Product category:
Simulation, modelling and validation software
News Release from: Vector Fields | Subject: Opera
Edited by the Engineeringtalk Editorial
Team on 13 December 2005
Telescope evaluation sings with Opera
Massachusetts Institute of Technology uses Opera design software from Vector Fields to evaluate the magnetic performance of actuator designs for the JW Space Telescope, the successor to Hubble.
Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) used Opera design software from Vector Fields of Oxford to evaluate the magnetic performance of actuator designs for the JW Space Telescope, the successor to Hubble No other technology was available to assess design performance under the extremely cold environments and temperature variations of space
This article was originally published on Engineeringtalk on 28 Oct 2003 at 8.00am (UK)
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Unlike Hubble, the mirrors are very thin membranes of carbon composites with a reflecting surface which is deformable by computer controlled actuators.
MIT collaborated with Nasa on the development of the actuators based on superconducting and magnetostrictive materials.
Due to the high number of design variables involved and time constraints, trial and error methods were ruled out.
The superconducting materials, yttrium-barium-oxygen (YBCO) and bismuth-strontium-calcium-copper-oxygen (BSCCO), were charged with a magnetic field that attracts the reflective nickel surface.
Opera supports non-linear analysis and the charging process for superconducting materials is non-linear.
Properties of most materials, including Terzinol, were within Opera's materials library; YBCO and BSCCO were entered after experimental determination.
For each actuator concept at least two dozen iterations were evaluated in Opera before two designs were committed to prototypes.
Leslie Bromberg, Principal Scientist at MIT, said: "Opera was chosen principally because of its ease of use".
"I didn't know much about finite element modelling, but had results the first day".
"The beauty of using electromagnetic analysis software was that by the time we built the actuators we knew that both designs generated the level of magnetic force they were supposed to".
The telescope is scheduled for launch in about 2010.
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