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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 451 records · Page 25

The method of complex characteristics for design of transonic blade sections

A variety of computational methods were developed to obtain shockless or near shockless flow past two-dimensional airfoils. The approach used was the method of complex characteristics, which determines smooth solutions to the transonic flow equations based on an input speed distribution. General results from fluid mechanics are presented. An account of the method of complex characteristics is given including a description of the particular spaces and coordinates, conformal transformations, and numerical procedures that are used. The operation of the computer program COMPRES is presented along with examples of blade sections designed with the code. A user manual is included with a glossary to provide additional information which may be helpful. The computer program in Fortran, including numerous comment cards is listed.

Bledsoe, M. R.↗

Injection Parameters That Promote Branching of Hydraulic Cracks

Fluid injection into rock formations can either produce complex branched hydraulic fractures, create simple planar fractures, or be dominated by porous diffusion. Currently, the optimum injection parameters to create branched fractures are unknown. We conducted repeatable hydraulic fracturing experiments using analog-rock samples with controlled heterogeneity to quantify the fluid parameters that promote fracture branching. A large range of injection rates and fluid viscosities were used to investigate their effects on induced fracture patterns. Paired with a simple analytical model, our results identify the threshold at which fracture transitions from an isolated planar crack to branched cracks when closed natural fractures exist. These results demonstrate that this transition can be controlled by injection rate and fluid viscosity. In relation to the field practices, the present model predicts slickwater and lower viscosity fluid injections promote fracture branching, with the Marcellus shale used as an example.

58 GEOSCIENCES↗

Non-invasive characterization of complex coronary lesions

Conventional invasive diagnostic imaging techniques do not adequately resolve complex Type B and C coronary lesions, which present unique challenges, require personalized treatment and result in worsened patient outcomes. These lesions are often excluded from large-scale non-invasive clinical trials and there does not exist a validated approach to characterize hemodynamic quantities and guide percutaneous intervention for such lesions. This work identifies key biomarkers that differentiate complex Type B and C lesions from simple Type A lesions by introducing and validating a coronary angiography-based computational fluid dynamic (CFD-CA) framework for intracoronary assessment in complex lesions at ultrahigh resolution. Among 14 patients selected in this study, 7 patients with Type B and C lesions were included in the complex lesion group including ostial, bifurcation, serial lesions and lesion where flow was supplied by collateral bed. Simple lesion group included 7 patients with lesions that were discrete, <10mm long and readily accessible. Intracoronary assessment was performed using CFD-CA framework and validated by comparing to clinically measured pressure-based index, such as FFR. Local pressure, endothelial shear stress (ESS) and velocity profiles were derived for all patients. We validates the accuracy of our CFD-CA framework and report excellent agreement with invasive measurements (n=14,R 2 =0.6,p=0.0013). Ultra-high resolution achieved by the model enable physiological assessment in complex lesions and quantify hemodynamic metrics in all vessels up to 1mm in diameter. Importantly, we demonstrate that in contrast to traditional pressure-based metrics, there is a significant difference in the intracoronary hemodynamic forces, such as ESS, in complex lesions compared to simple lesions at both resting and hyperemic physiological states [n = 14, p=0.03]. Higher ESS was observed in the complex lesion group (7.0±4.7 Pa) than in simple lesion group (4.8±3.6 Pa). Complex coronary lesions have higher ESS compared to simple lesions, such differential hemodynamic evaluation can provide much the needed insight into the increase in adverse outcomes for such patients and has incremental prognostic value over traditional pressure-based indices, such as FFR.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗

Assessment of Updraft Modeling Bias Using Computational Fluid Dynamics

Golden Eagle (Aquila chrysaetos) habitats may overlap with wind energy development in some regions of the US. Eagles, and similar soaring bird species, are therefore at risk of collision with wind turbines when flying through wind farms. Recently developed behavioral modeling approaches can predict the presence of eagles near turbines within the rotor-swept layer but require reliable prediction of atmospheric flowfield conditions. In particular, the vertical component of the wind speed dictates a soaring bird's ability to maintain or gain altitude, since they rely on updrafts to subsidize their flight. In this work, we investigate the atmospheric conditions around a wind farm in complex terrain and compare methods for atmospheric characterization. We use computational fluid dynamics (specifically, large-eddy simulations, or LES) to simulate the atmospheric boundary layer over a region encompassing multiple wind farms with high temporal and spatial resolution (seconds and 10's of meters, respectively). We compare traditional non-simulation-based methods of determining the orographic updraft potential based on wind direction, terrain slope and aspect, with the flowfields from LES that include both orographic updrafts alone and combined thermal and orographic updrafts. Preliminary analysis suggests that although the model captures the horizontal pattern of vertical updrafts, their magnitude can be improved with information about the surface heat flux, which is usually correlated with time of the day. Within our study region, we found that the low-fidelity model may over- or underestimate updraft potential by up to 400% at 80 m AGL, depending on local orographic features. This can result in an inaccurate representation of eagle presence and, consequently, risk. Another important finding is that flowfield time-averaging can hide important details about the flight environment, including how thermally generated flow structures within the atmospheric boundary layer (e.g., convective rolls and/or cells) may be important drivers of eagle flight.

atmospheric turbulence↗

A Review of Lattice-Boltzmann Models Coupled with Geochemical Modeling Applied for Simulation of Advanced Waterflooding and Enhanced Oil Recovery Processes

To maintain economic profit and improve the oil production efficiency after the primary and secondary production phase, advanced waterflooding techniques such as low salinity waterflooding in carbonate reservoirs have been investigated in numerical simulations, laboratory experiments, and field pilot tests. Multiple underlying mechanisms have been proposed based on these studies, and they are still under debate. Various numerical modeling approaches are introduced, but there exists a lack of a pore-scale comprehensive modeling scheme to fully understand the processes. Lattice-Boltzmann method (LBM) is a type of numerical fluid flow modeling technique that shows capabilities and flexibilities in modeling pore-scale fluid flow to integrate physical–chemical processes within complex structures. The intrinsic feature of LBM makes it a promising framework for simulating advanced waterflooding due to its flexibility, accuracy, and parallel efficiency. LBM works either by itself for solving reactive transport problems or by coupling with a third-party reaction solver. This review mainly introduces the LBM fluid flow and reactive transport capabilities and the concept and modeling approaches to simulate advanced waterflooding techniques. Meanwhile, an evaluation of the coupled LBM models for enhanced oil recovery (EOR) simulations is discussed with future research challenges and directions concluded.

02 PETROLEUM↗

Slip velocity boundary conditions for the lattice Boltzmann modeling of microchannel flows

Abstract Slip flows in ducts are important in numerous engineering applications, most notably in microchannel flows. Compared to the standard no‐slip Dirichlet condition, the case of slip formulates as a Robin‐type condition for the fluid tangential velocity. Such an increase in mathematical complexity is accompanied by a more challenging numerical transcription. The present work concerns with this topic, addressing the modeling of the slip velocity boundary condition in the lattice Boltzmann method (LBM) applied to steady slow viscous flows inside ducts of nontrivial shapes. As novelty, we extend the newly revised local second‐order boundary (LSOB) Dirichlet fluid flow method [ Philos. Trans. R. Soc. A 378, 20190404 (2020)] to implement the slip velocity condition within the two‐relaxation‐time (TRT) framework. The LSOB follows an in‐node philosophy where its operation principle seeks to explicitly reconstruct the unknown boundary populations in the form of a third‐order accurate Chapman–Enskog expansion, where the wall slip condition is built‐in as a normal Taylor‐type condition. The key point of this approach is that the required first‐ and second‐order momentum derivatives, rather than computed through nonlocal finite difference approximations, are locally determined through a simple local linear algebra procedure, whose formulation is particularly aided by the TRT symmetry argument. To express the obtained derivatives, two approaches are considered, called and , which operate with node and wall variables, respectively. These two formulations are developed to prescribe the physical slip condition over plane and curved walls, including the corners. Their consistency and accuracy characteristics are examined against alternative linkwise strategies to impose the wall slip velocity, such as the kinetic‐based diffusive bounce‐back scheme, the central linear interpolation slip scheme, and the multireflection slip scheme. The several slip schemes are tested over different 3D microchannel configurations, with walls not conforming with the LBM uniform mesh. Numerical tests confirm the advanced accuracy characteristics of the proposed LSOB slip boundary scheme, revealing the added challenge of the wall slip modeling, and that parabolic accuracy is a necessary requirement to reach second‐order accuracy within this problem class.

Silva, Goncalo↗

A Dataset of CFD Simulated Industrial Furnace Images for Conditional Automatic Generation with GANs

The steel industry is constantly looking for ways to automate processes and improve efficiency. A standard practice in industry is to simulate how complex systems will operate before they are actually used. Some complex systems, including steel industry processes such as blast furnaces, require complex physics-based simulations utilizing computational fluid dynamics (CFD). These CFD physics-based simulations are very accurate but can take significant time and computational resources to process, resulting in challenges for the implementation of the models in real-world operational environments. In recent years, deep learning (DL) has been considered as a substitute for these CFD models. DL models can be trained on validated CFD simulation data and then used for industrial process inference. Previous DL-based solutions have made great contributions for industrial automation but are currently missing the additional visualization component that CFD simulations also provide. In this paper, we propose a dataset for simple DL generative approaches that can help to address this issue. The dataset and methodology under development to approach this prediction are discussed in this work.

Calix, Ricardo↗

Integrability technique for fluid flow induced deformation of a boundary hair

The deformation of a dense carpet of hair due to Stokes flow in a channel can be described by a nonlinear integrodifferential equation for the shape of a single hair, which possesses several solutions for a given choice of parameters. Although it was posed in a previous study and it bears a resemblance to the pendulum problem from mechanics, this equation has not been analytically solved until now. Despite the presence on an integral with a nonlinear functional dependence on the dependent variable, the system is integrable. We compare the analytically obtained solution to a finite-difference numerical approach, identify the physically realizable solution branch, and briefly study the solution structure through a conserved energylike quantity. Time-dependent fluid-structure interactions are a rich and complex subject to investigate, and we argue that the solution discussed herein can be used as a basis for understanding these systems.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗

Imaging of a fluid injection process using geophysical data — A didactic example

In many subsurface industrial applications, fluids are injected into or withdrawn from a geologic formation. It is of practical interest to quantify precisely where, when, and by how much the injected fluid alters the state of the subsurface. Routine geophysical monitoring of such processes attempts to image the way that geophysical properties, such as seismic velocities or electrical conductivity, change through time and space and to then make qualitative inferences as to where the injected fluid has migrated. The more rigorous formulation of the time-lapse geophysical inverse problem forecasts how the subsurface evolves during the course of a fluid-injection application. Using time-lapse geophysical signals as the data to be matched, the model unknowns to be estimated are the multiphysics forward-modeling parameters controlling the fluid-injection process. Properly reproducing the geophysical signature of the flow process, subsequent simulations can predict the fluid migration and alteration in the subsurface. The dynamic nature of fluid-injection processes renders imaging problems more complex than conventional geophysical imaging for static targets. This work intents to clarify the related hydrogeophysical parameter estimation concepts.

58 GEOSCIENCES↗

Virtual Flow Solver - Geophysics: A 3D Incompressible Navier-Stokes Solver

Virtual Flow Solver - Geophysics (VFS-Geophysics) is a three-dimensional (3D) incompressible Navier-Stokes solver based on the Curvilinear Immersed Boundary (CURVIB) method. The CURVIB is a sharp interface type of immersed boundary (IB) method that enables the simulation of fluid flows in the presence of geometrically complex moving bodies. The CURVIB method can be applied to wind/MHK turbine simulations and energy applications. VFS-Geophysics is the result of many years of research work by several graduate students, post-docs, and research associates that have been involved in the Computational Hydrodynamics and Biofluids Laboratory directed by Professor Fotis Sotiropoulos. The preparation of the present manual has been supported by the U.S. Department of Energy (DE-EE 0005482).

16 TIDAL AND WAVE POWER↗

Compare linear-system solver and preconditioner stacks with emphasis on GPU performance and propose phase-2 NGP solver development pathway

The goal of the ExaWind project is to enable predictive simulations of wind farms comprised of many megawatt-scale turbines situated in complex terrain. Predictive simulations will require computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations for which the mesh resolves the geometry of the turbines and captures the rotation and large deflections of blades. Whereas such simulations for a single turbine are arguably petascale class, multi-turbine wind farm simulations will require exascale-class resources. The primary physics codes in the ExaWind project are Nalu-Wind, which is an unstructured-grid solver for the acoustically incompressible Navier-Stokes equations, and OpenFAST, which is a whole-turbine simulation code. The Nalu-Wind model consists of the mass-continuity Poisson-type equation for pressure and a momentum equation for the velocity. For such modeling approaches, simulation times are dominated by linear-system setup and solution for the continuity and momentum systems. For the ExaWind challenge problem, the moving meshes greatly affect overall solver costs as reinitialization of matrices and recomputation of preconditioners is required at every time step. In this report we evaluated GPU-performance baselines for the linear solvers in the Trilinos and hypre solver stacks using two representative Nalu-Wind simulations: an atmospheric boundary layer precursor simulation on a structured mesh, and a fixed-wing simulation using unstructured overset meshes. Both strong-scaling and weak-scaling experiments were conducted on the OLCF supercomputer Summit and similar proxy clusters. We focused on the performance of multi-threaded Gauss-Seidel and two-stage Gauss-Seidel that are extensions of classical Gauss-Seidel; of one-reduce GMRES, a communication-reducing variant of the Krylov GMRES; and algebraic multigrid methods that incorporate the afore-mentioned methods. The team has established that AMG methods are capable of solving linear systems arising from the fixed-wing overset meshes on CPU, a critical intermediate result for ExaWind FY20 Q3 and Q4 milestones. For the fixed-wing strong-scaling study (model with 3M grid-points), the team identified that Nalu-Wind simulations with the new Trilinos and hypre solvers scale to modest GPU counts, maintaining above 70% efficiency up to 6 GPUs. However, there still remain significant bottlenecks to performance: matrix assembly (hypre), AMG setup (hypre and Trilinos) In the weak-scaling experiments (going from 0.4M to 211M gridpoints), it's shown that the solver apply phases are faster on GPUs, but that Nalu-Wind simulation times grow, primarily due to the multigrid-setup process. Finally, based on the report outcomes, we propose a linear solver path-forward for the remainder of the ExaWind project. Near term, the NREL team will continue their work on GPU-based linear-system assembly. They will also investigate how the use of alternatives to the NVIDIA UVM (unified virtual memory) paradigm affects performance. Longer term, the NREL team will evaluate algorithmic performance on other types of accelerators and merge their improvements back to the main hypre repository branch. Near term, the Trilinos team will address performance bottlenecks identified in this milestone, such as implementing a GPU-based segregated momentum solve and reusing matrix graphs across linear-system assembly phases. Longer term, the Trilinos team will do detailed analysis and optimization of multigrid setup.

17 WIND ENERGY↗

Demonstration and performance testing of extreme-resolution simulations with static meshes on Summit (CPU & GPU) for a parked-turbine configuration and an actuator-line (mid-fidelity model) wind farm configuration (ECP-Q4 FY2020 Milestone Report)

The goal of the ExaWind project is to enable predictive simulations of wind farms comprised of many megawatt-scale turbines situated in complex terrain. Predictive simulations will require computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations for which the mesh resolves the geometry of the turbines and captures the rotation and large deflections of blades. Whereas such simulations for a single turbine are arguably petascale class, multi-turbine wind farm simulations will require exascale-class resources. The primary physics codes in the ExaWind simulation environment are Nalu-Wind, an unstructured-grid solver for the acoustically incompressible Navier-Stokes equations, AMR-Wind, a block-structured-grid solver with adaptive mesh refinement capabilities, and OpenFAST, a wind-turbine structural dynamics solver. The Nalu-Wind model consists of the mass-continuity Poisson-type equation for pressure and Helmholtz-type equations for transport of momentum and other scalars. For such modeling approaches, simulation times are dominated by linear-system setup and solution for the continuity and momentum systems. For the ExaWind challenge problem, the moving meshes greatly affect overall solver costs as reinitialization of matrices and recomputation of preconditioners is required at every time step. The choice of overset-mesh methodology to model the moving and non-moving parts of the computational domain introduces constraint equations in the elliptic pressure-Poisson solver. The presence of constraints greatly affects the performance of algebraic multigrid preconditioners.

17 WIND ENERGY↗

Demonstrate moving-grid multi-turbine simulations primarily run on GPUs and propose improvements for successful KPP-2

The goal of the ExaWind project is to enable predictive simulations of wind farms comprised of many megawatt-scale turbines situated in complex terrain. Predictive simulations will require computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations for which the mesh resolves the geometry of the turbines, capturing the thin boundary layers, and captures the rotation and large deflections of blades. Whereas such simulations for a single turbine are arguably petascale class, multi-turbine wind farm simulations will require exascale-class resources.

17 WIND ENERGY↗

Demonstrate multi-turbine simulation with hybrid-structured / unstructured-moving-grid software stack running primarily on GPUs and propose improvements for successful KPP-2

The goal of the ExaWind project is to enable predictive simulations of wind farms comprised of many megawatt-scale turbines situated in complex terrain. Predictive simulations will require computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations for which the mesh resolves the geometry of the turbines, capturing the thin boundary layers, and captures the rotation and large deflections of blades. Whereas such simulations for a single turbine are arguably petascale class, multi-turbine wind farm simulations will require exascale-class resources.

17 WIND ENERGY↗

Integration of seismic-pressure-petrophysics inversion of continuous active-seismic monitoring data for monitoring and quantifying CO 2 plume (Final Report)

The overall objective of this project is to develop and validate an integrated package of joint seismic-pressure-petrophysics inversion (jSPPI) of continuous active-source seismic monitoring dataset capable of providing real-time monitoring of CO 2 plume during geologic carbon sequestration (GCS). The three specific developments include: (a) the methodologies for fast seismic full waveform inversion of continuous active source seismic monitoring, (CASSM) datasets for simultaneously estimating velocity and attenuation, and with data assimilation; (b) joint Bayesian petrophysical inversion of seismic models and pressure data for providing and updating CO 2 saturation models; (c) the methods using multiple datasets including (Crainfield and Frio-II borehole) synthetic, laboratory, and field CASSM datasets. The outcomes of jSPPI include (a) a workflow for processing CASSM data, (b) Bayesian inversion algorithms using CASSM data and pressure response data, and (c) integration with data assimilation algorithms for continuously updating site-specific models used for prediction and reservoir management. The validation of joint FWI will be conducted using synthetic models based on the Cranfield and Frio experiments as well as field CASSM datasets collected as part of the Frio-II pilot injection. To quantify and map the mass and distribution of CO 2 (saturation), we will jointly invert velocity and attenuation measurements from the FWI with a Bayesian approach using a rock physics model for attenuation (e.g., White’s attenuation model with two selected patch sizes (White, 1976; Dutta and Seriff, 1979)). The Bayesian inversion will be applied to each time step in the CASSM survey in an updating scheme, which integrates with an ensemble of reservoir simulations at each step. A more complete experimental validation dataset will be collected as part of a mesoscale (2-3 m) gas-CO 2 injection experiment utilizing a higher frequency version of the CASSM system developed for laboratory studies; the integrated inversion will be demonstrated using this dataset which will provide both a dense geometry as well as more precise secondary confirmation measurements (e.g. saturation) typically not available in the field. The resulting real-time map of CO 2 saturation is able to provide a deeper scientific understanding of the complex, time-varying dynamics of subsurface fluid flow migration path as well as the rapid detection of CO 2 leakage hazards.

25 ENERGY STORAGE↗

Scalable foundation models for numerical simulations on HPC platforms

In recent years, foundation models (FMs) have begun to reshape numerical simulations on high-performance computing (HPC) platforms. These large, pre-trained AI models enable rapid predictions across a broad range of physical domains, including Earth system modeling, fluid dynamics, materials science, as well as complex multi-modal simulations in aerospace engineering and fusion research. By training on diverse datasets, FMs learn intricate relationships and underlying physical behavior while also enabling the quantification of uncertainty in their predictions. This capability allows simulations that once required days of numerical calculation to be completed in minutes (FM inference), supporting real-time design optimization, uncertainty-aware decision making, and more comprehensive exploration of complex scenarios.

AI↗

PyDA: A Hands-On Introduction to Dynamical Data Assimilation with Python

Dynamic data assimilation offers a suite of algorithms that merge measurement data with numerical simulations to predict accurate state trajectories. Meteorological centers rely heavily on data assimilation to achieve trustworthy weather forecast. With the advance in measurement systems, as well as the reduction in sensor prices, data assimilation (DA) techniques are applicable to various fields, other than meteorology. However, beginners usually face hardships digesting the core ideas from the available sophisticated resources requiring a steep learning curve. In this tutorial, we lay out the mathematical principles behind DA with easy-to-follow Python module implementations so that this group of newcomers can quickly feel the essence of DA algorithms. We explore a series of common variational, and sequential techniques, and highlight major differences and potential extensions. We demonstrate the presented approaches using an array of fluid flow applications with varying levels of complexity.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗

Fluid logic control circuit operates nutator actuator motor

Fluid logic control circuit operates a pneumatic nutator actuator motor. It has no moving parts and consists of connected fluid interaction devices. The operation of this circuit demonstrates the ability of fluid interaction devices to operate in a complex combination of series and parallel logic sequence.

Source record↗