2,717 research outputs found
Staley, Roberta
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BA (University of Calgary)
Diploma Journalism (Grant MacEwan)
MA Liberal Studies (Simon Fraser University)
Roberta Staley is an author, a magazine editor and writer, and a documentary filmmaker who has reported from such places as Afghanistan, Papua New Guinea, Kenya, El Salvador, Haiti, Colombia, Cambodia, South Africa, Israel, and New Zealand. She currently edits Enterprise magazine, and is a contributor to BC Business, the South China Morning Post Magazine, Ms. Magazine, Trek, the Canadian Chemical News, Corporate Knights, and Sculpture, among others. She is also a columnist for Just for Canadian Doctors/Dentists magazines. Roberta has published her first book, titled Voice of rebellion : how Mozhdah Jamalzadah brought hope to Afghanistan. It is a biography of Afghan-Canadian human rights activist Mozhdah Jamalzadah
Preliminary reliability and safety assessment methodology for trans-atmospheric transportation systems
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Purpose
This paper aims to propose a methodology for a safety and reliability assessment for the conceptual and preliminary design of very complex and disrupting innovative systems like trans-atmospheric vehicles. The proposed methodology differs from existing ones because it does not rely on statistical data at aircraft-level but exploits the statistical population at components-level only. For the sake of clarity, the paper provides some preliminary results of the application of the methodology at system level. The example deals with the safety and reliability assessment of a very complex propulsion system aimed at guaranteeing vertical take-off and landing capabilities of a suborbital vehicle.
Design/methodology/approach
The proposed methodology is strongly based on a systems engineering approach. It exploits safety and reliability assessment analyses which have already been developed in both aeronautical and space engineering domains, but it combines them in an innovative way to overcome the lack of statistics at aircraft level. The methodology consists of two different steps: a qualitative top-down process, allowing a functional and physical decomposition of the transportation system and a following quantitative bottom-up approach, which provides the estimation of system-level reliability and safety characteristics starting from the statistical estimation of the components’ characteristics.
Findings
The paper presents a new methodology for the preliminary reliability and safety assessment of innovative transportation systems, such as hypersonic transportation systems. The envisaged methodology will overcome the poorness of statistical data that is usually affecting the conceptual design of breakthrough systems.
Research limitations/implications
The paper shows the application of the articulated methodology to a limited case study. A complete example of application of the methodology to estimate safety and reliability characteristics at vehicle level will be provided in feature works.
Practical implications
The methodology has been proposed to be exploited in international research activities in the field of hypersonic transportation systems. Furthermore, a massive application of this approach would allow to create a database for the generation and the update of semi-empirical models focused on high-level estimations of reliability, availability, maintainability and safety (RAMS) characteristics. Moreover, the proposed safety assessment has been conceived to be fully integrated within a typical conceptual design process.
Originality/value
The existing literature about safety and reliability assessment at the early design stages proposes pure statistical approaches which are usually not applicable to highly innovative products, where the statistical population is not existing, for example, in the case of trans-atmospheric vehicles. This paper describes how to overcome this problem, through the exploitation of statistical data at components-level only through the combination of these data to estimate RAMS characteristics at aircraft-level thanks to functional analysis, concept of operations and typical safety assessment tools, like functional hazard analysis, failure mode and effect analysis, reliability block diagram and fault tree analysis.
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A SUPPORT FOR THE VEHICLE ARCHITECTURE DEFINITION OF INNOVATIVE HYPERSONIC TRANSPORTATION SYSTEMS DURING CONCEPTUAL DESIGN PHASE.
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Ghaznavid, Qarakhanid and Seljuq Monumental Inscriptions and the Development of Royal Propaganda: Towards an Epigraphic Corpus
No full textFormal methods and empirical practices. Conversations with Patrick Suppes
No full textThe philosopher Patrick Suppes has developed a unique and influential approach to studying the foundations of science—he combines an understanding of the main principles of scientific theories in axiomatic terms and formal models with a hands-on approach. While moving the study of the philosophy of science out of the parlor and into the lab, he often comes up with original results from the psychology of learning to the theory of measurement and quantum mechanics. This book searches for a common thread in Suppes's multifaceted work through a series of conversations with the man himself and illuminates many of the more challenging aspects of his philosophy.
Roberta Feffario is a researcher in the Institute for Cognitive Sciences and Technologies of the Italian Research Council. She works at the Laboratory for Applied Ontology in Trento, Italy.
Viola Schiaffonati is assistant professor in the Dipartimento di Elettronica e Informazione of the Politecnico di Milano
A conceptual design tool to support high-speed vehicle design
Get PDFThis paper aims at presenting an integrated multidisciplinary methodology and the related
software tool, called ASTRID-H, developed at Politecnico di Torino to support the conceptual
and preliminary design phases of high-speed vehicles. Based on the experience in the
development of innovative methodologies to cope with complex and highly integrated aircraft,
ASTRID-H has been developed to guide students, researchers and engineers through the very
first phases of the design of high-speed vehicles. ASTRID-H supports the users to move from
the statistical evaluation of the guess data and the identification of the design space to the
geometrical characterization of the vehicle guaranteeing a proper integration of the main
subsystems. Already available and widely used mathematical models are here integrated in a
new algorithm to face the complexity of the design of high-speed vehicles. In addition, the
coefficients of the semi-empirical models that were not focusing on high-speed vehicles have
been updated to widen classical theories to cover high-speed vehicles. The resulting
implemented methodology allows the users to cope with complex multidisciplinary problems,
which encompass a variety of interrelated disciplines and heterogeneous levels of fidelity.
Furthermore, this paper reports the some of the main results achieved during the validation
of the methodology thanks to the application to the STRATOFLY MR3 vehicle case study.
STRATOFLY MR3 is a Mach 8 waverider configuration that stems from more than a decade
of European research activities in the field of high-speed and currently under investigation in
the Horizon 2020 STRATOFLY Project
Technology Roadmap Methodology and Tool Upgrades to Support Strategic Decision in Space Exploration
Get PDFTechnological roadmaps are essential tools for managing and planning complex projects, especially in the rapidly evolving field of space exploration. Defined as dynamic schedules, they support strategic and long-term planning while coordinating current and future objectives with particular technology solutions. Currently, the available methodologies are mostly built on experts’ opinions and in just few cases, methodologies and tools have been developed to support the decision makers with a rational approach. In any case, all the available approaches are meant to draw “ideal” maturation plans. Therefore, it is deemed essential to develop an integrate new algorithms able to decision guidelines on “non-nominal” scenarios. In this context, Politecnico di Torino, in collaboration with the European Space Agency (ESA) and Thales Alenia Space–Italia, developed the Technology Roadmapping Strategy (TRIS), a multi-step process designed to create robust and data-driven roadmaps. However, one of the main concerns with its initial implementation was that TRIS did not account for time and budget estimates specific to the space exploration environment, nor was it capable of generating alternative development paths under constrained conditions. This paper discloses two main significant updates to TRIS methodology: (1) improved time and budget estimation to better reflect the specific challenges of space exploration scenarios and (2) the capability of generating alternative roadmaps, i.e., alternative technological maturation paths in resource-constrained scenarios, balancing financial and temporal limitations. The application of the developed routines to available case studies confirms the tool’s ability to provide consistent planning outputs across multiple scenarios without exceeding 20% deviation from expert-based judgements available as reference. The results demonstrate the potential of the enhanced methodology in supporting strategic decision making in early-phase mission planning, ensuring adaptability to changing conditions, optimized use of time and financial resources, as well as guaranteeing an improved flexibility of the tool. By integrating data-driven prioritization, uncertainty modeling, and resource-constrained planning, TRIS equips mission planners with reliable tools to navigate the complexities of space exploration projects. This methodology ensures that roadmaps remain adaptable to changing conditions and optimized for real-world challenges, supporting the sustainable advancement of space exploration initiatives
Model-Based Object-Oriented Systems Engineering methodology for the conceptual design of a hypersonic transportation system
No full textThis article suggests a Model-Based Object-Oriented approach for the conceptual design of a very complex aerospace product. Indeed, the new frontiers of aerial transportation systems require integrated and multidisciplinary approaches. In particular, this paper suggests not only a proper methodology but also supports tool-chain, consisting of both commercial and ad-hoc, built-in tools. The set of tools selected is not exclusive and can be widened as soon as proper interfaces will be developed, but the real aim of the paper is to show the potentialities of this approach in managing the design of very complex systems. In the second part of the article, the theoretical approach is then a applied to the conceptual design of a hypersonic transportation aimed at performing suborbital parabolic flights. Eventually, the result related to this application are summarized and the enhancements in traceability and standardization will be highlighte
Technology roadmapping methodology for future hypersonic transportation systems
Get PDFThis paper discloses an innovative methodology for the generation and update of technology roadmaps to
support strategic decisions for future hypersonic transportation systems, specifically targeting non-profit oriented
R&D. The methodology is fully integrated into up-to-date conceptual design activity flows. It consists of five main
steps that through mathematical and logical models moves from stakeholders’ analysis up to planning definition
and results evaluation. Complementary to the traditional experts-based methodologies, the rational process here
presented allows for a well-structured logical definition of activities and/or missions required to enhance the
readiness level of technologies, including a more accurate and reliable budget and time resources estimation to
support the technology development plan. This methodology is exploited in the framework of the H2020
STRATOFLY Project to assess the potential of hypersonic civil vehicles to reach Technology Readiness Level 6 by
2035 with respect to key technological, societal and economical aspects. The paper discloses a unique assessment
of the readiness level of the European air-breathing propulsive technologies. The final results confirm the crucial
role of air-breathing propulsive technologies in the development of future hypersonic transportation system and
highlight the urgent need to invest in in-flight demonstration missions with increasing functionalities, to target
2050 as entry in to service of the first Mach 8 civil transport
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