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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 217 records · Page 12
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS1986

High-spatial-resolution microwave and related observations as diagnostics of coronal loops

High spatial resolution microwave observations of coronal loops, together with theoretical models for the loop emission, can provide detailed information about the temperature, density, and magnetic field within the loop, as well as the environment around the loop. The capability for studying magnetic fields is particularly important, since there is no comparable method for obtaining direct information about coronal magnetic fields. Knowledge of the magnetic field strength and structure in coronal loops is important for understanding both coronal heating and flares. With arc-second-resolution microwave observations from the Very Large Array (VLA), supplemental high-spectral-resolution microwave data from a facility such as the Owens Valley frequency-agile interferometer, and the ability to obtain second-of-arc resolution EUV aor soft X ray images, the capability already exists for obtaining much more detailed information about coronal plasma and magnetic structures than is presently available. This capability is discussed.

Holman, Gordon D.↗
NASA NTRS1986

The propagation of solar flare particles in a coronal loop

A time-dependent diffusion equation with velocity-dependent diffusion and energy-loss coefficients was solved for the case where energetic solar particles are injected into a coronal loop and then diffuse out the ends of the loop into the lower corona/chromosphere. The solution yields for the case of relativistic electrons, precipitation rates and populations which are necessary for calculating thick and thin target X-ray emission. It follows that the thick target emission is necessarily delayed with respect to the particle acceleration on injection by more than the mere travel time of the particle over the loop length. In addition the time-dependent electron population at the top of the loop is calculated. This is useful in estimating the resulting micron-wave emission. The results show relative timing differences in the different emission processes which are functions of particle species, energy and the point of injection of the particles into the loop. Equivalent quantities are calculated for non-relativistic protons.

Ryan, J. M.↗
NASA NTRS1987

A numerical study of the thermal stability of solar loops

An important property of all loops is their thermal stability. If low lying hot loops were thermally unstable, for example, a great majority of the low loops on the Sun might be expected to be cool. How small perturbations evolve in low lying, linearly unstable hot loops was determined and how high lying, linearly stable hot loops respond to large amplitude disturbances such as might be expected on the Sun were examined. Only general descriptions and results are given.

Klimchuk, J. A.↗
NASA NTRS1986

A class of optimum digital phase locked loops

This paper presents a class of optimum digital filters for digital phase locked loops, for the important case in which the maximum update rate of the loop filter and numerically controlled oscillator (NCO) is limited. This case is typical when the loop filter is implemented in a microprocessor. In these situations, pure delay is encountered in the loop transfer function and thus the stability and gain margin of the loop are of crucial interest. The optimum filters designed for such situations are evaluated in terms of their gain margin for stability, dynamic error, and steady-state error performance. For situations involving considerably high phase dynamics an adaptive and programmable implementation is also proposed to obtain an overall optimum strategy.

Kumar, R.↗
NASA NTRS1988

A magnetic loop model for structure and activity in the Galactic center

A simple model for the production and propagation of magnetized loops in the Galactic center is developed. It is found that a magnetized model can reproduce the filamentary, asymmetric structures on all scales from 100 pc to subparsec scales in the Galactic center. The radio and molecular gas morphology on all scales inside the Galactic center lobe may be explained in terms of the expansion of strongly magnetized loops and their interaction with the 2-5 pc torus and 30-50 pc portion of the center lobe. The magnetic loops have a toroidal field which explains the braided appearance of the radio continuum emission on the 2 pc scale. The barlike feature on the 2 pc radio continuum maps can be viewed as a piece of a magnetic loop with field strength about 0.01 G which is colliding and reconnecting with the ionized inner edge of the 2 pc molecular torus. The loop-torus interaction feeds energetic particles and shear Alfven waves into the torus, and deposits mass and energy.

Heyvaerts, Jean↗
NASA NTRS1988

Heating of solar coronal loops by resonant absorption of Alfven waves

Numerical calculations governing the efficiency of coronal loop heating by the resonant absorption of shear Alfven waves are reported. The loop structure is modeled by a class of axisymmetric force-free equilibria of a long straight cylinder, approximating a large aspect ratio loop. For a range of parameters characterizing the evolution of solar coronal loops, the absorption bandwidth falls in the frequency range of the photospheric motions due to granulation and p-modes. Resonant Alfven wave absorption is thus a viable mechanism for coronal loop heating.

Grossmann, William↗
NASA NTRS1988

Run-time parallelization and scheduling of loops

The class of problems that can be effectively compiled by parallelizing compilers is discussed. This is accomplished with the doconsider construct which would allow these compilers to parallelize many problems in which substantial loop-level parallelism is available but cannot be detected by standard compile-time analysis. We describe and experimentally analyze mechanisms used to parallelize the work required for these types of loops. In each of these methods, a new loop structure is produced by modifying the loop to be parallelized. We also present the rules by which these loop transformations may be automated in order that they be included in language compilers. The main application area of the research involves problems in scientific computations and engineering. The workload used in our experiment includes a mixture of real problems as well as synthetically generated inputs. From our extensive tests on the Encore Multimax/320, we have reached the conclusion that for the types of workloads we have investigated, self-execution almost always performs better than pre-scheduling. Further, the improvement in performance that accrues as a result of global topological sorting of indices as opposed to the less expensive local sorting, is not very significant in the case of self-execution.

Saltz, Joel H.↗
NASA NTRS1988

Active region coronal loops - Structural and variability

X-ray images of a pair of active region loops are studied which show significant, short time-scale variability in the line fluxes of O VIII, Ne IX, and Mg XI and in the 3.5-11.5 keV soft X-ray bands. Vector magnetograms and high-resolution UV images were used to model the three-dimensional characteristics of the loops. X-ray light curves were generated spanning four consecutive orbits for both loops individually, and light curves of the loop tops and brightest points were also generated. The largest variations involve flux changes of up to several hundred percent on time scales of 10 minutes. No significant H-alpha flare activity is reported, and loop temperatures remain in the four to six million K range. The decay phases of the light curves indicate radiative cooling, inhibition of conduction, and some type of 'continued heating' due to ongoing, underlying activity at the microflare level.

Haisch, Bernhard M.↗
NASA NTRS1990

The preprocessed doacross loop

Dependencies between loop iterations cannot always be characterized during program compilation. Doacross loops typically make use of a-priori knowledge of inter-iteration dependencies to carry out required synchronizations. A type of doacross loop is proposed that allows the scheduling of iterations of a loop among processors without advance knowledge of inter-iteration dependencies. The method proposed for loop iterations requires that parallelizable preprocessing and postprocessing steps be carried out during program execution.

Saltz, Joel H.↗
NASA NTRS1990

Effects of Coulomb collisions on cyclotron maser and plasma wave growth in magnetic loops

The evolution of nonthermal electrons accelerated in magnetic loops is determined by solving the kinetic equation, including magnetic field convergence and Coulomb collisions in order to determine the effects of these interactions on the induced cyclotron maser and plasma wave growth. It is found that the growth rates are larger and the possibility of cyclotron maser action is stronger for smaller loop column density, for larger magnetic field convergence, for a more isotropic injected electron pitch angle distribution, and for more impulsive acceleration. For modest values of the column density in the coronal portion of a flaring loop, the growth rates of instabilities are significantly reduced, and the reduction is much larger for the cyclotron modes than for the plasma wave modes. The rapid decrease in the growth rates with increasing loop column density suggests that, in flare loops when such phenomena occur, the densities are lower than commonly accepted.

Hamilton, Russell J.↗
NASA NTRS1991

On the transport and acceleration of solar flare particles in a coronal loop

The turbulent environment of a flaring solar coronal loop directly affects the population of particles to be accelerated or already accelerated. Under the assumption of a uniform turbulent MHD wave field within the loop, the behavior of a particle distribution as it interacts with the turbulence is discussed, including particle precipitation to the footpoints of the loop and the evolution of the energy distribution as the particles undergo second-order stochastic acceleration. Two cases are discussed in detail: (1) particles spatially diffusing within the loop and precipitating with minimal acceleration in the short time scale of an impulsive event and (2) particles diffusing in both real and momentum space in a long duration event. Collisional losses due to ambient electrons are included. The gamma-ray flare of June 3, 1982 is modeled, and good agreement is obtained between predicted and observed time profiles if the loop length is 100,000 km with an intrinsic spatial diffusion time of 100-450 s. It follows that the production of high-energy neutrons and pi mesons extends over a time scale of 1000 s as observed.

Ryan, James M.↗
NASA NTRS1992

Two AFC Loops For Low CNR And High Dynamics

Two alternative digital automatic-frequency-control (AFC) loops proposed to acquire (or reacquire) and track frequency of received carrier radio signal. Intended for use where carrier-to-noise ratios (CNR's) low and carrier frequency characterized by high Doppler shift and Doppler rate because of high relative speed and acceleration, respectively, between transmitter and receiver. Either AFC loops used in place of phase-locked loop. New loop concepts integrate ideas from classical spectrum-estimation, digital-phase-locked-loop, and Kalman-Filter theories.

Hinedi, Sami M.↗
NASA NTRS1990

A brief introduction to coronal 'loops'

A discussion is presented of elementary aspects of the physics of coronal loops, in order to more securely approach the question of their existence. It is noted that the time-scales for pressure equilibration are far shorter than typical cooling times in loop structures, and that the loop structures are accordingly in pressure balance with their surroundings. Those surroundings, however, are dark, implying a decreased density and gas pressure outside the bright loops. It is deduced that the loop interiors must have a weaker magnetic field than the gas immediately outside them.

Rosner, Robert↗
NASA NTRS1992

Coronal loops - Current-based heating processes

Based on new observations, a theoretical model of magnetic-field related heating processes in the solar corona is given. In this model, field-aligned currents are induced along coronal loops in thin current sheaths. Excitation of instabilities involving magnetic reconnection converts the energy associated with the current-related magnetic field directly into particle energy, where the heating process proceeds via short bursts corresponding to an intermittent disruption of the current sheath configuration. Because of the relatively low transverse thermal conduction, only a small fraction of the loop volume is heated to a much higher temperature than the average value. This is consistent with experimental observations of low filling factors of hot plasmas in coronal loops. Thus the model involves a repeated sequence of dynamic events taking into account the observed loop topology, the differential emission measure distribution in the 10 exp 6 - 10 exp 7 K range, the energy balance requirements in the loop, and the probable duty cycles involved in the heating processes.

Beaufume, P.↗
NASA NTRS1993

Long-term containment of energetic particles in coronal loops

Recent observation from the Compton Gamma-Ray Observatory shows that gamma-ray emission after a solar flare can last for as long as 8 hours. There is also evidence that electrons and protons are accelerated only during the impulsive phase of the flare and are subsequently mirror trapped in coronal magnetic loops. This poses the following dilemma: if the magnetic field lines in the loop are simple plane arches, the protons will drift across the cross section of the loop in seconds to minutes, rather than hours. To solve the dilemma, we use guiding center theory to show that long-term containment of energetic protons in a coronal loop is possible if magnetic field lines have enough twist. We also find that in the trapped region of the loop, the twist angle of field lines between the mirror points of a bounce orbit is approximately 2 pi.

Lau, Yun-Tung↗
NASA NTRS1994

Fatigue-Resistant Metal Hook-And-Loop Fastener

Proposed metal hook-and-loop fastener engaged and disengaged many hundreds of times without breaking. Fastener opens by mechanical action. Translation moves hooks out of loops or pushes loops away from hooks. Hooks not required to flex and, therefore, do not fail by fatigue. Lifetime much greater than that of other metal hook-and-loop fasteners, depending on flexure for disengagement such as article, "Hook-and-Loop Metal Fastener" (MSC-21586).

Sawaf, Bernard↗
NASA NTRS1989

Low-order design and high-order simulation of active closed-loop control for aerospace structures under construction

Partially constructed/assembled structures in space are complicated enough but their dynamics will also be operating in closed-loop with feedback controllers. The dynamics of such structures are modeled by large-scale finite element models. The model dimension L is extremely large (approximately 10,000) while the numbers of actuators (M) and sensors (P) are small. The model parameters M(sub m) mass matrix, D(sub o) damping matrix, and K(sub o) stiffness matrix, are all symmetric and sparse (banded). Thus simulation of open-loop structure models of very large dimension can be accomplished by special integration techniques for sparse matrices. The problem of simulation of closed-loop control of such structures is complicated by the addition of controllers. Simulation of closed-loop controlled structures is an essential part of the controller design and evaluation process. Current research in the following areas is presented: high-order simulation of actively controlled aerospace structures; low-order controller design and SCI compensation for unmodeled dynamics; prediction of closed-loop stability using asymptotic eigenvalue series; and flexible robot manipulator control experiment.

Balas, Mark J.↗
NASA NTRS1994

Design and implementation of a hybrid digital phase-locked loop with a TMS320C25: An application to a transponder receiver breadboard

Design, modeling, analysis, and simulation of a phase-locked loop (PLL) with a digital loop filter are presented in this article. A TMS320C25 digital signal processor (DSP) is used to implement this digital loop filter. In order to keep the compatibility, the main design goal was to replace the analog PLL (APLL) of the Deep-Space Transponder (DST) receiver breadboard's loop filter with a digital loop filter without changing anything else. This replacement results in a hybrid digital PLL (HDPLL). Both the original APLL and the designed HDPLL are Type I second-order systems. The real-time performance of the HDPLL and the receiver is provided and evaluated.

Yeh, H.-G.↗