The Texas Spacecraft Laboratory (TSL) at the University of Texas at Austin is currently planning to launch two CubeSat missions in 2014. Innovations are more readily attempted on such low-risk small satellites than with higher-cost payloads, which puts CubeSats at the forefront of space research. The TSL CubeSats will thus be used to pioneer and demonstrate new on-orbit technology. Due to the innovative aspect of the CubeSat missions, limited prior experience exists with the technology used. It is thus important to have an accurate understanding of mission operations prior to launch through computer simulation. In order to improve the success and reliability of current and future TSL missions, a MATLAB tool was developed to simulate on-orbit operations. The various capabilities of the user-friendly tool developed include power budget calculations, pass determination and orbit simulation. The comprehensive program can predict the life of the spacecraft at critical moments of its operation and, in general, help improve understanding of how to successfully meet mission requirements and design mission operations. / text

International Telemetering Conference Proceedings / October 27-30, 1997 / Riviera Hotel and Convention Center, Las Vegas, Nevada / This student paper was produced as part of the team design competition in the University of Arizona course ECE 485, Radiowaves, and Telemetry. It describes the design of a telemetry support package for interplanetary exploration. Control and processing of telemetric signals between an earth based control station, an exploratory orbiter and probe pods are the focus of this design. Using this design data retrieval is achieved at a highly reliable rate of 1 error in 10^-10 bits. The exploratory orbiter, carrying a payload of probes, is launched and proceeds along its predetermined trajectory. Commands from the earth-based control station is used to send the orbiter to planetary destinations. The craft then establishes a stable non-geosynchronous orbit. Several probe pods are launched towards the planet at predetermined locations. These probe pods collect and send data, as well as system monitoring information to the orbiting craft. The orbiting craft then retrieves the signals generated by all pods and relays that information to an earth-based control station.

International Telemetering Conference Proceedings / October 27-30, 1997 / Riviera Hotel and Convention Center, Las Vegas, Nevada / This student paper was produced as part of the team design competition in the University of Arizona course ECE 485, Radiowaves and Telemetry. It describes the design of a telemetering system for race cars. Auto Racing is an exciting sport where the winners are the ones able to optimize the balance between the driver’s skill and the racing teams technology. One of the main reasons for this excitement is that the main component, the race car, is traveling at extremely high speeds and constantly making quick maneuvers. To be able to do this continually, the car itself must be constantly monitored and possibly adjusted to insure proper maintenance and prevent damage. To allow for better monitoring of the car’s performance by the pit crew and other team members, a telemetering system has been designed, which facilitates the constant monitoring and evaluation of various aspects of the car. This telemetering system will provide a way for the speed, engine RPM, engine and engine compartment temperature, oil pressure, tire pressure, fuel level, and tire wear of the car to be measured, transmitted back to the pit, and presented in a way which it can be evaluated and utilized to increase the car’s performance and better its chances of winning the race. Furthermore, this system allows for the storing of the data for later reference and analysis.

En la última década los ingenieros informáticos se han enfrentado a profundos cambios en el modo en que se diseñan y fabrican los microprocesadores. Los nuevos procesadores no solo deben ser más rápidos que los anteriores, también deben ser factibles en términos de energía y disipación térmica, sobre todo en dispositivos que trabajan con baterías. Los problemas relacionados con consumo y temperatura son muy comunes en estos procesadores. En esta Tesis analizamos el rendimiento, consumo energético y precisión de diferentes mecanismos de reducción de consumo y descubrimos que no son suficientemente buenos para adaptarse a un límite de consumo con una penalización de rendimiento razonable. Para solucionar este problema proponemos diversas técnicas a nivel de microarquitectura que combinan de manera dinámica varios mecanismos de reducción de consumo para obtener una aproximación al límite de consumo mucho más precisa con una penalización de rendimiento mínima. / In the last decade computer engineers have faced changes in the way microprocessors are designed. New microprocessors do not only need to be faster than the previous generation, but also be feasible in terms of energy consumption and thermal dissipation, especially in battery operated devices. In this Thesis we worked in the design, implementation and testing of microarchitecture techniques for accurately adapting the processor performance to power constraints in the single core scenario, multi-core scenario and 3D die-stacked core scenario. We first designed “Power-Tokens”,to approximate the power being consumed by the processor in real time. Later we proposed different mechanisms based on pipeline throttling, confidence estimation, instruction criticality information, to adapt the processor to a predefined power budget . We also propose some layout optimizations for 3D die-stacked vertical designs.

The aim of this thesis is to study the methods of a free space optical link design and its application in the communication technologies. The thesis describes possible intrusive influences on the transmitted optical signal, which are the signal noise, atmospheric attenuation and atmospheric turbulences. The thesis is particulary focused on the influence of the atmospheric turbulences and atmospheric attenuation on the optical beam.