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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 1,009 records · Page 56
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS1985

Digital control of diode laser for atmospheric spectroscopy

A system is described for remote absorption spectroscopy of trace species using a diode laser tunable over a useful spectral region of 50 to 200 cm(-1) by control of diode laser temperature over range from 15 K to 100 K, and tunable over a smaller region of typically 0.1 to 10 cm(-1) by control of the diode laser current over a range from 0 to 2 amps. Diode laser temperature and current set points are transmitted to the instrument in digital form and stored in memory for retrieval under control of a microprocessor during measurements. The laser diode current is determined by a digital to analog converter through a field effect transistor for a high degree of ambient temperature stability, while the laser diode temperature is determined by set points entered into a digital to analog converter under control of the microprocessor. Temperature of the laser diode is sensed by a sensor diode to provide negative feedback to the temperature control circuit that responds to the temperature control digital to analog converter.

Menzies, R. T.↗
NASA NTRS1985

Survey of ultraviolet shuttle glow

The University of Colorado Get Away Special (GAS) project utilizes the efforts of its students to place experiments on the shuttle. The objective of one experiment, the shuttle glow study, is to conduct a general survey of emissions in the ultraviolet near vehicle surfaces. An approximate wavelength range of 1900 to 3000 A will be scanned to observe predominant features. Special emphasis will be placed on studying the band structure of NO near 2000 A and the Mg+ line at 2800 A. The spectrometer, of Ebert-Faste 1/8-meter design, will perform the experiment during spacecraft night. It will be oriented such that the optical axis points to the cargo bay zenith. In order to direct the field-of-view of the instrument onto the shuttle vertical stabilizer (tail), a mirror assembly is employed. The mirror system has been designed to rotate through 7.5 degrees of arc using 10 positions resulting in a spatial resolution of 30 x 3 cm, with the larger dimension corresponding to the horizontal direction. Such a configuration can be attained from the forwardmost position in the cargo bay. Each spatial position will be subjected to a full spectral scan with a resolution on the order of 10 A.

Spear, K. A.↗
NASA NTRS1987

A comparative study of the influence of buoyancy driven fluid flow on GaAs crystal growth

An experiment on the effect of gravity-driven fluid flow on GaAs crystal growth under a variety of Earth-based conditions and in microgravity aboard the space shuttle is described. Earth-based growth is performed under stabilizing and destabilizing temperature gradients, with and without applied magnetic fields. The space growth experiment is flown in a self-contained payload container through NASA's Get Away Special program. The scope of the experiment and the experimental apparatus are outlined. Results of the Earth-based portions of the experiment are presented.

Kafales, J. A.↗
NASA NTRS1987

Application of stability theory to laminar flow control - Progress and requirements

Paper briefly summarizes the current status of linear stability theory as applied to laminar flow control for aerodynamics. Results indicate that the conventional 'N factor' method of correlating stability theory and transition has a broad application range, including low- and high-speeds, two- and three-dimensional mean flow and TS, Gortler and crossflow disturbance modes. Linear theory is particularly applicable to the laminar flow control problem as, for system efficiency, control must be exercised and disturbances maintained in the linear regime. Current areas of concern for LFC, which require further stability theory research, include TS-crossflow interaction, combined disturbance fields (roughness, waviness, noise) and suction-induced disturbances. Some results on wave-interactions are presented.

Bushnell, D. M.↗
NASA NTRS1990

Counterrotating prop-fan simulations which feature a relative-motion multiblock grid decomposition enabling arbitrary time-steps

Improvements are presented of a computer algorithm developed for the time-accurate flow analysis of rotating machines. The flow model is a finite volume method utilizing a high-resolution approximate Riemann solver for interface flux definitions. The numerical scheme is a block LU implicit iterative-refinement method which possesses apparent unconditional stability. Multiblock composite gridding is used to orderly partition the field into a specified arrangement of blocks exhibiting varying degrees of similarity. Block-block relative motion is achieved using local grid distortion to reduce grid skewness and accommodate arbitrary time step selection. A general high-order numerical scheme is applied to satisfy the geometric conservation law. An even-blade-count counterrotating unducted fan configuration is chosen for a computational study comparing solutions resulting from altering parameters such as time step size and iteration count. The solutions are compared with measured data.

Janus, J. Mark↗
NASA NTRS1990

Strategy for contamination control to improve Wide-Field/Planetary Camera far-ultraviolet performance

A multifaceted contamination control strategy has been developed for the second generated Wide-Field and Planetary Camera (WFPC-2) to improve the FUV stability by several orders of magnitude, compared to the first camera (WFPC-1). The strategy involves: improved on-orbit boil-off capability of the detector optics, added internal shielding and instrument venting, in-process subassembly vacuum bakeout at elevated temperatures, material substitution, sample testing in ultraclean vacuum facility, and internal instrument contamination-transport modeling. A science performance goal of 1 percent photometric accuracy at 1470 A over an extended time (of at least 30 days) has been established as a contamination control target for WFPC-2. The WFPC-2 is currently planned to be launched by the Shuttle in mid-1993 and replace the WFPC-1 which was recently launched with the HST.

Leschly, Kim↗
NASA NTRS1995

Stabilization Of Combustion Of Sprayed Fuel

Several modifications of nozzle spraying liquid propellant into combustion chamber proposed to stabilize combustion. Proposed changes in design of nozzle alter flow field in combustion chamber, according to fluid-mechanical principles, in such way as to suppress oscillations. Various alternative nozzle configurations include bluff or toroidal body to generate turbulence. Other features helping to suppress oscillations include down-stream recirculation zones, baffles, and damping cavities. Similar modifications help to suppress oscillations in industrial combustion chambers and in commercial and domestic oil-burning furnaces.

Voecks, Gerald E.↗
DOE OSTI2021

Neoclassical toroidal viscosity torque prediction via deep learning

GPECnet is a densely connected neural network that has been trained on GPEC data, to predict the plasma stability, neoclassical toroidal viscosity (NTV) torque, and optimized 3D coil current distributions for desired NTV torque profiles. Using NTV torque, driven by non-axisymmetric field perturbations in a tokamak, can be vital in optimizing pedestal performance by controlling the rotation profile in both the core, to ensure tearing stability, and the edge, to avoid edge localized modes (ELMs). The generalized perturbed equilibrium code (GPEC) software package can be used to calculate the plasma stability to 3D perturbations and the NTV torque profile generated by applied 3D magnetic fields. These calculations, however, involve complex integrations over space and energy distributions, which takes time to compute. Initially, GPECnet has been trained solely on data representative of the quiescent H-mode (QH) scenario, in which neutral beams are often balanced and toroidal rotation is low across the plasma profile. Lastly, this work provides the foundation for active control of the rotation shear using a combination of beams and 3D fields for robust and high performance QH mode operation.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
NASA NTRS1972

Instabilities and turbulence in highly ionized plasmas in a magnetic field

Physical mechanisms were considered which are responsible for plasma turbulence and the establishment of necessary conditions for energy exchange and transfer in the frequency spectrum. In addition, work was performed to better understand the drift instability in the highly inhomogeneous Rensselaer arc, and methods to suppress this instability using feedback stabilization techniques. Correlation techniques were refined to study plasma turbulence, the diffusion wave technique for monitoring cross-field diffusion was extended to include regimes of high turbulence levels, and a technique for coupling stabilizing RF power to the Rensselaer arc was developed.

Jennings, W. C.↗
DOE OSTI2022

Thermodynamics and Magnetism of SmFe12 Compound Doped with Co and Ni: An Ab Initio Study

Ni-doped Sm(Fe1−xCox)12 alloys are investigated for their magnetic properties. The Sm(Fe,Co)11M1 compound (M acts as a stabilizer) with the smallest (7.7 at.%) rare-earth-metal content has been recognized as a possible contender for highly efficient permanent magnets thanks to its significant anisotropy field and Curie temperature. The early transition metals (Ti-Mn) as well as Al, Si, and Ga stabilize the SmFe12 compound but significantly decrease its saturation magnetization. To keep the saturation magnetization in the range of 1.4–1.6 T, we suggest replacing a certain amount of Fe and Co in the Sm(Fe1−xCox)12 alloys with Ni. Ni plays the role of a thermodynamic stabilizer, and contrary to the above-listed elements, has the spin moment aligned parallel to the spin moment of the SmFe12 compound, thereby boosting its saturation magnetization without affecting the anisotropy field or Curie temperature.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗
DOE OSTI2019

Gauge-potential-induced vortices in spin-1 Bose–Einstein condensates with spin–orbit coupling

Highlights: •Effectively rotate the so-coupled condensate by an external magnetic field. •New effects of the Aharonov–Bohm geometric phase in ultracold atomic gases. •Many novel vortex structures have been studied. •A new stabilization mechanism for multiquantum vortices in spinor BECs. -- Abstract: We investigate the vortex states generated by the gauge-potential-induced rotation in spin-1 Bose–Einstein condensates with spin–orbit coupling. An external magnetic field coupling with spin equivalently imprints a non-zero gauge angular momentum, which induces an equivalent canonical angular momentum in the opposite direction, accompanied by the generation of quantized vortices. The competition between interatomic interactions, spin–orbit coupling and magnetic field leads to a variety of vortex structures. In the weakly interatomic interacting regime, as the increase of SO coupling strength, the condensate with a weak magnetic field gradient experiences the transition from polar-core vortex to Mermin–Ho vortex then to vortex cluster , and the three-vortex structures are found in the vortex cluster. As the SO coupling increases further, the condensate presents symmetrical density domains separated by radial vortex arrays. With the increase of magnetic field gradient, the number of density domains increases, and the condensate eventually turns into a giant vortex. In the relatively strong interatomic interacting regime, vortex sheets are formed when the magnetic field gradient is weak, and the increasing of magnetic field gradient makes the vortex arrangement orderly. Compared with the cases of weak interatomic interacting regime, density domain structures are broken because of the strong interatomic interactions, and the vortices are arranged in coaxial annular arrays.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
NASA NTRS2020

ATD-2 Benefits Mechanism

NASA has been developing and demonstrating a suite of decision support capabilities for integrated arrival, departure, and surface (IADS) operations in a metroplex environment. The effort is being made in three phases, under NASA’s Airspace Technology Demonstration 2 (ATD-2) sub-project, through a close partnership with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), air carriers, airport, and general aviation community. The Phase 1 Baseline IADS capabilities provide enhanced operational efficiency and predictability of flight operations through data exchange and integration, tactical surface metering, and automated coordination of release time of controlled flights for overhead stream insertion. The Phase 2 Fused IADS capabilities include the fusion of strategic and tactical surface metering, Atlanta Center airspace tactical scheduling, Electronic Flight Data (EFD) integration, Terminal Flight Data Manager (TFDM) Terminal Publication (TTP) prototype, and Mobile App for General Aviation (GA) community. In the Phase 2 field evaluation, strategic surface metering provides advance notice of metering and additional stability to the assigned gate holds. The users of the IADS system in Phases 1 and 2 include the personnel at Charlotte Douglas International Airport (CLT) air traffic control tower, American Airlines ramp tower, CLT terminal radar approach control (TRACON), and Washington and Atlanta Center. This document describes the ATD-2 benefits mechanism used to assess the Phases 1 and 2 IADS capabilities and field evaluation conducted at CLT since September 2017. The ATD-2 benefits mechanism mainly consists of surface metering and overhead stream insertion. This document provides detailed calculation methods of major benefit metrics, such as fuel savings, gas emissions savings, and engine runtime reduction, which can be obtained through surface metering, gate hold of Approval Request (APREQ) flights prior to pushback, and the renegotiation of release time while taxiing. As of March 31, 2020, it is estimated that 5,075,981 pounds of fuel savings and 15,634,022 pounds of CO2 emission reduction have been achieved so far, with a reduction of 3,832 hours in total engine runtime. The amount of CO2 savings is estimated to be equivalent to planting 116,254 urban trees. The pre- and post-metering comparison results using FAA’s Aviation System Performance Metrics (ASPM) data have also shown that the surface metering had no negative impact on the on-time arrival performance of both outbound and inbound flights at CLT.

ATD-2↗
NASA NTRS2020

ATD-2 Benefits Mechanism

NASA has been developing and demonstrating a suite of decision support capabilities for integrated arrival, departure, and surface (IADS) operations in a metroplex environment. The effort is being made in three phases, under NASA’s Airspace Technology Demonstration 2 (ATD-2) sub-project, through a close partnership with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), air carriers, airport, and general aviation community. The Phase 1 Baseline IADS capabilities provide enhanced operational efficiency and predictability of flight operations through data exchange and integration, tactical surface metering, and automated coordination of release time of controlled flights for overhead stream insertion. The Phase 2 Fused IADS capabilities include the fusion of strategic and tactical surface metering, Atlanta Center airspace tactical scheduling, Electronic Flight Data (EFD) integration, Terminal Flight Data Manager (TFDM) Terminal Publication (TTP) prototype, and Mobile App for General Aviation (GA) community. In the Phase 2 field evaluation, strategic surface metering provides advance notice of metering and additional stability to the assigned gate holds. The users of the IADS system in Phases 1 and 2 include the personnel at Charlotte Douglas International Airport (CLT) air traffic control tower, American Airlines ramp tower, CLT terminal radar approach control (TRACON), and Washington and Atlanta Center. This document describes the ATD-2 benefits mechanism used to assess the Phases 1 and 2 IADS capabilities and field evaluation conducted at CLT since September 2017. The ATD-2 benefits mechanism mainly consists of surface metering and overhead stream insertion. This document provides detailed calculation methods of major benefit metrics, such as fuel savings, gas emissions savings, and engine runtime reduction, which can be obtained through surface metering, gate hold of Approval Request (APREQ) flights prior to pushback, and the renegotiation of release time while taxiing. As of April 30, 2020, it is estimated that 5,097,173 pounds of fuel savings and 15,699,292 pounds of CO2 emission reduction have been achieved so far, with a reduction of 3,831 hours in total engine runtime. The amount of CO2 savings is estimated to be equivalent to planting 116,739 urban trees. The pre- and post-metering comparison results using FAA’s Aviation System Performance Metrics (ASPM) data have also shown that the surface metering had no negative impact on the on-time arrival performance of both outbound and inbound flights at CLT.

ATD-2↗
DOE OSTI2024

Atomically Precise Graphene Nanoribbon Transistors with Long-Term Stability and Reliability

Atomically precise graphene nanoribbons (GNRs) synthesized from the bottom-up exhibit promising electronic properties for high-performance field-effect transistors (FETs). The feasibility of fabricating FETs with GNRs (GNRFETs) has been demonstrated, with ongoing efforts aimed at further improving their performance. However, their long-term stability and reliability remain unexplored, which is as important as their performance for practical applications. In this work, we fabricated short-channel FETs with nine-atom-wide armchair GNRs (9-AGNRFETs). We revealed that the on-state (/ ON ) current performance of the 9-AGNRFETs deteriorates significantly over consecutive full transistor on and off logic cycles, which has neither been demonstrated nor previously considered. To address this issue, we deposited a thin ~10 nm thick atomic layer deposition (ALD) layer of aluminum oxide (Al 2 O 3 ) directly on these devices. The integrity, compatibility, electrical performance, stability, and reliability, of the GNRFETs before and/or after Al 2 O 3 deposition were comprehensively studied. The results indicate that the observed decline in electrical device performance is most likely due to the degradation of contact resistance over multiple measurement cycles. We successfully demonstrated that the devices with the Al 2 O 3 layer operate well up to several thousand continuous full cycles without any degradation. Our study offers valuable insights into the stability and reliability of GNR transistors, which could facilitate their large-scale integration into practical applications.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2025

Efficient Measurement of Length Distribution of 1D Nanoparticles in Solution via Optical Polarimetry

The efficient measurement of the length distribution of nanotubes, nanowires, and other one-dimensional (1D) nanoparticles in solution is important to enable their incorporation into materials and devices and to optimize their processing for properties of interest, such as thermal/electrical conductivity or mechanical strength, in suspensions and composites. We report an electric-field (E-field)-assisted optical-polarimetry technique to measure the length distribution of ensembles of high-aspect-ratio particles in dilute suspension. The degree of alignment of polarizable 1D particles suspended in a fluid under Brownian motion explicitly depends on the E-field strength and the particle length. We show that it is possible to extract the length distribution of 1D nanoparticles suspended in an insulating fluid by applying a range of E-fields and using optical polarimetry to measure the corresponding alignment order parameter. Notably, the method is relatively insensitive to the diameter of the 1D particles, which can be poorly known or vary within a sample. The technique is validated with silver nanowires and carbon nanotubes of known lengths, as well as polymer-depletion-length-separated single-wall carbon nanotube samples with length distributions independently measured with analytical ultracentrifugation. Finally, we demonstrate the ability of the optical-polarimetry technique to quantify changes in the length distribution of ultranarrow, sub-nanometer-diameter single-wall carbon nanotubes under different types and durations of ultrasonication. Within its range of applicability (polarizable 1D nanoparticles in the 0.5 to 15 μm length range, constrained by the voltage stability of the media and the suspended particles), the E-field-assisted optical-polarimetry method is a particularly efficient and accurate method to measure the length distribution of nanowires and nanotubes in suspension.

1D nanoparticles↗
DOE OSTI2021

Understanding Reentrance in Frustrated Magnets: The Case of the Er 2 Sn 2 O 7 Pyrochlore

Reentrance, the return of a system from an ordered phase to a previously encountered less-ordered one as a controlled parameter is continuously varied, is a recurring theme found in disparate physical systems, yet its microscopic cause is often not investigated thoroughly. Here, through detailed characterization and theoretical modeling, we uncover the microscopic mechanism behind reentrance in the strongly frustrated pyrochlore antiferromagnet Er 2 Sn 2 O 7 . We use single crystal heat capacity measurements to expose that Er 2 Sn 2 O 7 exhibits multiple instances of reentrance in its magnetic field B vs temperature T phase diagram for magnetic fields along three cubic high symmetry directions. Through classical Monte Carlo simulations, mean field theory, and classical linear spin-wave expansions, we argue that the origins of the multiple occurrences of reentrance observed in Er 2 Sn 2 O 7 are linked to soft modes. These soft modes arise from phase competition and enhance thermal fluctuations that entropically stabilize a specific ordered phase, resulting in an increased transition temperature for certain field values and thus the reentrant behavior. Our work represents a detailed examination into the mechanisms responsible for reentrance in a frustrated magnet and may serve as a template for the interpretation of reentrant phenomena in other physical systems.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
NASA NTRS2019

Stability and Spin-Orbit Resonance Analysis of Low Altitude Martian Orbits

Orbit stability has been thoughtfully studied in various celestial bodies. In particular the focus has been placed on the Moon, due to the unstable natural perturbations of its gravity field. The increasing interest in Mars orbiters brings the question of the likelihood of natural decay in low altitude regimes. This paper studies the change in shape of low altitude Mars orbits by carrying out large sets of numerical high fidelity simulations. Results showed that various configurations of the orbital elements gave perturbations that result-ed in unstable orbits. The paper also studies the potential causes of the observed unstable regions. First by taking a close look at zonal and tesseral harmonics to find the implications of Mars mass concentrations of the used gravity fields, and second by computing theoretical spin-orbit resonances to study their implications in the stability at low altitudes.

gravity perturbations↗
NASA NTRS1982

Stability of mixed time integration schemes for transient thermal analysis

A current research topic in coupled-field problems is the development of effective transient algorithms that permit different time integration methods with different time steps to be used simultaneously in various regions of the problems. The implicit-explicit approach seems to be very successful in structural, fluid, and fluid-structure problems. This paper summarizes this research direction. A family of mixed time integration schemes, with the capabilities mentioned above, is also introduced for transient thermal analysis. A stability analysis and the computer implementation of this technique are also presented. In particular, it is shown that the mixed time implicit-explicit methods provide a natural framework for the further development of efficient, clean, modularized computer codes.

Liu, W. K.↗