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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
NASA NTRS1992

Heat transfer characteristics of hypersonic waveriders with an emphasis on the leading edge effects

The heat transfer characteristics in surface radiative equilibrium and the aerodynamic performance of blunted hypersonic waveriders are studied along two constant dynamic pressure trajectories for four different Mach numbers. The inviscid leading edge drag was found to be a small (4 to 8 percent) but not negligible fraction of the inviscid drag of the vehicle. Although the viscous drag at the leading edge can be neglected, the presence of the leading edge will influence the transition pattern of the upper and the lower surfaces and therefore affect the viscous drag of the entire vehicle. For an application similar to the National Aerospace Plane (NASP), the present study demonstrates that the waverider remains a valuable concept at high Mach numbers if a state-of-the-art active cooling device is used along the leading edge. At low Mach number (less than 5), the study shows the surface radiative cooling might be sufficient. In all cases, radiative cooling is sufficient for the upper and lower surfaces of the vehicle if ceramic composites are used as thermal protection.

Vanmol, Denis O.↗
NASA NTRS2000

Thermal Edge-Effects Model for Automated Tape Placement of Thermoplastic Composites

Two-dimensional thermal models for automated tape placement (ATP) of thermoplastic composites neglect the diffusive heat transport that occurs between the newly placed tape and the cool substrate beside it. Such lateral transport can cool the tape edges prematurely and weaken the bond. The three-dimensional, steady state, thermal transport equation is solved by the Green's function method for a tape of finite width being placed on an infinitely wide substrate. The isotherm for the glass transition temperature on the weld interface is used to determine the distance inward from the tape edge that is prematurely cooled, called the cooling incursion Delta a. For the Langley ATP robot, Delta a = 0.4 mm for a unidirectional lay-up of PEEK/carbon fiber composite, and Delta a = 1.2 mm for an isotropic lay-up. A formula for Delta a is developed and applied to a wide range of operating conditions. A surprise finding is that Delta a need not decrease as the Peclet number Pe becomes very large, where Pe is the dimensionless ratio of inertial to diffusive heat transport. Conformable rollers that increase the consolidation length would also increase Delta a, unless other changes are made, such as proportionally increasing the material speed. To compensate for premature edge cooling, the thermal input could be extended past the tape edges by the amount Delta a. This method should help achieve uniform weld strength and crystallinity across the width of the tape.

Costen, Robert C.↗
DOE OSTI2023

Urbanization and edge effects interact to drive mutualism breakdown and the rise of unstable pathogenic communities in forest soil

Temperate forests are threatened by urbanization and fragmentation, with over 20% (118,300 km 2 ) of U.S. forest land projected to be subsumed by urban land development. We leveraged a unique, well-characterized urban-to-rural and forest edge-to-interior gradient to identify the combined impact of these two land use changes—urbanization and forest edge creation—on the soil microbial community in native remnant forests. We found evidence of mutualism breakdown between trees and their fungal root mutualists [ectomycorrhizal (ECM) fungi] with urbanization, where ECM fungi colonized fewer tree roots and had less connectivity in soil microbiome networks in urban forests compared to rural forests. However, urbanization did not reduce the relative abundance of ECM fungi in forest soils; instead, forest edges alone led to strong reductions in ECM fungal abundance. At forest edges, ECM fungi were replaced by plant and animal pathogens, as well as copiotrophic, xenobiotic-degrading, and nitrogen-cycling bacteria, including nitrifiers and denitrifiers. Urbanization and forest edges interacted to generate new “suites” of microbes, with urban interior forests harboring highly homogenized microbiomes, while edge forest microbiomes were more heterogeneous and less stable, showing increased vulnerability to low soil moisture. When scaled to the regional level, we found that forest soils are projected to harbor high abundances of fungal pathogens and denitrifying bacteria, even in rural areas, due to the widespread existence of forest edges. Our results highlight the potential for soil microbiome dysfunction—including increased greenhouse gas production—in temperate forest regions that are subsumed by urban expansion, both now and in the future.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
NASA NTRS1992

Heat transfer characteristics of hypersonic waveriders with an emphasis on leading edge effects

The present analysis of the heat-transfer characteristics of a family of viscous-optimized, 60 m-long waverider hypersonic vehicles gives attention to the transition from laminar to turbulent flow, and to how the transition affects aerodynamic heating distributions over the waverider surface. Two different constant-dynamic-pressure flight trajectories are considered, at 0.2 and 1.0 freestream atmospheres. For Mach numbers below 10, it is found that passive radiative cooling of the surface is sufficient. The degree of leading-edge bluntness required by aerodynamic heating constraints does not significantly degrade the aerodynamic performance of these waveriders.

Vanmol, Denis O.↗
NASA NTRS1990

Layering, interface and edge effects in multi-layered composite medium

Guided waves in a cross-ply laminated plate are studied. Because of the complexity of the exact dispersion equation that governs the wave propagation in a multi-layered fiber-reinforced plate, a stiffness method that can be applied to any number of layers is presented. It is shown that, for a sufficiently large number of layers, the plate can be modeled as a homogeneous anisotropic plate. Also studied is the reflection of guided waves from the edge of a multilayered plate. These results are quite different than in the case of a single homogeneous plate.

Datta, S. K.↗
NASA NTRS1979

Scaling laws and edge effects for polymer surface discharges

Specimens of Mylar sheet were exposed to a 20 kV electron beam. The resulting surface discharge arcs were photographed and the discharge current into a metal backing plate measured as a function of time. The area of the Mylar sheet was defined by a round aperture in a close-fitting metal mask, and the current pulse characteristics were plotted against area on log-log paper. The plots appear as straight lines (due to power-law behavior) with slopes of 0.50 for the peak current, 1.00 for the charge released, 1.49 for the energy and 0.55 for the pulse duration. Evidence is presented for the occurrence of banded charge distributions near grounded edges, on both Teflon and Mylar.

Balmain, K. G.↗
NASA NTRS1966

Collector/collector guard ring balancing circuit eliminates edge effects

Circuit in which an emitter is maintained opposite a concentric collector and guard structure is achieved by matching the temperature and potential of the guard with that of the collector over the operating range. This control system is capable of handling up to 100 amperes in the guard circuit and 200 amperes in the collectors circuit.

Lieb, D. P.↗
NASA NTRS1977

A possible edge effect in enhanced network

K-line observations of enhanced network taken with the NASA/SPO Multichannel Spectrometer on September 28, 1975, in support of OSO-8 are discussed. The data show a correlation between core brightness and asymmetry for spatial scans which cross enhanced network boundaries. The implications of this result concerning mass flow in and near supergranule boundaries are discussed.

Jones, H. P.↗
NASA NTRS1990

Analysis of the leading edge effects on the boundary layer transition

A general theory of boundary layer control by surface heating is presented. Some analytical results for a simplified model, i.e., the optimal control of temperature fluctuations in a shear flow are described. The results may provide a clue to the effectiveness of the active feedback control of a boundary layer flow by wall heating. In a practical situation, the feedback control may not be feasible from the instrumentational point of view. In this case the vibrational control introduced in systems science can provide a useful alternative. This principle is briefly explained and applied to the control of an unstable wavepacket in a parallel shear flow.

Chow, Pao-Liu↗
NASA NTRS1992

Free-edge effects in laminates under extension, bending and twisting. II - Sublaminate/layer modeling and analysis

The stress-function-based variational method of Yin (1991) is extended and modified into a combined layer/sublaminate approach applicable to a laminated strip composed of a large number of differently orientated, anisotropic elastic plies. Lekhnitskii's (1963) stress functions are introduced into two interior layers adjacent to a particular interface. The remaining layers are grouped into an upper sublaminate and a lower sublaminate. The stress functions are expanded in truncated power series of the thickness coordinate, and the differential equations governing the coefficient functions are derived by using the complementary virtual work principle. The layer/sublaminate approach limits the dimension of the eigenvalue problem to a fixed number irrespective of the number of layers in the sublaminate, so that reasonably accurate solutions of the interlaminar stresses can be computed with extreme ease. For symmetric, four-layer, angle-ply and cross-ply laminates, a comparison of the previous analysis results based on the pure layer model and new results based on two different layer/sublaminate models indicates reasonable over-all agreement in the interlaminar stresses and superior agreement in the total peeling and shearing force.

Yin, Wan-Lee↗
NASA NTRS1990

Leading-edge effects on boundary-layer receptivity

Numerical calculations are presented for the incompressible flow over a parabolic cylinder. The computational domain extends from a region upstream of the body downstream to the region where the Blasius boundary-layer solution holds. A steady mean flow solution is computed and the results for the scaled surface vorticity, surface pressure and displacement thickness are compared to previous studies. The unsteady problem is then formulated as a perturbation solution starting with and evolving from the mean flow. The response to irrotational time harmonic pulsation of the free-stream is examined. Results for the initial development of the velocity profile and displacement thickness are presented. These calculations will be extended to later times to investigate the initiation of instability waves within the boundary-layer.

Gatski, Thomas B.↗
NASA NTRS1956

Second-order subsonic airfoil theory including edge effects

Several recent advances in plane subsonic flow theory are combined into a unified second-order theory for airfoil sections of arbitrary shape. The solution is reached in three steps: the incompressible result is found by integration, it is converted into the corresponding subsonic compressible result by means of the second-order compressibility rule, and it is rendered uniformly valid near stagnation points by further rules. Solutions for a number of airfoils are given and are compared with the results of other theories and of experiment. A straight-forward computing scheme is outlined for calculating the surface velocities and pressures on any airfoil at any angle of attack

Van Dyke, Milton D↗