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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 451 records · Page 25

The method of Ritz applied to the equation of Hamilton

Without any reference to the theory of differential equations, the initial value problem of the nonlinear, nonconservative double pendulum system is solved by the application of the method of Ritz to the equation of Hamilton. Also shown is an example of the reduction of the traditional eigenvalue problem of linear, homogeneous, differential equations of motion to the solution of a set of nonhomogeneous algebraic equations. No theory of differential equations is used. Solution of the time-space path of the linear oscillator is demonstrated and compared to the exact solution.

Bailey, C. D.↗

Stress-concentration factors for finite orthotropic laminates with a circular hole and uniaxial loading

Stresses were calculated for finite-width orthotropic laminates with a circular hole and remote uniaxial loading using a two-dimensional finite element analysis with both uniform stress and uniform displacement boundary conditions. Five different laminates were analyzed. Computed results are presented for selected combinations of hole diameter/sheet-width ratio d/w and length-to-width ratio L/w. For small L/w values, the stress-concentration factors K sub tn were significantly different for the uniform stress and uniform displacement boundary conditions. Typically, for the uniform stress condition, the K sub tn values were much larger than for the infinite strip reference condition; however, for the uniform displacement condition, they were only slightly smaller than for this reference. The results for long strips are also presented as width correction factors. For d/w less or = 0.33, these width correction factors are nearly equal for all five laminates.

Hong, C. S.↗

Some studies of zonal and meridional wind characteristics at low latitude Indian stations

At the beginning of the Indian Middle Atmosphere Programme (IMAP), it was decided that the preparation of consolidation reports of already available parameters for the middle atmosphere would be useful. Atmospheric wind data obtained by rockets and balloons constituted one such parameter which had to be consolidated. The present paper summaries the results of this consolidation study. Both zonal and meridional components of winds at four low latitude Indian stations namely Thumba, Shar, Hyderabad, and Balasore, have been analyzed to yield reference wind profiles for each month. The montly mean values have been used to bring out the amplitudes and phases of the annual, semiannual and quasi-biennial oscillations.

Nagpal, O. P.↗

Noncoplanar magnetic fields, shock potentials, and ion deflection

A puzzling aspect of the structure of collisionless shock waves concerns the existence of a component of magnetic field that lies out of the coplanarity plane in the transition layer. It is shown that the existence of this component may be understood and its value calculated from a simple expression derived from first principles. The value of this field component may be derived without reference to the transformation properties of the fields or the changes in energy that the ions and electrons undergo on traversing the electrostatic potential of the shock interface.

Jones, Frank C.↗

Damage tolerance of a composite sandwich with interleaved foam core

A composite sandwich panel consisting of carbon fiber-reinforced plastic (CFRP) skins and a syntactic foam core was selected as an appropriate structural concept for the design of wind tunnel compressor blades. Interleaving of the core with tough interlayers was done to prevent core cracking and to improve damage tolerance of the sandwich. Simply supported sandwich beam specimens were subjected to low-velocity drop-weight impacts as well as high velocity ballistic impacts. The performance of the interleaved core sandwich panels was characterized by localized skin damage and minor cracking of the core. Residual compressive strength (RCS) of the skin, which was derived from flexural test, shows the expected trend of decreasing with increasing size of the damage, impact energy, and velocity. In the case of skin damage, RCS values of around 50 percent of the virgin interleaved reference were obtained at the upper impact energy range. Based on the similarity between low-velocity and ballistic-impact effects, it was concluded that impact energy is the main variable controlling damage and residual strength, where as velocity plays a minor role.

Ishai, Ori↗

Average effects of large-scale convection on helioseismic line widths and frequencies

The formalism of Lavely and Ritzwoller (1992) is here applied to the model of stationary large-scale solar convection developed by Glatzmaier (1984) in order to determine a characteristic giant-cell convection signature in helioseismic data. Frequency and line-width measurements are presented on spatially filtered spectra, so that references to azimuthal orders apply to the m-value of the spatial filter's spherical harmonic. Attention is given to the 'Q-bowl' pattern of large-scale convection, a systematic, apparent line-broadening.

Lavely, Eugene M.↗

Realization of Ultra-High Spectral Purity with the Opto-Electronic Oscillator

Recent results with the Opto-Electronic Oscillator (OEO) have led to the realization of very high spectral purity. Experimental results have produced a performance characterized by a noise as low as by -50 dBc/Hz at 10 Hz for a 10 GHz OEO. The unit was built in a compact package containing an integrated DFB laser and the modulator. This performance is significant because the oscillator is free running, and since the noise in an OEO is independent of the oscillation frequency, the same result can also be obtained at higher frequencies. The result also demonstrates that high frequency, high performance, low cost, and miniature OEO can be realized with the integrated photonic technology. We have also developed a novel carrier suppression technique to reduce the 1/f phase noise of the oscillator even further. The technique is based on the use of a long fiber delay, in place of the high Q cavity, to implement carrier suppression. Our preliminary experimental results indicate an extra 10 to 20 dB phase noise reduction of the OEO with this novel technique. Further noise reduction beyond this value is expected with improved circuit design and longer reference fiber.

Yao, Steve↗

Afterbody Heating Predictions for a Mars Science Laboratory Entry Vehicle

The Mars Science Laboratory mission intends to deliver a large rover to the Martian surface within 10 km of its target site. One candidate entry vehicle aeroshell consists of a 3.75-m diameter, 70-deg sphere-cone forebody and a biconic afterbody similar to that of Viking. This paper presents computational fluid dynamics predictions of laminar afterbody heating rates for this configuration and a 2010 arrival at Mars. Computational solutions at flight conditions used an 8-species Mars gas model in chemical and thermal non-equilibrium. A grid resolution study examined the effects of mesh spacing on afterbody heating rates and resulted in grids used for heating predictions on a reference entry trajectory. Afterbody heating rate reaches its maximum value near 0.6 W/sq cm on the first windward afterbody cone at the time of peak freestream dynamic pressure. Predicted afterbody heating rates generally are below 3% of the forebody laminar nose cap heating rate throughout the design trajectory. The heating rates integrated over time provide total heat load during entry, which drives thermal protection material thickness.

Edquist, Karl T.↗

2010 CEOS Field Reflectance Intercomparisons Lessons Learned

This paper summarizes lessons learned from the 2009 and 2010 joint field campaigns to Tuz Golu, Turkey. Emphasis is placed on the 2010 campaign related to understanding the equipment and measurement protocols, processing schemes, and traceability to SI quantities. Participants in both 2009 and 2010 used an array of measurement approaches to determine surface reflectance. One lesson learned is that even with all of the differences in collection between groups, the differences in reflectance are currently dominated by instrumental artifacts including knowledge of the white reference. Processing methodology plays a limited role once the bi-directional reflectance of the white reference is used rather than a hemispheric-directional value. The lack of a basic set of measurement protocols, or best practices, limits a group s ability to ensure SI traceability and the development of proper error budgets. Finally, rigorous attention to sampling methodology and its impact on instrument behavior is needed. The results of the 2009 and 2010 joint campaigns clearly demonstrate both the need and utility of such campaigns and such comparisons must continue in the future to ensure a coherent set of data that can span multiple sensor types and multiple decades.

Thome, Kurtis↗

Coming of Age: Polarization as a Probe of Plant Canopy Water Status

We tested the hypothesis that the relative water content (RWC) of the sunlit leaves in a plant canopy may be estimated from polarized canopy imagery. Recently (IGARSS, July 27-31, 2015, Milan, Italy), we reported the results of laboratory polarization measurements of single detached leaves during dry down. We found that RWC was linearly related to the ratio of the reflectance of the interior of the leaf and the leaf transmittance. Here we report application of the laboratory results to estimate RWC for sunlit leaves in a plant canopy. Using a commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) Nikon 810 camera with Nikkor 300 mm lens and Polaroid type HN-22 linear polarizer, we photographed in the principle plane a plant canopy displaying a gradient of water stress and collected, at each of multiple points along the gradient, two images, one with the polarization filter oriented for maximum scene response and a second with the filter oriented for minimum scene response. We converted the digital values in the two images to reflectance factor with reference to images of a white, flat, horizontal Spectralon surface. We classified the polarization imagery, identifying reflecting leaves, transmitting leaves, other sunlit vegetation and shadows. For each image pair we normalized the leaf internal reflectance by dividing by the cosine of the angle of incidence of the sunlight on the leaf, selected the leaf maximum transmittance in the scene and divided to obtain the ratio reflectance/transmittance, which we compared with leaf RWC. We determined the leaf relative water content by harvesting a section of leaf and immediately placing it in a sealed container in an ice chest. Later in the laboratory the leaf sample was weighed, rehydrated, weighed, dried and again weighed. RWC was determined using the standard formula. Our experimental results support our hypothesis, suggesting that the RWC of sunlit leaves in a plant canopy may be estimated from analysis of polarization imagery collected by a COTS camera system. Unlike remotely sensed estimates of canopy equivalent water thickness, our estimates of the RWC of sunlit canopy leaves provide leaf physiological information. We propose RWC estimates based upon sunlit leaves are more relevant to assessing the water status of a plant canopy than would be RWC estimates based upon large FOV canopy measurements.

estimates↗

Extreme Case of Spectral Band Difference Correction Between the OSIRIS-REX-NAVCAM2 and DSCOVR-EPIC Imagers

Earth-viewed images acquired during a recent asteroid intercept mission present a unique opportunity for radiometric calibration of visible imagers onboard a space exploration probe. Measurements from the CERES consistent DSCOVR-EPIC imager act as a reference in providing spatially, temporally, and angularly matched radiance values for deriving OSIRIS-REx-NavCam sensor calibration gains. The calibration is accomplished using an optimized all-sky tropical ocean ray-matching technique, which employs complex pixel remapping, navigation correction, and angular geometry consideration. Of critical consideration in this specific inter-calibration event is the extreme difference in spectral response function (SRF) width between the NavCam and EPIC imagers, which could cause a rather large bias. The NASA-LaRC SCIAMACHY based online spectral band adjustment factor (SBAF) calculation tool provides an empirical solution to such potential spectral-difference-induced biases through a high spectral- resolution hyper spectral convolution approach. The adjustments produced from this tool can effectively reduce the calibration gain bias of NavCam2 by nearly 6%, thereby adjusting the NavCam2 sensor to within 3.2% of its prelaunch calibration. These results highlight the capability of the SBAF tool to account for exceptionally disparate SRFs.

Scarino, Benjamin↗

TeMPI Shim

This is the manual for the TeMPI Shim library, whose goal is to facilitate scientific apps being loosely coupled through MPI. TeMPI Shim can be used to create and manage Message Passing Interface (MPI, see [MPI]) Communicators for Single Program, Multiple Data (SPMD, see [SPMD]) and Multiple Programs, Multiple Data (MPMD, see [MPMD]) workflows. MPI provides the MPI_APPNUM command number to each of the processes within its context. This number, starting at 0, is the application number being executed. In a case where 3 applications are being run in MPMD mode, there would be MPI_APPNUM values of 0, 1, and 2. TeMPI Shim creates intra- and inter-communicators between each pair of MPI_APPNUM values. In the aforementioned case, application 0 would have intra- and inter-communicators to speak to itself, application 1, and application 2. This is replicated for each of the applications. Additionally, TeMPI Shim creates intra- and inter-communicators for the first MPI rank of each application to directly communicate only with each other. Finally, TeMPI Shim creates its own copy of the default world communicator, i.e., MPI_COMM_WORLD. In the case where there is only a single application, it will have the communicators to only speak with itself. TeMPI Shim is useful in this case since it is considered good practice for MPI applications to copy the default world communicator and reference this copy (see [Duplicate World]_) anyways. Ultimately, it provides value independent of the number of applications present.

96 KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT AND PRESERVATION↗

New Releases and Upgrades of Giant Planet Global Reference Atmospheric Models (GRAMs)

• GRAMs are engineering-oriented atmospheric models that estimate mean values and statistical variations of atmospheric properties for numerous planetary destinations – Outputs atmospheric density, temperature, pressure, winds, and chemical composition along a user-defined path – Provide mean values and variability for any point in an atmosphere – Includes seasonal, geographic, and altitude variations – Used by engineering community because of their ability to create realistic atmospheric dispersions; can be integrated into high fidelity flight dynamic simulations of launch, entry, descent, and landing (EDL), aerobraking, and aerocapture • GRAMs are not forecast models • GRAMs are available for: Earth, Mars, Venus, Neptune, Titan, Jupiter, and Uranus • Available through the NASA Software Catalog https://software.nasa.gov/software/MFS-33888-1

atmospheric models↗

Orbital Signature Analyzer (OSA): A spacecraft health/safety monitoring and analysis tool

Fixed or static limit sensing is employed in control centers to ensure that spacecraft parameters remain within a nominal range. However, many critical parameters, such as power system telemetry, are time-varying and, as such, their 'nominal' range is necessarily time-varying as well. Predicted data, manual limits checking, and widened limit-checking ranges are often employed in an attempt to monitor these parameters without generating excessive limits violations. Generating predicted data and manual limits checking are both resource intensive, while broadening limit ranges for time-varying parameters is clearly inadequate to detect all but catastrophic problems. OSA provides a low-cost solution by using analytically selected data as a reference upon which to base its limits. These limits are always defined relative to the time-varying reference data, rather than as fixed upper and lower limits. In effect, OSA provides individual limits tailored to each value throughout all the data. A side benefit of using relative limits is that they automatically adjust to new reference data. In addition, OSA provides a wealth of analytical by-products in its execution.

Weaver, Steven↗

Evaluation of Methods to Select Scale Velocities in Icing Scaling Tests

A series of tests were made in the NASA Glenn Icing Research Tunnel to determine how icing scaling results were affected by the choice of scale velocity. Reference tests were performed with a 53.3-cm-chord NACA 0012 airfoil model, while scale tests used a 27.7-cm-chord 0012 model. Tests were made with rime, mixed, and glaze ice. Reference test conditions included airspeeds of 67 and 89 m/s, an MVD of 40 microns, and LWCs of 0.5 and 0.6 g/cu m. Scale test conditions were established by the modified Ruff (AEDC) scaling method with the scale velocity determined in five ways. The resulting scale velocities ranged from 85 to 220 percent of the reference velocity. This paper presents the ice shapes that resulted from those scale tests and compares them to the reference shapes. It was concluded that for freezing fractions greater than 0.8 as well as for a freezing fraction of 0.3, the value of the scale velocity had no effect on how well the scale ice shape simulated the reference shape. For freezing fractions of 0.5 and 0.7, the simulation of the reference shape appeared to improve as the scale velocity increased.

Anderson, David N.↗

Our Sun IV: The Standard Model and Helioseismology: Consequences of Uncertainties in Input Physics and in Observed Solar Parameters

Helioseismic frequency observations provide an extremely accurate window into the solar interior; frequencies from the Michaelson Doppler Imager (MDI) on the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) spacecraft, enable the adiabatic sound speed and adiabatic index to be inferred with an accuracy of a few parts in 10(exp 4) and the density with an accuracy of a few parts in 10(exp 3). This has become a Serious challenge to theoretical models of the Sun. Therefore, we have undertaken a self-consistent, systematic study of the sources of uncertainties in the standard solar models. We found that the largest effect on the interior structure arises from the observational uncertainties in the photospheric abundances of the elements, which affect the sound speed profile at the level of 3 parts in 10(exp 3). The estimated 4% uncertainty in the OPAL opacities could lead to effects of 1 part in 10(exp 3); the approximately 5%, uncertainty in the basic pp nuclear reaction rate would have a similar effect, as would uncertainties of approximately 15% in the diffusion constants for the gravitational settling of helium. The approximately 50% uncertainties in diffusion constants for the heavier elements would have nearly as large an effect. Different observational methods for determining the solar radius yield results differing by as much as 7 parts in 10(exp 4); we found that this leads to uncertainties of a few parts in 10(exp 3) in the sound speed int the solar convective envelope, but has negligible effect on the interior. Our reference standard solar model yielded a convective envelope position of 0.7135 solar radius, in excellent agreement with the observed value of 0.713 +/- 0.001 solar radius and was significantly affected only by Z/X, the pp rate, and the uncertainties in helium diffusion constants. Our reference model also yielded envelope helium abundance of 0.2424, in good agreement with the approximate range of 0.24 to 0.25 inferred from helioseismic observations; only extreme Z/X values yielded envelope helium abundance outside this range. We found that other current uncertainties, namely, in the solar age and luminosity, in nuclear rates other than the pp reaction, in the low-temperature molecular opacities, and in the low-density equation of state, have no significant effect on the quantities that can be inferred from helioseismic observations. The predicted pre-main-sequence lithium depletion is uncertain by a factor of 2. The predicted neutrino capture rate is uncertain by approximately 30% for the Cl-27 experiment and by approximately 3% for Ga-71 experiments, while the B-8 neutrino flux is uncertain by approximately 30%.

Boothroyd, Arnold I.↗

Four-D global reference atmosphere technical description, part 1

An empirical atmospheric model was developed which generates values for pressure, density, temperature, and winds from surface levels to orbital altitudes. The output parameters consist of components for: (1) latitude, longitude, and altitude dependent monthly and annual means; (2) quasi-biennial oscillations; and (3) random perturbations to simulate partially the variability due to synoptic, diurnal, planetary wave, and gravity wave variations. Quasi-biennial and random variation perturbations are computed from parameters determined from various empirical studies and are added to the monthly mean values. This model has been developed as a computer program called PROFILE which can be used to generate altitude profiles of atmospheric parameters along any simulated trajectory through the atmosphere. The PROFILE program was developed for design applications in the space shuttle program. Other applications of the model are discussed, such as for global circulation and diffusion studies, and for generating profiles for comparison with other atmospheric measurement techniques, (e.g. satellite measured temperature profiles).

Justus, C. G.↗