hardware, and specifications. It is a tool for modeling and analyzing spacecraft interactions. It will be used to design experiments, to interpret results of experiments, and to aid in future spacecraft design. It breaks a Spacecraft Ineraction analysis into several modules. Each module will perform an analysis for some physical process, using phenomenology and algorithms which are well documented and have been subject to review. This system and its characteristics are discussed

The international organizational network as core capability : global product development in Fujitsu Limited

Includes bibliographical references (p. 51-52).Supported by the Japan-United States Friendship Commission and by the MIT Japan Program Corporate Consortium.Christopher J. Voisey

Interactions of an Additive Manufacturing Program with Society

Additive Manufacturing (AM) has shown considerable promise for the future but also proposes some challenges. Many AM barriers tend to be non-technical and instead are human-centric issues such as lack of education of practitioners in AM capabilities, cultural differences, vested interests, and potentially lack of imagination. It is highly desirable for all research and educational institutions to help address these issues. This paper summarizes the additive manufacturing research and education program at the Missouri University of Science and Technology (Missouri S&T) and its interactions with various constituents, including K-12 students, undergraduate and graduate students, distance students, and industry

Rotorcraft Conceptual Design Environment

Requirements for a rotorcraft conceptual design environment are discussed, from the perspective of a government laboratory. Rotorcraft design work in a government laboratory must support research, by producing technology impact assessments and defining the context for research and development; and must support the acquisition process, including capability assessments and quantitative evaluation of designs, concepts, and alternatives. An information manager that will enable increased fidelity of analysis early in the design effort is described. This manager will be a framework to organize information that describes the aircraft, and enable movement of that information to and from analyses. Finally, a recently developed rotorcraft system analysis tool is described

Advancing automation and robotics technology for the Space Station and for the US economy. Volume 1: Executive overview

In response to Public Law 98-371, dated July 18, 1984, the NASA Advanced Technology Advisory Committee has studied automation and robotics for use in the Space Station. The Executive Overview, Volume 1 presents the major findings of the study and recommends to NASA principles for advancing automation and robotics technologies for the benefit of the Space Station and of the U.S. economy in general. As a result of its study, the Advanced Technology Advisory Committee believes that a key element of technology for the Space Station is extensive use of advanced general-purpose automation and robotics. These systems could provide the United States with important new methods of generating and exploiting space knowledge in commercial enterprises and thereby help preserve U.S. leadership in space

Implementation of a robotic flexible assembly system

As part of the Intelligent Task Automation program, a team developed enabling technologies for programmable, sensory controlled manipulation in unstructured environments. These technologies include 2-D/3-D vision sensing and understanding, force sensing and high speed force control, 2.5-D vision alignment and control, and multiple processor architectures. The subsequent design of a flexible, programmable, sensor controlled robotic assembly system for small electromechanical devices is described using these technologies and ongoing implementation and integration efforts. Using vision, the system picks parts dumped randomly in a tray. Using vision and force control, it performs high speed part mating, in-process monitoring/verification of expected results and autonomous recovery from some errors. It is programmed off line with semiautomatic action planning

A manufacturing model to support data-driven applications for design and manufacture

This thesis is primarily concerned with conceptual work on the Manufacturing Model. The Manufacturing Model is an information model which describes the manufacturing capability of an enterprise. To achieve general applicability, the model consists of the entities that are relevant and important for any type of manufacturing firm, namely: manufacturing resources (e.g. machines, tools, fixtures, machining cells, operators, etc.), manufacturing processes (e.g. injection moulding, machining processes, etc.) and manufacturing strategies (e.g. how these resources and processes are used and organized). The Manufacturing Model is a four level model based on a de—facto standard (i.e. Factory, Shop, Cell, Station) which represents the functionality of the manufacturing facility of any firm. In the course of the research, the concept of data—driven applications has emerged in response to the need of integrated and flexible computer environments for the support of design and manufacturing activities. These data—driven applications require the use of different information models to capture and represent the company's information and knowledge. One of these information models is the Manufacturing Model. The value of this research work is highlighted by the use of two case studies, one related with the representation of a single machining station, and the other, the representation of a multi-cellular manufacturing facility of a high performance company

Break, Make, Retake: Interrogating the Social and Historical Dimensions of Making as a Design Practice

Making and digital fabrication technologies are the focus of bold promises. Among the most tempting are that these activities and processes require little initial skill, knowledge, and expertise. Instead, they enable their acquisition, opening them up to everyone. Makerspaces and fab labs would blur the identities between professional and amateur, designer and engineer, maker and hacker, ushering in a broad-based de-professionalization. Prototyping and digital fabrication would unite design and manufacturing in ways that resemble and revive traditional craftwork. These activities and processes promise the reindustrialization of places where manufacturing has disappeared. These promises deploy historical categories and conditionsexpertise, design, craft production, manufacturing, post- industrial urbanismwhile claiming to transform them. This dissertation demonstrates how these proposals and narratives rely on imaginaries in which countercultural practices become mainstream by presenting a threefold argument. First, making and digital fabrication sustain supportive environments that reconfigure contemporary design practice. Second, making and digital fabrication simultaneously reshape the categories of professional, amateur, work, leisure, and expertise; but not always in the ways its proponents suggest. Third, as making and digital fabrication propagate, they reproduce traditional practices and values, negating much of their countercultural and alternative capacities. The dissertation supports these claims through a multi-sited and multinational ethnographic investigation of the historical and social effects of making and digital fabrication on design practice and the people and places enacting. The study lies at the intersection of science and technology studies, human-computer interaction, and design research. In addressing the argument throughout this scholarship, it explores three central themes: (1) the idea that making and digital fabrication lead to instant materialization of design while re-uniting design with manufacturing; (2) the amount of skill and expertise expected for participation in these practices and how these are encoded in rhetoric and in practice; and (3) the material and social infrastructures that configure making as a design practice. The dissertation demonstrates that that the perceived marginality of making, maker cultures, digital fabrication allows for its bolder promises to thrive invisibly by concealing other social issues, while the societal contributions of this technoculture say something different on the surface