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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 487 records · Page 27

Omni-directional L-band antenna for mobile communications

The principle and design of an L-band omni-directional mobile communication antenna are discussed. The antenna is a circular wave guide aperture with hybrid circuits attached to higher order mode excitation. It produces polarized and symmetric two split beams in elevation. The circular waveguide is fed by eight probes with a 90 degree phase shift between their inputs. Radiation pattern characteristics are controlled by adjusting the aperture diameter and mode excitation. This antenna satisfies gain requirements as well as withstanding the harsh environment.

Kim, C. S.↗

Active control of turbomachine discrete tones

This paper was directed at active control of discrete frequency noise generated by subsonic blade rows through cancellation of the blade row interaction generated propagating acoustic waves. First discrete frequency noise generated by a rotor and stator in a duct was analyzed to determine the propagating acoustic pressure waves. Then a mathematical model was developed to analyze and predict the active control of discrete frequency noise generated by subsonic blade rows through cancellation of the propagating acoustic waves, accomplished by utilizing oscillating airfoil surfaces to generate additional control propagating pressure waves. These control waves interact with the propagating acoustic waves, thereby, in principle, canceling the acoustic waves and thus, the far field discrete frequency tones. This model was then applied to a fan exit guide vane to investigate active airfoil surface techniques for control of the propagating acoustic waves, and thus the far field discrete frequency tones, generated by blade row interactions.

Fleeter, Sanford↗

Case-Based Capture and Reuse of Aerospace Design Rationale

The goal of this project was to apply artificial intelligence techniques to facilitate capture and reuse of aerospace design rationale. The project combined case-based reasoning (CBR) and concept maps (CMaps) to develop methods for capturing, organizing, and interactively accessing records of experiences encapsulating the methods and rationale underlying expert aerospace design, in order to bring the captured knowledge to bear to support future reasoning. The project's results contribute both principles and methods for effective design-aiding systems that aid capture and access of useful design knowledge. The project has been guided by the tenets that design-aiding systems must: (1) Leverage a designer's knowledge, rather than attempting to replace it; (2) Be able to reflect different designers' differing conceptualizations of the design task, and to clarify those conceptualizations to others; (3) Include capabilities to capture information both by interactive knowledge modeling and during normal use; and (4) Integrate into normal designer tasks as naturally and unobtrusive as possible.

Leake, David B.↗

MULTI-FIDELITY MODELING AND UNCERTAINTY QUANTIFICATION OF INVERTER BASED RESOURCES IN INTEGRATED T&D SYSTEMS

Uncertainty quantification plays a pivotal role in improving the accuracy and reliability of inverter operation within modern power systems that are increasingly dominated by inverter-based resources (IBRs). IBRs, especially those operating under grid forming (GFM) control, rely heavily on a complex set of control parameters and system measurements to maintain voltage, frequency, and power balance. Traditional deterministic modeling approaches often fail to capture these parameter deviations, potentially resulting in suboptimal control actions, reduced system stability, or even instability under high penetration of IBRs. In this paper, we demonstrate the application of model calibration and uncertainty quantification (UQ) principles to an integrated transmission and distribution (T&D) model involving a GFM converter and provide a framework for prioritizing control improvements, guiding robust design, and informing adaptive strategies that can accommodate real-time variability in system conditions. The proposed approach could be valuable in enhancing the robustness of current and future power systems under increased IBR penetrations.

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Direct prediction of nonlinear tearing mode saturation using a variational principle

It is shown that the variational principle of multi-region relaxed magnetohydrodynamics (MRxMHD) can be used to predict the stability and nonlinear saturation of tearing modes in strong guide field configurations without resolving the dynamics and without explicit dependence on the plasma resistivity. While the magnetic helicity is not a good invariant for tearing modes, we show that the saturated tearing mode can be obtained as an MRxMHD state of a priori unknown helicity by appropriately constraining the current profile. The predicted saturated island width in a tearing-unstable force-free slab equilibrium is shown to reproduce the theoretical scaling at small values of Δ' and the scaling obtained from resistive magnetohydrodynamics simulations at large Δ'.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗

Combining theory and experiment in electrocatalysis: Insights into materials design

Electrocatalysis plays a central role in clean energy conversion, enabling a number of sustainable processes for future technologies. This review discusses design strategies for state-of-the-art heterogeneous electrocatalysts and associated materials for several different electrochemical transformations involving water, hydrogen, and oxygen, using theory as a means to rationalize catalyst performance. By examining the common principles that govern catalysis for different electrochemical reactions, we describe a systematic framework that clarifies trends in catalyzing these reactions, serving as a guide to new catalyst development while highlighting key gaps that need to be addressed. Here, we conclude by extending this framework to emerging clean energy reactions such as hydrogen peroxide production, carbon dioxide reduction, and nitrogen reduction, where the development of improved catalysts could allow for the sustainable production of a broad range of fuels and chemicals.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗

Space vehicle accelerometer applications

The physics of accelerometer applications are reviewed, and details are given on accelerometer instruments and the principles of their operations. The functions to which accelerometers are applied are listed, and terms commonly used in accelerometer reports are defined. Criteria guides state what rule, limitation, or standard must be imposed on each essential design element to insure successful design. Elaboration of these criteria in the form of recommended practices show how to satisfy each of these criteria, with the best procedure described when possible.

Source record↗

Multiple-slit shadow device for sensing the direction to a shining object

A multi-slit shadow direction sensor of jalousie type (JDS) was developed to provide a simple, highly reliable tracking system to guide a rotating mirror toward the sun so that the reflected light would illuminate the input slit of a photoelectric spectrometer. The operating principle and stability are considered as well as determination of initial signal level at the output of each photosensor. A procedure is recommended for calculation of a JDS. Both one- and two-coordinate sun direction sensors are described and considered for use in the tracking system of a photoelectric spectrometer.

Bruns, A. V.↗

The Performance of a Vaneless Diffuser Fan

The present paper is devoted to the theoretical and experimental investigation of one of the stationary elements of a fan, namely, the vaneless diffuser. The method of computation is based on the principles developed by Pfleiderer (Forschungsarbeiten No. 295). The practical interest of this investigation arises from the fact that the design of the fan guide elements - vaneless diffusers, guide vanes, spiral casing - is far behind the design of the impeller as regards accuracy and. reliability. The computations conducted by the method here presented have shown sufficiently good agreement with the experimental data and indicate the limits within which the values of the coefficient of friction lie.

Polikovsky, V.↗

A Guide to Axial-Flow Turbine Off-Design Computer Program AXOD2

A Users Guide for the axial flow turbine off-design computer program AXOD2 is composed in this paper. This Users Guide is supplementary to the original Users Manual of AXOD. Three notable contributions of AXOD2 to its predecessor AXOD, both in the context of the Guide or in the functionality of the code, are described and discussed in length. These are: 1) a rational representation of the mathematical principles applied, with concise descriptions of the formulas implemented in the actual coding. Their physical implications are addressed; 2) the creation and documentation of an Addendum Listing of input namelist-parameters unique to AXOD2, that differ from or are in addition to the original input-namelists given in the Manual of AXOD. Their usages are discussed; and 3) the institution of proper stoppages of the code execution, encoding termination messaging and error messages of the execution to AXOD2. These measures are to safe-guard the integrity of the code execution, such that a failure mode encountered during a case-study would not plunge the code execution into indefinite loop, or cause a blow-out of the program execution. Details on these are discussed and illustrated in this paper. Moreover, this computer program has since been reconstructed substantially. Standard FORTRAN Langue was instituted, and the code was formatted in Double Precision (REAL*8). As the result, the code is now suited for use in a local Desktop Computer Environment, is perfectly portable to any Operating System, and can be executed by any FORTRAN compiler equivalent to a FORTRAN 9095 compiler. AXOD2 will be available through NASA Glenn Research Center (GRC) Software Repository.

Gas Turbine Engines↗

Application of mobile digital communications in law enforcement, an introductory planning guide

A set of planning guidelines for the application of digital communications techniques to law enforcement use is presented. Some essential characteristics of digital techniques and their applications are outlined, as are some principles of system analysis, evaluation, and planning. Requirements analysis, system concept design, implementation planning, and performance and cost modeling are described and demonstrated with respect to this application problem. Information on law enforcement digital communications systems and equipment and a list of vendor sources are given in appendices.

Sohn, R. L.↗

Guide to remote-sensor data systems

Remote sensing data-handbook presents theoretical and practical information on spaceborne sensors and associated systems for Earth-resources applications. Handbook provides discussion on historical information, principles of operations, factors affecting performances, nature of data output, and system required to process data and trends in research and development.

Dewitt, R. R.↗

Quasi‐Binary Transition Metal Dichalcogenide Alloys: Thermodynamic Stability Prediction, Scalable Synthesis, and Application

Abstract Transition metal dichalcogenide (TMDCs) alloys could have a wide range of physical and chemical properties, ranging from charge density waves to superconductivity and electrochemical activities. While many exciting behaviors of unary TMDCs have been demonstrated, the vast compositional space of TMDC alloys has remained largely unexplored due to the lack of understanding regarding their stability when accommodating different cations or chalcogens in a single‐phase. Here, a theory‐guided synthesis approach is reported to achieve unexplored quasi‐binary TMDC alloys through computationally predicted stability maps. Equilibrium temperature–composition phase diagrams using first‐principles calculations are generated to identify the stability of 25 quasi‐binary TMDC alloys, including some involving non‐isovalent cations and are verified experimentally through the synthesis of a subset of 12 predicted alloys using a scalable chemical vapor transport method. It is demonstrated that the synthesized alloys can be exfoliated into 2D structures, and some of them exhibit: i) outstanding thermal stability tested up to 1230 K, ii) exceptionally high electrochemical activity for the CO 2 reduction reaction in a kinetically limited regime with near zero overpotential for CO formation, iii) excellent energy efficiency in a high rate Li–air battery, and iv) high break‐down current density for interconnect applications. This framework can be extended to accelerate the discovery of other TMDC alloys for various applications.

Hemmat, Zahra↗

A Decision-Relevant Factor-Fixing Framework: Application to Uncertainty Analysis of a High-Dimensional Water Quality Model

Factor Fixing (FF) is a common method for reducing the number of model parameters to lower computational cost. FF typically starts with distinguishing the insensitive parameters from the sensitive and pursues uncertainty quantification (UQ) on the resulting reduced-order model, fixing each insensitive parameter at a fixed value. There is a need, however, to expand such a common approach to consider the effects of decision choices in the FF-UQ procedure on metrics of interest. Therefore, to guide the use of FF and increase confidence in the resulting dimension-reduced model, we propose a new adaptive framework consisting of four principles: (a) re-parameterize the model first to reduce obvious non-identifiable parameter combinations, (b) focus on decision relevance especially with respect to errors in quantities of interest (QoI), (c) conduct adaptive evaluation and robustness assessment of errors in the QoI across FF choices as sample size increases, and (d) reconsider whether fixing is warranted. The framework is demonstrated on a spatially-distributed water quality model. The error in estimates of QoI caused by FF can be estimated using a Polynomial Chaos Expansion (PCE) surrogate model. Built with 70 model runs, the surrogate is computationally inexpensive to evaluate and can provide global sensitivity indices for free. For the selected catchment, just two factors may provide an acceptably accurate estimate of model uncertainty in the average annual load of Total Suspended Solids (TSS), suggesting that reducing the uncertainty in these two parameters is a priority for future work before undertaking further formal uncertainty quantification.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

Physics and chemistry from parsimonious representations: image analysis via invariant variational autoencoders

Electron, optical, and scanning probe microscopy methods are generating ever increasing volume of image data containing information on atomic and mesoscale structures and functionalities. This necessitates the development of the machine learning methods for discovery of physical and chemical phenomena from the data, such as manifestations of symmetry breaking phenomena in electron and scanning tunneling microscopy images, or variability of the nanoparticles. Variational autoencoders (VAEs) are emerging as a powerful paradigm for the unsupervised data analysis, allowing to disentangle the factors of variability and discover optimal parsimonious representation. Here, we summarize recent developments in VAEs, covering the basic principles and intuition behind the VAEs. The invariant VAEs are introduced as an approach to accommodate scale and translation invariances present in imaging data and separate known factors of variations from the ones to be discovered. We further describe the opportunities enabled by the control over VAE architecture, including conditional, semi-supervised, and joint VAEs. Several case studies of VAE applications for toy models and experimental datasets in Scanning Transmission Electron Microscopy are discussed, emphasizing the deep connection between VAE and basic physical principles. Python codes and datasets discussed in this article are available at https://github.com/saimani5/VAE-tutorials and can be used by researchers as an application guide when applying these to their own datasets.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗

Photon Upconversion at Organic-Inorganic Interfaces

Photon upconversion is a process that combines low-energy photons to form useful high-energy photons. There are potential applications in photovoltaics, photocatalysis, biological imaging, etc. Semiconductor quantum dots (QDs) are promising for the absorption of these low-energy photons due to the high extinction coefficient of QDs, especially in the near infrared (NIR). This allows the intriguing use of diffuse light sources such as solar irradiation. In this review, we describe the development of this organic-QD upconversion platform based on triplet-triplet annihilation, focusing on the dark exciton in QDs with triplet character. Then we introduce the underlying energy transfer steps, starting from QD triplet photosensitization, triplet exciton transport, triplet-triplet annihilation, and ending with the upconverted emission. Design principles to improve the total upconversion efficiency are presented. We end with limitations in current reports and proposed future directions. This review provides a guide for designing efficient organic-QD upconversion platforms for future applications, including overcoming the Shockley-Queisser limit for more efficient solar energy conversion, NIR-based phototherapy, and diagnostics in vivo.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗

Microgrid Design Toolkit (MDT) Simple Use Case Example for the Microgrid Sizing Capability Software (V1.2)

This simple Microgrid Design Toolkit (MDT) use case will provide you an example of performing microgrid sizing by identifying the types and quantities of technology to be purchased for use in a microgrid. It will introduce basic principles of using the MDT microgrid sizing capability by comparing the results of two microgrids in two different markets. Please reference the MDT User Guide (SAND2017-9374) for detailed instructions on how to use the tool.

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Microgrid Design Toolkit (MDT) Simple Use Case Example for the Microgrid Sizing Capability (Software v1.3)

This simple Microgrid Design Toolkit (MDT) use case will provide you an example of performing microgrid sizing by identifying the types and quantities of technology to be purchased for use in a microgrid. It will introduce basic principles of using the MDT microgrid sizing capability by comparing the results of two microgrids in two different markets. Please reference the MDT User Guide (SAND2020-4550) for detailed instructions on how to use the tool.

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION↗