HYBRID: NASA’s Challenges and Needs to Ensure Safe Structures for Human Space Exploration

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Zum Inhalt: NASA’s rich history of human spaceflight provides the foundation for today’s exploration vision: to maintain U.S. leadership in space, establish a lasting presence on and around the Moon, and pave the way forward to Mars and beyond. NASA Artemis missions will use the Space Launch System, the ORION Spacecraft, and the Human Landing System to return humans to the lunar surface and establish a permanent lunar basecamp.  In support of the Artemis missions, NASA’s Gateway Program will, through an international collaboration, establish humanity's first space station around the Moon.  Accomplishing these ambitious goals will require innovative technologies and systems, some of which have not yet been demonstrated. Advanced materials, structures and manufacturing techniques will be the foundation of long-duration habitats on and around the moon as well as lunar and deep-space exploration vehicles.  To successfully perform for extended periods of time in the harsh environment of space, these habitats and vehicles require equally advanced inspection and monitoring techniques that can ensure they are both manufactured properly and are able to fully accomplish their mission. These techniques need to be robust and easily operated by astronauts who may have limited inspection experience and are wearing bulky spacesuits.  NASA also plans on using robotic technologies to construct certain crucial infrastructure elements for extra-terrestrial application. Potential elements to be built include habitats, landing pads and aprons, roads, blast walls and shade walls, and thermal and micrometeorite protection shields using both raw materials from Earth and materials existing on the lunar surface. Automated inspection techniques that can complement the robotic manufacturing of materials is therefore highly desirable.  This presentation will discuss in detail some of the needs for advanced technologies as NASA pursues its vision for the human exploration of space, along with some examples of how these needs have been addressed in the past.

Zur Person: Mr. K. Elliott Cramer is the NASA Engineering and Safety Center (NESC) Chief Engineer at the Langley Research Center (LaRC).  Prior to this position Mr. Cramer served as the Associate Director and then Acting Deputy Director for Structures & Materials in the Research Directorate at NASA LaRC, where he led a team of 165 civil servants in 6 research branches developing safe, reliable, lightweight aerospace structures to meet NASA mission needs.  Before his directorate role, Mr. Cramer was the head of the Nondestructive Evaluation Sciences Branch at LaRC, managing a team of civil servants developing novel methods for automated and large area inspection, modelling and data analysis tools, material state awareness technologies, and intelligent measurement and sensor systems.  During his career Mr. Cramer has also completed Headquarters detail assignments in the Office of the Chief Engineer and the Office of the NASA Administrator. Mr. Cramer began his career as an Aerospace Technologist at LaRC in 1989 with the Nondestructive Evaluation Sciences Branch where his research focused on developing novel nondestructive inspection techniques for a variety of NASA applications including the Space Shuttle, the International Space Station, the X-37, as well as numerous aeronautics projects. Mr. Cramer has authored more than 85 technical reports and publication.  He holds 15 U.S. patents on various inventions, including NASA’s Ultrasonic Wire Crimp Inspection Technology, winner of the 2009 NASA Government Invention of the Year Award.  He is a recipient of numerous awards throughout his career including a NASA’s Exceptional Engineering Achievement Medal, a NASA Space Flight Awareness (Silver Snoopy) Award, an Outstanding Leadership Medal, and an R&D 100 Award.

Diskussionsleitung: Dr. Uwe Ewert

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