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Microstructural Characterization of Sheet Lamination-Based Additively Manufactured Fiber-Reinforced Thermoplastic Composites
No full textAdditive manufacturing (AM) of fiber-reinforced composites has garnered significant interest for its versatility in creating intricate parts and rapid prototyping. Short fiber-reinforced composites are typically fabricated through fused deposition modeling (FDM), but they possess several challenges including limited fiber volume fraction, low printing speed, and low throughput for industry scales. Composite-based additive manufacturing (CBAM) is a novel sheet laminationbased AM process, combining non-woven fabric reinforcement with thermoplastic materials to fabricate three-dimensional objects. CBAM offers notable advantages over FDM, including the potential for achieving higher fiber volume fractions and faster production rates, making it a promising technology for further investigation in composite manufacturing. This paper investigates the microstructural characteristics and porosity analyses of non-woven carbon fabric reinforced nylon composites (CF-PA12) manufactured by CBAM and FDM. Test coupons were fabricated in flatwise and edgewise printing orientations. Micro-computed tomography (μCT) analysis revealed that the CBAM specimens contained significantly lower porosity than FDM specimens and had more uniformly distributed smaller porous regions. CBAM flatwise specimens were less porous than edgewise specimens attributed to the comparatively higher number of sheets in edgewise orientation. This study highlights the microstructural characteristics of mechanical test specimens prepared using CBAM and FDM, emphasizing the lower porosity and smaller, more uniformly distributed pores in CBAM specimens which enhance its material integrity and performance, offering a foundation for further development in composite AM technology
Reducing Residential Landscape Water Use in Utah: Technologies and Strategies
No full textWater conservation is a critical issue in Utah, and several actions are already underway to help lower residential landscape water use. Strategies include smart irrigation controllers, efficient sprinkler bodies and nozzles, drip irrigation systems, soil amendments that increase water-holding capacity, and drought-tolerant grass cultivars for lawns. While additional conservation efforts will be necessary to reach sustainable water management, statewide adoption of current programs can help reduce water use and loss
Investigating Extension\u27s Scope and Role in Outdoor Recreation in the West: Attitudes, Challenges, and Opportunities
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The Atlantic Constellation Very High Resolution, A Small Satellite Approach Achieving High-Performance Optical Imagery
No full textThe Atlantic Constellation (AC) was launched politically by Portugal and Spain in 2021 as an initiative to develop an Earth Observation (EO) satellite constellation capable of delivering multispectral optical imagery at high revisit. The Constellation has evolved over time and is an anchor programme of the Portuguese National Space Strategy. It entails optical VHR satellites as well as SAR observation capabilities. Sharing the same ground and data infrastructure, the constellation will provide coverages at \u3c 1m and images below 50 cm resolution with daily access time based on tasked imaging acquisitions. This constellation will constitute a strategic autonomy asset capable of serving a broad field of sectors, such as Defence, Maritime, Agriculture, Security and Disaster monitoring. As the leader of the VHR space segment component of the AC, and its main industrial partner, N3O faces diverse technical and programmatic challenges. The major challenge arises from the growing commercial demand for rapid access to orbit, which shortens the development and integration timelines imposed by customers. This demand leads to wider adoption for off-the-shelf components. The VHR satellites are a product of this philosophy. One of the major drivers is tailoring the mission requirements to accommodate what standard VHR payloads and small satellite platforms in the market can offer, and what their interfaces can support. Another challenge is maintaining a low orbit altitude, due to limited low thrust system and power capabilities that keep cost and complexity manageable, while ensuring the target 50 cm Ground Sampling Distance (GSD) and fulfilling the updated space debris regulation to decay within 5 years. Moreover, these commercial space products do not always follow standard processes and specifications (e.g. ECSS, MIL), making co-engineering effort and heritage knowledge key for satellite design and verification activities. Opportunities for rideshare and small satellite launch service providers are growing, together with the diverse market on Ground Stations services. Lastly, the development of dedicated in-house facilities and planning for the assembly, integration and test (AIT) phase of the VHR satellites, built from scratch, and based on space industry best practices and standards, all combine to make this one of the most ambitious space programmes ever carried out in Portugal
Compact, Value-Driven Solar Array Drive Solution for Small Sats
No full textFlash Talk presented during the 2025 SmallSat Conference
Evaluating the “What’s Up Down South” Economic Summit: Accelerating Growth and Expanding Impact
No full textThis study evaluates the effectiveness of the 2025 What’s Up Down South economic summit, a platform for regional economic development. Data were collected through an online exit survey with a 30% response rate (n = 176), incorporating quantitative ratings and open-ended feedback to assess learning outcomes and program quality. The evaluation examined attendees’ perceptions of keynote and breakout sessions, overall satisfaction, and suggestions for improving the event. Findings indicate that the summit delivered valuable economic insights and programming while citing opportunities to improve speaker diversity, event logistics, and data collection. These insights will guide future planning to sustain the summit’s role as a relevant Extension program
Reaching Full Operating Capability With the Tomorrow.io Weather Constellation
Get PDFThe Tomorrow.io weather constellation leverages advances in small satellite technology and the emergence of affordable rideshare options to provide timely, global weather measurements using a constellation of precipitation radars and passive microwave sounders. The focus of this paper is on the design and deployment of Tomorrow.io’s CubeSats carrying passive microwave radiometers known as Tomorrow.io Microwave Sounders (TMS). The TMS instrument design is based on technology transitioned from the MIT Lincoln Laboratory (MIT LL) with technology insertions to improve performance. TMS will achieve full operating capability (FOC) with 12 satellites in a hybrid mix of sun synchronous and mid inclination orbits. This paper will report on the development of the TMS constellation and provide an overview of the mission performance and lessons learned
The Little UV Camera: Customizable Imaging Platform for Space-Based Astronomy
Get PDFPoster presented during the 2025 SmallSat Conference
SCOPE-1: On-Orbit Surface Feature-Based Navigation and Timing Mission Overview
Get PDFThe SpaceCraft for Optical-based Position Estimation-1 (SCOPE-1) is a 3U CubeSat developed by the Texas Spacecraft Laboratory (TSL) at The University of Texas at Austin to demonstrate near real-time Position, Navigation, and Timing (PNT) estimation primarily using optical detections of Earth’s islands and archipelagos. The mission adapts algorithms originally developed for lunar crater-based PNT and applies them to terrestrial features for validation in low Earth orbit (LEO). SCOPE-1 features an onboard system combining Mask R-CNN-based surface-feature detection, catalog-based feature identification, and an extended Kalman filter (EKF) to estimate position and timing in near real-time. The SCOPE-1 spacecraft will be built with primarily commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) components and will operate in LEO for one year following a planned 2027 launch. Additionally, the TSL is constructing an on-site ground station with UHF and S-Band capabilities to support in-house mission operations. This mission advances the technology readiness level (TRL) of the surface feature-based navigation algorithms and serves as a key step toward enabling autonomous navigation for future lunar and deep space missions. This paper presents an overview of the SCOPE-1 mission, including its objectives, concept of operations (ConOps), payload system, PNT algorithms, and spacecraft design