James Webb Telescope Issue - 27

Understanding Our Universe Through Imagery and Data:
An Interview with HKN Eminent Member Dr. Asad Madni
Feature
bits of resolution), together with advanced actuation
and signal processing techniques that would allow
HST to scan a portion of the sky while orbiting earth
at approximately 18000 mph. The system is still in
use, 32 years since it was launched in 1990, with
its pointing accuracy and stability resulting in
over one million truly remarkable images such as
the discovery of Pluto's moons and the formation
of galaxies thousands of light-years away.
In the spring
of 1998, BEI's
success was key
in having the
Honorable Dan
Goldin, NASA
Administrator and
his wife, Judy;
astronaut, Dr. Stephen Hawley (who had flown on
the second Hubble maintenance mission); the new
Chancellor of University of Arkansas, John A. White;
Arkansas Congressman Vic Snyder, and numerous
dignitaries spend a day at PSSD to view first-hand the
remarkable encoder and systems technology.
Q: What engineering challenges did this pose,
and what was done to ensure the lifespan?
The system that we developed was designed to
specifications that included size, performance, cost,
radiation testing, temperature, humidity, and the most
stringent environmental testing. It had to be designed
with utmost care to ensure that the testing replicated
the space environment that it would be operating
in. The biggest challenge, however, was designing
the system to meet the most stringent pointing and
stability accuracy.
During the servicing missions, the system would be
replaced by the backup system (also developed and
maintained by us) and we would then refurbish the
original system together with any required upgrades
and full performance and reliability testing to ensure
uninterrupted performance and appropriate reliability.
Madni accepting award from Dan Goldin,
NASA Administrator. Image credit: A. Madni
Madni (center) with the Transline Analyzer team. Image credit: A. Madni
Q: Beyond your work on Hubble, what
are some of your biggest engineering
accomplishments?
There were actually quite a few, however, I will focus
on two projects that were landmark contributions.
In the first, I developed industry's first standalone
system capable of detecting the severities and
locations of multiple faults in coaxial/waveguide
transmission lines/antenna systems within inches and
within minutes. This system, the Transline Analyzer®
(military version AN/PSM-40) was developed
for the U.S. Navy under the Combat Readiness
Electromagnetic Analysis and Measurement Program
(CREAM). The program was initiated to provide the
fleet with capable, standardized measurement and
analysis equipment and techniques and trained
personnel, so that an effective Navy-wide EMC
effort could be implemented and sustained. This
system replaced nine instruments that took weeks
to perform the measurements by highly trained
personnel with much lower accuracy. It is also a
critical test and measurement system for commercial
passenger/cargo ships, and commercial/military
aircraft. It has long become standard test equipment
for the U.S. Navy while exponentially enhancing its
combat readiness and that of our allies that adopted
it. The digital correlation and interpolation techniques
I developed in this system overcame several longstanding
problems with both Time Domain and
Frequency Domain Reflectometers and represented a
major breakthrough for the industry.
The other key project was the development and
commercialization of BEI's Quartz MEMS GyroChip®
technology which revolutionized navigation and
stability in aerospace and automotive systems. It
resulted in world's first solid-state, 6 Degrees of
Freedom, Micro-Electro-Mechanical System (MEMS)
Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU), a revolutionary
breakthrough which required convergence of
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James Webb Telescope Issue

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