Surface Texturing of Flexible Solar Array Blankets for Stratosonde

There is a clear need to improve weather forecasting especially in remote areas to provide better planning for numerous air missions and satellite launches. Also, the ability to better predict the pathway of incoming hurricanes provides valuable information to better support and target relief missions. The Air Force Weather Systems Program Office at Hanscom AFB seeks to advance terrestrial and space weather observations, analysis, and predictions from research to operations through increased commercial industry collaborations. Specifically, the office seeks commercial weather data that meets military requirements. CENTCOM relies on AF weather systems to deliver weather data and technologies from military, US civil government, and international partners’ sensors and satellites.  These resources along with other ground, air, and space-based hardware and software technologies provide critical weather information and forecasts for military operations.  High Altitude Pseudo-Satellites (HAPS) are fixed wing, heavier than air solar electric aircraft, that operate continuously for multiple months in the stratosphere and represent a new technology platform that can meet these weather forecasting needs.  Unlike other high-altitude platforms (e.g., high-altitude balloons), fixed wing HAPS can maintain station keeping, like a geostationary satellite, at 20 km above the Earth’s surface and can change ‘orbital’ location by over 1000 nautical miles in just 24 hrs. They are energy self-sufficient, highly automated, low signature, and low vulnerability to enemy action. They provide new and disruptive capabilities and can be used to complement existing systems by permitting more efficient, targeted use.  MicroLink will further enhance the solar power generation of the flexible solar sheet blankets used to power the HAPS by developing and integrating a textured film surface onto the solar arrays to enhance light collection.  This will improve light collection for missions when the sun is lower in the sky particularly during dawn and dusk, while operating at high latitude locations, and during winter months.  For the StratoSonde HAPS UAV, this will enable missions in the North Atlantic through the winter months.  MicroLink will develop, optimize, and integrate the textured solar array technology initially demonstrated in the AWERX Phase I Pitch Day effort.  A final material and prismatic structure will be defined that maximizes the amount of energy captured by the underlying solar cell array.  Reliability testing will then be performed to qualify the textured material for use in terrestrial environments.  Textured solar array blankets will then be integrated into the wings of the UAV platform.  Finally, static, flight, and ground testing will be performed to assess the performance improvement of the textured solar arrays.