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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 163 records · Page 9
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2018

Magnesium diboride (MgB2): An effective and novel precursor for the synthesis of vertically aligned BNNTs

Highlights: • Discovered Magnesium diboride (MgB{sub 2}) as an effective and novel precursor for the synthesis of BNNTs. • Synthesized vertically aligned BNNTs directly on SiO{sub 2} substrate at 1000{sup °}C. • Magnesium (Mg) from MgB{sub 2} in partially melted form diffuses on SiO{sub 2} substrate. • The adsorbed Boron with Mg reacts with Nitrogen from decomposed ammonia and synthesized vertically aligned BNNTs. - Abstract: Vertically aligned Boron nitride nanotubes (BNNTs) have exceptional electrical, mechanical and thermal properties suitable for its potential applications without any further purification. However, the synthesis of aligned BNNTs via previously reported techniques is not only complicated, lengthy and misleading but also result in useless impurities in the final product. Here, we report Magnesium diboride (MgB{sub 2}) as an effective and novel precursor for the synthesis of vertically aligned BNNTs directly on SiO{sub 2} substrate at 1000 {sup °}C. Magnesium (Mg) from MgB{sub 2} in partially melted form diffuses on SiO{sub 2} substrate whereas the adsorbed Boron with Mg reacts with Nitrogen from decomposed ammonia and synthesized vertically aligned BNNTs. The morphology, alignment, structure and compositions of the as-synthesized BNNTs are studied via field emission scanning electron microscope, high resolution transmission electron microscope, energy dispersive x-ray spectroscopy, x-ray diffraction, Raman spectroscopy and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy.

77 NANOSCIENCE AND NANOTECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2017

Strain-induced alignment and phase behavior of blue phase liquid crystals confined to thin films

Here, we report on the influence of surface confinement on the phase behavior and strain-induced alignment of thin films of blue phase liquid crystals (BPs). Confining surfaces comprised of bare glass, dimethyloctadecyl [3-(trimethoxysilyl)propyl] ammonium chloride (DMOAP)-functionalized glass, or polyvinyl alcohol (PVA)-coated glass were used with or without mechanically rubbing to influence the azimuthal anchoring of the BPs. These experiments reveal that confinement can change the phase behavior of the BP films. For example, in experiments performed with rubbed-PVA surfaces, we measured the elastic strain of the BPs to change the isotropic–BPII phase boundary, suppressing formation of BPII for film thicknesses incommensurate with the BPII lattice. In addition, we observed strain-induced alignment of the BPs to exhibit a complex dependence on both the surface chemistry and azimuthal alignment of the BPs. For example, when using bare glass surfaces causing azimuthally degenerate and planar anchoring, BPI oriented with (110) planes of the unit cell parallel to the contacting surfaces for thicknesses below 3 μm but transitioned to an orientation with (200) planes aligned parallel to the contacting surfaces for thicknesses above 4 μm. In contrast, BPI aligned with (110) planes parallel to confining surfaces for all other thicknesses and surface treatments, including bare glass with uniform azimuthal alignment. Complementary simulations based on minimization of the total free energy (Landau–de Gennes formalism) confirmed a thickness-dependent reorientation due to strain of BPI unit cells within a window of surface anchoring energies and in the absence of uniform azimuthal alignment. In contrast to BPI, BPII did not exhibit thickness-dependent orientations but did exhibit orientations that were dependent on the surface chemistry, a result that was also captured in simulations by varying the anchoring energies. Overall, the results in this paper reveal that the orientations assumed by BPs in thin films reflect a complex interplay of surface interactions and elastic energies associated with strain of the BP lattice. The results also provide new principles and methods to control the structure and properties of BP thin films, which may find use in BP-templated material synthesis, and BP-based optical and electronic devices.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2014

Alignment of gold nanorods by angular photothermal depletion

In this paper, we demonstrate that a high degree of alignment can be imposed upon randomly oriented gold nanorod films by angular photothermal depletion with linearly polarized laser irradiation. The photothermal reshaping of gold nanorods is observed to follow quadratic melting model rather than the threshold melting model, which distorts the angular and spectral hole created on 2D distribution map of nanorods to be an open crater shape. We have accounted these observations to the alignment procedures and demonstrated good agreement between experiment and simulations. The use of multiple laser depletion wavelengths allowed alignment criteria over a large range of aspect ratios, achieving 80% of the rods in the target angular range. We extend the technique to demonstrate post-alignment in a multilayer of randomly oriented gold nanorod films, with arbitrary control of alignment shown across the layers. Photothermal angular depletion alignment of gold nanorods is a simple, promising post-alignment method for creating future 3D or multilayer plasmonic nanorod based devices and structures.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗
DOE OSTI2020

Ionization induced dynamic alignment of water

Two-body dissociation resulting from strong-field double ionization of water is investigated. Two distinct features are seen in the alignment of the fragment momenta with respect to the laser polarization. One feature shows alignment of the H–OH axis with the laser polarization, while the other indicates polarization alignment normal to the H–OH axis. By analyzing kinematic differences between the OH + /D + and OD + /H + channels of HOD, these two alignment features are shown to result from dissociation from different states in the dication. Only dissociation from one of these states has an alignment dependence consistent with predictions of sequential strong-field tunneling ionization models. Finally, the alignment dependence of dissociation from the other state can only be explained by dynamic alignment launched by the unbending of the molecule during ionization.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
DOE OSTI2014

Paramagnetic alignment of small grains: A novel method for measuring interstellar magnetic fields

We present a novel method to measure the strength of interstellar magnetic fields using ultraviolet (UV) polarization of starlight that is in part produced by weakly aligned, small dust grains. We begin with calculating the degrees of the paramagnetic alignment of small (size a ∼ 0.01 μm) and very small (a ∼ 0.001 μm) grains in the interstellar magnetic field due to the Davis-Greenstein relaxation and resonance relaxation. To calculate the degrees of paramagnetic alignment, we use Langevin equations and take into account various interaction processes essential for the rotational dynamics of small grains. We find that the alignment of small grains is necessary to reproduce the observed polarization in the UV, although the polarization arising from these small grains is negligible at the optical and infrared (IR) wavelengths. Based on fitting theoretical models to observed extinction and polarization curves, we find that the best-fit model for the case with the peak wavelength of polarization λ{sub max} < 0.55 μm requires a higher degree of alignment of small grains than for the typical case with λ{sub max} = 0.55 μm. We interpret the correlation between the systematic increase of the UV polarization relative to maximum polarization (i.e., of p(6 μm{sup –1})/p{sub max}) with λ{sub max}{sup −1} for cases of low λ{sub max} by appealing to the higher degree of alignment of small grains. We utilize the correlation of the paramagnetic alignment of small grains with the magnetic field strength B to suggest a new way to measure B using the observable parameters λ{sub max} and p(6 μm{sup –1})/p{sub max}.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2012

The shapes and alignments of dark matter halos

We present measurements of the triaxial dark matter halo shapes and alignment correlation functions in the Millennium and Millennium-2 dark matter N-body simulations. These two simulations allow us to measure the distributions of halo shapes down to 10% of the virial radius over a halo mass range of 6 × 10{sup 9}–2 × 10{sup 14} h{sup −1}M{sub s}un. We largely confirm previous results on the distributions of halo axis ratios as a function of halo mass, but we find that the median angle between halo major axes at different halo radii can vary by a factor of 2 between the Millennium-1 and 2 simulations because of the different mass resolution. Thus, error in the shape determinations from limited resolution is potentially degenerate with the misalignment of halo inner and outer shapes used to constrain Brightest Cluster Galaxy alignments in previous works. We also present simplifying parameterizations for the 3-D halo-mass alignment correlation functions that are necessary ingredients for triaxial halo models of large-scale structure and models of galaxy intrinsic alignments as contaminants for cosmic shear surveys. We measure strong alignments between halos of all masses and the surrounding dark matter overdensities out to several tens of h{sup −1} Mpc, in agreement with observed shear-galaxy and cluster shape correlations. We use these measurements to forecast the contribution to the weak lensing signal around galaxy clusters from correlated mass along the line-of-sight. For prolate clusters with major axes aligned with the line-of-sight the fraction of the weak lensing signal from mass external to the cluster can be twice that predicted if the excess halo alignment correlation is assumed to be zero.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2022

The alignment between brightest cluster galaxies and host clusters

The alignment between the brightest cluster galaxies (BCGs) and host clusters can reveal the mystery of the formation and evolution of galaxy clusters. We measure cluster orientations in optical based on the projected distribution of member galaxies and in X-ray by fitting the morphology of intracluster medium (ICM). Cluster orientations determined in the two wavelengths are generally consistent. The orientation alignment between BCGs and host clusters is confirmed and more significant than in previous works. We find that BCGs are more aligned with cluster orientations measured in X-ray than those from optical data. Clusters with a brighter BCG generally show a stronger alignment. We argue that the detected redshift evolution of the alignment is probably caused by observational bias rather than intrinsic evolution. The alignment is not related to the ellipticity of BCGs, and the richness, ellipticity, and dynamical state of host clusters. As a result, the strong alignment between BCGs and the morphology of ICMs may be the consequence of the co-evolution between the central massive galaxy and host clusters.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2024

Increasing the power of weak lensing data with multipole-based intrinsic alignment estimators

ABSTRACT It has long been known that galaxy shapes align coherently with the large-scale density field. Characterizing this effect is essential to interpreting measurements of weak gravitational lensing, the deflection of light from distant galaxies by matter overdensities along the line of sight, as it also produces coherent galaxy alignments that we wish to interpret in terms of a cosmological model. Existing direct measurements of intrinsic alignments using galaxy samples with high-quality shape and redshift measurements typically use well-understood but sub-optimal projected estimators, which do not make good use of the information in the data when comparing those estimators to theoretical models. We demonstrate a more optimal estimator, based on a multipole expansion of the correlation functions or power spectra, for direct measurements of galaxy intrinsic alignments. We show that even using the lowest order multipole alone increases the significance of inferred model parameters using simulated and real data, without any additional modelling complexity. We apply this estimator to measurements of parameters of the non-linear alignment model using data from the Sloan Digital Sky survey, demonstrating consistent results with a factor of ∼2 greater precision in parameter fits to intrinsic alignments models. This result is functionally equivalent to quadrupling the survey area, but without the attendant costs – thereby demonstrating the value in using this new estimator in current and future intrinsic alignments measurements using spectroscopic galaxy samples.

Astronomy & Astrophysics↗
DOE OSTI2014

Alignathon: a competitive assessment of whole-genome alignment methods

Multiple sequence alignments (MSAs) are a prerequisite for a wide variety of evolutionary analyses. Published assessments and benchmark data sets for protein and, to a lesser extent, global nucleotide MSAs are available, but less effort has been made to establish benchmarks in the more general problem of whole-genome alignment (WGA). Using the same model as the successful Assemblathon competitions, we organized a competitive evaluation in which teams submitted their alignments and then assessments were performed collectively after all the submissions were received. Three data sets were used: Two were simulated and based on primate and mammalian phylogenies, and one was comprised of 20 real fly genomes. In total, 35 submissions were assessed, submitted by 10 teams using 12 different alignment pipelines. We found agreement between independent simulation based and statistical assessments, indicating that there are substantial accuracy differences between contemporary alignment tools. We saw considerable differences in the alignment quality of differently annotated regions and found that few tools aligned the duplications analyzed. We found that many tools worked well at shorter evolutionary distances, but fewer performed competitively at longer distances. We provide all data sets, submissions, and assessment programs for further study and provide, as a resource for future benchmarking, a convenient repository of code and data for reproducing the simulation assessments.

59 BASIC BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2026

Observing neutron alignment at high angular momenta in heavy deformed actinides

An outstanding puzzle in the structure of very heavy nuclei lies in the rotation response of deformed transuranic isotopes. While the rotation alignment of pairs of 𝑖 13/2 protons is ubiquitous and well understood, observing the analogous alignment of the 𝑗 15/2 neutrons has been elusive. In this work we present a new quantitative analysis approach: from their moments of inertia as a function of frequency, we compare the alignments of rotational bands with both “low” and high-𝑗 intrinsic structures in the 𝑁 = 151 isotones of Pu, Cm, Cf, and No, thereby distinguishing between the alignments of neutron versus proton pairs through “blocking” effects. In this way, the alignment of 𝑗 15/2 neutrons can be clearly identified for the first time. The protons and neutrons begin aligning at a very similar frequency. The contribution of 𝑗 15/2 neutrons to the total alignment is found to grow with increasing 𝑍 compared to 𝑖 13/2 protons. To explain these observations, it is necessary to adopt a self-consistent set of single-particle energies corresponding to the nuclear shape that minimizes the mass. The shape description needs to include high-order deformations up to at least 𝛽 6 .

A ≥ 220↗
DOE OSTI2019

A Graphical Design Approach for Two-Input Single-Output Systems Exploiting Plant/Controller Alignment: Design and Application

Due to the unique structure of two-input single-output (TISO) feedback systems, several closed-loop properties can be characterized using the concepts of plant and controller “directions” and “alignment.” Poor plant/controller alignment indicates significant limitations in terms of closed-loop performance. In general, it is desirable to design a controller that is well aligned with the plant in order to minimize the size of the closed-loop sensitivity functions and closed-loop interactions. Although the concept of alignment can be a useful analysis tool for a given plant/controller pair, it is not obvious how a controller should be designed to achieve good alignment. We present a new controller design approach, based on the PQ method (Schroeck et al., 2001, “On Compensator Design for Linear Time invariant Dual-Input Single-Output Systems,” IEEE/ASME Trans. Mechatronics, 6(1), pp. 50–57), which explicitly incorporates knowledge of alignment into the design process. Here, this is accomplished by providing graphical information about the alignment angle on the Bode plot of the PQ frequency response. We show the utility of this approach through a design example.

21 SPECIFIC NUCLEAR REACTORS AND ASSOCIATED PLANTS↗
DOE OSTI2019

Xavier: High-Performance X-Drop Adaptive Banded Pairwise Alignment (Xavier) v1.0

Pairwise sequence alignment is one of the most compute-intense challenges for the analysis of genomics data and it can account for more than 90% of the runtime depending on the application. Despite the effort to reduce the computational cost introducing heuristics such as banded and x-drop alignment, the performance of state-of-the-art software is often unsatisfactory for long sequences. Recent advances in single-molecule sequencing technologies keep increasing the length of the sequences to align at the cost of higher error rates b ranging from 5% to 15% b, emphasizing the need for fast and accurate software. Our long-read alignment software, named Xavier, computes high-performance x-drop adaptive banded pairwise alignment exploiting instruction-level parallelism via Single-Instruction-Multiple-Data (SIMD) operations. Xavier uses a narrow bandwidth that appreciably improves performance reducing the search space for the optimal alignment. In our experiment, the adaptive mechanism enables Xavier to find the optimal alignment between related sequences even when the error rate is as high as 50%. Xavier achieves speed-up up to 5X over competitor software when enabling the x-drop termination and up to 415X when disabling it, with negligible accuracy loss.

Guidi, Giulia↗
DOE OSTI2019

LOGAN: High-Performance X-Drop Pairwise Alignment on GPU (LOGAN) v1.0

Pairwise sequence alignment is one of the most computationally intensive kernels in genomic data analysis, accounting for more than 90% of the run time for key bioinformatics applications. This method is particularly expensive for third-generation sequences due to the high computational expense of analyzing these long read lengths (1Kb-1Mb). Given the quadratic overhead of exact pairwise algorithms such as Smith-Waterman, for long alignments, the community primarily relies on approximate algorithms that search only for high-quality alignments and stop early when one is not found. In this work, we present the first GPU optimization of the popular X-drop alignment algorithm, named LOGAN. Results show that our high-performance multi-GPU LOGAN implementation achieves up to 181.6 GCUPS and speed-ups up to 6.6x and 30.7x using 1 and 6 NVIDIA Tesla V100, respectively, over the state-of-the-art software running on two IBM Power9 processors using 168 threads, with equivalent accuracy. We also demonstrate a 2.3x LOGAN speed-up versus ksw2, a state-of-art vectorized algorithm for sequence alignment implemented in minimap2. To highlight the impact of our work on a real-world application, we couple the LOGAN aligner with a many-to-many long-read alignment software called BELLA, and demonstrate that our implementation improves the overall BELLA runtime by up to 10.6x. Finally, we adapt the Roofline model for our optimized kernel and demonstrate that our implementation is near-optimal on the NVIDIA Tesla V100s.

Guidi, Giulia↗
DOE OSTI2016

CHSalign: A Web Server That Builds upon Junction-Explorer and RNAJAG for Pairwise Alignment of RNA Secondary Structures with Coaxial Helical Stacking

RNA junctions are important structural elements of RNA molecules. They are formed when three or more helices come together in three-dimensional space. Recent studies have focused on the annotation and prediction of coaxial helical stacking (CHS) motifs within junctions. Here we exploit such predictions to develop an efficient alignment tool to handle RNA secondary structures with CHS motifs. Specifically, we build upon our Junction-Explorer software for predicting coaxial stacking and RNAJAG for modelling junction topologies as tree graphs to incorporate constrained tree matching and dynamic programming algorithms into a new method, called CHSalign, for aligning the secondary structures of RNA molecules containing CHS motifs. Thus, CHSalign is intended to be an efficient alignment tool for RNAs containing similar junctions. Experimental results based on thousands of alignments demonstrate that CHSalign can align two RNA secondary structures containing CHS motifs more accurately than other RNA secondary structure alignment tools. CHSalign yields a high score when aligning two RNA secondary structures with similar CHS motifs or helical arrangement patterns, and a low score otherwise. This new method has been implemented in a web server, and the program is also made freely available, at http://bioinformatics.njit.edu/CHSalign/.

59 BASIC BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2020

Data-driven Alignment of the Tracker for the Mu2e Experiment

An alignment of the Mu2e Tracker is investigated using the Mu2e Offline Software and Millepede-II. Simulated misalignments of Tracker planes were inserted between Monte-Carlo event generation and before reconstruction using randomly generated $(x,y,z)$-translations and rotations of the rigid-body planes in the detector model. Cosmic ray muons, with no magnetic field present in the Detector Solenoid, will follow a straight-line trajectory. A maximum-likelihood fit is used to reconstruct a track and determine its parameters. Tracks traversing at least four planes, with ten registered straw hits, and a maximum time residual of $20$ ns are selected to be used in an alignment sample. The cuts were chosen to discard tracks with low information content, such as those with high levels of multiple scattering or those with low numbers of measurements contributing to a single track fit. Millepede-II produces the resulting alignment constants according to a simultaneous least-squares fit of the alignment parameters and the track parameters for all input tracks. The improved alignment constants are used to repeat the process and recover an increased number of suitable tracks, further improving the estimate of the alignment constants in subsequent iterations. A performance study of the process was conducted on a misaligned Tracker in the case of translation-only, and translation plus rotational misalignments. In both cases, the correct alignment constants were recovered to within statistical error after three global fit iterations. Additionally, a continuous integration system was developed for the \texttt{Mu2e/Offline} GitHub repository, introducing a convenient automated testing process for all proposed changes (``pull requests"). The tests developed included a full build of the software, followed by tests of the validation routines, geometry overlap checking, and multi-threading mode. Additionally, code quality checks and low-statistics physics comparison checks a re also available.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2017

Effect of Alignment on Polarized Infrared Emission from Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons

Polarized emission from polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) potentially provides a new way to test the basic physics of the alignment of ultrasmall grains. In this paper, we present a new model of polarized PAH emission that takes into account the effect of PAH alignment with the magnetic field. We first generate a large sample of the grain angular momentum J by simulating the alignment of PAHs due to resonance paramagnetic relaxation that accounts for various interaction processes. We then calculate the polarization level of the PAH emission features for the different phases of the interstellar medium, including the cold neutral medium (CNM), reflection nebulae (RNe), and photodissociation regions. We find that a moderate degree of PAH alignment can significantly enhance the polarization degree of the PAH emission compared to the previous results obtained with randomly oriented angular momentum. In particular, we find that the smallest negatively charged PAHs in RNe can be excited to slightly suprathermal rotation due to enhanced ion collisional excitation, resulting in an increase of the polarization with the ionization fraction. Our results suggest that an RN is the most favorable environment in which to observe polarized PAH emission and to test the alignment physics of nanoparticles. Finally, we present an explicit relationship between the polarization level of PAH emission and the degree of external alignment for the CNM and RNe. The obtained relationship will be particularly useful for testing the alignment physics of PAHs in future observations.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2017

Orbit Alignment in Triple Stars

The statistics of the angle Φ between orbital angular momenta in hierarchical triple systems with known inner visual or astrometric orbits are studied. A correlation between apparent revolution directions proves the partial orbit alignment known from earlier works. The alignment is strong in triples with outer projected separation less than ∼50 au, where the average Φ is about 20{sup ∘}. In contrast, outer orbits wider than 1000 au are not aligned with the inner orbits. It is established that the orbit alignment decreases with the increasing mass of the primary component. The average eccentricity of inner orbits in well-aligned triples is smaller than in randomly aligned ones. These findings highlight the role of dissipative interactions with gas in defining the orbital architecture of low-mass triple systems. On the other hand, chaotic dynamics apparently played a role in shaping more massive hierarchies. The analysis of projected configurations and triples with known inner and outer orbits indicates that the distribution of Φ is likely bimodal, where 80% of triples have Φ<70{sup ∘} and the remaining ones are randomly aligned.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2022

Galaxy Alignments with Surrounding Structure in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey

Using data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Legacy Survey, we study the alignment of luminous galaxies with spectroscopic data with the surrounding larger-scale structure as defined by galaxies with only photometric data. We find that galaxies from the red sequence have a statistically significant tendency for their apparent long axes to align parallel to the projected surrounding structure. Red galaxies more luminous than the median of our sample (M r < –21.78) have a mean alignment angle $\langle$Φ$\rangle$ < 45°, indicating preferred parallel alignment, at a significance level >4.5σ on projected scales 0.1 Mpc < r p ≤ 7.5 Mpc. Fainter red galaxies have $\langle$Φ$\rangle$ < 45° at a significance level >4.3σ at scales 1 Mpc < r p < 3 Mpc. At a projected scale r p = 3.0 Mpc, the mean alignment angle decreases steadily with increasing luminosity for red galaxies with M r ≲ –22.5, reaching $\langle$Φ$\rangle$ = 40$^{°}_{.}$49 ± 0$^{°}_{.}$56 for the most luminous 1% (M r ~ –23.57). Galaxies from the blue sequence show no statistically significant tendency for their axes to align with larger-scale structure, regardless of galaxy luminosity. Galaxies in higher-density regions do not show a statistically significant difference in the mean alignment angle from galaxies in lower-density regions; this holds true for the faint blue, luminous blue, faint red, and luminous red subsets.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗