GRC NEWS RELEASE 00-060



00-060  

For Release: October 12, 2000


Sally V. Harrington
Media Relations Office
(216) 433-2037
s.harrington@grc.nasa.gov
<h3>Cleveland's Powerful Connection with the International Space 
Station</h3> Excitement is mounting in the Greater Cleveland area 
with regard to the continuing construction of the International Space 
Station. Scientists and engineers at NASA Glenn Research Center have 
a special interest in the next two Space Shuttle missions. 

STS-92, launched from Kennedy Space Center at 7:17 p.m. EDT on 
Wednesday, October 11, has aboard four types of hardware, all parts 
of station's electrical power system (EPS), in which an important 
part. On this mission, the Integrated Truss Structure Z1, an early 
exterior framework, will be installed. It will contain several pieces 
of hardware:

<dl> <dd>The Plasma Contactor, which will serve as a high-tech 
grounding rod for station. The Hollow Cathod Assembly, which is the 
major component of the contactor, was designed, developed, built and 
tested at Glenn.</dd> <dd>The truss will also contain dc/dc Converter 
Units to provide grounding and voltage regulation.</dd> <dd>Another 
set of Remote Power Control Modules like those contained in Unity, 
the first U.S. module installed on station in December 1998. These 
multi-channel, high-power circuit breakers will provide switching and 
protection in case of a short circuit during construction of the ISS 
as well as during operation of the completed station. Glenn led the 
early design and development of this device and has performed 
extensive testing of it in its EPS test bed.</dd> <dd>Circuit 
Isolation Devices, which are manually activated switches providing 
manual shut-off of high power to enable installation/construction as 
station is assembled. Glenn designed and built these devices. They 
will be launched on this mission and will be installed on station 
assembly flights 4A and 5A scheduled to take place in November and 
January, respectively.</dd> </dl> 

Glenn is especially looking forward to the launch of STS-97, station 
assembly flight 4A, scheduled for November 30. The first U.S. 
photovoltaic module, which will supply station with solar power via 
solar arrays, batteries and other power system electronics, will be 
launched on that mission. Glenn has had a significant role in the 
design and development of the PV module and managing the hardware 
development for it, including testing, system analysis and 
participating in the neutral buoyancy testing of the assembly 
operations for the PV module. Also installed on that mission will be 
two radiators, which will remove waste heat from station. One of 
these radiator panels was tested in the Space Power Facility, the 
world's largest space environment simulation chamber at Glenn's Plum 
Brook Station in Sandusky, OH.



Glenn is the co-lead for station's electrical power system (EPS) in 
partnership with Johnson Space Center in Houston, TX. In addition, as 
EPS co-subsystem manager, Glenn is responsible for the technical 
design and development of all the individual pieces of the EPS on 
station.



For further information about Space Shuttle or International Space 
Station in general, visit



http://spaceflight.nasa.gov

For further information about Glenn's involvement in International 
Space Station, visit 

http://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/PAO/issgrc.htm



* * * *

Note to Editors: During the month of November there are various media 
events planned, and on December 2 and 3 in the Glenn Visitor Center, 
there will be a two-day event open to the public and the media 
focusing on Glenn's involvement in the STS-97 mission and its 
continuing role in station, including the electrical power system and 
research that will be performed on station. More detailed Information 
on those events will be forthcoming, as we get closer to that 
mission. 

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