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At least 613 records · Page 34

Photonic Waveguide Choke Joint with Non-Absorptive Loading

A waveguide choke joint includes a first array of pillars positioned on a substrate, each pillar in the first array of pillars having a first size and configured to receive an input plane wave at a first end of the choke joint. The choke joint has a second end configured to transmit the input plane wave away from the choke joint. The choke joint further includes a second array of pillars positioned on the substrate between the first array of pillars and the second end of the choke joint. Each pillar in the second array of pillars has a second size. The choke joint also has a third array of pillars positioned on the substrate between the second array and the second end of the choke joint. Each pillar in the third array of pillars has a third size.

Wollack, Edward J.↗

Dynamic fracture of glass fiber-reinforced ductile polymer matrix composites and loading rate effect

Here, the dynamic fracture of S-2 glass fiber-reinforced polymer matrix composites (FRPMCs) was investigated in this study. The matrix ductility was improved by a recently developed network topology modification technique via mixing partially reacted substructures (mPRS). The composite material was manufactured and characterized by micro-CT scanning and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). Dynamic single-edge notched bending (d-SENB) experiments were performed on the composites by using a modified split-Hopkinson pressure bar. Each specimen’s fracture process was visualized by ultrafast X-ray imaging. Such in-situ radiography enabled identifying the damage initiation below 50-micron scale and inspecting its propagation through the internal structures of opaque composites, thereby accurately quantifying the composites’ mechanical properties. Furthermore, the identical d-SENB experiments were designed and the digital image correlation (DIC) was employed to monitor the stress wave propagation on the composite specimens. The force and deflection measurements were modified and correlated to the physical damage processes. Besides, quasi-static SENB experiments were conducted to identify the loading rate effects on the composites’ fracture behaviors. The force and deflection history, bending stiffness, energy dissipation, and fracture toughness at different loading rates were quantified and compared. Finally, post-fracture analysis by micro-CT scanning and SEM provided physical observations on the variation of the fracture morphology by different loading rates.

42 ENGINEERING↗

Elastic plate spallation

The dynamic finite element method was used to investigate elastic stress waves in a plate. Strain displacement and stress strain relations are discussed along with the stiffness and mass matrix. The results of studying point load, and distributed load over small, intermediate, and large radii are reported. The derivation of finite element matrices, and the derivation of lumped and consistent matrices for one dimensional problems with Laplace transfer solutions are included. The computer program JMMSPALL is also included.

Oline, L.↗

Dynamical response to pulse excitations in large space structures

Finite dimensional approximations of large space structures as distributed parameter systems may lead to a loss of contribution of high frequencies to the dynamic response in case of impulsive or concentrated loads. It is shown that the unmodeled part of this response can be represented by a system of thin pulses which propagate as characteristic waves. It is demonstrated that the dynamical response to such a system of pulses can be modeled by a system of equations with delay argument. Fundamental dynamical properties of this system such as Liapunov stability, structural stability, loss of periodicity and transition to ergodicity are analyzed in this study. The results are illustrated by examples.

Zak, Michail↗

An Upgrade of the Imaging for Hypersonic Experimental Aeroheating Testing (IHEAT) Software

The Imaging for Hypersonic Experimental Aeroheating Testing (IHEAT) code is used at NASA Langley Research Center to analyze global aeroheating data on wind tunnel models tested in the Langley Aerothermodynamics Laboratory. One-dimensional, semi-infinite heating data derived from IHEAT are used to design thermal protection systems to mitigate the risks due to the aeroheating loads on hypersonic vehicles, such as re-entry vehicles during descent and landing procedures. This code was originally written in the PV-WAVE programming language to analyze phosphor thermography data from the two-color, relativeintensity system developed at Langley. To increase the efficiency, functionality, and reliability of IHEAT, the code was migrated to MATLAB syntax and compiled as a stand-alone executable file labeled version 4.0. New features of IHEAT 4.0 include the options to batch process all of the data from a wind tunnel run, to map the two-dimensional heating distribution to a three-dimensional computer-aided design model of the vehicle to be viewed in Tecplot, and to extract data from a segmented line that follows an interesting feature in the data. Results from IHEAT 4.0 were compared on a pixel level to the output images from the legacy code to validate the program. The differences between the two codes were on the order of 10-5 to 10-7. IHEAT 4.0 replaces the PV-WAVE version as the production code for aeroheating experiments conducted in the hypersonic facilities at NASA Langley.

Mason, Michelle L.↗

Nonlinear Dynamic Analyses of STS-1 Forward RCS Oxidizer Tank Structural Failure

At liftoff of the first Space Shuttle mission, a strong ignition overpressure pulse excited the stack. The frequency of the experienced pressure wave exceeded pre-launch predictions, and resulted in high, alternating normal accelerations along the length of the vehicle. As result of this unexpected loading, an oxidizer tank support strut in the orbiter’s forward reaction control system module failed in buckling under axial compression, which could have led to loss of the mission, crew, and vehicle. This incident is investigated in more detail using linear and nonlinear finite element analyses, complementing previous analyses with classical structural mechanics. The results of these analyses are examined to provide additional insight into the accident and to better inform future design decisions for modern space vehicle systems and structures.

Space Shuttle↗

Nonlinear Dynamic Analyses of STS-1 Forward RCS Oxidizer Tank Structural Failure

At liftoff of the first Space Shuttle mission, a strong ignition overpressure pulse excited the stack. The frequency of the experienced pressure wave exceeded pre-launch predictions, and resulted in high, alternating normal accelerations along the length of the vehicle. As result of this unexpected loading, an oxidizer tank support strut in the orbiter’s forward reaction control system module failed in buckling under axial compression, which could have led to loss of the mission, crew, and vehicle. This incident is investigated in more detail using linear and nonlinear finite element analyses, complementing previous analyses with classical structural mechanics. The results of these analyses are examined to provide additional insight into the accident and to better inform future design decisions for modern space vehicle systems and structures.

Space Shuttle↗

2.2.2.405 - Verdant/NREL Research Measurement Campaign

The marine renewable energy industry primarily uses thermoset composite materials for blades and other hydrodynamic components, which can have up to 50% reduction in strength when exposed to seawater and are not recyclable. Thermoplastic composite materials have been shown at a coupon-scale to have improved seawater saturated properties but have not been validated at full scale. The primary goal of the project is to demonstrate the structural properties of thermoplastic-fiberglass composite blades compared to epoxy-fiberglass composite blades in seawater at a tidal energy site on an operational turbine. Through this work, NREL manufactured, tested and deployed thermoplastic blades and a data acquisition system on Verdant Power's turbine TriFrame in the East River, NYC. The thermoplastic blades and DAQ were retrieved after a 6-month deployment with no signs of degradation and all cable connections, structural supports and strain gages had a 100% survival rate. The blades are currently undergoing post-deployment structural validation to compare their performance to traditional epoxy blades that were deployed for the same amount of time. This will increase confidence in thermoplastic materials and move it closer to commercial adoption, as well as increase confidence in the design of a DAQ and instrumentation method for a tidal turbine. However, due to an error in the DAQ software that was introduced after the DAQ and software were validated, there was no loads data collected during the deployment.

blade testing↗

Efficient use of bit planes in the generation of motion stimuli

The production of animated motion sequences on computer-controlled display systems presents a technical problem because large images cannot be transferred from disk storage to image memory at conventional frame rates. A technique is described in which a single base image can be used to generate a broad class of motion stimuli without the need for such memory transfers. This technique was applied to the generation of drifting sine-wave gratings (and by extension, sine wave plaids). For each drifting grating, sine and cosine spatial phase components are first reduced to 1 bit/pixel using a digital halftoning technique. The resulting pairs of 1-bit images are then loaded into pairs of bit planes of the display memory. To animate the patterns, the display hardware's color lookup table is modified on a frame-by-frame basis; for each frame the lookup table is set to display a weighted sum of the spatial sine and cosine phase components. Because the contrasts and temporal frequencies of the various components are mutually independent in each frame, the sine and cosine components can be counterphase modulated in temporal quadrature, yielding a single drifting grating. Using additional bit planes, multiple drifting gratings can be combined to form sine-wave plaid patterns. A large number of resultant plaid motions can be produced from a single image file because the temporal frequencies of all the components can be varied independently. For a graphics device having 8 bits/pixel, up to four drifting gratings may be combined, each having independently variable contrast and speed.

Mulligan, Jeffrey B.↗

The structure of mass-loading shocks. 1: Comets

A new multifluid model to describe the solar wind-cometary ion plasma in the outer cometary coma is derived. This model is distinguished from previous multifluid models in that wave-particle effects are included explicitly. By considering hydrodynamic timescales, self-consistent dissipative terms (which correspond to the spatial diffusion of cometary ions) are derived, thereby allowing the structure of a cometary bow shock to be resolved. In the hypersonic limit, our diffusive multifluid model reveals an attractive connection to the one-fluid model formulated by Biermann et al. (1967), a connection which serves as an important guide when investigating our more complicated nonhypersonic diffusive model. The detailed model consists of cometary ions diffusing in a warm solar wind which is heated by the dissipation of Alfvenic turbulence (in situ and generated by the initial ring beam distribution). The quasi-parallel cometary shock is found to be at least an order of magnitude thicker than a quasi-perpendicular cometary shock. It is furthermore found that for undisturbed solar wind (sonic) Mach numbers in excess of approximately 6, the cometary bow shock (for both perpendicular and parallel cases) is smoothed completely by the cometary ions and no 'proton' or thermal subshock is necessary. Finally, a detailed comparison of the model with the plasma observations made at Halley by Giotto is undertaken. It is found that the observed shock structure, thickness, location, and plasma parameters compare well with the predictions of the theoretical model, particularly in the case of the quasi-parallel shock.

Zank, G. P.↗

Atomically Dispersed Pentacoordinated‐Zirconium Catalyst with Axial Oxygen Ligand for Oxygen Reduction Reaction

Single-atom catalysts (SACs), as promising alternatives to Pt-based catalysts, suffer from the limited choice of center metals and low single-atom loading. Here, we report a pentacoordinated Zr-based SAC with nontrivial axial O ligands (denoted O-Zr-N-C) for oxygen reduction reaction (ORR). The O ligand downshifts the d-band center of Zr and confers Zr sites with stable local structure and proper adsorption capability for intermediates. Consequently, the ORR performance of O-Zr-N-C prominently surpasses that of commercial Pt/C, achieving a half-wave potential of 0.91 V vs. reversible hydrogen electrode and outstanding durability (92% current retention after 130-hour operation). Moreover, the Zr site shows good resistance towards aggregation, enabling the synthesis of Zr-based SAC with high loading (9.1 wt%). With the high-loading catalyst, the zinc-air battery (ZAB) delivers a record-high power density of 324 mW cm -2 among those of SAC-based ZABs.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗

Unraveling the role of temperature on the onset of ejecta formation at atomic scales

Shock wave interactions with perturbations on a free surface can lead to the inversion and growth of the perturbation and eventual ejection of a jet of material, referred to as an ejecta microjet, from shocked surfaces. Here, this study carries out large-scale molecular dynamics (MD) simulations using single-crystal Cu and Sn systems with a pre-existing groove to characterize the localized gradients in temperatures and pressures generated that render the microjet formation. MD simulations are carried out for three loading orientations (along the [001], [011], and [111] directions) and shock pressures ranging from 16 GPa to 100 GPa to understand the role of temperatures generated at the groove vertex on the formation of ejecta. The simulations suggest that the interaction of the shock wave with the groove results in a localized increase in temperatures, leading to localized softening at the groove vertex and the generation of an ejecta microjet. For Cu systems, the simulations suggest that the orientation effects on shock wave structures, velocities, and localized softening affect the ejecta formation at low pressures. Jetting is only observed when temperatures at the groove vertex are high enough to induce localized softening (close to melting temperature), and the jet velocity increases with shock pressure. In contrast, the loading orientation is rendered inconsequential for Sn systems due to the melting of the material during shock compression at the pressures chosen. The jet velocities are similar, regardless of crystal orientation in Sn systems.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗

Data-Driven Protection Software to classify fault locations by protective zone in distribution systems with high PV penetration

The software contains (a) the source codes to generate Point-on-Wave (PoW) transient data for any feeder model in Alternative Transient Program (ATP) format. Codes provide options to change different steady state settings, including the loading condition and PV capacity and transient state setting like faults type, location and initiation time (b) data post-processing source code to converted data from native format to COMTRADE, csv, HDF5 (c) Docker container to train CNN to classify fault locations by protective zone. The container takes dataset and other training parameters (sampling rate, training epochs, batch size etc) as input to train CNN. The container writes back the trained CNN model, training and testing metrics and plots to the local workstation

Ramesh, Meghana↗

Fluid dynamics of the unsteady two phase processes leading to DDT in granular solid propellants

Deflagration to Detonation (DDT) was predicted to occur in porous beds of high-energy solid propellants by solving the unsteady fluid mechanical convective heat transfer from hot gas products, obtained from the rapid burning at high pressures, provides the impetus to develop a narrow combustion zone and a resulting strong shock. A parametric study clearly indicates that DDT occurs only when a combination of the solids loading fraction, the burning rate constants, the propellant chemical energy, and the particle size provide for critical energy and gas release to support a detonation wave. Predictions for the run-up length to detonation as a function of these parameters are presented.

Krier, H.↗

Computer modeling of solar wind interaction with Venus and Mars

The fundamental ideas, successes, and shortcomings of fluid models based on MHD theory for the interaction of the solar wind and a planetary magnetic field and/or atmosphere are reviewed, with special attention to applications to Venus and Mars. An account, including new quantitative results, is given of a number of enhancements of a basic gasdynamic convected field approximation to the magnetohydrodynamic model that incorporate features of solar wind flow past a planet not treated previously. These permit solutions to be calculated for 3D, as opposed to axisymmetric, obstacle shapes, the effects of a magnetic barrier region just exterior to the ionopause, the complete MHD equations for the special case in which the interplanetary magnetic field is aligned with the flow, the effects of mass loading by pickup of ions newly created by photoionization of atmospheric neutrals, and for the unsteady effects associated with the passage of an interplanetary shock wave. Particular emphasis is placed on the information furnished by these models that can be compared with observations, and conversely on the observational data that provide critical tests of the models.

Spreiter, John R.↗

Mechanical Properties of Shock-Damaged Rocks

Stress-strain tests were performed both on shock-damaged gabbro and limestone. The effective Young's modulus decreases with increasing initial damage parameter value, and an apparent work-softening process occurs prior to failure. To further characterize shock-induced microcracks, the longitudinal elastic wave velocity behavior of shock-damaged gabbro in the direction of compression up to failure was measured using an acoustic transmission technique under uniaxial loading. A dramatic increase in velocity was observed for the static compressive stress range of 0-50 MPa. Above that stress range, the velocity behavior of lightly damaged (D(sub 0) less than 0.1) gabbro is almost equal to unshocked gabbro. The failure strength of heavily-damaged (D(sub 0) greater than 0.1) gabbro is approx. 100-150 MPa, much lower than that of lightly damaged and unshocked gabbros (approx. 230-260 MPa). Following Nur's theory, the crack shape distribution was analyzed. The shock-induced cracks in gabbro appear to be largely thin penny-shaped cracks with c/a values below 5 x 10(exp -4). Moreover, the applicability of Ashby and Sammis's theory relating failure strength and damage parameter of shock-damaged rocks was examined and was found to yield a good estimate of the relation of shock-induced deficit in elastic modulus with the deficit in compressive strength.

He, Hongliang↗

Aerosol Backscatter from Airborne Continuous Wave CO2 Lidars over Western North America and the Pacific Ocean

Aerosol backscatter measurements using two continuous wave CO2 Doppler lidars were obtained over western North America and the Pacific Ocean during a 1995 NASA airborne mission. Similarities and differences for aerosol loading over land and ocean were observed. Mid-tropospheric aerosol backscatter background mode was approximately 6 x 10(exp -11)/m.sr, consistent with previous lidar datasets.

Jarzembski, Maurice A.↗

The Cylinder and Semicylinder in Subsonic Flow

In studying the diffraction of shock waves around various two-dimensional obstacles we have observed that flow separation and the formation of vortices contributes in an important way to transient loading of the obstacle. The cases of a cylinder and semicylinder are especially interesting because the breakaway point is not clearly defined as it is for objects having sharp corners. Accordingly a number of experiments have been made in the shock tube to observe the influence of Reynolds number and Mach number on the transient flow patterns about a cylinder and about a semicylinder mounted on a smooth plane. Some differences might be anticipated since the plane would impose a symmetry on the flow and produce a viscous boundary layer for which there is no counterpart with the cylinder. In the course of these experiments it was noted that a condition of steady subsonic flow about both the cylinder and semicylinder was approached. Thus a comparison with von Karrnan's theoretical calculation of the drag on a cylinder, from certain characteristics of its wake or "vortex street", was undertaken.

Bingham, Harry J.↗