NASA Platform for Autonomous Systems (NPAS)

NASA Platform for Autonomous Systems (NPAS) is a disruptive software platform and processes being developed by SSC Autonomous Systems Laboratory (ASL). Autonomous operations are critical for the success, safety and crew survival of NASA deep space missions beyond low Earth orbit, including Lunar Orbital Platform-Gateway, and for the future of cost-effective ground mission operations. NPAS represents the embodiment of an innovative implementation for "thinking" autonomy in contrast to brute-force autonomy. It also uniquely addresses the requirements and integrates five primary functionalities for autonomous operations including: (1) Integrated System Health Management (ISHM), (2) autonomy, guided by health and system concepts of operations; (3) knowledge models of applications; (4) infrastructure to create, schedule, and execute mission plans; and (5) infrastructure to integrate distributed autonomous applications across networks

Woven Words: A Semiology of Clothing in Medieval Texts.

Much criticism in medieval studies has focused on Chrisitan allegory and its dissemination through Middle English poetry. Using recent insights into the nature of allegory in its medieval context, this study offers a new means of understanding allegory as it appears in the work of Chaucer and the Pearl-poet. Which ideas of figurality actually informed the works of these poets? The investigation into the influence of medieval textuality on Chaucer and the Pearl-poet has overlooked the image of the veil in the Middle Ages. This study asserts that instead of being a flat image, the veil provides us with a palpable means of understanding the ways in which Christian sign theory treated allegory. Chapter One reviews the semiology of clothing in exegesis as it appears in the image of the textualized body of Christ. It suggests that the origin of the vacillation between the perceived presence and absence of meaning in medieval allegory exists in the different readings of this body as both the revealer and reveiler of truth. The paradox of the Incarnational text provided the unstable foundation of medieval theories of textuality, both religious and secular. Chapters Two and Three focus on The Clerk\u27s Tale and Pearl to reveal how the poets who understood language to be simultaneously pre- and post-linguistic. In the way they identified this fundamental tension within allegory, Pearl and The Clerk\u27s Tale reveal through the semiology of clothing an appreciation for and keen awareness of the problem of allegory. The Pearl-poet questions the possibility of uncovering the spiritual res of allegory by demonstrating the endless reflexivity of the allegorical sign in the image of the Pearl-maiden. In The Clerk\u27s Tale, Griselda\u27s relationship to her garments asks us to reevaluate her role as the tale\u27s unchanging sentence. The Clerk\u27s Tale exposes how language creates and changes the reality it represents. Chaucer\u27s poetics critique the quest for an absolute and divinely inspired correspondence between language and truth and find it lacking

Methodologies to determine forces on bones and muscles of body segments during exercise, employing compact sensors suitable for use in crowded space vehicles

A complete description of an instrumented ergometer system, including the sensors, the data acquisition system, and the methodologies to calculate the kinematic parameters were initially developed at Tulane University. This work was continued by the PI at NASA Johnson Space Center, where a flight ergometer was instrumented and tested during a KC-135 Zero-Gravity flight. The sensors that form part of the system include EMG probes and accelerometers mounted on the subject using the ergometer, load cells to measure pedal forces, and encoders to measure position and orientation of the pedal (foot). Currently, data from the flight test is being analyzed and processed to calculate the kinematic parameters of the individual. The formulation developed during the initial months of the grant will be used for this purpose. The system's components are compact (all sensors are very small). A salient feature of the system and associated methodology to determine the kinematics is that although it uses accelerometers, position is not determined by integration. Position is determined by determining the angle of two frames of reference for which acceleration at one point is known in coordinates of both frames

Bicycle ergometer instrumentation to determine muscle and bone forces during exercise

It is hypothesized that bone loss experienced by astronauts in zero gravity conditions may be curtailed by appropriate exercise. According to Wolf's law, bone regenerates when muscles produce stresses by pulling on the bone during daily activity and/or exercise on Earth. to use this theory to prevent or decrease bone loss, one needs to quantify musculoskeletal loads and relate them to bone density changes. In the context of the space program, it is desirable to determine musculoskeletal loads during exercise (using the bicycle ergometer in this case) so that one may make similar measurements on Earth and in space. In this manner, load measurements on Earth may be used as reference to generate similar loads during exercise in space. The work reported in this document entails a musculoskeletal load measurement system that, when complete, will provide forces at muscle insertion points and other contact points, on bone. This data will be used by Dr. Beth A. Todd, who is also a SSF working with Dr. Shackelford, as input to a finite element model of bone sections to determine stress distributions. A bicycle ergometer has been instrumented to measure parameters needed to determine musculoskeletal forces during exercise. A primary feature of the system is its compactness. It uses small/light sensors without line-of-sight requirements. The system developed includes sensors, signal processing, a data acquisition system, and software to collect the data. The sensors used include optical encoders to measure position and orientation of the pedal (foot), accelerometers to determine kinematic parameters of the shank and thigh, load cells to measure pedal forces on the sagittal plane, and EMG probes to measure muscle activity. The signals are processed using anti-aliasing filters and amplifiers. The sensors' output is digitized using 30 channels of a board mounted inside a 486 class PC. A program sets the data acquisition parameters and collects data during a time period specified by the user. The data is put directly into a file on the hard disk in binary form. The 30 channels are sampled at 200 KHz, and each 30 channel scan is done at a rate of 1000 Hz. The instrumented ergometer has been flown in the KC-135 zero-gravity (zero-g) flight to collect information needed to determine musculoskeletal forces under these conditions. Similar information has been collected in 1-g conditions for comparision with the results from the zero-g case. At this time, the sets of data from both experiments are being processed. An existing methodology will be used to determine the kinematic parameters of the shank and thigh using accelerometer and encoder data. This methodology was developed during the fellow's previous NASA/ASEE fellowship and thanks to a Director's Grant. In the future, a methodology to determine the musculoskeletal forces using Newton's Law of Motion and optimization techniques will be developed to determine forces exerted by particular muscles

Música contemporánea

El repertorio seleccionado para el concierto de graduación es la opción A: jazz; el cual estará conformado por ocho temas

Diagnóstico para el diseño de un programa de ética para mejorar el nivel de comprensión del sentido de la vida en los estudiantes universitarios

En la actualidad el incremento del número de suicidios, aumento de los divorcios, proliferación de enfermedades psíquicas, el recurso indiscriminado al sexo, etc.; han hecho que las personas se vean inmersos en lo que llamaría Víctor Frankl, un “vacío existencial”. Por ello la presente investigación tiene como objeto de estudio, proponer un programa de ética fundamentado en el personalismo de Carlos Cardona, para mejorar el nivel de comprensión del sentido de la vida en los estudiantes del VI ciclo de la escuela de Psicología, los objetivos a lograr son: determinar el nivel de comprensión del sentido de la vida, identificar la problemática en torno al nivel de comprensión del sentido de la vida, identificar los fundamentos de la ética personalista de Cardona, seleccionar contenidos, elaborar actividades de aprendizaje basados en la ética personalista de Cardona. Este trabajo se encuentra sustentado por Cardona, Santo Tomás DE Aquino y Víctor Frankl. Por el alcance que tiene la investigación se ha definido como descriptiva, ya que una de las funciones principales de esta es la de “la capacidad para seleccionar las características fundamentales del objeto de estudio y su descripción detallada” Bernal (2006, p.112). El instrumento utilizado es un test elaborado por el investigador y su asesora, recolectando datos y obteniendo como resultados: algunos estudiantes carecen de proyecto de vida, consideran innecesaria una realidad superior, piensan que el futuro no ofrece bien alguno; buscan una existencia sin esfuerzos; piensan que el dinero se utiliza para demostrar dominio ante los demás, quieren una libertad ilimitada, etc

El graffiti en metálico: análisis sobre el graffiti y la circulación monetaria

The graffiti makers have used of coins and banknotes like a writing supports along the History and in the modern times particularly. The aware of symbolic value, the practical use like private media or the intervention in the monetary traffic are some factors that have become the currency graffiti in a feature of the contemporary graffiti. Its rooting and proliferation are showed through the examples, located in the 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries in Europe and America

Integrated Systems Health Management for Intelligent Systems

The implementation of an integrated system health management (ISHM) capability is fundamentally linked to the management of data, information, and knowledge (DIaK) with the purposeful objective of determining the health of a system. It is akin to having a team of experts who are all individually and collectively observing and analyzing a complex system, and communicating effectively with each other in order to arrive at an accurate and reliable assessment of its health. In this paper, concepts, procedures, and approaches are presented as a foundation for implementing an intelligent systems ]relevant ISHM capability. The capability stresses integration of DIaK from all elements of a system. Both ground-based (remote) and on-board ISHM capabilities are compared and contrasted. The information presented is the result of many years of research, development, and maturation of technologies, and of prototype implementations in operational systems