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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 37 records · Page 2

Fluid Dynamics and Thermodynamics of Vapor Phase Crystal Growth

The ground-based research effort under this program is concerned with systematic studies of the effects of variations: (1) of the relative importance of buoyancy-driven convection, and (2) of diffusion and viscosity conditions on crystal properties. These experimental studies are supported by thermodynamic characterizations of the systems, based on which fluid dynamic parameters can be determined. The specific materials under investigation include: the GeSe-GeI4, Ge-GeI4, HgTe-HgI2, and Hg sub (1-x)Cd sub (x) Te-HgI2 systems. Mass transport rate studies of the GeSe-GeI system as a function of orientation of the density gradient relative to the gravity vector demonstrated the validity of flux anomalies observed in earlier space experiments. The investigation of the effects of inert gases on mass flux yielded the first experimental evidence for the existence of a boundary layer in closed ampoules. Combined with a thorough thermodynamic analysis, a transport model for diffusive flow including chemical vapor transport, sublimation, and Stefan flow was developed.

Wiedemeier, H.↗

Astrometry With the Hubble Space Telescope: Trigonometric Parallaxes of Planetary Nebula Nuclei NGC 6853, NGC 7293, ABELL 31, and DeHt 5

We present absolute parallaxes and relative proper motions for the central stars of the planetary nebulae NGC 6853 (The Dumbbell), NGC 7293 (The Helix), Abell 31, and DeHt 5. This paper details our reduction and analysis using DeHt 5 as an example. We obtain these planetary nebula nuclei (PNNi) parallaxes with astrometric data from Fine Guidance Sensors FGS 1r and FGS 3, white-light interferometers on the Hubble Space Telescope. Proper motions, spectral classifications and VJHKT2M and DDO51 photometry of the stars comprising the astrometric reference frames provide spectrophotometric estimates of reference star absolute parallaxes. Introducing these into our model as observations with error, we determine absolute parallaxes for each PNN. Weighted averaging with previous independent parallax measurements yields an average parallax precision, sigma (sub pi)/ pi = 5%. Derived distances are: d(sub NGC6853) = 405(exp +28 sub -25) pc, d(sub NGC7293) = 216(exp +14 sub -12) pc, d(sub Abell31) = 621(exp +91 sub -70) pc, and d(sub DeHt5) = 345(exp +19 sub -17) pc. These PNNi distances are all smaller than previously derived from spectroscopic analyses of the central stars. To obtain absolute magnitudes from these distances requires estimates of interstellar extinction. We average extinction measurements culled from the literature, from reddening based on PNNi intrinsic colors derived from model SEDs, and an assumption that each PNN experiences the same rate of extinction as a function of distance as do the reference stars nearest (in angular separation) to each central star. We also apply Lutz-Kelker bias corrections. The absolute magnitudes and effective temperatures permit estimates of PNNi radii through both the Stefan-Boltzmann relation and Eddington fluxes. Comparing absolute magnitudes with post-AGB models provides mass estimates. Masses cluster around 0.57 solar Mass, close to the peak of the white dwarf mass distribution. Adding a few more PNNi with well-determined distances and masses, we compare all the PNNi with cooler white dwarfs of similar mass, and confirm, as expected, that PNNi have larger radii than white dwarfs that have reached their final cooling tracks.

STARS↗

Regional and Model-Specific Response Types in A Global Gridded Crop Model Ensemble

Crop models are often employed to project crop yields under changing conditions such as global warming and associated management change for adaptation. Multi-model ensembles are promoted to enhance the robustness of projections, but questions remain on what causes often large differences between projections of individual models. Global Gridded Crop Models (GGCMs) are especially exposed to this question when applied for assessing climate change impacts, adaptation, environmental impacts of agricultural production, because their results are used in downstream analyses, such as in integrated assessment or economic modeling for projecting future land-use change. Even though global gridded crop models are often based on detailed field-scale models or have implemented similar modeling principles in other ecosystem models, global-scale models are subject to substantial uncertainties from both model structure and parametrization as well as from calibration and input data quality. AgMIP’s Global Gridded Crop Model Intercomparison (GGCMI) has thus set out to intercompare GGCMs in order to evaluate model performance, describe model uncertainties, identify inconsistencies within the ensemble and underlying reasons, and to ultimately improve models and modeling capacities. In phase 2 of the GGCMI activities, 12 modeling groups followed a modeling protocol that asked for up to 1404 31-year global simulations at 0.5 arc-degree spatial resolution to assess models’ sensitivities to changes in carbon dioxide (C; 4 different levels) temperature (T; 7 different offset levels), water supply (W; 9 levels), and nitrogen (N; 3 levels), the so-called CTWN experiment (Franke et al. 2020; http://dx.doi.org/10.5194/gmd-13-2315-2020). We here present analyses of model response types using impact response surfaces along the C, T, W, and N dimensions, respectively and collectively. Doing so, we can understand differences in simulated responses per driver rather than aggregated changes in yields. We find that models’ sensitivities to the individual driver dimensions are substantially different and often more different across models than across regions. A cluster analysis finds regional and model-specific patterns. There is some agreement across models with respect to the spatial patterns of response types but strong differences in the distribution of response type clusters across models suggests that models need to undergo further scrutiny. We suggest establishing standards in model process evaluation not only against historical dynamics but also against dedicated experiments across the CTWN dimensions.

crop models↗

An AeroCom–AeroSat study: intercomparison of satellite AOD datasets for aerosol model evaluation

To better understand and characterize current uncertainties in the important observational constraint of climate models of aerosol optical depth (AOD), we evaluate and intercompare 14 satellite products, representing nine different retrieval algorithm families using observations from five different sensors on six different platforms. The satellite products (super-observations consisting of 1°×1° daily aggregated retrievals drawn from the years 2006, 2008 and 2010) are evaluated with AErosol RObotic NETwork (AERONET) and Maritime Aerosol Network (MAN) data. Results show that different products exhibit different regionally varying biases (both under- and overestimates) that may reach ±50 %, although a typical bias would be 15 %–25 % (depending on the product). In addition to these biases, the products exhibit random errors that can be 1.6 to 3 times as large. Most products show similar performance, although there are a few exceptions with either larger biases or larger random errors. The intercomparison of satellite products extends this analysis and provides spatial context to it. In particular, we show that aggregated satellite AOD agrees much better than the spatial coverage (often driven by cloud masks) within the 1°×1° grid cells. Up to ∼50 % of the difference between satellite AOD is attributed to cloud contamination. The diversity in AOD products shows clear spatial patterns and varies from 10 % (parts of the ocean) to 100 % (central Asia and Australia). More importantly, we show that the diversity may be used as an indication of AOD uncertainty, at least for the better performing products. This provides modellers with a global map of expected AOD uncertainty in satellite products, allows assessment of products away from AERONET sites, can provide guidance for future AERONET locations and offers suggestions for product improvements. We account for statistical and sampling noise in our analyses. Sampling noise, variations due to the evaluation of different subsets of the data, causes important changes in error metrics. The consequences of this noise term for product evaluation are discussed.

Aerosol↗

Droplet Combustion in a Slow Convective Flow

The influences of slow convective flow on droplet combustion, particularly in the low Reynolds number regime, have received very little attention in the past. Most studies in the literature are semi-empirical in nature and they were motivated by spray combustion applications in the moderate to high Reynolds number regime. None of the limited number of fundamental theoretical studies applicable to low Reynolds numbers have been verified by rigorous experimental data. Moreover, many unsteady phenomena associated with fluid-dynamic unsteadiness, such as impulsive starting or stopping of a burning droplet, or flow acceleration/deceleration effects, have not been investigated despite their importance in practical applications. In this study we investigate the effects of slow convection on droplet burning dynamics both experimentally and theoretically. The experimental portion of the study involves both ground-based experiments in the drop towers and future flight experiments on board the International Space Station. Heptane and methanol are used as test fuels, and this choice complements the quiescent-environment studies of the Droplet Combustion Experiment (DCE). An analytical model that employs the method of matched asymptotic expansions and uses the ratio of the convective velocity far from the droplet to the Stefan velocity at its surface as the small parameter for expansion has also been developed as a part of this investigation. Results from the ground-based experiments and comparison with the analytical model are presented in this report.

Nayagam, V.↗

Combustion instability analysis for liquid propellant rocket engines

The multi-dimensional numerical model has been developed to analyze the nonlinear combustion instabilities in liquid-fueled engines. The present pressure-based approach can handle the implicit pressure-velocity coupling in a non-iterative way. The additional scalar conservation equations for the chemical species, the energy, and the turbulent transport quantities can be handled by the same predictor-corrector sequences. This method is time-accurate and it can be applicable to the all-speed, transient, multi-phase, and reacting flows. Special emphasis is given to the acoustic/vaporization interaction which may act as the crucial rate-controlling mechanism in the liquid-fueled rocket engines. The subcritical vaporization is modeled to account for the effects of variable thermophysical properties, non-unitary Lewis number in the gas-film, the Stefan flow effect, and the effect of transient liquid heating. The test cases include the one-dimenisonal fast transient non-reacting and reacting flows, and the multi-dimensional combustion instabilities encountered in the liquid-fueled rocket thrust chamber. The present numerical model successfully demonstrated the capability to simulate the fast transient spray-combusting flows in terms of the limiting-cycle amplitude phenomena, correspondence between combustion and acoustics, and the steep-fronted wave and flame propagation. The investigated parameters include the spray initial conditions, air-fuel mixture ratios, and the engine geometry. Stable and unstable operating conditions are found for the liquid-fueled combustors. Under certain conditions, the limiting cycle behavior of the combusting flowfields is obtained. The numerical results indicate that the spray vaporization processes play an important role in releasing thermal energy and driving the combustion instability.

Kim, Y. M.↗

Magnetospheric Multiscale (MMS) Mission Commissioning Phase Orbit Determination Error Analysis

The Magnetospheric MultiScale (MMS) mission commissioning phase starts in a 185 km altitude x 12 Earth radii (RE) injection orbit and lasts until the Phase 1 mission orbits and orientation to the Earth-Sun li ne are achieved. During a limited time period in the early part of co mmissioning, five maneuvers are performed to raise the perigee radius to 1.2 R E, with a maneuver every other apogee. The current baseline is for the Goddard Space Flight Center Flight Dynamics Facility to p rovide MMS orbit determination support during the early commissioning phase using all available two-way range and Doppler tracking from bo th the Deep Space Network and Space Network. This paper summarizes th e results from a linear covariance analysis to determine the type and amount of tracking data required to accurately estimate the spacecraf t state, plan each perigee raising maneuver, and support thruster cal ibration during this phase. The primary focus of this study is the na vigation accuracy required to plan the first and the final perigee ra ising maneuvers. Absolute and relative position and velocity error hi stories are generated for all cases and summarized in terms of the ma ximum root-sum-square consider and measurement noise error contributi ons over the definitive and predictive arcs and at discrete times inc luding the maneuver planning and execution times. Details of the meth odology, orbital characteristics, maneuver timeline, error models, and error sensitivities are provided.

Chung, Lauren R.↗

Unstructured CFD Aerodynamic Analysis of a Generic UCAV Configuration

Three independent studies from the United States (NASA), Sweden (FOI), and Australia (DSTO) are analyzed to assess the state of current unstructured-grid computational fluid dynamic tools and practices for predicting the complex static and dynamic aerodynamic and stability characteristics of a generic 53-degree swept, round-leading-edge uninhabited combat air vehicle configuration, called SACCON. NASA exercised the USM3D tetrahedral cell-centered flow solver, while FOI and DSTO applied the FOI/EDGE general-cell vertex-based solver. The authors primarily employ the Reynolds Averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) assumption, with a limited assessment of the EDGE Detached Eddy Simulation (DES) extension, to explore sensitivities to grids and turbulence models. Correlations with experimental data are provided for force and moments, surface pressure, and off-body flow measurements. The vortical flow field over SACCON proved extremely difficult to model adequately. As a general rule, the prospect of obtaining reasonable correlations of SACCON pitching moment characteristics with the RANS formulation is not promising, even for static cases. Yet, dynamic pitch oscillation results seem to produce a promising characterization of shapes for the lift and pitching moment hysteresis curves. Future studies of this configuration should include more investigation with higher-fidelity turbulence models, such as DES.

Frink, Neal T.↗

Aerosol Comparisons Between Observations and Models: AeroCom and ABC

I will represent the AeroCom community to the Atmospheric Brown Cloud (ABC) workshop. I will summarize the activities and results from AeroCom Phase I activities in the past 8 years and introduce the new results and activities in the current AeroCom Phase II. We hope to coordinate some activities with the ABC community to share model output and data access for model evaluations, comparisons, and assessment.

Chin, Mian↗

Reasoning Service Exemplars for NASA’s Data and Reasoning Fabric

Future operations for Urban and Advanced Air Mobility are enabled by a distributed network of reliable and secured data and reasoning services referred to here as a fabric. In the aggregate, such a system must be all encompassing and mission agnostic, but specific use-cases are still needed to improve understanding and drive design paradigms. For this purpose, three reasoning service exemplars for Target Selection and Routing, Trajectory Generation, and Battery Health Management were developed and integrated into a specific NASA proposed data and reasoning fabric. These services were then used to build a mission reasoning application for lightning strike reconnaissance developed in collaboration with the Civil Air Patrol. Autonomous mission execution was then demonstrated using a multivehicle simulation platform with a full envelope 6 Degree-of-Freedom dynamics model for a concept electric Vertical Takeoff and Landing aircraft.

Autonomy↗

On Boundary-Value Problems for RANS Equations and Two-Equation Turbulence Models

Currently, in engineering computations for high Reynolds number turbulent flows, turbulence modeling continues to be the most frequently used approach to represent the effects of turbulence. Such models generally rely on solving either one or two transport equations along with the Reynolds-Averaged Navier–Stokes (RANS) equations. The solution of the boundary-value problem of any system of partial differential equations requires the complete delineation of the equations and the boundary conditions, including any special restrictions and conditions. In the literature, such a description is often incomplete, neglecting important details related to the boundary conditions and possible restrictive conditions, such as how to ensure satisfying prescribed values of the dependent variables of the transport equations in the far field of a finite domain. In this article, we discuss the possible influence of boundary values, as well as near-field and far-field behavior, on the solution of the RANS equations coupled with transport equations for turbulence modeling. In so doing, we defne the concept of a welldefined boundary-value problem. Additionally, a three-dimensional, rather than a simpler one-dimensional analysis is performed to analyze the near-wall and far-field behavior of the turbulence model variables. This allows an assessment of the decay rate of these variables required to realize the boundary conditions in the far field. This paper also addresses the impact of various transformations of two-equation models (e.g., the model of Wilcox) to remove the singular behavior of the dissipation rate (ω) at the surface boundary. Finally, the issue of well-posedness regarding the governing equations is considered. A compelling argument (although not a proof) for ill-posedness is made for both direct and inverse problems.

Navier–Stokes equations↗

Combustion Of Moving Droplets And Of Droplets Suspended Within A Convective Environment: Transient Numerical Results

The problem considered is that of a single-component liquid fuel (n-heptane) droplet undergoing evaporation and combustion in a hot, convective, low pressure, zero-gravity environment of infinite expanse. For a moving droplet, the relative velocity (U(sub infinity)) between the droplet and freestream is subject to change due to the influence of the drag force on the droplet. For a suspended droplet, the relative velocity is kept constant. The governing equations for the gas-phase and the liquid-phase consist of the unsteady, axisymmetric equations of mass, momentum, species (gas-phase only) and energy conservation. Interfacial conservation equations are employed to couple the two phases. Variable properties are used in the gas- and liquid-phase. Multicomponent diffusion in the gas-phase is accounted for by solving the Stefan-Maxwell equations for the species diffusion velocities. A one-step overall reaction is used to model the combustion. The governing equations are discretized using the finite volume and SIMPLEC methods. A colocated grid is adopted. Hyperbolic tangent stretching functions are used to concentrate grid points near the fore and aft lines of symmetry and at the droplet surface in both the gas- and liquid-phase. The discretization equations are solved using the ADI method with the TDMA used on each line of the two alternating directions. Iterations are performed within each time-step until convergence is achieved. The grid spacing, size of the computational domain and time-step were tested to ensure that all solutions are independent of these parameters. A detailed discussion of the numerical model is given.

Gogos, George↗

Meteorology Modulates the Impact of GCM Horizontal Resolution on Underestimation of Midlatitude Ocean Wind Speeds

We utilize ocean 10-m wind speed (U 10m ) from the microwave Multi-sensor Advanced Climatology data set to examine the coupling between convective cloud and precipitation processes, synoptic state, and U 10m and to evaluate the representation of U 10m in global climate models (GCMs). We find that midlatitude U 10m is underestimated by GCMs relative to observations. We examine two potential mechanisms to explain this model behavior: cold pool formation in cold air outbreaks (CAOs) associated with downdrafts that enhance U 10m and sea surface temperature (SST) gradients affecting U 10m through thermally forced surface winds at regional scales. When the effects of the CAO index (M) and SST gradients on U 10m are accounted for, a relationship between GCM horizontal resolution and U 10m appears. The strongest correlation between resolution and U 10m is over the western boundary currents characterized by frequent CAOs atop strong SST gradients which drives the strongest surface fluxes on Earth.

surface wind speed↗