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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 55 records · Page 3
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2010

Simulations of multipactor in circular waveguides

Detailed numerical simulations have been done to investigate the properties of multipactor breakdown in circular waveguides operating in the propagating fundamental TE11 mode. Main attention has been given to a comparison between the two fundamental cases corresponding to linear and circular polarizations, respectively, of the propagating electromagnetic wave. It is found that circular polarization is considerably more susceptible to multipactor than linear polarization. The reason for this difference is clarified by a comprehensive study of the electron motion in the waveguide.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2010

Gauge field localization on brane worlds

We consider the effects of spacetime curvature and brane thickness on the localization of gauge fields on a brane via kinetic terms induced by localized fermions. We find that in a warped geometry with an infinitely thin brane, both the infrared and the ultraviolet behavior of the electromagnetic propagator are affected, providing a more stringent bound on the brane's tension than that coming from the requirement of four-dimensional gravity on the brane. On the other hand, for a thick wall in a flat spacetime, where the fermions are localized by means of a Yukawa coupling, we find that four-dimensional electromagnetism is recovered in a region bounded from above by the same critical distance appearing in the thin case, but also from below by a new scale related to the brane's thickness and the electromagnetic couplings. This imposes very stringent bounds on the brane's thickness which seem to invalidate the localization mechanism for this case.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2019

Electromagnetic currents for dressed hadrons

We propose an extension of the minimal-substitution prescription for coupling the electromagnetic field to hadronic systems with internal structure. The resulting rules of extended substitution necessarily distinguish between couplings to scalar and Dirac particles. Moreover, they allow for the incorporation of electromagnetic form factors for virtual photons in an effective phenomenological framework. Applied to pions and nucleons, assumed to be fully dressed to all orders, the resulting dressed currents are shown to be locally gauge invariant. Moreover, half-on-shell expressions of (hadron propagator)×(electromagnetic current) needed in all descriptions of physical processes will lose all information about hadronic dressing for real photons. The Ball-Chiu ansatz for the spin-1/2 current is seen to suffer from an incomplete coupling procedure where some essential aspects of the Dirac particle are effectively treated as those of a scalar particle. Applied to real Compton scattering on pions and nucleons, we find that all dressing information cancels exactly when external hadrons are on shell, leaving only gauge-invariant bare Born-type contributions with physical masses. Furthermore, nontrivial descriptions necessarily require contact-type two-photon processes obtained by hadrons looping around two photon insertion points.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2010

Question Isotropy

The 'cosmological principle' was set up early without realizing its implications for the horizon problem, and almost entirely without support from observational data. Consistent signals of anisotopy have been found in data on electromagnetic propagation, polarizations of QSOs and CMB temperature maps. The axis of Virgo is found again and again in signals breaking isotropy, from independent observables in independent energy regimes. There are no satisfactory explanations of these effects in conventional astrophysics. Axion-photon mixing and propagation in axion condensates are capable of encompassing the data.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2011

Transition between positive and negative permittivity in field-dependent metamaterial

Permittivity in a metamaterial, which depends on the electric field of a propagating electromagnetic wave, induces anomalous responses against electromagnetic waves. When we consider discharge plasma an example of a metamaterial with field-dependent permittivity and negative permeability, a transition takes place between positive and negative permittivity, leading to reflection of waves in a low-field branch and transmission by the creation of a negative-refractive-index medium in a high-field branch. Nonlinearity in the phase space of the permittivity and the electric field in this system trigger this dynamic transition, which is suggested in the numerical results and clarified in an analytical model.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗
DOE OSTI2012

Slow wave structures using twisted waveguides for charged particle applications

A rapidly twisted electromagnetic accelerating structure includes a waveguide body having a central axis, one or more helical channels defined by the body and disposed around a substantially linear central axial channel, with central portions of the helical channels merging with the linear central axial channel. The structure propagates electromagnetic waves in the helical channels which support particle beam acceleration in the central axial channel at a phase velocity equal to or slower than the speed of light in free space. Since there is no variation in the shape of the transversal cross-section along the axis of the structure, inexpensive mechanical fabrication processes can be used to form the structure, such as extrusion, casting or injection molding. Also, because the field and frequency of the resonant mode depend on the whole structure rather than on dimensional tolerances of individual cells, no tuning of individual cells is needed. Accordingly, the overall operating frequency may be varied with a tuning/phase shifting device located outside the resonant waveguide structure.

43 PARTICLE ACCELERATORS↗
DOE OSTI2010

Double-slit vacuum polarization effects in ultraintense laser fields

The influence of the strong laser-driven vacuum on a propagating electromagnetic probe wave has been studied in detail. We investigate two scenarios, which comprise a focused probe laser beam that passes through a region of vacuum polarized by an ultraintense laser field. By splitting this strong field into two separated monochromatic Gaussian pulses that counterpropagate in a plane perpendicular to the probe-field axis, we demonstrate a leading-order light-by-light diffraction effect that generates an interference pattern reminiscent of the classic double-slit experiment. We calculate the total number of probe photons diffracted as well as the number diffracted into regions where the vacuum polarization signal is higher than the probe background. In addition, we calculate the induced ellipticity and polarization rotation in the probe beam and show how, in the realistic situation in which the centers of the two strong fields are not exactly aligned, certain ranges of beam separation and observation distance may actually lead to an increase over the idealized case of a single strong laser beam.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2014

Particle-in-cell simulations of velocity scattering of an anisotropic electron beam by electrostatic and electromagnetic instabilities

The velocity space scattering of an anisotropic electron beam (T{sub ⊥b}/T{sub ∥b}>1) flowing along a background magnetic field B{sub 0} through a cold plasma is investigated using both linear theory and 2D particle-in-cell simulations. Here, ⊥ and ∥ represent the directions perpendicular and parallel to B{sub 0}, respectively. In this scenario, we find that two primary instabilities contribute to the scattering in electron pitch angle: an electrostatic electron beam instability and a predominantly parallel-propagating electromagnetic whistler anisotropy instability. Our results show that at relative beam densities n{sub b}/n{sub e}≤0.05 and beam temperature anisotropies T{sub b⊥}/T{sub b∥}≤25, the electrostatic beam instability grows much faster than the whistler instabilities for a reasonably fast hot beam. The enhanced fluctuating fields from the beam instability scatter the beam electrons, slowing their average speed and increasing their parallel temperature, thereby increasing their pitch angles. In an inhomogeneous magnetic field, such as the geomagnetic field, this could result in beam electrons scattered out of the loss cone. After saturation of the electrostatic instability, the parallel-propagating whistler anisotropy instability shows appreciable growth, provided that the beam density and late-time anisotropy are sufficiently large. Although the whistler anisotropy instability acts to pitch-angle scatter the electrons, reducing perpendicular energy in favor of parallel energy, these changes are weak compared to the pitch-angle increases resulting from the deceleration of the beam due to the electrostatic instability.

58 GEOSCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2011

MAGNETIC HELICITY SPECTRUM OF SOLAR WIND FLUCTUATIONS AS A FUNCTION OF THE ANGLE WITH RESPECT TO THE LOCAL MEAN MAGNETIC FIELD

Magnetic field data acquired by the Ulysses spacecraft in high-speed streams over the poles of the Sun are used to investigate the normalized magnetic helicity spectrum {sigma}{sub m} as a function of the angle {theta} between the local mean magnetic field and the flow direction of the solar wind. This spectrum provides important information about the constituent modes at the transition to kinetic scales that occurs near the spectral break separating the inertial range from the dissipation range. The energetically dominant signal at scales near the thermal proton gyroradius k{sub perpendicular{rho}i} {approx} 1 often covers a wide band of propagation angles centered about the perpendicular direction, {theta} {approx_equal} 90{sup 0} {+-} 30{sup 0}. This signal is consistent with a spectrum of obliquely propagating kinetic Alfven waves with k{sub perpendicular} >> k{sub ||} in which there is more energy in waves propagating away from the Sun and along the direction of the local mean magnetic field than toward the Sun. Moreover, this signal is principally responsible for the reduced magnetic helicity spectrum measured using Fourier transform techniques. The observations also reveal a subdominant population of nearly parallel propagating electromagnetic waves near the proton inertial scale k{sub ||} c/{omega}{sub pi} {approx} 1 that often exhibit high magnetic helicity |{sigma}{sub m}| {approx_equal} 1. These waves are believed to be caused by proton pressure anisotropy instabilities that regulate distribution functions in the collisionless solar wind. Because of the existence of a drift of alpha particles with respect to the protons, the proton temperature anisotropy instability that operates when T{sub pperpendicular}/T{sub p||} > 1 preferentially generates outward propagating ion-cyclotron waves and the fire-hose instability that operates when T{sub pperpendicular}/T{sub p||} < 1 preferentially generates inward propagating whistler waves. These kinetic processes provide a natural explanation for the magnetic field observations.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2014

Efficient regime of electromagnetic emission in a plasma with counterstreaming electron beams

Efficiency of electromagnetic emission produced in a magnetized plasma with counterstreaming electron beams was investigated using both the linear kinetic theory and particle-in-cell simulations. We calculated the growth rate of the beam-plasma instability taking into account both kinetic and relativistic effects and showed that there exists a regime in which transversely propagating electromagnetic waves can be generated by the coupling of the most unstable oblique beam-driven modes. It was confirmed by numerical simulations that such a tune-up of system parameters for a specific nonlinear process can lead to a substantial increase in electromagnetic emission efficiency. It was found that electromagnetic radiation emerging from the plasma in such a regime is generated near the harmonics of the pump frequency that is determined by the typical eigenfrequency of the beam-driven modes. It was also shown that the peak emission power can reach 5% of the maximal power lost by beam electrons.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2016

In situ evidence of the modification of the parallel propagation of EMIC waves by heated He + ions

With observations of the Van Allen Probe B, we report in situ evidence of the modification of the parallel propagating electromagnetic ion cyclotron (EMIC) waves by heated He + ions. In the outer boundary of the plasmasphere, accompanied with the He + ion heating, the frequency bands of H + and He + for EMIC waves merged into each other, leading to the disappearance of a usual stop band between the gyrofrequency of He + ions (Ω He+ ) and the H + cutoff frequency (ω H+co ) in the cold plasma. Moreover, the dispersion relation for EMIC waves theoretically calculated with the observed plasma parameters also demonstrates that EMIC waves can indeed parallel propagate across Ω He+ . Therefore, this work provides an in situ evidence of the modification of the parallel propagation of EMIC waves by heated He + ions.

58 GEOSCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2015

Electron residual energy due to stochastic heating in field-ionized plasma

The electron residual energy originated from the stochastic heating in under-dense field-ionized plasma is investigated here. Initially, the optical response of plasma is modeled by using two counter-propagating electromagnetic waves. In this case, the solution of motion equation of a single electron indicates that by including the ionization, the electron with higher residual energy compared with that without ionization could be obtained. In agreement with chaotic nature of the motion, it is found that the electron residual energy will be significantly changed by applying a minor change in the initial conditions. Extensive kinetic 1D-3V particle-in-cell simulations have been performed in order to resolve full plasma reactions. In this way, two different regimes of plasma behavior are observed by varying the pulse length. The results indicate that the amplitude of scattered fields in a proper long pulse length is high enough to act as a second counter-propagating wave and trigger the stochastic electron motion. On the contrary, the analyses of intensity spectrum reveal the fact that the dominant scattering mechanism tends to Thomson rather than Raman scattering by increasing the pulse length. A covariant formalism is used to describe the plasma heating so that it enables us to measure electron temperature inside and outside of the pulse region.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2012

Quantum states and linear response in dc and electromagnetic fields for the charge current and spin polarization of electrons at the Bi/Si interface with the giant spin-orbit coupling

An expansion of the nearly free-electron model constructed by Frantzeskakis, Pons, and Grioni [1] describing quantum states at the Bi/Si(111) interface with the giant spin-orbit coupling is developed and applied for the band structure and spin polarization calculation, as well as for the linear response analysis of the charge current and induced spin caused by a dc field and by electromagnetic radiation. It is found that the large spin-orbit coupling in this system may allow resolving the spin-dependent properties even at room temperature and at a realistic collision rate. The geometry of the atomic lattice combined with spin-orbit coupling leads to an anisotropic response for both the current and spin components related to the orientation of the external field. The in-plane dc electric field produces only the in-plane components of spin in the sample, while both the in-plane and out-of-plane spin components can be excited by normally propagating electromagnetic wave with different polarizations.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗
DOE OSTI2026

Measurement of the Hubble constant with high-energy neutrinos

Measuring distances in the Universe is one of the hardest problems in physics and astronomy. Almost every distance probe relies on photons, whose propagation across cosmic distances introduces extinction, absorption, scattering, and radiative-transfer effects. Neutrinos suffer none of these and propagate unattenuated through dust, intergalactic medium, and dense source environments alike. We introduce a new distance-ladder method for measuring the Hubble constant $H_0$ using high-energy astrophysical neutrinos from point sources as standardizable candles, and report its first observational realization. Using 12 X-ray-selected Seyfert galaxies for which IceCube reports significant per-source neutrino excesses in its 14-year public point-source release, we exploit the disk-corona correlation $L_ν= κ\, L_X^β$ between neutrino and X-ray luminosities to construct a neutrino distance ladder anchored by non-redshift distances to NGC 1068 (Cepheid + TRGB). We find $H_0 = 49^{+40}_{-30}\,\mathrm{km\,s^{-1}\,Mpc^{-1}}$ and $β= 0.67^{+0.16}_{-0.25}$ (68% credible intervals), with the corona slope disfavoring the calorimetric limit $β= 1$ at ${\sim}2σ$. The result is consistent with existing $H_0$ determinations from Planck and SH0ES within 1$σ$. While the uncertainty on $H_0$ is large, the measurement is free of electromagnetic propagation systematics and demonstrates the viability of neutrinos as a novel cosmographical probe.

Herrera, Gonzalo [MIT, MKI; Harvard U.] (ORCID:000↗
DOE OSTI2014

A new Green's function Monte Carlo algorithm for the solution of the two-dimensional nonlinear Poisson–Boltzmann equation: Application to the modeling of the communication breakdown problem in space vehicles during re-entry

The objective of this paper is the exposition of a recently-developed, novel Green's function Monte Carlo (GFMC) algorithm for the solution of nonlinear partial differential equations and its application to the modeling of the plasma sheath region around a cylindrical conducting object, carrying a potential and moving at low speeds through an otherwise neutral medium. The plasma sheath is modeled in equilibrium through the GFMC solution of the nonlinear Poisson–Boltzmann (NPB) equation. The traditional Monte Carlo based approaches for the solution of nonlinear equations are iterative in nature, involving branching stochastic processes which are used to calculate linear functionals of the solution of nonlinear integral equations. Over the last several years, one of the authors of this paper, K. Chatterjee has been developing a philosophically-different approach, where the linearization of the equation of interest is not required and hence there is no need for iteration and the simulation of branching processes. Instead, an approximate expression for the Green's function is obtained using perturbation theory, which is used to formulate the random walk equations within the problem sub-domains where the random walker makes its walks. However, as a trade-off, the dimensions of these sub-domains have to be restricted by the limitations imposed by perturbation theory. The greatest advantage of this approach is the ease and simplicity of parallelization stemming from the lack of the need for iteration, as a result of which the parallelization procedure is identical to the parallelization procedure for the GFMC solution of a linear problem. The application area of interest is in the modeling of the communication breakdown problem during a space vehicle's re-entry into the atmosphere. However, additional application areas are being explored in the modeling of electromagnetic propagation through the atmosphere/ionosphere in UHF/GPS applications.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2023

Resolution of a Few Problems in the Application of Quasilinear Theory to Calculating Diffusion Coefficients in Heliophysics

A theory of quasilinear diffusion for obliquely propagating electromagnetic waves was developed in the 1960's and applied in the 1970's to model scattering of relativistic electrons by a prescribed distribution of waves. In the latter work, a transformation of variables, from wavevector space to the temporal frequency and tangent of the wave normal angle, was used so that simple Gaussian functions of frequency and tangent of the wave normal angle could be multiplied together to define the distribution of wave power, although arbitrary distributions of power in these two variables is also permitted. Finally, in 2005, previous work was consolidated and has been widely used in heliophysics studies that require computation of quasilinear diffusion coefficients. Here it is shown that this transformation is inppropriate when the precise wave vector distribution is known. The correct transformation is derived and used to produce diffusion coefficients that can differ by orders of magnitude from those computed using the inappropriate transformation. The differences are largest when the distribution of wave power extends to wave normal angles near the resonance cone. When the ratio of the plasma frequency to the gyrofrequency is large, only low energies (keV) are affected, but as the ratio decreases higher energies (MeV) also show differences. It is also shown that the derivation from the 1960's uses a notation that results in the diffusion coefficients depending on the distribution of wave power with respect to the wave azimuthal angle whereas there should be no such dependence.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2016

Magnetic hyperbolic optical metamaterials

Strongly anisotropic media where the principal components of electric permittivity or magnetic permeability tensors have opposite signs are termed as hyperbolic media. Such media support propagating electromagnetic waves with extremely large wave vectors exhibiting unique optical properties. However, in all artificial and natural optical materials studied to date, the hyperbolic dispersion originates solely from the electric response. This then restricts material functionality to one polarization of light and inhibits free-space impedance matching. Such restrictions can be overcome in media having components of opposite signs for both electric and magnetic tensors. Here we present the experimental demonstration of the magnetic hyperbolic dispersion in three-dimensional metamaterials. We also measure metamaterial isofrequency contours and reveal the topological phase transition between the elliptic and hyperbolic dispersion. In the hyperbolic regime, we demonstrate the strong enhancement of thermal emission, which becomes directional, coherent and polarized. These findings show the possibilities for realizing efficient impedance-matched hyperbolic media for unpolarized light.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2014

Electrical characterization of the flowing afterglow of N{sub 2} and N{sub 2}/O{sub 2} microwave plasmas at reduced pressure

A cylindrical Langmuir probe was used to analyze the spatial distribution of the number density of positive ions and electrons as well as the electron energy distribution function (EEDF) in the flowing afterglow of a 6 Torr N{sub 2} and N{sub 2}/O{sub 2} plasma sustained by a propagating electromagnetic surface wave in the microwave regime. In pure N{sub 2} discharges, ion densities were in the mid 10{sup 14} m{sup −3} in the pink afterglow and in the mid 10{sup 12} m{sup −3} early in the late afterglow. In both pink and late afterglows, the ion population was much higher than the electron population, indicating non-macroscopically neutral media. The EEDF was close to a Maxwellian with an electron temperature of 0.5 ± 0.1 eV, except in the pink afterglow where the temperature rose to 1.1 ± 0.2 eV. This latter behavior is ascribed to N{sub 2} vibration-vibration pumping in the pink afterglow that increases the concentration of high N{sub 2} vibrational states and thus rises the electron temperature by vibration-electron collisions. After addition of small amounts of O{sub 2} in the nominally pure N{sub 2} discharge, the charged particles densities and average electron energy first strongly increased and then decreased with increasing O{sub 2} concentration. Based on these data and the evolution of the N{sub 2}{sup +}(B) band emission intensities, it is concluded that a significant change in the positive ion composition of the flowing afterglow occurs, going from N{sub 2}{sup +} in nominally pure N{sub 2} discharges to NO{sup +} after addition of trace amounts of O{sub 2} in N{sub 2}.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗