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At least 235 records · Page 13

The mechanisms of fine particle generation and electrification during Mount St. Helens volcanic eruption

Microscopical investigation of volcanic ash collected from ground stations during Mount St. Helens eruptions reveal a distinctive bimodel size distribution with high concentrations of particle ranges at (1) 200-100 microns and (2) 20-0.1 microns. Close examination of individual particles shows that most larger ones are solidified magma particles of porous pumice with numerous gas bubbles in the interior and the smaller ones are all glassy fragments without any detectable gas bubbles. Elemental analysis demonstrates that the fine fragments all have a composition similar to that of the larger pumice particles. Laboratory experiments suggest that the formation of the fine fragments is by bursting of glassy bubbles from a partially solidified surface of a crystallizing molten magma particle. The production of gas bubbles is due to the release of absorbed gases in molten magma particles when solubility decreases during phase transition. Diffusion cloud chamber experiments strongly indicate that sub-micron volcanic fragments are highly hygroscopic and extremely active as cloud condensation nuclei. Ice crystals also are evidently formed on those fragments in a supercooled (-20 C) cloud chamber. It has been reported that charge generation from ocean volcanic eruptions is due to contact of molten lava with sea water. This seems to be insufficient to explain the observed rapid and intense lightning activities over Mount St. Helens eruptions. Therefore, a hypothesis is presented here that highly electrically charged fine solid fragments are ejected by bursting of gas bubbles from the surface of a crystallizing molten magma particles.

Cheng, R. J.↗

Ice growth in supercooled solutions of antifreeze glycoproteins

The effects of different degrees of supercooling on the habit and rates of growth of ice crystals from solutions of antifreeze glycoproteins are reported. To isolate the influence of different solutions and supercooling alone, a system was devised that nucleated crystals in the middle of a uniformly supercooled sample. Alternatively, single crystals of selected orientation were inserted into free liquid surface. A crystallization rate up to five times greater than that in pure water was found. A mechanism explaining these results is suggested.

Harrison, K.↗

The Winter 2010 and 2011 FRONT/NIRSS In-Flight Icing Hazard Detection Project

The NASA Icing Remote Sensing System (NIRSS) deploys a vertically-pointing K-band radar, a lidar ceiliometer, and a profiling microwave radiometer to obtain measurements for diagnosing local inflight icing conditions. RAL is working with NASA GRC to develop algorithms and data ingest and display software for the system. NASA has an ongoing activity to develop remote sensing technologies for the detection and measurement of icing conditions aloft. As part of that effort NASA teamed with NCAR to develop software that fuses data from multiple instruments into a single detected icing condition product. The multiple instrument approach, which is the current emphasis of this activity, utilizes a K-band vertical staring radar, a microwave radiometer that detects twelve frequencies between 22 and 59 GHz, and a lidar ceilometer. The radar data determine cloud boundaries, the radiometer determines the sub-freezing temperature heights and total liquid water content, and the ceilometer refines the lower cloud boundary. Data is post-processed in C++ program with a Java-based web display of resultant supercooled LWC profile and aircraft hazard identification. In 2010, a multi-channel scanning radiometer, designed and built by Radiometrics, Inc. under a SBIR grant,,was added to the system to assess its utility in improving icing diagnoses.

Serke, David↗

High-Density, Low-Hysteresis Storage Using Hydrated Salts in Surface-Functionalized Hydrogels (Final Technical Report)

Nearly 70 years ago, Glauber’s salt was identified as a leading phase change material (PCM) in terms of its heat storage density (~2x paraffin), thermal conductivity (~1W/m·K), safety, availability and cost (~$\$$100/ton). However, the complex issues of supercooling and incongruent melting due to phase separation have prevented realization of the promise. The addition of thickeners and nucleating agents such as borax solve these issues but only over few cycles. This work aims to (a) resolve long-standing challenges with Glauber’s salt as a thermal storage material through a unique materials approach, (b) to characterize the new material’s properties that are relevant to performance and (c) to explore its incorporation into commercial water heaters. The materials concept involves encapsulating the salt in custom-designed, large-mesh hydrogels that enable breakthrough advances. Specifically, (1) the choice of mesh size and polymer chemistry control diffusion of salt/water and help to eliminate phase segregation. With the hydrogel itself occupying <10% volume, there is little loss in storage density compared to another encapsulation. (2) Specific nucleation centers that covalently tether to the hydrogel trigger heterogeneous nucleation, eliminating supercooling-associated hysteresis losses. The fact that they are spatially tethered, prevents the loss in performance over multiple freeze/thaw cycles (>100). We report extensive characterization of the hydrogel complex in terms of its storage density, freezing/melting temperature, cycling losses, rheological properties, aging and thermal conductivity. The novel material developed in this work is a significant advancement over the state-of-art. Finally, we investigate its potential as a thermal storage material for commercial/residential water heating and identify scenarios in which its deployment is advantageous.

25 ENERGY STORAGE↗

Large charged drop levitation against gravity

A hybrid electrostatic-acoustic levitator that can levitate and manipulate a large liquid drop in one gravity is presented. To the authors' knowledge, this is the first time such large drops (up to 4 mm in diameter in the case of water) have been levitated against 1-gravity. This makes possible, for the first time, many new experiments both in space and in ground-based laboratories, such as 1)supercooling and superheating, 2) containerless crystal growth from various salt solutions or melts, 3) drop dynamics of oscillating or rotating liquid drops, 4) drop evaporation and Rayleigh bursting, and 5) containerless material processing in space. The digital control system, liquid drop launch process, principles of electrode design, and design of a multipurpose room temperature levitation chamber are described. Preliminary results that demonstrate drop oscillation and rotation, and crystal growth from supersaturated salt solutions are presented.

Rhim, Won-Kyu↗

Thermodynamic and Dynamic Aspects of Ice Nucleation

It is known that ice nucleating particles (INP) immersed within supercooled droplets promote the formation of ice. Common theoretical models used to represent this process assume that the immersed particle lowers the work of ice nucleation without significantly affecting the dynamics of water in the vicinity of the particle. This is contrary to evidence showing that immersed surfaces significantly affect the viscosity and diffusivity of vicinal water. To study how this may affect ice formation this work introduces a model linking the ice nucleation rate to the modification of the dynamics and thermodynamics of vicinal water by immersed particles. It is shown that INP that significantly reduce the work of ice nucleation also pose strong limitations to the growth of the nascent ice germs. This leads to the onset of a new ice nucleation regime, called spinodal ice nucleation, where the dynamics of ice germ growth instead of the ice germ size determines the nucleation rate. Nucleation in this regime is characterized by an enhanced sensitivity to particle area and cooling rate. Comparison of the predicted ice nucleation rate against experimental measurements for a diverse set of species relevant to cloud formation suggests that spinodal ice nucleation may be common in nature.

Barahona, Donifan↗

Homogeneous ice nucleation in an ab initio machine-learning model of water

Molecular simulations have provided valuable insight into the microscopic mechanisms underlying homogeneous ice nucleation. While empirical models have been used extensively to study this phenomenon, simulations based on first-principles calculations have so far proven prohibitively expensive. Here, we circumvent this difficulty by using an efficient machine-learning model trained on density-functional theory energies and forces. We compute nucleation rates at atmospheric pressure, over a broad range of supercoolings, using the seeding technique and systems of up to hundreds of thousands of atoms simulated with ab initio accuracy. The key quantity provided by the seeding technique is the size of the critical cluster (i.e., a size such that the cluster has equal probabilities of growing or melting at the given supersaturation), which is used together with the equations of classical nucleation theory to compute nucleation rates. We find that nucleation rates for our model at moderate supercoolings are in good agreement with experimental measurements within the error of our calculation. We also study the impact of properties such as the thermodynamic driving force, interfacial free energy, and stacking disorder on the calculated rates.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗

SLD Instrumentation in Icing Wind Tunnels – Investigation Overview

A collaborative effort to better understand cloud characterization probes in Supercooled Large Drop (SLD) conditions, as well the ability to simulate these conditions in several icing wind tunnels, was undertaken by NASA, NRCC, CIRA, ECCC, FAA and Met Analytics, Inc. Both drop sizing and liquid water content, LWC, were measured with various probes using current to emerging technologies. To ensure the best possible data quality from the newest probes, the probe manufacturers, SEA, Inc. and Artium, Inc. were invited to support testing and data analysis efforts. A common set of probes was identified to test in each of the three participating facilities: NRCC’s Altitude Icing Wind Tunnel, NASA’s Icing Research Tunnel and CIRA’s Icing Wind Tunnel. From the common set of probes, a subset were identified to use for comparison across the three facilities. These were the CDP-2 and 2D-S for drop sizing, and the Multi-wire for LWC. The LWC value was also checked by measuring the ice accretion thickness under hard rime conditions on a NACA-0012 airfoil. A common test matrix with sweeps in both LWC and median volume diameter, MVD, was developed. Each facility achieved these conditions as determined by their own calibration. The MVD ranged from 20 to at least 200 um, and LWC ranged from 0.5 to 3 g/m3. The comparison probes tested at common conditions in each facility were intended to allow for a direct comparison, and check of potential facility bias.

Icing Wind Tunnel↗

Engineering Antifreeze Proteins to Optimally Resist Engulfment by Ice

Antifreeze proteins (AFPs) facilitate the survival of organisms in cold climates by inhibiting the growth and/or recrystallization of ice. To function, AFPs must first bind to ice crystals; bound AFPs must then resist engulfment by using their nonbinding side (NBS) to pin the ice–water interface. Here, we seek to understand how the molecular characteristics of an NBS, such as its ice-phobicity or shape, influence its ability to resist engulfment. By characterizing the free energy barriers that impede the engulfment of model AFPs, we find that the critical supercooling ΔT*, above which an AFP is engulfed, is dictated by an optimal pinning site on the NBS. We further find that the optimal pinning site is determined by an interplay between the contact line perimeter P and a pinning efficiency η, with ΔT* ∝ ηP at the optimal pinning site. For a hemispherical AFP, which displays progressively inward tapering, we find that η increases during engulfment, whereas P decreases; conversely, an NBS with outward tapering can achieve high P, but it suffers from low η. Because the product of η and P determines ΔT*, the inverse correlation between them limits ΔT. To circumvent such limiting behavior, we propose an NBS shape with an outward bulge; by initially tapering outward, a bulged NBS permits higher P, and by subsequently tapering inward, it promotes high η as well. Importantly, we find that ΔT* is enhanced by more than a factor of 2 with an outward bulge of only 1 nm. We also find that the more ice-phobic an NBS is, the more efficiently it pins the ice–water interface, resulting in a higher ΔT. Furthermore, our findings shed light on how the NBS molecular characteristics influence ΔT* and suggest strategies for engineering the NBS to optimally resist engulfment by ice.

Antifreeze↗

Neural Network Water Model Based on the MB-Pol Many-Body Potential

The MB-pol many-body potential accurately predicts many properties of water, including cluster, liquid phase, and vapor–liquid equilibrium properties, but its high computational cost can make applying it in large-scale simulations quite challenging. Here, in order to address this limitation, we developed a “deep potential” neural network (DPMD) model based on the MB-pol potential for water. We find that a DPMD model trained on mostly liquid configurations yields a good description of the bulk liquid phase but severely underpredicts vapor–liquid coexistence densities. By contrast, adding cluster configurations to the neural network training set leads to a good agreement for the vapor coexistence densities. Liquid phase densities under supercooled conditions are also represented well, even though they were not included in the training set. These results confirm that neural network models can combine accuracy and transferability if sufficient attention is given to the construction of a representative training set for the target system.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗

Test Results for the SEA Ice Crystal Detector (ICD) under SLD Conditions at the NASA IRT

The Science Engineering Associates hot-wire Ice Crystal Detector was tested under Appendix C and Supercooled Large Drop Conditions at the NASA Icing Research Tunnel, with the purpose of comparing the measurements to the tunnel LWC calibration, and to test the performance of the mixed-phase retrievals of the probe. The liquid water content measured by the total water content sensor of the probe agreed well with the tunnel calibration over a wide range of MVDs, not unexpectedly since the tunnel was calibrated with a similar Multiwire hot-wire probe. A scale factor difference of about 7% was attributed to the lack of an efficiency correction for the Ice Crystal Detector at smaller median volume diameters, and typical sample area uncertainties of liquid water content devices. In addition, the simultaneous equations that are used to retrieve liquid and ice water contents were tested under liquid and glaciated conditions. Using constant ice and water efficiencies for each wire, the equations were found to produce a large and false ice water content retrieval in large median volume diameter liquid cases. By applying a liquid efficiency to the liquid water content sensor that varied with median volume diameter, retrievals were improved such that false ice water content was less than ±10% of the total water content out to the 460 μm median volume diameter limit of the testing. The probe was also tested in glaciated conditions by freezing out a small median volume diameter spray. Using constant ice efficiencies for the two sensors provided from aircraft measurements, the retrieved ice water content was about 40% higher than expected for the case presented, likely due to the ice efficiencies that were used from aircraft measurements of natural clouds being too low for the tunnel’s glaciated sprays. Application of ice efficiencies that vary with particle size and potentially other parameters will be explored for future improvement of retrievals.

Air Craft Icing↗

Test Results for the SEA Ice Crystal Detector (ICD) under SLD Conditions at the NASA IRT

The Science Engineering Associates hot-wire Ice Crystal Detector was tested under Appendix C and Supercooled Large Drop Conditions at the NASA Icing Research Tunnel, with the purpose of comparing the measurements to the tunnel LWC calibration, and to test the performance of the mixed-phase retrievals of the probe. The liquid water content measured by the total water content sensor of the probe agreed well with the tunnel calibration over a wide range of MVDs, not unexpectedly since the tunnel was calibrated with a similar Multiwire hot-wire probe. A scale factor difference of about 7% was attributed to the lack of an efficiency correction for the Ice Crystal Detector at smaller median volume diameters, and typical sample area uncertainties of liquid water content devices. In addition, the simultaneous equations that are used to retrieve liquid and ice water contents were tested under liquid and glaciated conditions. Using constant ice and water efficiencies for each wire, the equations were found to produce a large and false ice water content retrieval in large median volume diameter liquid cases. By applying a liquid efficiency to the liquid water content sensor that varied with median volume diameter, retrievals were improved such that false ice water content was less than ±10% of the total water content out to the 460 μm median volume diameter limit of the testing. The probe was also tested in glaciated conditions by freezing out a small median volume diameter spray. Using constant ice efficiencies for the two sensors provided from aircraft measurements, the retrieved ice water content was about 40% higher than expected for the case presented, likely due to the ice efficiencies that were used from aircraft measurements of natural clouds being too low for the tunnel’s glaciated sprays. Application of ice efficiencies that vary with particle size and potentially other parameters will be explored for future improvement of retrievals.

o Aircraft Icing↗

Freezing temperatures of H2SO4/HNO3/H2O mixtures: Implications for polar stratospheric clouds

The freezing temperatures of H2SO4/HNO3/H2O mixtures were systematically documented. Nitric acid was found to affect freezing significantly. Measurements show that nitric acid can cause substantial supercooling over a broad composition range. However, some ternary compositions, like to those in polar stratospheric clouds (PSCs), have high freezing temperatures. The freezing of PSC particles could be controlled by the temperature and vapor pressure of both nitric acid and water in a non-linear way. Formation of polar stratospheric clouds may be forecasted on the basic of conditions of temperature and vapor contents of water and nitric acid.

Song, Naihui↗

Fragile-to-strong transition in liquid As 2 S 3 under pressure: The effect of melt metallization

The well-known classification of glass-forming melts into fragile and strong liquids has several notable exceptions, including water, silica, and certain phase-change materials (PCMs). These exceptional fluid systems exhibit a fragile-to-strong transition (FST) upon cooling: a transformation from a high-temperature liquid with fast atomic dynamics, low viscosity, and low flow activation energy, to a viscous supercooled melt with high energy barriers near the glass transition temperature T g . This behavior is critically important for non-volatile memories, photonic tensor cores, reconfigurable metamaterials, and other devices, that use PCMs, enabling nanosecond-scale crystallization in the fragile regime and long data retention in the strong regime near or below T g . A significant structural transformation is expected between these two viscosity regimes, along with a semiconductor-metal (SC-M) transition upon heating, driven by high internal pressure and associated density increase. By applying high external pressure to the canonical low-conducting chalcogenide melt As 2 S 3 , we observed both the FST and the SC-M transition, occurring simultaneously within the same domain of the P, T−phase space. These findings suggest that the FST is not limited to a few exceptional liquids but is a common phenomenon, at least in systems that exhibit melt metallization within specific regions of their P, T−phase diagrams.

first-principles molecular dynamics↗

Creating a Bimodal Drop-Size Distribution in the NASA Glenn Icing Research Tunnel

The Icing Research Tunnel at NASA Glenn has demonstrated that they can create a drop-size distribution that matches the FAA Part 25 Appendix O FZDZ, MVD40 m normalized cumulative volume within 10. This is done by simultaneously spraying the Standard and Mod1 nozzles at the same nozzle air pressure and different nozzle water pressures. It was also found through these tests that the distributions that are measured when the two nozzle sets are sprayed simultaneously closely matched what was found by combining the two individual distributions analytically. Additionally, distributions were compared between spraying all spraybars and also by spraying only every-other spraybar, and were found to match within 4. The cloud liquid water content uniformity for this condition has been found to be excellent: 10. It should be noted, however, that the liquid water content for this condition in the IRT is much higher than the requirement specified in Part 25 Appendix O.

drop-size↗

Overview of High Speed Close-Up Imaging in an Icing Environment

The Icing Branch and Imaging Technology Center at NASA Glenn Research Center have recently been involved in several projects where high speed close-up imaging was used to investigate water droplet impact/splash, and also ice particle impact/bounce in an icing wind tunnel. The combination of close-up and high speed imaging capabilities were required because the particles being studied were relatively small (d < 1 mm in diameter), and the impact process occurred in a very short time period (t(sub impact) << 1 sec). High speed close-up imaging was utilized to study the dynamics of droplet impact and splash in simulated Supercooled Large Droplet (SLD) icing conditions. The objective of this test was to evaluate the capability of a ultra high speed camera system to acquire quantitative information about the impact process (e.g., droplet size, velocity). Imaging data were obtained in an icing wind tunnel for spray cloud MVD > 50 m. High speed close-up imaging was also utilized to characterize the impact of ice particles on an airfoil with a thermally protected leading edge. The objective of this investigation was to determine whether ice particles tend to "stick" or "bounce" after impact. Imaging data were obtained for cases where the airfoil surface was heated and unheated. Based on the results from this test, follow on tests were conducted to investigate ice particle impact on the sensing elements of water content measurement devices. This paper will describe the use of the imaging systems to support these experimental investigations, present some representative results, and summarize what was learned about the use of these systems in an icing environment.

Miller, Dean R.↗

High concentrations of ice: Investigations using polarimetric radar observations combined with in situ measurements and cloud modeling (Final Report)

This DOE-funded joint project had the over-arching goal of understanding the reasons for observed size distributions of ice particles in cold clouds. Its approach involves the use of cloud models and field observations by radar and aircraft of real storms. The project addresses three major research objectives: (1) Utilize a novel polarimetric radar technique to retrieve size distributions and amounts of ice from radar data collected during the previous DOE ARM field campaigns; (2) Evaluate the results of ice microphysical retrievals using available in situ aircraft measurements and other remote sensors (e.g., vertically pointing cloud radars and wind profilers); (3) Improve the treatment of microphysical processes leading to cloud glaciation and ice multiplication in numerical cloud models. The study was performed by three research organizations: University of Oklahoma, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel, and Lund University, Sweden. The Israel and Swedish partners were funded by the sub-awards from the University of Oklahoma. Cloud modeling studies have been performed by the research teams at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem (HUJ) and Lund University to identify the origins of high concentrations of cloud ice in areas of high ice water content (HIWC). The Hebrew University Cloud Model (HUCM) with full spectral bin microphysics and the Lund University aerosol-cloud (AC) model with a hybrid bin / bulk microphysics scheme complementing HUCM were utilized for simulations. Both research teams had particular focus on secondary ice production (SIP) as one of the possible sources of enhanced ice concentration. The HUJ group suggested a novel concept of ice multiplication during droplet freezing. It is assumed that splintering and droplet fragmentation during droplet freezing takes place because of dendritic growth within a supercooled drop. The resulting simulations of SIP generated small ice in concentrations exceeding hundreds per liter similar to what was observed in the HIWC regions of the tropical storms. The Lund team explored the SIP mechanisms such as breakup of ice particles due to ice-ice collisions and ice sublimation that are expected to dominate the continental storms. They also quantified the impact of homogeneous nucleation of cloud droplets on the total number concentration of ice at very low temperatures near the tops of the clouds. Additionally, the Lund AC model is able to simulate the effect of aerosols of various types (including biological) on the cloud life cycle and the corresponding ice production. The HUCM / AC model was used to simulate one of the “golden” cases of the DOE MC3E campaign on 20 May 2011. The model output was converted into the fields of polarimetric radar variables using the polarimetric radar forward operator developed at the University of Oklahoma and compared with radar observations and in situ microphysical measurements onboard research aircraft. It was demonstrated that specific differential phase KDP is the best radar parameter to identify the HIWC areas and quantify the corresponding ice parameters. For the first time, the shape of the vertical profile of KDP was realistically reproduced by the cloud model with the KDP maximum in the dendritic growth layer (DGL) centered at the -15°C isotherm. The University of Oklahoma team has developed a methodology for polarimetric radar retrievals of such microphysical parameters of ice as ice water content (IWC), mean volume diameter (Dm), and total number concentration (Nt) of ice particles. These retrievals have been validated using in situ aircraft measurements during 6 field campaigns and proved to be quite robust and reliable. This allowed to build the first climatology of the vertical profiles of polarimetric radar variables and retrieved microphysical parameters for the three types of weather systems: continental MCSs, maritime MCSs, and tropical cyclones / hurricanes (Hu and Ryzhkov 2022). The data were collected by a multitude of the WSR-88D radars in 13 continental and 10 maritime MCSs and 11 landfalling hurricanes. The HIWC areas were identified within the examined storms and the corresponding “HIWC statistics” was compared with the “background” one without HIWC. An overarching conclusion of the study is that maritime tropical storms (MCSs and hurricanes) are characterized by smaller size ice in higher concentration compared to the continental MCSs. High ice water content in the HIWC areas is primarily caused by a strong jump in a number concentration of ice particles rather than the increase of their size compared to the “background” environment. This may point to the homogeneous nucleation of excessive amounts of supercooled droplets and / or secondary ice production as the possible origins of HIWC. Such a climatology provides a good observational reference for the modelers to evaluate the performance of their models. As an example, the in-depth analysis of the 20 May 2011 MC3E case shows that the advanced cloud models developed in the course of this study still tend to underestimate the number concentration of ice in the HIWC areas although they succeed in reproducing realistically looking vertical profiles of IWC and Nt. The results of the project research are summarized in 13 journal papers.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

Temperature Dependence of Structural Relaxation in Glass-Forming Liquids and Polymers

Understanding the microscopic mechanism of the transition of glass remains one of the most challenging topics in Condensed Matter Physics. What controls the sharp slowing down of molecular motion upon approaching the glass transition temperature T g , whether there is an underlying thermodynamic transition at some finite temperature below T g , what the role of cooperativity and heterogeneity are, and many other questions continue to be topics of active discussions. This review focuses on the mechanisms that control the steepness of the temperature dependence of structural relaxation (fragility) in glass-forming liquids. We present a brief overview of the basic theoretical models and their experimental tests, analyzing their predictions for fragility and emphasizing the successes and failures of the models. Special attention is focused on the connection of fast dynamics on picosecond time scales to the behavior of structural relaxation on much longer time scales. A separate section discusses the specific case of polymeric glass-forming liquids, which usually have extremely high fragility. We emphasize the apparent difference between the glass transitions in polymers and small molecules. We also discuss the possible role of quantum effects in the glass transition of light molecules and highlight the recent discovery of the unusually low fragility of water. At the end, we formulate the major challenges and questions remaining in this field.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗