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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 199 records · Page 11
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS1981

Evaluation of HCMM satellite data for estuarine tidal circulation patterns and thermal inertia soil moisture measurements

Digital thermal maps of the Cooper River (SC) and the Potomac River estuaries were prepared from heat capacity mapping radiometer (HCMR) tapes. Tidal phases were correctly interpreted and verified. Synoptic surface circulation patterns were charted by location thermal fronts and water mass boundaries within the estuaries. Thermal anomalies were detected adjacent of a conventional power plant on the Potomac. Under optimum conditions, estuaries as small as the Cooper River can be monitored for generalized thermal/tidal circulation patterns by the HCMM-type IR sensors. The HCMM thermal inertia approach to estimating soil moisture at the Luverne (MN) test site was found to be unsatisfactory as a NESS operational satellite technique because of cloud cover interference. Thermal-IR data show similar structure of the Baltimore and Washington heat islands when compared to NOAA AVHRR thermal-IR data. Thermal anomalies from the warm water discharge water of a nuclear power plant were mapped in Lake Anna, Virginia.

Wiesnet, D. R.↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Progress Toward Evaluating Roughness-Resolved Aerothermodynamic Simulations for the Mars Sample Return Earth Entry System

This work pursues the efficient Navier-Stokes simulation, using NASA’s standard LAURA and DPLR simulation tools, of the flowfield and convective heating resulting from the patterned-roughness surface of the Mars Sample Return (MSR) Earth Entry System (EES). This type of simulation has been infeasible for past NASA missions. However, for EES, the combination of a patterned roughness heatshield approximated with a sinusoidal pattern, the zero degrees angle of attack nominal flow, and the supersonic boundary layer edge Mach number, all combine to make these roughness resolved grid simulations feasible. The patterned roughness and zero degrees angle of attack nominal flow allow the simulation domain to be reduced to a thin axial flowfield slice that captures a minimum of single period of the roughness pattern. With a periodic boundary condition applied along the boundaries of this slice, simulation on the reduced domain is identical to the full domain but with significant cost saving. The supersonic boundary layer edge Mach number prevents the upstream influence, which allows the smooth stagnation region to be frozen. This freezing of the stagnation region flow is required because of the numerical instability resulting from the tight spacing of the grid in the axial direction as the stagnation point is approached. Applying the developed analysis approach to a peak heating EES case results in a roughness augmentation factor for the convective heating of 1.32, which agrees well with correlations that predict values between 1.30 and 1.37. Analysis approach developed in this work provides the framework for future studies of turbulence modeling impacts and the influence of an ablating surface.

Earth Entry System↗
NASA NTRS1961

Interaction of Highly Underexpanded Jets with Simulated Lunar Surfaces

Pressure distributions and erosion patterns on simulated lunar surfaces (hard and soft) and interference effects between the surface and two representative lunar vehicles (cylindrical and spherical) were obtained with cold-air jets at various descent heights and nozzle total-pressure ratios up to 288,000. Surface pressure distributions were dependent on both nozzle area ratio and, nozzle contour. Peak pressures obtained with a sonic nozzle agreed closely with those predicted theoretically for a near-sonic jet expanding into a vacuum. Short bell-shaped nozzles gave annular pressure distributions; the low center pressure resulted from the coalescence of shocks that originated within the nozzle. The high surface pressures were contained within a circle whose diameter was about 16 throat diameters, regardless of nozzle area ratio or contour. The peak pressure increased rapidly as the vehicle approached the surface; for example, at a descent height of 40 throat diameters the peak pressure was 0.4 percent of the chamber pressure, but increased to 6 percent at 13 throat diameters. The exhaust jet eroded a circular concave hole in white sand at descent heights from about 200 to 600 throat diameters. The hole diameter was about 225 throat diameters, while the depth was approximately 60 throat diameters. The sand particles, which formed a conical sheet at a semivertex angle of 50 deg, appeared to follow a ballistic trajectory and at no time struck the vehicle. An increase in pressure was measured on the base of the cylindrical lunar vehicle when it approached to within 14 throat diameters of the hard, flat surface. No interference effects were noted between the spherical model and the surface to descent heights as low as 8 throat diameters.

Stitt, Leonard E.↗
NASA NTRS2010

Orbiter BLT Flight Experiment Wind Tunnel Simulations: Nearfield Flowfield Imaging and Surface Thermography

This paper reports a series of wind tunnel tests simulating the near-field behavior of the Space Shuttle Orbiter Boundary Layer Transition Detailed Test Objective (BLT DTO) flight experiment. Hypersonic flow over a flat plate with an attached BLT DTO-shaped trip was tested in a Mach 10 wind tunnel. The sharp-leading-edge flat plate was oriented at an angle of 20 degrees with respect to the freestream flow, resulting in post-shock edge Mach number of approximately 4. The flowfield was visualized using nitric oxide (NO) planar laser-induced fluorescence (PLIF). Flow visualizations were performed at 10 Hz using a wide-field of view and high-resolution NO PLIF system. A lower spatial resolution and smaller field of view NO PLIF system visualized the flow at 500 kHz, which was fast enough to resolve unsteady flow features. At the lowest Reynolds number studied, the flow was observed to be laminar and mostly steady. At the highest Reynolds number, flow visualizations showed streak instabilities generated immediately downstream of the trip. These instabilities transitioned to unsteady periodic and spatially irregular structures downstream. Quantitative surface heating imagery was obtained using the Temperature Sensitive Paint (TSP) technique. Comparisons between the PLIF flow visualizations and TSP heating measurements show a strong correlation between flow patterns and surface heating trends.

Danehy, Paul M.↗
NASA NTRS1971

NOAA's oceanography studies under the Earth Resources Survey Program

Some results are presented of Earth Resources Survey Program studies conducted on: (1) Defining and developing methods of suppressing system noise and cloud contamination in satellite measurements of infrared window radiation. (2) Relating sea surface temperature patterns in the Gulf Stream and Gulf of Mexico to associated thermal front structure with aid of infrared data from Nimbus or ITOS. (3) Testing the feasibility of mapping sea surface roughness and low level wind speed over tropical oceans by means of ATS imagery in sun glitter zones. (4) Microwave radiometer measurements from aircraft and their usefulness and limitations for all-weather mapping of surface roughness, sea ice conditions, and possible surface temperature. (5) Evaluation of scanning radiometer data from ITOS for purposes of mapping snow and ice conditions.

Mcclain, E. P.↗
NASA NTRS1984

Reflector antennas with low sidelobes, low cross polarization, and high aperture efficiency

Techniques are presented for computing the horn near field patterns on the subreflectors and for correcting the phase center errors of the horn pattern by shaping the subreflector surface. The diffraction pattern computations for scanned beams are described. The effects of dish aperture diffraction on pattern bandwidth are investigated. A model antenna consisting of a reflector, shaped subreflector, and corrugated feed horn is described.

Faigen, I. M.↗
NASA NTRS2011

Surface Instability of Liquid Propellant under Vertical Oscillatory Forcing

Fluid motion in a fuel tank produced during thrust oscillations can circulate sub-cooled hydrogen near the liquid-vapor interface resulting in increased condensation and ullage pressure collapse. The first objective of this study is to validate the capabilities of a Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) tool, CFD-ACE+, in modeling the fundamental interface transition physics occurring at the propellant surface. The second objective is to use the tool to assess the effects of thrust oscillations on surface dynamics. Our technical approach is to first verify the CFD code against known theoretical solutions, and then validate against existing experiments for small scale tanks and a range of transition regimes. A 2D axisymmetric, multi-phase model of gases, liquids, and solids is used to verify that CFD-ACE+ is capable of modeling fluid-structure interaction and system resonance in a typical thrust oscillation environment. Then, the 3D mode is studied with an assumed oscillatory body force to simulate the thrust oscillating effect. The study showed that CFD modeling can capture all of the transition physics from solid body motion to standing surface wave and to droplet ejection from liquid-gas interface. Unlike the analytical solutions established during the 1960 s, CFD modeling is not limited to the small amplitude regime. It can extend solutions to the nonlinear regime to determine the amplitude of surface waves after the onset of instability. The present simulation also demonstrated consistent trends from numerical experiments through variation of physical properties from low viscous fluid to high viscous fluids, and through variation of geometry and input forcing functions. A comparison of surface wave patterns under various forcing frequencies and amplitudes showed good agreement with experimental observations. It is concluded that thrust oscillations can cause droplet formation at the interface, which results in increased surface area and enhanced heat transfer between the liquid and gas phases as the ejected droplets travel well into the warmer gas region.

Yang, H. Q.↗
NASA NTRS2019

The Southern Ocean Sea Surface Temperature Response to Ozone Depletion: A Multi-Model Comparison

The effect of the Antarctic ozone hole extends downwards from the stratosphere, with clear signatures in surface weather patterns including a positive trend in the Southern Annular Mode (SAM). Several recent studies have used coupled climate models to investigate the impact of these changes on Southern Ocean sea surface temperature (SST), notably motivated by the observed cooling from the late 1970s. Here we examine the robustness of these model results through comparison of both previously published and new simulations. We focus on the calculation of ‘climate response functions' (CRFs), transient responses to an instantaneous step-change in ozone concentrations. The CRF for most models consists of a rapid cooling of SST, followed by a slower warming trend. However, inter-model comparison reveals large uncertainties, such that even the sign of the impact of ozone depletion on historical SST, when reconstructed from the CRF, remains unconstrained. Comparison of these CRFs with SST responses to a hypothetical step-change in the SAM, inferred through lagged linear regression, shows broadly similar results. Causes of uncertainty are explored by examining relationships between model climatologies and their CRFs. The inter-model spread in CRFs can be reproduced by varying a single subgrid-scale mixing parameter within a single model. Antarctic sea-ice CRFs are also calculated: these do not generally exhibit the two-time-scale behavior of SST, suggesting a complex relationship between the two. Finally, by constraining model climatology-response relationships with observational values, we conclude that ozone depletion in unlikely to have been the primary driver of the observed SST cooling trend.

Climate response functions (CRF)↗
DOE OSTI2026

Recent Weakening of the Global Radiative Feedback

Earth's climate stability, characterized by the global radiative feedback parameter (𝜆), varies decadally due to changing surface temperature patterns. Recent variations in 𝜆 are poorly understood as coordinated model simulations typically end in 2014. We apply a convolutional neural network trained on climate model simulations to observation-based surface temperature reconstructions to estimate variations in 𝜆 up to 2025. We find that 𝜆 reached a minimum (maximum stability) around the mid 1990s (𝜆 ≃ −3 Wm −2 /K), but has since weakened significantly (𝜆 ≃ −2 Wm −2 /K). We confirm these results with climate model simulations extended to 2022. The recent 𝜆 weakening is not significantly affected by El Niño Southern Oscillation or Pacific Decadal Oscillation. Attribution reveals that warming in the subtropical Northeast Pacific is an important driver of the recently weakened feedback, confirmed by targeted experiments in E3SMv2. Our approach enables near real-time monitoring of Earth's climate stability.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
NASA NTRS1976

Solar wind H-3 and C-14 abundances and solar surface processes

Tritium is measured as a function of depth in a Surveyor 3 sample. The upper limit for solar-wind-implanted tritium gives an H-3/H-1 limit for the solar wind of 10 to the -11th power. The temperature-release patterns of C-14 from lunar soils are measured. The C-14 release pattern from surface soils differs from a trench-bottom soil and gives positive evidence for the presence of C-14 in the solar wind with a C-14/H-1 ratio of approximately 6 by 10 to the -11th power. This C-14 content fixes a minimal magnitude for nuclear processes on the solar surface averaged over the past 10,000 yr. The H-3 and C-14 contents combine to require that either the mixing rate above the photosphere be rapid or that the H-3 produced by nuclear reactions be destroyed by secondary nuclear reactions before escaping in the solar wind.

Fireman, E. L.↗
NASA NTRS1975

California coastal processes study: Skylab

The author has identified the following significant results. In San Pablo Bay, the patterns of dredged sediment discharges were plotted over a three month period. It was found that lithogenous particles, kept in suspension by the fresh water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin, were transported downstream to the estuarine area at varying rates depending on the river discharge level. Skylab collected California coastal imagery at limited times and not at constant intervals. Resolution, however, helped compensate for lack of coverage. Increased spatial and spectral resolution provided details not possible utilizing Landsat imagery. The S-192 data was reformatted; band by band image density stretching was utilized to enhance sediment discharge patterns entrainment, boundaries, and eddys. The 26 January 1974 Skylab 4 imagery of San Francisco Bay was taken during an exceptionally high fresh water and suspended sediment discharge period. A three pronged surface sediment pattern was visible where the Sacramento-San Joaquin Rivers entered San Pablo Bay through Carquinez Strait.

Pirie, D. M.↗
NASA NTRS2001

Tropical Ocean Evaporation/SST Sensitivity and It's Link to Water and Energy Budget Variations During ENSO

The continuing debate over feedback mechanisms governing tropical sea surface temperatures (SSTs) and tropical climate in general has highlighted the diversity of potential checks and balances within the climate system. Competing feedbacks due to changes in surface evaporation, water vapor, and cloud long- and shortwave radiative properties each may serve critical roles in stabilizing or destabilizing the climate system. It is also intriguing that even those climate variations having origins internal to the climate system - changes in ocean heat transport for example, apparently require complementary equilibrating effects by changes in atmospheric energy fluxes. Perhaps the best observational evidence of this is the relatively invariant nature of tropically averaged net radiation exiting the top-of-atmosphere (TOA) as measured by broadband satellite sensors over the past two decades. Thus, analyzing how these feedback mechanisms are operating within the context of current interannual variability may offer considerable insight for anticipating future climate change. In this paper we focus primarily on interannual variations of ocean evaporative fluxes and their significance for coupled water and energy cycles within the tropical climate system. In particular, we use both the da Silva estimates of surface fluxes (based on the Comprehensive Ocean Atmosphere Data Set, COADS) and numerical simulations from several global climate models to examine evaporation sensitivity to perturbations in SST associated with warm and cold ENSO events. The specific questions we address are as follows: (1) What recurring patterns of surface wind and humidity anomalies are present during ENSO and how do they combine to yield systematic evaporation anomalies?, (2) What is the resulting tropical ocean mean evaporation-SST sensitivity associated with this climate perturbation?, and (3) What role does this evaporation play in tropical heat and water balance over tropical oceanic regions? We use the da Silva ocean flux data to identify composite structure of departures of latent heat flux from climatology. We also show how these patterns arise out of associated wind and humidity anomaly distributions. Our preliminary work shows that evaporation sensitivity estimates from the da Silva / COADS data, computed for the tropical oceans (30 degrees N/S) are in the neighborhood of 5 to 6 W/square m K. Model estimates are also quite close to this figure. This rate is only slightly less than a rate corresponding to constant relative humidity; however, substantial regional departures from constant relative humidity are present. These patterns are robust and we relate the associated wind and humidity fluctuations noted in previous investigations to the derived evaporation anomalies. Finally, these results are interpreted with other data from the Earth radiation Budget Experiment (ERBE), Global Precipitation Climatology Project (GPCP) and NASA's Surface Radiation Budget (SRB) data set to characterize the tropical energetics of ENSO-related climate variability.

Robertson, Franklin R.↗
NASA NTRS2012

The Stellar Imager (SI) - A Mission to Resolve Stellar Surfaces, Interiors, and Magnetic Activity

The Stellar Imager (SI) is a space-based, UV/Optical Interferometer (UVOI) designed to enable 0.1 milli-arcsecond (mas) spectral imaging of stellar surfaces and of the Universe in general. It will also probe via asteroseismology flows and structures in stellar interiors. SI will enable the development and testing of a predictive dynamo model for the Sun, by observing patterns of surface activity and imaging of the structure and differential rotation of stellar interiors in a population study of Sun-like stars to determine the dependence of dynamo action on mass, internal structure and flows, and time. SI's science focuses on the role of magnetism in the Universe and will revolutionize our understanding of the formation of planetary systems, of the habitability and climatology of distant planets, and of many magnetohydrodynamically controlled processes in the Universe. SI is a "LandmarklDiscovery Mission" in the 2005 Heliophysics Roadmap, an implementation of the UVOI in the 2006 Astrophysics Strategic Plan, and a NASA Vision Mission ("NASA Space Science Vision Missions" (2008), ed. M. Allen). We present here the science goals of the SI Mission, a mission architecture that could meet those goals, and the technology development needed to enable this mission

Christensen-Dalsgaard, Jorgen↗
NASA NTRS2016

Role of Surface Wind and Vegetation Cover in Multi-decadal Variations of Dust Emission in the Sahara and Sahel

North Africa, the world's largest dust source, is non-uniform, consisting of a permanently arid region (Sahara), a semi-arid region (Sahel), and a relatively moist vegetated region (Savanna), each with very different rainfall patterns and surface conditions. This study aims to better understand the controlling factors that determine the variation of dust emission in North Africa over a 27-year period from 1982 to 2008, using observational data and model simulations. The results show that the model-derived Saharan dust emission is only correlated with the 10-m winds (W10m) obtained from reanalysis data, but the model-derived Sahel dust emission is correlated with both W10m and the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) that is obtained from satellite. While the Saharan dust accounts for 82 of the continental North Africa dust emission (1340-1570 Tg year(exp -1) in the 27-year average, the Sahel accounts for 17 with a larger seasonal and inter-annual variation (230-380 Tg year(exp -1), contributing about a quarter of the transatlantic dust transported to the northern part of South America. The decreasing dust emission trend over the 27-year period is highly correlated with W10m over the Sahara (R equals 0.92). Over the Sahel, the dust emission is correlated with W10m (R 0.69) but is also anti-correlated with the trend of NDVI (R equals 0.65). W10m is decreasing over both the Sahara and the Sahel between 1982 and 2008, and the trends are correlated (R equals 0.53), suggesting that Saharan Sahelian surface winds are a coupled system, driving the inter-annual variation of dust emission.

Inter-annual variation↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Mars Sample Return Earth Entry System Woven Roughness Mach 6 Aeroheating Test

The Mars Sample Return Earth Entry System is the first entry vehicle designed for a NASA flagship mission to utilize a woven thermal protection system as well as a 52.5 degree sphere cone forebody geometry. As a result, no heritage aeroheating experimental data set exists to compare with computational predictions. In order to obtain a set of validation data for computational models, an extensive wind tunnel test campaign was funded by the Mars Sample Return Earth Entry System project. The first entry in the test campaign was completed in April of 2023, which was an investigation of turbulent heating augmentation due to woven thermal protection system roughness on the 52.5 degree Mars Sample Return - Earth Entry System vehicle forebody geometry. This test entry produced the first ever experimental aeroheating data on a 52.5 degree sphere-cone geometry as well as the first NASA experimental aeroheating data on a woven surface roughness pattern. Data obtained from this test campaign is being directly leveraged to support the NASA flight program, as experimental results are being utilized to validate the computational models which characterize the aeroheating environment that the vehicle experiences and predict turbulent surface heating levels and margins across the woven surface.

Jonathan S Cheatwood↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Mars Sample Return Earth Entry System Woven Roughness Mach 6 Aeroheating Test

The Mars Sample Return Earth Entry System is the first entry vehicle designed for a NASA flagship mission to utilize a woven thermal protection system as well as a 52.5 degree sphere cone forebody geometry. As a result, no heritage aeroheating experimental data set exists to compare with computational predictions. In order to obtain a set of validation data for computational models, an extensive wind tunnel test campaign was funded by the Mars Sample Return Earth Entry System project. The first entry in the test campaign was completed in April of 2023, which was an investigation of turbulent heating augmentation due to woven thermal protection system roughness on the 52.5 degree Mars Sample Return - Earth Entry System vehicle forebody geometry. This test entry produced the first ever experimental aeroheating data on a 52.5 deg sphere-cone geometry as well as the first NASA experimental aeroheating data on a woven surface roughness pattern. Data obtained from this test campaign is being directly leveraged to support the NASA flight program, as experimental results are being utilized to validate the computational models which characterize the aeroheating environment that the vehicle experiences and predict turbulent surface heating levels and margins across the woven surface.

Jonathan Cheatwood↗
NASA NTRS1993

Ishtar deformed belts: Evidence for deformation from below?

The mountain belts of Ishtar Terra are unique on Venus. Models for their formation include mantle upwelling, mantle downwelling, and horizontal convergence. The present forms of these models are too simple to predict surface strain, topography, or gravity. More detailed models will require specific constraints as imposed by geologic relations. In order to develop specific constraints for geodynamic models, we examine the geology of Ishtar Terra as viewed in Magellan SAR imagery in an attempt to interpret regional surface strain patterns. In this paper, we present geologic and structural relations that leads us to postulate that Ishtar deformed belts result from shear forces within the mantle acting on the lithosphere, and not by horizontal forces from colliding plates. We propose that the surface strains result from differential strain and displacement of domains within the upper mantle, and that further analysis of Ishtar deformation may allow us to identify individual domains within the mantle, and to constrain displacement trajectories between domains.

Hansen, V. L.↗
NASA NTRS1988

Principal components of the North American summer temperature field and the antecedent oceanic and atmospheric conditions

The North American summer temperature field is evaluated in terms of the preceding patterns of the ocean and atmosphere. It is found that the planetary scale circulation associated with the thermal field over the western tropical Pacific and the ocean-atmosphere interaction over the central North Pacific-Aleutian region are important in determining the summer surface temperature pattern over North America. Also, evidence is presented for the possible impact of the El Nino-Southern Oscillation on the summer circulation pattern. It is suggested that by using the principal components, the predictability of regional circulation can be evaluated as a linear combination of independent sources of variability.

Park, Chung-Kyu↗