Future experiments and improved service system for automated MAUS payloads

Abstract

The German MAUS project for autonomous material science experiments was initiated in 1980 for optimum utilization of NASA's Get-Away-Special (GAS) program. It is one of the flight opportunities which is offered by the F.R.G. to scientists for performing experiments under microgravity conditions. MAUS payloads are housed in GAS containers and consist of the experimental mounting structure, the batteries, the standard electronics for experiment control and data acquisition, the house-keeping systems and the individual experiment hardware. The standard service system was developed to offer a range of services within a framework of standardized interfaces to the experimenter and to meet NASA requirements. A payload can either be flown in the American GAS-program or with specific carrier structures, like SPAS, OSTA or USS, the latter being considered for the D-2 mission. Up to now, ten MAUS experiments were flown and currently seven payloads are in preparation for future Space Shuttle missions. The top four experiments are already equipped with the recently modified and modernized standard system which has been improved in experiment control, data management and semiconductor memory. The experiments to be performed deal with critical Marangoni convection, oscillatory Marangoni convection, gas bubbles in glass melts and pool boiling in liquids. A promising means of increasing resources in the field of MAUS-experiments is the interconnection of GAS containers. In the TWIN-MAUS configuration, electrical power and data will be transferred between two containers mounted adjacent to each other.