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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 NTRS1977

Baseline performance of solar collectors for NASA Langley solar building test facility

The solar collector field contains seven collector designs. Before operation in the field, the experimental performances (thermal efficiencies) of the seven collector designs were measured in an indoor solar simulator. The resulting data provided a baseline for later comparison with actual field test data. The simulator test results are presented for the collectors as received, and after several weeks of outdoor exposure with no coolant (dry operation). Six of the seven collector designs tested showed substantial reductions in thermal efficiency after dry operation.

Knoll, R. H.↗
NASA NTRS1982

Advanced Czochralski silicon growth technology for photovoltaic modules

Several economic analyses had indicated that large-diameter, multiple ingot growth using a single crucible with melt replenishment would be required for Cz growth to be economically viable. Based on the results of these analyses, two liquid and two solid feed melt replenishment approaches were initiated. The sequential solid feed melt replenishment approach, which demonstrated elements of technical feasibility is described in detail in this paper. Growth results of multiple ingots (10-cm-diameter, totaling 100 kg; and 15-cm-diameter, totaling 150 kg weight per crucible) are presented. Solar cells were fabricated and analyzed to evaluate the effects of structure and chemical purities as a result of multiple growth. The results indicate that, with semiconductor-grade silicon, feedstock impurity build-up does not seem to degrade cell performance. For polycrystalline cells, the average efficiencies are 15 to 25% lower than those of single crystalline cells. Concerns regarding single crystal yields, crucible quality and growth speed are indicated, and present status and future research thrusts are also discussed.

Daud, T.↗
NASA NTRS1991

Parallel processing for scientific computations

The main contribution of the effort in the last two years is the introduction of the MOPPS system. After doing extensive literature search, we introduced the system which is described next. MOPPS employs a new solution to the problem of managing programs which solve scientific and engineering applications on a distributed processing environment. Autonomous computers cooperate efficiently in solving large scientific problems with this solution. MOPPS has the advantage of not assuming the presence of any particular network topology or configuration, computer architecture, or operating system. It imposes little overhead on network and processor resources while efficiently managing programs concurrently. The core of MOPPS is an intelligent program manager that builds a knowledge base of the execution performance of the parallel programs it is managing under various conditions. The manager applies this knowledge to improve the performance of future runs. The program manager learns from experience.

Alkhatib, Hasan S.↗
NASA NTRS2010

Model-Checking with Edge-Valued Decision Diagrams

We describe an algebra of Edge-Valued Decision Diagrams (EVMDDs) to encode arithmetic functions and its implementation in a model checking library along with state-of-the-art algorithms for building the transition relation and the state space of discrete state systems. We provide efficient algorithms for manipulating EVMDDs and give upper bounds of the theoretical time complexity of these algorithms for all basic arithmetic and relational operators. We also demonstrate that the time complexity of the generic recursive algorithm for applying a binary operator on EVMDDs is no worse than that of Multi-Terminal Decision Diagrams. We have implemented a new symbolic model checker with the intention to represent in one formalism the best techniques available at the moment across a spectrum of existing tools: EVMDDs for encoding arithmetic expressions, identity-reduced MDDs for representing the transition relation, and the saturation algorithm for reachability analysis. We compare our new symbolic model checking EVMDD library with the widely used CUDD package and show that, in many cases, our tool is several orders of magnitude faster than CUDD.

Roux, Pierre↗
NASA NTRS2015

High Radiation Resistance IMM Solar Cell

Due to high launch costs, weight reduction is a key driver for the development of new solar cell technologies suitable for space applications. This project is developing a unique triple-junction inverted metamorphic multijunction (IMM) technology that enables the manufacture of very lightweight, low-cost InGaAsP-based multijunction solar cells. This IMM technology consists of indium (In) and phosphorous (P) solar cell active materials, which are designed to improve the radiation-resistant properties of the triple-junction solar cell while maintaining high efficiency. The intrinsic radiation hardness of InP materials makes them of great interest for building solar cells suitable for deployment in harsh radiation environments, such as medium Earth orbit and missions to the outer planets. NASA Glenn's recently developed epitaxial lift-off (ELO) process also will be applied to this new structure, which will enable the fabrication of the IMM structure without the substrate.

Pan, Noren↗
NASA NTRS2019

Design of an Automated Ultrasonic Scanning System for In-Situ Composite Cure Monitoring and Defect Detection

The preliminary design and development of an automated ultrasonic scanning system for in-situ composite cure monitoring and defect detection in the high temperature environment of an oven was completed. This preliminary design is a stepping stone to deployment in the high temperature and high pressure environment of an autoclave, the primary cure method of aerospace grade thermoset composites. Cure monitoring with real-time defect detection during the process could determine when defects form and how they move. In addition, real-time defect detection during cure could assist validating physics-based process models for predicting defects at all stages of the cure cycle. A physics-based process model for predicting porosity and fiber waviness originating during cure is currently under development by the NASA Advanced Composites Project (ACP). For the design, an ultrasonic contact scanner is enclosed in an insulating box that is placed inside an oven during cure. Throughout the cure cycle, the box is nitrogen-cooled to approximately room temperature to maintain a standard operating environment for the scanner. The composite part is mounted on the outside of the box in a vacuum bag on the build/tool plate. The build plate is attached to the bottom surface of the box. The scanner inspects the composite panel through the build plate, tracking the movement of defects introduced during layup and searching for new defects that may form during cure. The focus of this paper is the evaluation and selection of the build plate material and thickness. The selection was based on the required operating temperature of the scanner, the cure temperature of the composite material, thermal conductivity models of the candidate build plates, and a series of ultrasonic attenuation tests. This analysis led to the determination that a 63.5 mm thick build plate of borosilicate glass would be utilized for the system. The borosilicate glass plate was selected as the build plate material due to the low ultrasonic attenuation it demonstrated, its ability to efficiently insulate the scanner while supporting an elevated temperature on the part side of the plate, and the availability of a 63.5 mm thick plate without the need for lamination.

Hudson, Tyler B.↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

TPSAS-NF1676L-28151-DND

The proposed suborbital mission is to collect and analyze observations to help improve our ability to model and forecast these crucial monsoonal transports and their downstream effects. The objectives are 1) to observe and relate convective-scale to meso-scale changes in the three-dimensional circulation with the efficiency of the resulting convective transports (of air mass and heat) and the build-up of the large-scale anomalies, as they are modulated by the three-dimensional structure of the aerosol loading; and 2) to observe how fluctuations in the monsoon large-scale upper-level outflow affect downstream convection, especially within AEWs. The observations will be tailor-made to help understand the controls of the northward march of the monsoon isochrones, the initiation and magnitude of heat towers over the subcontinent during the monsoon, and how the mostly zonal land-sea differential heating interacts with the meridional progress of the Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ) to constrain the intensities of the northern and western outflows. Unique contributions will be made by two airborne instruments, operated in concert: NASA-LARC's Doppler Aerosol Wind Lidar (DAWN) coherent-detection wind lidar which uses a pulsed laser with a wavelength of about two microns to measure vertical profiles of the three dimensional components of the wind field, and JPL's Airborne Second Generation Precipitation Radar (APR-2) precipitation radar which measures the three-dimensional structure of rain within a swath that is about10km wide (depending on the altitude of the plane) and extends from flight level down to the surface.

Upendra N Singh↗
NASA NTRS1998

Using Decision Procedures to Build Domain-Specific Deductive Synthesis Systems

This paper describes a class of decision procedures that we have found useful for efficient, domain-specific deductive synthesis. These procedures are called closure-based ground literal satisfiability procedures. We argue that this is a large and interesting class of procedures and show how to interface these procedures to a theorem prover for efficient deductive synthesis. Finally, we describe some results we have observed from our implementation. Amphion/NAIF is a domain-specific, high-assurance software synthesis system. It takes an abstract specification of a problem in solar system mechanics, such as 'when will a signal sent from the Cassini spacecraft to Earth be blocked by the planet Saturn?', and automatically synthesizes a FORTRAN program to solve it.

VanBaalen, Jeffrey↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Enabling in-time Prognostics with Surrogate Modeling through Physics-enhanced Dynamic Mode Decomposition Method

Computational models provide essential quantitative tools for assessing and predicting the health and performance of physical systems. However, high-fidelity models are rarely used in real-time operations or large optimization loops, due to their time-intensive nature. A common approach to improving computational efficiency of prognosis is to employ surrogate models. Such models can significantly decrease computation time for some accuracy loss. In this context, use of Dynamic Mode Decomposition (DMD) is proposed to generate surrogate models for lithium-ion (Li-ion) battery discharge. DMD has been suggested and used successfully in the area of fluid dynamics for over a decade, but it has not been applied to the PHM domain, where far-ahead prediction of nonlinear behavior is crucial to propagate faults or predict Remaining Useful Life (RUL). For Li-ion battery health management, the standard application of DMD using only the observable quantities of interest was unable to capture the nonlinear discharge of batteries exhibited in lab testing. The Koopman theory, however, provides a mechanism to tradeoff low dimensional nonlinear models with high-dimensional linear ones in a DMD framework, by augmenting nonlinear state variables into the system representation. In this way, DMD allows for configurable simulation accuracy dependent on the dimensionality of the Koopman operator. For battery health management, we augmented the observable variables with the hidden states of a higher-fidelity physics model to build the DMD surrogate. In comparison to a high-fidelity model, the surrogate improved computational efficiency with only a minimal loss of accuracy, and enabled long-term prognostics horizons. A generalized method for this was implemented in the prog models python package.

prognostics and health management↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Concept-based Analysis of Neural Networks via Vision-Language Models

The analysis of vision-based deep neural networks (DNNs) is highly desirable but it is very challenging due to the difficulty of expressing formal specifications for vision tasks and the lack of efficient verification procedures. In this paper, we propose to leverage emerging multimodal, vision-language, foundation models (VLMs) as a lens through which we can reason about vision models. VLMs have been trained on a large body of images accompanied by their textual description, and are thus implicitly aware of high-level, human-understandable concepts describing the images. We describe a logical specification language Con spec designed to facilitate writing specifications in terms of these concepts. To define and formally check Con spec specifications, we build a map between the internal representations of a given vision model and a VLM, leading to an efficient verification procedure of natural-language properties for vision models. We demonstrate our techniques on a ResNet-based classifier trained on the RIVAL-10 dataset using CLIP as the multimodal model.

Large Vision Language Models↗
NASA NTRS1978

Automatic phase control in solar power satellite systems

Various approaches to the problem of generating, maintaining and distributing a coherent, reference phase signal over a large area are suggested, mathematically modeled and analyzed with respect to their ability to minimize: phase build-up, beam diffusion and beam steering phase jitter, cable length, and maximize power transfer efficiency. In addition, phase control configurations are suggested which alleviate the need for layout symmetry.

Lindsey, W. C.↗
NASA NTRS2004

Design of an EXB Probe

The amount of chemical propellant required to accomplish certain NASA s planned missions is too immense such that the spacecraft will never be able to lift off. To address this concern, electric propulsion systems have been chosen as the primary propulsion systems for some NASA s future missions, including DAWN and JIMO. Research Center is a proposed engine for the JIMO mission, which will visit three of Jupiter s icy moons. Optimizing thruster s lifetime and efficiency are the two foci for the engineers on the Ion Team. One qualitative study of the engine s efficiency can be accomplished by examining the ratio of doubly- to singly-charged ions in the ion beam of the engine. Thrust efficiency directly relates to this ratio. The bulk of this project is to redesign and build an EXB probe to obtain this qualitative measurement. Once this probe is built, it can be installed in a vacuum tank (VF 65 in building 301) behind the exit plane of the HiPEP engine to collect data. Current chemical propulsion technology cannot address the needs of some deep space The HiPEP (High Power Electric Propulsion) engine being developed at NASA Glenn Research Center is a proposed engine for the JIMO mission, which will visit three Jupiter's icy moons.

Nguyen, Sonca↗
NASA NTRS2007

The DaveMLTranslator: An Interface for DAVE-ML Aerodynamic Models

It can take weeks or months to incorporate a new aerodynamic model into a vehicle simulation and validate the performance of the model. The Dynamic Aerospace Vehicle Exchange Markup Language (DAVE-ML) has been proposed as a means to reduce the time required to accomplish this task by defining a standard format for typical components of a flight dynamic model. The purpose of this paper is to describe an object-oriented C++ implementation of a class that interfaces a vehicle subsystem model specified in DAVE-ML and a vehicle simulation. Using the DaveMLTranslator class, aerodynamic or other subsystem models can be automatically imported and verified at run-time, significantly reducing the elapsed time between receipt of a DAVE-ML model and its integration into a simulation environment. The translator performs variable initializations, data table lookups, and mathematical calculations for the aerodynamic build-up, and executes any embedded static check-cases for verification. The implementation is efficient, enabling real-time execution. Simple interface code for the model inputs and outputs is the only requirement to integrate the DaveMLTranslator as a vehicle aerodynamic model. The translator makes use of existing table-lookup utilities from the Langley Standard Real-Time Simulation in C++ (LaSRS++). The design and operation of the translator class is described and comparisons with existing, conventional, C++ aerodynamic models of the same vehicle are given.

Hill, Melissa A.↗
NASA NTRS2011

Mission Operations Directorate - Success Legacy of the Space Shuttle Program (Overview of the Evolution and Success Stories from MOD During the Space Shuttle program)

In support of the Space Shuttle Program, as well as NASA's other human space flight programs, the Mission Operations Directorate (MOD) at the Johnson Space Center has become the world leader in human spaceflight operations. From the earliest programs - Mercury, Gemini, Apollo - through Skylab, Shuttle, ISS, and our Exploration initiatives, MOD and its predecessors have pioneered ops concepts and emphasized a history of mission leadership which has added value, maximized mission success, and built on continual improvement of the capabilities to become more efficient and effective. This paper provides specific examples that illustrate how MOD's focus on building and contributing value with diverse teams has been key to their successes both with the US space industry and the broader international community. This paper will discuss specific examples for the Plan, Train, Fly, and Facilities aspects within MOD. This paper also provides a discussion of the joint civil servant/contractor environment and the relative badge-less society within MOD. Several Shuttle mission related examples have also been included that encompass all of the aforementioned MOD elements and attributes, and are used to show significant MOD successes within the Shuttle Program. These examples include the STS-49 Intelsat recovery and repair, the (post-Columbia accident) TPS inspection process and the associated R-Bar Pitch Maneuver for ISS missions, and the STS-400 rescue mission preparation efforts for the Hubble Space Telescope repair mission. Since their beginning, MOD has consistently demonstrated their ability to evolve and respond to an ever changing environment, effectively prepare for the expected and successfully respond to the unexpected, and develop leaders, expertise, and a culture that has led to mission and Program success.

Azbell, Jim A.↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Spacecraft Cabin Ventilation Fan Research at NASA

NASA has recently made the geometry and solid model for a spacecraft cabin ventilation fan prototype available to the public via electronic file downloads from the NASA Technical Report Server. This fan can be used for research and development by many organizations. The fan is 3.5 inches in diameter, 9 inches long, and weighed 3.6 lb. The NASA Quiet Space Fan was designed to make 3.64 inches of water pressure rise at 150.3 cfm of airflow at 12,000 rpm at standard air conditions of 70ºF and 14.7 psia. The performance of the metal version of the fan was measured to be 3.48 inches of water at 150.6 cfm at design speed. A low-noise blade-vane count was chosen to try to reduce tone noise generated by this fan by cutting off the first three blade passing frequency tones. In-duct microphone array measurements indicated that the most evident tones occur for frequencies of 1800 Hz (1 BPF) and 7200 Hz (4 BPF). Using reverberant room standard testing methods, the A-weighted sound power level for the fan operating at design point conditions was measured to be 71 dBA. This report describes the current set of publicly available information for this fan. The fan was designed, optimized, and tested with tools and techniques that NASA has traditionally used for turbofan engine research. This is one way that technology developed for aerospace applications can be used more broadly, since quiet and efficient fans are needed for many ventilation systems on spacecraft, aircraft, watercraft, land vehicles, and buildings.

fan, noise, ventilation↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Spacecraft Cabin Ventilation Fan Research at NASA

NASA has recently made the geometry and solid model for a spacecraft cabin ventilation fan prototype available to the public via electronic file downloads from the NASA Technical Reports Server. This fan can be used for research and development by many organizations. The NASA Quiet Space Fan is 8.89 cm (3.50 in) in diameter, 22.9 cm (9.00 in) long, and the metal fan weighs 1.63 kg (3.6 lbm). The fan was designed to generate a system total pressure rise of 906 Pa (3.64 inches of water) at 0.709 m3/s (150.3 cfm) of airflow at 12,000 rpm (at 21.1ºC (70ºF) and 14.7 psia). Performance measured using standardized techniques showed good agreement with design and predicted values. A low-noise blade-vane count was chosen to reduce tonal noise generated by rotor-stator interaction for the first three blade passing frequency harmonics. In-duct microphone array measurements indicated that the most evident tones occur at frequencies of 1,800 Hz (1 BPF) and 7,200 Hz (4 BPF). Using reverberant room standard testing methods, the A-weighted sound power level for the fan operating at design point conditions was measured to be 71 dBA. This report describes the current set of publicly available information for this fan. The fan was designed, optimized, and tested with tools and techniques that NASA has traditionally used for turbofan engine research. This demonstrates that technology developed for aerospace applications can be used more broadly, since quiet and efficient fans are needed for many ventilation systems in spacecraft, aircraft, watercraft, land vehicles, and buildings.

fan↗
NASA NTRS1992

Computation of high resolution unsteady airloads using a constant vorticity contour free wake model

Recent work in the study of helicopter aerodynamic loading for acoustics applications has involved research on the development of an exceptionally efficient simulation of the velocity field induced by the rotor's vortex wake. This paper summarizes the work to date on the development of this analysis, which builds on the refined constant vorticity contour (CVC) free wake model recently developed for application to the study of vibratory loading. The particular focus of this paper is on demonstrations of a reconstruction approach that efficiently computes both the flow fields and airloads induced by CVC wakes on lifting rotor blades. Results of recent calculations on both main rotor and tail rotors are presented. These calculations show that by employing flow field reconstruction it is possible to apply the CVC wake analysis with temporal and spatial resolution suitable for acoustics applications while reducing the computation time required by one to two orders of magnitude relative to the direct calculations used in traditional methods.

Quackenbush, T. R.↗
NASA NTRS2002

17th Space Photovoltaic Research and Technology Conference

The 17th Space Photovoltaic Research and Technology (SPRAT XVII) Conference was held September 11-13, 2001, at the Ohio Aerospace Institute (OAI) in Cleveland, Ohio. The SPRAT conference, hosted by the Photovoltaic and Space Environments Branch of the NASA Glenn Research Center, brought together representatives of the space photovoltaic community from around the world to share the latest advances in space solar technology. This year's conference continued to build on many of the trends shown in SPRAT XVI; the use of new high-efficiency cells for commercial use and the development of novel array concepts such as Boeing's Solar Tile concept. In addition, new information was presented on space environmental interactions with solar arrays.

Jenkins, Phillip↗