Good vibrations

Daniel Kammer (27K JPG)

Professor Daniel Kammer recently presented Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Alabama, a software "toolbox" that will standardize one aspect of its testing process and may help its space vehicles — including the International Space Station — fly more safely.

The vehicles undergo a battery of tests, including one that measures their vibrations to predict whether the structures will survive stresses they're subjected to during a flight. Engineers must corroborate the data with complex mathematical models (sets of differential equations in the form of finite-element models), and Kammer's software enables them to develop accurate models more easily and efficiently.