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At least 1,495 records · Page 83

Elementary solutions of coupled model equations in the kinetic theory of gases

The method of elementary solutions is employed to solve two coupled integrodifferential equations sufficient for determining temperature-density effects in a linearized BGK model in the kinetic theory of gases. Full-range completeness and orthogonality theorems are proved for the developed normal modes and the infinite-medium Green's function is constructed as an illustration of the full-range formalism. The appropriate homogeneous matrix Riemann problem is discussed, and half-range completeness and orthogonality theorems are proved for a certain subset of the normal modes. The required existence and uniqueness theorems relevant to the H matrix, basic to the half-range analysis, are proved, and an accurate and efficient computational method is discussed. The half-space temperature-slip problem is solved analytically, and a highly accurate value of the temperature-slip coefficient is reported.

Kriese, J. T.↗

Blowing Agents for Fabrication of Polyimide Foams

Polyimide resin can be foamed by agent generated within matrix of powder precursor. Blowing agent is mixture of water and methanol that are byproducts of condensation/polymerization reaction in resin. Expansion of these two compounds produces cellular foam structure that is flexible and resilient but that tends to have very-fine cellular structure. More open structure with lower density can be attained by modifying mechanism of foam formation. Foams have applications as fillers for seat cushions, wall panels, floor sheets, and thermal and acoustical insulation.

Gagliani, J.↗

Implementation of a fast digital optical matrix-vector multiplier using a holographic look-up table and residue arithmetic

The design and implementation of a digital (numerical) optical matrix-vector multiplier are presented. A Hughes liquid crystal light valve, the residue arithmetic representation, and a holographic optical memory are used to construct position coded optical look-up tables. All operations are performed in effectively one light valve response time with a potential for a high information density.

Habiby, Sarry F.↗

Diabatic Hamiltonian matrix elements made simple

With a view to applying the generator coordinate method to large configuration spaces, we propose a simple approximate formula to compute diabatic many-body matrix elements without having to evaluate two-body interaction matrix elements. Here, the method is illustrated with two analytically solvable Hamiltonians based on the harmonic oscillator.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗

Epoxy hydantoins as matrix resins

Tensile strength and fracture toughness of castings of the hydantoin resins cured with methylenedianiline are significantly higher than MY 720 control castings. Water absorption of an ethyl, amyl hydantoin formulation is 2.1 percent at equilibrium and Tg's are about 160 C, approximately 15 deg below the final cure temperature. Two series of urethane and ester-extended hydantoin epoxy resins were synthesized to determine the effect of crosslink density and functional groups on properties. Castings cured with methylenedianiline or with hexahydrophthalic anhydride were made from these compounds and evaluated. The glass transition temperatures, tensile strengths and moduli, and fracture toughness values were all much lower than that of the simple hydantoin epoxy resins. Using a methylene bishydantoin epoxy with a more rigid structure gave brittle, low-energy fractures, while a more flexible, ethoxy-extended hydantoin epoxy resin gave a very low Tg.

Weiss, J.↗

Analytical derivatives of the individual state energies in ensemble density functional theory. II. Implementation on graphical processing units (GPUs)

Conical intersections control excited state reactivity, and thus, elucidating and predicting their geometric and energetic characteristics are crucial for understanding photochemistry. Locating these intersections requires accurate and efficient electronic structure methods. Unfortunately, the most accurate methods (e.g., multireference perturbation theories such as XMS-CASPT2) are computationally challenging for large molecules. The state-interaction state-averaged restricted ensemble referenced Kohn–Sham (SI-SA-REKS) method is a computationally efficient alternative. The application of SI-SA-REKS to photochemistry was previously hampered by a lack of analytical nuclear gradients and nonadiabatic coupling matrix elements. We have recently derived analytical energy derivatives for the SI-SA-REKS method and implemented the method effectively on graphical processing units. We demonstrate that our implementation gives the correct conical intersection topography and energetics for several examples. Furthermore, our implementation of SI-SA-REKS is computationally efficient, with observed sub-quadratic scaling as a function of molecular size. This demonstrates the promise of SI-SA-REKS for excited state dynamics of large molecular systems.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗

Fault isolation and fault-tolerant control for Takagi-Sugeno fuzzy time-varying delay stochastic distribution systems

A fault isolation, estimation, and fault-tolerant control (FTC) scheme for nonlinear time-varying delay stochastic distribution control systems was presented in this paper. The Takagi-Sugeno fuzzy model was adopted to approach the nonlinear dynamics of time-varying delay systems. According to the output equivalence principle and Laplace transformation, an augmented state vector was given to solve the time-varying delay problem. When multiple actuator faults and interference occur simultaneously, fault detection, isolation and fault estimation was designed to obtained the fault information. To decouple faults and obtain the value and location information of the fault, the system was separated into two parts through the designed multiple conversion matrices, in which one subsystem was only affected by one actuator fault. This has simplified the design of fault isolation and estimation. A adaptive observer for fault estimation was given. Then, fault information such as the time, location, and size was determined. The observer gain matrices were calculated using linear matrix inequality (LMI). When a fault was detected and diagnosed, a FTC algorithm was devised using the proportional-integral control scheme to compensate the fault as much as possible. It has been shown that even if multiple faults actuator occurred simultaneously, the FTC controller still ensured the output probability density function of the system traced the desired probability density function when a fault occurred. Finally, the expected results were obtained through the simulation example, which confirmed the effectiveness of the method.

42 ENGINEERING↗

Connection between variations of the atmosphere temperature profile and variations of the meson component intensity

The influence of temperature effects on intensity variations of the cosmic ray meson component were studied. The connection between the temperature variation delta T and the intensity variation delta I was established by using the temperature coefficient density technique. To realize how many devices are needed on the Earth for predicting the temperature variation of the atmosphere profile with a reasonable accuracy, IO isobaric levels and IO were calculated. The set of initial elements of the cosmic ray mesons are varied and it is shown that the matrix of the coefficients B sub ij is rather sensitive to their choice. It is found that if for the calculations of the atmospheric temperature variations the model is used, the number of meson components, essentially exceeding 3, should be considered.

Blokh, Y. L.↗

Extracellular matrix controls tubulin monomer levels in hepatocytes by regulating protein turnover

Cells have evolved an autoregulatory mechanism to dampen variations in the concentration of tubulin monomer that is available to polymerize into microtubules (MTs), a process that is known as tubulin autoregulation. However, thermodynamic analysis of MT polymerization predicts that the concentration of free tubulin monomer must vary if MTs are to remain stable under different mechanical loads that result from changes in cell adhesion to the extracellular matrix (ECM). To determine how these seemingly contradictory regulatory mechanisms coexist in cells, we measured changes in the masses of tubulin monomer and polymer that resulted from altering cell-ECM contacts. Primary rat hepatocytes were cultured in chemically defined medium on bacteriological petri dishes that were precoated with different densities of laminin (LM). Increasing the LM density from low to high (1-1000 ng/cm2), promoted cell spreading (average projected cell area increased from 1200 to 6000 microns2) and resulted in formation of a greatly extended MT network. Nevertheless, the steady-state mass of tubulin polymer was similar at 48 h, regardless of cell shape or ECM density. In contrast, round hepatocytes on low LM contained a threefold higher mass of tubulin monomer when compared with spread cells on high LM. Furthermore, similar results were obtained whether LM, fibronectin, or type I collagen were used for cell attachment. Tubulin autoregulation appeared to function normally in these cells because tubulin mRNA levels and protein synthetic rates were greatly depressed in round cells that contained the highest level of free tubulin monomer. However, the rate of tubulin protein degradation slowed, causing the tubulin half-life to increase from approximately 24 to 55 h as the LM density was lowered from high to low and cell rounding was promoted. These results indicate that the set-point for the tubulin monomer mass in hepatocytes can be regulated by altering the density of ECM contacts and changing cell shape. This finding is consistent with a mechanism of MT regulation in which the ECM stabilizes MTs by both accepting transfer of mechanical loads and altering tubulin degradation in cells that continue to autoregulate tubulin synthesis.

Non-NASA Center↗

Modeling of Interfacial Modification Effects on Thermal Conductivity of Carbon Nanotube Composites

The effect of functionalization of carbon nanotubes on the thermal conductivity of nanocomposites has been studied using a multi-scale modeling approach. These results predict that grafting linear hydrocarbon chains to the surface of a single wall carbon nanotube with covalent chemical bonds should result in a significant increase in the thermal conductivity of these nanocomposites. This is due to the decrease in the interfacial thermal (Kapitza) resistance between the single wall carbon nanotube and the surrounding polymer matrix upon chemical functionalization. The nanocomposites studied here consist of single wall carbon nanotubes in a bulk poly(ethylene vinyl acetate) matrix. The nanotubes are functionalized by end-grafting linear hydrocarbon chains of varying length to the surface of the nanotube. The effect which this functionalization has on the interfacial thermal resistance is studied by molecular dynamics simulation. Interfacial thermal resistance values are calculated for a range of chemical grafting densities and with several chain lengths. These results are subsequently used in an analytical model to predict the resulting effect on the bulk thermal conductivity of the nanocomposite.

Clancy, Thomas C.↗

Robust, Flexible and Lightweight Dielectric Barrier Discharge Actuators Using Nanofoams/Aerogels

Robust, flexible, lightweight, low profile enhanced performance dielectric barrier discharge actuators (plasma actuators) based on aerogels/nanofoams with controlled pore size and size distribution as well as pore shape. The plasma actuators offer high body force as well as high force to weight ratios (thrust density). The flexibility and mechanical robustness of the actuators allows them to be shaped to conform to the surface to which they are applied. Carbon nanotube (CNT) based electrodes serve to further decrease the weight and profile of the actuators while maintaining flexibility while insulating nano-inclusions in the matrix enable tailoring of the mechanical properties. Such actuators are required for flow control in aeronautics and moving machinery such as wind turbines, noise abatement in landing gear and rotary wing aircraft and other applications.

Sauti, Godfrey↗

Redox-homogeneous, gel electrolyte-embedded high-mass-loading cathodes for high-energy lithium metal batteries

Lithium metal batteries have higher theoretical energy than their Li-ion counterparts, where graphite is used at the anode. However, one of the main stumbling blocks in developing practical Li metal batteries is the lack of cathodes with high-mass-loading capable of delivering highly reversible redox reactions. To overcome this issue, here we report an electrode structure that incorporates a UV-cured non-aqueous gel electrolyte and a cathode where the LiNi 0.8 Co 0.1 Mn 0.1 O 2 active material is contained in an electron-conductive matrix produced via simultaneous electrospinning and electrospraying. This peculiar structure prevents the solvent-drying-triggered non-uniform distribution of electrode components and shortens the time for cell aging while improving the overall redox homogeneity. Moreover, the electron-conductive matrix eliminates the use of the metal current collector. When a cathode with a mass loading of 60 mg cm -2 is coupled with a 100 µm thick Li metal electrode using additional non-aqueous fluorinated electrolyte solution in lab-scale pouch cell configuration, a specific energy and energy density of 321 Wh kg -1 and 772 Wh L -1 (based on the total mass of the cell), respectively, can be delivered in the initial cycle at 0.1 C (i.e., 1.2 mA cm -2 ) and 25 °C.

25 ENERGY STORAGE↗

Subspace recursive Fermi-operator expansion strategies for large-scale DFT eigenvalue problems on HPC architectures

Quantum mechanical calculations for material modeling using Kohn–Sham density functional theory (DFT) involve the solution of a nonlinear eigenvalue problem for N smallest eigenvector-eigenvalue pairs, with N proportional to the number of electrons in the material system. Here, these calculations are computationally demanding and have asymptotic cubic scaling complexity with the number of electrons. Large-scale matrix eigenvalue problems arising from the discretization of the Kohn–Sham DFT equations employing a systematically convergent basis traditionally rely on iterative orthogonal projection methods, which are shown to be computationally efficient and scalable on massively parallel computing architectures. However, as the size of the material system increases, these methods are known to incur dominant computational costs through the Rayleigh–Ritz projection step of the discretized Kohn–Sham Hamiltonian matrix and the subsequent subspace diagonalization of the projected matrix. This work explores the potential of polynomial expansion approaches based on recursive Fermi-operator expansion as an alternative to the subspace diagonalization of the projected Hamiltonian matrix to reduce the computational cost. Subsequently, we perform a detailed comparison of various recursive polynomial expansion approaches to the traditional approach of explicit diagonalization on both multi-node central processing unit and graphics processing unit architectures and assess their relative performance in terms of accuracy, computational efficiency, scaling behavior, and energy efficiency.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗

Modeling graphene sheet growth and dynamical matrix calculations using molecular dynamics

Molecular dynamics (MD) has been an incredibly useful tool to model physical processes that were synthesized experimentally but not fully understood. MD, through the use of semi-empirical inter-atomic potentials, has allowed understanding of different physical processes in materials science. Yet as well as providing useful insights into materials science, molecular dynamics has a wider range of usability. In this report, I will be detailing how MD can be used to study graphene formation from a carbon liquid which requires high temperatures and pressures. Beyond this, I will describe the usefulness of MD for understanding the physics for phonon transport quantum sensors. To do this, MD was employed to determine the dynamical matrix by treating atoms as coupled oscillators. An accurate understanding of the dynamical matrix of a system is required to calculate the non-equilibrium Green’s function used to describe the phonon transport within phonon wave-guides. I found that, across multiple pressures and temperatures, randomly placed carbon atoms will show evidence of pent-first formation with semi-empirical models. Density functional theory (DFT), on the other hand, was too computationally expensive to use for full scale MD simulations, but we have the possibility of training a machine learned interatomic potential to approximate DFT for carbon in the environments being studied for pent-first graphene sheet formation.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗

Phase-Field Modeling of Mechanical Damages in Ceramic Matrix Composites

Developed a phase-field model for mechanical damages in CMCs, which incorporates the CMC microstructures, matrix cracking, fiber breakage, and interfacial sliding. Two types of mechanisms, fiber bridging and fiber pull-out, are considered. The obtained simulation results agree with experimental observations and an analytical solution. Simulation results suggest that the performance of CMCs would be enhanced with thicker fibers, longer fibers, and higher fiber density. Opposite trends of interfacial sliding resistances are suggested for the two types of situations. In reality, a mixture of the two situations may exist, and then an intermediate interfacial sliding resistance may be optimal.

Xue, Fei↗

Boron/aluminum graphite/resin advanced fiber composite hybrids

Fabrication feasibility and potential of an adhesively bonded metal and resin matrix fiber-composite hybrid are determined as an advanced material for aerospace and other structural applications. The results show that using this hybrid concept makes possible a composite design which, when compared with nonhybrid composites, has greater transverse strength, transverse stiffness, and impact resistance with only a small penalty on density and longitudinal properties. The results also show that laminate theory is suitable for predicting the structural response of such hybrids. The sequence of fracture modes indicates that these types of hybrids can be readily designed to meet fail-safe requirements.

Chamis, C. C.↗

Screening of metal matrix composites using ultrasonic C-scans

Ultrasonic C-scans can be used to find some types of defects in continuous fiber-reinforced metal matrix composites such as boron/aluminum composites. These defects are related to the fatigue behavior and fracture location of each inspected specimen. The C-scan technique determined the relative amount of defects in boron/aluminum composites. The defects were primarily identified as gaps in the fiber spacing. Those specimens with higher defect densities had shorter fatigue lives, lower fatigue endurance limits, and greater reductions in the elastic unloading modulus (that is, stiffness) because of fatigue cycling. This type of data could be used to set accept/reject levels for a composite panel based on C-scan indications.

Johnson, W. S.↗

An efficient optical architecture for sparsely connected neural networks

An architecture for general-purpose optical neural network processor is presented in which the interconnections and weights are formed by directing coherent beams holographically, thereby making use of the space-bandwidth products of the recording medium for sparsely interconnected networks more efficiently that the commonly used vector-matrix multiplier, since all of the hologram area is in use. An investigation is made of the use of computer-generated holograms recorded on such updatable media as thermoplastic materials, in order to define the interconnections and weights of a neural network processor; attention is given to limits on interconnection densities, diffraction efficiencies, and weighing accuracies possible with such an updatable thin film holographic device.

Hine, Butler P., III↗