The Kentucky Re-entry Universal Payload System (KRUPS) is an adaptable testbed for atmosphere entry science experiments, with an initial application to thermal protection systems (TPS). Because of the uniqueness of atmospheric entry conditions that ground testing is unable to replicate, scientists principally rely on numerical models for predicting entry conditions. The KRUPS spacecraft, developed at the University of Kentucky, provides an inexpensive means of obtaining validation data to verify and improve these models. To increase the technology readiness level (TRL) of the spacecraft, two sub-orbital missions were developed. The first mission, KUDOS, launched August 13th, 2017 on a Terrier-Improved Malamute rocket to an altitude of ~150 km. The second mission, KOREVET, launched on March 25th, 2018 on the same type of rocket to an altitude of ~170 km. The chief purpose of both missions was to validate the spacecraft design, ejection mechanism, on-board power, data transmission, and data collection. After both missions, the overall TRL improved from 4 to 5 by validating most subsystems in a relevant environment. Both of these missions were invaluable preparation for the project's ultimate goal of releasing multiple experimental testbeds from the ISS.

The initial stage of liquid phase sintering, involving liquid penetration, agglomerate separation, particle spreading and growth has been investigated in experiments using tungsten heavy alloys. The particle composites used were produced by hot isostatic pressing (HIP) of pure powder mixtures of W-Ni-Fe-(Co). By using different HIP temperatures, volume fractions of tungsten, alloying elements like Cobalt and Sulphur or excluding Iron from the matrix, liquid penetration, agglomerate separation and particle growth conditions were affected. The investigations were performed mainly under microgravity (sounding rockets or parabolic trajectories by airplanes) but at high tungsten particle fractions, short sintering times or at infiltration of solid pure tungsten, they were performed at normal gravity. The liquid penetration of the tungsten agglomerates is explained by initial wetting under non-equilibrium conditions, due to the reaction between the liquid matrix and the particles, and a decrease of interfacial energy. The dissolving of tungsten gives a pressure drop in the penetrating liquid and a driving force for the liquid movement by a suggested parabolic penetration model. For cold worked tungsten, a penetration theory was proposed, where an internal stress release in the penetrated tungsten grains creates space for the advancing liquid. The spreading of the tungsten agglomerates is explained by an interagglomerate melt swelling due to a Kirkendall effect. The liquid matrix undergoes a volume increase since the diffusion rates of Ni-Fe are higher than for W and initial concentration gradients of W and Ni, Fe exists. The suggested model by Kirkendall are also used for an analysis of the interaction behaviour between solid particles and a solidification front and inclusion behaviour in iron base alloys during teeming and deoxidation. The average tungsten particles size decrease initially since part of the tungsten particles is dissolved when the non-equilibrium matrix phase is melting. When equilibrium is reached, the tungsten particles grow in accordance with the Ostwald ripening process by an approximately 1/3 power law. Larger particle fraction of particles showed a higher growth rate, due to shorter diffusion distances between the particles. Cobalt, Sulphur and absence of iron in the matrix were found to increase the growth rate of the tungsten particles due to a higher surface tension between the solid tungsten particles and the matrix melt. / QC 20100528

No description available.

Sounding rockets find applications in multiple fields of scientific research including meteorology, astronomy and microgravity. Indigenous sounding rocket technologies are absent on the African continent despite a potential market in the local aerospace industries. The UKZN Phoenix Sounding Rocket Programme was initiated to fill this void by developing inexpensive medium altitude sounding rocket modeling, design and manufacturing capacities. This dissertation describes the development of the Hybrid Rocket Performance Simulator (HYROPS) software tool and its application towards the structural design of the reusable, 10 km apogee capable Phoenix-1A hybrid sounding rocket, as part of the UKZN Phoenix programme. HYROPS is an integrated 6–Degree of Freedom (6-DOF) flight performance predictor for atmospheric and near-Earth spaceflight, geared towards single-staged and multi-staged hybrid sounding rockets. HYROPS is based on a generic kinematics and Newtonian dynamics core. Integrated with these are numerical methods for solving differential equations, Monte Carlo uncertainty modeling, genetic-algorithm driven design optimization, analytical vehicle structural modeling, a spherical, rotating geodetic model and a standard atmospheric model, forming a software framework for sounding rocket optimization and flight performance prediction. This framework was implemented within a graphical user interface, aiming for rapid input of model parameters, intuitive results visualization and efficient data handling. The HYROPS software was validated using flight data from various existing sounding rocket configurations and found satisfactory over a range of input conditions. An iterative process was employed in the aerostructural design of the 1 kg payload capable Phoenix-1A vehicle and CFD and FEA numerical techniques were used to verify its aerodynamic and thermo-structural performance. The design and integration of the Phoenix-1A‟s hybrid power-plant and onboard electromechanical systems for recovery parachute deployment and motor oxidizer flow control are also discussed. It was noted that use of HYROPS in the design loop led to improved materials selection and vehicle structural design processes. It was also found that a combination of suitable mathematical techniques, design know-how, human-interaction and numerical computational power are effective in overcoming the many coupled technical challenges present in the engineering of hybrid sounding rockets. / Thesis (M.Sc.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2012.

The continuous advancement in wireless communications technology demands new approaches to improving the capacity of existing radio links. The high data throughput required can be achieved by the complete utilization of space, time and polarization diversities inherent in any propagation environment. Among the different propagation scenarios, the indoor channels represent a particularly challenging problem given the number and complexity of interactions between the transmitted signal and the environment. This dissertation explores the interrelation between propagation physics and space-time-polarization diversity based on a novel high resolution channel sounding and reconstruction technique. First, a method to reconstruct the indoor complex channel response based on a limited set of samples and the elimination of the interference using deconvolution techniques is presented. Then, the results for the joint angle-of-arrival, delay characterization and depolarization of electromagnetic waves are presented. Finally, a novel approach to using depolarized multipath signals to boost the receiver signal-to-noise performance is presented. The current study shows that full utilization of the diversities of channel novel wireless systems can be proposed with significant improvement in capacity.

In order to meet the ever-growing demand for mobile data, a number of different technologies have been adopted by the fourth generation standardization bodies. These include multiple access schemes such as spatial division multiple access (SDMA), and efficient modulation techniques such as orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM)-based modulation. The specific objectives of this theses are to develop an effective feedback method for interference management in smart antenna SDMA systems and to design an efficient OFDM-based modulation technique, where an additional dimension is added to the conventional two-dimensional modulation techniques such as quadrature amplitude modulation (QAM). In SDMA time division duplex (TDD) systems, where channel reciprocity is maintained, uplink (UL) channel sounding method is considered as one of the most promising feedback methods due to its bandwidth and delay efficiency. Conventional channel sounding (CCS) only conveys the channel state information (CSI) of each active user to the base station (BS). Due to the limitation in system performance because of co-channel interference (CCI) from adjacent cells in interference-limited scenarios, CSI is only a suboptimal metric for multiuser spatial multiplexing optimization. The first major contribution of this theses is a novel interference feedback method proposed to provide the BS with implicit knowledge about the interference level received by each mobile station (MS). More specifically, it is proposed to weight the conventional channel sounding pilots by the level of the experienced interference at the user’s side. Interference-weighted channel sounding (IWCS) acts as a spectrally efficient feedback technique that provides the BS with implicit knowledge about CCI experienced by each MS, and significantly improves the downlink (DL) sum capacity for both greedy and fair scheduling policies. For the sake of completeness, a novel procedure is developed to make the IWCS pilots usable for UL optimization. It is proposed to divide the optimization metric obtained from the IWCS pilots by the interference experienced at the BS’s antennas. The resultant new metric, the channel gain divided by the multiplication of DL and UL interference, provides link-protection awareness and is used to optimize both UL and DL. Using maximum capacity scheduling criterion, the link-protection aware metric results in a gain in the median system sum capacity of 26.7% and 12.5% in DL and UL respectively compared to the case when conventional channel sounding techniques are used. Moreover, heuristic algorithm has been proposed in order to facilitate a practical optimization and to reduce the computational complexity. The second major contribution of this theses is an innovative transmission approach, referred to as subcarrier-index modulation (SIM), which is proposed to be integrated with OFDM. The key idea of SIM is to employ the subcarrier-index to convey information to the receiver. Furthermore, a closed-form analytical bit error ratio (BER) of SIM OFDM in Rayleigh channel is derived. Simulation results show BER performance gain of 4 dB over 4-QAM OFDM for both coded and uncoded data without power saving policy. Alternatively, power saving policy maintains an average gain of 1 dB while only using half OFDM symbol transmit power.

The University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN) Phoenix Hybrid Sounding Rocket Programme was established in 2010. The programme’s main objective is to develop a sounding rocket launch capability for the African scientific community, which currently lacks the ability to fly research payloads to the upper atmosphere. In this dissertation, UKZN’s in-house Hybrid Rocket Performance Simulator (HYROPS) software is used to improve the design of the Phoenix-2A vehicle, which is intended to deliver a 5 kg instrumentation payload to an apogee altitude of 100 km. As a benchmarking exercise, HYROPS was first validated by modelling the performance of existing sub-orbital sounding rockets similar in apogee to Phoenix-2A. The software was found to approximate the performance of the published flight data within 10%. A generic methodology was then proposed for applying HYROPS to the design of hybrid propellant sounding rockets. An initial vehicle configuration was developed and formed the base design on which parametric trade studies were conducted. The performance sensitivity for varying propulsion and aerodynamic parameters was investigated. The selection of parameters was based on improving performance, minimising cost, safety and ease of manufacturability. The purpose of these simulations was to form a foundation for the development of the Phoenix-2A vehicle as well as other large-scale hybrid rockets. Design chamber pressure, oxidiser-to-fuel ratio, nozzle design altitude, and fin geometry were some of the parameters investigated. The change in the rocket’s propellant mass fraction was the parameter which was found to have the largest effect on performance. The fin and oxidiser tank geometries were designed to avoid fin flutter and buckling respectively. The oxidiser mass flux was kept below 650 kg/m2s and the pressure drop across the injector relative to the chamber pressure was maintained above 15% to mitigate the presence of combustion instability. The trade studies resulted in an improved design of the Phoenix-2A rocket. The propellant mass of the final vehicle was 30 kg less than the initial conceptual design and the overall mass was reduced by 25 kg. The Phoenix-2A vehicle was 12 m in length with a total mass of 1006 kg. The fuel grain length of Phoenix-2A was 1.27 m which is approximately 3 times that of Phoenix-1A. The benefit of aluminised paraffin wax as a fuel was also investigated. The results indicated that more inert mass can be delivered to the target apogee of 100 km when using a 40% aluminised paraffin wax. / M.Sc.Eng. University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban 2013.

The continuous advancement in wireless communications technology demands new approaches to improving the capacity of existing radio links. The high data throughput required can be achieved by the complete utilization of space, time and polarization diversities inherent in any propagation environment. Among the different propagation scenarios, the indoor channels represent a particularly challenging problem given the number and complexity of interactions between the transmitted signal and the environment. This dissertation explores the interrelation between propagation physics and space-time-polarization diversity based on a novel high resolution channel sounding and reconstruction technique. First, a method to reconstruct the indoor complex channel response based on a limited set of samples and the elimination of the interference using deconvolution techniques is presented. Then, the results for the joint angle-of-arrival, delay characterization and depolarization of electromagnetic waves are presented. Finally, a novel approach to using depolarized multipath signals to boost the receiver signal-to-noise performance is presented. The current study shows that full utilization of the diversities of channel novel wireless systems can be proposed with significant improvement in capacity.

La découverte de nombreuses planètes extrasolaires depuis 1995 est une source d’inspiration pour les modèles de formation et évolution des systèmes solaires. Une fraction de ces planètes ont un demi-grand axe inférieur à 0.1 UA; une planète qui migre à proximité de son étoile subit donc d’abord un fort vent solaire et, après son entrée dans la magnétosphère stellaire, un fort champ magnétique. Nous étudions séparemment l’interaction entre ces planètes et la composante périodique et indépendente du temps du champ magnétique dipolaire stellaire. L’interaction périodique est associée à des courants induits confinés dans la planète. Nous étudions deux effets qui pourraient augmenter le moment angulaire d’une planète gaseuse géante qui migre vers son étoile: un torque de Lorentz qui transferre du moment angulaire de la rotation de l’étoile vers l’orbite de la planète et une perte de masse induite par la dissipation ohmique dans la planète qui peut donner du moment angulaire à la planète lorsque cette masse est accrétée sur l’étoile. Nous modellisons l’interaction indépendente du temps comme un modèle d’inducteur unipolaire, dans lequel le courant induit circule dans une boucle fermée formée par la planète, le flux de tube, et le pied du flux de tube dans l’atmosphère stellaire. Nous calculons de fa con cohérente la dissipation ohmique dans la planète et le pied du flux de tube ainsi que le couple de Lorentz. Nous utilisons alors ce modèle pour expliquer l’aspect enflé de certaines planètes géantes. Finalement, nous suggérons que ce modèle permettrait également d’estimer la conductivité électrique des super-Terres qui interagissent magnétiquement avec leur étoile. / The numerous and diverse extrasolar planets detected since 1995 provide much inspiration for planetary astrophysics. A fraction of these extrasolar planets orbit their host stars at semi-major axes less than 0.1 AU; a planet which has migrated toward its host star would thus first encounter a strong magnetized wind and, as it enters the stellar magnetosphere, strong magnetic fields. We model the interaction of such a close-in extrasolar planet with the dipolar magnetic field of its host star and study separately the time-dependent and independent components. The time-dependent interaction gives rise to Eddy currents confined in the planet. We investigate two effects that may transfer angular momentum to a planet approaching its host TTauri star through type II migration: a Lorentz torque that transfers angular momentum from the stellar spin to the planetary orbit and a mass loss induced by the ohmic dissipation in the planet, which may transfer angular momentum to the planet as the gas is accreted onto the star. We model the time-independent interaction with the unipolar inductor model, which allows the current induced in the planet to flow along a closed loop constituted by the planet, the flux tube, and its footprint on the stellar atmosphere. We self-consistently calculate the ohmic dissipation in the planet and the star and the associated Lorentz torque. We then suggest that the ohmic dissipation may provide the extra energy needed to explain some planets with inflated radii. Finally, we propose that the model may also be used to remotely infer the electric conductivity of the outer layers of super-Earths interacting magnetically with their host stars.

A caracterização geológica e geotécnica dos locais de implantação de aterros sanitários é fundamental, tanto para fornecer subsídios adequados ao projeto de instalação das células de deposição dos resíduos sólidos urbanos (RSU), quanto para que se conheçam as características da área antes de ser modificada pela obra. Neste sentido, o presente trabalho visou mostrar a contribuição que a geofísica, com o uso da técnica da eletrorresistividade e do potencial espontâneo, associado a informações de investigação geotécnica direta pode dar para o estabelecimento de um background da área de instalação do aterro sanitário da cidade de São Carlos-SP. Foram realizados 7 caminhamentos elétricos (CE) com o arranjo dipolo-dipolo com eletrodos espaçados de 10 metros e três sondagens elétricas verticais (SEV), utilizando o arranjo Schlumberger, com profundidade de investigação de até 100 metros. Para processamento dos modelos bidimensionais dos CE utilizou-se o programa RES2DINV, e enquanto que para as SEV foi utilizado o modelo unidimensional. A interpretação dos modelos geoelétricos foi aperfeiçoada pela confrontação com informações geológico-geotécnicas prévias da área, obtidas nos estudos de impacto ambiental (EIA/RIMA) e resultados de sondagens de simples reconhecimento (SPT), realizadas na fase de estudo para implantação do aterro sanitário. Com isso foi possível definir com clareza a profundidade do topo rochoso e das zonas de maior umidade nos CE e SEV. O conjunto de seções de CE foi georeferenciada com o auxílio de GPS de precisão, o que permitiu o tratamento espacial das informações e o estabelecimento dos mapas da superfície do topo rochoso, das zonas de fluxo de água subterrânea e da espessura dos materiais inconsolidados. O conjunto de informações obtido permitiu identificar locais possíveis para a instalação futura de poços de monitoramento, assim como os dados geoelétricos das várias camadas servirá como padrão para identificar eventuais contaminações do solo ou da água subterrânea no futuro. A identificação da presença do topo rochoso em pequena profundidade, em algumas áreas do aterro, permite o melhor planejamento das escavações para instalação das células de deposição do RSU. / The geological and geotechnical characterization of landfill implantation areas is crucial; even to provide appropriate subsidies of urban solid residues (USR) installation project of deposition cells and for knowing the characteristics of the area before being modified by the work. In this sense, the present work aimed to show the contribution that the geophysics, with the use of electrical resistivity technique and the spontaneous potential, associated with direct geotechnical investigation information can give to the establishment of a background of landfill installation area from São Carlos-SP city. Were performed 7 electrical imaging (EI) with the dipole-dipole array with electrodes spaced by 10 meters and three vertical electrical sounding (VES), using the Schlumberger array with depth research up to 100 meters. For processing of two-dimensional models of the EI was used the RES2DINV program and while for the vertical electrical sounding (VES)-was used one-dimensional model. Interpretation of geoelectric models was enhanced by the confrontation with geological and geotechnical information of prior area, obtained in the environmental impact assessment (EIA) and results of a simple reconnaissance probes, performed in the study phase for the landfill implementation. It was possible to clearly define the depth of the bedrock and the higher humidity areas in the EI and VES. The set of sections electrical Imaging (EI) was georeferenced with the aid of GPS accuracy that allowed the spatial treatment of Information and the setting maps of the bedrock surface, the groundwater flow zones and the thickness of the unconsolidated materials. The obtained set of information enabling identification of possible locations for the wells future monitoring installation, as well as the geoelectrical data from several layers will be use as a standard to identify possible contamination of the soil or groundwater in the future. The identification of bedrock presence in small depth, in some areas of landfill, allows better planning of excavation for installation of MSW deposition cells.