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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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At least 199 records · Page 11
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS1981

Application of information theory to the design of line-scan imaging systems

Information theory is used to formulate a single figure of merit for assessing the performance of line scan imaging systems as a function of their spatial response (point spread function or modulation transfer function), sensitivity, sampling and quantization intervals, and the statistical properties of a random radiance field. Computational results for the information density and efficiency (i.e., the ratio of information density to data density) are intuitively satisfying and compare well with experimental and theoretical results obtained by earlier investigators concerned with the performance of TV systems.

Huck, F. O.↗
NASA NTRS1984

Saturation Phenomena in LIF Measurements, Appendix B

Optical saturation is the phenomenon in which the laser-induced rates of absorption and spontaneous emission between two levels, induced by a laser, become comparable to or greater than the spontaneous emission and collision rates connecting these levels. This results in the excited state population N(u) acquiring a value of similar magnitude to that of the ground state, N(e). Under these conditions the observed fluorescence signal, which is proportional to N(u), is no longer linearly dependent on laser intensity I, but increases at a slower rate, and in principle ultimately becomes independent of I. A conceptual picture of optical saturation using a two-level picture is described. This is, however, inadequate for the description of a real experiment involving a molecule, such as OH, for several reasons, which will be explained briefly; these are the multi-level nature of the electronic states and energy transfer among them and effects due to spatial, spectral, and temporal fluctuations in the laser pulse.

Source record↗
NASA NTRS1999

Waves in the Martian Atmosphere: Results from MGS Radio Occultations

Temperatures retrieved from Mars Global Surveyor radio occultations have been searched for evidence of waves. Emphasis has been on the initial series of occultations between 29 deg N and 64 deg S, obtained during the early martian southern summer, L(sub s) = 264 deg - 308 deg. The profiles exhibit an undulatory behavior that is suggestive of vertically propagating waves. wavelengths approximately 10 km are often dominant, but structure on smaller scales is evident. The undulatory structure is most pronounced between latitudes 29 deg N and 10 deg S, usually in regions of "interesting" topography, e.g., in the Tharsis region and near the edge of Syrtis Major. Several temperature profiles, particularly within 30 deg of the equator, exhibit lapse rates that locally become superadiabatic near the 0.4-mbar level or at higher altitudes. This implies that the waves are "breaking" and depositing horizontal momentum into the atmosphere. Such a deposition may play an important role in modulating the atmospheric winds, and characterizing the spatial and temporal distribution of these momentum transfers can provide important clues to understanding how the global circulation is maintained.

Flasar, F. M.↗
NASA NTRS1994

Multichannel Spatial Auditory Display for Speed Communications

A spatial auditory display for multiple speech communications was developed at NASA/Ames Research Center. Input is spatialized by the use of simplifiedhead-related transfer functions, adapted for FIR filtering on Motorola 56001 digital signal processors. Hardware and firmware design implementations are overviewed for the initial prototype developed for NASA-Kennedy Space Center. An adaptive staircase method was used to determine intelligibility levels of four-letter call signs used by launch personnel at NASA against diotic speech babble. Spatial positions at 30 degree azimuth increments were evaluated. The results from eight subjects showed a maximum intelligibility improvement of about 6-7 dB when the signal was spatialized to 60 or 90 degree azimuth positions.

Begault, Durand R.↗
NASA NTRS2000

BOREAS HYD-3 Subcanopy Incoming Solar Radiation Measurements

The Boreal Ecosystem-Atmosphere Study (BOREAS) Hydrology (HYD)-3 team collected several data sets related to the hydrology of forested areas. This data set contains solar radiation measurements from several pyranometers (solar radiometers) placed on the snow surface in jack pine (1994) and black spruce and aspen forests (1996) in the BOREAS southern study area (SSA). An array of radiometers was used to collect data for three to four consecutive days in each forest type to study the hypothesis that energy transfer and snow water equivalent would vary spatially as a function of canopy closure. The quality of the data is good, because the days were generally clear and the radiometers were checked daily to remove anything that landed on the radiometers. The data are available in tabular ASCII files. The subcanopy incoming solar radiation measurement data are available from the Earth Observing System Data and Information System (EOSDIS) Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) Distributed Active Archive Center (DAAC). The data files are available on a CD-ROM (see document number 20010000884).

Hardy, Janet P.↗
NASA NTRS2002

Combustion Sensors: Gas Turbine Applications

This report documents efforts to survey the current research directions in sensor technology for gas turbine systems. The work is driven by the current and future requirements on system performance and optimization. Accurate real time measurements of velocities, pressure, temperatures, and species concentrations will be required for objectives such as combustion instability attenuation, pollutant reduction, engine health management, exhaust profile control via active control, etc. Changing combustor conditions - engine aging, flow path slagging, or rapid maneuvering - will require adaptive responses; the effectiveness of such will be only as good as the dynamic information available for processing. All of these issues point toward the importance of continued sensor development. For adequate control of the combustion process, sensor data must include information about the above mentioned quantities along with equivalence ratios and radical concentrations, and also include both temporal and spatial velocity resolution. Ultimately these devices must transfer from the laboratory to field installations, and thus must become low weight and cost, reliable and maintainable. A primary conclusion from this study is that the optics-based sensor science will be the primary diagnostic in future gas turbine technologies.

Human, Mel↗
NASA NTRS2009

Cavities of Weak Magnetic Field Strength in the Wake of FTEs: Results from Global Magnetospheric MHD Simulations

We use the global magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) code BATS-R-US to model multipoint observations of Flux Transfer Event (FTE) signatures. Simulations with high spatial and temporal resolution predict that cavities of weak magnetic field strength protruding into the magnetosphere trail FTEs. These predictions are consistent with recently reported multi-point Cluster observations of traveling magnetopause erosion regions (TMERs).

Kuznetsova, M. M.↗
DOE OSTI2021

High-Temperature Multi-Process Sensor Development and Demonstration at a Full-scale PC Combustion System

The main objective of this research program is to design, manufacture, and demonstrate a miniaturized, multi-process, monitoring system (mMPMS) for boiler condition management and easy system deployment to obtain a higher spatial resolution. This system will facilitate a Condition-Based Maintenance (CBM) philosophy that actively monitors the health of assets to predict and prevent failures and maximize availability and generating capacity at a reduced cost. CBM systems can provide boiler data that the advanced process control (APC) system can utilize for plant performance optimization, which is increasingly relevant as coal power plants shift from predominantly base-load operation to predominantly transient operation involving large load swings. The mMPMS is based on an electrochemical sensor that provides a real-time indication of the risk of damage to key locations in the radiant or convective section of a coal-fired boiler such as metal loss rates, heat flux, metal surface temperature, and deposit thickness. These indications can be utilized to optimize boiler performance as well as improve boiler availability in conjunction with corresponding operating conditions. This monitoring system was developed and tested in the high-temperature regions of coal-fired utility boilers in this project but can be applied to many other industries and applications as well. This project leveraged the existing electrochemical noise-based monitoring system and the new sensor design is small enough to be installed through the webbing of the waterwalls without the need for long shut-downs to bend tubes and to make it feasible to obtain high spatial resolution in the boiler. Data is transferred to the plant distributed control system (DCS) and any other control system. The sensor body that houses the sensor assembly was designed to ensure good conductive contact with boiler tubes to ensure the sensor is held at an identical temperature to the tube surface temperature. The data acquisition and signal conditioning modules were redesigned into a small footprint with optimized cooling of the module. System software was developed specifically for the new signal conditioning module and is compatible with plant PLCs. After the preliminary testing at a pilot-scale facility, the three mMPMS were installed at a full-scale pulverized coal-fired plant, PacifiCorp’s Hunter 3. The systems were demonstrated over 20,000 hours at the plant during regular operation. Also, the sensor data was fed to the plant’s advanced process control system to evaluate the corrosion control by the operation changes and utilized to understand the impacts of load cycling with different ramping up and down speeds. At the end of the project, the systems were converted to the permanent installation at the power plant to be used with the advanced process control system installed at the plant.

Advanced Sensors, Corrosion, Ash Deposition, Optim↗
DOE OSTI2025

Real-Space Quantification of Exciton Localization in Acene Crystals Using Wannier Function Decomposition

Here, we introduce the Wannier function decomposition of excitons (WFDX) method to quantify exciton localization in solids within the ab initio Bethe-Salpeter equation framework. By decomposing each Bloch exciton wave function into products of single-particle electron and hole maximally localized Wannier functions, this real-space approach provides well-defined orbital- and spatial-resolved measures of both Frenkel and charge-transfer excitons at low computational cost. We apply WFDX to excitons in acene crystals, quantifying how the number of rings, the exciton spin state, and the center-of-mass momentum affect spatial localization. Additionally, we show how this real-space representation reflects structural nonsymmorphic symmetries that are hidden in standard reciprocal-space descriptions. We demonstrate how the WFDX framework can be used to efficiently interpolate exciton expansion coefficients in reciprocal-space and outline how it may facilitate evaluation of observables involving position operators, highlighting its potential as a general tool for both analyzing and computing excitonic properties in solids.

Tao, Zui [University of California, Berkeley, CA (↗
NASA NTRS1990

Navier-Stokes computations for aerodynamic configurations at high angles of attack

Navier-Stokes computations at high angles of attack over aerodynamic configurations are presented using an implicit finite-volume algorithm. The spatial differencing is upwind-biased for the convective and pressure terms and central for the shear stress and heat transfer terms. The equations are relaxed to steady state with a spatially factored implicit algorithm. In order to treat general geometries, a multiblock patched-grid framework is implemented. Applications and detailed comparisons with experimental data are made for two simple but representative geometric shapes: (1) a highly swept delta wing and (2) a prolate spheroid of 6:1 length-to-diameter. Recent extensions of the algorithm to compute the flow over an F-18 forebody-strake configuration are shown, including comparisons with wind tunnel and flight test results. Comparisons across the range of Reynolds number for all cases indicate that either low Reynolds number or high Reynolds number flows are simulated well, but that flows at intermediate Reynolds number cannot be simulated accurately without a detailed knowledge of the transitional zone between laminar and turbulent flow.

Thomas, J. L.↗
NASA NTRS2001

Real-time three-dimensional color Doppler echocardiography for characterizing the spatial velocity distribution and quantifying the peak flow rate in the left ventricular outflow tract

Quantification of flow with pulsed-wave Doppler assumes a "flat" velocity profile in the left ventricular outflow tract (LVOT), which observation refutes. Recent development of real-time, three-dimensional (3-D) color Doppler allows one to obtain an entire cross-sectional velocity distribution of the LVOT, which is not possible using conventional 2-D echo. In an animal experiment, the cross-sectional color Doppler images of the LVOT at peak systole were derived and digitally transferred to a computer to visualize and quantify spatial velocity distributions and peak flow rates. Markedly skewed profiles, with higher velocities toward the septum, were consistently observed. Reference peak flow rates by electromagnetic flow meter correlated well with 3-D peak flow rates (r = 0.94), but with an anticipated underestimation. Real-time 3-D color Doppler echocardiography was capable of determining cross-sectional velocity distributions and peak flow rates, demonstrating the utility of this new method for better understanding and quantifying blood flow phenomena.

NASA Discipline Cardiopulmonary↗
DOE OSTI2020

Pairing Directional Solar Inputs From Ray Tracing to Solar Receiver/Reactor Heat Transfer Models on Unstructured Meshes: Development and Case Studies

A novel method for pairing surface irradiation and volumetric absorption from Monte Carlo ray tracing to computational heat transfer models is presented. The method is well-suited to directionally and spatially complex concentrated radiative inputs (e.g., solar receivers and reactors). The method employs a generalized algorithm for directly mapping absorbed rays from a Monte Carlo ray tracing model to boundary or volumetric source terms in the computational mesh. The algorithm is compatible with unstructured, two and three-dimensional meshes with varying element shapes. Four case studies were performed on a directly irradiated, windowed solar thermochemical reactor model to validate the method. The method was shown to conserve energy and preserve spatial variation when mapping rays from a Monte Carlo ray tracing model to a computational heat transfer model in ansys fluent.

14 SOLAR ENERGY↗
NASA NTRS2007

A Non-Radiative Transfer Approach to Radiometric Vicarious Calibration

TOA (top-of-atmosphere) radiance from high-spatial-resolution satellite imagery systems is important for a wide variety of research and applications. Many research initiatives require data with absolute radiometric accuracy better than a few percent. The conversion of satellite digital numbers to radiance depends on accurate radiometric calibration. A common method for determining and validating radiometric calibrations is to rely upon vicarious calibration approaches. Historically, vicarious calibration methods use radiative transfer codes with ground-based atmosphere and surface reflectance or radiance inputs for estimating TOA radiance values. These TOA radiance values are compared against the satellite digital numbers to determine the radiometric calibration. However, the radiative transfer codes used depend on many assumptions about the aerosol properties and the atmospheric point spread function. A measurement-based atmospheric radiance estimation approach for high-spatial-resolution, multispectral, visible/near-infrared sensors is presented that eliminates the use of radiative transfer codes and many of the underlying assumptions. A comparison between the radiative transfer and non-radiative transfer approaches is made.

Ryan, Robert↗
NASA NTRS1995

Imaging spectrometer measurement of water vapor in the 400 to 2500 nm spectral region

The Airborne Visible-Infrared Imaging Spectrometer (AVIRIS) measures the total upwelling spectral radiance from 400 to 2500 nm sampled at 10 nm intervals. The instrument acquires spectral data at an altitude of 20 km above sea level, as images of 11 by up to 100 km at 17x17 meter spatial sampling. We have developed a nonlinear spectral fitting algorithm coupled with a radiative transfer code to derive the total path water vapor from the spectrum, measured for each spatial element in an AVIRIS image. The algorithm compensates for variation in the surface spectral reflectance and atmospheric aerosols. It uses water vapor absorption bands centered at 940 nm, 1040 nm, and 1380 nm. We analyze data sets with water vapor abundances ranging from 1 to 40 perceptible millimeters. In one data set, the total path water vapor varies from 7 to 21 mm over a distance of less than 10 km. We have analyzed a time series of five images acquired at 12 minute intervals; these show spatially heterogeneous changes of advocated water vapor of 25 percent over 1 hour. The algorithm determines water vapor for images with a range of ground covers, including bare rock and soil, sparse to dense vegetation, snow and ice, open water, and clouds. The precision of the water vapor determination approaches one percent. However, the precision is sensitive to the absolute abundance and the absorption strength of the atmospheric water vapor band analyzed. We have evaluated the accuracy of the algorithm by comparing several surface-based determinations of water vapor at the time of the AVIRIS data acquisition. The agreement between the AVIRIS measured water vapor and the in situ surface radiometer and surface interferometer measured water vapor is 5 to 10 percent.

Green, Robert O.↗
DOE OSTI2026

A time-parallel method for scalable heat transfer simulations of additive manufacturing

Here, a major challenge in simulating the thermal behavior in additive manufacturing processes is the disparate length and time scales between transport phenomena occurring in the melt pool and the component. A common simulation approach relies on spatial decomposition for parallel computing, but due to the nature of heat transfer in AM, where most of the computational expenditure is localized near the melt pool, the computational speedup from spatial parallelization saturates quickly. Therefore, additional parallelism by means of time-domain decomposition is needed to fully take advantage of high-performance computing (HPC) resources. This work introduces a time-parallel method to improve the computational scalability of additive manufacturing simulations on HPC systems, while maintaining high temporal resolution of heat transfer near the melt pool. The method, inspired by the nonlinear paraexp formalism, performs an iterative superposition of nonlinear solutions to the initial value problem, integrating the heat equation across overlapping time-parallel intervals. For a single layer of the NIST AMB2018–01 L7 benchmark problem, the method achieves a 38.51x speedup in wall-clock time with a maximum error in the global temperature solution of 0.99%. This reduces the total solution time from 196.72 min to 5.11 min on 128 nodes of the ORNL Frontier supercomputer. The tradeoff between accuracy and total wall-clock time is investigated and recommendations for time-parallel deployment for AM problems are made.

Additive manufacturing↗
NASA NTRS2010

Transfer of Satellite Rainfall Uncertainty from Gauged to Ungauged Regions at Regional and Seasonal Timescales

Hydrologists and other users need to know the uncertainty of the satellite rainfall data sets across the range of time/space scales over the whole domain of the data set. Here, uncertainty' refers to the general concept of the deviation' of an estimate from the reference (or ground truth) where the deviation may be defined in multiple ways. This uncertainty information can provide insight to the user on the realistic limits of utility, such as hydrologic predictability, that can be achieved with these satellite rainfall data sets. However, satellite rainfall uncertainty estimation requires ground validation (GV) precipitation data. On the other hand, satellite data will be most useful over regions that lack GV data, for example developing countries. This paper addresses the open issues for developing an appropriate uncertainty transfer scheme that can routinely estimate various uncertainty metrics across the globe by leveraging a combination of spatially-dense GV data and temporally sparse surrogate (or proxy) GV data, such as the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) Precipitation Radar and the Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) mission Dual-Frequency Precipitation Radar. The TRMM Multi-satellite Precipitation Analysis (TMPA) products over the US spanning a record of 6 years are used as a representative example of satellite rainfall. It is shown that there exists a quantifiable spatial structure in the uncertainty of satellite data for spatial interpolation. Probabilistic analysis of sampling offered by the existing constellation of passive microwave sensors indicate that transfer of uncertainty for hydrologic applications may be effective at daily time scales or higher during the GPM era. Finally, a commonly used spatial interpolation technique (kriging), that leverages the spatial correlation of estimation uncertainty, is assessed at climatologic, seasonal, monthly and weekly timescales. It is found that the effectiveness of kriging is sensitive to the type of uncertainty metric, time scale of transfer and the density of GV data within the transfer domain. Transfer accuracy is lowest at weekly timescales with the error doubling from monthly to weekly.However, at very low GV data density (<20% of the domain), the transfer accuracy is too low to show any distinction as a function of the timescale of transfer.

Tang, Ling↗
NASA NTRS1992

Mars: Correcting surface albedo observations for effects of atmospheric dust loading

We have developed a radiative transfer model which allows the effects of atmospheric dust loading on surface albedo to be investigated. This model incorporates atmospheric dust opacity, the single scattering albedo and particle phase function of atmospheric dust, the bidirectional reflectance of the surface, and variable lighting and viewing geometry. The most recent dust particle properties are utilized. The spatial and temporal variability of atmospheric opacity (Tan) strongly influences the radiative transfer modelling results. We are currently using the approach described to determine Tan for IRTM mapping sequences of selected regions. This approach allows Tan to be determined at the highest spatial and temporal resolution supported by the IRTM data. Applying the radiative transfer modelling and determination of Tan described, IRTM visual brightness observations can be corrected for the effects of atmospheric dust loading a variety of locations and times. This approach allows maps of 'dust-corrected surface albedo' to be constructed for selected regions. Information on the variability of surface albedo and the amount of dust deposition/erosion related to such variability results. To date, this study indicates that atmospheric dust loading has a significant effect on observations of surface albedo, amounting to albedo corrections of as much as several tens of percent. This correction is not constant or linear, but depends upon surface albedo, viewing and lighting geometry, the dust and surface phase functions, and the atmospheric opacity. It is clear that the quantitative study of surface albedo, especially where small variations in observed albedo are important (such as photometric analyses), needs to account for the effects of the atmospheric dust loading. Maps of 'dust-corrected surface albedo' will be presented for a number of regions.

Lee, S. W.↗
NASA NTRS1980

Spatial frequency response of an optical heterodyne receiver

The principles of transfer function analysis are applied to a passive optical heterodyne receiver to obtain the modulation transfer function (MTF). MTF calculations are performed based on an optical platform which is imaging vertically varying profiles at worst case shuttle orbit altitudes. An analysis of the derogatory effects of sampling (aliasing) and central obscurations on both resolution and heterodyne efficiency is given. It is found that the cascading property of MTF analysis must be carefully applied since the coherent transfer function of the optical receiver and that due to the local oscillator-detector combination are not separable but are related by the convolution of their products. Application of these results to the specific case of a space-lab type optical heterodyne receiver shows that resolutions of the order of 1.5-2.0 Km are possible for worst-case type orbital scenarios. Further, comparison of obscured-type receivers (e.g., Cassegrains) with unobscured receivers shows that both resolution and efficiency are severely degraded in an obscured-type receiver and consequently should not be used for a passive heterodyne detection scheme.

Fales, C. L.↗