The Automation Technology Branch of NASA Langley Research Center is developing a research capability in the field of artificial intelligence, particularly as applicable in teleoperator/robotics development for remote space operations. As a testbed for experimentation in these areas, a system concept has been developed and is being implemented. This system, termed DAISIE (Distributed Artificially Intelligent System for Interacting with the Environment), interfaces the key processes of perception, reasoning, and manipulation by linking hardware sensors and manipulators to a modular artificial intelligence (AI) software system in a hierarchical control structure. Verification experiments have been performed: one experiment used a blocksworld database and planner embedded in the DAISIE system to intelligently manipulate a simple physical environment; the other experiment implemented a joint-space collision avoidance algorithm. Continued system development is planned.

The RAPIER B Amplifier electron beam system has been completed and produces 36kJ of 450 keV electrons in a 150 ns pulse to be used for pumping a KrF laser amplifier. The operating characteristics of the system have been studied. The efficiency of conversion of energy stored in the Marx generator to electron beam output is 72 +- 3% including an 89% designed transfer efficiency. The system is triggered electrically with a 150 ns delay from the command trigger to machine output. The rms jitter for the six individual modules range from 1.6 to 3.9 ns and the average timing difference between the earliest and latest module output is 12 ns. Film dosimetry indicates no observable interaction between the magnetically isolated beams in the module diodes and fluorescence measurements do not indicate strong interaction in the gas filled laser cell. Current probe measurements show no significant change in beam size during the output pulse. Energy deposition profiles agree reasonably with Monte Carlo calculations up to pressures of 1.5 atm.

The determination of the response of copper stabilizers to neutron irradiation in fusion-reactor superconducting magnets requires information in four areas: (1) neutron flux and spectrum determination, (2) resistivity changes at zero field, (3) resistivity changes at field, and (4) the cyclic irradiation and annealing. Applications of our current understanding of the limits of copper stabilizers in fusion-reactor designs are explored in two examples. Recommendations for future additions to the data base are discussed.

Plasma size is an important parameter in wavelength-scaling experiments because it determines both the threshold and potential gain for a variety of laser-plasma instabilities. Most experiments to date have of necessity produced relatively small plasmas, due to laser energy and pulse-length limitations. We have discussed in detail three recent Livermore experiments which had large enough plasmas that some instability thresholds were exceeded or approached. Our evidence for Raman scatter, filamentation, and the two-plasmon decay instability needs to be confirmed in experiments which measure several instability signatures simultaneously, and which produce more quantitative information about the local density and temperature profiles than we have today.