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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 271 records · Page 15
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2024

Block Mott insulating state induced by next-nearest-neighbor hopping in the S = 3 2 zigzag chain BaCoTe 2 O 7

Quasi-one-dimensional correlated electronic multiorbital systems with either ladder or chain geometries continue attracting considerable interest due to their complex electronic phases arising from the interplay of the hopping matrix, the crystal-field splitting, the electronic correlations (Hubbard repulsion U and Hund coupling J H ), and strong quantum fluctuations. Recently, the intriguing cobalt zigzag chain system BaCoTe 2 ⁢ O 7 , with electronic density n=7, was prepared experimentally. Here, we systematically study the electronic and magnetic properties of this quasi-one-dimensional compound from the theoretical perspective. Based on first-principles density functional theory calculations, strongly anisotropic one-dimensional electronic Co 3⁢d bands were found near the Fermi level. By evaluating the relevant hopping amplitudes, we provide the magnitude and origin of the nearest-neighbor (NN) and next-nearest-neighbor (NNN) hopping matrices in BaCoTe 2 ⁢ O 7 . With this information, we constructed a three-orbital electronic Hubbard model for this zigzag chain system, and studied two cases: with only a NN hopping matrix, and with NN plus NNN hopping matrices. Introducing the Hubbard and Hund couplings and studying the model via the density matrix renormalization group method, we constructed the ground-state phase diagram. A robust staggered ↑ - ↓ - ↑ - ↓ antiferromagnetic (AFM) region was found when only the NN hopping matrix in the chain direction was employed. However, for the realistic case where the NNN hopping matrix is also included, the dominant state becomes instead a block AFM ↑ - ↑ - ↓ - ↓ order, in agreement with experiments. The system displays Mott insulator characteristics with three half-filled orbitals, when the block AFM order is stable. In conclusion, our results for BaCoTe 2 ⁢O 7 provide guidance to experimentalists and theorists working on this zigzag one-dimensional chain and related materials.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗
DOE OSTI2024

Decoupling Power Quality Issues in Grid-Microgrid Network Using Microgrid Building Blocks

Microgrids are evolving as promising options to enhance reliability of the connected transmission and distribution systems. Traditional design and deployment of microgrids require significant engineering analysis. However, Microgrid Building Blocks (MBB), consisting of modular blocks that integrate seamlessly to form effective microgrids, are promising technologies to enable faster and broader adoption of microgrids. Back-to-Back converter placed at the point of common coupling of microgrid is an integral part of MBB. This paper presents applications of MBB to decouple power quality issues in grid-microgrid network serving power quality sensitive critical loads such as data centers, new grid-edge technologies such as vehicle-to-grid generation, and emergency condition loads such as electric vehicle charging loads during evacuation prior disaster events. Simulation results show that MBB effectively decouple the power quality issues across networks and allow network with low power quality to transfer high-power quality power to connected networks during emergency conditions.

Acharya, Samrat S. [BATTELLE (PACIFIC NW LAB)]↗
DOE OSTI2024

Impact of Reordering on the LU Factorization Performance of Bordered Block-Diagonal Sparse Matrix

Power engineers rely on computer-based simulation tools to assess grid performance and ensure security. At the core of these tools are solvers for sparse linear equations. When transformed into a bordered block-diagonal (BBD) structure, part of the sparse linear equation solving can be parallelized. This work focuses on using the Schur-complement-based method for LU factorization on BBD matrices, specifically, Jacobian matrices from large-scale systems. Our findings show that the natural ordering method outperforms the default ordering method in computational performance for each block of the BBD matrix. This observation is validated using synthetic 25k-bus and 70k-bus cases, showing a speedup of up to 38% when using natural ordering without permutation. Additionally, the impact of the number of partitions is studied, and the result shows that computational performance improves with more, smaller partitions in the BBD matrices.

BBD matrix↗
DOE OSTI2025

Impact of Geomagnetic Induced Current Neutral Blocking Devices on Distance Relays in Sub-transmission Networks with IBR

Geomagnetically induced currents (GICs) can flow through transmission lines during geomagnetic disturbances, such as solar flares or coronal mass ejections. These currents can cause problems like transformer saturation and equipment damage. The most common method of mitigating GICs involves installing GIC neutral blocking devices (NBDs) in transformer neutrals. However, the wide application of capacitive GIC blocking devices may have unintended adverse effects on other devices, such as distance protection relays. As the number of inverter-based resources being connected to the transmission and sub-transmission systems increases, the likelihood of a sub-transmission line protected by a distance relay connected to a transformer with NBDs is increasing. Therefore, distance relays fed by IBRs and transmission lines with GIC-NBDs must be studied. This paper studies the effect of GIC-NBDs on a 69kV sub-transmission line of various lengths fed by a 25 MVA IBR and synchronous source. This work focused on the behavior of the GIC-NBDs using the measured apparent phase-to-ground and phase-to-phase impedance calculated by the relay and the source impedance ratio (SIR) during various electrical faults.

Patel, Trupal R [Sandia National Laboratories (SNL↗
DOE OSTI2024

High-resolution chemical patterns from negative tone resists for the integration of extreme ultraviolet patterns of metal-oxide resists with directed self-assembly of block copolymers

Extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography faces significant challenges in designing suitable resist materials that can provide adequate precision, while maintaining economically viable throughput. These challenges in resist materials have led to printing failures and high roughness in EUV patterns, compromising the performance of semiconductor devices. Integrating directed self-assembly (DSA) of block copolymers (BCPs) with EUV lithography offers a promising solution because, while the BCPs register to the EUV-defined chemical guiding pattern, the thermodynamically determined structures of the BCPs automatically rectify defects and roughness in the EUV pattern. Despite the superior resolution of metal-oxide EUV resists (MORs), their application to DSA is limited by the difficulty in converting them into chemical patterns that allow effective transfer of the rectified patterns of DSA films into inorganic materials. To address this challenge, this study introduces a novel strategy for fabricating chemical patterns using hydrogen silsesquioxane (HSQ), a high-resolution negative tone inorganic resist, as a model system for MORs. Initially, a sacrificial Cr pattern is generated from HSQ patterns via reactive ion etching. The sacrificial Cr pattern is converted into a chemical pattern by first grafting a water-soluble polyethylene oxide brush onto the substrate, then wet etching the Cr, and finally grafting nonpolar polystyrene brushes. Assembling polystyrene-block-poly(methyl methacrylate) on these patterns results in structures oriented and registered with the underlying pattern, achieving 24 nm full-pitch resolutions. In conclusion, this approach has the potential to integrate MOR patterns into the DSA process, thereby enabling the generation of high-quality sub-10 nm patterns with high-χ BCPs.

Atomic force microscopy↗
DOE OSTI2024

A graphics processing unit accelerated sparse direct solver and preconditioner with block low rank compression

We present the GPU implementation efforts and challenges of the sparse solver package STRUMPACK. The code is made publicly available on github with a permissive BSD license. STRUMPACK implements an approximate multifrontal solver, a sparse LU factorization which makes use of compression methods to accelerate time to solution and reduce memory usage. Multiple compression schemes based on rank-structured and hierarchical matrix approximations are supported, including hierarchically semi-separable, hierarchically off-diagonal butterfly, and block low rank. Here, in this paper, we present the GPU implementation of the block low rank (BLR) compression method within a multifrontal solver. Our GPU implementation relies on highly optimized vendor libraries such as cuBLAS and cuSOLVER for NVIDIA GPUs, rocBLAS and rocSOLVER for AMD GPUs and the Intel oneAPI Math Kernel Library (oneMKL) for Intel GPUs. Additionally, we rely on external open source libraries such as SLATE (Software for Linear Algebra Targeting Exascale), MAGMA (Matrix Algebra on GPU and Multi-core Architectures), and KBLAS (KAUST BLAS). SLATE is used as a GPU-capable ScaLAPACK replacement. From MAGMA we use variable sized batched dense linear algebra operations such as GEMM, TRSM and LU with partial pivoting. KBLAS provides efficient (batched) low rank matrix compression for NVIDIA GPUs using an adaptive randomized sampling scheme. The resulting sparse solver and preconditioner runs on NVIDIA, AMD and Intel GPUs. Interfaces are available from PETSc, Trilinos and MFEM, or the solver can be used directly in user code. We report results for a range of benchmark applications, using the Perlmutter system from NERSC, Frontier from ORNL, and Aurora from ALCF. For a high frequency wave equation on a regular mesh, using 32 Perlmutter compute nodes, the factorization phase of the exact GPU solver is about 6.5× faster compared to the CPU-only solver. The BLR-enabled GPU solver is about 13.8× faster than the CPU exact solver. For a collection of SuiteSparse matrices, the STRUMPACK exact factorization on a single GPU is on average 1.9× faster than NVIDIA’s cuDSS solver.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗
DOE OSTI2025

The Alamo multiphysics solver for phase field simulations with strong-form mechanics and block structured adaptive mesh refinement

Alamo is a high-performance scientific code that uses block-structured adaptive mesh refinement to solve such problems as: the ignition and burn of solid rocket propellant, plasticity, damage and fracture in materials undergoing loading, and the interaction of compressible flow with eroding solid materials. Alamo is powered by AMReX, and provides a set of unique methods, models, and algorithms that enable it to solve solid-mechanics problems (coupled to other physical behavior such as fluid flow or thermal diffusion) using the power of block-structured adaptive mesh refinement.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2025

Control Oriented Models for Co-Design: Technical Overview of MT HVDC, MVDC, and Solid State Transformer Building Blocks

The electric power system is shifting toward a power electronics–enabled grid, where converter based “building blocks” (e.g., high voltage direct current (HVDC) links, multi terminal HVDC (MT HVDC) networks, medium voltage DC (MVDC) links, and solid state transformers (SSTs)) provide fast, precise control of power flows, voltage, and frequency. This report develops and applies publicly shareable electromagnetic transient (EMT) and phasor models to examine how such building blocks can be composed and coordinated to support offshore wind integration, inter area transfers, feeder support, and resilience. Section 2 documents a modular multilevel converter (MMC)–based MT HVDC modeling framework and two use cases: a compact WSCC/IEEE 9 bus test system and a 240 bus “mini WECC” case with five offshore wind plants (OWFs). Phasor to EMT transfer, initialization, and sanity checks are summarized, and neutral demonstrations of normal and contingency operation are reported. Section 3 frames the problem of wind plant inertial frequency response (IFR): shaping energy release and recovery to improve nadir while avoiding aerodynamic stall; representative simulations illustrate the issues without disclosing proprietary control. Section 4 develops MVDC concepts through an IEEE 16 bus loop and an Olympic Peninsula case study that compares AC vs. MVDC corridors and shows how feeder headroom can be pooled via DC couplers. Section 5 surveys SST architectures and identifies a gap: scalable, communication free coordination of multiple SSTs for islanded feeder networks. Across the report, novel methods and configurations under separate publication and IP review are not disclosed; only topic oriented, replicable setups and non proprietary results are shown. These models and use cases are intended as foundations for future publications and co design studies on architecture, control, and coordination of PE enabled grids.

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗
DOE OSTI2026

Block Island Survey and Deployment Operations Data

This dataset contains survey, navigation, and platform-design data supporting instrument deployment and positioning during the 2016-2017 RODEO field operations at Block Island. It includes an acoustic localization software toolkit and its Block Island position solutions, R/V Tioga ship navigation and underway data, CTD casts, ship-track charts, and engineering designs for the deployed moorings and arrays.

17 WIND ENERGY↗
DOE OSTI2025

Block encoding bosons by signal processing

Block Encoding (BE) is a crucial subroutine in many modern quantum algorithms, including those with near-optimal scaling for simulating quantum many-body systems, which often rely on Quantum Signal Processing (QSP). Currently, the primary methods for constructing BEs are the Linear Combination of Unitaries (LCU) and the sparse oracle approach. In this work, we demonstrate that QSP-based techniques, such as Quantum Singular Value Transformation (QSVT) and Quantum Eigenvalue Transformation for Unitary Matrices (QETU), can themselves be efficiently utilized for BE implementation. Specifically, we present several examples of using QSVT and QETU algorithms, along with their combinations, to block encode Hamiltonians for lattice bosons, an essential ingredient in simulations of high-energy physics. We also introduce a straightforward approach to BE based on the exact implementation of Linear Operators Via Exponentiation and LCU (LOVE-LCU). We find that, while using QSVT for BE results in the best asymptotic gate count scaling with the number of qubits per site, LOVE-LCU outperforms all other methods for operators acting on up to qubits, highlighting the importance of concrete circuit constructions over mere comparisons of asymptotic scalings. Using LOVE-LCU to implement the BE, we simulate the time evolution of single-site and two-site systems in the lattice theory using the Generalized QSP algorithm and compare the gate counts to those required for Trotter simulation.

Kane, Christopher F↗
NASA NTRS1964

Blocking oscillator uses low triggering voltage

To prevent premature triggering of a blocking oscillator, a smaller magnetic core is added to the conventional oscillator circuit. This serves as a second blocking oscillator and has a lower triggering threshold.

Source record↗
NASA NTRS1971

Foldable patterns form construction blocks

Building blocks with interlocking tabs can be constructed from flat sheets of material using minimum of tools and equipment. Blocks can be used for storing and shipping supplies to remote areas, then filled with soil and stacked to form inhabitable structures which can be dismantled and reused.

Huber, W. C.↗
NASA NTRS1971

Reliability computation from reliability block diagrams

A method and a computer program are presented to calculate probability of system success from an arbitrary reliability block diagram. The class of reliability block diagrams that can be handled include any active/standby combination of redundancy, and the computations include the effects of dormancy and switching in any standby redundancy. The mechanics of the program are based on an extension of the probability tree method of computing system probabilities.

Chelson, P. O.↗
NASA NTRS1972

The formation and analysis of a 5 deg equal area block terrestrial gravity field

A set of 23,355 1 degree x 1 degree mean free air anomalies were used to predict a set of 5 degree equal area anomalies and their standard errors. Using the 1 degree data incorporating geophysically predicted values of ACIC, 1283 5 degree blocks were computed. Excluding the geophysically predicted anomalies 1249 blocks were computed. The 1 degree data were also used to compute covariance functions and the equatorial gravity and flattening implied by this data. The predicted anomalies were supplemented by model anomalies to form a complete 1654 global anomaly field. These data were used in a weighted least squares to determine potential coefficients to degree 15, and in a summation type formulation to determine potential coefficients to degree 25. These potential coefficients sets are compared to recent satellite determinations.

Rapp, R. H.↗
NASA NTRS1973

Mission building blocks for outer solar system exploration.

Description of the technological building blocks required for exploring the outer planets with maximum scientific yields under stringent resource constraints. Two generic spacecraft types are considered: the Mariner and the Pioneer. Following a discussion of the outer planet mission constraints, the evolutionary development of spacecraft, probes, and propulsion building blocks is presented. Then, program genealogies are shown for Pioneer and Mariner missions and advanced propulsion systems to illustrate the soundness of a program based on spacecraft modification rather than on the development of new spacecraft for each mission. It is argued that, for minimum costs, technological advancement should occur in an evolutionary manner from mission to mission. While this strategy is likely to result in compromises on specific missions, the realization of the overall objectives calls for an advance commitment to the entire mission series.

Herman, D.↗
NASA NTRS1974

REDUCE 2: A computer program for the symbolic reduction of large block diagrams

REDUCE 2 is reported as a FORMAC program which symbolically calculates the transfer function(s) of any linear-block-diagram output variable to any or all input variables. The program requires as input a set of algebraic expressions representing the block diagram, the desired transfer function(s), and a string of variables indicating the desired order of reduction. The solution is presented in the compact form of a set of nested functions (super G's). The program can handle systems as large as 600 equations and is intended as a tool for the analysis of complex control and dynamic systems. A companion FORTRAN program, EVAL 2, which numerically evaluates the solution set to obtain amplitude ratio and phase angle as functions of frequency is also presented.

Lorenzo, C. F.↗