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At least 1,027 records · Page 57

Model fusion with physics-guided machine learning: Projection-based reduced-order modeling

The unprecedented amount of data generated from experiments, field observations, and large-scale numerical simulations at a wide range of spatiotemporal scales has enabled the rapid advancement of data-driven and especially deep learning models in the field of fluid mechanics. Although these methods are proven successful for many applications, there is a grand challenge of improving their generalizability. This is particularly essential when data-driven models are employed within outer-loop applications like optimization. In this work, we put forth a physics-guided machine learning (PGML) framework that leverages the interpretable physics-based model with a deep learning model. Leveraging a concatenated neural network design from multi-modal data sources, the PGML framework is capable of enhancing the generalizability of data-driven models and effectively protects against or inform about the inaccurate predictions resulting from extrapolation. We apply the PGML framework as a novel model fusion approach combining the physics-based Galerkin projection model and long- to short-term memory (LSTM) network for parametric model order reduction of fluid flows. We demonstrate the improved generalizability of the PGML framework against a purely data-driven approach through the injection of physics features into intermediate LSTM layers. Our quantitative analysis shows that the overall model uncertainty can be reduced through the PGML approach, especially for test data coming from a distribution different than the training data. Moreover, we demonstrate that our approach can be used as an inverse diagnostic tool providing a confidence score associated with models and observations. The proposed framework also allows for multi-fidelity computing by making use of low-fidelity models in the online deployment of quantified data-driven models.

42 ENGINEERING↗

Flax fiber-reinforced fatty acid vitrimer biocomposite with enhanced chemical recyclability

Here, this study unveils a sustainable, easily recyclable biocomposite, leveraging the dynamic nature of covalently adaptive bonds in a vitrimer matrix. The fabrication involved a fatty acid-derived vitrimer as the polymer matrix and multi-layered, nonwoven flax mat as reinforcing scaffold. The incorporation of these fibers significantly improved the mechanical performance of the vitrimer matrix uniformly. The ester-based covalently adaptive network plays a crucial role in enabling exceptional fiber-matrix bonding, as well as recyclability. The vitrimer matrix dissolves in ethylene glycol through transesterification, facilitating complete material recovery and biocomposite recycling without compromising the original properties of the matrix and reinforcing fibers.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗

Low level remote sensing: Orographic winds

The orographic flow data set was obtained from a flight program to measure the influence of orographic features on turbulence momentum, heat, and moisture fluxes. The NASA B-57 aircraft instrumented with probes for measuring the three fluctuating wind speed components, temperature, and humidity was the primary measuring vehicle. Ancillary measurements were made with several ground-based sensors. These include the NOAA radar wind profilers, the Boulder wind network, the PROFS mesoscale surface network, the Boulder Atmospheric Observatory 300 m tower, special rawinsonde observations, and the NOAA/WPL Doppler lidar. The major objective of the flight program was to provide planetary boundary layer parameter information for new and current general circulation computer models. A numerical code, WINDER, based on a discrete element technique was run to numerically model the water tunnel simulated flow. Comparison of the analytical model with the experimental results is very good. Physical fluid dynamic principles embedded in the computational model and visual and hot wire anemometer measurements from the simulation are being rationalized to develop a physical understanding of the vortex flow. The results will be interpreted as they pertain to full scale atmospheric flows.

Frost, Walter↗

Autonomous organization of grasping tasks

This paper describes an architecture for the control of robotic devices, and in particular of anthropomorphic hands, characterized by a hierarchical structure in which every level of the architecture contains data and control function with varying degree of abstraction. Bottom levels of the hierarchy interface directly with sensors and actuators, and process raw data and motor commands. Higher levels perform more symbolic types of tasks, such as application of Boolean rules and general planning operations. The implementation of the layer has to be consistent with the type of operation and its requirements for real time control. One implementation of the rule level, with a Boolean artificial neural network which would have a response time sufficient for producing reflex corrective action at the actuator level is presented.

Fiorini, Paolo↗

Data Analysis of a Space Experiment: Common Software Tackles Uncommon Task

Presented here are the software adaptations developed by laboratory scientists to process the space experiment data products from three experiments on two International Microgravity Laboratory Missions (IML-1 and IML-2). The challenge was to accommodate interacting with many types of hardware and software developed by both European Space Agency (ESA) and NASA aerospace contractors, where data formats were neither commercial nor familiar to scientists. Some of the data had been corrupted by bit shifting of byte boundaries. Least-significant/most-significant byte swapping also occurred as might be expected for the various hardware platforms involved. The data consisted of 20 GBytes per experiment of both numerical and image data. A significant percentage of the bytes were consumed in NASA formatting with extra layers of packetizing structure. It was provided in various pieces to the scientists on magnetic tapes, Syquest cartridges, DAT tapes, CD-ROMS, analog video tapes, and by network FIP. In this paper I will provide some science background and present the software processing used to make the data useful in the months after the missions.

Wilkinson, R. Allen↗

Evidence for Two Separate but Interlaced Components of the Chromospheric Magnetic Field

Chromospheric fibrils are generally thought to trace out horizontal magnetic fields that fan out from flux concentrations in the photosphere. A high-resolution (0.2") image taken in the core of the Ca IJ854.2 nm line shows the dark fibrils within an active region remnant as fine, loop-like features that are aligned parallel to each other and have lengths on the order of a supergranular diameter (approx.30 Mm). Comparison with a line-of-sight magnetogram confirms that the fibrils are centered above intranetwork areas, with one end rooted just inside the neighboring plage or strong unipolar network but the other endpoint less clearly defined. Focusing on a particular arcade-like structure lying entirely on one side of a filament channel (large-scale polarity inversion), we find that the total amount of positive-polarity flux underlying this "fibril arcade' is 50 times greater than the total amount of negative-polarity flux. Thus, if the fibrils represent closed loops, they must consist of very weak fields (in terms of flux density), which are interpenetrated by a more vertical field that contains most of the flux. This surprising result suggests that the fibrils in unipolar regions connect the network to the nearby intranetwork flux, while the bulk of the network flux is diverted upward into the corona and connects to remote regions of the opposite polarity. We conclude that the chromospheric field near the edge of the network has an interlaced structure resembling that in sunspot penumbrae, with the fibrils representing the low-lying horizontal flux that remains trapped within the highly nonpotential chromospheric layer.

Muglach, K.↗

Determination of Lidar Ratio for Major Aerosol Types over Western North Pacific Based on Long-Term MPLNET Data

East Asia is the most complex region in the world for aerosol studies, as it encounters a lot of varieties of aerosols, and aerosol classification can be a challenge in this region. In the present study, we focused on the relationship between aerosol types and aerosol optical properties. We analyzed the long-term (2005–2012) data of vertical profiles of aerosol extinction coefficients, lidar ratio (Sp), and other aerosol optical properties obtained from a NASA Micro-Pulse Lidar Network and Aerosol Robotic Network site in northern Taiwan, which frequently receives Asian continental outflows. Based on aerosol extinction vertical profiles, the profiles were classified into two types: type 1 (single-layer structure) and type 2 (two-layer structure). Fall season (October–November) was the prevailing season for the Type 1, whereas type 2 mainly happened in spring (March–April). In type 1, air masses normally originated from three regional sectors, i.e., Asia continental (AC), Pacific Ocean (PO), and Southeast Asia (SA). The mean Sp values were 39 ± 17 sr, 30 ± 12 sr, and 38 ± 18 sr for the AC, PO, and SA sectors, respectively. The Sp results suggested that aerosols from the AC sector contained dust and anthropogenic particles, and aerosols from the PO sector were most likely sea salts. We further combined the EPA dust event database and backward trajectory analysis for type 2. Results showed that Sp was 41 ± 14 sr and 53 ± 21 sr for dust storm and biomass-burning events, respectively. The Sp for biomass-burning events in type 2 showed two peaks patterns. The first peak occurred within range of 30–50 sr corresponding to urban pollutant, and the second peak occurred within range of 60–80 sr in relation to biomass burning. Finally, our study summarized the Sp values for four major aerosol types over northern Taiwan, viz., urban (42 ± 18 sr), dust (34 ± 6 sr), biomass-burning (69 ± 12 sr), and oceanic (30 ± 12 sr). Our findings provide useful references for aerosol classification and air pollution identification over the western North Pacific.

Sheng-Hsiang Wang↗

Probabilistic Nanomagnetic Memories for Uncertain and Robust Machine Learning

This project evaluated the use of emerging spintronic memory devices for robust and efficient variational inference schemes. Variational inference (VI) schemes, which constrain the distribution for each weight to be a Gaussian distribution with a mean and standard deviation, are a tractable method for calculating posterior distributions of weights in a Bayesian neural network such that this neural network can also be trained using the powerful backpropagation algorithm. Our project focuses on domain-wall magnetic tunnel junctions (DW-MTJs), a powerful multi-functional spintronic synapse design that can achieve low power switching while also opening the pathway towards repeatable, analog operation using fabricated notches. Our initial efforts to employ DW-MTJs as an all-in-one stochastic synapse with both a mean and standard deviation didn’t end up meeting the quality metrics for hardware-friendly VI. In the future, new device stacks and methods for expressive anisotropy modification may make this idea still possible. However, as a fall back that immediately satisfies our requirements, we invented and detailed how the combination of a DW-MTJ synapse encoding the mean and a probabilistic Bayes-MTJ device, programmed via a ferroelectric or ionically modifiable layer, can robustly and expressively implement VI. This design includes a physics-informed small circuit model, that was scaled up to perform and demonstrate rigorous uncertainty quantification applications, up to and including small convolutional networks on a grayscale image classification task, and larger (Residual) networks implementing multi-channel image classification. Lastly, as these results and ideas all depend upon the idea of an inference application where weights (spintronic memory states) remain non-volatile, the retention of these synapses for the notched case was further interrogated. These investigations revealed and emphasized the importance of both notch geometry and anisotropy modification in order to further enhance the endurance of written spintronic states. In the near future, these results will be mapped to effective predictions for room temperature and elevated operation DW-MTJ memory retention, and experimentally verified when devices become available.

77 NANOSCIENCE AND NANOTECHNOLOGY↗

Harnessing distributed GPU computing for generalizable graph convolutional networks in power grid reliability assessments

Although machine learning (ML) has emerged as a powerful tool for rapidly assessing grid contingencies, prior studies have largely considered a static grid topology in their analyses. This limits their application, since they need to be re-trained for every new topology. Here, this paper explores the development of generalizable graph convolutional network (GCN) models by pre-training them across a range of grid topologies and contingency types. We found that a GCN model with auto-regressive moving average (ARMA) layers with a line graph representation of the grid offered the best predictive performance in predicting voltage magnitudes (VM) and voltage angles (VA). We introduced the concept of phantom nodes to consider disparate grid topologies with a varying number of nodes and lines. For pre-training the GCN ARMA model across a variety of topologies, distributed graphics processing unit (GPU) computing afforded us significant training scalability. The predictive performance of this model on grid topologies that were part of the training data is substantially better than the direct current (DC) approximation. Although direct application of the pre-trained model to topologies that are not part of the grid is not particularly satisfactory, fine-tuning with small amounts of data from a specific topology of interest significantly improves predictive performance. In general, this paper highlights the feasibility of training large-scale GNN models to assess the reliability of power grids by considering a wide variety of grid topologies and contingency types. With the advent of foundational models in ML and the exponential increase in GPU computing clusters, generalizable ML models will significantly enhance how utilities manage power systems and make decisions in real-time or near-real-time.

24 - POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗

A simple hyperbolic model for communication in parallel processing environments

We introduce a model for communication costs in parallel processing environments called the 'hyperbolic model,' which generalizes two-parameter dedicated-link models in an analytically simple way. Dedicated interprocessor links parameterized by a latency and a transfer rate that are independent of load are assumed by many existing communication models; such models are unrealistic for workstation networks. The communication system is modeled as a directed communication graph in which terminal nodes represent the application processes that initiate the sending and receiving of the information and in which internal nodes, called communication blocks (CBs), reflect the layered structure of the underlying communication architecture. The direction of graph edges specifies the flow of the information carried through messages. Each CB is characterized by a two-parameter hyperbolic function of the message size that represents the service time needed for processing the message. The parameters are evaluated in the limits of very large and very small messages. Rules are given for reducing a communication graph consisting of many to an equivalent two-parameter form, while maintaining an approximation for the service time that is exact in both large and small limits. The model is validated on a dedicated Ethernet network of workstations by experiments with communication subprograms arising in scientific applications, for which a tight fit of the model predictions with actual measurements of the communication and synchronization time between end processes is demonstrated. The model is then used to evaluate the performance of two simple parallel scientific applications from partial differential equations: domain decomposition and time-parallel multigrid. In an appropriate limit, we also show the compatibility of the hyperbolic model with the recently proposed LogP model.

Stoica, Ion↗

New Horizons for a Practical and Performance-Optimized Solar System Internet

The High-rate Delay Tolerant Networking (HDTN) project at the NASA Glenn Research Center (GRC) is developing a performance-optimized Delay Tolerant Networking (DTN) implementation using the Bundle Protocol (BP) both for infusion in modern, distributed spacecraft systems and for foundational network research purposes. While one purpose of networking is to enable a returns-to-scale with communicating assets, it is recognized that neither the protocol nor its implementations may impose a bottleneck on data delivery if expected to be implemented. With this in mind, this paper explores the current status of the HDTN software, including its capabilities and also various performance metrics at the bundle layer, the convergence layers (e.g. performance-optimized Licklider Transmission Protocol, or LTP), and bundle storage and retrieval. This includes goals of software implementations that support multi-gigabit per second communications regardless of payload size. A discussion on the current software architecture and internal scheduling and routing is included. Interoperability with such extant DTN implementations as Interplanetary Overlay Network (ION) and DTN Marshall Enterprise Implementation (DTNME) are included. The research goals of the project are also listed, including Software-Defined Networking (SDN) and the theory of DTNs. A table-based filtration system for the Bundle Protocol (BP), called BP Filter, is also explored: this addition enables table-based policies within the context of a DTN for management purposes. Infusion begins with systems testing in the Johnson Space Center (JSC) Software Development and Integration Laboratory (SDIL), which supports International Space Station (ISS) Flight Software development, integration, and verification. Observations made from the results of testing in the SDIL and in flight testing are also discussed, pointing to a path for infusion into high data return low-earth orbit (LEO) missions. The paper concludes with areas for future work.

Delay Tolerant Networking↗

Multidisciplinary Modeling Software for Analysis, Design, and Optimization of HRRLS Vehicles

The concept for Highly Reliable Reusable Launch Systems (HRRLS) under the NASA Hypersonics project is a two-stage-to-orbit, horizontal-take-off / horizontal-landing, (HTHL) architecture with an air-breathing first stage. The first stage vehicle is a slender body with an air-breathing propulsion system that is highly integrated with the airframe. The light weight slender body will deflect significantly during flight. This global deflection affects the flow over the vehicle and into the engine and thus the loads and moments on the vehicle. High-fidelity multi-disciplinary analyses that accounts for these fluid-structures-thermal interactions are required to accurately predict the vehicle loads and resultant response. These predictions of vehicle response to multi physics loads, calculated with fluid-structural-thermal interaction, are required in order to optimize the vehicle design over its full operating range. This contract with ResearchSouth addresses one of the primary objectives of the Vehicle Technology Integration (VTI) discipline: the development of high-fidelity multi-disciplinary analysis and optimization methods and tools for HRRLS vehicles. The primary goal of this effort is the development of an integrated software system that can be used for full-vehicle optimization. This goal was accomplished by: 1) integrating the master code, FEMAP, into the multidiscipline software network to direct the coupling to assure accurate fluid-structure-thermal interaction solutions; 2) loosely-coupling the Euler flow solver FEFLO to the available and proven aeroelasticity and large deformation (FEAP) code; 3) providing a coupled Euler-boundary layer capability for rapid viscous flow simulation; 4) developing and implementing improved Euler/RANS algorithms into the FEFLO CFD code to provide accurate shock capturing, skin friction, and heat-transfer predictions for HRRLS vehicles in hypersonic flow, 5) performing a Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes computation on an HRRLS configuration; 6) integrating the RANS solver with the FEAP code for coupled fluid-structure-thermal capability; and 7) integrating the existing NASA SRGULL propulsion flow path prediction software with the FEFLO software for quasi-3D propulsion flow path predictions, 8) improving and integrating into the network, an existing adjoint-based design optimization code.

Spradley, Lawrence W.↗

Robustness of the smartpixels classifier for different simulated sensor geometries and non-ideal detector conditions

Pixel tracking detectors at upcoming collider experiments will see unprecedented charged-particle densities. Real-time data reduction on the detector will enable higher granularity and faster readout, possibly enabling the use of the pixel detector in high-rate online event selection, such as the ATLAS or CMS first-level trigger systems. This data reduction can be accomplished with a neural network (NN) in the readout chip bonded with the sensor that recognizes and rejects tracks with low transverse momentum (p T ) based on the geometrical shape of the charge deposition (“cluster”). To design viable detectors for deployment, the dependence of the NN as a function of the sensor geometry, external magnetic field, irradiation, and noise must be understood. In this paper, we present first studies of the efficiency and data reduction for planar pixel sensors exploring these parameters. For the CMS HL-LHC sensor geometry, we obtain a signal efficiency of (91.9 ± 0.7)% and a data reduction of (29.7 ± 1.0)%. A smaller sensor pitch in the bending direction improves the p T discrimination, but a larger pitch can be partially compensated with detector thickness. Any accumulated radiation damage also changes the cluster shape, reducing the signal efficiency compared to the baseline by approximately 30–60% in absolute terms, but nearly all of the performance can be recovered through retraining of the network and updating the weights. Finally, the impact of noise was investigated, and retraining the network on noise-injected datasets was found to maintain performance within 6% of the baseline network trained and evaluated on noiseless data. •ASIC-compatible track-momentum classifier is robust in realistic detector conditions.•About 90% signal efficiency and 30% data reduction per layer for CMS HL-LHC geometry.•Single-layer signal efficiency increases for smaller pixel pitch or thicker sensors.•Performance with noise or after radiation damage mostly recovered by retraining.

Shekar, Danush [Illinois U., Chicago] (ORCID:00000↗

BTE-Sim: Fast Simulation Environment For Public Transportation

The public commute is essential to all urban centers and is an efficient and environment-friendly way to travel. Transit systems must become more accessible and user-friendly. Since public transit is majorly designed statically, with very few improvements coming over time, it can get stagnated, unable to update itself with changing population trends. To better understand transportation demands and make them more usable, efficient, and demographic-focused, we propose a fast, multi-layered transit simulation that primarily focuses on public transit simulation (BTE-Sim). BTE-Sim is designed based on the population demand, existing traffic conditions, and the road networks that exist in a region. The system is versatile, with the ability to run different configurations of the existing transit routes, or inculcate any new changes that may seem necessary, or even in extreme cases, new transit network design as well. In all situations, it can compare multiple transit networks and provide evaluation metrics for them. It provides detailed data on each transit vehicle, the trips it performs, its on-time performance and other necessary factors. Its highlighting feature is the considerably low computation time it requires to perform all these tasks and provide consistently reliable results.

Sen, Rishav↗

Whetstone v.0.9.2

Whetstone is a deep learning software library for spiking/binary threshold neuromorphic hardware. Built to integrate with Keras models, Whetstone provides a collection of layers, callbacks, and utility functions designed to allow the training of integrate-and-fire neurons rather than traditional analog activation functions (e.g. rectified linear units). Generally, training a network for neuromorphic hardware is challenging due to the discontinuity of the activation function. Whetstone overcomes this challenge by using ever-closer continuous approximations of a threshold activation, modified during training time. This allows rapid and consistent training for ultra-low powered neuromorphic hardware.

Severa, William↗

Low-Level Mesoscale and Cloud-Scale Interactions Promoting Deep Convection Initiation

Data from scanning radars, radiosondes, and vertical profilers deployed during three field campaigns are analyzed to study interactions between cloud-scale updrafts associated with initiating deep moist convection and the surrounding environment. Three cases are analyzed in which the radar networks permitted dual-Doppler wind retrievals in clear air preceding and during the onset of surface precipitation. These observations capture the evolution of (i) the mesoscale and boundary layer flow, and (ii) low-level updrafts associated with deep moist convection initiation (CI) events yielding sustained or short-lived precipitating storms. The elimination of convective inhibition did not distinguish between sustained and unsustained CI events, though the vertical distribution of convective available potential energy may have played a role. The clearest signal differentiating the initiation of sustained versus unsustained precipitating deep convection was the depth of the low-level horizontal wind convergence associated with the mesoscale flow feature triggering CI, a sharp surface wind shift boundary, or orographic upslope flow. The depth of the boundary layer relative to the height of the LFC failed to be a consistent indicator of CI potential. Widths of the earliest detectable low-level updrafts associated with sustained precipitating deep convection were ~3–5 km, larger than updrafts associated with surrounding boundary layer turbulence (~1–3 km wide). It is hypothesized that updrafts of this larger size are important for initiating cells to survive the destructive effects of buoyancy dilution via entrainment.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

A JWST Survey of the Supernova Remnant Cassiopeia A

We present initial results from a James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) survey of the youngest Galactic core-collapse supernova remnant, Cassiopeia A (Cas A), made up of NIRCam and MIRI imaging mosaics that map emission from the main shell, interior, and surrounding circumstellar/interstellar material (CSM/ISM). We also present four exploratory positions of MIRI Medium Resolution Spectrograph integral field unit spectroscopy that sample ejecta, CSM, and associated dust from representative shocked and unshocked regions. Surprising discoveries include (1) a weblike network of unshocked ejecta filaments resolved to ~0.01 pc scales exhibiting an overall morphology consistent with turbulent mixing of cool, low-entropy matter from the progenitor's oxygen layer with hot, high-entropy matter heated by neutrino interactions and radioactivity; (2) a thick sheet of dust-dominated emission from shocked CSM seen in projection toward the remnant's interior pockmarked with small (~1'') round holes formed by ≲0$^"_•$1 knots of high-velocity ejecta that have pierced through the CSM and driven expanding tangential shocks; and (3) dozens of light echoes with angular sizes between ~0$^"_•$1 and 1' reflecting previously unseen fine-scale structure in the ISM. NIRCam observations place new upper limits on infrared emission (≲20 nJy at 3 μm) from the neutron star in Cas A's center and tightly constrain scenarios involving a possible fallback disk. These JWST survey data and initial findings help address unresolved questions about massive star explosions that have broad implications for the formation and evolution of stellar populations, the metal and dust enrichment of galaxies, and the origin of compact remnant objects.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

Analysis of Doppler lidar wind measurements

Doppler lidar and multiple Doppler radar data were obtained in a convectively mixed planetary boundary layer. The lidar measurements were possible due to scattering from existing aerosols; radar reflecting chaff was released in the atmosphere to make it visible to the multiple Doppler radar network. The data were analyzed to obtain detailed horizontal wind structures. The divergence of the horizontal wind was calculated and the anelastic continuity equation integrated to obtain vertical air motions. Differences between the areally averaged quantities and the grid point values provided a measure of the fluctuations in the wind components or the turbulent wind fluctuations. Vertical profiles of the mean winds and quantities related to the turbulent kinetic energy components and the turbulent momentum transfers were also calculated.

Srivastava, R. C.↗