Search NASA⌕ Search

SEARCH · Search NASA

Results for “collaborative design”

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 199 records · Page 11
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2021

Planned Steady State Irradiation of Characterized Instruments for Nuclear Thermal Rockets Using In-Pile Experiment Apparatus

The development of nuclear rocket technology is critical for the further exploration of extraterrestrial bodies. Nuclear rockets are capable of providing various advantages over current chemical rockets. However, the harsh environment provides a number of challenges regarding instrument performance. Temperature extremes, radiation (reactor and space), and the inability to conduct traditional maintenance activities can lead to a severe degradation in instrument performance. To better understand the effects of radiation on instrumentation, an irradiation campaign has been designed to test a set of instruments provided by a collaborator in the aerospace industry. Details concerning pre-irradiation performance are provided for a future comparison to the irradiated performance. Additionally, the design of the irradiation test is described in detail.

Floyd, Dan↗
DOE OSTI2023

NETL Direct Air Capture Center

In 2022 Congress authorized the $25M National Energy Technology Laboratory Direct Air Capture Center. The facility will be specifically targeted at accelerating the commercialization of technologies beyond the conceptual stage which have not yet reached full pilot-scale (TRL 3 to 6). The ability to operate over a wide range of conditions will help the developers to understand how their technologies respond in different climates, from summer to winter and arid to tropical. NETL recognizes that DAC technology is still early in its evolution, and a wide variety of highly varied technologies are being explored. The Center will be designed with substantial flexibility to accommodate the rapidly evolving technological landscape. Testing systems at three scales will be included: lab-scale systems designed to examine the long-term stability of DAC materials, bench-scale module testing systems capable of probing flow dynamics, and small pilot-scale skid rooms able to test prototype DAC units under a wide variety of climate conditions. The NETL DAC Center will feature dedicated engineering, technician, scientific and logistical support for experimental system design, installation, operation of experiments, and interpretation of results for projects including but not limited to kinetics of absorption/desorption, thermal duty, and post-mortem elemental characterization to understand degradation. The NETL DAC Center projects will also have access to dedicated process modeling and analysis to evaluate the technoeconomic aspects of new technologies. NETL’s Systems Engineering and Analysis (SEA) team, the Carbon Capture Simulation Initiative (CCSI), and the Institute for the Design of Advanced Energy Systems (IDAES) are all potential collaborators with NETL’s testing partners from industry, academia, and other research institutions. NETL also has world class capabilities in device scale modeling (i.e., MFIX) that will be available to help design more efficient contactors and optimize unique internal configurations that can be realized by advanced manufacturing. The talk will cover the design and capabilities of the center, the planned availability, and feedback will be solicited from the audience on DAC testing needs.

Luebke, David↗
DOE OSTI2023

Accelerating commercialization of direct air capture technology

In 2022 Congress authorized the $25M National Energy Technology Laboratory Direct Air Capture Center. The facility will be specifically targeted at accelerating the commercialization of technologies beyond the conceptual stage which have not yet reached full pilot-scale (TRL 3 to 6). The ability to operate over a wide range of conditions will help the developers to understand how their technologies respond in different climates, from summer to winter and arid to tropical. NETL recognizes that DAC technology is still early in its evolution, and a wide variety of highly varied technologies are being explored. The Center will be designed with substantial flexibility to accommodate the rapidly evolving technological landscape. Testing systems at three scales will be included: lab-scale systems designed to examine the long-term stability of DAC materials, bench-scale module testing systems capable of probing flow dynamics, and small pilot-scale skid rooms able to test prototype DAC units under a wide variety of climate conditions. The NETL DAC Center will feature dedicated engineering, technician, scientific and logistical support for experimental system design, installation, operation of experiments, and interpretation of results for projects including but not limited to kinetics of absorption/desorption, thermal duty, and post-mortem elemental characterization to understand degradation. The NETL DAC Center projects will also have access to dedicated process modeling and analysis to evaluate the technoeconomic aspects of new technologies. NETL’s Systems Engineering and Analysis (SEA) team, the Carbon Capture Simulation Initiative (CCSI), and the Institute for the Design of Advanced Energy Systems (IDAES) are all potential collaborators with NETL’s testing partners from industry, academia, and other research institutions. NETL also has world class capabilities in device scale modeling (i.e., MFIX) that will be available to help design more efficient contactors and optimize unique internal configurations that can be realized by advanced manufacturing. The talk will cover the design and capabilities of the center, the planned availability, and feedback will be solicited from the audience on DAC testing needs.

Luebke, David↗
DOE OSTI2025

Accelerated data-driven materials science with the Materials Project

The Materials Project was launched formally in 2011 to drive materials discovery forwards through high-throughput computation and open data. More than a decade later, the Materials Project has become an indispensable tool used by more than 600,000 materials researchers around the world. This Perspective describes how the Materials Project, as a data platform and a software ecosystem, has helped to shape research in data-driven materials science. We cover how sustainable software and computational methods have accelerated materials design while becoming more open source and collaborative in nature. Next, we present cases where the Materials Project was used to understand and discover functional materials. We then describe our efforts to meet the needs of an expanding user base, through technical infrastructure updates ranging from data architecture and cloud resources to interactive web applications. Finally, we discuss opportunities to better aid the research community, with the vision that more accessible and easy-to-understand materials data will result in democratized materials knowledge and an increasingly collaborative community.

Horton, Matthew K↗
DOE OSTI2023

Light detection with power and signal transmission over fiber

The Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment is a next generation long baseline (1300 km) neutrino oscillation experiment. The neutrino beam measurements will be performed by a near detector and far detector. The far detector will consist of four modules, installed 1.5 km deep underground, based on Liquid Argon Time Projection Chamber (LArTPC) technology to detect particles. The Vertical Drift (VD) LArTPC is a recent technology proposed by the DUNE collaboration for the second FD module. In VD, light collection will be optimized by embedding photon detectors within the LArTPC cathode, which is biased at −300 kV. As a result, power must arrive to the Photon Detection System and signal must be transmitted via non-conductive material. The proposed solution is to use Power-over-Fiber and Signal-over-Fiber. An intense validation of the system is being performed by the collaboration at the CERN Neutrino Platform. The design of the system and the results of the validation collected over the first half of 2022 are presented here.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗
DOE OSTI2025

Performance of heavy-flavour jet identification in Lorentz-boosted topologies in proton-proton collisions at √(s) = 13 TeV

Measurements in the highly Lorentz-boosted regime provoke increased interest in probing the Higgs boson properties and in searching for particles beyond the standard model at the LHC. In the CMS Collaboration, various boosted-object tagging algorithms, designed to identify hadronic jets originating from a massive particle decaying to bb̅ or cc̅, have been developed and deployed across a range of physics analyses. This paper highlights their performance on simulated events, and summarizes novel calibration techniques using proton-proton collision data collected at √(s) = 13 TeV during the 2016–2018 LHC data-taking period. Three dedicated methods are used for the calibration in multijet events, leveraging either machine learning techniques, the presence of muons within energetic boosted jets, or the reconstruction of hadronically decaying high-energy Z bosons. The calibration results, obtained through a combination of these approaches, are presented and discussed.

Pattern recognition↗
DOE OSTI2020

RF deflecting cavity for fast radioactive ion beams

Abstract The Facility for Rare Isotope Beams (FRIB) will be a new scientific user facility that produces rare-isotope beams for experiments from the fragmentation of heavy ions at energies of 100–200 MeV/u. During the projectile fragmentation, the rare isotope of interest is produced along with many contaminants that need to be removed before the beam reaches detectors. At FRIB, this is accomplished with a magnetic projectile fragment separator. However, to achieve higher beam purity, in particular for proton-rich rare isotopes, additional purification is necessary. RadiaBeam in collaboration with Michigan State University (MSU) has designed a 20.125 MHz radiofrequency (RF) fragment separator capable of producing a 4 MV kick with 18 cm aperture in order to remove contaminant isotopes based on their time of flight. In this paper, we will discuss the RF and engineering design considerations of this separator cavity.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗
DOE OSTI2024

PIPES (Pipeline for Integrated Projects in Energy Systems) [SWR-24-89]

The Pipeline for Integrated Projects in Energy Systems (PIPES) is a comprehensive project, data, and workflow management tool designed for integrated modeling teams. PIPES facilitates the management of data requirements, tasks, and progress tracking, serving as a higher-level integration layer that works across various data and modeling software. This tool integrates models, data, and tools to perform large-scale, integrated analysis work at scale. PIPES is designed to streamline integrated modeling projects, enhance collaboration, and ensure the quality and efficiency of data management and workflow processes. https://github.com/nrel-pipes/pipes-api https://github.com/nrel-pipes/pipes-web https://github.com/nrel-pipes/nrel-pipes

Gu, Jianli↗
DOE OSTI2021

High Performance Superconducting Undulator Development

Initial Phase I work has involved a collaborative technical analysis of the superconducting magnet design. ANL has provided CMI with a history of the SCAPE prototype including the short 0.5m wet coil versions as well as thoughts on possible manufacturing methods.

43 PARTICLE ACCELERATORS↗
DOE OSTI2025

MITRE Domain Specific Language (DSL) for synthetic biology workflows (CRADA Final Report)

MITRE is currently developing BioNet, a network designed to facilitate the work of biologist collaborators that are distributed across multiple organizations. BioNet is envisaged to break down traditional barriers in biology, allowing for an integrated, service-based approach to projects which can utilize expertise from any participating entity. This disaggregation fosters innovation by enabling contributions from multiple sources. The public will benefit from the development of the BioNet (to which this project contributes), in that this fostered innovation could positively contribute to our economy.

59 BASIC BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2026

Lessons Learned from Site Selection Efforts for Deep Geological Disposal

This report discusses international experiences from site selection of deep geological repositories (DGR) for radioactive waste disposal. Based on experiences from three countries with recent or ongoing site selections, the report describes different site selection approaches and summarizes lessons learned. The German and Swiss programs are two slightly different examples of one end of the spectrum of potential siting approaches: Starting with the entire country, a technically based downselection is performed to select the repository site. The Canadian program is an example of the other end of the spectrum: Here, the program started with an extensive engagement program with Canadians to collaboratively develop a socially acceptable and technically sound national approach for the long-term management of used nuclear fuel. This was followed by the launch of a collaboratively developed consent-based siting process designed to seek an informed and willing host with suitable sites, considering both technical and community well-being site requirements.

12 MANAGEMENT OF RADIOACTIVE AND NON-RADIOACTIVE W↗
DOE OSTI2025

Pipeline for Integrated Projects in Energy Systems (PIPES): A Tool for Integrated System Planning [Slides]

The Pipeline for Integrated Projects in Energy Systems (PIPES) is a comprehensive project, data, and workflow management tool designed for integrated modeling teams. PIPES facilitates the management of data requirements, tasks, and progress tracking, serving as a higher-level integration layer that works across various data and modeling software. This tool integrates models, data, and tools to perform large-scale, integrated analysis work at scale. PIPES is designed to streamline integrated modeling projects, enhance collaboration, and ensure the quality and efficiency of data management and workflow processes. This presentation introduces PIPES a multi-model tool for integrated system planning; it describes the underlying architecture, deep dives into common user workflows, and outlines the upcoming development roadmap beyond its current alpha state.

29 ENERGY PLANNING, POLICY, AND ECONOMY↗
DOE OSTI2026

Innovating Distributed Embedded Energy Prize (InDEEP): A Lessons Learned Report

The U.S. Department of Energy's Water Power Technologies Office (WPTO) launched the Innovating Distributed Embedded Energy Prize (InDEEP) in March 2023 to accelerate innovation in Distributed Embedded Energy Conversion Technologies (DEEC-Tec) for ocean wave energy. Administered by the National Laboratory of the Rockies (NLR) with technical support from Sandia National Laboratories (SNL), InDEEP focused on the development of small, distributed, and embeddable energy converters (DEECs) and their integration into scalable DEEC-Tec metamaterials for marine renewable energy applications. Spanning three phases over two years, InDEEP awarded approximately $2.3 million to teams from academia, industry, and startups. Phase I emphasized conceptual design. Phase II moved into the prototyping of individual DEECs. Phase III required integration into functional DEEC-Tec metamaterial prototypes. Across 60 submissions, teams explored a wide range of energy conversion mechanisms - including piezoelectric, variable-capacitance, ionic, and inductive methods. Note, the prize did not include the design nor demonstration of ocean wave energy conversion systems. Rather, the prize only required participants to design and demonstrate individual DEECs and corresponding DEEC-Tec metamaterials. This prize utilized a mix of novel and proven techniques to attract participants from outside marine energy, including an engagement leaderboard, robust recruitment, technical expert mentorship, and a suite of technical trainings. Key insights from the competition emphasized that DEEC-Tec metamaterials must be intentionally designed to produce beneficial emergent behaviors - advantages that go beyond simply combining multiple DEEC units. Top-performing teams showed that thoughtful design of system architecture, coordinated deformation, and systems adaptabilities could unlock meaningful performance gains both at the DEEC system level and DEEC-Tec metamaterial system level. A critical realization was that many DEEC-Tec metamaterials could benefit from being designed to accept lower-frequency energy inputs and shift those into higher-frequencies per each DEEC making up the respective DEEC-Tec metamaterial. Other important takeaways included the need for rigorous and quantitative performance testing, effective integration of power conditioning electronics, and the pivotal role of material science in enabling innovative, adaptive DEEC-Tec-based energy conversion designs. InDEEP also helped establish a growing DEEC-Tec community of practitioners, attracting participants from beyond traditional marine energy sectors. Through a strong support infrastructure, InDEEP fostered early-stage innovation and laid a foundation for future DEEC-Tec-based ocean wave energy conversion solutions - positioning DEEC-Tec as a promising pathway toward scalable, resilient ocean wave energy conversion. Through focused R&D of individual DEECs and their integration into DEEC-Tec metamaterials, alongside a growing, multidisciplinary community catalyzed by InDEEP, there is a strong opportunity to drive a disruptive shift in ocean wave energy conversion design and development. This convergence of novel architectures, emergent behaviors, and collaborative innovation positions DEEC-Tec as a transformative approach, moving the field from rigid, centralized energy conversion-based designs to resilient, modular systems highly adaptable for real-world ocean wave energy conversion applications.

16 TIDAL AND WAVE POWER↗
DOE OSTI2021

6 MeV novel hybrid (standing wave - traveling wave) photo-cathode electron gun for a THz superradiant FEL

A novel 6 MeV hybrid photo-injector has been designed and constructed, based on a smaller-scale prototype previously built in UCLA’s Particle Beam Physics Laboratory. It has been commissioned at Ariel University in Israel as an on-going collaboration between the two universities. This unique, new generation design provides a radically simpler approach to RF feeding of a gun/buncher system, leading to a much shorter beam via velocity bunching owed to an attached traveling wave section of the photo-injector. This design offers better performance in beam parameters, providing a high quality electron beam, with energy of 6 MeV. The hybrid photo-injector was designed to provide emittance of approximately 3 μm, and pulse duration of 150 fs at up to 1 nC per pulse. The hybrid gun is driven by a SLAC XK5 klystron as the high power RF source, and third harmonic of a ~35 fs IR Laser amplifier (266 nm) to extract electrons from the photo-cathode. The unique electron gun will produce a bunched electron pulse to drive a THz FEL, which will operate at the super-radiant regime, and therefore requires ambitious beam properties. This paper describes the gun and presents experimental results from the gun and its sub-systems, including energy and charge measurements, compared with the design simulations.

150fs↗
DOE OSTI2020

A User-Centered Design Study in Scientific Visualization Targeting Domain Experts

The development of usable visualization solutions is essential for ensuring both their adoption and effectiveness. User-centered design principles, which involve users throughout the entire development process, have been shown to be effective in numerous information visualization endeavors. We describe how we applied these principles in scientific visualization over a two year collaboration to develop a hybrid in situ/post hoc solution tailored towards combustion researcher needs. Lastly, we examine the importance of user-centered design and lessons learned over the design process in an effort to aid others seeking to develop effective scientific visualization solutions.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗
DOE OSTI2025

Employing MACS/ViBRANT as a Surrogate MARVEL Reactor for Startup Reactivity Tuning and Supervisory Control Processes

Advanced nuclear reactors are a key part of the future of nuclear energy both in the United States and globally. They offer unique benefits for various energy-demanding applications, including use in remote locations, compact size, modular manufacturing, remote monitoring, low and/or variable power rating operation, and reliance on novel technologies to enhance operational safety. To achieve economic feasibility, advanced reactors must significantly reduce their workforces in comparison with the current fleet. Achieving this reduction will occur through reducing staff workloads using technology to achieve autonomous or semi-autonomous operations, demonstrated by comprehensive testing and validation activities. These operations will require both software and hardware platforms during the design and testing phases. While simulations are useful during the design phase, their performance can significantly deviate during actual deployment on hardware. This report presents the outcomes of a collaborative technical initiative between the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Microreactor Program (MRP) and Advanced Sensors and Instrumentation (ASI) Program. The collaboration utilized the Microreactor Automated Control System (MACS) hardware platform to bridge the gap between theoretical reactor design and actual startup and control operations. Two key use cases were investigated: facilitating the startup testing period and demonstrating supervisory control. The first use case details the key Microreactor Applications Research Validation and Evaluation (MARVEL) reactor startup physics testing activities conducted using the MACS platform. These activities included drum worth measurements, shutdown margin assessment, temperature feedback analysis, and scram time evaluation, as well as unique testing that would apply to the MARVEL reactor to demonstrate the testing methodologies in a low-risk environment. The MACS platform, serving as a surrogate representation of the MARVEL reactor, proved instrumental in performing these tests. The exercise revealed aspects that led to optimized processes, refined hardware design, and enhanced base software capabilities. By maturing methods and technologies in this manner, the initiative promises to reduce wasted time in the actual on-site reactor deployment effort, thereby saving significant time and resources. The second use case focuses on the development and implementation of supervisory control methods aimed at managing core tilt, which can result from asymmetrical operations or manufacturing imperfections in fuel rods or reactivity control devices. A key objective was to assess and compare the use of artificial intelligence (AI) for supervisory control. The effort aimed to define the role of supervisory control to enhance performance without risking control instability. This effort explored three distinct approaches: rules-based (RB) methods, optimization techniques, and reinforcement learning (RL) algorithms. Each approach was evaluated for its ease of implementation, its usability, and its effectiveness in responding to asymmetries in neutron flux. Comparative analysis of these approaches provided valuable insights into their applicability and effectiveness, offering a robust framework for advanced reactor operations. Together, these two use cases highlight the potential of hardware test beds to help streamline the design, operation, and control of advanced nuclear reactors. This collaborative effort underscores the importance of continued innovation and experimentation in achieving the next generation of safe, reliable, and economically viable nuclear energy solutions.

22 - GENERAL STUDIES OF NUCLEAR REACTORS↗