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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 217 records · Page 12
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS1984

Investigation of mixing in a turbofan exhaust duct. II Computer code application and verification

A three-dimensional analysis of turbofan forced mixer nozzle aerodynamics demonstrates that the complex flow structure is dominated by geometrically induced secondary flow rather than by turbulence. The test apparatus consisted of a fixed upstream model section and a rotating shroud. The Mach number of the fan and core streams at the mixing plane (lobe exit) was 0.45, the bypass ratio was about 4, and the Reynolds number based on the shroud radius was 1,100,000. The three velocity components near the exit plane of the lobes were measured using flow angularity probes to provide information about the mixer inflow conditions for turbulent computations. The validity of a previous computer code was demonstrated in a comparison of the nozzle exit temperature data with the computed temperature distributions. The mechanism most responsible for the generation of secondary flow within the lobes is due to the turning of the fan and core streams in opposite radial directions.

Povinelli, L. A.↗
NASA NTRS1993

Evaluation of the Intel iWarp parallel processor for space flight applications

The potential of a DARPA-sponsored advanced processor, the Intel iWarp, for use in future SSF Data Management Systems (DMS) upgrades is evaluated through integration into the Ames DMS testbed and applications testing. The iWarp is a distributed, parallel computing system well suited for high performance computing applications such as matrix operations and image processing. The system architecture is modular, supports systolic and message-based computation, and is capable of providing massive computational power in a low-cost, low-power package. As a consequence, the iWarp offers significant potential for advanced space-based computing. This research seeks to determine the iWarp's suitability as a processing device for space missions. In particular, the project focuses on evaluating the ease of integrating the iWarp into the SSF DMS baseline architecture and the iWarp's ability to support computationally stressing applications representative of SSF tasks.

Hine, Butler P., III↗
NASA NTRS1989

Coolant side heat transfer with rotation. Task 3 report: Application of computational fluid dynamics

An experimental and analytical program was conducted to investigate heat transfer and pressure losses in rotating multipass passages with configurations and dimensions typical of modern turbine blades. The objective of this program is the development and verification of improved analysis methods that will form the basis for a design system that will produce turbine components with improved durability. As part of this overall program, a technique is developed for computational fluid dynamics. The specific objectives were to: select a baseline CFD computer code, assess the limitations of the baseline code, modify the baseline code for rotational effects, verify the modified code against benchmark experiments in the literature, and to identify shortcomings in the code as revealed by the verification. The Pratt and Whitney 3D-TEACH CFD code was selected as the vehicle for this program. The code was modified to account for rotating internal flows, and these modifications were evaluated for flow characteristics of those expected in the application. Results can make a useful contribution to blade internal cooling.

Kopper, F. C.↗
DOE OSTI2017

Capturing provenance as a diagnostic tool for workflow performance evaluation and optimization

In extreme-scale computing environments such as the DOE Leadership Computing Facilities scientific workflows are routinely used to coordinate software processes for the execution of complex, computational applications that perform in-silico experiments. Monitoring the performance of workflows without also simultaneously tracking provenance is not sufficient to understand variations between runs, configurations, versions of a code, and between changes in an implemented stack, and systems, i.e. the variability of performance metrics data in their historical context. We take a provenance-based approach and demonstrate that provenance is useful as a tool for evaluating and optimizing workflow performance in extreme-scale HPC environments. We present Chimbuko, a framework for the analysis and visualization of the provenance of performance. Chimbuko implements a method for the evaluation of workflow performance from multiple components that enables the exploration of performance metrics data at scale.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗
DOE OSTI2021

Exploration of multifidelity UQ sampling strategies for computer network applications.

Network modeling is a powerful tool to enable rapid analysis of complex systems that can be challenging to study directly using physical testing. Here, two approaches are considered: emulation and simulation. The former runs real software on virtualized hardware, while the latter mimics the behavior of network components and their interactions in software. Although emulation provides an accurate representation of physical networks, this approach alone cannot guarantee the characterization of the system under realistic operative conditions. Operative conditions for physical networks are often characterized by intrinsic variability (payload size, packet latency, etc.) or a lack of precise knowledge regarding the network configuration (bandwidth, delays, etc.); therefore uncertainty quantification (UQ) strategies should be also employed. UQ strategies require multiple evaluations of the system with a number of evaluation instances that roughly increases with the problem dimensionality, i.e., the number of uncertain parameters. It follows that a typical UQ workflow for network modeling based on emulation can easily become unattainable due to its prohibitive computational cost. In this paper, a multifidelity sampling approach is discussed and applied to network modeling problems. The main idea is to optimally fuse information coming from simulations, which are a low-fidelity version of the emulation problem of interest, in order to decrease the estimator variance. By reducing the estimator variance in a sampling approach it is usually possible to obtain more reliable statistics and therefore a more reliable system characterization. Several network problems of increasing difficulty are presented. For each of them, the performance of the multifidelity estimator is compared with respect to the single fidelity counterpart, namely, Monte Carlo sampling. For all the test problems studied in this work, the multifidelity estimator demonstrated an increased efficiency with respect to MC.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗
DOE OSTI2020

Consistent Space Runtime (CSPACER) v1.0

This software provides a runtime for communication-bound applications, especially with irregular communication patterns. The target programming abstraction for the runtime is the space consistency model, which defines consistency guarantees at the granularity of memory spaces. This model has relaxed consistency semantics that enables a wide range of runtime optimizations. The runtime leverages threading to accelerate communication primitives, especially collective operations. It also allows efficient pipelining of communication operations and enable constructing a consistent state of multiple unordered communication activities targeting a memory space. The runtime uses a reduced API design that decomposes complex communication primitives in traditional general-purpose runtime into a sequence of simpler steps. To improve the productivity of using this runtime, we provide communication patterns commonly used for regular scientific computing applications and irregular data analytics. These communication patterns offer skeletons for the integration with application computation to allow efficient overlap.

Ibrahim, Khaled↗
DOE OSTI2015

Utilizing multiple state variables to improve the dynamic range of analog switching in a memristor

Memristors and memristive systems have been extensively studied for data storage and computing applications such as neuromorphic systems. To act as synapses in neuromorphic systems, the memristor needs to exhibit analog resistive switching (RS) behavior with incremental conductance change. In this study, we show that the dynamic range of the analog RS behavior can be significantly enhanced in a tantalum-oxide-based memristor. By controlling different state variables enabled by different physical effects during the RS process, the gradual filament expansion stage can be selectively enhanced without strongly affecting the abrupt filament length growth stage. Detailed physics-based modeling further verified the observed experimental effects and revealed the roles of oxygen vacancy drift and diffusion processes, and how the diffusion process can be selectively enhanced during the filament expansion stage. These findings lead to more desirable and reliable memristor behaviors for analog computing applications. Additionally, the ability to selectively control different internal physical processes demonstrated in the current study provides guidance for continued device optimization of memristor devices in general.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2014

Visualizing domain wall and reverse domain superconductivity

In magnetically coupled, planar ferromagnet-superconductor (F/S) hybrid structures, magnetic domain walls can be used to spatially confine the superconductivity. In contrast to a superconductor in a uniform applied magnetic field, the nucleation of the superconducting order parameter in F/S structures is governed by the inhomogeneous magnetic field distribution. The interplay between the superconductivity localized at the domain walls and far from the walls leads to effects such as re-entrant superconductivity and reverse domain superconductivity with the critical temperature depending upon the location. Here we use scanning tunnelling spectroscopy to directly image the nucleation of superconductivity at the domain wall in F/S structures realized with Co-Pd multilayers and Pb thin films. Our results demonstrate that such F/S structures are attractive model systems that offer the possibility to control the strength and the location of the superconducting nucleus by applying an external magnetic field, potentially useful to guide vortices for computing application.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2014

Ultra-High Temperature Steam Corrosion of Complex Silicates for Nuclear Applications: A Computational Study

Stability of materials under extreme conditions is an important issue for safety of nuclear reactors. Presently, silicon carbide (SiC) is being studied as a cladding material candidate for fuel rods in boiling-water and pressurized water-cooled reactors (BWRs and PWRs) that would substitute or modify traditional zircaloy materials. The rate of corrosion of the SiC ceramics in hot vapor environment (up to 2200 degrees C) simulating emergency conditions of light water reactor (LWR) depends on many environmental factors such as pressure, temperature, viscosity, and surface quality. Using the paralinear oxidation theory developed for ceramics in the combustion reactor environment, we estimated the corrosion rate of SiC ceramics under the conditions representing a significant power excursion in a LWR. It was established that a significant time – at least 100 h – is required for a typical SiC braiding to significantly degrade even in the most aggressive vapor environment (with temperatures up to 2200 °C) which is possible in a LWR at emergency condition. This provides evidence in favor of using the SiC coatings/braidings for additional protection of nuclear reactor rods against off-normal material degradation during power excursions or LOCA incidents. Additionally, we discuss possibilities of using other silica based ceramics in order to find materials with even higher corrosion resistance than SiC. In particular, we found that zircon (ZrSiO4) is also a very promising material for nuclear applications. Thermodynamic and first-principles atomic-scale calculations provide evidence of zircon thermodynamic stability in aggressive environments at least up to 1535 degrees C.

11 NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE AND FUEL MATERIALS↗
DOE OSTI2024

The role of driver head pose dynamics and instantaneous driving in safety critical events: Application of computer vision in naturalistic driving

This paper investigates the role of driver behavior especially head pose dynamics in safety–critical events (SCEs). Using a large dataset collected in a naturalistic driving study, this paper analyzes the head pose dynamics and driving behavior in moments leading up to crashes or near-crashes. The study uses advanced computer vision and mixed logit modeling techniques to identify patterns and relationships between drivers’ head pose dynamics and crash involvement. The results suggest that driver-head pose dynamics, especially poses that indicate distraction and movement volatility, are important factors that can contribute to undesirable safety outcomes. Marginal effects show that angular deviation for head pose dynamics indicated by yaw, pitch and roll increase the likelihood of crash intensity by 4.56%, 4.92% and 8.26% respectively. Furthermore, traffic flow and lane changing also contribute to increase in likelihood of crash intensity. These findings provide new insights into pre-crash factors, especially human factors and safety–critical events. The study highlights the importance of considering human factors in designing driver assistance systems and developing safer vehicles. This research contributes by examining naturalistic driving data at the microscopic level with early detection of behaviors that lead to SCEs and provides a basis for future research on automation.

33 ADVANCED PROPULSION SYSTEMS↗
DOE OSTI2013

Discrete Calderon's projections on parallelepipeds and their application to computing exterior magnetic fields for FRC plasmas

Confining dense plasma in a field reversed configuration (FRC) is considered a promising approach to fusion. Numerical simulation of this process requires setting artificial boundary conditions (ABCs) for the magnetic field because whereas the plasma itself occupies a bounded region (within the FRC coils), the field extends from this region all the way to infinity. If the plasma is modeled using single fluid magnetohydrodynamics (MHD), then the exterior magnetic field can be considered quasi-static. This field has a scalar potential governed by the Laplace equation. The quasi-static ABC for the magnetic field is obtained using the method of difference potentials, in the form of a discrete Calderon boundary equation with projection on the artificial boundary shaped as a parallelepiped. The Calderon projection itself is computed by convolution with the discrete fundamental solution on the three-dimensional Cartesian grid.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2016

Recent advances, and unresolved issues, in the application of computational modelling to the prediction of the biological effects of nanomaterials

Nanomaterials research is one of the fastest growing contemporary research areas. The unprecedented properties of these materials have meant that they are being incorporated into products very quickly. Regulatory agencies are concerned they cannot assess the potential hazards of these materials adequately, as data on the biological properties of nanomaterials are still relatively limited and expensive to acquire. Computational modelling methods have much to offer in helping understand the mechanisms by which toxicity may occur, and in predicting the likelihood of adverse biological impacts of materials not yet tested experimentally. This paper reviews the progress these methods, particularly those QSAR-based, have made in understanding and predicting potentially adverse biological effects of nanomaterials, and also the limitations and pitfalls of these methods. - Highlights: • Nanomaterials regulators need good information to make good decisions. • Nanomaterials and their interactions with biology are very complex. • Computational methods use existing data to predict properties of new nanomaterials. • Statistical, data driven modelling methods have been successfully applied to this task. • Much more must be learnt before robust toolkits will be widely usable by regulators.

60 APPLIED LIFE SCIENCES↗