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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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All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2023

Opiate Sensitivity in Fruit Flies

Substance use disorder is a debilitating clinical condition in which behavioral dependence results from biological, environmental, genetic, and psychosocial factors. An epidemic surrounding the use and abuse of opioids is ravaging the world. While considerable efforts have explored the social drivers of addiction, a deeper understanding of biological causes and genetic vulnerabilities, preventative interventions, and effective treatments, have all proven elusive. This perspective article aims to remind readers that addictive natural compounds such as cocaine, nicotine, cathinone, or morphine, evolved as defensive metabolites to deter insect herbivory. The molecular mechanisms underlying motivational seeking and learning/reward show remarkable conservation since their early emergence in bilateral metazoans. An extended coevolutionary arms race subsequently weaponized these compounds into disruptors of learning, motivation, and incentivized attention. When plant chemical defenses attack insect physiology, humans are rendered susceptible due to strong conservation in the underlying molecular machinery. This perspective addresses the paradox that opiates were shaped to target insect neuropharmacology, even though this taxon appears to lack the recognized opioid receptor clade of mammals. We argue that the link is to be found in the allatostatin receptor, a basal ortholog of opioid receptors. Moreover, preliminary evidence indicates that morphine reduces Drosophila feeding and locomotion, concordant with a purported role as a defensive compound reducing herbivory. An implementation via allatostatin-mediated mechanisms is likely. This research argues for a broader heuristic perspective of substance abuse and a recognition of the evolutionary constraints that have likely shaped the biological drivers of opioid sensitivity and of its behavioral targets.

59 BASIC BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2021

Chapter 22: Compressed Air Evaluation Protocol. The Uniform Methods Project: Methods for Determining Energy Efficiency Savings for Specific Measures (September 2011 - August 2020)

Compressed-air systems are used widely throughout industry for many operations, including pneumatic tools, packaging and automation equipment, conveyors, and other industrial process operations. Compressed-air systems are defined as a group of subsystems composed of air compressors, air treatment equipment, controls, piping, pneumatic tools, pneumatically powered machinery, and process applications using compressed air. A compressed-air system has three primary functional subsystems: supply, distribution, and demand. Air compressors are the primary energy consumers in a compressed-air system and are the primary focus of this protocol. The two compressed-air energy efficiency measures specifically addressed in this protocol are: high-efficiency/variable speed drive (VSD) compressor replacing modulating, load/unload, or constant-speed compressor; compressed-air leak survey and repairs. This protocol provides direction on how to reliably verify savings from these two measures using a consistent approach for each.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗
DOE OSTI2021

Embodied carbon in the U.S. manufacturing and trade

On average, one quarter of the global carbon footprint is embodied in traded goods. These emissions are a growing issue for global efforts to decarbonize the world economy. Embodied emissions in trade are not accounted for by existing greenhouse gas accounting systems. For example, countries only report their domestic carbon emissions (also known as production-based or territorial accounting) to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). If the embodied carbon in trade were accounted for and reported, the promising climate trends depicted by many countries would be negated or reversed. For example, many achievements of reducing emissions by developed countries under the Kyoto Protocol would actually appear as emissions outsourced to developing countries. Like many other developed countries, the United States is a net importer of embodied greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in trade. The goal of this study was to calculate the carbon footprint of various sectors of the U.S. economy using the latest available data and based on that, estimate the embodied carbon in certain manufacturing sector products imported and exported by the U.S. First, we conducted an input-output analysis to calculate the carbon footprint of 401 aggregate level sectors of the U.S. economy. After that, for a selected number of manufacturing subsectors /products(hereafter referred to as products),we collected their trade(import/export) data and combined that with their computed carbon footprint to estimate the embodied carbon in import and export of these products for the U.S. While we conducted the carbon footprint analysis for sectors covering the entire U.S. economy (401 sectors), we only conducted the embodied carbon in trade analysis for a few products within specific aggregate level manufacturing sectors,such as computer and electronic product manufacturing (NAICS 334), transport equipment manufacturing (NAICS 336), machinery manufacturing (NAICS 333), and chemical manufacturing (NAICS 325). It is possible to do the detailed embodied carbon analysis for all other products within the various aggregate level manufacturing sectors of the U.S. economy, but given the scope of this study and space constraint of this report, we only present the results for a few products. The results of our analysis for the selected products show the embodied carbon in trade for each product by country and also show the rankings of countries in terms of top importers and exporters of embodied carbon in trade with the U.S. Our results show that in majority of cases, the U.S. is a net importer of embodied carbon in trade. Unless consumption-based accounting is used, the U.S. and other net embodied carbon importing countries may continue to outsource their emissions to meet their climate change mitigation targets under the Paris Agreement, as observed previously with the Kyoto Protocol. Some countries reported reductions that exceeded their Kyoto targets, however, the changes in emissions embodied in imports were comparable to or larger than changes in domestic emissions. Traded emissions undermined emissions reductions in the Kyoto Protocol, and threaten to continue to do so for the Paris Agreement. New climate policies such as California’s Buy Clean act, EU’s proposed border carbon tax adjustment, as well as efforts in the private sector can help address the embodied carbon in traded products.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2021

Structure-preserving numerical discretizations for domains with boundaries

This SAND report documents Exploratory Express LDRD Project 223790, "Structure-preserving numerical discretizations for domains with boundaries", which developed a method to incorporate consistent treatment of domain boundaries and arbitrary boundary conditions in discrete exterior calculus (DEC) for arbitrary polygonal (2D) and tensor-product structure prism (3D) grids. The new DEC required the development of novel discrete exterior derivatives, boundary operators, wedge products and Hodge stars. This was accomplished through the use of boundary extension and the blending of known 2D operators on the interior with 1D operators on the boundary. The Hodge star was based on the Voronoi Hodge star, and retained the limitation of a triangular circumcentric primal or dual grid along with low-order accuracy. In addition to the new DEC, two related software packages were written: one for the study of DEC operators on arbitrary polygonal and polyhedral grids using both symbolic and numerical approaches and one for a (thermal) shallow water testbed using TRiSK-type numerics. Immediately relevant (already funded, through CANGA) followup work is the development of a high-order, geometrically flexible Hodge star and structure-preserving, high-order, oscillation-limiting transport operators (using WENO) for n-forms on arbitrary 2D and 3D grids. This will provide all of the machinery required for a high-order version of TRiSK with boundaries on arbitrary 2D and tensor-product 3D grids, which is applicable to both the atmospheric (CRM in E3SM-MMF) and oceanic (MPAS-O) components of E3SM.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗
DOE OSTI2021

Control of Carbon Allocation in Phenylpropanoid Metabolism

Understanding the molecular mechanisms by which carbon flux is partitioned in plants, and how flux through the phenylpropanoid pathway in particular is regulated and allocated to different branches of the pathway is essential for the eventual rational manipulation of phenylpropanoid flux for bioenergy applications. The phenylpropanoid pathway is responsible for the biosynthesis of a diverse array of metabolites essential for structural integrity, water transport, UV protection, and defense against herbivores and pathogens. The products of the phenylpropanoid pathway, all of which are derived from phenylalanine, range from complex, insoluble polymers such as lignin and suberin, to soluble flavonoids and hydroxycinnamate esters, to volatile compounds used to attract pollinators. By far the most abundant of these is the complex heteropolymer lignin, which accounts for a significant portion of the dry weight of not only woody plants, but also of crop residues. Decreasing or altering lignin structure to provide increased cell wall digestibility could greatly increase the cost effectiveness of converting cell wall polysaccharides to ethanol or second-generation biofuels. On the other hand, it is also possible that plants engineered to accumulate higher levels of lignin could provide improved feedstock for direct combustion and electricity generation as part of a diverse bioenergy portfolio. Consistent with the enormous commitment of energy and carbon it requires, the synthesis of lignin is under tight regulatory control. In order to influence transcription, gene-specific activators and repressors must interact with basal transcription factors and the rest of the core transcriptional machinery. In eukaryotes, this interaction is bridged by the large, multi-subunit complex known as Mediator. Despite the clear importance of Mediator throughout the eukaryotes, the complex has only recently been studied in plants. We have shown that a pair of Mediator subunits, MED5a and MED5b are required for normal regulation of phenylpropanoid pathway product accumulation. Plants lacking these proteins show increased accumulation of phenylpropanoids in multiple tissues indicating that normally they directly or indirectly repress expression of phenylpropanoid pathway genes. Furthermore, we have recently shown that MED5 plays a role in dwarfing in some low lignin plants and feedback between and within metabolic pathways of secondary metabolism in Arabidopsis. Taken together with the established roles of Mediator in transcriptional regulation, and of MED5a and MED5b in the repression of phenylpropanoid metabolism, these observations suggest that MED5a and MED5b are key components of an active, transcriptional process by which phenylpropanoid homeostasis is maintained in wild-type plants. Our research focused on expanding our understanding of the role of Mediator, as well as elucidating the mechanisms by which these proteins influence phenylpropanoid biosynthesis and how metabolite accumulation within the pathway and between metabolic pathways is essential for feedback regulatory control. This research will inform future bioengineering efforts aimed at altering carbon allocation and cell wall engineering by contributing to our understanding of the role of Mediator in regulating lignin biosynthesis, a pathway of plant metabolism that is important on a global scale.

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗
DOE OSTI2022

Industrial Deployment of Computer Aided Manufacturing Software for Hybrid Advanced Manufacturing

GibbsCAM, 3D Systems’ software product, is a full-featured CAM system that provides powerful CNC programming, capabilities, and solutions, delivering high quality parts without sacrificing ease of use. Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) collaborated with GibbsCAM to evaluate their toolpath generating software being developed for both blown powder and hybrid CNC/additive manufacturing machinery. The current approach in toolpath solutions for additive manufacturing is to utilize subtractive toolpaths created by existing CAM software and reversing it for additive manufacturing applications. GibbsCAM is working to develop a full solution to mitigate the challenges that arise with this approach and deploy a fully customized solution for producing quality, reliable components for a range of different DED systems. When successful, this will be an automated solution deployed through a future release of GibbsCAM software.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗
DOE OSTI2021

Argonne Leadership Computing Facility: 2021 Operational Assessment Report

This Operational Assessment Report describes how the Argonne Leadership Computing Facility (ALCF) met or exceeded every one of its goals for calendar year (CY) 2021 as an advanced scientific computing center. In CY 2021, the ALCF operated its production resource, Theta, an Intel-based Cray XC40 system (11.7-petaflops) augmented with 24 NVIDIA DGX A100-based nodes (3.9-petaflops) that supports diverse workloads, integrating data analytics with artificial intelligence (AI) training and learning in a single platform. In 2021, we began deploying Polaris, our newest 40- petaflops system, and augmented this powerful testbed system with an additional 28 nodes to support the integration of real-time experiments and HPC resources. We also deployed our two largest storage systems yet, named Grand and Eagle, that will bring new services to our users and will power data-driven research for years to come. Last year, Theta delivered a total of 20.8 million node-hours to 16 Innovative and Novel Computational Impact on Theory and Experiment (INCITE) projects and 7.2 million node-hours to ASCR Leadership Computing Challenge (ALCC) projects (32 awarded during the 2020–2021 ALCC year and 17 awarded during the 2021–2022 ALCC year), as well as substantial support to Director’s Discretionary (DD) projects (5.5 million node-hours). As Table ES.1 shows, Theta performed exceptionally well in terms of overall availability (95.1 percent), scheduled availability (99.4 percent), and utilization (98.1 percent; Table 2.1). As of the submission date of this document, ALCF’s user community has published 249 papers in high-quality, peer-reviewed journals and technical proceedings. At the 2021 International Conference for High Performance Computing, Networking, Storage and Analysis (SC’21), Argonne researchers won two HPCwire Readers’ Choice Awards and were part of a Gordon Bell Prize finalist team recognized for developing an AI-enabled, multi-resolution simulation framework for studying complex biomolecular machines. Their framework was used to observe the SARS-CoV-2 replication-transcription machinery in action, by directly integrating experimental data. ALCF also provided a comprehensive program of high-performance computing (HPC) support services to help our community make productive use of the facility’s diverse and growing collection of resources. We are now entering the exascale era, with exascale machines being planned for national laboratories across the country, including Aurora at Argonne National Laboratory (Argonne) in 2023. ALCF researchers have been leading and guiding numerous strategic activities that will push the boundaries of what’s possible in computational science and engineering and allow us to deliver science on day one.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗
DOE OSTI2023

Second Target Station Target Segment PIE Dose Estimates

The purpose of the analysis described in this document is to support post irradiation examination (PIE) future decisions as related to the Second Target Station (STS) Project. The STS Project is discussing plans for future PIE studies, and the radionuclide inventories and dose rates included in this study will aid decision makers as they consider the need for various PIE-related machinery. Three configurations of the lasagna-type target segment are evaluated for this analysis: a single bare tungsten plate, a slice of the segment containing a single tungsten plate, and the upstream half of a segment. The lasagna type target segment used in this analysis has a precipitation hardenable nickel alloy (UNS N07718 or inconel 718) shroud, copper (C10100) cladding, and pure tungsten plates. The target segment is evaluated for 10 years of operation followed by two decay periods: 6 months and 2 years. For each decay period, decay gamma dose rates are tallied 30 cm from the upstream, downstream, top, bottom, and sides of the configurations. Radionuclide inventories are also provided in this report separated by material. The highest dose rates calculated in this study are 2872 rem/hr 30 cm away from the top and bottom of the half-target configuration after 6 months of decay.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2022

Harnessing Biomineralization Potential of Metal-Sequestering Bacteria for Rare Earth Elements (REE) Material Synthesis

Extremophilic methylotrophs, such as Methylotuvimicrobium alcaliphilum 20ZR are known for their natural ability to carry out REE capture and uptake. It has been predicted that proteins associated with surface layers facilitate transport and homeostasis of essential metals. Indeed, electron microscopic analysis coupled with antibody staining revealed that cell envelop of metal-grown M. alcaliphilum 20ZR contains metal-binding proteins in the base of the cup-shaped structures of S-layers. While less explored, the proteins associated with S-layers are also predicted to contribute to scavenging of other minerals essential for core metabolism. Here, we employed bottom-up proteomic study to compare the protein content of S-layer fractions of M. alcaliphilum 20ZR cultures grown in the presence and absence trace metals to identify putative components REE-scavenging machinery.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2023

Parameterization of the β and γ phases of Tin using the Vinet and Mie-Grüneisen Equations of State

When testing new phase aware materials models, it is often not possible to use tabulated Equations of States for the phases since the model might only be available in a smaller specialized research code without capability to read in tables. These EOS parameterizations for two of the solid phases of Tin were developed for testing the Kinetic Phase Transition model by Carl Greeff, LANL. They are based on two isotherms per phase obtained from work in progress by Carl Greeff, and their phase boundary corresponds fairly well to SESAME 2162. A full machinery is applied for the parameterization of the Vinet EOSs while the Mie-Grüneisen parameterizations are translated from the Vinet EOSs.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2023

NIMROD Development AND Applications for Advanced Simulations of Tokamak Plasmas

Magnetic fusion experiments have the largest gradients in the world that are in steady state. These gradients lead to instabilities, and thus, most of plasma theory over the past four decades have been devoted to the development of instability theory and their use in interpreting plasma results. Instabilities in tokamaks lead to 3 different phenomenological outcomes: coherent saturation, turbulent saturation, and sudden relaxation (which may include disruptions). For long-wavelength instabilities, the NIMROD extended MHD code has emerged as an important tool for understanding tokamak instabilities. Because of the long history of NIMROD, a new version of it has been started at Tech-X to be able to address multi-species capabilities as well as exploit modern GPU systems. The new version builds on the previous version and improves the workflow by enabling new equilibria from experiments to be resolved. The fundamental formulation of the equations underlying NIMROD has also been explored in multiples ways. First, understanding instabilities in tokamaks through numerical methods is aided by being able to understand the rich history of analytic studies. A paper was published which aid in understanding the literature by simplifying some of the analytic machinery inherent in these studies. Extended MHD, like gyrokinetics, are quasineutral models. From a theoretical point of view, plasma quasineutrality approximation is best understood as the same as the magneto-quasistatic approximation of the Maxwell equations. Finally, the standard model of tokamak theory is that of instability theory. A simple dynamical systems model has been developed to better illustrate the strengths and weaknesses of this model.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2023

Improved Biofuel Production through Discovery and Engineering of Terpene Metabolism in Switchgrass

Project Objectives - Of the myriad specialized metabolites that plants deploy to adapt to environmental challenges, terpenes form the largest group. In many major crops, unique terpene blends serve as key stress defenses that directly impact plant fitness and yield. In addition, terpenes, such as bisabolene and pinene, are used for producing renewable biofuels. Essential to advancing a broader use of terpenes for biofuel feedstock engineering is a system-wide knowledge of the diverse biosynthetic machinery and defensive potential of often species-specific terpene blends. The proposed project would merge genome-wide enzyme discovery with comparative –omics, protein structural and plant microbiome studies to define the biosynthesis and stress-defensive functions of the switchgrass (Panicum virgatum) terpene network. These insights would be combined with developing and applying non-transgenic genome editing tools to design plants with desirable terpene blends for higher productivity and biofuel production on marginal lands. As a dedicated lignocellulosic feedstock for U.S. biofuel production with high net energy yield, stress tolerance, and available genome resources, switchgrass is well-suited for devising new avenues for biofuel production. Project Description – The diversity of plant terpene defenses is governed by species-specific families of terpene synthase (TPS) and cytochrome P450 monooxygenase (P450) enzymes. Mining of the switchgrass genome (genotype Alamo) identified ~100 TPS and P450 candidate genes, and combinatorial biochemical analysis of synthesized TPSs and P450s revealed more than a dozen enzymes with common and novel activities. In addition, several identified terpene metabolites and the corresponding transcripts were up-regulated in response to abiotic stressors. These findings demonstrate a unique switchgrass terpene network with probable importance to abiotic stress tolerance, thus providing a large chemical portfolio for optimizing crop resistance, yield, and biofuel composition. Leveraging these preliminary data, we propose to generate a genome-wide map of the switchgrass terpene metabolic network through multi-gene co-expression analyses that allow the efficient cross-validation of TPS and P450 functions. Key enzymes would further be applied to structure-function studies via X-ray protein crystallography, homology modeling and site-directed mutagenesis to gain mechanistic insight into the catalytic specificity of switchgrass terpene metabolism and provide gene and amino acid targets for genome editing. In tandem with terpene pathway discovery, system-wide metabolomics, transcriptomics and proteomics studies in switchgrass accessions of contrasting drought tolerance would define the role of switchgrass terpene metabolism in conferring abiotic stress resilience. Metabolic changes would be assessed in a combined approach of targeted (terpenes) and untargeted metabolite profiling using a high-resolution LC-MS/MS approach, differential gene expression analyses through multiplexed Illumina RNA sequencing, and quantitative analysis of high-priority pathway enzymes using multiple reaction monitoring (MRM). Drawing on these insights, knock-down/out mutants of stress-associated pathway nodes would be generated by optimizing transient virus-induced gene silencing (VIGS) and CRISPR/Cas9 systems under control of the Tobacco Rattle Virus (TRV). The resulting mutant lines would then be analyzed for stress susceptibility and the impact on the root microbiome to define gene functions in planta. Knowledge of terpene pathways, enzyme mechanisms and bioactivities would be applied to enhance switchgrass stress resilience and to tailor-make terpene blends for biofuel production. Here, TRV-enabled CRISPR/Cas9 genome editing, including allele-specific knock-out of redundant genes, engineering of enzyme specificity via structure-guided point mutations, and overexpression of terpene genes relevant to stress-protection or biofuel production, would be used to increase metabolic flux toward desired pathways. Broader Impacts - Integrating the system-wide discovery, mechanistic analysis and non-transgenic genome engineering of the switchgrass terpene network aligns the required steps to unlock the chemical potential of this important metabolite class to generate crops that are more resistant to stress and provide advanced biofuel production in light of rising climate pressures as foreseeable challenges for bioenergy crop cultivation. The proposed project would further offer interdisciplinary student training through active involvement in the project and integration of research concepts and outcomes into newly-developed graduate and undergraduate courses on Plant Biotechnology.

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗
DOE OSTI2024

US Department of Energy, Office of Science, High-Performance Computing Facility: 2023 Operational Assessment Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility

The Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility (OLCF) was established to accelerate scientific discovery by providing world-leading computational performance and advanced data infrastructure. As a US Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Science user facility, the OLCF has managed the successful deployment and operation of a succession of leadership-class resources dedicated to open science. In addition to these resources, the OLCF staff continually strive to develop innovative processes and technologies, improve security, and empower users through effective allocation management and comprehensive user support and training. These efforts support the advancement of science by the OLCF users and benefit high-performance computing (HPC) facilities around the world. In calendar year (CY) 2023, the OLCF supported 1,676 users and 598 projects and exceeded all targets for user satisfaction. The facility received an average satisfaction score of 4.52 out of 5 on the annual user survey, and 94% of respondents reported a high satisfaction rate with the OLCF overall. Of the 3,619 user tickets submitted in CY 2023, OLCF staff resolved 97% within 3 business days. The facility opened Frontier to full scientific operations this year. Two projects conducted on Frontier received the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) Gordon Bell Prize and the Gordon Bell Special Prize for Climate Modeling, and a third earned a nomination as a Gordon Bell Prize finalist. The facility’s previous flagship machine, Summit, gained new life and was extended through 2024 in part to help provide resources to the Integrated Research Infrastructure (IRI) projects and the National Artificial Intelligence Research Resource (NAIRR) pilot program. The facility instantiated an Advanced Computing Ecosystem testbed in part to support IRI workflows. OLCF made interactivity easier and more accessible to users than ever through tools like Jupyter notebooks and workflows.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗
DOE OSTI2024

Internship Work Report

I worked on two projects during my summer internship at Sandia. My official title was “Intern - Mission Tech Electrical Eng./Computer Eng.- R&D Undergraduate Summer.” I worked at the central location, which is Albuquerque, New Mexico. The department you are placed in at Sandia doesn’t always correspond to the people you will be working with. For example, I only directly worked with one person from my department this summer. On one of my projects, I worked with a diverse team of engineers from many different departments. On my other project, I mainly worked with two departments, as the project had two distinct parts. As mentioned earlier, I worked on two projects during my summer at Sandia. The first project focused on a lightweight embedded controller in an advanced FPGA System-on-Chip for radar signal processing applications. The term “controller” refers to a hardware device that directs the flow of data between two entities. An FPGA is a reprogrammable integrated circuit (as opposed to an integrated circuit with one purpose). An FPGA was used on this project so in order to protype various ideas for our System-on-Chip. My role on the project was to implement designs on the fabric of the FPGA and design a state machine (written in C) for the processor. My second project was also heavily involved with embedded systems but had a different application. It focused on using a Newton-Raphson control algorithm to stabilize an inverted pendulum using a novel microcontroller. The pendulum dynamics were derived, and it was successfully simulated in MATLAB. I worked on integrating the microcontroller with the inverted pendulum machinery, and converting the Newton-Raphson control algorithm from MATLAB into C. The inverted pendulum was successfully stabilized using a simple PID controller and industry-standard microcontroller. The project is still ongoing, and the team is gearing up for more tests using the novel Newton-Raphson control algorithm and novel microcontroller

42 ENGINEERING↗
DOE OSTI2025

Technologies for Enhanced Condensation in sCO 2 Power Cycles

The direct fired supercritical carbon dioxide power cycle has higher efficiency, compact machinery footprint, and is resilient under transient operation. It has been shown that improving the cycle main cooler significantly improves performance, including increased cycle efficiency, decreased cost of electricity and decreased cooler outlet temperatures. One way to improve this process is through enhanced condensation techniques and management of condensation fluid. This manuscript provides an overview of active and passive enhanced condensation technologies, with a focus on the passive approaches. compared to passive approaches, active approaches can have higher heat transfer enhancement, but the additional power and infrastructure can be problematic. The passive approaches identified include microfins (helical and herringbone), corrugated tubing, dimpled tubing and pin fins. After comparison it is found that the microfin geometry has the best performance characteristics followed by the additively manufactured pin fins. It is noted that current literature around additively manufactured enhancements is lacking, and investigation of conventional as well as novel geometries fabricated in this manner may be worth further investigation. Benchmark correlations for these geometries are identified and their limitations outlined. For further investigation, a matrix of test articles is presented for possible experimentation.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗
DOE OSTI2025

Foil Bearing Supported Compressor-Expander

R&D Dynamics Corporation (RDD) is developing a fuel cell system compressor-expander designed for heavy-duty vehicle applications. The system emphasizes high reliability, versatility, long service life, and cost-effective mass production. Its design integrates a high-speed centrifugal compressor/expander, oil-free foil air/gas bearings, a direct current permanent magnet (DCPM) motor, and an inverter utilizing silicon carbide (SiC) switches. Key advantages include high efficiency, compact size and reduced weight, enhanced reliability, and elimination of oil contamination risks. The technology targets multiple sectors such as long-haul semi-trucks, mining and construction equipment, power generation, data centers, marine systems, and other heavy machinery. Evaluation units are ready for shipment, and manufacturing capabilities are currently being developed. Contract Number: DE-EE0009617 (2021).

30 DIRECT ENERGY CONVERSION↗
DOE OSTI2025

Towards Better Modeling the Probability of Hydrogen Ignition

It is paramount to accurately access the risk of facilities and machinery that use hydrogen. Towards this effort, this report surveys and compares existing models for the ignition of unintended hydrogen releases, typically leaks. These models are primarily formed on expert experience and perhaps a few points of data. As such, this report provides suggestions for improvement in ignition probability modeling, both in terms of experimentation and incident collection as well as modeling.

08 HYDROGEN↗
DOE OSTI2025

Fundamental Research Aimed at Diverting Excess Reducing Power in Photosynthesis to Orthogonal Metabolic Pathways

Photosystems are incredible biological machines that use sunlight to drive the conversion of carbon dioxide to sugar. The amount of sunlight available for photosynthesis sometimes exceeds the amount of energy plants can use. This excess energy has to be safely dissipated through non-productive biological processes. The ultimate goal of this project is to understand whether we can utilize that otherwise unused excess energy. In our previous work, we showed that, in principle, it is possible to attach a catalyst to photosystem I and generate H2 using light. Our current strategy is to genetically fuse parts of the photosystem I complex with a recently discovered oxygen-tolerant [FeFe] hydrogenase. Our rationale is that such chimeric proteins may potentially result in the natural incorporation of the photosystem I-hydrogenase link using the inherent genetic machinery of the cell. In this project, we aim to verify that light-driven hydrogen production in this construction is possible. Throughout the project, we designed nanoconstructs that showcase the plausibility of this technology, at least in vitro. We take advantage of these constructs to investigate details of the coupling between photosystem I and a H2-producing enzyme called [FeFe] hydrogenase. This part of the project reveals details of the electron transfer between photosystem I and the attached hydrogenase, providing information that can lead to new strategies for improved biological photocatalysis. We also researched efficient and robust tethering of the [FeFe] hydrogenase to photosystem I in cyanobacteria. This work will highlight successful design strategies to guide the future development of photosynthetic biohybrids. Uncovering the principles governing the utilization of otherwise unusable energy significantly further our understanding of cyanobacterial photosynthesis. The work proposed establishes the feasibility of diverting excess energy under high light conditions to orthogonal enzymatic pathways and set design rules for efficient utilization of such a strategy for scientific and industrial applications in biosensing, renewable energy, and high-value chemicals production. The work addresses the DOE-BES Photosynthetic Systems program goal to develop a multidimensional understanding of photosystems that would provide specific metrics that instruct strategies for improving biological photosynthesis and for guiding the future development of bioreactors and biomimetic energy systems.

Photosynthetic systems, hydrogenase, cyanobacteria↗