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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 775 records · Page 43
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS1993

Experimental Determination of in Situ Utilization of Lunar Regolith for Thermal Energy Storage

A Lunar Thermal Energy from Regolith (LUTHER) experiment has been designed and fabricated at the NASA Lewis Research Center to determine the feasibility of using lunar soil as thermal energy storage media. The experimental apparatus includes an alumina ceramic canister (25.4 cm diameter by 45.7 cm length) which contains simulated lunar regolith, a heater (either radiative or conductive), 9 heat shields, a heat transfer cold jacket, and 19 type B platinum rhodium thermocouples. The simulated lunar regolith is a basalt, mined and processed by the University of Minnesota, that closely resembles the lunar basalt returned to earth by the Apollo missions. The experiment will test the effects of vacuum, particle size, and density on the thermophysical properties of the regolith. The properties include melt temperature (range), specific heat, thermal conductivity, and latent heat of storage. Two separate tests, using two different heaters, will be performed to study the effect of heating the system using radiative and conductive heat transfer. The physical characteristics of the melt pattern, material compatibility of the molten regolith, and the volatile gas emission will be investigated by heating a portion of the lunar regolith to its melting temperature (1435 K) in a 10(exp -4) pascal vacuum chamber, equipped with a gas spectrum analyzer. A finite differencing SINDA model was developed at NASA Lewis Research Center to predict the performance of the LUTHER experiment. The analytical results of the code will be compared with the experimental data generated by the LUTHER experiment. The code will predict the effects of vacuum, particle size, and density has on the heat transfer to the simulated regolith.

Richter, Scott W.↗
NASA NTRS2010

Identifying Aerosol Type/Mixture from Aerosol Absorption Properties Using AERONET

Aerosols are generated in the atmosphere through anthropogenic and natural mechanisms. These sources have signatures in the aerosol optical and microphysical properties that can be used to identify the aerosol type/mixture. Spectral aerosol absorption information (absorption Angstrom exponent; AAE) used in conjunction with the particle size parameterization (extinction Angstrom exponent; EAE) can only identify the dominant absorbing aerosol type in the sample volume (e.g., black carbon vs. iron oxides in dust). This AAE/EAE relationship can be expanded to also identify non-absorbing aerosol types/mixtures by applying an absorption weighting. This new relationship provides improved aerosol type distinction when the magnitude of absorption is not equal (e.g, black carbon vs. sulfates). The Aerosol Robotic Network (AERONET) data provide spectral aerosol optical depth and single scattering albedo - key parameters used to determine EAE and AAE. The proposed aerosol type/mixture relationship is demonstrated using the long-term data archive acquired at AERONET sites within various source regions. The preliminary analysis has found that dust, sulfate, organic carbon, and black carbon aerosol types/mixtures can be determined from this AAE/EAE relationship when applying the absorption weighting for each available wavelength (Le., 440, 675, 870nm). Large, non-spherical dust particles absorb in the shorter wavelengths and the application of 440nm wavelength absorption weighting produced the best particle type definition. Sulfate particles scatter light efficiently and organic carbon particles are small near the source and aggregate over time to form larger less absorbing particles. Both sulfates and organic carbon showed generally better definition using the 870nm wavelength absorption weighting. Black carbon generation results from varying combustion rates from a number of sources including industrial processes and biomass burning. Cases with primarily black carbon showed improved definition in the 870nm wavelength absorption weighting due to the increased absorption in the near-infrared wavelengths, while the 440nm wavelength provided better definition when black carbon mixed with dust. Utilization of this particle type scheme provides necessary information for remote sensing applications, which needs a priori knowledge of aerosol type to model the retrieved properties especially over semi-bright surfaces. In fact, this analysis reveals that the aerosol types occurred in mixtures with varying magnitudes of absorption and requires the use of more than one assumed aerosol mixture model. Furthermore, this technique will provide the aerosol transport model community a data set for validating aerosol type.

Giles, D. M.↗
NASA NTRS2008

Preliminary Examination of the Interstellar Collector of Stardust

The findings of the Stardust spacecraft mission returned to earth in January 2006 are discussed. The spacecraft returned two unprecedented and independent extraterrestrial samples: the first sample of a comet and the first samples of contemporary interstellar dust. An important lesson from the cometary Preliminary Examination (PE) was that the Stardust cometary samples in aerogel presented a technical challenge. Captured particles often separate into multiple fragments, intimately mix with aerogel and are typically buried hundreds of microns to millimeters deep in the aerogel collectors. The interstellar dust samples are likely much more challenging since they are expected to be orders of magnitudes smaller in mass, and their fluence is two orders of magnitude smaller than that of the cometary particles. The goal of the Stardust Interstellar Preliminary Examination (ISPE) is to answer several broad questions, including: which features in the interstellar collector aerogel were generated by hypervelocity impact and how much morphological and trajectory information may be gained?; how well resolved are the trajectories of probable interstellar particles from those of interplanetary origin?; and, by comparison to impacts by known particle dimensions in laboratory experiments, what was the mass distribution of the impacting particles? To answer these questions, and others, non-destructive, sequential, non-invasive analyses of interstellar dust candidates extracted from the Stardust interstellar tray will be performed. The total duration of the ISPE will be three years and will differ from the Stardust cometary PE in that data acquisition for the initial characterization stage will be prolonged and will continue simultaneously and parallel with data publications and release of the first samples for further investigation.

Westphal, A. J.↗
NASA NTRS2006

Generalized Orbital Projections of a Sublimating Ice Particle

The issue of orbital debris resulting from human activities in space is a growing concern for the space users' community. Waste generated in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) can stay in orbit for a long time, creating significant hazards for other spacecraft flying at lower intercepting orbits. Many spacecraft, especially crewed vehicles, are required to vent fluids into space. These fluids include propellant, wastewater, excess condensate, and others. It is important to analyze the behavior of particles that result from these activities, since each individual particle is capable of damaging or destroying a spacecraft in a lower, crossing orbit, and such particles are invisible to tracking radar systems on the ground. The deorbit trajectory of an ice particle is complex. It depends on factors including attitude of the vehicle during vent, initial velocities of particles, altitude at which the vent occurred, and numerous evaporation and sublimation factors. These include contamination within the vented water, evolution of bubbles within the clear water, and sun flux factors such as time of the year and current beta angle. The purpose of this study is to examine the influences of these factors on the trajectories of ice particles resulting from condensate water dumps, and to bound the safe trajectories of spacecraft that lie below the venting spacecraft.

Menkin, Evgeny↗
NASA NTRS1971

Biodetection grinder

Work on a biodetection grinder is summarized. It includes development of the prototype grinder, second generation grinder, and the production version of the grinder. Tests showed the particle size distribution was satisfactory and biological evaluation confirmed the tests.

Shaia, C. D.↗
NASA NTRS1971

Optical and high frequency electrical properties of the lunar sample

Reflectivity and polarization laws for the powder sample and its spectrum are close to the mean for the lunar maria. Solid samples show a marked absorption feature at 1 micron. The low albedo appears to be due to a surface coating on dust grains rather than volume absorption. The high frequency electrical properties resemble those of a fine powder made from typical dense terrestrial rocks, and are consistent with previous ground-based radar estimates. The differential mass spectrum is almost constant from 100 micron particles down to 0.1 micron; most particles are smaller than 0.3 micron. Their shapes disclose a variety of generation processes.

Gold, T.↗
NASA NTRS1973

The formation of planetesimals.

Four stages in the accretion of planetesimals are described. The initial stage is the condensation of dust particles from the gaseous solar nebula as it cools. These dust particles settle into a thin disk which is gravitationally unstable. A first generation of planetesimals, whose radii range up to about 0.1 km, form from the dust disk by direct gravitational collapse to solid densities on a time scale of the order of 1 year. The resulting disk, composed of first-generation planetesimals, is still gravitationally unstable, and the planetesimals are grouped into clusters containing approximately 10,000 members. The contraction of these clusters is controlled by the rate at which gas drag damps their internal rotational and random kinetic energies. On a time scale of a few thousand years, the clusters contract to form a second generation of planetesimals having radii of the order of 5 km. Further coalescence of planetesimals proceeds by direct collisions which seem capable of producing growth at a rate of the order of 15 cm per year at 1 AU.

Goldreich, P.↗
NASA NTRS1979

Magnetospheric plasma waves

Space measurements have provided a wealth of data on wave phenomena, plasma parameters, and energetic particle characteristics within the earth's magnetosphere. In the present paper, the generation, propagation, and interaction of plasma waves are discussed, along with the interpretation of the observations. Data on plasma waves from other planetary magnetospheres and cosmic plasma systems are examined and interpreted by analogy to the earth's magnetosphere. Areas requiring continued plasma wave research are indicated.

Shawhan, S. D.↗
NASA NTRS1983

The Jovian magnetosphere

Research on Jovian magnetospheric physics from 1979 through 1982 is surveyed, with a focus on the observations of Voyagers 1 and 2. Jovian fields and plasmas are characterized in the order of their distance from the planet, and special emphasis is given to the Io plasma torus (IPT) in the 4.9-8-Jovian-radius region and to the extended Jovian magnetotail. Topics reviewed include synchrotron radiation, magnetic-field models, Na and S emissions in the IPT, aurora, the magnetic-anomaly model, IPT plasma diffusion-convection, Io-generated Alfven wave, plasma configuration beyond the IPT, low-energy charged particles, cosmic-ray-energy particles, particle acceleration, magnetic configuration, tail current sheet and plasma disc, magnetopause and magnetosheath, interplanetary ions of Jovian origin, and the Jovian magnetosphere at Saturnian distances.

Birmingham, T. J.↗
NASA NTRS1991

Hypervelocity Impact Physics

All large spacecraft are susceptible to impacts by meteoroids and orbiting space debris. These impacts occur at extremely high speed and can damage flight-critical systems, which can in turn lead to a catastrophic failure of the spacecraft. Therefore, the design of a spacecraft for a long-duration mission must take into account the possibility of such impacts and their effects on the spacecraft structure and on all of its exposed subsystems components. The work performed under the contract consisted of applied research on the effects of meteoroid/space debris impacts on candidate materials, design configurations, and support mechanisms of long term space vehicles. Hypervelocity impact mechanics was used to analyze the damage that occurs when a space vehicle is impacted by a micrometeoroid or a space debris particle. An impact analysis of over 500 test specimens was performed to generate by a hypervelocity impact damage database.

William P Schonberg↗
NASA NTRS1991

Planar imaging of the mixing characteristics of a multi-element triplet injector

Planar light scattering has been used to investigate the turbulent mixing in a multi-element triplet injector at mixture ratio conditions typical of liquid rocket engine gas generators. Experiments were conducted at atmospheric pressure using air seeded with smoke particles to simulate the oxidizer flow and unseeded air to simulate the fuel. Data sets of 200 images (containing 122,000 simultaneous measurements each) of the instantaneous distribution of the scattered light were acquired at several positions throughout the flow. These images have been processed digitally to produce local distributions of the average and rms fluctuation of the mixture fraction. In addition, the spatial autocorrelation of the images has been calculated and analyzed to determine a mean length scale related to the large scale structures in the flow.

Makel, D. B.↗
NASA NTRS1992

The origin of complex organic ions in the coma of Comet Halley

The Giotto-PICCA instrument has obtained heavy-ion mass spectra in the inner coma of Comet Halley; the spectra exhibit a series of distinct mass groups separated by a constant about 15 amu, and extending to at least 120 amu, whose pattern is typical of CHON molecules. It is found that neither coma gas-phase chemistry nor UV photon, solar wind particle, or cosmic irradiation of the nucleus in its current orbit can generate enough heavy molecules to account for the PICCA abundances. It is suggested that these abundances may be supplied by UV and cosmic irradiation of the icy, precometary grains within interstellar molecular clouds and/or the protosolar nebula.

Mitchell, D. L.↗
NASA NTRS1992

Large-scale microwave anisotropy from gravitating seeds

Topological defects could have seeded primordial inhomogeneities in cosmological matter. We examine the horizon-scale matter and geometry perturbations generated by such seeds in an expanding homogeneous and isotropic universe. Evolving particle horizons generally lead to perturbations around motionless seeds, even when there are compensating initial underdensities in the matter. We describe the pattern of the resulting large angular scale microwave anisotropy.

Veeraraghavan, Shoba↗
NASA NTRS2005

Support for the Harvard University Water Vapor and Total Water Instruments for the 2004 NASA WB57 Middle Latitude Cirrus Experiment

In order to improve our understanding of the role clouds play in the climate system, NASA is investing considerable effort in characterizing clouds with instruments ranging from passive remote sensors on board the EOS platforms, to the forthcoming active remote sensors on Cloudsat and Calipso. These missions, when taken together, have the capacity to advance our understanding of the coupling between various components of the hydrologic cycle and the atmospheric circulation, and hold the additional potential of leading to significant improvements in the characterization of cloud feedbacks in global models. This is especially true considering that several of these platforms will be flown in an identical orbit within several minutes of one another-a constellation of satellites known as the A-Train. The algorithms that are being implemented and developed to convert these new data streams from radiance and reflectivity measurements into geophysical parameters invariably rely on some set of simplifymg assumptions and empirical constants. Uncertainties in these relationships lead to poorly understood random and systematic errors in the retrieved properties. This lack of understanding introduces ambiguity in interpreting the data and in using the global data sets for their intended purposes. In light of this, a series of flights with the W57F was proposed to address certain specific issues related to the basic properties of mid latitude cirrus clouds: the NASA WE357 Middle Latitude Cirrus Experiment ("MidCiX"). The science questions addressed are: 1) Can cloud property retrieval algorithms developed for A-Train active and passive remote sensing measurements accurately characterize the microphysical properties of synoptic and convectively generated cirrus cloud systems? 2) What are the relationships between the cirrus particle mass, projected area, and particle size spectrum in various genre of cirrus clouds? 3) Does the present compliment of state of the art in situ cloud probes provide the level of precision and accuracy needed to develop and validate algorithms and to contribute to our understanding of the characteristics and microphysical processes operating in cirrus clouds?

Anderson, James G.↗
NASA NTRS2011

Generation and Evaluation of Lunar Dust Adhesion Mitigating Materials

Particulate contamination is of concern in a variety of environments. This issue is especially important in confined spaces with highly controlled atmospheres such as space exploration vehicles involved in extraterrestrial surface missions. Lunar dust was a significant challenge for the Apollo astronauts and will be of greater concern for longer duration, future missions. Passive mitigation strategies, those not requiring external energy, may decrease some of these concerns, and have been investigated in this work. A myriad of approaches to modify the surface chemistry and topography of a variety of substrates was investigated. These involved generation of novel materials, photolithographic techniques, and other template approaches. Additionally, single particle and multiple particle methods to quantitatively evaluate the particle-substrate adhesion interactions were developed.

Wohl, Christopher J.↗
NASA NTRS2016

Scattering of Gaussian Beams by Disordered Particulate Media

A frequently observed characteristic of electromagnetic scattering by a disordered particulate medium is the absence of pronounced speckles in angular patterns of the scattered light. It is known that such diffuse speckle-free scattering patterns can be caused by averaging over randomly changing particle positions and/or over a finite spectral range. To get further insight into the possible physical causes of the absence of speckles, we use the numerically exact superposition T-matrix solver of the Maxwell equations and analyze the scattering of plane-wave and Gaussian beams by representative multi-sphere groups. We show that phase and amplitude variations across an incident Gaussian beam do not serve to extinguish the pronounced speckle pattern typical of plane-wave illumination of a fixed multi-particle group. Averaging over random particle positions and/or over a finite spectral range is still required to generate the classical diffuse speckle-free regime.

radiative transfer theory↗
NASA NTRS2018

Li-ion 18650 Thermal Runaway Particulate Analysis

Three types of atmospheres were tested for their effects on the particulates generated in a lithium ion (Li-ion) battery thermal runaway. Normal laboratory air (Ambient), a mixture of 23.5% O2/76.5% N2 meant to simulate the atmosphere on the International Space Station (ISS), and Vacuum environments were tested. Samsung 26F 18650 cells were driven to thermal runaway using heater tape, and the resultant particulates were collected analyzed using SEM/EDX, FTIR, GCMS, as well as conductivity and magnetic probes. All three conditions generated dense black particulate films composed of very fine carbon and metal particles. These films, however, were not very conductive, though individual particulates would be, and the particles demonstrated weak paramagnetism. FTIR and GCMS identified a substantial amount of volatile components in the particulate films, both organic partial combustion products, but also electrolyte salt products.

Nemanick, E. Joseph↗