Engineering Papers⌕ Search

SEARCH · Engineering Papers

Results for “Critical field”

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.

Quote a phrase for an exact phrase match. Source license links do not imply unrestricted reuse.

At least 271 records · Page 15

Optimization of a traveling wave superconducting radiofrequency cavity for upgrading the International Linear Collider

The standing wave TESLA niobium-based superconducting radio frequency structure is limited to an accelerating gradient of about 50 MV/m by the critical rf magnetic field. To break through this barrier, we explore the option of niobium-based traveling wave (TW) structures. Optimization of TW structures was done considering experimentally known limiting electric and magnetic fields. It is shown that a TW structure can have an accelerating gradient above 70 MeV/m that is about 1.5 times higher than contemporary standing wave structures with the same critical magnetic field. The other benefit of TW structures shown is R/Q about 2 times higher than the TESLA structure that reduces the dynamic heat load by a factor of 2. A method is proposed how to make TW structures multipactor-free. Some design proposals are offered to facilitate fabrication. Further increase of the real-estate gradient (equivalent to 80 MV/m active gradient) is also possible by increasing the length of the accelerating structure because of higher group velocity and cell-to-cell coupling. Realization of this work opens paths to International Linear Collider energy upgrades beyond 1 to 3 TeV in competition with CLIC. The paper will discuss corresponding opportunities and challenges.

43 PARTICLE ACCELERATORS↗

Microtearing stability and turbulence in the pedestal: Linear gyrokinetics, reduced models, and nonlinear turbulent transport

Microtearing modes can play a crucial role in electron heat transport in tokamak plasmas, affecting both energy confinement and overall performance. This study investigates microtearing modes (MTM) stability and turbulence in a JET pedestal through gyrokinetic simulations using the Gene code, complemented by a reduced eigenvalue model. The focus is on how MTM properties depend on key plasma parameters, including collisionality and plasma beta β—the ratio of plasma pressure to magnetic pressure—the normalized toroidal wavenumber k y ρ s ⁠, where ρ s denotes the ion sound gyroradius (typically a few millimeters in edge plasmas) and isotope mass. Collisionality enhances MT growth rates, while increasing β leads to a shift from MTMs to kinetic-ballooning modes, typically for k y ρ s ⁠, where ρ s ≲ 0.2⁠. A purely collisionless branch of MTMs persists at low k y ρ s ⁠, where ρ s with distinctive properties including non-negligible particle flux and ion thermal transport. Isotope mass scans reveal modest reduction of MTM growth rates as ion mass decreases. Nonlinear simulations produce experimentally relevant transport levels. Numerical experiments turning off zonal flows and fields identify the critical role of zonal flows and zonal fields in regulating MTM turbulence. Their removal leads to a significant increase in electron heat flux. These findings provide new insight into MTM-driven transport and its impact on tokamak confinement and lay a foundation for reduced modeling and predictive capabilities.

Electrostatics↗

Supercurrent diode effect and finite-momentum superconductors

When both inversion and time-reversal symmetries are broken, the critical current of a superconductor can be nonreciprocal. In this work, we show that, in certain classes of two-dimensional superconductors with antisymmetric spin–orbit coupling, Cooper pairs acquire a finite momentum upon the application of an in-plane magnetic field, and, as a result, critical currents in the direction parallel and antiparallel to the Cooper pair momentum become unequal. This supercurrent diode effect is also manifested in the polarity dependence of in-plane critical fields induced by a supercurrent. These nonreciprocal effects may be found in polar SrTiO 3 film, few-layer MoTe 2 in the Td phase, and twisted bilayer graphene in which the valley degree of freedom plays a role analogous to spin.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗

Quantum criticality in Ce 1 - x Sm x Co In 5

Motivated by the possibility of observing the coexistence between magnetism and unconventional superconductivity in heavy-fermion Ce 1-x Sm x CoIn 5 alloys, we studied how the samarium substitution on the cerium site affects the magnetic field-tuned-quantum criticality of stoichiometric CeCoIn 5 by performing specific heat and resistivity measurements. By applying an external magnetic field, we have observed Fermi-liquid to non-Fermi-liquid crossovers in the temperature dependence of the electronic specific heat normalized by temperature and of the resistivity. We obtained the magnetic-field-induced quantum critical point (QCP) by extrapolating to zero temperature the temperature-magnetic field dependence at which the crossovers take place. Furthermore, a scaling analysis of the electronic specific heat is used to confirm the existence of the QCP. We have found that the magnitude of the magnetic-field-induced QCP decreases with increasing samarium concentration. Our analysis of heat capacity and resistivity data reveals a zero-field QCP for x cr ≈0.15, which falls inside the region where Sm ions antiferromagnetism and superconductivity coexist.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗

Using Artificial Soiling to Rank Anti-Soiling Coatings for Arid Climates

A simple method to evaluate (e.g., screen and rank) the performance of coatings that are fully or partially anti-soiling (AS) is lacking within the PV industry. Artificial soiling may be used as a rapid and economical assessment approach, offering an efficient alternative to time-intensive, site-specific field testing. In this study, we present an artificial soiling method to replicate the anti-soiling performance rankings of two groups of coated glass samples supplied by two manufacturers (group C with CA, CP, and CS coatings; group A with AC coating). These are compared to field aging in two climates: semi-arid Lemoore, California over 4 months, and the hot desert in Mesa, Arizona over 7 months. Both field and indoor performance ranking utilize the transmittance ratio, defined as the optical transmittance between a coated sample and an uncoated reference in each group, as an evaluation metric to assess the effectiveness of the artificial soiling approach in replicating field soiling. It is critical to mimic the dominant field meteorological conditions associated with soiling-prone days and vulnerable times of day during the soiling season. Our results reveal that the use of artificial soiling for field performance ranking among coatings strongly depends on the soil type (composition and particle distribution), dust surface density, and prevalent environmental factors (wetting saturation by humidity, dew condensation extent, and prior weathering history of the coating). The similar rank order relative to the field suggests that the artificial soiling approach presented may be used for down-selecting anti-soiling coatings prior to prolonged field validation.

14 SOLAR ENERGY↗

Nontrivial critical behavior at magnetic transitions: A case study of Sm 7 ⁢Pd 3

We present a comprehensive analysis of the critical behavior of Sm 7 ⁢Pd 3 in the vicinity of its second-order magnetoelastic transition at 𝑇 c =173 K. The critical exponents (CEs) 𝛽 and 𝛾, determined using both the standard convergence procedure and the average normalized slope (ANS) method, diverge at 𝑇 c –-a characteristic typically associated with first-order transitions. Notably, none of the established universality classes satisfactorily describe the critical behavior of Sm 7 ⁢Pd 3 , and we discuss the possible origins of this deviation in the context of the strong spin-lattice coupling intrinsic to the sample. We emphasize the importance of accurately selecting the critical temperature and magnetic field ranges to ensure robust critical behavior analysis, and propose a quantitative approach to assess the reliability of the extracted CEs. Additionally, we demonstrate that in the ANS method, the critical exponents 𝛽 and 𝛾 should be calculated separately using data for 𝑇 ⩽ 𝑇 c and 𝑇 ⩾ 𝑇 c , respectively. In conclusion, our findings underscore the need for a revised theoretical framework to accurately describe second-order magnetoelastic transitions.

Ferrimagnets↗

A perspective on lessons learned and future needs for wind energy field campaigns

This perspective paper provides motivation and guidance to the wind energy community for suggested future investments and a long-term strategy for wind-energy-related field campaigns that will provide much-needed observations for improving wind energy science and model validation. We synthesize key lessons learned from past field campaigns, identify critical science gaps that we think should drive future field efforts, and provide a suggested pipeline on how future endeavors should be developed. When considering future grand field campaigns, we stress the need for international cooperation across funding bodies, research institutes, and industry partners to collect observations to overcome current and future grand challenges for wind energy.

17 WIND ENERGY↗

Transport characterization and pinning analysis of BaFe 1.9 Ni 0.1 As 2.05 thin films

In this paper, we report on the vortex-glass transition and superconducting performance of BaFe 1.9 Ni 0.1 As 2.05 thin films with T c = 17.8 K on CaF 2 (00 l ) single crystals by pulsed laser deposition. Atomic force microscopy characterization indicates the volumes of droplets appearing on the film surface increase with thickness and Magneto-optical imaging proves slight inhomogeneities in the current flow within the ab -plane of thin film. The thin films show a transport current density J c of ~1.14 MA cm –2 in self-field, and 0.34 and 0.28 MA cm –2 for H // c and H // ab up to 9 T at 4.2 K. Pinning mechanism associated with the fluctuations in the mean free path of the charge carries is found to be dominant in the thin films. The vortex-glass (VG) to vortex-liquid phase transition is identified in terms of the plots of the logarithmic derivative of the resistivity curves under different fields, allowing us to deduce the values of the VG transition temperature T g , and the critical exponent s . The ρ – T curves are well scaled by VG theory. A phase diagram combining the VG transition temperature, irreversibility field and upper critical field is constructed.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗

Critical Unresolved Region Integral Experiment Execution

Integral Experiments are a key aspect of validating nuclear data behavior and simulation capabilities. Further, integral experiments are the earliest form of validation of equations and codes. They have been used extensively since the 1940s. Today, simulation and predictive capabilities have improved greatly from 75 years ago, but nonetheless, integral experiments are still needed. As simulation capabilities improve, their uncertainties get much smaller. The current focus of many new experiments is understanding the intermediate energy range. The intermediate energy range does not have a wide application space and it can be challenging to design experiments that are sensitive to neutron energies in this region. The Zeus experiments evaluated highly enriched uranium (HEU) in the intermediate energy region. Building on the success and knowledge gained from the Zeus experiments, the Critical Unresolved Region Integral Experiment (CURIE) experiments were designed to evaluate HEU in the narrower unresolved resonance region (URR). These experiments were executed during June and July 2020 at the National Criticality Experiments Research Center (NCERC). The National Criticality Experiments Research Center (NCERC), operated by Los Alamos National Laboratory, is the only general purpose critical experiments facility in the United States of America. NCERC regularly designs and executes critical experiments and other measurements useful to a wide variety of fields including nuclear criticality safety, commercial nuclear energy, nonproliferation, and nuclear data.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗

Theoretical assessment of the transition between electron emission mechanisms in a collisional crossed-field gap

Understanding the transition to the limiting current under vacuum and collisional conditions for thermal-field emission in a crossed-field gap is critical for characterizing the operating regime for numerous applications, such as high-power microwaves and Hall thrusters. By deriving the exact solution for the current density as a function of cathode temperature (and, by extension, initial velocity), cathode electric field, applied voltage, collision frequency, and magnetic field, we determine the transition from the canonical current source (thermal-field emission) to the vacuum and collisional limiting currents under different operating conditions. Here, we further show that the exact solution recovers the asymptotic solutions for the canonical and limiting currents for vacuum and collisional crossed-field gaps under appropriate limits. The exact solution demonstrates that the critical current decreases with both increasing magnetic field strength and increasing collisionality. Nexus phase space plots constructed by matching the individual asymptotic solutions provide the conditions for the transitions between mechanisms, elucidating when a single mechanistic equation would suffice and when theories combining multiple mechanisms are necessary.

Breen, Lorin I. [Purdue Univ., West Lafayette, IN ↗

Analysis of Defect Irrelevancy in a Non-Insulated REBCO Pancake Coil Using an Electric Network Model

High-temperature superconducting REBCO coated conductor is one of the main candidates for next-generation high field magnets in fusion reactors and particle accelerators owing to their high current-carrying capability. Although these materials can operate at higher temperatures and generate higher magnetic fields than their counterparts with lower critical temperatures, protecting the REBCO magnet against quench is challenging. A variety of candidate technologies that may be able to enable self-protection, including no-insulation technology and insulative coatings with temperature-dependent resistance, are in development. Here, in order to understand current sharing and thermal processes during a quench, we model a REBCO pancake coil as an electrical circuit, considering power generation and heat transfer along conductor turns, and study the current distribution around a local defect with lower critical current. The magnetic field and coil terminal voltage predicted by the simulation was compared to published experimental results. Our results provide useful insights into how current sharing occurs around defects.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗

A cornucopia of AdS5 vacua

We report on a systematic search for AdS 5 vacua corresponding to critical points of the potential in the five-dimensional $$ \mathcal{N} $$ N = 8 SO(6) gauged supergravity. By employing Google’s TensorFlow Machine Learning library, we find the total of 32 critical points including 5 previously known ones. All 27 new critical points are non-supersymmetric. We compute the mass spectra of scalar fluctuatons for all points and find that the non- supersymmetric AdS 5 vacua are perturbatively unstable. Many of the new critical points can be found analytically within consistent truncations of the $$ \mathcal{N} $$ N = 8 supergravity with respect to discrete subgroups of the S(O(6) × GL(2 , R)) symmetry of the potential. In par- ticular, we discuss in detail a $$ {\mathrm{\mathbb{Z}}}_2^3 $$ Z 2 3 -invariant truncation with 10 scalar fields and 15 critical points. We also compute explicitly the scalar potential in a $$ {\mathrm{\mathbb{Z}}}_2^2 $$ Z 2 2 -invariant extension of that truncation to 18 scalar fields and reproduce 17 of the 32 critical points from the numerical search. Finally, we show that the full potential as a function of 42 scalar fields can be studied analytically using the so-called solvable parametrization. In particular, we find that all critical points lie in a Z 2 -invariant subspace spanned by 22 scalar fields.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗

Symmetric Mass Generation with Four SU(2) Doublet Fermions

We study a single exactly massless staggered fermion in the fundamental representation of an SU(2) gauge group. We utilize an nHYP-smeared fermion action supplemented with additional heavy Pauli-Villars fields that serve to decrease lattice artifacts. The phase diagram exhibits a clear two-phase structure with a conformal phase at weak coupling and a novel new phase, the symmetric mass generation (SMG) phase, appearing at strong coupling. The SMG phase is confining with all states gapped and chiral symmetry unbroken. Our finite size scaling analysis provides strong evidence that the phase transition between these two phases is continuous, which would allow for the existence of a continuum SMG phase. Furthermore, the renormalization group flows are consistent with a 𝛽 function that vanishes quadratically at the new fixed point, suggesting that the 𝑁 𝑓 = 4 flavor SU(2) gauge theory lies at the opening of the conformal window.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗

A multi-criteria land suitability assessment of field allocation decisions for switchgrass

With the goal of evaluating biomass resource availability in certain regions in the United States, the Department of Energy, Department of Agriculture, Environmental Protection Agency, national laboratories, and Forest Service research laboratories, together with academic and industry collaborators, performed a resource analysis study, 2016 Billion-Ton Report: Advancing Domestic Resources for a Thriving Bioeconomy, Volume 1: Economic Availability of Feedstocks, using POLYSYS model to estimate biomass potential. The study provided county- and state-level biomass potential projections, with biomass feedstock production estimates and suitability assessment of lands acreage likely to transition to energy crops. For this analysis, we estimate biomass supply by year 2028, more specifically, lands acreage transition to switchgrass in the Midwest of the United States, across 50 counties in 3 states (Nebraska, Kansas, and Colorado). We propose a multi-criteria site suitability framework, to determine the potential acreage and production for switchgrass, at the field level. Site selection criteria span agronomic and ecosystem services such as previous land cover, crop rotation, soil water holding capacity, crop productivity, field efficiency, topography, soil organic matter, soil leaching propensity, distance to surface water bodies, and soil erosivity. Efficient agricultural field selection for dedicated energy crops field allocation is critical to evaluate biomass resource availability, and it is our position that estimation at the field level would provide a more accurate and useful estimation to support an emerging bioeconomy. Using field suitability scores and county-level assessments, we model land allocation decision for energy crop in the future, estimating the spatial distribution of dynamics of energy crop adoption with priority to fields scoring the highest. Additionally, compared with POLYSYS results from the report mentioned above, our method shows good performance overall, with about 2% and 1.2% of difference in switchgrass acreage allocation and crop production, respectively.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

Field-dependent carrier transport in implanted isolation region of GaN lateral power devices

Among GaN lateral power devices, with proper E-field management, the breakdown occurs in the device isolation region rather than the active region. In this paper, we investigate field-dependent carrier transport in the isolation structures. Isolation test structures with variations in buffer doping, un-intentionally doped (UID) GaN thickness, and implantation conditions were fabricated. Electrical characterization was performed over a wide range of voltage and temperature. With varying UID GaN thickness and buffer doping, the leakage current and breakdown characteristics remain the same for a specific implantation condition, indicating that the leakage conduction and breakdown are governed by the implanted GaN region. Analysis of the temperature-dependent I–V reveals that carrier transport in the implanted GaN can be well explained by hopping conduction, involving three distinctive regions of operation depending on the E-field. At low E-field, carrier transport is ohmic, consistent with variable range hopping, driven by thermal activation. At medium E-field, a field enhanced thermally activated hopping is observed, following σ ∼ σ(T)exp(E). At high E-field, activation-less hopping is visible, following σ ∼ exp(−1/E), which occurs above a critical E-field limited by localization length.

Sadek, Mansura (ORCID:0000000322588338)↗

Toroidal magnetic field ripple in the presence of misaligned toroidal field coils on the COMPASS-U tokamak

Homogeneity of the toroidal magnetic field is a critical aspect of the tokamak fusion device. It is affected by the design of toroidal magnetic field coils and their manufacturing and assembly misalignments. The magnetic field of the COMPASS-U project is analysed using toroidal field ripple quantity. Here ANSYS modelling of bitter-plate-designed toroidal field coils is performed to prepare an accurate simplistic representation of the coils using a virtual current line. Toroidal field ripple is analysed using a Gaussian distribution of possible misalignments. The worst-case toroidal field ripple corresponding to the technical drawings only slightly exceeds the chosen limit of 0.5%.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗

Synthesis of Yttrium Superhydride Superconductor with a Transition Temperature up to 262 K by Catalytic Hydrogenation at High Pressures

The recent observation of room-temperature superconductivity will undoubtedly lead to a surge in the discovery of new, dense, hydrogen-rich materials. The rare earth metal superhydrides are predicted to have very high-T c superconductivity that is tunable with changes in stoichiometry or doping. Here we report the synthesis of an yttrium superhydride that exhibits superconductivity at a critical temperature of 262 K at 182±8 GPa. A palladium thin film assists the synthesis by protecting the sputtered yttrium from oxidation and promoting subsequent hydrogenation. Phonon-mediated superconductivity is established by the observation of zero resistance, an isotope effect and the reduction of T c under an external magnetic field. Furthermore, the upper critical magnetic field is 103 T at zero temperature.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗