Tempest is a reusable crew exploration vehicle (CEV) for transferring crew from the Earth to the lunar surface and back. Tempest serves as a crew transfer module that supports a 4-person crew for a mission duration of ...

Entry, descent, and landing (EDL) is a multidimensional, complex problem, which is difficult to visualize in simple plots. The purpose of this work is to develop a systematic visualization scheme that could capture Mars ...

In the fall of 2003 a multi-disciplinary team consisting of graduate students from the Space Systems Design Lab (SSDL), the Aerospace Systems Design Lab (ASDL), and the Elevated Temperature Structural Durability Lab (ETSDL) ...

The President's Vision for Space Exploration presents a need to determine the best architecture and set of vehicle elements in order to achieve a sustained human lunar exploration program. The Lunar Architecture Stochastic ...

In order to return humans to the Moon, the Constellation Program will be required to operate a complex network of humans and spacecraft in several locations. This requires an early look at how decision-making authority ...

An interplanetary trajectory calculation application SAMURAI - Simulation and Animation Model Used for Rockets with Adjustable Isp - has been developed. SAMURAI is written in C++ and calculates transfer trajectories with ...

Electric propulsion has recently become a viable option for robotic missions, enabling shorter flight times, fewer required planetary gravity assists, smaller launch vehicles, and/or larger payloads. Trajectory design ...

The Lunar Architecture Stochastic Simulator and Optimizer (LASSO) is a simulation-based capability, based upon discrete event simulation (DES), for evaluating and optimizing flight element options for lunar transportation ...

In 2006, the 2nd Global Trajectory Optimization Competition (GTOC2) posed a “Grand Asteroid Tour” trajectory optimization problem, where participants were required to find the best possible low-thrust trajectory that ...