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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 721 records · Page 40
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS2003

Obscured Star-Formation in Merging Galaxies: High Resolution Radio Imaging of a Time-Ordered Sequence

We present new, deep, high resolution 6cm and 4cm radio continuum images of the central regions of a time-ordered sequence of seven large galaxy mergers. The radio observations are able to detect star-forming re- gions that are completely obscured at optical wavelengths. In all systems, we detect numerous compact radio sources embedded in more diffuse ra- dio emission, with limiting luminosities of approx. 1-5 x 10(exp l8) W Hz or approx. 1-5 times the luminosity of Cas A. Many of the compact radio sources are loosely associated with active starforming regions but not with specific optical or W emission sources. Several of the compact radio sources are coincident with Ultra-luminous X-ray objects (ULX's). In most systems, we are able to measure reliable spectral indices for the stronger sources. We find that the fraction of compact radio cources with nominally flat radio spectral indices (indicating they ae dominated by thermal radio emission from HII regions) decreases with merger age, while the fraction of sources with nonimally steep spectral indices (indicating they are dominated by nonthermal emission from supernova remnants) increases. For the flat-spectrum sources, we estimate the numbers of young massive stars, associated ionized gas masses, we estimate supernova rates and required star-formation rates, We compare these results with those from other well-studied merging galaxy systems and from other determinations of star-formation rates. We gratefully acknowledge use of the NRAO Very Large Array (VLA) and the VLA Archive. NRAO is a facility of the National Science Foundation, operated under cooperative agreement by Associated Universities, Inc.

Neff, S. G.↗
NASA NTRS1990

Fiber optic smart structures and skins II; Proceedings of the Meeting, Boston, MA, Sept. 5-8, 1989

The present conference on embedded fiber-optics incorporating 'smart' structural systems and structural surfaces discusses topics in the nature and current status of university- and government-sponsored smart-structure development programs, manufacturing and cure-monitoring for composite smart structures, smart-structure damage assessment, smart-structure actuators, and smart-structure sensors and components. Attention is given to fiber-optic sensor selection, the optical properties of curing epoxies, the automated production of smart structures, damage-detection in composites with embedded fiber-optic interferometers, fiber-optic strain and impact sensors, dynamically-tunable smart composites, smart structures incorporating artificial neural networks, active structural acoustic control with smart structures, and fiber-optic shape sensing for flexible structures.

Udd, Eric↗
NASA NTRS1981

Distributed processing on the Space Shuttle - A case study

A Power Extension Package (PEP) has been designed to provide additional electrical power and energy during Shuttle sortie missions. The considered investigation was conducted to determine the most suitable allocation of PEP monitoring and control functions between the Orbiter's existing (centralized) Systems Management General Purpose Computer and an embedded PEP processor. PEP monitoring and control functions are examined, and a configuration definition is considered, taking into account the 'functional migration' process, function allocation criteria, and candidate functional configurations. A trade study is conducted, giving attention to an assessment of four candidate configurations. Assessment factors are related to cost, development risk, aspects of reliability and safety, PEP design complexity, PEP/STS integration complexity, flight operations, and launch/landing site operations. A thorough (subjective) assessment of the PEP system life cycle indicates substantial benefits from a distributed processing approach.

Schoonmaker, P. B.↗
NASA NTRS2009

A Distributed Prognostic Health Management Architecture

This paper introduces a generic distributed prognostic health management (PHM) architecture with specific application to the electrical power systems domain. Current state-of-the-art PHM systems are mostly centralized in nature, where all the processing is reliant on a single processor. This can lead to loss of functionality in case of a crash of the central processor or monitor. Furthermore, with increases in the volume of sensor data as well as the complexity of algorithms, traditional centralized systems become unsuitable for successful deployment, and efficient distributed architectures are required. A distributed architecture though, is not effective unless there is an algorithmic framework to take advantage of its unique abilities. The health management paradigm envisaged here incorporates a heterogeneous set of system components monitored by a varied suite of sensors and a particle filtering (PF) framework that has the power and the flexibility to adapt to the different diagnostic and prognostic needs. Both the diagnostic and prognostic tasks are formulated as a particle filtering problem in order to explicitly represent and manage uncertainties; however, typically the complexity of the prognostic routine is higher than the computational power of one computational element ( CE). Individual CEs run diagnostic routines until the system variable being monitored crosses beyond a nominal threshold, upon which it coordinates with other networked CEs to run the prognostic routine in a distributed fashion. Implementation results from a network of distributed embedded devices monitoring a prototypical aircraft electrical power system are presented, where the CEs are Sun Microsystems Small Programmable Object Technology (SPOT) devices.

Bhaskar, Saha↗
NASA NTRS1988

The use of an automated flight test management system in the development of a rapid-prototyping flight research facility

An automated flight test management system (ATMS) and its use to develop a rapid-prototyping flight research facility for artificial intelligence (AI) based flight systems concepts are described. The ATMS provides a flight test engineer with a set of tools that assist in flight planning and simulation. This system will be capable of controlling an aircraft during the flight test by performing closed-loop guidance functions, range management, and maneuver-quality monitoring. The rapid-prototyping flight research facility is being developed at the Dryden Flight Research Facility of the NASA Ames Research Center (Ames-Dryden) to provide early flight assessment of emerging AI technology. The facility is being developed as one element of the aircraft automation program which focuses on the qualification and validation of embedded real-time AI-based systems.

Duke, Eugene L.↗
DOE OSTI2021

Learning Implicit Models of Complex Dynamical Systems From Partial Observations [Slides]

Conclusions: certain data-driven models do implicitly what physics simulations do explicitly; theoretical underpinnings in Koopman theory, delay-coordinate embeddings, and Mori-Zwanzig formalism; best approach for given system with finite data an open question; physics-informed machine learning (PIML) emerging framework for combining explicit and implicit modeling.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗
DOE OSTI2024

Experimental testing of additively manufactured embedded fiber optic smart devices for clean energy applications

Abstract An additively manufactured prototype smart device was created to investigate in-flow temperature distributions using embedded high-definition fiber optic sensors within a component for clean energy systems. The devices were created using Ultrasonic Additive Manufacturing to create a unique embedded pathway within a flow conditioner for the high-definition fiber optic sensors to be placed within. The fibers used allowed for temperature measurements to be taken every 0.65 mm along the fiber. The high-resolution fibers were thermally calibrated enable the 2D reconstruction of the temperature profile in the flow path of the structure. This is due to the temperature-related strain response of the material and strain measurements of the fibers. Hot airflow testing of these devices showed the ability to identify localized temperature differences in the flow. The observed strain response within the smart device had higher strain concentrations in the thicker web regions than in the thinner web regions. These higher strain regions resulted in higher uncertainties for the temperature responses. Further calibration is needed to improve the accuracy of the smart devices, specifically within the inner web structures of a flow straightening component. Further investigations of the devices within flow showed the temperature sensing to be independent of the effects of flow velocity. The devices were able to distinguish temperature differences within single and two-phase flow and showed local sensitivity to the temperature changes with the identification of hot and cold spots. The presented results showed the viability of the smart device for obtaining detailed temperature distributions using common industrial components. Eventually, the goal for these smart devices will be to withstand higher temperature and pressure environments such as those experienced in nuclear, fusion, and concentrated solar energy systems.

Donlan, Connor F. (ORCID:0000000223317882)↗
NASA NTRS1999

Control of a Thrust Alignment Table for Modeling the Coning Dynamics of a Spinning Spacecraft with a Follower Force

This document presents a system controlling the motion of a spherical air bearing used in the modeling of spacecraft dynamics and controls in a laboratory environment. The system is part of the Spinning Rocket Simulator (SRS), used to simulate the coning of spacecraft during a thrusting stage. The reaction force at the spherical air bearing supporting the spacecraft model must coincide with the thrust axis of the model for proper simulation. Therefore, the bearing is translated in a circular path to introduce a centrifugal force. This horizontal force along with the gravitational reaction force at the bearing combines to simulate the direction of the spacecraft's thrust force. The control system receives attitude information from the spacecraft model via a laser beam embedded in the model that impinges on a photosensitive array. The non-linear system is controlled using high-speed lookup tables and digital techniques. A vector-controlled motor and a stepper motor are given the necessary signals to accurately control the turntable and platform supporting the air bearing. Preliminary performance data is presented. Mechanical elements of the table and platform are described in detail. A wireless (RF) data path for all devices on the spacecraft model to an off-table command computer is also described.

Halsmer, Dominic↗
DOE OSTI2020

US energy system transitions under cumulative emissions budgets

Cumulative emissions budgets are increasingly being used by decision makers and analysts to understand emissions reductions and associated transitions in the context of long-term goals such as limiting global mean temperature increase over the century to 1.5 or 2°C (IPCC, 2014). While previous studies have explored the implications of cumulative emissions budgets for the global economy, few studies have conducted regional and national-level analyses (Iyer et al., 2015; Riahi et al., 2015). This paper explores cumulative emissions budgets through 2050 consistent with the 1.5 and 2°C long-term temperature goals in the context of the United States. We employ a state-level model of the United States embedded within a global human-Earth system model (GCAM-USA) to study the implications of such budgets for the U.S. energy system (Iyer et al., 2017a; Iyer et al., 2017b). Our results show that achieving the stringent cumulative emissions budgets entails accelerated deployment of energy conserving technology, almost complete decarbonization of the power sector and increased electrification of buildings and industrial end-use sectors and decarbonization of transport employing a combination of electrification and the substitution of bioenergy for fossil fuels by the mid-century. We also find substantial state-level differences in the relative roles of these decarbonization strategies. Furthermore, our results highlight that increased ambition in the near-term will be valuable in setting the stage for smoother transformations in the future to achieve stringent cumulative emissions budgets consistent with long-term temperature goals established by the international community.

Feijoo, Felipe↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

A Temporal Differential Dynamic Logic Formal Embedding

Differential dynamic logic is a formal framework to specify and reason about hybrid programs (HPs). The core of dL is a proof calculus that contains a collection of axioms and rules for the rigorous verification of properties of HPs. Recently, dL has been embedded within the theorem prover Prototype Verification System (PVS) resulting in the tool Plaidypvs2. The integration of dL into PVS expands its expressive power; user defined functions, such as trigonometric and other transcendental functions, can be used inside the dL framework, and meta-reasoning about HPs can be performed, including reasoning about entire classes of HPs, specified using dependent types in PVS. The differential temporal dynamic logic (dTL2) extends dL with temporal logic operators to reason about all the states reachable during the execution of an HP. This paper presents a work in progress focusing on embedding dTL2 in PVS as an extension of Plaidypvs. Plaidypvs is expanded with the formalization of a trace semantics for HPs, the definition of the LTL temporal operators eventually and globally, and the implementation of the proof calculus for dTL2. This new embedding has the same capabilties as Plaidypvs, which allows user defined functions and meta-reasoning of properties of HPs. To the best of the authors’ knowledge this is the first implementation of dTL2.

differential dynamic logic↗
NASA NTRS2004

[The Engineering and Technical Services Directorate at the Glenn Research Center]

My name is James Moon and I am a senior at Tennessee State University where my major is Aeronautical and Industrial Technology with a concentration in industrial electronics. I am currently serving my internship in the Engineering and Technical Services Directorate at the Glenn Research Center (GRC). The Engineering and Technical Service Directorate provides the services and infrastructure for the Glenn Research Center to take research concepts to reality. They provide a full range of integrated services including engineering, advanced prototyping and testing, facility management, and information technology for NASA, industry, and academia. Engineering and Technical Services contains the core knowledge in Information Technology (IT). This includes data systems and analysis, inter and intranet based systems design and data security. Including the design and development of embedded real-time s o h a r e applications for flight and supporting ground systems, Engineering and Technical Services provide a wide range of IT services and products specific to the Glenn Research Center research and engineering community. In the 7000 Directorate I work directly in the 7611 organization. This organization is known as the Aviation Environments Technical Branch. My mentor is Vincent Satterwhite who is also the Branch Chief of the Aviation Environments Technical Branch. In this branch, I serve as the Assistant program manager of the Engineering Technology Program. The Engineering Technology Program (ETP) is one of three components of the High School L.E.R.C.I.P. This is an Agency-sponsored, eight-week research-based apprenticeship program designed to attract traditionally underrepresented high school students that demonstrate an aptitude for and interest in mathematics, science, engineering, and technology.

Moon, James↗
DOE OSTI2024

Residential HVAC Fault Data Collection Plan – Refrigerant Undercharge and Overcharge Faults

Heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning (HVAC) systems can develop faults due to poor installation practices or gradual wear and tear, leading to decreased HVAC system’s efficiency, compromised thermal comfort, and shortened equipment lifespan (EERE, 2018). Automated fault detection and diagnosis (AFDD) technologies offer a solution by identifying energy-wasting HVAC faults, such as inadequate indoor airflow and incorrect refrigerant charge, and guiding technicians to enhance system efficiency. In the realm of residential HVAC, AFDD can be implemented through various fault detection and diagnosis capabilities, sensor configurations, and target applications. These technologies typically fall into three categories: smart diagnostic tools, original equipment manufacturer (OEM)-embedded tools, and add-on tools. Smart diagnostic tools employ temporarily installed sensors to directly measure HVAC system characteristics, while OEM-embedded tools utilize factory-installed sensors to identify faults or assess system performance. However, both these types of AFDD technologies are often only accessible for high-end HVAC equipment or require additional sensor installation by qualified technicians, resulting in high investment costs and limited applicability for low-income residential buildings. On the other hand, add-on tools rely solely on data from smart thermostats and meters to detect faults by continuously analyzing equipment runtime or energy usage. As smart thermostat and meter costs decrease and their prevalence increases, these tools can be readily deployed in low-income residential buildings. However, they possess limited capabilities as they rely solely on basic trend analysis. Enhancing such tools with advanced machine learning algorithms can significantly improve their effectiveness.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗
NASA NTRS2005

Smart Sensors' Role in Integrated System Health Management

During the last decade, there has been a major effort in the aerospace industry to reduce the cost per pond of payload and become competitive in the international market. Competition from Europe, Japan, and China has reduced this cost to almost a third from 1990 to 2000. This cost has leveled in recent years to an average price of around $12,000/pound of payload. One of NASA's goals is to promote the development of technologies to reduce this cost by a factor of 10 or more Exploration of space, specially manned exploration missions, involves very complex launch and flight vehicles, associated ground support systems, and extensive human support during all phases of the mission. When considering the Space Shuttle Program, we can see that vehicle and ground support systems' processing, operation, and maintenance represent a large percentage of the program cost and time. Reducing operating, processing and maintenance costs will greatly reduce the cost of Exploration programs. The Integrated System Health Management (ISHM) concept is one of the technologies that will help reduce these operating, processing and maintenance costs. ISHM is an integrated health monitoring system applicable to both flight and ground systems. It automatically and autonomously acquires information from sensors and actuators and processes that information using the ISHM-embedded knowledge. As a result, it establishes the health of the system based on the acquired information and its prior knowledge. When this concept is fully implemented, ISHM systems shall be able to perform failure prediction and remediation before actual hard failures occurs, preventing its costly consequences. Data sources, sensors, and their associated data acquisition systems, constitute the foundation of the system. A smart sensing architecture is required to support the acquisition of reliable, high quality data, required by the ISHM. A thorough definition of the smart sensor architectures, their embedded diagnostic agents, and communication protocols need to be established and standardized to allow the embedding and exchange of health information among sensors and ISHM. This workshop is aimed to foster the exchange of ideas and lessons learned between government, industry and academia to aid in the establishment of ISHM (and smart sensors) standards and guidelines as well as to identify present technology gaps that will have to be overcome to successfully achieve this goal.

Perotti, Jose M.↗
NASA NTRS1980

An assessment of inductive coupling roadway powered vehicles

The technical concept underlying the roadway powered vehicle system is the combination of an electrical power source embedded in the roadway and a vehicle-mounted power pickup that is inductively coupled to the roadway power source. The feasibility of such a system, implemented on a large scale was investigated. Factors considered included current and potential transportation modes and requirements, economics, energy, technology, social and institutional issues. These factors interrelate in highly complex ways, and a firm understanding of each of them does not yet exist. The study therefore was structured to manipulate known data in equally complex ways to produce a schema of options and useful questions that can form a basis for further, harder research. A dialectical inquiry technique was used in which two adversary teams, mediated by a third-party team, debated each factor and its interrelationship with the whole of the known information on the topic.

Leschly, K. O.↗
DOE OSTI2023

Analysis of phase stability and chemical segregation in the Mo-V alloys using a generalized embedded atom method potential

A new interatomic potential for the Mo-V system is introduced to facilitate the study of phase stability and mechanical properties at lower temperatures. This potential is based on a generalization of the embedded atom method and includes contributions from embedding energy, explicit two- and three-body interactions and nonlocal many-body interaction terms. The parameters of the potential are optimized by using data from ab initio density functional theory (DFT) calculations. The potential is rigorously validated across a range of physical properties, such as elastic constants, equation of states, phonon dispersion curves, point defect properties and melting temperatures for different compositions. Even though our potential is trained on a small dataset, its accuracy is comparable to available machine learning potentials for Mo and V. Furthermore, our results show that an ordered B2 phase is stable at low temperatures in alloys containing 50% V, but the solid solution phase is stable above 800 K. However, such long-range ordering is not observed in V-rich or Mo-rich alloys. In addition, our results show that V segregates to dislocation cores and grain boundaries.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2023

CoolPINNs: A physics-informed neural network modeling of active cooling in vascular systems

Emerging technologies like hypersonic aircraft, space exploration vehicles, and batteries avail fluid circulation in embedded microvasculatures for efficient thermal regulation. Modeling is vital during the design and operational phases of these engineered systems. However, many challenges exist in developing a modeling framework. What is lacking is an accurate framework that (i) captures sharp jumps in the thermal flux across complex vasculature layouts, (ii) deals with oblique derivatives (involving tangential and normal components), (iii) handles nonlinearity because of radiative heat transfer, (iv) provides a high-speed forecast for real-time monitoring, and (v) facilitates robust inverse modeling. Here, this paper addresses these challenges by availing the power of physics-informed neural networks (PINNs). We develop a fast, reliable, and accurate Scientific Machine Learning (SciML) framework for vascular-based thermal regulation—called CoolPINNs: a PINNs-based modeling framework for active cooling. The proposed mesh-less framework elegantly overcomes all the mentioned challenges. The significance of the reported research is multi-fold. First, the framework is valuable for real-time monitoring of thermal regulatory systems because of rapid forecasting. Second, researchers can address complex thermoregulation designs since the approach is meshless. Finally, the framework facilitates systematic parameter identification and inverse modeling studies, perhaps the most significant utility of the current framework.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Advanced Radiation Detectors and Detector Systems Research

Real‐time awareness of space radiation is critical for missions beyond LEO. Missions to the Moon, Mars, Near‐Earth‐Objects (NEOs), inner and outer planets, as well as other destinations in space, will require embedded instrumentation to provide feedback for “smart”, adaptive control systems. Precision instrumentation will also be needed to provide improved data for space radiation modeling and space weather forecasting and awareness. Compact instrumentation on small platforms such as CubeSats and other small space‐faring vehicles will provide a better understanding of the space radiation environment by supplying data from multiple locations in space where information is yet unknown. Compact integrable solid‐state detectors with low noise and high tolerance of operation in a radiation environment are enabled by the application of Wide Band Gap semiconductors as radiation detectors. NASA Glenn Research Center (GRC) is applying its expertise and facilities in harsh environment instrumentation to develop supporting technologies that enable improved instruments for space science missions. A variety of radiation detectors are under development, such as silicon carbide semiconductor detectors, for applications to space science, lunar prospecting, and fission power systems.

Field and particle detectors↗
DOE OSTI2021

Nematoelasticity of hybrid molecular-colloidal liquid crystals

Colloidal rods immersed in a thermotropic liquid-crystalline solvent are at the basis of so-called hybrid liquid crystals, which are characterized by tunable nematic fluidity with symmetries ranging from conventional uniaxial nematic or antinematic to orthorhombic. Here, we provide a theoretical analysis of the elastic moduli of such systems by considering interactions between the individual rods with the embedding solvent through surface-anchoring forces, as well as steric and electrostatic interactions between the rods themselves. For uniaxial systems, the presence of colloidal rods generates a marked increase of the splay elasticity, which we found to be in quantitative agreement with experimental measurements. For orthorhombic hybrid liquid crystals, we provide estimates of all 12 elastic moduli and show that only a small subset of those elastic constants play a relevant role in describing the nematoelastic properties. The complexity and possibilities related to identifying the elastic moduli in experiments are briefly discussed.

42 ENGINEERING↗