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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 253 records · Page 14
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS1975

Hypersonic research engine project. Phase 2: Aerothermodynamic integration model development, data item no. 55-4-21

The design and development of the Aerothermodynamic Integration Model (AIM) of the Hypersonic Research Engine (HRE) is described. The feasibility of integrating the various analytical and experimental data available for the design of the hypersonic ramjet engine was verified and the operational characteristic and the overall performance of the selected design was determined. The HRE-AIM was designed for operation at speeds of Mach 3 through Mach 8.

Jilly, L. F.↗
NASA NTRS1984

Thermal barrier coating life prediction model development

In order to fully exploit thermal barrier coatings (TBCs) on turbine components and achieve the maximum performance benefit, the knowledge and understanding of TBC failure mechanisms must be increased and the means to predict coating life developed. The proposed program will determine the predominant modes of TBC system degradation and then develop and verify life prediction models accounting for those degradation modes. The successful completion of the program will have dual benefits: the ability to take advantage of the performance benefits offered by TBCs, and a sounder basis for making future improvements in coating behavior.

Hillery, R. V.↗
NASA NTRS1985

Thermal barrier coating life prediction model development

The objectives are to determine the predominant modes of degradation of a plasma sprayed thermal barrier coating system, and then to develop and verify life prediction models accounting for these degradation modes. Two possible predominant failure mechanisms being evaluated are bond coat oxidation and bond coat creep.

Hillery, R. V.↗
NASA NTRS1985

Thermal barrier coating life prediction model development

The objective is to develop an integrated life prediction model accounting for all potential life-limiting thermal barrier coating (TBC) degradation and failure modes, including spallation resulting from cyclic thermal stress, oxidation degradation, hot corrosion, erosion and foreign object damage.

Demasi, J. T.↗
NASA NTRS2003

International Space Station Solar Array Bifacial Electrical Performance Model Developed

The first U.S. photovoltaic array (PVA) was activated on the International Space Station (ISS) in December 2000. Though normally Sun-tracking, U.S. ISS arrays are held stationary to minimize plume impingement from the space shuttle during docking and undocking, as well as during ISS assembly operations. Because of these operational constraints, it is not always possible to point the front side of the arrays at the Sun. In these cases, sunlight directly illuminates the backside of the PVA as well as albedo illumination on either the front or the back. Since the solar cells are mounted on a thin, solar transparent substrate, appreciable backside power (about one-third of the front-side power) is produced. To provide a more detailed assessment of the ISS power production capability, researchers at the NASA Glenn Research Center developed a PVA electrical performance model applicable to generalized bifacial illumination conditions. The model validation was done using on-orbit PVA performance.

Delleur, Ann M.↗
DOE OSTI2022

Nuclide inventory validation: radiochemical assay data quality and modeling challenges in benchmark models development

Oak Ridge National Laboratory is conducting radiochemical assay experiments, using high-precision analytical protocols validated with a comprehensive quality assurance plan, to expand the nuclide inventory validation basis for high burnup spent nuclear fuel. Preliminary measurement data for key actinides and fission products in two pressurized water reactor spent fuel samples are being used to investigate the impact of measurement data uncertainty on the sample burnup estimation. These measurement data are also being used to examine the impact of assumptions applied when developing best-estimate computational models to simulate fuel irradiation history. The simulations are being performed using depletion capabilities in the SCALE code system. Comparison of calculated and measured nuclide concentrations shows good agreement for the considered nuclides. (authors)

11 NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE AND FUEL MATERIALS↗
NASA NTRS2000

Use of Maps, GTE and UARS-MLS Data in Understanding Tropospheric Processes Critical to Model Development

Two of the major problems in using meteorological models to explain observed tropospheric trace constituent distributions and thereby to understand the global budgets of the tracers are to properly define the vertical layered structure in the free atmosphere, and to understand the contribution of advection processes in generating horizontal inhomogeneities at all scales. We proposed to tackle these problems through the examination of an extensive collection of trace constituent data from research and commercial aircraft in conjunction with meteorological data from the European Center for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts. The physical mechanisms responsible for these advection and layering processes were explored and their implications for theories and models assessed. In addition, we calculated examples of how thin layers (not currently resolved by models) affect the radiative heating/cooling rates. We developed an improved algorithm for trace constituent layer detection, and used it to analyze over 100,000 km of ozone and humidity vertical profiles collected by instruments piggybacked on commercial aircraft. The same method was also used to examine ozone, humidity, carbon monoxide, and methane data from the NASA Pacific Exploratory Missions. The major conclusions from these studies were that tropospheric trace constituent layers are ubiquitous, and that their characteristics are remarkably universal. These results support the notion that ozone layers coming in from the stratosphere play a large role in creating tropospheric layers, whether by themselves or by capping buoyant pollution plumes. This, in turn, has important implications for the transport (especially in the vertical) of trace gases and how it is represented in models.

Newell, Reginald E.↗
NASA NTRS1974

Experimental investigation and model development of the Skylab ATM secondary nickel-cadmium batteries

The performance of a Ni-Cd battery was evaluated and the cyclic battery controls to be used on the ATM batteries were determined. Cell and battery performance models were developed which to predict the performance of the secondary Ni-Cd batteries on the ATM. Capacity degradation and charge acceptance characteristics were considered. Mathematical models for each of these operating areas were developed based on data from two separate test programs. The capacity degradation model describes the expected usable battery capacity as a function of time, temperature, and depth-of-discharge. The charge acceptance model describes the cell charge acceptance as a function of charge rate, temperature, and state of charge. The models were designed for computer use and to facilitate possible battery modification. They can be used to predict expected performance or to compare real time performance during flight.

Kirsch, W. W.↗
NASA NTRS2000

Use of Maps, GTE and UARS-MLS Data in Understanding Tropospheric Processes Critical to Model Development

Two of the major problems in using meteorological models to explain observed tropospheric trace constituent distributions and thereby to understand the global budgets of the tracers are to properly define the vertical layered structure in the free atmosphere, and to understand the contribution of advection processes in generating horizontal inhomogeneities at all scales. We proposed to tackle these problems through the examination of an extensive collection of trace constituent data from research and commercial aircraft in conjunction with meteorological data from the European Center for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts. The physical mechanisms responsible for these advection and layering processes were explored and their implications for theories and models assessed. In addition, we calculated examples of how thin layers (not currently resolved by models) affect the radiative heating/cooling rates. We developed an improved algorithm for trace constituent layer detection, and used it to analyze over 100,000 km of ozone and humidity vertical profiles collected by instruments piggybacked on commercial aircraft. We have also performed radiative heating/cooling calculations on some observed layer structures, and have demonstrated that the sharp edges on humidity layers can have strong local effects of self-stabilization (dry layers) or destabilization (wet layers), and have suggested that clear-air turbulence might result from the latter case through convective instability. We also systematically analyzed the mesoscale variabilities, not only of the trace constituents, but also of the aircraft-measured dynamical variables.

Newell, Reginald E.↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Gas-Particle Interaction Model Development in Plume Surface Interaction Erosion and Cratering

The development of a predictive simulation capability for extra-terrestrial Plume Surface Interaction (PSI) environments is undertaken by the Fluid Dynamics Branch at NASA/MSFC under the Game Changing Development (GCD) Program funded by NASA’s Space Technology Mission Directorate (STMD). Predictive simulation capability for propulsive Martian and Lunar landing PSI requires accurate modeling of the complex high-speed plume impingement and resulting gas/particle-cloud and ejecta stream formation. Physics modeling gap analysis during formulation of the PSI project scope identified two particular phenomena of first order importance in gas-particle interactions that lacked existing modeling formulations. The first arises from the lack of models capturing the unsteady drag forces imparted on particles by the rapidly expanding supersonic compressible flow. The second addresses the fluctuating forces and dispersions imparted on both the particle and the fluid resulting from the interference and wake turbulence generated by close proximity particle clouds, dubbed the Particle Turbulent Kinetic Energy(PTKE). Their first order significance has been identified in experiments, but simulation models currently do not exist for either effect. The development of models and the eventual implementation into the Eulerian Gas-Granular Flow Solver (GGFS) simulation tools was constructed as one of four major tasks of the PSI project. In this process, data on particle kinetics and gas-particle interactions are collected from carefully designed experiments of particles embedded in jets. The effects observed in the experiments are then replicated in high-fidelity particle-resolved CFD simulations to inform the formulation of improvements to particle phase drag models for implementations in the more efficient Eulerian-Lagrangian CFD simulations. The resulting models are ultimately ported to the Eulerian-Eulerian models applied for most efficient simulations in PSI production application tools. This paper describes the activities and accomplishments of the past year in the gas-particle interaction modeling task of the PSI project.

Jeff West↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

The NASA DEVELOP Model of Community Science & Engagement: Localizing Earth Science Information

The NASA DEVELOP Program conducts 10 week feasibility studies that apply Earth observation data to address community priorities and support informed decision making. Part of NASA’s Earth Action Capacity Building Program, DEVELOP builds skills in both participants ( recent graduates, and early/transitioning career professionals), who work on small interdisciplinary project teams, and partner organizations (state and local governments, federal agencies, non profit and for profit organizations, universities, and international organizations) that work closely with DEVELOP to design the project. Projects address a wide variety of environmental issues, such as disaster risk and resilience, air pollution, and the impact of urban development, with a growing number of projects exploring how satellite data can help inform decision making around environmental injustices. A subset of DEVELOP partner organizations are local municipalities or community led non profits, with the co production model serving as an effective engagement tool and an introduction for communities to engage in Earth science research and become familiar with satellite remote sensing. This presentation will highlight the DEVELOP co production model, community project use cases, and lessons learned in partnering with local communities.

Michael Pazmino↗
DOE OSTI2021

NRAP-Open-IAM Analytical Reservoir Model: Development and Testing

Geological carbon sequestration (GCS) is a key technology for reducing global carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) emissions. Over the last decade, the U.S. Department of Energy has invested in understanding the science base, developing practical implementation methods, and demonstrating secure GCS technologies to mitigate the environmental impacts associated with the atmospheric release of CO 2 . As part of the National Risk Assessment Partnership, a systems-level risk assessment tool, called the NRAP-Open-IAM, has been developed to conduct risk assessment and enable safe operations at a GCS site. The current NRAP-Open-IAM contains a simple reservoir model component that calculates the evolution of CO 2 saturation and fluid pressure in a storage reservoir during CO 2 injection operations. This report presents the development and testing of a new analytical reservoir reduced-order model (ROM), which is extended from an existing semi-analytical model for estimation of CO 2 and brine leakage along legacy wells, and enhances the capability of the NRAP-Open-IAM to simulate more types of reservoir conditions. The developed model is validated against three reference studies, and the results indicate that the new ROM predicts the behavior of the two-phase fluids (brine and injected CO 2 ) well and is applicable to different reservoir simulation boundary conditions (i.e., constant pressure boundary and infinite-acting boundary) without a priori user specification of the boundary type. Sensitivity analysis for a set of model parameters is performed using 4,000 synthetic cases prepared via a fully automated process and using machine-learning-based feature selection. The stochastic analysis identifies gravitational number (i.e., ratio of gravitational forces to viscous force) and distance between the injection well and observation location as the most impactful parameters for matching the pressure and CO 2 saturation, respectively, between the numerical simulations and the ROM. This report details the possible ROM uncertainties and serves as a guide for users to understand the use and limitations of this ROM. The code implementation of the model will be released as a module within the NRAP-Open-IAM.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
NASA NTRS2011

Software Testing and Verification in Climate Model Development

Over the past 30 years most climate models have grown from relatively simple representations of a few atmospheric processes to a complex multi-disciplinary system. Computer infrastructure over that period has gone from punch card mainframes to modem parallel clusters. Model implementations have become complex, brittle, and increasingly difficult to extend and maintain. Existing verification processes for model implementations rely almost exclusively upon some combination of detailed analysis of output from full climate simulations and system-level regression tests. In additional to being quite costly in terms of developer time and computing resources, these testing methodologies are limited in terms of the types of defects that can be detected, isolated and diagnosed. Mitigating these weaknesses of coarse-grained testing with finer-grained "unit" tests has been perceived as cumbersome and counter-productive. In the commercial software sector, recent advances in tools and methodology have led to a renaissance for systematic fine-grained testing. We discuss the availability of analogous tools for scientific software and examine benefits that similar testing methodologies could bring to climate modeling software. We describe the unique challenges faced when testing complex numerical algorithms and suggest techniques to minimize and/or eliminate the difficulties.

Clune, Thomas L.↗
NASA NTRS1979

Accuracy and performance of LACIE crop development models

Of the three principal phenological crop calendar models evaluated for LACIE, Robertson's triquadratic model which predicts the rate of progression of wheat through its biological development, was selected. Daily maximum and minimum temperatures and day length are the input variables, and the principal output is a daily increment of development through six physiological growth stages. Because wheat corresponds differently to the environment during each growth stage, five different equations are required. The estimated and observed crop development data were compared in order to establish a measure of confidence in the model and to identify consistent discrepancies that would adversely affect LACIE operation. Although the model provided reliable estimates for various wheat growing regions of the world, it was found that there are still areas in need of further model improvement or development.

Woolley, S. K.↗
DOE OSTI2015

Modeling methane emissions from arctic lakes: Model development and site‐level study

Abstract To date, methane emissions from lakes in the pan‐arctic region are poorly quantified. In order to investigate the response of methane emissions from this region to global warming, a process‐based climate‐sensitive lake biogeochemical model was developed. The processes of methane production, oxidation, and transport were modeled within a one‐dimensional sediment and water column. The sizes of 14 C‐enriched and 14 C‐depleted carbon pools were explicitly parameterized. The model was validated using observational data from five lakes located in Siberia and Alaska, representing a large variety of environmental conditions in the arctic. The model simulations agreed well with the measured water temperature and dissolved CH 4 concentration (mean error less than 1°C and 0.2 μM, respectively). The modeled CH 4 fluxes were consistent with observations in these lakes. We found that bubbling‐rate‐controlling nitrogen (N 2 ) stripping was the most important factor in determining CH 4 fraction in bubbles. Lake depth and ice cover thickness in shallow waters were also controlling factors. This study demonstrated that the thawing of Pleistocene‐aged organic‐rich yedoma can fuel sediment methanogenesis by supplying a large quantity of labile organic carbon. Observations and modeling results both confirmed that methane emission rate at thermokarst margins of yedoma lakes was much larger (up to 538 mg CH 4 m −2 d −1 ) than that at nonthermokarst zones in the same lakes and a nonyedoma, nonthermokarst lake (less than 42 mg CH 4 m −2 d −1 ). The seasonal variability of methane emissions can be explained primarily by energy input and organic carbon availability.

Tan, Zeli↗
DOE OSTI2015

High Fidelity Forward Model Development for Nuclear Reactor Spent Fuel Technical Nuclear Forensics

The fidelity of the forward model within a spent fuel forensic analysis system was improved by using two unique methodologies. The first consisted of developing a system to create accurate one-group neutron cross-section libraries for any user specified reactor system. In such, a detailed model is developed using the depletion code MONTEBURNS. During MONTEBURNS execution, cross-section libraries are generated at every user specified burnup step in time. These libraries could be developed for many reactor systems, then housed in a database and used for analyzing unknown fuel samples. The forensic analysis system for spent fuel resulted in higher accuracy at predicting the initial uranium isotopic compositions and burnup from spent fuel samples. Using this method, the error in results was reduced from the order of 1-6% down to less than 1% when recovering a fuel sample's burnup and initial uranium isotopic composition. The second method consisted of implementing 2D/3D reactor depletion codes as the forward model within the system's framework. This method would allow the usage of potentially recoverable geometric information from an unknown sample. No predetermined cross-section library is required for the system using this method, therefore potentially reducing model error associated with the neutron flux spectrum. The accuracy of the recovered initial uranium isotopic compositions and burnup from spent fuel samples was also improved using this method, even more so than the first. For MTR reactors, the error using this method was significantly reduced and was driven to below 0.5%. However, additional research may be required to determine the ideal fission yield and recoverable energy per fission for cases where significant amounts of 239 PU are bred and burned throughout the life of the fuel.

11 NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE AND FUEL MATERIALS↗
NASA NTRS1993

Numerical study of 3-D inducer and impeller for pump model development

Current design of high-performance turbopumps for rocket engines requires effective and robust analytical tools to provide design information in a productive manner. The main goal of this study is to develop a robust and effective CFD pump model for general turbopump design and analysis applications. A finite difference Navier-Stokes flow solver, FDNS, which includes an extended k-epsilon turbulence model and appropriate moving zonal interface boundary conditions, was developed to analyze turbulent flows in turbomachinery devices. In the present study, two key components of the turbopump, the inducer and impeller, were investigated by the proposed pump model, and the numerical results were benchmarked by the experimental data provided by Rocketdyne.

Cheng, G. C.↗