Automated flight test management system

The Phase 1 development of an automated flight test management system (ATMS) as a component of a rapid prototyping flight research facility for artificial intelligence (AI) based flight concepts is discussed. The ATMS provides a flight engineer with a set of tools that assist in flight test planning, monitoring, and simulation. The system is also capable of controlling an aircraft during flight test by performing closed loop guidance functions, range management, and maneuver-quality monitoring. The ATMS is being used as a prototypical system to develop a flight research facility for AI based flight systems concepts at NASA Ames Dryden

Hypersonic Research Vehicle (HRV) real-time flight test support feasibility and requirements study. Part 2: Remote computation support for flight systems functions

The requirements are assessed for the use of remote computation to support HRV flight testing. First, remote computational requirements were developed to support functions that will eventually be performed onboard operational vehicles of this type. These functions which either cannot be performed onboard in the time frame of initial HRV flight test programs because the technology of airborne computers will not be sufficiently advanced to support the computational loads required, or it is not desirable to perform the functions onboard in the flight test program for other reasons. Second, remote computational support either required or highly desirable to conduct flight testing itself was addressed. The use is proposed of an Automated Flight Management System which is described in conceptual detail. Third, autonomous operations is discussed and finally, unmanned operations

From an automated flight-test management system to a flight-test engineer's workstation

The capabilities and evolution is described of a flight engineer's workstation (called TEST-PLAN) from an automated flight test management system. The concept and capabilities of the automated flight test management systems are explored and discussed to illustrate the value of advanced system prototyping and evolutionary software development

Brane Localized Curvature for Warped Gravitons

We study the effects of including brane localized curvature terms in the Randall-Sundrum (RS) model of the hierarchy. This leads to the existence of brane localized kinetic terms for the graviton. Such terms can be induced by brane and bulk quantum effects as well as Higgs-curvature mixing on the brane. We derive the modified spectrum of Kaluza-Klein (KK) gravitons and their couplings to 4-dimensional fields in the presence of these terms. We find that the masses and couplings of the KK gravitons have considerable dependence on the size of the brane localized terms; the weak-scale phenomenology of the model is consequently modified . In particular, the weak-scale spin-2 graviton resonances which generically appear in the RS model may be significantly lighter than previously assumed. However, they may avoid detection as their widths may be too narrow to be observable at colliders. In the contact interaction limit, for a certain range of parameters, the experimental reach for the scale of the theory is independent of the size of the boundary terms.Comment: 20 pages, 11 figures, LaTex, minor revision

Leptoquark pair production at the Fermilab Tevatron: Signal and backgrounds

We perform a Monte-Carlo simulation of scalar leptoquark pair production at the Tevatron (energy =1.8 TeV and luminosity =100 pb^{-1}) with ISAJET. We also investigate the dominant sources of Standard Model background: Z*jj, ZZ production and heavy quark top-antitop. We find that the top-antitop background is the most important except near the Z pole where the Z*jj background is peaked. We also evaluate the signal-to-background ratio and find a discovery reach of 130 GeV (170 GeV) for a branching ratio of B(LQ-> eq)=0.5 (B=1).Comment: 8 pages, 6 figures, latex (revtex

Signals for Vector Leptoquarks in Hadronic Collisions

We analyze systematically the signatures of vector leptoquarks in hadronic collisions. We examine their single and pair productions, as well as their effects on the production of lepton pairs. Our results indicate that a machine like the CERN Large Hadron Collider (LHC) will be able to unravel the existence of vector leptoquarks with masses up to the range of $2$--$3$ TeV.Comment: 15 pages and 5 figures (available upon request or through anonymous ftp), revtex3, IFUSP-P 108

Indirect Collider Signals for Extra Dimensions

A recent suggestion that quantum gravity may become strong near the weak scale has several testable consequences. In addition to probing for the new large (submillimeter) extra dimensions associated with these theories via gravitational experiments, one could search for the Kaluza Klein towers of massive gravitons which are predicted in these models and which can interact with the fields of the Standard Model. Here we examine the indirect effects of these massive gravitons being exchanged in fermion pair production in \epem annihilation and Drell-Yan production at hadron colliders. In the latter case, we examine a novel feature of this theory, which is the contribution of gluon gluon initiated processes to lepton pair production. We find that these processes provide strong bounds, up to several TeV, on the string scale which are essentially independent of the number of extra dimensions. In addition, we analyze the angular distributions for fermion pair production with spin-2 graviton exchanges and demonstrate that they provide a smoking gun signal for low-scale quantum gravity which cannot be mimicked by other new physics scenarios.Comment: Corrected typos, added table and reference

The use of an automated flight test management system in the development of a rapid-prototyping flight research facility

An automated flight test management system (ATMS) and its use to develop a rapid-prototyping flight research facility for artificial intelligence (AI) based flight systems concepts are described. The ATMS provides a flight test engineer with a set of tools that assist in flight planning and simulation. This system will be capable of controlling an aircraft during the flight test by performing closed-loop guidance functions, range management, and maneuver-quality monitoring. The rapid-prototyping flight research facility is being developed at the Dryden Flight Research Facility of the NASA Ames Research Center (Ames-Dryden) to provide early flight assessment of emerging AI technology. The facility is being developed as one element of the aircraft automation program which focuses on the qualification and validation of embedded real-time AI-based systems

Production of Pairs of Sleptoquarks in Hadron Colliders

We calculate the cross section for the production of pairs of scalar leptoquarks (sleptoquarks) in a supersymmetric $E_6$ model, at hadron colliders. We estimate higher order corrections by including $\pi^2$ terms induced by soft-gluon corrections. Discovery bounds on the sleptoquark mass are estimated at collider energies of 1.8, 2, and 4 TeV (Tevatron), and 16 TeV (LHC).Comment: 8 pages, REVTEX, (1 fig. available on request), LAVAL-PHY-94-13/McGILL-94-26/SPhT-94-07