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The Rider (2026-08-26), Daniela Chapa-Reyes

The Rider Archives

Vol. 12, No. 1

Legal Malpractice In Washington: Use Of The Rules Of Professional Conduct, Angelo Tadrous

Seattle University Law Review

Legal malpractice claims are difficult to prove. They are difficult to prove because many jurisdictions require that a plaintiff prove that, but for the lawyer’s misconduct, the client would have fared better. Thus, in a malpractice suit, a plaintiff must try a case within a case. Despite this difficulty, many jurisdictions prohibit the use of the Rules of Professional Conduct when litigating a malpractice case. Washington State is one of these jurisdictions. The Washington Supreme Court held in Hizey v. Carpenter that the Rules of Professional Conduct may not be referred to during trial. This Note argues that this prohibition …

Converting Buildings Is Hard: Why Seattle’S Municipal Government Should Streamline Commercial-To-Residential Conversions, Tyler M. King

Seattle University Law Review

The conversion of commercial buildings into housing is a promising solution to the growing housing crisis in many urban areas. However, despite its potential benefits, the process of repurposing commercial spaces is often stymied by complex zoning codes, high conversion costs, and bureaucratic hurdles. This Article argues that the local and state governments in Seattle should adopt more streamlined policies and offer greater incentives to developers to facilitate these conversions. By reforming zoning regulations and providing targeted financial support, municipalities can reduce the barriers to conversion and unlock the potential of underutilized commercial properties. This article examines the legal and …

Usa V. Lamonica Mciver

2026 Decisions

USDC for the District of New Jersey

Ganiyu Jaiyeola V. Chemours Co

2026 Decisions

USDC for the District of Delaware

Hudson Hospital Opco Llc V. Cigna Health And Life Insurance Co

2026 Decisions

USDC for the District of New Jersey

Toward Public Access To On-Orbit Propulsion Data From Equuleus: Preparing Real Flight Data For Community Use, Hiroyuki Koizumi, Isamu Moriai, Hokuto Sekine, Keita Nishii, Mariko Akiyama, Shintaro Nakajima, Yosuke Kawabata, Yasuho Ataka, Shunichiro Nomura, Ryota Fuse, Ryu Funase

Small Satellite Conference

EQUULEUS is a 6U lunar exploration CubeSat, jointly developed and operated by the University of Tokyo and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA). It was launched in November 2022 by the Space Launch System (SLS) into a lunar transfer orbit and achieved insertion into a trajectory toward the Earth–Moon Lagrange region through multiple lunar flybys using its onboard water resistojet propulsion system AQUARIUS. The EQUULEUS primary mission is the demonstration of trajectory control technology in the Sun-Earth-Moon region for the first time by a nano-spacecraft.

Deep Learning-Based Burned Area Mapping Of California Wildfires Using Sentinel-2 And Landsat-8 Imagery Enhanced With Super-Resolution Techniques, Youngmin Seo, Seung Hee Kim, Menas Kafatos, Jinsoo Kim, Yangwon Lee

Institute for ECHO Articles and Research

The increasing frequency of wildfires under a changing climate has led to extensive ecosystem destruction, highlighting the need for reliable burned area assessment using satellite imagery. Single-satellite data are constrained by observation gaps and interference from smoke and clouds, whereas multi-satellite data fusion can mitigate these limitations. Nonetheless, the fusion techniques still encounter challenges such as spatial information loss from resolution differences and cross-satellite domain mismatch. This study presents a burned area mapping framework that integrates super-resolution (SR) with transfer learning to address spatial and domain gaps in multi-satellite data. Specifically, Landsat-8 imagery is super-resolved to 7.5 m resolution, and …

Advancing Clean Mobility: Hydrogen Fuel Cell Electric Bus Workforce Development For Transit Agencies, Manideep Tummalapudi, Shantanu Kumar, Jaskaran Singh

Mineta Transportation Institute

Hydrogen fuel cell electric buses (FCEBs) are rapidly transforming public transportation in the United States. However, while transit agencies are investing heavily in new zero-emission vehicles and fueling infrastructure, far less attention has been paid to the workforce needed to operate and maintain them. As agencies accelerate toward ambitious climate and fleet transition goals, they are also confronting a critical challenge: preparing workers for an entirely new set of technologies, safety requirements, and operational demands. This study addresses that gap by systematically identifying the knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSAs) required for FCEB vehicle operators and maintenance technicians, assessing current training …

Allograft Tendon Pretensioning Technique Guide., Joseph R Brown, Robert W Mendicino

Surgery Articles

In foot and ankle surgery, allograft tendons are frequently used in both primary and revision cases to enhance stability and function. However, postoperative complications, such as creep, can compromise the intended correction and stability over time. This paper presents a practical guide on pretensioning techniques prior to implantation, aiming to reduce creep and improve long-term outcomes. Using two common allograft specimens, we demonstrate pretensioning methods with specific focus on tendon stitching, techniques for securing the allograft to the graft board, optimal tensioning and time parameters. We recommend pretensioning at 80 N for approximately 30 min to effectively decrease creep and …

Translational Initiative To Minimize Childhood Hemiparesis After Asymmetrical Perinatal Brain Injury, Susan V. Duff, Emily Garavatti, Terrie Inder

Physical Therapy Faculty Articles and Research

The purpose of this perspective paper is to present a translational approach aimed at identifying the critical periods in brain development during which to provide neuroprotective and neurorestorative strategies, followed by prehensile training, to minimize hemiparesis and foster skill acquisition after asymmetrical perinatal brain injury (APBI). We contend that hemiparesis could be minimized after APBI through a multimodal sequential approach based on timely implementation of evidence-based intervention strategies. If APBI is identified early, neuroprotective techniques can be used in the first 10 days of life to minimize cell death. This can be followed in the next 3 months by the …

2026 Final Bpsou Backfill And Cover Material Quality Assurance Project Plan (Qapp), Pioneer Technical Services, Inc.

Silver Bow Creek/Butte Area Superfund Site

This Butte Priority Soils Operable Unit (BPSOU) Backfill and Cover Material Quality Assurance Project Plan (QAPP) provides the procedures and protocols necessary to conduct sampling and geotechnical characterization activities on import borrow and other externally sourced materials that will be used in backfill, cover soil, or engineered caps for upcoming BPSOU remediation activities described in the BPSOU Consent Decree (CD) (referred to as BPSOU CD; EPA, 2020a) Further Remedial Elements Scope of Work (FRESOW) (Attachment C of Appendix D to the BPSOU CD), the 2020 Residential Metals Abatement Program (RMAP) Unilateral Administrative Order (UAO) Amendment (EPA, 2020a), and ongoing maintenance …

Statistical Model Of Subsurface Scattering Bias In Icesat‐2'S Atl06 Product, Thilini Bamunu Arachchige, Kelly E. Gleason, Jonathan C. Ryan, Markus Allgaier

Environmental Science and Management Faculty Publications and Presentations

ICESat‐2 uses visible laser pulses and photon‐counting detectors to range the Earth's surface, providing precision altimetry for measuring ice sheet elevation change. However, since water ice is transparent to visible light, the photon returns recorded by ICESat‐2's ATLAS instrument may originate from subsurface scattering inside the snow or glacier ice volume, making the surface appear lower than it is. Here, we develop a Monte Carlo Radiative Transfer model to characterize the potential bias caused by subsurface scattering in snow and ice. Our model allows us to study the subsurface scattering bias in relation to photon number, scattering coefficient, and slope …

A Comparative Analysis Of Sensing Methodologies During Rendezvous & Proximity Operations, Tyler Ritz, Ian Silverberg, Axel Garcia, Giovanni Lavezzi

Small Satellite Conference

The result: Actionable state estimates in seconds not hours

Fusing a small passive imager with a state-of-the-art ranging payload, such as Peregrine Space Corp’s CORVID 12U and 3U variants, collapses the time to a 10 m relative-navigation gate (1σ RSS uncertainty in 3-axes) by two to three orders of magnitude versus angles-only navigation. While ingested measurement types differ across scenarios, the CONOPS remains unchanged. Active ranging replaces hours of parallax inference with direct measurements.

Spot: A Cubesat Mission For High-Resolution Monitorig Of Anthropogenic Sulfur Emissions, Carla Roesch, Colleen Golja, James Custer, Catherine Ember, Jerome Woodwark, Andrew Matheson, Joshua Vande Hey, Sonymol Vk, Steven Heer, Zixuan Gao, Tim Trent

Small Satellite Conference

Resolving individual industrial sources of SO₂ to constrain aerosol forcing — one of the largest remaining uncertainties in Earth's energy budget.

Autongc Flight Opnav Experiment Results On Capstone, Andrew J. Liounis, Sun Hur-Diaz, Behnam Azimi, Nichalas L. Cason, Chris R. Gnam, Grant Hecht, Steven Z. Queen, Michael J. Romeo, Sean R. Semper, Nathan Stacey, Andrew Tennenbaum, Daniel G. Berdugo, Carl J. De Vries, Benjamin Leser, Anne Long, Liam A. Greenlee, Joseph W. Patton, Steven B. Slegel, Isaac R. Witte

Small Satellite Conference

Summary: We successfully demonstrated on-board automated optical navigation (OpNav) in a lunar near rectilinear halo orbit (NRHO) using images of the Moon, the Earth, and other solar system bodies, advancing the technology readiness level (TRL) of the autonomous guidance navigation and control (autoNGC) OpNav capabilities from 5 to 7.

Semi-Autonomous Reconnaissance Satellite: A Laboratory Demonstration Of End-To-End On-Board Mission Autonomy, Eran Shtoyerman, Raphael Cohen, Rafi Cohen, Oshri Fatkiev, Guy Zaidman, Gal Pinchas, Doron Shterman

Small Satellite Conference

Real-time satellite responsiveness to user requests from the field remains largely unavailable in current space systems. Such capabilities are typically restricted to low-altitude airborne platforms, primarily due to limited satellite communication bandwidth, intermittent ground contact, and the reliance on ground-based mission planning. Enabling true responsiveness requires a paradigm shift toward highly autonomous satellites, in which target selection, task execution, and mission planning are performed on board.

For example, a user may request a satellite to perform the following task in real-time: detect a ceiling tanker ship in a specified area, estimate its velocity from video data, and autonomously track the …

Tailored Catalysts For Space Propulsion, Florian Harth, Kathy Bynum, Ilaria Longobardo, Hendrik Spod, Ingo Gräf, Alexander Bier, Hans-Jörg Wölk

Small Satellite Conference

Why catalysts matter in space propulsion

Chemical propulsion systems remain indispensable for satellite attitude control, orbit correction and collision avoidance maneuvers due to their reliability and high specific impulse. In monopropellant thrusters, the catalyst initiates the rapid decomposition of the propellant, generating hot reaction gases that produce thrust without external ignition. Catalyst performance and especially catalyst stability therefore directly determine ignition reliability, response time, thermal stability and operational lifetime of the propulsion system.

Heraeus Precious Metals provides heterogeneous catalysts tailored for space propulsion by combining precious metal chemistry, support engineering and scalable manufacturing to meet the demanding requirements of aerospace …

Altered Postnatal Chromatin Development In The Nucleus Accumbens Primes Enduring Stress Sensitivity, Rebekah L Rashford, Lisa Z Fang, Michael Deberardine, Hye Ji J Kim, Laura W Hirschfield, Ella Cervi, Mason R Barrett, Jeremy M Thompson, Meaghan C Creed, Catherine Jensen Peña

2020-Current year OA Pubs

Early life stress (ELS) sensitizes individuals to subsequent stressors to increase lifetime risk for psychiatric disorders. Within the nucleus accumbens (NAc)-a key limbic and reward-associated brain region-ELS sensitizes both cellular and transcriptional response to later stress, which are programmed by enduring epigenetic changes. Among the histone modifications persistently enriched by ELS in NAc is H3K4me1, which is associated with open chromatin and epigenetic priming of genomic enhancers. Here, we sought to determine whether H3K4me1 enrichment in NAc was sufficient to prime cellular and behavioral responses to adult stress. Viral-mediated overexpression of the histone H3 monomethyltransferase

A Novel Deployable Telescope For Small Satellites Using Adaptive Optic Technology, William Hill, Harbinder Rana, Darren Jones, Trevor Wood, Zac Thomas, Thomas Lacy, Duncan Housden, Calum Meredith

Small Satellite Conference

SSTL has been developing a deployable telescope with funding from the UK Defence and Security Accelerator (DASA). The aim of the study was to design a telescope that could achieve higher resolutions in the visible spectrum while utilising a smaller launch volume. To achieve a cost-effective launch the deployable system has been sized such that it would fit within a representative SSTL platform in a SpaceX Falcon 9 small satellite launch volume. A monolithic system with equivalent performance would require a larger launch volume and, therefore, it is expected that a deployable telescope can secure an overall mission price advantage. …

Scaling Up Monolithic Optics Capabilities: 25cm Aperture And Beyond, Cohl Houldin Hatala, Jordan Smilo, Wim De Vries, Brian Bauman, Christian Tolfa, John Cortes, Paul Rosso, Aaron Godfrey, Darrell Carter, Michael Wong, Seth Cornman, Josephine Smith, John Ganino, Ben Bahney

Small Satellite Conference

The 25 cm “V10” Monolithic Optical Payload has been developed through study phase design into a fully qualified system ready for on-orbit demonstration. This extends Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory’s monolithic telescope technology toward a rapidly fieldable, high performance space imaging system for small and medium spacecraft buses. Centered on the V10 monolithic Cassegrain optic in fused silica, the payload provides highly robust, diffraction limited performance with inherently maintained mirror alignment, eliminating complex on orbit alignment procedures and significantly reducing mechanical risk. The V10 optic is paired with a heritage focus mechanism and a panchromatic commercial off the shelf CMOS detectors, …

Payload Operation Using On-Board Vision Language Model, Meirav Nevo, Oshri Fatkiev, Guy Zaidman, Doron Shterman

Small Satellite Conference

The rapid maturation of multimodal vision-language models (VLMs) has significantly expanded artificial intelligence applications at the edge, including spaceborne systems. In this work, we present one of the first demonstrations of deploying a compact vision-language model directly on a very-high-resolution Earth-observation satellite payload processor, enabling autonomous on-orbit scene understanding and near real-time decision-making. This represents a paradigm shift in satellite operations, moving from ground-centric processing toward intelligent, self-directed spacecraft. 

Conventional Earth-observation missions rely on ground-based image processing and interpretation, introducing latency, downlink bandwidth constraints, and limited operational responsiveness. By embedding a VLM on board the satellite, visual reasoning can be …

Hyti-2: Advancing Hyperspectral Thermal Imaging Into The Era Of Space-Based Edge Processing, Miguel Nunes, Yosef Onodera, Trevor Sorensen, Robert Wright, Paul Lucey, Luke Flynn, Eric Pilger, Scott Ginoza, Mark Wood, Lance Yoseshige, Gabriel Guererro, Lucas Anderson, Charles Swenson, Sachidananda Babu

Small Satellite Conference

The Hyperspectral Thermal Imager 2.0 (HyTI-2) is a next-generation long-wave infrared (LWIR) hyperspectral imaging payload designed to operate as a continuously sensing, onboard intelligent node on a small satellite platform. Building on the heritage of the original HyTI mission, HyTI-2 delivers advances in spectral and spatial performance, onboard processing capability, and operational duty cycle, enabling sustained operational capability to support low-latency, data-rich Earth observation architectures for future satellite constellations. As the primary payload of the NASA ESTO InVEST-funded Active Cooling for Multispectral Earth Sensors (ACMES) mission, HyTI-2 is scheduled to launch in 2027 to a 550 km sun-synchronous orbit. HyTI-2 …

Optimization Of Orbit-Maintenance Strategies For Small Satellites In Cislunar Space, Timothy Lauinger, Bradley Cotten, Robert E. Zee

Small Satellite Conference

Renewed interest in lunar exploration and the development of a sustained cislunar economy has driven demand for low-cost missions supporting mapping, communications networks, navigation services, and scientific studies. Recent growth in rideshare opportunities to the Moon has made small-satellite architectures a viable and cost-effective approach for these missions. Successful execution of these missions, however, depends critically on fuel-efficient and reliable orbital insertion and maintenance strategies, as cislunar missions impose substantially higher delta V requirements than low-Earth orbit missions due to the inherent instability of low lunar orbits. Perturbations arising primarily from lunar mass concentrations drive secular growth in orbital eccentricity …

Model To Predict Solar Eclipse Impacts On Cygnss Mission Operations, Zach Wiens, Jillian Redfern, Amanda Alexander, Brian Magee, Sam Jones, William Wells, Caden Gobat

Small Satellite Conference

Launched into low-Earth orbit in 2016, the Cyclone Global Navigation Satellite System (CYGNSS) mission is a constellation of eight small satellites that studies hurricanes and soil moisture. The spacecraft orbit in a fixed orientation with the instrument pointed nadir and the main solar array pointed zenith. During high beta angle seasons – periods during which the magnitude of angle between the Sun vector and the orbit plane is large – the solar arrays generate less power, so mission operators roll the spacecraft 10-16° towards the Sun. This maintains the battery state of charge above the safe-mode threshold. After nine years …

A Feasibility-Aware Attitude Trajectory Planner For Small Satellites, Patrick Mckeen, Niclas Scheuer, Kerri Cahoy

Small Satellite Conference

Spacecraft attitude control traditionally requires extensive per-mission engineering—hand-tuned gains, mission-specific mode logic, and conservative operating envelopes—that breaks down when on-orbit conditions deviate from ground assumptions. This is especially costly for small satellites, where limited ground support makes autonomous adaptability essential. We present a feasibility-aware attitude trajectory planner that replaces this hand-engineered stack with continuous planning from a digital twin: less a new feedback law than a different division of labor, in which the mode logic, gain tuning, and desaturation a conventional ADCS builds as separate pieces are instead absorbed into a single optimization.

Built on the ALTRO trajectory optimization algorithm, …

Dante: A Spaceborne Radar Constellation For Debris Detection And Tracking, Leonardo Carrer, Davide Giudici, Bernhard Niedermayer, Christian Federspiel, Wolfgang Ebner, Robert Greinecker

Small Satellite Conference

The growth of space debris in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) is increasing collision risk and challenging the sustainability of space operations, while current ground‑based radars remain limited in sensitivity, coverage and update rates especially for small objects. This paper presents DANTE (Detection ANd Tracking of space dEbris), a spaceborne radar constellation concept designed to enhance debris detection, tracking and orbit refinement directly from LEO. DANTE employs multiple low‑cost satellites equipped with X‑band phased‑array radars operating in two modes: a Tracking Mode for trajectory refinement of known objects and a Beam‑Park/Electronic Fence Mode for debris discovery. Performance analyses indicate sub‑meter resolution …

Software Defined Swarms, Nathan Benz, Scott Miller, Jeff Huang, Sonny Hwang, Todd Sarshad, Edmund De La Cruz, Thomas Magesarcher

Small Satellite Conference

The Starling Extended Mission has demonstrated the transformative potential of software-defined architectures in multi-spacecraft swarms. Building on the original Starling mission, which validated autonomous coordination and networking among small satellites, the extended phase focused on adaptability—updating onboard payload software and software-defined radios (SDRs) to enable entirely new experiments without hardware modifications. This capability signals a new approach: spacecraft swarms can evolve post-launch to meet emerging scientific and operational objectives. 

Central to this extension was the deployment of new software enabling two-way ranging and “reverse GPS” source identification using raw radio frequency (RF) signals. Traditionally, ranging and navigation rely on pre-integrated …

Design Mechanism Framework For Autonomous Small Satellite Constellations – A Newspace Outlook, Mohammed Irfan Rashed

Small Satellite Conference

The increasing deployment of small satellite constellations is driving a transition from isolated spacecraft missions toward distributed and coordinated space operations. However, as constellation size and mission complexity grow, traditional ground-centric operational approaches become difficult to scale due to communication limitations, delayed decision-making, and increased operational workload. While autonomy has been widely explored through onboard algorithms and artificial intelligence techniques, there remains limited focus on how autonomy should be integrated into the systems engineering architecture of constellation missions. This paper presents a Design Mechanism Framework (DMF) for autonomous small satellite constellations that embeds autonomy directly into mission architecture, operational logic, …

High-Torque Reaction Wheels For Agile Small Satellites, Thomas Brunsgaard, Matt Carton, Kearney Lackas

Small Satellite Conference

Blue Canyon Technologies has developed a high-torque reaction wheel (RW) product line to meet the growing attitude control demands of next-generation small spacecraft. As small satellites expand into missions requiring rapid retargeting and precise pointing, spacecraft agility is foundational to mission performance. More targets equal more data collection, translating to greater mission insight and revenue generation. 

This paper describes Blue Canyon’s approach to product line architecture that enabled rapid development and deployment of high-torque reaction wheels across multiple size classes. The high-torque variants deliver 0.5 Nm of torque, representing a 2X increase over standard configurations with 60% of the baseline …