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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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All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS1975

Electromagnetic wave energy conversion research

Known electromagnetic wave absorbing structures found in nature were first studied for clues of how one might later design large area man-made radiant-electric converters. This led to the study of the electro-optics of insect dielectric antennae. Insights were achieved into how these antennae probably operate in the infrared 7-14um range. EWEC theoretical models and relevant cases were concisely formulated and justified for metal and dielectric absorber materials. Finding the electromagnetic field solutions to these models is a problem not yet solved. A rough estimate of losses in metal, solid dielectric, and hollow dielectric waveguides indicates future radiant-electric EWEC research should aim toward dielectric materials for maximum conversion efficiency. It was also found that the absorber bandwidth is a theoretical limitation on radiant-electric conversion efficiency. Ideally, the absorbers' wavelength would be centered on the irradiating spectrum and have the same bandwith as the irradiating wave. The EWEC concept appears to have a valid scientific basis, but considerable more research is needed before it is thoroughly understood, especially for the complex randomly polarized, wide band, phase incoherent spectrum of the sun. Specific recommended research areas are identified.

Bailey, R. L.↗
NASA NTRS1984

Potential to kinetic energy conversion in wave number domain for the Southern Hemisphere

Preliminary results of a wave number study conducted for the South Pacific Convergence Zone (SPCZ) using FGGE data for the period January 10-27, 1979 are reported. In particular, three variables (geomagnetic height, z, vertical p-velocity, omega, and temperature, T) and one energy conversion quantity, omega-alpha (where alpha is the specific volume), are shown. It is demonstrated that wave number 4 plays an important role in the conversion from available potential energy to kinetic energy in the Southern Hemisphere tropics, particularly in the vicinity of the SPCZ. It is therefore suggested that the development and movement of wave number 4 waves be carefully monitored in making forecasts for the South Pacific region.

Huang, H.-J.↗
NASA NTRS2013

Feasibility of Traveling Wave Direct Energy Conversion of Fission Reaction Fragments

Fission fragment direct energy conversion has been considered in the past for the purpose of increasing nuclear power plant efficiency and for advanced space propulsion. Since the fragments carry electric charge (typically in the order of 20 e) and have 100 MeV-range kinetic energy, techniques utilizing very high-voltage DC electrodes have been considered. This study is focused on a different approach: the kinetic energy of the charged fission fragments is converted into alternating current by means of a traveling wave coupling scheme (Traveling Wave Direct Energy Converter, TWDEC), thereby not requiring the utilization of high voltage technology. A preliminary feasibility analysis of the concept is introduced based on a conceptual level study and on a particle simulation model of the beam dynamics.

Tarditi, A. G.↗
NASA NTRS1976

Theoretical analysis of the EWEC report

This analytic investigation shows how the electromagnetic wave energy conversion (EWEC) device, as used for solar-to-electric power conversion, is significantly different from solar cells, with respect to principles of operation. An optimistic estimate of efficiency is about 80% for a full-wave rectifying configuration with solar radiation normally incident. This compares favorably with the theoretical maximum for a CdTe solar cell (23.5%), as well as with the efficiencies of more familiar cells: Si (19.5%), InP (21.5%), and GaAs (23%). Some key technological issues that must be resolved before the EWEC device can be realized are identified. Those issues include: the fabrication of a pn semi-conductor junction with no permittivity resonances in the optical band; and the efficient channeling of the power received by countless microscopic horn antennas through a relatively few number of wires.

Source record↗
NASA NTRS1979

Isis 1 observations at the source of auroral kilometric radiation

Observations of auroral kilometric radiation (AKR) were made by Isis 1 in the source region. The radiation is found to be generated in the extraordinary mode just above the local cut-off frequency and to emanate nearly perpendicular to the magnetic field. It occurs within local depletions of electron density, where the ratio of plasma frequency to cyclotron frequency is less than 0.2. The density depletion is restricted to altitudes above about 2000 km, and the upper AKR frequency limit corresponds to the extraordinary cut-off frequency at this altitude. AKR is observed from Isis 1 above the nighttime auroral zone over a wider extent in longitude than in latitude with an intense source region observed most often near 2200 LMT and 70 deg invariant latitude. It is directly related to inverted V electron precipitation events with an electron-to-wave energy conversion efficiency of the order of 0.1 to 1%.

Benson, R. F.↗
NASA NTRS1980

Maintenance of quasi-stationary waves in a two-level quasi-geostrophic spectral model with topography

A study of the maintenance of the quasistationary waves forced by topography using a truncated two-level quasigeostrophic spectral model in a zonal channel on a beta-plane is presented. The model's motion contains wavenumbers 0, n, and 2n in the zonal direction, where n is the lowest eddy wavenumber and also the wavenumber of the topography. The study covered the two cases defined by n=2 and n=3; the spectral mode was integrated by initially perturbing the stationary solution of the equations governing the spectral coefficients, and a detailed energetics study was made of the quasiequilibrium state to study the maintenance of the quasistationary waves. The energy conversions required for maintaining these waves when n=3 imply that they are generated mainly by baroclinic stability of the forced waves; this type of baroclinic wave tends to become stationary to draw efficiently on the available energy of the forced wave.

Yao, M.-S.↗
NASA NTRS2014

Direct Energy Conversion for Nuclear Propulsion at Low Specific Mass

The project will continue the FY13 JSC IR&D (October-2012 to September-2013) effort in Travelling Wave Direct Energy Conversion (TWDEC) in order to demonstrate its potential as the core of a high potential, game-changing, in-space propulsion technology. The TWDEC concept converts particle beam energy into radio frequency (RF) alternating current electrical power, such as can be used to heat the propellant in a plasma thruster. In a more advanced concept (explored in the Phase 1 NIAC project), the TWDEC could also be utilized to condition the particle beam such that it may transfer directed kinetic energy to a target propellant plasma for the purpose of increasing thrust and optimizing the specific impulse. The overall scope of the FY13 first-year effort was to build on both the 2012 Phase 1 NIAC research and the analysis and test results produced by Japanese researchers over the past twenty years to assess the potential for spacecraft propulsion applications. The primary objective of the FY13 effort was to create particle-in-cell computer simulations of a TWDEC. Other objectives included construction of a breadboard TWDEC test article, preliminary test calibration of the simulations, and construction of first order power system models to feed into mission architecture analyses with COPERNICUS tools. Due to funding cuts resulting from the FY13 sequestration, only the computer simulations and assembly of the breadboard test article were completed. The simulations, however, are of unprecedented flexibility and precision and were presented at the 2013 AIAA Joint Propulsion Conference. Also, the assembled test article will provide an ion current density two orders of magnitude above that available in previous Japanese experiments, thus enabling the first direct measurements of power generation from a TWDEC for FY14. The proposed FY14 effort will use the test article for experimental validation of the computer simulations and thus complete to a greater fidelity the mission analysis products originally conceived for FY13.

Scott, John H.↗
NASA NTRS1985

Middle atmosphere modeling

Breaking gravity waves generate and maintain a background level of turbulence which is capable of producing substantial cooling and/or heating in the upper mesosphere and lower thermosphere. The net thermodynamic effect of breaking gravity waves is critically dependent on the eddy Prandt number (P sub t) applicable to mesospheric turbulence. When P sub t is approximately 1, the calculations of the heat budget for the mesopause region imply that the globally averaged eddy or turbulent diffusion coefficient cannot exceed .000001 sq cm/s. This upper limit on turbulant diffusion applies to both potential temperature transport and chemically inert tracer transport when radiative damping is neglible. For chemically active species larger diffusion coefficients are permitted, because the effective eddy diffusion coefficient is increased by an additive term L/2 gamma (sup 2), where L is the chemical loss rate and gamma is the vertical wavenumber. For P sub t is approximately 4 to 6, the turbulent diffusion of momentum (D sub M) is sufficiently greater than the turbulent diffusion of heat (D sub H) that the conversion of gravity wave energy to heat with high efficiency nearly balances the divergence of the downward eddy heat flux in the wave breaking zone. Therefore the heat budget of the mesopause region would no longer provide a powerful and useful constraint on D sub H. If P sub t exceeds 6 with high efficiency for energy conversion to heat, gravity waves would heat the mesosphere throughout the wave breaking region.

Strobel, D. F.↗
NASA NTRS1995

Some wave-particle effects on large-scale Alfven wave propagation and damping

Phase mixing can reduce greatly the torsional Alfven wave's dissipation length for propagation in complex magnetic field-line geometries. This phase mixing causes significant energy transfers from large to small scales where a conversion from ordered wave energy into a particle kinetic form occurs. This conversion during its initial stages is an entropy conserving process well described by Vlasov theory, Nonlinear stages of wave-particle resonance, particle trapping, and collisional resistivity are often invoked as processes eventually responsible for converting ordered wave motions into random thermal motion. Strictly speaking, this entropy producing phase cannot be described within Vlasov theory, and the large-scale effects of these microscopic events resides at the difficult frontier between generalized fluid and kinetic theories. We attempt to describe certain aspects of such resonances within the framework of fluid theory focusing on torsional Alfven wave energy transport and deposition within flux tubes.

Siregar, E.↗
NASA NTRS1966

Annual Progress Report, 1966

Rarefied gas mechanics, plasma dynamics, blast wave phenomena, energy conversion, aerodynamic noise, subsonics, flight dynamics, materials, high altitude measurements, and molecular beams

PLASMA DYNAMICS↗
NASA NTRS1984

The structures and energetics of fully nonlinear symmetric baroclinic waves

Rotating baroclinic flow for Richardson number lower than about 1 is studied by means of a finite difference Navier-Stokes model assuming no variations except in the vertical plane that completely contains the density gradient vector. The horizontally infinite channel to which attention is given further assumes periodic boundary conditions at the vertical computational boundaries and no-slip conducting horizontal boundaries. Two configurations are considered. Symmetric baroclinic waves developed in the flows in a manner consistent with linear theory, and it is noted that the structures and energetics of the fully developed waves were dependent on the Prandtl number Pr. For Pr greater than 1, the conversion from potential energy to wave kinetic energy was direct, via temperature and vertical motion correlation, while for Pr of less than 1, conversion proceeded from potential energy to average kinetic energy by means of an induced meridional flow, and then to wave kinetic energy.

Miller, T. L.↗
NASA NTRS2017

Critical Fluctuations in Beam-Plasma Systems and Solar Type III Radio Bursts

The type III radio bursts are the most intense radio emissions from the sun. In Figure 1, we present a typical type III burst observed by the STEREO spacecraft. Ginzburg and Zheleznyakov (1958) were the first to suggest that Langmuir waves excited by the solar flare accelerated electrons are the source of these bursts. The in situ detection of electron beams and Langmuir waves in association with type III bursts together with tracking of type III burst sources in the interplanetary medium confirmed this plasma hypothesis. However, the dynamics of type III electron beams and their interaction with the ambient plasma through the excited Langmuir waves is an unsolved problem. In order that the electron beams don't lose their energy by resonantly interacting with Langmuir waves, various nonlinear processes, such as the induced scattering of Langmuir waves off the background ions in weak turbulence regime and oscillating two-stream instability in strong turbulence regime were invoked. However, the observed electron density fluctuations do not allow Langmuir waves to grow to very high intensities as pointed out by several authors. As far as the conversion of Langmuir wave energy into electromagnetic energy is concerned, there is no consensus either for the fundamental or for the second harmonic emission. In this paper, we address these issues in terms of critical fluctuations near the boundary of the beam-plasma instability which is analogous to the anomalously growing fluctuations near the phase transition points called critical points. We show that this phenomenon can account for the survival of electron beams over large distances as well as the intensities of Langmuir waves excited during this phase transition regime are sufficient to explain the peak intensities of the fundamental as well as harmonic emissions

Fluctuations↗
NASA NTRS1980

Magnetoacoustic heating by ion Landau damping

The Vlasov-fluid model of Freidberg (1972) is used to study the resonance heating of a sharp-boundary screw pinch. The analysis provides the first treatment of the magnetoacoustic heating of a cylindrical plasma by means of ion Landau damping, which was identified as a viable dissipative mechanism for the conversion of magnetoacoustic wave energy into ion thermal energy. In addition, local and global energy conservation are considered, and formulae and numerical results for the thermal energy doubling time and the associated induced rf electric fields are presented. It is shown that collisionless absorption can provide a heating mechanism when an equilibrium plasma column is pumped by oscillations of the confining magnetic field at a frequency near the oblique magnetoacoustic frequency.

Turner, L.↗