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At least 91 records · Page 5

A Census of X-ray Gas in NGC 1068: Results From 450 ks of CHANDRA High Energy Transmisson Grating Observations

We present models for the X-ray spectrum of the Seyfert 2 galaxy NGC 1068. These are fitted to data obtained using the High Energy Transmission Grating on Chandra. The data show line and radiative recombination continuum emission from a broad range of ions and elements. The models explore the importance of excitation processes for these lines including photoionization followed by recombination, radiative excitation by absorption of continuum radiation, and inner shell fluorescence. The models show that the relative importance of these processes depends on the conditions in the emitting gas and that no single emitting component can fit the entire spectrum. In particular, the relative importance of radiative excitation and photoionization/recombination differs according to the element and ion stage emitting the line. This in turn implies a diversity of values for the ionization parameter of the various components of gas responsible for the emission, ranging from log(E ) = 1 to 3. Using this, we obtain an estimate for the total amount of gas responsible for the observed emission. The mass flux through the region included in the HETG extraction region is approximately 0.3M/yr, assuming ordered flow at the speed characterizing the line widths. This can be compared with what is known about this object from other techniques.

galaxies: Seyfert↗

Cooling Strategies for an Electric Motor with Additively Manufactured Hollow Conductors and Distributed Power Electronics Integrated with Heat Pipes

This paper discusses design tradeoffs and thermal modeling explored in cooling strategies for an aircraft propulsion electric motor with additively manufactured coils and distributed power electronics integrated with heat pipes. Design tradeoffs include heat pipe Qmax performance related to inclination, condenser configuration, coolant type, coolant flow path complexity, and ease of access to modular power electronics. Three cooling strategies were selected and realized into CAD models. These models were further evaluated using 3D thermal FEA and optimization tools to explore cooling geometry details that include fin thickness, spacing and count with the objective to minimize fin mass under a set of constraints. Lastly, motorette test data is presented comparing air versus liquid cooling of heat pipes.

additive manufacturing↗

RODeO (Revenue Operation and Device Optimization Model) [SWR 20-67]

The Revenue, Operation, and Device Optimization (RODeO) model explores optimal system design and operation considering different levels of grid integration, equipment cost, operating limitations, financing, and credits and incentives. RODeO is a price-taker model formulated as a mixed-integer linear programming (MILP) model in the GAMS modeling platform. The objective is to maximizes the net revenue for a collection of equipment at a given site. The equipment includes generators (e.g., gas turbine, steam turbine, solar, wind, hydro, fuel cells, etc.), storage systems (batteries, pumped hydro, gas-fired compressed air energy storage, long-duration systems, hydrogen), and flexible loads (e.g., electric vehicles, electrolyzers, flexible building loads). The input data required by RODeO can be classified into three bins: 1) utility service data, which refers to retail utility rate information (meter cost, energy and demand charges), 2) electricity market data, which include energy and reserve prices, 3) other inputs, which refer to additional electrical demand, product output demand, technological assumptions, financial properties, and operational parameters.

Guerra Fernandez, Omar Jose↗

Closing the Loops on Solar Photovoltaics Modules: An Agent-Based Modeling Approach for the Study of Circular Economy Strategies

Solar photovoltaics (PV) installed capacity have grown exponentially since the early 2000s (average annual growth rate of 50%). With 4,700 GW projected installed capacity by 2050, the volume of PV panels waste is also expected to become substantial. Though renewables are a sine qua non to the establishment of a truly circular economy (CE), the issue arising from their end-of-life management needs to be resolved. The management of PV end-of-life also represent a singular opportunity to create value, from recovered valuable, rare or critical materials (e.g. silver, tellurium, indium). Moreover, the PV case illustrates some of the current barriers to CE; for instance, the need for a common definition of waste (PV are defined as e-waste in the European Union but as general waste in the United States) and potential loss of innovations' advantages (PV average efficiency has continuously grown the past 10 years). In this study, an agent-based modeling (ABM) approach is proposed to simulate PV end-of-life management in the United States. The model explores how the decisions of the various actors involved in handling PV waste affect the quantities of PV that are reused, recycled, or land-filled. In the model, manufacturers, residential, and nonresidential PV owners, installers, and recyclers are represented by agents while governmental policies and regulations are treated as exogenous variables. PV-market data are used to define agents' characteristics (e.g., installed PV capacities or producing costs). Agents' decision rules draw on the literature related to industrial symbiosis (IS) and peoples' waste behaviors as they appear as the most widely used model to implement CE principles at a meso level. Specifically, the concepts of mutual trust between IS actors and knowledge about the IS philosophy are yielded to define the agents' decision process. The primary outputs of the ABM are the costs and volume of waste associated with each end-of-life pathway. Preliminaries results indicate recycling of residential PV is affected by the cost, perceived difficulty of recycling behaviors, and social norms. Moreover, the type of network connecting agents and the initial recycling rate strongly influence results. The model also highlights the crucial role of recycling behavior adoption: in case of early failure of PV, recycled volumes increase by about 40%. This represents an additional 5.7 billion USD from potential recovered silver. Finally, although results for the PV case are presented here, the developed ABM aims at being a general tool for the study of CE strategies and the CE transition. Furthermore, steps of this research include extending the model to encompass circular economy strategies (e.g., design for recycling or lifetime extension) and validating its general architecture from various case studies.

14 SOLAR ENERGY↗

Charging-management And Infrastructure-planning (cmip) Model

CMIP model explores various charging infrastructure network designs to serve a free-floating car-sharing fleet and determine the charging downtime experienced by the fleet for each design. Development of the CMIP model had two major steps: (1) describing modeling assumptions and (2) developing an integer program (IP) that jointly optimizes decisions about locations to install DC fast chargers and EV-to-charger assignments. The CMIP model integrates an EV charging model, EV energy consumption model, and heterogeneous, real-world vehicle use data with an integer programming optimization model to identify optimal location of new charging stations and calculate vehicle downtime for charging. The CMIP model can be applied to understand: (a) the reduction of EV fleet downtime if an additional fast-charging station is added to the current infrastructure and (b) to what extent total vehicle downtime would be sensitive to additional charging infrastructure.

Roni, MohammadS↗

Large-eddy simulation of compressible turbulence

The increase in the range of length scales with increasing Reynolds number limits the direct simulation of turbulent flows to relatively simple geometries and low Reynolds numbers. However, since most flows of engineering interest occur at much higher Reynolds number than is currently within the capabilities of full simulation, prediction of these flow fields can only be obtained by solving some suitably-averaged set of governing equations. In the traditional Reynolds-averaged approach, the Navier-Stokes equations are averaged over time. This in turn yields correlations between various turbulence fluctuations. It is these terms, e.g. the Reynolds stresses, for which a turbulence model must be derived. Turbulence modeling of incompressible flows has received a great amount of attention in the literature. An area of research that has received comparatively less attention is the modeling of compressible turbulent flows. An approach to simulating compressible turbulence at high Reynolds numbers is through the use of Large-Eddy Simulation (LES). In LES the dependent variables are decomposed into a large-scale (resolved) component and a sub-grid scale component. It is the small-scale components of the velocity field which are presumably more homogeneous than the large scales and, therefore, more easily modeled. Thus, it seems plausible that simpler models, which should be more universal in character than those employed in second-order closure schemes, may be developed for LES of compressible turbulence. The objective of the present research, therefore, is to explore models for the Large-Eddy Simulation of compressible turbulent flows. Given the recent successes of Zeman in second order closure modeling of compressible turbulence, model development was guided by principals employed in second-order closures.

Squires, Kyle D.↗

Constraining particle acceleration in Sgr A? with simultaneous GRAVITY, Spitzer, NuSTAR, and Chandra observations

We report the time-resolved spectral analysis of a bright near-infrared and moderate X-ray flare of Sgr A⋆. We obtained light curves in the M, K, and H bands in the mid- and near-infrared and in the 2 − 8 keV and 2 − 70 keV bands in the X-ray. The observed spectral slope in the near-infrared band is νLν ∝ ν0.5 ± 0.2; the spectral slope observed in the X-ray band is νLν ∝ ν−0.7 ± 0.5. Using a fast numerical implementation of a synchrotron sphere with a constant radius, magnetic field, and electron density (i.e., a one-zone model), we tested various synchrotron and synchrotron self-Compton scenarios. The observed near-infrared brightness and X-ray faintness, together with the observed spectral slopes, pose challenges for all models explored. We rule out a scenario in which the near-infrared emission is synchrotron emission and the X-ray emission is synchrotron self-Compton. Two realizations of the one-zone model can explain the observed flare and its temporal correlation: one-zone model in which the near-infrared and X-ray luminosity are produced by synchrotron self-Compton and a model in which the luminosity stems from a cooled synchrotron spectrum. Both models can describe the mean spectral energy distribution (SED) and temporal evolution similarly well. In order to describe the mean SED, both models require specific values of the maximum Lorentz factor γmax, which differ by roughly two orders of magnitude. The synchrotron self-Compton model suggests that electrons are accelerated to γmax ∼ 500, while cooled synchrotron model requires acceleration up to γmax ∼ 5 × 104. The synchrotron self-Compton scenario requires electron densities of 1010 cm−3 that are much larger than typical ambient densities in the accretion flow. Furthermore, it requires a variation of the particle density that is inconsistent with the average mass-flow rate inferred from polarization measurements and can therefore only be realized in an extraordinary accretion event. In contrast, assuming a source size of 1 RS, the cooled synchrotron scenario can be realized with densities and magnetic fields comparable with the ambient accretion flow. For both models, the temporal evolution is regulated through the maximum acceleration factor γmax, implying that sustained particle acceleration is required to explain at least a part of the temporal evolution of the flare.

R. Abuter↗

High-Fidelity Modeling Approach for Coupling Thermal, Fluid, and Neutronic Analysis in an NTP Engine

Nuclear thermal propulsion (NTP), with its increased efficiency compared to traditional rocket engines, is a potentially enabling technology for space missions of higher complexity, such as delivering heavy machinery or crew to the moon or other planets. Thus, exploring modeling approaches that can effectively couple the thermal, fluid, and neutronic behaviors of NTP reactors is essential to mitigate cost and schedule challenges with hardware development. This paper details one such approach which utilizes Cardinal to unify reactor physics analysis performed using OpenMC, heat transfer analysis performed using the MOOSE framework, and thermal hydraulic analysis performed using the MOOSE Thermal Hydraulic Module. This approach is demonstrated with a proof of concept that focuses on a legacy reactor geometry from the historic NERVA program. This preliminary model found an overprediction in, when compared to the reference data, axial power peaking and the temperatures of both solids and fluids by roughly 20%. It is clear, however, that the model conserved a number of broad trends, and a few model refinements should reduce the observed error. This approach has definite merit and should enable the production of informative results for more modern NTP systems. This work is a first step in creating a transient reactor model that can be updated across a sequence of time steps based on continually fluctuating, time-dependent boundary conditions.

Nuclear Thermal Propulsion↗

Rejection Sampling with Autodifferentiation -- Case study: Fitting a Hadronization Model

We present an autodifferentiable rejection sampling algorithm termed Rejection Sampling with Autodifferentiation (RSA). In conjunction with reweighting, we show that RSA can be used for efficient parameter estimation and model exploration. Additionally, this approach facilitates the use of unbinned machine-learning-based observables, allowing for more precise, data-driven fits. To showcase these capabilities, we apply an RSA-based parameter fit to a simplified hadronization model.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗

Solid Modeling of Crew Exploration Vehicle Structure Concepts for Mass Optimization

Parametric solid and surface models of the crew exploration vehicle (CEV) command module (CM) structure concepts are developed for rapid finite element analyses, structural sizing and estimation of optimal structural mass. The effects of the structural configuration and critical design parameters on the stress distribution are visualized, examined to arrive at an efficient design. The CM structural components consisted of the outer heat shield, inner pressurized crew cabin, ring bulkhead and spars. For this study only the internal cabin pressure load case is considered. Component stress, deflection, margins of safety and mass are used as design goodness criteria. The design scenario is explored by changing the component thickness parameters and materials until an acceptable design is achieved. Aluminum alloy, titanium alloy and an advanced composite material properties are considered for the stress analysis and the results are compared as a part of lessons learned and to build up a structural component sizing knowledge base for the future CEV technology support. This independent structural analysis and the design scenario based optimization process may also facilitate better CM structural definition and rapid prototyping.

Mukhopadhyay, Vivek↗

Sequentially calibrating a Bayesian microsimulation model to incorporate new information and assumptions

Background: Microsimulation models are mathematical models that simulate event histories for individual members of a population. They are useful for policy decisions because they simulate a large number of individuals from an idealized population, with features that change over time, and the resulting event histories can be summarized to describe key population-level outcomes. Model calibration is the process of incorporating evidence into the model. Calibrated models can be used to make predictions about population trends in disease outcomes and effectiveness of interventions, but calibration can be challenging and computationally expensive. Methods: This paper develops a technique for sequentially updating models to take full advantage of earlier calibration results, to ultimately speed up the calibration process. A Bayesian approach to calibration is used because it combines different sources of evidence and enables uncertainty quantification which is appealing for decision-making. We develop this method in order to re-calibrate a microsimulation model for the natural history of colorectal cancer to include new targets that better inform the time from initiation of preclinical cancer to presentation with clinical cancer (sojourn time), because model exploration and validation revealed that more information was needed on sojourn time, and that the predicted percentage of patients with cancers detected via colonoscopy screening was too low. Results: The sequential approach to calibration was more efficient than recalibrating the model from scratch. Incorporating new information on the percentage of patients with cancers detected upon screening changed the estimated sojourn time parameters significantly, increasing the estimated mean sojourn time for cancers in the colon and rectum, providing results with more validity. Conclusions: A sequential approach to recalibration can be used to efficiently recalibrate a microsimulation model when new information becomes available that requires the original targets to be supplemented with additional targets.

60 APPLIED LIFE SCIENCES↗

Integrated Modeling and Development of Component-Based Embedded Software in Scala

Programming of embedded systems is challenging due to the low-level design patterns normally applied in the implementation of such systems. Furthermore, programming languages normally considered suitable for this level of programming, such as C and C++, are themselves low-level compared to more modern programming languages. We report on an effort exploring modeling and programming of embedded systems in modern high-level programming languages combining object-oriented and functional programming. We present an integration of four separate internal DSLs (libraries), considered useful for embedded program- ming, in the Scala programming language, for programming and testing component-based systems. These include a DSL for defining components and their connections, and a DSL for programming the individual components as hierarchical state machines. Two additional DSLs support testing, and include a DSL for writing temporal logic flavored test oracles for monitoring program executions, and a DSL for rule-based test input generation. The paper discusses the gap between Scala as used here and the needs for embedded systems programming.

Bocchino, Robert↗

Explaining and predicting human behavior and social dynamics in simulated virtual worlds: reproducibility, generalizability, and robustness of causal discovery methods

Ground Truth program was designed to evaluate social science modeling approaches using simulation test beds with ground truth intentionally and systematically embedded to understand and model complex Human Domain systems and their dynamics Lazer et al. (Science 369:1060–1062, 2020). Our multidisciplinary team of data scientists, statisticians, experts in Artificial Intelligence (AI) and visual analytics had a unique role on the program to investigate accuracy, reproducibility, generalizability, and robustness of the state-of-the-art (SOTA) causal structure learning approaches applied to fully observed and sampled simulated data across virtual worlds. In addition, we analyzed the feasibility of using machine learning models to predict future social behavior with and without causal knowledge explicitly embedded. In this paper, we first present our causal modeling approach to discover the causal structure of four virtual worlds produced by the simulation teams—Urban Life, Financial Governance, Disaster and Geopolitical Conflict. Our approach adapts the state-of-the-art causal discovery (including ensemble models), machine learning, data analytics, and visualization techniques to allow a human-machine team to reverse-engineer the true causal relations from sampled and fully observed data. We next present our reproducibility analysis of two research methods team’s performance using a range of causal discovery models applied to both sampled and fully observed data, and analyze their effectiveness and limitations. We further investigate the generalizability and robustness to sampling of the SOTA causal discovery approaches on additional simulated datasets with known ground truth. Our results reveal the limitations of existing causal modeling approaches when applied to large-scale, noisy, high-dimensional data with unobserved variables and unknown relationships between them. We show that the SOTA causal models explored in our experiments are not designed to take advantage from vasts amounts of data and have difficulty recovering ground truth when latent confounders are present; they do not generalize well across simulation scenarios and are not robust to sampling; they are vulnerable to data and modeling assumptions, and therefore, the results are hard to reproduce. Finally, when we outline lessons learned and provide recommendations to improve models for causal discovery and prediction of human social behavior from observational data, we highlight the importance of learning data to knowledge representations or transformations to improve causal discovery and describe the benefit of causal feature selection for predictive and prescriptive modeling.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗

Turbulent transport modelling of separating and reattaching shear flows

The improvement of capabilities for computer simulation of turbulent recirculating flows was investigated. Attention has been limited to two dimensional flows and principally to statistically stationary motion. Improvement of turbulence modeling explored the treatment of the near wall sublayer and of the exterior fully turbulent region, working within the framework of turbulence closures requiring the solution of transport equations for the turbulence energy and its dissipation rate. The work on the numerical procedure, based on the Gosman-Pun program TEACH, addressed the problems of incorporating the turbulence model as well as the extension to time dependent flows, the incorporation of a third order approximation of convective transport, and the treatment of non-orthogonal boundaries.

Launder, B. E.↗

Technoeconomic Opportunity Analysis for Local Power Generation in Falls City, Nebraska

Falls City is a small community in Nebraska interested in understanding how energy from local energy systems could support the community's economic development planning. To address the current community needs and address the future energy demand technical assistance conducted through the Communities Local Energy Action Program (Communities LEAP) assessed the technical and economic opportunities of adding energy technologies to Falls City's municipally owned and operated electric utility system. The modeling performed considered the technical and economic feasibility of technologies using the System Advisor Model (SAM). The modeling explored three technology configurations using multiple years of historical weather and wholesale cost data (2015-2022 & a typical meteorological year), and two different wholesale escalation rates (0.3% and 2.5%). Wholesale energy prices were based on the Southwest Power Pool's (SPP) real-time energy market and the annual escalation rates of these rates based on historical SPP wholesale and national retail electricity price trends. Results from the modeling showed that at current CAPEX costs and SPP wholesale electricity costs no technology combination averaged across the scenarios run provide a positive net present value (NPV). External financial support, changes in market conditions, and additional revenue streams would help create more economically favorable projects. As conditions change re-evaluation may be necessary.

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗

Modeling Phase-Aligned Gamma-Ray and Radio Millisecond Pulsar Light Curves

Since the discovery of the first eight gamma-ray millisecond pulsars (MSPs) by the Fermi Large Area Telescope, this population has been steadily expanding. Four of the more recent detections, PSR J00340534, PSR J1939+2134 (B1937+21; the first MSP ever discovered), PSR J1959+2048 (B1957+20; the first discovery of a black widow system), and PSR J2214+3000, exhibit a phenomenon not present in the original discoveries: nearly phase-aligned radio and gamma-ray light curves (LCs). To account for the phase alignment, we explore models where both the radio and gamma-ray emission originate either in the outer magnetosphere near the light cylinder or near the polar caps. Using a Markov Chain Monte Carlo technique to search for best-fit model parameters, we obtain reasonable LC fits for the first three of these MSPs in the context of altitude-limited outer gap (alOG) and two-pole caustic (alTPC) geometries (for both gamma-ray and radio emission). These models differ from the standard outer gap (OG)/two-pole caustic (TPC) models in two respects: the radio emission originates in caustics at relatively high altitudes compared to the usual conal radio beams, and we allow both the minimum and maximum altitudes of the gamma-ray and radio emission regions to vary within a limited range (excluding the minimum gamma-ray altitude of the alTPC model, which is kept constant at the stellar radius, and that of the alOG model, which is set to the position-dependent null charge surface altitude). Alternatively, phase-aligned solutions also exist for emission originating near the stellar surface in a slot gap scenario (low-altitude slot gap (laSG) models). We find that the alTPC models provide slightly better LC fits than the alOG models, and both of these give better fits than the laSG models (for the limited range of parameters considered in the case of the laSG models). Thus, our fits imply that the phase-aligned LCs are likely of caustic origin, produced in the outer magnetosphere, and that the radio emission for these pulsars may come from close to the light cylinder. In addition, we were able to constrain the minimum and maximum emission altitudes with typical uncertainties of 30% of the light cylinder radius. Our results therefore describe a third gamma-ray MSP subclass, in addition to the two previously found by Venter et al.: those with LCs fit by standard OG/TPC models and those with LCs fit by pair-starved polar cap models.

Venter, C.↗

Narrow-Channel, Fluidized Beds for Effective Particle Thermal Energy Transport and Storage

Colorado School of Mines (Mines) led this program in collaboration with Sandia National Laboratories (Sandia) to characterize narrow-channel fluidized beds of aluminosilicate particles – supplied by Carbo Ceramics – as a means for releasing high-temperature thermal energy in particle heat exchangers and for capturing concentrated solar energy in indirect particle receivers. Single-channel, heat transfer experiments at Mines and reduced-order 1-D models and 3-D two-fluid, CFD models explored many aspects of counterflow, bubbling fluidized beds (net downward particle flow and upward gas flow) for enhancing particle-wall heat transfer at elevated temperatures. Results at Mines on single-channel test sections consistently showed that mild bubbling fluidization increases particle-wall heat transfer coefficients (h T,w ) regularly by more than 4.0x over h T,w values without fluidization at similar conditions (mean particle diameter d p , bed depth Δz b , and bed particle temperatures T p ). Insights from lab-scale tests and modeling studies provided Nusselt number correlations for h T,w and informed the design and fabrication (by Vacuum Process Engineering) of a nominal 40-kWth, particle-sCO 2 plate heat exchanger (HX) with 12 parallel narrow-channel, fluidized beds bounded by stainless-steel walls with embedded microchannels for high-pressure sCO 2 flows. Tests of the 40-kW th HX at the particle-sCO 2 HX test stand at Sandia's National Solar Thermal Test Facility (NSTTF) were limited, due to HX design, to particle inlet temperatures T p,in ≤ 520°C with maximum sCO 2 outlet temperatures T sCO2,out ≈ 440°C, which are well below design conditions for a primary HX in a sCO 2 power cycle for a Gen-3 concentrating solar power (CSP) plant. Total heat transfer $\dot{Q}_{HX}$ remains relatively constant with increased fluidization for fixed particle and sCO 2 inlet conditions because higher h T,w due to fluidization is offset by increased axial dispersion, which suppresses temperature differences between the particles and sCO 2 in the counterflow configuration. The axial dispersion reduces the effective overall heat transfer coefficient U based on T p,in to values around 200 W m -2 K -1 .

14 SOLAR ENERGY↗

Ratio-preserving approach to cosmological concordance

Cosmological observables are particularly sensitive to key ratios of energy densities and rates, both today and at earlier epochs of the Universe. Well-known examples include the photon-to-baryon and the matter-to-radiation ratios. Equally important, though less publicized, are the ratios of pressure-supported to pressureless matter and the Thomson scattering rate to the Hubble rate around recombination, both of which observations tightly constrain. Preserving these key ratios in theories beyond the Λ Cold-Dark-Matter ( Λ CDM ) model ensures broad concordance with a large swath of datasets when addressing cosmological tensions. We demonstrate that a mirror dark sector, reflecting a partial Z 2 symmetry with the Standard Model, in conjunction with percentage level changes to the visible fine-structure constant and electron mass which represent a phenomenological change to the Thomson scattering rate, maintains essential cosmological ratios. Incorporating this ratio-preserving approach into a cosmological framework significantly improves agreement to observational data ( Δ χ 2 = - 35.72 ) and completely eliminates the Hubble tension with a cosmologically inferred H 0 = 73.80 ± 1.02 km / s / Mpc when including the S H 0 ES calibration in our analysis. While our approach is certainly nonminimal, it emphasizes the importance of keeping key ratios constant when exploring models beyond Λ CDM .

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗