National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Small Business Innovation Research 2001 Program Solicitation

TOPIC H7 Space Transportation

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H7.01Test and Validation Management Methodologies
H7.02 High Power Electric Propulsion For Human Missions

The goal of the HEDS Space Transportation topic is to identify and to develop specific new space transportation technologies that can significantly increase the safety and reliability of ambitious, future human exploration missions and campaigns beyond Earth orbit while dramatically reducing the transportation-related cost of human exploration initial missions and sustained campaigns. This includes both systems and infrastructures associated with Earth-to-orbit transportation, in-space transport, and excursions from space to and from targets in space (including the Moon, Mars and asteroids). The objectives under this topic include: (1) Developing and demonstrating selected, highly innovative technologies needed to assure that future human exploration space transportation systems and infrastructures are safe and "robustly" reliable. (2) Developing and validating technologies for the affordable transportation to - and from - targets in space beyond low Earth orbit. (3) Enabling reliable and affordable transportation to all points of interest globally on the Moon or Mars. (4) Establishing a foundation for profitable commercial development of space applications of these technologies in the mid- to far-term.

H7.01 Test and Validation Management Methodologies
Lead Center: SSC
Participating Center(s): None

Proposals are solicited for innovative methods and approaches to management of test and validation of space transportation technologies. Proposals should address methods of providing more cost efficient, effective identification and use of test and validation facilities or the development of key test and validation technologies that can improve reliability and performance of test and validation facilities and operations. Specific areas of interest in this subtopic include the following:

Application of System Science to Management of Test and Validation
New innovative technologies and approaches to incorporating knowledge and information processing techniques (intelligent systems, data mining techniques, fuzzy logic, neural nets, optimization techniques, etc.) to support decision making for test and validation management.

• Data mining and optimization techniques that will provide identification and analysis of test and validation facilities for selection of the best facility.
• Modeling and analysis methods to identify and evaluate technical areas required to be developed or modified to provide effective testing and validation of space transportation technology.
• Modeling and analysis methods to identify and assess areas for improving test efficiencies and/or reducing operational costs for the test and validation of the technology.
• Techniques to reduce required sample size to maintain acceptable levels of confidence in cost data.
• Risk management techniques.

Methods for Improvements in Test and Validation Operations, Safety and Reliability
Identification and development of specific technologies that will provide improved effectiveness and efficiency in the operation, safety, and reliability in all test and validation programs.

• Software and hardware systems that create a virtual test and control system to monitor operations and data analysis. This virtual control system would incorporate expert base and information processing techniques that provide for real time interactive decision making.
• Graphical data software to provide a near real time data translation into 2-D or 3-D graphic display that provides a visual representation of the physical characteristics of the data, facilitating the data analysis.
• Interface hardware and software that provide for Network Appliance technology to be applied to test operations.
• Develop design concepts for optimized, and/or modularized, test and validation facilities which will improve test efficiency and reduce transition time between test articles.
  

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H7.02 High Power Electric Propulsion For Human Missions
Lead Center: GRC
Participating Center(s): None

High-power (> 100 kW), electric propulsion technologies are a critical component of orbit transfer and planetary insertion in the HEDS missions. High-power electric propulsion can reduce propellant mass requirements (compared to all-chemical propulsion) to the extent where it allows a reduction in launch vehicle class or an increase in payload. In either case, the mass savings result in significant cost savings for HEDS missions. For interplanetary missions, high-power electric propulsion will provide quicker trip times (depending on available power) than all-chemical propulsion since its high specific impulse (Isp) allows for direct transit to planetary bodies.

Innovations in high-power electric propulsion technology are sought that will increase high-power electric thruster efficiency, increase thruster life, reduce total system mass, reduce system complexity, and reduce trip time. Thruster parameters of interest include power levels of 100-kW to several megawatts; Isp values of 2000 s for Earth-orbit transfers to over 5000 s for planetary missions; thruster efficiencies in excess of 50 percent; and system lifetimes commensurate with mission requirements (typically 10,000 hours of operation). Proposals that seek to investigate and resolve, either theoretically or experimentally, the fundamental lifetime and performance limiting mechanisms of high-power electric thrusters are of particular interest.
Several propulsion devices are being considered for high-power HEDS missions including Hall, Ion, magnetoplasmadynamic (MPD) thrusters, pulsed inductive thrusters (PIT), and VASMIR. The specific technology challenges for high-power propulsion devices include:

Hall and Ion

• Scaled up in power (100 kW class)
• Use of alternate propellants such as krypton or argon
• Maintain high efficiency of today's lower power systems (> 55 to 70 percent efficient)
• Long lifetimes (> 10,000 hours)

MPD

• Long lifetime components > 10,000 hours
• Improved efficiency (> 60 percent)
• Simpler, higher efficient, continuous (not pulsed) power processing systems (> 90 percent)
• Lighter thermal control (most of the inefficiency results in waste heat not removed by the exhaust, e.g., almost 400 kW of heat must be removed for a 1 MW MPD) (< 2 kg/kWt)

Pulsed Inductive Thrusters

• High efficiency > 60 percent
• Simple, efficient and light pulsed power processing systems (> 90 percent, < 1 kg/kW)

VASMIR

• High efficiency stages and processes (total efficiency > 60 percent)
• Light components including superconducting magnets
• Advanced, long-term fuel storage (e.g., hydrogen and helium) [years on-orbit, < 20 percent tankage]

Specific Impulse Throttling

• Techniques to allow for throttling of Isp at constant power (~2500 sec to 10,000 sec)
• Other innovative propulsion concepts providing the above Isp's, > 60 percent efficiency, at power levels from 100 kW to multi-megawatts

Support Systems

• Light, inexpensive, throttleable propellant feed systems for various fuels
• Radiation-resistant components to resist cosmic and power system radiation
• Safety and redundant systems to ensure crew member safety and mission success
• Gimbaling systems: (2DOF > +/- 20^o)

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