A virtual worlds presentation technique with embodied, intelligent agents is being developed as an instructional medium suitable to present in situ training on long term space flight. The system combines a behavioral element based on finite state automata, a behavior based reactive architecture also described as subsumption architecture, and a belief-desire-intention agent structure. These thre...

Manned space flight induces a reduction in immune competence among crew and is likely to cause deleterious changes to the composition of the gastrointestinal, nasal, and respiratory bacterial flora, leading to an increased risk of infection. The space flight environment may also affect the susceptibility of microorganisms within the spacecraft to antibiotics, key components of flown medical kit...

There are quite a few solutions for crew scheduling, including some commercial applications. The same happens for aircraft scheduling and for flight scheduling including revenue management. However, the airline operations problem did not receive the same attention as the other airline scheduling problems. In this paper we introduce this problem and report the work we are doing in the developmen...

Task management (TM) is always performed on the flight deck, although not always explicitly, consistently, or rigorously. Nowhere is TM as important as it is in dealing with non-normal situations. The objective of this study was to analyze pilot TM behavior for non-normal situations. Specifically, the study observed pilots’ performance in a full workload environment in order to discern their TM...

Airline operations depend on the complex control of many expensive, tightly-constrained, interdependent resources such as crews and aircraft. Operations research (OR) has played an important role in developing planning tools for this complex system. In recent years, however, the already intense pressure on the airline industry has dramatically increased due to rising fuel costs, competitive pri...

The control system of the NASA Crew Launch Vehicle is designed to meet performance and robustness requirements during its ascent flight phase. However, the controller bandwidth and the attainable level of robust performance is limited by the degree of flexibility inherent in the long and slender design that has been adopted for this vehicle. Since there remains a substantial degree of uncertain...

Flight and research experience to date indicates that teams of robots and humans will provide significantly greater productivity and capabilities than either system working alone. This paper details research developments in the University of Maryland Space Systems Laboratory on three different approaches to human/robotic interaction in the space environment. In each of these, the human performi...

A human being can live in outer space only in the artificially created environment of a spacecraft. Space vacuum, galactic space radiation, meteorite currents, super-low temperatures outboard give rise in space crew members to a natural feeling of threat to their health and survival. In this connection a high level of psychic tension persists even in a trouble-free space flight due to a natural...