SEARCH · Engineering Papers

Results for “difference scaling”

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.

SourceResearch connectionFrom yearThrough year

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

At least 307 records · Page 17

All sources NASA NTRS DOE OSTI

NASA NTRS2023

Wetting and Drying Trends Under Climate Change

The geography and timing of changes in water availability under climate change are of considerable societal interest. Characterizing these changes in a robust and meaningful manner, however, has not been easy. In the past decade, studies have engaged two provocative hypotheses to explain and predict large-scale trends in water availability. One hypothesis holds that there will be increased contrasts in available water, as wet places become wetter and dry places become drier. Another hypothesis states that there will be global aridification, as widespread increases in evapotranspiration overwhelm changes in precipitation in most terrestrial regions. There is an extensive and sometimes contentious literature on the evidence for each. In some cases, these debates reflect direct disagreement, but the appearance of disagreement is exaggerated by the diversity of methods and terminologies employed in different studies. Herein we examine the applicability and limits of both hypotheses across different frameworks, scales and contexts, yielding insights on hydrologic change and the future of water availability.

Benjamin F. Zaitchik↗

NASA NTRS2006

Evaluating Trichloroethylene Degradation Using Differing Nano- and Micro-Scale Iron Particles

Trichioroethylene, or TCE, is a central nervous system depressant and possible carcinogen, as well as a persistent groundwater pollutant. TCE exists in the aquifer either as free product in the form of a dense non-aqueous phase liquid (DNAPL) or as a dissolved-phase constituent. It is only slightly soluble in water, so dissolution of the contaminant is a long-term process and in-situ remediation is difficult. To remedy this, NASA and the University of Central Florida developed Emulsified Zero-Valent Iron, or EZVI. The emulsion droplet contains ZVI particles and water encapsulated by an oil/surfactant membrane, and effectively penetrates to degrade DNAPL-phase TCE. To maximize the efficiency of this process, several commercially available ZVIs of radically different particle sizes and morphologies both in emulsion and as neat (unemulsified) metal were evaluated for relative effectiveness at TCE degradation.

Berger, Cristina M.↗

NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Using Secondary Craters to Assess Strength Differences Between Neighboring Surface Units

Introduction: An issue with Martian remote sensing studies is the difficulty directly inferring surface and crustal material properties. For direct measurements we currently rely on the instruments of landed missions, like InSight. However, these are limited to specific locations (i.e., Elysium Planitia for InSight). To understand how results from in situ missions apply to other parts of Mars’ crust, we would like to apply a methodology that uses remote sensing. We are exploring using secondary craters, which are often thought of as nuisances when finding accurate relative ages, to get at these properties. An upside of secondary craters is that they form by ejecta blocks moving at relatively slow speeds (compared to primary impacts), which lets them reside in a different crater scaling regime [1], one that is more sensitive to the crust’s effective strength (Yeff) and its porosity. Secondary Crater Scaling: There are multiple parameters that influence the size of secondary craters, but we can measure craters in ways that isolate the dependence of crater size to just Yeff. We focus on secondary clusters that have impacted into distinct but bordering geological units. These secondaries can be used to determine Yeff thanks to one important fact: all the secondaries in this cluster are from the same distant primary, and as a result, the ejecta velocity, median block sizes, and densities are expected to be the same (at least to first order). Thus, variations between crater size on the two units are due to material property differences (i.e. Yeff). Thanks to the steep size frequency distributions (SFD) of secondaries [2], observable secondary crater sizes are tightly clustered, and we can simply use differences in median secondary sizes between two geologic units to constrain the ratio of Yeff. We are also able to use the SFD of our counting areas to check if our counted craters are secondaries (i.e. have a steep distribution), and if the two crater counting areas are from the same source (and thus have the same power law slope), but are offset from each other at around the same factor as the median difference.

Mars; Craters; Crustal Strength↗

NASA NTRS2020

The Impacts of Fossil Fuel Emission Uncertainties and Accounting for 3-D Chemical CO2 Production on Inverse Natural Carbon Flux Estimates from Satellite and In Situ Data

Atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) inversions for estimating natural carbon fluxes typically do not allow for adjustment of fossil fuel CO2 emissions, despite significant uncertainties in emission inventories and inadequacies in the specification of international bunker emissions in inversions. Also, most inversions place CO2 release from fossil fuel combustion and biospheric sources entirely at the surface. However, a non-negligible portion of the emissions actually occurs in the form of reduced carbon species, which are eventually oxidized to CO2 downwind. Omission of this ‘chemical pump’ can result in a significant redistribution of the inferred total carbon fluxes among regions. We assess the impacts of different prescriptions of fossil fuel emissions and accounting for the chemical pump on flux estimation, with a novel aspect of conducting both satellite CO2 observation-based and surface in situ-based inversions. We apply 3-D carbon monoxide (CO) loss rates archived from a state-of-the-art GEOS chemistry and climate model simulation in a forward transport model run to simulate the distribution of CO2 originating from oxidation of carbon species. We also subtract amounts from the prior surface CO2 fluxes that are actually emitted in the form of fossil and biospheric CO, methane, and nonmethane volatile organic compounds (VOCs). We find that the posterior large-scale fluxes are generally insensitive to the finer-scale spatial differences between the ODIAC and CDIAC fossil fuel CO2 gridded datasets and assumptions about international bunker emissions. However, accounting for 3-D chemical CO2 production and the surface correction shifts the global carbon sink, e.g., from land to ocean and from the tropics to the north, with a magnitude and even direction that depend on assumptions about the surface correction. A GOSAT satellite-based inversion is more sensitive to the chemical pump than one using in situ observations, exhibiting substantial flux impacts of 0.28, 0.53, and -0.47 Pg C yr(exp -1) over tropical land, global land, and oceans, due to differences in the horizontal and vertical sampling of the wo observation types. Overall, the biases from neglecting the chemical pump appear to be minor relative to the flux estimate uncertainties and the differences between the in situ and GOSAT inversions, but their relative importance will grow in the future as observational coverage further increases and satellite retrieval biases decrease.

James S Wang↗

NASA NTRS1991

Perceiving the coherent movements of spatially-separated features

When a partially-occluded object is represented in an image, it is defined by a set of spatially-separated features that may be registered at different spatial scales. To understand the image, human vision must organize these fragmented optical features into common and distinct object surfaces. Although the common fate of moving features often is considered a primary source of reliable information for image segmentation, little is known of the visual system's capacity to discriminate the coherent relative movements of spatially-separated features. In a series of experiments, observers viewed elements whose movements were correlated (direction and magnitude) or were uncorrelated. Our results indicate that observers can discriminate the two types of movement about as well as they can detect any movement at all. Moreover, the ability to perceive coherent movements is maintained under a variety of conditions including differences in the elements' spatial frequency content, spatial position and contrast, and temporal phase shifts between the spatially-correlated displacements. These results suggest that coherent relative motion may be a fundamental source of information exploited by vision, despite considerable variability in the spatial and temporal characteristics of the individual features.

Mowafy, Lyn↗

NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Application of the Global Precipitation Forecast dataset for Global Landslide Forecasting System

Landslides are extremely damaging, pervasive and cause fatalities and economic impacts. Extreme rainfall events, coupled with inopportune surface conditions, are the primary triggers of landslides around the world. Forecasting landslide events represent an area of open research. A global Landslide Hazard Assessment for Situational Awareness (LHASA) model has been created that provides near real-time dynamic landslide characterization using Integrated Multi-Satellite Retrievals for Global Precipitation Mission (IMERG). However, it does not provide information on prediction of landslides into future. This study considers how global precipitation forecast data compares to satellite rainfall at different spatiotemporal scales and outlines the potential for its use in landslide hazard prediction/forecasting system. NASA Goddard Earth Observing System (GEOS)-Forecast model assimilates new observations every 6 hours, at 00, 06, 12, and 18 UTC. The GEOS-Forecast model is initialized at 00 UTC and is evaluated with IMERG Early, using Multi-Radar Multi-Sensor gauge corrected (MRMS-GC) precipitation product as a reference over contiguous United States (CONUS). Categorical and continuous statistics along with probability density functions and cumulative distribution functions are considered to assess the performance of the precipitation products, with a focus on landslide hotspots. Seasonality appears to influence the performance of both the GEOS-Forecast and IMERG Early product. Moreover, the global comparison between the GEOS-Forecast and IMERG Early is carried out in terms of percentile difference, correlation, and bias maps. For extreme rainfall events in regions such as Mekong, Colombia, and Tajikistan, GEOS-Forecast appears to resolve high rainfall relative to IMERG Early more frequently. Validation over landslide points reveal that for 24hr rainfall accumulations > 100mm, GEOS-Forecast and IMERG coincide. GEOS-Forecast and IMERG Early precipitation matches more closely for tropical cyclones than other types of storms. Overall, the performance varies with respect to location, rainfall intensities, and type of precipitation events.

Sana Khan↗

NASA NTRS2001

The Variability of the Horizontal Circulation in the Troposphere and Stratosphere: A Comparison

The variability of the horizontal circulation in the stratosphere and troposphere of the Northern Hemisphere (NH) is compared by using various approaches. Spatial degrees of freedom (dof) on different time scales were derived. Modes of variability were computed in geopotential height fields at the tropospheric and stratospheric pressure levels by applying multivariate statistical approaches. Features of the spatial and temporal variability of the winterly zonal wind were studied with the help of recurrence and persistence analyses. The geopotential height and zonally-averaged zonal wind at the 50-, 500- and 1000-hPa level are used to investigate the behavior of the horizontal circulation in the lower stratosphere, mid-troposphere and at the near surface level, respectively. It is illustrated that the features of the variability of the horizontal circulation are very similar in the mid-troposphere and at the near surface level. Due to the filtering of tropospheric disturbances by the stratospheric and upper tropospheric zonal mean flow, the variability of the stratospheric circulation exhibits less spatial complexity than the circulation at tropospheric pressure levels. There exist enormous differences in the number of degrees of freedom (or free variability modes) between both atmospheric layers. Results of the analyses clearly show that the concept of a zonally symmetric AO with a simple structure in the troposphere similar to the one in the stratosphere is not valid. It is concluded that the spatially filtered climate change signal can be detected earlier in the stratosphere than in the mid-troposphere or at the near surface level.

Perlwitz, Judith↗

NASA NTRS2015

Multiscale and Multiphysics Modeling of Additive Manufacturing of Advanced Materials

The objective of this proposed project is to research and develop a prediction tool for advanced additive manufacturing (AAM) processes for advanced materials and develop experimental methods to provide fundamental properties and establish validation data. Aircraft structures and engines demand materials that are stronger, useable at much higher temperatures, provide less acoustic transmission, and enable more aeroelastic tailoring than those currently used. Significant improvements in properties can only be achieved by processing the materials under nonequilibrium conditions, such as AAM processes. AAM processes encompass a class of processes that use a focused heat source to create a melt pool on a substrate. Examples include Electron Beam Freeform Fabrication and Direct Metal Deposition. These types of additive processes enable fabrication of parts directly from CAD drawings. To achieve the desired material properties and geometries of the final structure, assessing the impact of process parameters and predicting optimized conditions with numerical modeling as an effective prediction tool is necessary. The targets for the processing are multiple and at different spatial scales, and the physical phenomena associated occur in multiphysics and multiscale. In this project, the research work has been developed to model AAM processes in a multiscale and multiphysics approach. A macroscale model was developed to investigate the residual stresses and distortion in AAM processes. A sequentially coupled, thermomechanical, finite element model was developed and validated experimentally. The results showed the temperature distribution, residual stress, and deformation within the formed deposits and substrates. A mesoscale model was developed to include heat transfer, phase change with mushy zone, incompressible free surface flow, solute redistribution, and surface tension. Because of excessive computing time needed, a parallel computing approach was also tested. In addition, after investigating various methods, a Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics Model (SPH Model) was developed to model wire feeding process. Its computational efficiency and simple architecture makes it more robust and flexible than other models. More research on material properties may be needed to realistically model the AAM processes. A microscale model was developed to investigate heterogeneous nucleation, dendritic grain growth, epitaxial growth of columnar grains, columnar-to-equiaxed transition, grain transport in melt, and other properties. The orientations of the columnar grains were almost perpendicular to the laser motion's direction. Compared to the similar studies in the literature, the multiple grain morphology modeling result is in the same order of magnitude as optical morphologies in the experiment. Experimental work was conducted to validate different models. An infrared camera was incorporated as a process monitoring and validating tool to identify the solidus and mushy zones during deposition. The images were successfully processed to identify these regions. This research project has investigated multiscale and multiphysics of the complex AAM processes thus leading to advanced understanding of these processes. The project has also developed several modeling tools and experimental validation tools that will be very critical in the future of AAM process qualification and certification.

Liou, Frank↗

NASA NTRS1972

A review of some aspects of inferring the ozone profile by inversion of ultraviolet radiance measurements

The mathematical inversion of light-scattering observations to obtain the atmospheric ozone profile is discussed in terms of the filtering properties of the physical and mathematical processes for different spatial scales. Within this context, it is shown that the physical process of scattering acts as a low pass filter; which transfers large-scale profile information efficiently to radiance observations but very strongly attenuates small- or fine-scale profile information. To avoid domination of the mathematical inversion by the random error of radiance measurements, an equivalent spatial-scale filtering in the inversion procedure is essential. The available evidence suggests that mathematical inversion to obtain the low level ozone profile below 25 to 30 km is either inferior to or no better than the statistical estimation of the profile using total ozone as predictor. However, inversion profiles for high level ozone above 25 to 30 km appear to have moderately good accuracy.

Mateer, C. L.↗

NASA NTRS1974

A full-scale fire program to evaluate new furnishings and textile materials developed by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration

A program of experimental fires was carried out to establish the advantages offered by new materials for improved fire safety. Four full-scale bedrooms, differing only in the materials used to furnish them, were built and burned to provide comparative data on the fire hazards produced. Cost and availability differences were not considered. The visual evidence provided by TV and photographic coverage of the four experimental room fires showed clearly that the rooms responded very differently to a common ignition condition. Resistance to the ignition and spread of fire was substantially improved in the rooms furnished completely or partially with the new materials.

Hillenbrand, L. J.↗

NASA NTRS1974

The solar corona as seen from Skylab

The white light coronagraph (WLC) experiment of the Skylab/ATM obtained an unprecedented series of observations of the solar corona from 1.5 to 6 solar radii for approximately eight and one-half months. Coronal evolution and disruptions seen by the WLC occur on many different time scales. Some illustrative examples will be shown. The characteristics of mass ejection coronal transients - as we presently know them - will be given. These include: the greater than expected frequency of occurrence; the correlation with solar activity; the quantity of mass and energy contained in a transient; etc.

Hildner, E.↗

NASA NTRS1975

User requirements for project-oriented remote sensing

Registration of remotely sensed data to geodetic coordinates provides for overlay analysis of land use data. For aerial photographs of a large area, differences in scales, dates, and film types are reconciled, and multispectral scanner data are machine registered at the time of acquisition.

Hitchcock, H. C.↗

NASA NTRS1977

X-ray signatures: New time scales and spectral features

The millisecond bursts from Cyg X-1 are investigated and the overall chaotic variability for the bulk of the Cyg X-1 emission is compared to that of Sco X-1, showing that the essential character is remarkably similar (i.e. shot noise) although the fundamental time scales involved differ widely, from a fraction of a second (for Cyg X-1) to a fraction of a day (for Sco X-1). Recent OSO-8 observations of spectra features attributable to iron are reviewed. In particular, line emission is discussed within the context of a model for thermal radiation by a hot evolved gas in systems as different as supernova remnants and clusters of galaxies. Newly observed spectral structure in the emission from the X-ray pulsar Her X-1 is reported.

Boldt, E. A.↗

NASA NTRS1977

Application of conventional and advanced techniques for the interpretation of LANDSAT 2 images for the study of linears in the Friuli earthquake area

The results obtained in the study of linears derived from the analysis of LANDSAT 2 images recorded over Friuli during 1975 are described. Particular attention is devoted to the comparison of several passes in different bands, scales and photographic supports. Moreover reference is made to aerial photographic interpretation in selected sites and to the information obtained by laser techniques.

Cardamone, P.↗

NASA NTRS1978

A solar wind turbulence event during the Voyager 1978 solar conjunction profiled via new DSN radio science

A radio science data capability within the DSN Tracking System is described. This capability consists of routine provision of phase fluctuation data concurrently computed over several different time scales. This capability was used to observe phase fluctuation spectral characteristics during a rapid increase in solar wind turbulence that occurred during a July 23, 1978 track of the Voyager 1 spacecraft by Deep Space Station 11. It is suggested that the capability will prove useful in studies of variations of solar wind phase fluctuation spectral characteristics with, for instance, parameters such as the solar cycle and radial distance.

Berman, A. L.↗

NASA NTRS1979

Interplanetary sector boundaries, 1971 - 1973

Eighteen interplanetary sector boundary crossings observed at 1 AU by the magnetometer on the IMP-6 spacecraft are discussed. The events were examined on many different time scales ranging from days on either side of the boundary to high resolution measurements of 12.5 vectors per second. Two categories of boundaries were found, one group being relatively thin and the other being thick. In many cases the field vector rotated in a plane from one polarity to the other. Only two of the transitions were null sheets. Using the minimum variance analysis to determine the normals to the plane of rotation, and assuming that this is the same as the normal to the sector boundary surface, it was found that the normals were close to the ecliptic plane. An analysis of tangential discontinuities contained in 4-day periods about the events showed that their orientations were generally not related to the orientations of the sector boundary surface, but rather their characteristics were about the same as those for discontinuities outside the sector boundaries.

Klein, L.↗

NASA NTRS1978

A dispersion relationship governing incompressible wall turbulence

The method of separation of variables is shown to make turbulent correlation equations of Karman-Howarth type tractable for shear turbulence as well under the condition of neglected triple correlation. The separated dependent variable obeys an Orr-Sommerfeld equation. A new analytical method is developed using a scaling law different from the classical one due to Heisenberg and Lin and more appropriate for wall turbulent profiles. A dispersion relationship between the wave number and the separation constant which has the dimension of a frequency is derived in support of experimental observations of wave or coherent structure of wall turbulence.

Tsuge, S.↗

NASA NTRS1979

The optical counterpart of GX 339-4, a possible black hole X-ray source

Optical studies of the galactic X-ray source GX 339-4 (4U 1658-48), which led to its recent identification as reported by Doxsey et al. (1979), are presented. Reddening and distance estimates are given, as well as evidence for optical variability on differing time scales. The emission-line spectra and UBV photometry suggest that GX 339-4 may be at about 8 kpc and have a main-sequence B star binary companion. Both the optical spectrum and optical/X-ray luminosity ratio for GX 339-4 may be similar to Cir X-1.

Grindlay, J. E.↗