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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 37 records · Page 2
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2022

Soil pore network response to freeze-thaw cycles in permafrost aggregates

This dataset contains data used for the paper "Pore network response to freeze-thaw cycles in permafrost aggregates". The Related References field will be updated with a full citation when available.Climate change in Arctic landscapes may increase freeze-thaw frequency within the active layer as well as newly thawed permafrost. A highly disruptive process, freeze-thaw can deform soil pores and alter the architecture of the soil pore network with varied impacts to water transport and retention, redox conditions, and microbial activity. Our objective was to investigate how freeze-thaw cycles impacted the pore network of newly thawed permafrost aggregates to improve understanding of what type of transformations can be expected from warming Arctic landscapes. We measured the impact of freeze-thaw on pore morphology, pore throat diameter distribution, and pore connectivity with X-ray computed tomography (XCT) using six permafrost aggregates with sizes of 2.5 cm3 from a mineral soil horizon (Bw; 28-50 cm depths) in Toolik, Alaska. Freeze-thaw cycles were performed using a laboratory incubation consisting of five freeze-thaw cycles (-10˚C to 20˚C) over five weeks. Our findings indicated decreasing spatial connectivity of the pore network across all aggregates with higher frequencies of singly connected pores following freeze-thaw. Water-filled pores that were connected to the pore network decreased in volume while the overall connected pore volumetric fraction was not affected. Shifts in the pore throat diameter distribution were mostly observed in pore throats ranges of 100 microns or less with no corresponding changes to the pore shape factor of pore throats. Responses of the pore network to freeze-thaw varied with aggregate, suggesting that initial pore morphology may play a role in driving freeze-thaw response. Our research suggests that freeze-thaw alters the microenvironment of permafrost aggregates during the incipient stage of deformation following permafrost thaw, impacting soil properties and function in Arctic landscapes undergoing transition. This dataset contains a compressed (.zip) archive of the data and R scripts used for this manuscript. The dataset includes files in .csv format, which can be accessed and processed using MS Excel or R. This archive can also be accessed on GitHub at https://github.com/Erin-Rooney/XCT-freezethaw (DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.5816355).

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2023

Arctic shrub size and leaf traits, northern Alaska, summer 2017 (Version 2.0)

This data package contains leaf and size trait and environmental data collected from 170 plots of rapidly expanding shrub genera (Alnus, Betula, and Salix) and a widespread sedge (Eriophorum vaginatum) along a latitudinal and climate gradient in northern Alaska. The trait data were collected in summer 2017 and include leaf area, specific leaf area, leaf nitrogen concentration, leaf delta 15N, leaf delta 13C, shrub height, aboveground biomass, and the ratio of root biomass to aboveground biomass. These raw data support a submitted manuscript that examines the intraspecific variations of size, leaf and root traits of shrubs across the graminoid-dominated nutrient-poor arctic tundra and reveals the environmental drivers of deciduous shrub traits in tundra ecosystems (Fraterrigo et al., submitted). Data are presented by site (n=5) and patch (shrub or sedge plot) in separate csv files. The location data are provided in the “plot coordinates” file; all other files contain the data in the file title. Detailed methods are in the submitted manuscript. A companion data package contains root trait data collected simultaneously from the same plots (Fraterrigo and Chen, 2020). See the "Related references" section for more information.2023/07/20 Update: The latest version of this dataset publication is version 2.0. The latest version of the data package was updated to correct the leaf size trait.csv file.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2022

Transport and Retention of Particulate Organic Matter in Sand: Lab Experiments and Modelling

Flow-through reactor (FTR) experiments were conducted at three different downward vertical flow rates to study the transport and retention of particulate organic matter (Chlorella powder) in riverbed sediments. This data package includes data files (.csv) regarding effluent collected from the FTRs during the experiments (time, duration, volume of each sample collection; concentration of nonreactive bromide tracer; concentration of suspended Chlorella determined by absorbance measurements) and sediment (sand) slices collected from the FTRs after the experiments (mass of Chlorella retained in 1 cm depth intervals determined by loss-on-ignition method). More detailed descriptions of data are provided in the data dictionary, and detailed methods are available in the associated MSc thesis listed in ‘Related References.’ The data dictionary and file level meta data (FLMD) are included in the data package as both .csv and .xlsx files. This data package also includes timelapse videos (.mp4) of the experiments, and modelling scripts associated with the experiments. The modelling scripts are included as MATLAB ‘live scripts’ (.mlx, which can be run using MATLAB), and are also included as .pdf and .html files with output plots included (which can be viewed without a MATLAB license and installation). The data files and modelling scripts are organized into a .zip folder for each of the three FTR experiments (three flow rates).

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2024

Substantial and overlooked greenhouse gas emissions from deep Arctic lake sediment - supporting data and code

This data package contains data, descriptions, and code-based analyses that were used to support conclusions drawn in “Substantial and overlooked greenhouse gas emissions from deep Arctic lake sediment”, by Freitas et al. (2025) (https://doi.org/10.1038/s41561-024-01614-y). The study evaluated greenhouse gas production along a deep sediment core (20 m) taken in 2018 from below Goldstream Lake, a field site approximately 15 km north of Fairbanks, Alaska.The file “ESSDive_NFreitas_2024_flmd.csv” includes an overview of all other csv files in this data package, namely: sediment descriptions (depth and type of sediment), sediment characterizations (bulk density, gravimetric water content, total carbon, etc.), calculated respiration and temperature sensitivity values associated with year-long incubations of the sediment core, and the R code used to process the dataset. Additional details regarding the content of these files and how the calculations were performed are described in the Methods section of this archive. The “data_dictionary_ESSDive_NFreitas_2024_dd.csv” is a data dictionary for all files included in the data package. Each row in the data dictionary represents a column name in a given file. The Next-Generation Ecosystem Experiments: Arctic (NGEE Arctic), was a research effort to reduce uncertainty in Earth System Models by developing a predictive understanding of carbon-rich Arctic ecosystems and feedbacks to climate. NGEE Arctic was supported by the Department of Energy's Office of Biological and Environmental Research. The NGEE Arctic project had two field research sites: 1) located within the Arctic polygonal tundra coastal region on the Barrow Environmental Observatory (BEO) and the North Slope near Utqiagvik (Barrow), Alaska and 2) multiple areas on the discontinuous permafrost region of the Seward Peninsula north of Nome, Alaska.Through observations, experiments, and synthesis with existing datasets, NGEE Arctic provided an enhanced knowledge base for multi-scale modeling and contributed to improved process representation at global pan-Arctic scales within the Department of Energy's Earth system Model (the Energy Exascale Earth System Model, or E3SM), and specifically within the E3SM Land Model component (ELM).Data package updates- August 2024: Title was updated, R code now includes a process for calculating potential production across the whole sediment column, the "sediment_column_production_potentials_ESSDive_NFreitas_2024.csv" is the associated data output file, and the file level metadata and data dictionaries were updated to reflect the contents of the additional csv file.- October 2024: Title was updated, and a statement was added to Step 2 of the Methods that describes that samples were collected (and exported) in a responsible manner and in accordance with relevant permits and local laws.- January 2025: Updated the associated manuscript details in the Abstract (manuscript title, publication date, DOI link) and in the Related References section (full citation).

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2026

Soil microbiome resilience to short-term (30 days, 90 days) and long-term (1000 days) drought

This dataset contains data used for the paper "Drought duration does not impact soil microbiome resilience". The Related References will be updated with a full citation when available. Increasing global droughts exert large but poorly understood effects on the microbial communities and ecology of soil. Microbial communities generally show resilience and return to pre-drought conditions when short-term droughted soils are rewet; soils exposed to long-term drought, however, often show a lag upon rewetting, after which microbial communities may or may not return to their pre-stressed conditions. Though short-term droughts have been widely studied, long-term drought manipulation experiments remain rare, especially those that compare microbial response to short-term and long-term drought in tandem. We conducted a 1000-day drought simulation in controlled laboratory conditions with soil cores collected from a tidal freshwater ecosystem in Washington state, USA, and subsequently exposed them to rewetting for two weeks. We also included short-term (30-day and 90-day) drought and rewet treatments to directly compare microbial community and organic matter responses across drought durations. We found distinct microbial taxa belonging to Firmicutes and Actinobacteria enriched after the 1000-day drought, but not after the short-term droughts. While we hypothesized that the microbial community would recover from a short-term drought after rewetting to resemble pre-drought conditions, our results revealed community dissimilarities between rewet and pre-drought conditions across all drought durations. These findings suggest unique microbial life history strategies within certain microbial phyla that make them successful colonizers during an extended drought period, and the influence of environmental and physiological context on microbial responses to rewetting. The 16SrRNA gene amplicon dataset contains processed DNA sequences in the form of an ASV table with raw unrarefied read counts and representative sequences in .fasta format as described in the ESS-DIVE amplicon sequence reporting format (https://ess-dive.gitbook.io/amplicon-sequencing-reporting-format/instructions). The Fourier Transform Ion Cyclotron Resonance Mass Spectrometry (FTICR-MS) dataset consists of processed files containing presence absence data of molecular formulae and molecular characterization of FTICR resolved peaks. The Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) dataset contains files relevant to NMR spectra and peaks. A sample key file and a sample metadata file is included for the FTICR/NMR and 16S dataset respectively.

1000-day drought↗
DOE OSTI2024

Expansion of high-latitude deciduous forests driven by interactions between climate warming and fire: Modeling Archive

This Modeling Archive is in support of an NGEE Arctic publication. More information in the related references. The dataset is a model (ecosys) output used in a study that examined the potential future shifts in high-latitude vegetation types (PFTs) driven by changes in 21st century climate and fire. The study highlights the importance of mechanistically representing differences in plant functional traits on current and possible 21st century trajectories of Alaskan PFTs. This dataset package includes 13 files in pdf, csv, and nc formats.The Next-Generation Ecosystem Experiments: Arctic (NGEE Arctic), was a research effort to reduce uncertainty in Earth System Models by developing a predictive understanding of carbon-rich Arctic ecosystems and feedbacks to climate. NGEE Arctic was supported by the Department of Energy's Office of Biological and Environmental Research.The NGEE Arctic project had two field research sites: 1) located within the Arctic polygonal tundra coastal region on the Barrow Environmental Observatory (BEO) and the North Slope near Utqiagvik (Barrow), Alaska and 2) multiple areas on the discontinuous permafrost region of the Seward Peninsula north of Nome, Alaska.Through observations, experiments, and synthesis with existing datasets, NGEE Arctic provided an enhanced knowledge base for multi-scale modeling and contributed to improved process representation at global pan-Arctic scales within the Department of Energy's Earth system Model (the Energy Exascale Earth System Model, or E3SM), and specifically within the E3SM Land Model component (ELM).

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
NASA NTRS1965

Electromechanical flowmeter accurately monitors fluid flow

Electromechanical flowmeter remotely and accurately monitors the flow rate and total volume of a transparent liquid discharged from a dispensing system. A dual dispensing tube system provides a relative reference level which permits compensation for temperature variations.

Grant, D. J.↗
NASA NTRS1968

The Compton-getting effect.

Transformation of differential mean and current densities and anisotropy of cosmic ray particles and photons observed in frames of reference relative to each other with isotropic flux

Axford, W. I.↗
NASA NTRS1977

The benefits of improved technologies in agricultural aviation

The results are present for a study of the economic benefits attributed to a variety of potential technological improvements in agricultural aviation. Part 1 gives a general description of the ag-air industry and discusses the information used in the data base to estimate the potential benefits from technological improvements. Part 2 presents the benefit estimates and provides a quantitative basis for the estimates in each area study. Part 3 is a bibliography of references relating to this study.

Lietzke, K.↗
NASA NTRS1984

Knowledge Based Systems: A Critical Survey of Major Concepts, Issues, and Techniques

This Working Paper Series entry presents a detailed survey of knowledge based systems. After being in a relatively dormant state for many years, only recently is Artificial Intelligence (AI) - that branch of computer science that attempts to have machines emulate intelligent behavior - accomplishing practical results. Most of these results can be attributed to the design and use of Knowledge-Based Systems, KBSs (or ecpert systems) - problem solving computer programs that can reach a level of performance comparable to that of a human expert in some specialized problem domain. These systems can act as a consultant for various requirements like medical diagnosis, military threat analysis, project risk assessment, etc. These systems possess knowledge to enable them to make intelligent desisions. They are, however, not meant to replace the human specialists in any particular domain. A critical survey of recent work in interactive KBSs is reported. A case study (MYCIN) of a KBS, a list of existing KBSs, and an introduction to the Japanese Fifth Generation Computer Project are provided as appendices. Finally, an extensive set of KBS-related references is provided at the end of the report.

Dominick, Wayne D.↗
NASA NTRS1992

A comparison of predicted and measured inlet distortion flows in a subsonic axial inlet flow compressor rotor

Detailed flow measurements were taken inside an isolated axial compressor rotor operating subsonically near peak efficiency. These Laser Anemometer measurements were made with two inlet velocity profiles. One profile consisted of an unmodified baseline flow, and the second profile was distorted by placing axisymmetric screens on the hub and shroud well upstream of the rotor. A detailed comparison in the rotor relative reference frame between a Navier-Stokes solver and the measured experimental results showed good agreement between the predicted and measured flows. A primary flow is defined in the rotor and deviations and the computed predictions is made to assess the development of a passage vortex due to the distortion of the inlet flow. Computer predictions indicate that a distorted inlet profile has a minimal effect on the development of the flow in the rotor passage and the resulting passage vortex.

Owen, Albert K.↗
NASA NTRS1993

Planar reorientation of a free-free beam in space using embedded electromechanical actuators

It is demonstrated that the planar reorientation of a free-free beam in zero gravity space can be accomplished by periodically changing the shape of the beam using embedded electromechanical actuators. The dynamics which determine the shape of the free-free beam is assumed to be characterized by the Euler-Bernoulli equation, including material damping, with appropriate boundary conditions. The coupling between the rigid body motion and the flexible motion is explained using the angular momentum expression which includes rotatory inertia and kinematically exact effects. A control scheme is proposed where the embedded actuators excite the flexible motion of the beam so that it rotates in the desired sense with respect to a fixed inertial reference. Relations are derived which relate the average rotation rate to the amplitudes and the frequencies of the periodic actuation signal and the properties of the beam. These reorientation maneuvers can be implemented by using feedback control.

Kolmanovsky, Ilya V.↗
NASA NTRS2001

Effect of Under-Resolved Grids on High Order Methods

There has been much discussion on verification and validation processes for establishing the credibility of CFD simulations. Since the early 1990s, many of the aeronautical and mechanical engineering related reference journals mandated that any accepted articles in numerical simulations (without known solutions to compared with) need to perform a minimum of one level of grid refinement and time step reduction. Due to the difficulty in analysis, the effect of under-resolved grids and the nonlinear behavior of available spatial discretizations, are scarcely discussed in the literature. Here, an under-resolved numerical simulation is one where the grid spacing being used is too coarse to resolve the smallest physically relevant scales of the chosen continuum governing equations that are of interest to the numerical modeler. With the advent of new developments in fourth-order or higher spatial schemes, it has become common to regard high order schemes as more accurate, reliable and require less grid points. The danger comes when one tries to perform computations with the coarsest grid possible while still hoping to maintain numerical results sufficiently accurate for complex flows, and especially, data-limited problems. On one hand, high order methods when applies to highly coupled multidimensional complex nonlinear problems might have different stability, convergence and reliability behavior than their well studied low order counterparts, especially for nonlinear schemes such as TVD, MUSCL with limiters, ENO, WENO and discrete Galerkin. On the other hand, high order methods involve more operation counts and systematic grid convergence study can be time consuming and prohibitively expansive. At the same time it is difficult to fully understand or categorize the different nonlinear behavior of finite discretizations, especially at the limits of under-resolution when different types of bifurcation phenomena might occur, depending on the combination of grid spacings, time steps, initial conditions and numerical treatments of boundary conditions.

Yee, H. C.↗
NASA NTRS2002

Hindlimb unloading rodent model: technical aspects

Since its inception at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Ames Research Center in the mid-1970s, many laboratories around the world have used the rat hindlimb unloading model to simulate weightlessness and to study various aspects of musculoskeletal loading. In this model, the hindlimbs of rodents are elevated to produce a 30 degrees head-down tilt, which results in a cephalad fluid shift and avoids weightbearing by the hindquarters. Although several reviews have described scientific results obtained with this model, this is the first review to focus on the technical aspects of hindlimb unloading. This review includes a history of the technique, a brief comparison with spaceflight data, technical details, extension of the model to mice, and other important technical considerations (e.g., housing, room temperature, unloading angle, the potential need for multiple control groups, age, body weight, the use of the forelimb tissues as internal controls, and when to remove animals from experiments). This paper is intended as a reference for researchers, reviewers of manuscripts, and institutional animal care and use committees. Over 800 references, related to the hindlimb unloading model, can be accessed via the electronic version of this article.

NASA Discipline Musculoskeletal↗
NASA NTRS2005

Progress in Insect-Inspired Optical Navigation Sensors

Progress has been made in continuing efforts to develop optical flight-control and navigation sensors for miniature robotic aircraft. The designs of these sensors are inspired by the designs and functions of the vision systems and brains of insects. Two types of sensors of particular interest are polarization compasses and ocellar horizon sensors. The basic principle of polarization compasses was described (but without using the term "polarization compass") in "Insect-Inspired Flight Control for Small Flying Robots" (NPO-30545), NASA Tech Briefs, Vol. 29, No. 1 (January 2005), page 61. To recapitulate: Bees use sky polarization patterns in ultraviolet (UV) light, caused by Rayleigh scattering of sunlight by atmospheric gas molecules, as direction references relative to the apparent position of the Sun. A robotic direction-finding technique based on this concept would be more robust in comparison with a technique based on the direction to the visible Sun because the UV polarization pattern is distributed across the entire sky and, hence, is redundant and can be extrapolated from a small region of clear sky in an elsewhere cloudy sky that hides the Sun.

Thakoor, Sarita↗
NASA NTRS2014

Evaluation of the New Version of the Laser-Optical Disdrometer, OTT Parsivel2

A comparative study of raindrop size distribution measurements has been conducted at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center where the focus was to evaluate the performance of the upgraded laser-optical OTT Particle Size Velocity (Parsivel2; P2) disdrometer. The experimental setup included a collocated pair of tipping-bucket rain gauges, OTT Parsivel (P1) and P2 disdrometers, and Joss-Waldvogel (JW) disdrometers. Excellent agreement between the two collocated rain gauges enabled their use as a relative reference for event rain totals. A comparison of event total showed that the P2 had a 6%absolute bias with respect to the reference gauges, considerably lower than the P1 and JW disdrometers. Good agreement was also evident between the JW and P2 in hourly raindrop spectra for drop diameters between 0.5 and 4 mm. The P2 drop concentrations mostly increased toward small sizes, and the peak concentrations were mostly observed in the first three measurable size bins. The P1, on the other hand, underestimated small drops and overestimated the large drops, particularly in heavy rain rates. From the analysis performed, it appears that the P2 is an improvement over the P1 model for both drop size and rainfall measurements. P2 mean fall velocities follow accepted terminal fall speed relationships at drop sizes less than 1 mm. As a caveat, the P2 had approximately 1ms21 slower mean fall speed with respect to the terminal fall speed near 1 mm, and the difference between the mean measured and terminal fall speeds reduced with increasing drop size. This caveat was recognized as a software bug by the manufacturer and is currently being investigated.

disdrometers↗
NASA NTRS2009

Terminal Descent Sensor Simulation

Sulcata software simulates the operation of the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) radar terminal descent sensor (TDS). The program models TDS radar antennas, RF hardware, and digital processing, as well as the physics of scattering from a coherent ground surface. This application is specific to this sensor and is flexible enough to handle end-to-end design validation. Sulcata is a high-fidelity simulation and is used for performance evaluation, anomaly resolution, and design validation. Within the trajectory frame, almost all internal vectors are represented in whatever coordinate system is used to represent platform position. The trajectory frame must be planet-fixed. The platform body frame is specified relative to arbitrary reference points relative to the platform (spacecraft or test vehicle). Its rotation is a function of time from the trajectory coordinate system specified via dynamics input (file for open loop, callback for closed loop). Orientation of the frame relative to the body is arbitrary, but constant over time. The TDS frame must have a constant rotation and translation from the platform body frame specified at run time. The DEM frame has an arbitrary, but time-constant, rotation and translation with respect to the simulation frame specified at run time. It has the same orientation as sigma0 frame, but is possibly translated. Surface sigma0 has the same arbitrary rotation and translation as DEM frame.

Chen, Curtis W.↗