Aerospace Engineering Commons^™

Lab-On-A-Chip Biosensor For Interplanetary Life Detection Missions, Thomas Wall

Utah Space Grant Consortium

Space research still consists of the major goal of the successful detection of life on another planet. The 2012 biological and life detection (BOLD) mission to Mars included the ARROW biosensor as one of its main life detection tools for the mission. Although the mission never went forward, the ARROW biosensor remains an obvious choice for interplanetary life detection missions. The sensor is cheap, small, lightweight, and very sensitive. All of these factors helped make it the candidate of choice for the BOLD mission to Mars and still make it a good candidate today. Since 2012, the ARROW biosensor has …

Testing An Oxygen Demand Delivery Device, Kyle M. Burk, Joseph A. Orr

Utah Space Grant Consortium

Anesthesia care providers routinely deliver supplemental O2 during monitored anesthesia care to prevent hemoglobin desaturation. The existing method of delivery, however, contributes to complications including respiratory depression and fire hazard. Patient variability also makes delivering O2 difficult. We have developed a demand oxygen delivery system that only gives oxygen during early inspiration. We designed a volunteer study to evaluate patient monitoring and to compare continuous flow to demand delivery. We hypothesized that ceasing oxygen delivery during expiration will facilitate reliable capnography in non-intubated patients. We also hypothesized that delivering oxygen on demand leads to higher alveolar oxygen concentrations and higher …

Detecting Low Respiratory Rates Using Myriad, Low-Cost Sensors, Sean Ermer, Lara Brewer, Kai Kuck, Joseph Orr

Utah Space Grant Consortium

The underlying problem for two of the three most common patterns of unexpected hospital deaths (PUHD) is hypoventilation¹. Current methods of post-operative respiratory monitoring give delayed signals and have a high false positive rate leading nurses to ignore alarms. We hypothesize there exists a combination of low cost sensors which are capable of providing real time feedback and alarms regarding obstructive sleep apnea and ventilatory depression. Such a monitor would be useful during space travel when monitoring personnel are limited following an injury or if astronauts were to be sedated during extended travel. Methods: Twenty-six subjects were recruited …

A Numerical Study Of The Development Of Inducer Backflow, D. Tate Fanning

Utah Space Grant Consortium

Inducers are used as a first stage in pumps to hinder cavitation and promote stable flow. Inducers pressurize the working fluid sufficiently such that cavitation does not develop in the rest of the pump, which allows the pump to operate at lower inlet head conditions. Despite the distinct advantages of inducer use, an undesirable region of backflow and resulting cavitation can form near the tips of the inducer blades. This backflow is often attributed to tip leakage flow, or the flow induced by the pressure differential across an inducer blade at the tip. We examine backflow of a single inducer …

Internal Wave Generation In The Presence Of A Turning Depth, Allison Lee Julie Crockett

Utah Space Grant Consortium

Internal waves are formed in stably stratified fluids where the natural frequency (N) of the fluid is greater than the excitation frequency (ω). If N < &omega, only evanescent waves form. Evanescent waves, which decay at an exponential rate, can become propagating internal waves if N increases above ω. Experiments were performed to investigate the effects of topography shape, distance between the topography and the turning depth (where N = ω), and the strength of the stratification as measured by the Froude number in both the evanescent and propagating regions. It was found that internal waves with the highest kinetic energy were generated by the medium Gaussian and that decreasing the distance between topography and the turning depth increased the kinetic energy over the entire range of tested values and topographical shapes. However, Fr_evan was a strong influence on kinetic energy for only a portion of the tested values.

Hemispherical Grid Retarding Field Analyzer Redesign For Secondary Electron Emission Studies, Gregory Wilson

Utah Space Grant Consortium

A redesign of the Hemispherical Grid Retarding Field Analyzer is discussed in relationship to multilayer charging models. In order to accurately extend single layer charging models to dynamic multilayer scenarios, precise measurements of electron emission as well as the net surface potential must be made. By learning from the previous design and thinking of future applications, the new instrument will greatly enhance our ability to precisely measure materials undergoing energetic electron bombardment.

The Aerodynamic Center Of Inviscid Airfoils, Orrin Pope

Utah Space Grant Consortium

A method for developing relations for C_L and C_m using general airfoil theory and conformal mapping without applying linearizing approximations such as the need for thin airfoils, small airfoil camber, or small angles of attack is shown. More accurate, and mathematically correct relations for the location of the aerodynamic center are obtained by accounting for the trigonometric and aerodynamic non-linearities lost in the development of traditional relations for the location of the aerodynamic center of airfoils. These more accurate descriptions for the location of the aerodynamic center are shown to be significant when predicting aircraft static stability.

Stem Summer Camp For K-6 Students At Uvu, Bonnie Andersen, Cyrill Slezak

Utah Space Grant Consortium

UVU offers an excellent academic summer program in the fields of Science, Engineering, Technology, and Mathematics (STEM) specifically designed to engage and further students having completed grades 1-6. Program courses have been developed in close collaboration with experienced STEM endorsed Elementary school teachers and established university research faculty aligned with state curriculum standards. Engaging students within a community of motivated students and enthusiastic faculty in hands-on projects will develop critical thinking, content knowledge, and problem-solving skills.

Bipyrimidine Signatures As A Photoprotective Genome Strategy In G+C-Rich Halophilic Archaea, Daniel L. Jones, Bonnie K. Baxter

Utah Space Grant Consortium

Halophilic Archaea

• Experience high levels of ultraviolet (UV) radiation in their environments

• Demonstrate high resistance to UV • Are protected by pigmentation and efficient DNA repair

• Have high genomic G+C content

Halophiles And Biogeography, Bex Kemp, Adam Wolford, Bonnie Baxter

Utah Space Grant Consortium

Halophilic Archaea

•Halophilic archaea dominate the Earth’s many hypersaline environments such as Great Salt Lake (GSL)

• They are multi-extremophiles, tolerating not only salinity, but also desiccation and high levels of UV irradiation

• Halorubrum is a genus of Halophilic archaea with wide distribution around the Earth

• The distribution of Halorubum across space and time begs the question of the mechanism behind the biogeography.

Analysis Of Oxygen-Conserving Delivery Methods, Jason King, Lara Brewer, Soren Hoehne, Joseph Orr

Utah Space Grant Consortium

•Oxygen therapy is needed to help treat patients with a variety of medical conditions.

•Oxygen conservation methods can be used to deliver oxygen only during beginning of inspiration.

•This can provide the same medical benefits as constant oxygen delivery while using less oxygen and reducing costs.

•These conserving methods include intermittent flow devices and reservoir cannulas.

•Our goal was to optimize a pulse flow and reservoir cannula device for use in children age 5 years and under.

Utah State University Design, Build, Fly 2016-17, Matthew Nelson, Spencer Wendell

Utah Space Grant Consortium

Competition Requirements

•Folding Design

• Entire design must fold and stow in a tube.

• Four Missions

• Ground Test –The whole system, in stowed condition, must survive a drop onto concrete.

• Demonstration Flight –Short flight to verify capabilities.

• Speed Mission –Complete 3 laps with a payload of 3 pucks as fast as possible.

• Endurance Mission –Fly as many laps as possible in 5 minutes with 3 or more pucks.

Using Heart Rate Waveform Patterns And Frequency To Detect Postoperative Airway Obstruction, Anh Pham, Lara Brewer

Utah Space Grant Consortium

Hypoventilation has a high risk of happening during the first 24 hours after the initiation of opioids (drugs used for treating pain) in postoperative patients.

Current techniques to detect airway obstruction either have high false positive rate, delay indicator or ineffective cost.

Our solution is to build a reliable respiratory depression monitoring technique integrated from pulse oximeter waveform pattern signal and its frequency.

Combining Undergraduate Student Curriculum, Research, And Outreach: High Altitude Balloons And Rockets, Eric Davis, Russell Garner, Ryley Shingleton, Brittany Williams, Jason Sheetz, Kim Nielsen

Utah Space Grant Consortium

Student research is known to be a high-impact learning to participating students. At Utah Valley University, we are introducing a student-driven research paradigm where the research is integrated with the undergraduate curriculum and students form their own scientific hypotheses and design experiments to address the science objectives.

Extracting Dna From Salt: Using Picogreen To Explore Detection Limits, Joshua Webb, Luisa Rusta, Erin Tabish, Edgar Chavez, Brett Denney, Bonnie Baxter

Utah Space Grant Consortium

Biological materials surviving in modern halite (salt) on Earth may point to a method for detection of potential or former life in salt deposits on Mars. This project attempts to find an efficient method extracting cells and DNA from modern halite crystals to gain more insight into efficient method of extracting DNA from ancient salt. Our method considers the limitations of Mars Rover techniques in terms of reagents and simplicity. Halite was collected form the north shore of Great Salt Lake, Utah. Through direct experimentation, we designed a filtration system to isolate DNA from salt samples and refined this process …

The Space Survivability Test Chamber, Alexander Souvall, Benjamin Russon, Brian Wood, Gregory Wilson, Jr Dennison

Utah Space Grant Consortium

The Space Survivability Test Chamber (SST) provides an extensive, versatile, and cost-effective system for pre-launch verification and assessment of small satellites, system components, and spacecraft materials. A UNSGC Faculty Research Infrastructure Grant was awarded a for the purpose of making improvements to enhance and extend the capabilities of the SST. Since the SST was brought online in August 2016, several externally funded projects have been completed and collaborative projects with The University of Tsukuba (Japan) and Logan High School (Utah). Many more projects are forthcoming and the capabilities of the SST continue to be improved and developed for the future.

Design Of In-Flight Instrumentation To Characterize A Hybrid Thruster, Stephen Whitmore, Hybrid Thrustuer Usip Team

Utah Space Grant Consortium

The NASA Undergraduate Student Instrument Project (USIP) is a program with the goal to provide hands-on flight project experience to undergraduate programs, and to fly new technology in space to improve Technology Readiness Level (TRL).

Survey Of Mars South Polar Craters For Subsurface Water Ice, John Armstrong, Michael Hernandez, Mars South Pole Survey Team

Utah Space Grant Consortium

Mars' polar ice caps experience seasonal sublimation, the process in which ice skips a liquid state, and moves directly from solid ice to gaseous vapor. Through geospatial analysis, we identify craters, observe geomorphology, then search for correlations with temperature and albedo to study the climate interaction between the surface and atmosphere in a search for liquid water.

The Utah Robotic Mining Project, Jonathan Davies, Utah Mining Robotics Team

Utah Space Grant Consortium

Autonomous robotics technology is improving at an exponential rate, and has the potential to be the largest leap in technology since the invention of the personal computer. Robot Operating System (ROS) [1] is a catalyst in the development of fully autonomous robots. With a large community of developers and many resources available, it allows researchers to focus their time on implementing fully autonomous systems on their robotic platform, instead of spending time developing algorithms.

This research focuses on the development of an autonomous robotic system using ROS, with the purpose of competing in the NASA Robotic Mining Competition [2]. While …

Literature Review: Biomimetic And Conventional Aircraft Wing Tips, Naseeb Ahmed Siddiqui, Waqar Asrar, Erwin Sulaeman

International Journal of Aviation, Aeronautics, and Aerospace

This paper is an attempt to summarize the effect of wing tip devices employed by birds, as well as aeronautical engineers in the past to improve the performance characteristics of aircraft. The focus is on reduction of the induced drag or drag due to lift also known as inviscid drag. This paper will provide an insight on both biomimetic and conventional wing tip approaches to reduce the induced drag. Prior analysis and experiments on the aerodynamics of airplane performance due to both these separate studies have been discussed. The needs of the industry and their past inventions have been described …