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The Earth Observing-1 spacecraft, built by Swales Aerospace for NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC), was successfully launched on a Boeing Delta-II ELV on November 21, 2000. The EO-1 spacecraft thermal design is a cold bias design using passive radiators, regulated conductive paths, thermal coatings, louvers, thermostatically controlled heaters and multi-layer insulating (MLI) blankets. Five of the six passive radiators were aluminum honeycomb panels. The sixth panel was a technology demonstration referred to as the Carbon Carbon Radiator (CCR) panel. Carbon-Carbon (C-C) is a special class of composite materials in which both the reinforcing fibers and matrix materials are made of pure carbon. The use of high conductivity fibers in C-C fabrication yields composite materials that have high stiffness and high thermal conductivity.

The Earth Observing-1 (EO-1) spacecraft, built by Swales Aerospace for NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC), was successfully launched on a Boeing Delta-II ELV on November 21, 2000. The EO-1 spacecraft thermal design is a cold bias design using passive radiators, regulated conductive paths, thermal coatings, louvers, thermostatically controlled heaters and multi-layer insulating (MLI) blankets. Several technology demonstrations were flown on EO-1. A late arrival to EO-1 was a technology demonstration to verify the thermal performance of a possible improved white thermal control coating developed by AZ Technology, Inc. The thermal control coating referred to as AZW/LA-II, is a low absorptance inorganic white paint. A low absorptance thermal coating allows radiators to run cooler when exposed to UV environments providing improved performance for space radiators. Two flight calorimeters, built by Swales Aerospace, were flown on the Earth Observing-1 spacecraft.

The thermal design and analysis of the Earth Observing-1 (EO-1) spacecraft, built by Swales Aerospace for NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC), consisted of a Thermal Synthesis System1 (TSS) geometric math model (GMM) and a SINDA/FLUINT2 thermal math model (TMM). These models took advantage of the submodel capability of TSS and SINDA/FLUINT providing a simplified approach for merging spacecraft and instrument models. In addition to the spacecraft thermal model, there is the Advanced Land Imager (ALI) instrument model by MIT/LL, the Hyperion instrument by TRW, the Atmospheric Corrector (AC) instrument by GSFC, and the New Millenium Program (NMP) experiments. Separate thermal models were developed for each NMP experiment which included, the Pulse Plasma Thruster (PPT) by Primex, Lightweight Flexible Solar Array (LFSA) by Lockheed, X-Band Phased Array by Boeing and the Carbon-Carbon Radiator that was developed as a joint effort between NASA and industry.

The Earth Observing-1 (EO-1) spacecraft is the first earth orbiting spacecraft in NASA's New Millennium Program. The New Millennium Program is part of the agency's Mission to Planet Earth enterprise, a series of space missions designed to enhance our knowledge of the Earth and its environmental systems. The EO-1's mission is to employ advanced remote-sensing technologies, including hyperspectral and multispectral imaging techniques, to develop highly accurate terrestrial images. In order to accomplish this mission, the spacecraft contains three primary instruments: Advanced Land Imager (ALI), Atmospheric Corrector, and Hyperion. The bus supporting these sensors is part of a 3-axis stabilized, nadir pointing spacecraft that employs an articulating solar array to provide a constant voltage, regulated power bus. EO-1 also contains several new technologies such as a carbon-carbon radiator and a pulsed plasma thruster that will be verified as part of the secondary mission objectives.

In August 1995, the Microsoft Corporation officially introduced a new operating system for IBM compatible computers. The release of Windows 951 revolutionized the software capabilities of the personal computer -- a true 32-bit operating system without the overhead of expensive hardware. To meet the needs of its customers many companies have migrated their software over to the Windows 95 operating system. Realizing the need for an improved user interface, SSPTA began a transformation toward becoming a true Windows 95 32-bit program. The first step toward this transformation was the development of the SSPTA File Manager5. A Windows 95 menu-driven program used to create input files needed to execute the SSPTA software.

The Geometric Archetype Design System (GADS) is intended to be used as an interface to the Thermal Radiation Analysis System (TRASYS) and the Simplified Space Payload Thermal Analyzer (SSPTA) programs. Technological advances in computer software and hardware during the last few years has provided the capability for developing versions of TRASYS and SSPTA that run on personal computers. GADS was designed to assist spacecraft thermal design engineers in generating and viewing TRASYS and SSPTA geometric math models. GADS is an object oriented program written for Microsoft Windows 3.1 with the intention of supporting Windows 95 and Windows/NT. GADS uses state-of-the-art numerical methods for fast and accurate geometric model generation. The Windows 3.1 user interface provides a familiar and user friendly working environment.

The Microcomputer Spacecraft Thermal Analysis Routines (MSTAR) software package is being developed for NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center by Swales and Associates, Inc. (S&AI). MSTAR is intended to replace the currently used thermal analysis programs SSPTA1, VIEW2, and TRASYS3. These software packages contain solution algorithms developed as much as 25 years ago. Many of the algorithms used in these programs are based on software and hardware available at that time. In recent years, the computer industry has made tremendous technological advances in providing powerful yet inexpensive desktop computers capable of competing with small mainframe computers. In June 1993, SAI completed the Phase I effort on the Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) contract awarded from NASA to develop MSTAR.

The Microcomputer Spacecraft Thermal Analysis Routines (MSTAR) software package is being developed for NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center by Swales and Associates, Inc. (S&AI). Thermal analysis of large-scale spacecraft are currently being performed with industry standard programs such as SSPTA1, VIEW2, and TRASYS3. These software packages, however, are based on solution algorithms developed as much as 25 years ago. Many of the algorithms used in these programs are based on software and hardware available at that time. In recent years, the computer industry has made tremendous technological advances in providing powerful yet inexpensive desktop computers capable of competing with small mainframe computers. In December 1992, S&AI was awarded a Phase I Small Business Innovative Research contract from NASA to develop a microcomputer based thermal analysis program to replace the current SSPTA and TRASYS programs.