Engineering Papers⌕ Search

SEARCH · Engineering Papers

Results for “ELEMENT 116”

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.

Quote a phrase for an exact phrase match. Source license links do not imply unrestricted reuse.

At least 19 records

Umbilical mechanism

Apparatus is described for automatically mating a pair of connectors and protecting them prior to mating, which minimizes weight and uses relatively simple and reliable mechanisms. Lower and upper connectors (24, 26) are held in lower and upper parts (14, 16) of a housing, with the upper connector mounted on a carrier (32) that is motor driven to move down and mate the connectors. A pair of movable members (36, 38) serve as shields, as coarse alignment aids, and as force transmitters. The movable members are pivotally mounted at the bottom of the upper housing, and as the carrier moves down it pivots the members out of the way. The movable members have socket elements (116) that closely receive pin elements (120) on the lower housing part, to coarsely align the connectors and to react mating and unmating forces between the housings. The carrier has a pair of plate portions (60, 62) with slots (64), and the movable members have cam followers engaged with the slot walls, to move the members with precision. The carrier plate-like portions engage follower members (82) that pivot open lower shield parts (44, 46) covering the lower connector, which is mounted on four stacks of Belleville washers (142).

Barron, Daniel R.↗

Active Correlation Technique: Status and Development

During the recent years, at the FLNR (JINR) a successful cycle of experiments has been accomplished on the synthesis of the superheavy elements with Z = 112-118 with {sup 48}Ca beam. From the viewpoint of the detection of rare decays and background suppression, this success was achieved due to the application of a new radical technique--the method of active correlations. The method employs search in a real-time mode for a pointer to a probable correlation like recoil-alpha for switching the beam off. In the case of detection in the same detector strip an additional alpha-decay event, of 'beam OFF' time interval is prolonged automatically.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗

Pomona College Dreamers and Achievers Profile

As an undergraduate at Pomona, Carol Meyers ’00 enjoyed proofs and pure math, but she also had a hankering to solve real-world problems. This eventually led her to discover the field of operations research, in which she earned a PhD from MIT, and from there onto a career at a national laboratory. “National labs are great because they serve a role between academia and industry,” she says, “solving problems too large or too applied for academia, and insufficiently profitdriven for industry.” Her workplace, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, is home to the world’s largest laser, frequent home to the world’s fastest supercomputer, and the namesake to element 116 (Livermorium) on the periodic table. During her 10+ years at the laboratory Carol has worked in the areas of energy grid modernization, nuclear counterterrorism, cyber security, stockpile stewardship, and supercomputing, often as a consultant providing mathematical modeling and optimization expertise. Carol has two young kids and serves as co-chair of the New Moms’ Group at her workplace. “Being in a supportive community of moms has really helped me at work,” she says, “because let’s face it – moms know how to get things done!” “People talk a lot about the importance of networking, but this doesn’t have to mean starting technical discussions with strangers. The ability to bond with and relate to other people is far more important, and many women do this very well. Some of my best work networking connections have come through our employer-affiliated daycare.”

99 GENERAL AND MISCELLANEOUS↗

Quantization in Classical Mechanics and Diffusion Mechanism of Alpha Decay, Cluster Radioactivity, Spontaneous Fission

Based on the Chetaev generalized theorem the Schredinger equation as the stability condition of trajectories in classical dynamics in the presence of dissipative forces is derived. In the framework of this approach the alternative model for unified description of alpha decay, spontaneous fission, cluster radioactivity and is developed. We show the possibility of the classical (without tunneling) description of radioactive decay of heavy nuclei, when the so called noise-induced transition or, in other words, the stochastic channel of radioactive decay conditioned by the Kramers diffusion mechanism is generated under certain conditions.Using the ENSDF nuclear data, we have found the parametrized solutions of the Kramers equation of the Langevin type by the Alexandrov dynamic auto-regularization method (REGN-Dubna program). These solutions describe with high-accuracy the dependences of half-life (the decay probability) of heavy radioactive nuclei on total kinetic energy of daughter decay products.Verification of the inverse problem solution in the framework of the universal Kramers description of alpha decay, spontaneous fission, cluster radioactivity, which based on the newest experimental data for alpha-decay of even-even superheavy nuclei (Z = 114, 116, 118), shows good coincidence of the experimental and theoretical dependences of half-life on alpha-decay energy.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗

Modification of the Core Cooling System of TRIGA 2000 Reactor

To accomplish safety requirements, a set of actions has to be performed following the recommendations of the IAEA safety series 35 applied to research reactor. Such actions are considered in modernization of the old system, improving the core cooling system and safety evaluations. Due to the complexity of the process and the difficulty in putting the apparatus in the reactor core, analytical and experimental study on the determination of flow and temperature distribution in the whole coolant channel are difficult to be done. In the present work, a numerical study of flow and temperature distribution in the coolant channel of TRIGA 2000 has been carried out using CFD package. For this study, simulations were carried out on 3-D tested model. The model consists of the reactor tank, thermal and thermalizing column, reflector, rotary specimen rack, chimney, fuel element, primary pipe, diffuser, beam tube and a part of the core are constructed by 1.50 million unstructured tetrahedral cell elements. The results show that for the initial condition (116 fuel elements in the core) and for the inlet temperature of 24 deg. C and the primary velocity of 5.6 m/s, there no boiling phenomena occur in the coolant channel. Due to this result, it is now possible to improve the core cooling system of TRIGA 2000 reactor. Meanwhile, forced flow from the diffuser system only affected the flow pattern in the outside of chimney and put on a small effect to the fluid flow's velocity in the inside of chimney.

21 SPECIFIC NUCLEAR REACTORS AND ASSOCIATED PLANTS↗

Toward the Discovery of New Elements: Production of Livermorium (𝑍 = 116) with 50 Ti

The 244 Pu ⁢(50 Ti ,𝑥⁢𝑛)⁢ 294−𝑥 Lv reaction was investigated at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory’s 88-Inch Cyclotron. The experiment was aimed at the production of a superheavy element with 𝑍 ≥114 by irradiating an actinide target with a beam heavier than 48 Ca. Produced Lv ions were separated from the unwanted beam and nuclear reaction products using the Berkeley Gas-filled Separator and implanted into a newly commissioned focal-plane detector system. Two decay chains were observed and assigned to the decay of 290 Lv . The production cross section was measured to be 𝜎 prod = 0.44($^{+0.58}_{−0.28}$) pb at a center-of-target center-of-mass energy of 220(3) MeV. Furthermore, this represents the first published measurement of the production of a superheavy element near the “island of stability,” with a beam of 50 Ti and is an essential precursor in the pursuit of searching for new elements beyond 𝑍 =118.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗

High transmission Ni compound refractive lens for high energy X-rays

We present a new planar Ni compound refractive lens for high energy X-rays (116 keV). The lens is composed of identical plano-concave elements with longitudinal parabolic grooves manufactured by a punch technique. In order to increase the lens transmission, the thickness of the single lens at the parabolic groove vertex was reduced to less than 5 μm and the radius of curvature was reduced to about 20 μm. The small radius of curvature allowed us to reduce the number of single elements needed to get the focal length of 3 m to 54 single lenses. The gain parameter has been significantly improved compared to the previous lenses due to higher transmission, but the focused beam size and its gain are not as good as expected, mostly due to the aberrations caused by the lens shape imperfections.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗

Latest Progress in Designs and Testings of PIP-II Power Couplers

Proton Improvement Plan – II (PIP-II) project is under go in Fermi National Laboratory. Main part of the project is 800 MeV proton superconducting accelerator which includes 116 superconducting cavities of 5 different types and three 162.5, 325 and 650 MHz frequencies. Key elements of accelerator which determine a reliable operation are main couplers for superconducting cavities. This paper describes the latest progress in design and testing of main couplers for PIP-II projects.

43 PARTICLE ACCELERATORS↗

Induced Radioactivity Analysis for the NSRL Linac in China Using Monte Carlo Simulations and Gamma Spectroscopy - Paper 141

The Synchrotron Radiation Facility of the National Synchrotron Radiation Laboratory (NSRL) located in Hefei, China consists of a 200-MeV electron linear accelerator and an 800-MeV electronic storage ring. Constructed in 1989, the 200-MeV Electron linac is one of the earliest high-energy electron linear accelerators in China. The NSRL is a large-scale experiment device, having been operated more than twenty years, so it is hard to give a historical recount about the injection of NSRL Linac. Lower-energy electrons emitted from the accelerator electron gun are progressively accelerated to about 200 MeV in five acceleration tubes, and then are injected into the electron storage ring, reaching the final energy of 800 MeV. The linear accelerator is a traveling wave linear accelerator, consisting of pre-injection, four 6-m acceleration segment, some beam sensing elements, and focusing inserts. The electrons are accelerated in the acceleration tubes to 32 MeV, 74 MeV, 116 MeV, 158 MeV, respectively, and the electronic energy reaches 200 MeV at the end of the acceleration trip. A scraper is used for beam collimation and is located at the end of each acceleration tube, with a length that increases with the energy to provide sufficient collimation. The NSRL Linac was retired in 2012 due to a plan to upgrade the facility. The decommissioning produced many real challenges related to the methods to handle the large size of the device and the time required to store structural materials until the radioactivity is reduced in the waste repository. These problems should be solved as soon as possible in order for the upgrade to proceed smoothly. At present, no prior decommissioning experience existed in China on such a high-energy electron linear accelerator. Therefore, the decommission project provided an opportunity to study and evaluate the challenges, in particular, involving the induced radioactivity for the purposes of radiation protection. For a well-shielded accelerator facility, the induced radioactivity is an important source of radiation for people who perform the decommissioning. In addition, information on the level of induced radioactivity is needed for disposing of the retired accelerator materials. Therefore it is significant to predict such radioactivity level accurately. However, the induced radioactivity study for such type high-energy electron linear accelerator is very seldom. Particle accelerators that operate at energy greater than 10 MeV will produce induced radioactivity due to well-known photonuclear interactions. However, the assessment of such as induced radioactivity of large-scale installations is a time-consuming process. Experimental methods are time-consuming and require special radiation safety measures to protection the investigators. On the other hand, empirical formula cannot yield sufficiently accurate results. Therefore, Monte Carlo simulation method is the primary means to study such problems. In the decommissioning process of the NSRL Linac, the induced radioactivity assessment will be based on Monte Carlo simulation method as the main auxiliary means to expand a series of studies. (authors)

43 PARTICLE ACCELERATORS↗

Production of Cf-252 and other transplutonium isotopes at Oak Ridge National Laboratory

In 1957 Glenn T. Seaborg conceived and advocated for the construction of the High Flux Isotope Reactor (HFIR) and the Transuranium Processing Plant (since then renamed the Radiochemical Engineering Development Center, or REDC) at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. There, heavily shielded hot cells, glove boxes, and laboratories allow recovery of transuranium elements produced in substantial quantities. Seaborg’s vision of HFIR and REDC producing milligram quantities of berkelium, californium, and einsteinium has been fulfilled beginning in 1966 through May 2019 with 78 production campaigns yielding a cumulative totals of 1.2 g of 249 Bk, 10.2 g of 252 Cf, 39 mg of 253 Es, and 15 pg of 257 Fm. Notably, 252 Cf is a neutron source used in many industrial applications including oil exploration; process control systems for the cement industry, coal analysis, and power production; sources to start nuclear reactors and perform nondestructive materials analyses; homeland security and national defense detection devices; and medical research. Isotopes made available through transplutonium production at HFIR/REDC have enabled scientists to study the nuclear properties and reactions, chemical properties, optical properties, and solid-state properties of transplutonium elements. Long-lived isotopes have served as targets in heavy ion accelerators to produce heavier elements leading to the discovery of 104 Rf, 105 Db, 106 Sg, 113 Nh, 114 Fl, 115 Mc, 116 Lv, 117 Ts, and 118 Og. This paper reviews the evolution of the processing flowsheets to produce, separate, and purify transplutonium isotopes, which have evolved over 50 years of operation at HFIR and REDC, and summarizes directions of future work to improve the efficiency of the production operations.

38 RADIATION CHEMISTRY, RADIOCHEMISTRY, AND NUCLEA↗

Surface fatigue life and failure characteristics of EX-53, CBS 1000M, and AISI 9310 gear materials

Spur gear endurance tests and rolling-element surface fatigue tests are conducted to investigate EX-53 and CBS 1000M steels for use as advanced application gear materials, to determine their endurance characteristics, and to compare the results with the standard AISI 9310 gear material. The gear pitch diameter is 8.89 cm (3.50 in). Gear test conditions are an oil inlet temperature of 320 K (116 F), an oil outlet temperature of 350 K (170 F), a maximum Hertz stress of 1.71 GPa (248 ksi), and a speed of 10,000 rpm. Bench-type rolling-element fatigue tests are conducted at ambient temperature with a bar specimen speed of 12,500 rpm and a maximum Hertz stress of 4.83 GPa (700 ksi). The EX-53 test gears have a surface fatigue life of twice that of the AISI 9310 spur gears. The CBS 1000M test gears have a surface fatigue life of more than twice that of the AISI 9310 spur gears. However, the CBS 1000M gears experience a 30-percent tooth fracture failure which limits its use as a gear material. The rolling-contact fatigue lines of RC bar specimens of EX-53 and ASISI 9310 are approximately equal. However, the CBS 1000M RC specimens have a surface fatigue life of about 50 percent that of the AISI 9310.

Townsend, D. P.↗

Application of nuclear density functionals to lepton number violating weak processes

We present an application of energy density functional methods with the Gogny interaction to the calculation of nuclear matrix elements (NME) for neutrinoless double beta decay and double electron capture. Beyond mean field effects have been included by particle number and angular momentum restoration and shape mixing within the generator coordinate method (GCM) framework. We analyze in detail the NME for {sup 116}Cd nucleus which is one of the most promising candidates to detect neutrinoless double beta decay.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗

Synthesis and structure determination of Ce 6 Cd 23 Te: a new chalcogen-containing member of the RE 6 Cd 23 T family ( RE is a rare-earth metal and T is a late group 14, 15 and 16 element)

The ternary phase hexacerium tricosacadmium telluride, Ce 6 Cd 23 Te, was synthesized by a high-temperature reaction of the elements in sealed Nb ampoules and was structurally characterized by powder and single-crystal X-ray diffraction. The structure, established from single-crystal X-ray diffraction methods, is isopointal with the Zr 6 Zn 23 Si structure type (Pearson symbol cF 120, cubic space group Fm -3 m ), a filled version of the Th 6 Mn 23 structure with the same space group and Pearson symbol cF 116. Though no Cd-containing rare-earth metal binaries are known to form with this structure, it appears that the addition of small amounts of a p -block element allows the formation of such interstitially stabilized ternary compounds. Temperature-dependent direct current (dc) magnetization measurements suggest local-moment magnetism arising from the Ce 3+ ground state, with possible valence fluctuations at low temperature, inferred from the deviations from the Curie–Weiss law.

Chemistry↗

Surface fatigue life of carburized and hardened M50NiL and AISI 9310 spur gears and rolling-contact test bars

Spur gear endurance tests and rolling-element surface tests were conducted to investigate vacuum-induction-melted, vacuum-arc-melted (VIM-VAR) M50NiL steel for use as a gear steel in advanced aircraft applications, to determine its endurance characteristics, and to compare the results with those for standard VAR and VIM-VAR AISI 9310 gear material. Tests were conducted with spur gears and rolling-contact bars manufactured from VIM-VAR M50NiL and VAR and VIM-VAR AISI 9310. The gear pitch diameter was 8.9 cm (3.5 in.). Gear test conditions were an inlet oil temperature of 320 K (116 F), and outlet oil temperature of 350 K (170 F), a maximum Hertz stress of 1.71 GPa (248 ksi), and a speed of 10,000 rpm. Bench rolling-element fatigue tests were conducted at ambient temperatures with a bar speed of 12,500 rpm and a maximum Hertz stress of 4.83 GPA (700 ksi). The VIM-VAR M50NiL gears had a surface fatigue life that was 4.5 and 11.5 times that for VIM-VAR and VAR AISI 9310 gears, respectively. The surface fatigue life of the VIM-VAR M50NiL rolling-contact bars was 13.2 and 21.6 times that for the VIM-VAR and VAR AISI 9310, respectively. The VIM-VAR M50NiL material was shown to have good resistance to fracture through a fatigue spall and to have fatigue life far superior to that of both VIM-VAR and VAR AISI 9310 gears and rolling-contact bars.

Townsend, Dennis P.↗

Surface fatigue life of carburized and hardened M50NiL and AISI 9310 spur gears and rolling-contact test bars

Spur gear endurance tests and rolling-element surface tests were conducted to investigate vacuum-induction-melted, vacuum-arc-melted (VIM-VAR) M50NiL steel for use as a gear steel in advanced aircraft applications, to determine its endurance characteristics, and to compare the results with those for standard VAR and VIM-VAR AISI 9310 gear material. Tests were conducted with spur gears and rolling-contact bars manufactured from VIM-VAR M50NiL and VAR and VIM-VAR AISI 9310. The gear pitch diameter was 8.9 cm (3.5 in.). Gear test conditions were an inlet oil temperature of 320 K (116 F), and outlet oil temperature of 350 K (170 F), a maximum Hertz stress of 1.71 GPa (248 ksi), and a speed of 10,000 rpm. Bench rolling-element fatigue tests were conducted at ambient temperatures with a bar speed of 12,500 rpm and a maximum Hertz stress of 4.83 GPA (700 ksi). The VIM-VAR M50NiL gears had a surface fatigue life that was 4.5 and 11.5 times that for VIM-VAR and VAR AISI 9310 gears, respectively. The surface fatigue life of the VIM-VAR M50NiL rolling-contact bars was 13.2 and 21.6 times that for the VIM-VAR and VAR AISI 9310, respectively. The VIM-VAR M50NiL material was shown to have good resistance to fracture through a fatigue spall and to have fatigue life far superior to that of both VIM-VAR and VAR AISI 9310 gears and rolling-contact bars.

Townsend, Dennis P.↗

Airborne spectrograph for the thermal IR: Broadband Array Spectrograph System

Spectroscopic studies in the 'fingerprint' region of the thermal IR from 3 to 14 microns of celestial dust components and the overall energy distribution of the sources are best served by moderate spectral resolution (R = lambda/Delta lambda approximately 30 to 200), high sensitivity observations. Spectral purity and the reproducibility of the spectral shape are critical as well, when using the spectral shape to assign temperatures to dust grains or to gas clouds based on the wavelength and shape of molecular bands. These sensor attributes are also important to the use of wavelengths and ratios of solid state features to derive compositions of dust grains in celestial sources. The advent of high quality linear arrays of blocked impurity band (BIB) detectors of Si:As permitted the development of a state-of-the-art, patented, cooled prism spectrograph. Developed at The Aerospace Corporation largely with in-house funds, the Broadband Array Spectrograph System (BASS) has been used for a variety of remote sensing applications, but especially for IR astronomical studies on the Kuiper Airborne Observatory and at the NASA Infrared Telescope Facility (IRTF). The attributes of the spectrograph, specifically having the pupil imaged onto the 2 linear 58 element detector arrays so that the effects of guiding errors are minimized, being able to maximally exploit the limited observing time by acquiring all 116 spectral channels simultaneously, and having all spectral channels imaged through the same aperture so that spectral mapping is readily and reliably accomplished, afford the scientist with a unique opportunity to conduct both surveys of examples of many different types of sources as well as in-depth studies of a given class of object by thoroughly sampling the class members. This duality was demonstrated with the BASS through a combination of KAO flights where spectral maps were obtained as part of in-depth studies of specific source regions (such as Orion and W3) and flights where up to 21 legs/flight were used to survey many different sources of different types.

Russell, Ray W.↗

Tracking the Sun IV: An Historical Summary of the Installed Cost of Photovoltaics in the United States from 1998 to 2010

The present report describes installed cost trends for grid-connected PV projects installed from 1998 through 2010 (with some limited and preliminary results presented for projects installed in the first six months of 2011). The analysis is based on project-level cost data from approximately 116,500 residential, non-residential, and utility-sector PV systems in the United States. The inclusion of utility-sector PV is a new element in this year’s report. The combined capacity of all systems in the data sample totals 1,685 MW, equal to 79% of all grid-connected PV capacity installed in the United States through 2010 and representing one of the most comprehensive sources of installed PV cost data for the U.S. Based on this dataset, the report describes historical installed cost trends over time, and by location, market segment, technology type, and component. The report also briefly compares recent PV installed costs in the United States to those in Germany and Japan, and describes trends in customer incentives for PV installations and net installed costs after receipt of such incentives. The analysis presented here focuses on descriptive trends in the underlying data, serving primarily to summarize the data in tabular and graphical form.

14 SOLAR ENERGY↗