In support of the Boundary Layer Transition Flight Experiment (BLT FE) Project, a manufactured protuberance tile was installed on the port wing of Space Shuttle Orbiter Discovery for the flights of STS-119 and STS -128. Additional instrumentation was also installed in order to obtain more spatially resolved measurements downstream of the protuberance. This paper provides an overview of the BLT FE Project, including the project history, organizations involved, and motivations for the flight experiment. Significant efforts were made to place the protuberance at an appropriate location on the Orbiter and to design the protuberance to withstand the expected environments. Efforts were also extended to understand the as-fabricated shape of the protuberance and the thermal protection system tile configuration surrounding the protuberance. A high-level overview of the in-situ flight data is presented, along with a summary of the comparisons between pre-and post-flight analysis predictions and flight data. Comparisons show that predictions for boundary layer transition onset time closely match the flight data, while predicted temperatures were significantly higher than observed flight temperatures.

In support of the Boundary Layer Transition Flight Experiment (BLT FE) Project, a manufactured protuberance tile was installed on the port wing of Space Shuttle Orbiter Discovery for STS-119, STS-128, STS-131 and STS-133 as well as Space Shuttle Endeavour for STS-134. Additional instrumentation was installed in order to obtain more spatially resolved measurements downstream of the protuberance. This paper provides an overview of the BLT FE Project with emphasis on the STS-131 and STS-133 results. A high-level overview of the in-situ flight data is presented, along with a summary of the comparisons between pre-and post-flight analysis predictions and flight data. Comparisons show that empirically correlated predictions for boundary layer transition onset time closely match the flight data, while predicted surface temperatures were significantly higher than observed flight temperatures. A thermocouple anomaly observed on a number of the missions is discussed as are a number of the mitigation actions that will be taken on the final flight, STS-134, including potential alterations of the flight trajectory and changes to the flight instrumentation.

The influence of Cu doping on the structural and magnetic properties of the Fe3Se4 ferrimagnet has been investigated by a combination of X-ray diffraction, Raman spectroscopy, X-ray absorption spectroscopy, and magnetic measurements. While the effects of dopants with ionic radii closer to those of the Fe sites in Fe3Se4 had been studied before, Cu is a less conventional dopant, due to its smaller size (at the same ionic charge) and preference for lower coordination numbers. A (Fe1–x Cu x )3Se4 series, where x = 0–0.15, has been prepared by either high-temperature annealing or the solvothermal method. Although only a limited amount of Cu enters the Fe3Se4 structure, the Cu doping causes a substantial increase in the coercivity of the material. Furthermore, the samples prepared by the solvothermal method exhibit much larger coercive fields as compared to those observed for the samples prepared by high-temperature annealing. The effect was traced to the higher lattice strain accumulated in the samples synthesized solvothermally, as evidenced by the broadening of their Raman peaks.