Draper Laboratory


Draper Laboratory is an American non-profit research and development organization, headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The laboratory specializes in the design, development, and deployment of advanced technology solutions to problems in national security, defence, space exploration, health care and energy.
The laboratory was founded in 1932 by Charles Stark Draper at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to develop aeronautical instrumentation, and came to be called the MIT Instrumentation Laboratory. During this period the laboratory is best known for developing the Apollo Guidance Computer, the first silicon integrated circuit-based computer. It was renamed for its founder in 1970, and separated from MIT in 1973 to become an independent, non-profit organization.
The expertise of the laboratory staff includes the areas of guidance, navigation, and control technologies and systems; fault-tolerant computing; advanced algorithms and software systems; modeling and simulation; and microelectromechanical systems and multichip module technology.

History

In 1932 Charles Stark Draper, an MIT aeronautics professor, founded a teaching laboratory to develop the instrumentation needed for tracking, controlling and navigating aircraft. During World War II, Draper's lab was known as the Confidential Instrument Development Laboratory. Later, the name was changed to the MIT Instrumentation Laboratory or I-Lab. As of 1970, it was located at 45 Osborn Street in Cambridge.
The laboratory was renamed for its founder in 1970 and remained a part of MIT until 1973 when it became an independent, not-for-profit research and development corporation. The transition to an independent corporation arose out of pressures for divestment of MIT laboratories doing military research at the time of the Vietnam War, despite the absence of a role of the laboratory in that war.
As it divested from MIT, the laboratory was initially moved to 75 Cambridge Parkway and other scattered buildings near MIT, until a centralized new building could be erected at 555 Technology Square. The complex, designed by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, was opened in 1976.
In 1984, the newly-built Albert G. Hill Building was opened at One Hampshire Street, and connected across the street to the main building via a securely enclosed pedestrian skybridge. However in 1989, Draper Lab was compelled to cut its workforce of over 2000 in half, through a combination of early retirement, attrition, and involuntary layoffs. This drastic shrinkage was caused by cutbacks in defense funding, and changes in government contracting rules. In response, Draper expanded its work addressing non-defense national goals in areas such as space exploration, energy resources, medicine, robotics, and artificial intelligence, and also took measures to increase its non-government work, eventually growing to 1400 employees within the decade.
In 2017, a formerly open-air courtyard between the original buildings was converted into an enclosed multistory atrium to accommodate security scanning, reception, semipublic areas, temporary exhibition space, and employee dining facilities. The open, airy interior space, designed by Boston architects Elkus Manfredi, features a green wall planting and plentiful seating.
A primary focus of the laboratory's programs throughout its history has been the development and early application of advanced guidance, navigation, and control technologies to meet the needs of the US Department of Defense and NASA. The laboratory's achievements include the design and development of accurate and reliable guidance systems for undersea-launched ballistic missiles, as well as for the Apollo Guidance Computer that unfailingly guided the Apollo astronauts to the Moon and back safely to Earth.
The laboratory contributed to the development of inertial sensors, software, and other systems for the GN&C of commercial and military aircraft, submarines, strategic and tactical missiles, spacecraft, and uncrewed vehicles. Inertial-based GN&C systems were central for navigating ballistic missile submarines for long periods of time undersea to avoid detection, and guiding their submarine-launched ballistic missiles to their targets, starting with the UGM-27 Polaris missile program.
The Apollo software team was led by Margaret Hamilton and included work by programmers such as Hal Laning, Dick Battin and Don Eyles.

Locations

Draper has locations in several US cities:
Former locations include Tampa, Florida at University of South Florida.

Technical areas

According to its website, the laboratory staff applies its expertise to autonomous air, land, sea and space systems; information integration; distributed sensors and networks; precision-guided munitions; biomedical engineering; chemical/biological defense; and energy system modeling and management. When appropriate, Draper works with partners to transition their technology to commercial production.
The laboratory encompasses seven areas of technical expertise:
  • Strategic Systems: Application of guidance, navigation, and control expertise to hybrid GPS-aided technologies and to submarine navigation and strategic weapons security.
  • Space Systems: As "NASA's technology development partner and transition agent for planetary exploration", development of GN&C and high-performance science instruments. Expertise also addresses the national security space sector.
  • Tactical Systems: Development of maritime intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance platforms, miniaturized munitions guidance, guided aerial delivery systems for materiel, soldier-centered physical and decision support systems, secure electronics and communications, and early intercept guidance for missile defense engagement.
  • Special Programs: Concept development, prototyping, low-rate production, and field support for first-of-a-kind systems, connected with the other technical areas.
  • Biomedical Systems: Microelectromechanical systems, microfluidic applications of medical technology, and miniaturized smart medical devices.
  • Air Warfare and ISR: Intelligence technology for targeting and target planning applications.
  • Energy Solutions: Managing the reliability, efficiency, and performance of equipment throughout complex energy generation and consumption systems, including coal-fired power plants or the International Space Station.

    Notable projects

Project areas that have surfaced in the news referred to Draper Laboratory's core expertise in inertial navigation, as recently as 2003. More recently, emphasis has shifted to research in innovative space navigation topics, intelligent systems that rely on sensors and computers to make autonomous decisions, and nano-scale medical devices.

Inertial navigation

The laboratory staff has studied ways to integrate input from Global Positioning System into Inertial navigation system-based navigation in order to lower costs and improve reliability. Military inertial navigation systems cannot totally rely on GPS satellite availability for course correction, because of the threat of hostile blocking or jamming of signal. A less accurate inertial system usually means a less costly system, but one that requires more frequent recalibration of position from another source, like GPS. Systems which integrate GPS with INS are classified as "loosely coupled", "tightly coupled", or "deeply integrated", depending on the degree of integration of the hardware., it was envisioned that many military and civilian uses would integrate GPS with INS, including the possibility of artillery shells with a deeply integrated system that can withstand 20,000 g, when fired from a cannon.

Space navigation

In 2010 Draper Laboratory and MIT collaborated with two other partners as part of the Next Giant Leap team to win a grant towards achieving the Google Lunar X Prize send the first privately funded robot to the Moon. To qualify for the prize, the robot must travel 500 meters across the lunar surface and transmit video, images and other data back to Earth. A team developed a "Terrestrial Artificial Lunar and Reduced Gravity Simulator" to simulate operations in the space environment, using Draper Laboratory's guidance, navigation and control algorithm for reduced gravity.
In 2012, Draper Laboratory engineers in Houston, Texas developed a new method for turning the International Space Station, called the "optimal propellant maneuver", which achieved a 94 percent savings over previous practice. The algorithm takes into account everything that affects how the station moves, including "the position of its thrusters and the effects of gravity and gyroscopic torque".
, at a personal scale, Draper was developing a garment for use in orbit that uses Controlled Moment Gyros that creates resistance to movement of an astronaut's limbs to help mitigate bone loss and maintain muscle tone during prolonged space flight. The unit is called a Variable Vector Countermeasure suit, or V2Suit, which uses CMGs also to assist in balance and movement coordination by creating resistance to movement and an artificial sense of "down". Each CMG module is about the size of a deck of cards. The concept is for the garment to be worn "in the lead-up to landing back on Earth or periodically throughout a long mission".
In 2013, a Draper/MIT/NASA team was also developing a CMG-augmented spacesuit that would expand the current capabilities of NASA's "Simplified Aid for EVA Rescue" —a spacesuit designed for "propulsive self-rescue" for when an astronaut accidentally becomes untethered from a spacecraft. The CMG-augmented suit would provide better counterforce than is now available for when astronauts use tools in low-gravity environments. Counterforce is available on Earth from gravity. Without it an applied force would result in an equal force in the opposite direction, either in a straight line or spinning. In space, this could send an astronaut out of control. Currently, astronauts must affix themselves to the surface being worked on. The CMGs would offer an alternative to mechanical connection or gravitational force.