Science Applications International Corporation is currently developing the Electric Propulsion Interactions Code, EPIC, as part of a project sponsored by the Space Environments and Effects Program at the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center. Now in its second year of development, EPIC is an interactive computer tool that allows the construction of a 3-D spacecraft model, and the assessment of a variety of interactions between its subsystems and the plume from an electric thruster. These...
Topics: NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS), AEROSPACE ENVIRONMENTS, ALGORITHMS, ELECTRIC PROPULSION,...
For fifteen years NASA and the Air Force Charging Analyzer Program for Geosynchronous Orbits (NASCAP/GEO) has been the workhorse of spacecraft charging calculations. Two new tools, the Space Environment and Effects (SEE) Spacecraft Charging Handbook (recently released), and Nascap-2K (under development), use improved numeric techniques and modern user interfaces to tackle the same problem. The SEE Spacecraft Charging Handbook provides first-order, lower-resolution solutions while Nascap-2K...
Topics: NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS), COMPUTERIZED SIMULATION, HANDBOOKS, SPACECRAFT CHARGING,...
Nascap-2k is the modern replacement for the older 3-D charging codes NASCAP/GEO, NASCAP/LEO, POLAR, and DynaPAC. Built on the DynaPAC kernel and incorporating surface charging, environment and space potential models from the older codes, Nascap-2k performs charging calculations for a wide variety of space environments under control of a unified graphical interface. In this paper we illustrate the use of Nascap-2k for spacecraft charging calculations. We touch on some of the unique physical and...
Topics: NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS), SPACECRAFT CHARGING, COMPUTERIZED SIMULATION, SPACE...
The recently released Nascap-2k, version 2.0, three-dimensional computer code models interactions between spacecraft surfaces and low-earth-orbit, geosynchronous, auroral, and interplanetary plasma environments. It replaces the earlier three-dimensional spacecraft interactions codes NASCAP/GEO, NASCAP/LEO, POLAR, and DynaPAC. Nascap-2k has improved numeric techniques, a modern user interface, and a simple, interactive satellite surface definition module (Object ToolKit). We establish the...
Topics: NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS), SPACECRAFT CHARGING, COMPUTER PROGRAMS, PROGRAM VERIFICATION...