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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
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS1981

Estimation of trends

The application of statistical methods to recorded ozone measurements. The effects of a long term depletion of ozone at magnitudes predicted by the NAS is harmful to most forms of life. Empirical prewhitening filters the derivation of which is independent of the underlying physical mechanisms were analyzed. Statistical analysis performs a checks and balances effort. Time series filters variations into systematic and random parts, errors are uncorrelated, and significant phase lag dependencies are identified. The use of time series modeling to enhance the capability of detecting trends is discussed.

Source record↗
NASA NTRS2017

Mind the Gap: Exploring the Underground of the NASA Space Cancer Risk Model

The REID quantifies the lifetime risk of death from radiation-induced cancer in an exposed astronaut. The NASA Space Cancer Risk (NSCR) 2012 mode incorporates elements from physics, biology, epidemiology, and statistics to generate the REID distribution. The current model quantifies the space radiation environment, radiation quality, and dose-rate effects to estimate a NASA-weighted dose. This weighted dose is mapped to the excess risk of radiation-induced cancer mortality from acute exposures to gamma rays and then transferred to an astronaut population. Finally, the REID is determined by integrating this risk over the individual's lifetime. The calculated upper 95% confidence limit of the REID is used to restrict an astronaut's permissible mission duration (PMD) for a proposed mission. As a statistical quantity characterized by broad, subjective uncertainties, REID estimates for space missions result in wide distributions. Currently, the upper 95% confidence level is over 350% larger than the mean REID value, which can severely limit an astronaut's PMD. The model incorporates inputs from multiple scientific disciplines in the risk estimation process. Physics and particle transport models calculate how radiation moves through space, penetrates spacecraft, and makes its way to the human beings onboard. Epidemiological studies of exposures from atomic bombings, medical treatments, and power plants are used to quantify health risks from acute and chronic low linear energy transfer (LET) ionizing radiation. Biological studies in cellular and animal models using radiation at various LETs and energies inform quality metrics for ions present in space radiation. Statistical methodologies unite these elements, controlling for mathematical and scientific uncertainty and variability. Despite current progress, these research platforms contain knowledge gaps contributing to the large uncertainties still present in the model. The NASA Space Radiation Program Element (SRPE) defines the knowledge gaps that impact our understanding of the cancer risks. These gaps are outlined in NASA's Human Research Roadmap [4], which identifies the research questions and actions recommended for reducing the uncertainty in the current NSCR model and for formulation of future models. The greatest contributors to uncertainty in the current model include radiation quality, dose rate effects, and the transfer of exposure-based risk from other populations to an astronaut population. Future formulations of the risk model may benefit from including other potential sources of uncertainty such as space dosimetry, errors in human epidemiology data, and the impact of microgravity and other spaceflight stressors. Here, we discuss the current capabilities of the NSCR-2012 model and several immediate research needs, highlighting areas expected to have an operational impact on the current model schema. The following subway-style route map outlines the NSCR-2012 model (Green Line), emphasizing the research gaps in the Human Research Roadmap for risk of radiation-induced carcinogenesis (Stops on Dashed Lines). The map diagrams how these research gaps feed specific portions of the model.

Chappell, L. J.↗
DOE OSTI2017

Supernova Driving. IV. The Star-formation Rate of Molecular Clouds

We compute the star-formation rate (SFR) in molecular clouds (MCs) that originate ab initio in a new, higher-resolution simulation of supernova-driven turbulence. Because of the large number of well-resolved clouds with self-consistent boundary and initial conditions, we obtain a large range of cloud physical parameters with realistic statistical distributions, which is an unprecedented sample of star-forming regions to test SFR models and to interpret observational surveys. We confirm the dependence of the SFR per free-fall time, SFR{sub ff}, on the virial parameter, α {sub vir}, found in previous simulations, and compare a revised version of our turbulent fragmentation model with the numerical results. The dependences on Mach number, M, gas to magnetic pressure ratio, β, and compressive to solenoidal power ratio, χ at fixed α {sub vir} are not well constrained, because of random scatter due to time and cloud-to-cloud variations in SFR{sub ff}. We find that SFR{sub ff} in MCs can take any value in the range of 0 ≤ SFR{sub ff} ≲ 0.2, and its probability distribution peaks at a value of SFR{sub ff} ≈ 0.025, consistent with observations. The values of SFR{sub ff} and the scatter in the SFR{sub ff}–α {sub vir} relation are consistent with recent measurements in nearby MCs and in clouds near the Galactic center. Although not explicitly modeled by the theory, the scatter is consistent with the physical assumptions of our revised model and may also result in part from a lack of statistical equilibrium of the turbulence, due to the transient nature of MCs.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
NASA NTRS1992

Lidar Studies of Clouds at Toronto During the ECLIPS Program

The Experimental Cloud Lidar Pilot Study (ECLIPS) measurement program involves the measurement of cloud optical and physical parameters with vertically pointing ground-based lidars simultaneously with satellites observing the same cloud system from above. Our frequency doubled Nd:YAG lidar transmits about 500 mJ of linearly polarized radiation at each wavelength (532, 1064 nm) with a prf of 20 Hz. An overview of the statistical behavior of cloud physical parameters and optical parameters is presented.

Pal, S. R.↗
DOE OSTI2019

A primer on resurgent transseries and their asymptotics

The computation of observables in general interacting theories, be them quantum mechanical, field, gauge or string theories, is a non-trivial problem which in many cases can only be addressed by resorting to perturbative methods. In most physically interesting problems these perturbative expansions result in asymptotic series with zero radius of convergence. These asymptotic series then require the use of resurgence and transseries in order for the associated observables to become nonperturbatively well-defined. Resurgence encodes the complete large-order asymptotic behaviour of the coefficients from a perturbative expansion, generically in terms of (multi) instanton sectors and for each problem in terms of its Stokes constants. Some observables arise from linear problems, and have a finite number of instanton sectors and associated Stokes constants; some other observables arise from nonlinear problems, and have an infinite number of instanton sectors and Stokes constants. By means of two very explicit examples, and with emphasis on a pedagogical style of presentation, here this work aims at serving as a primer on the aforementioned resurgent, large-order asymptotics of general perturbative expansions. This includes discussions of transseries, Stokes phenomena, generalized steepest-descent methods, Borel transforms, nonlinear resonance, and alien calculus. Furthermore, resurgent properties of transseries – usually described mathematically via alien calculus – are recast in equivalent physical languages: either a “statistical mechanical” language, as motions in chains and lattices; or a “conformal field theoretical” language, with underlying Virasoro-like algebraic structures.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2019

9Cr steel visualization and predictive modeling

The goals of this work were to develop tools to visualize and characterize materials information, to explore new alloy compositions and/or processing, to better predict tensile strength and other mechanical properties. The 9–12 wt% Cr (9Cr) steel test data were compiled from several sources. About 3000 records with 30 predictor variables represent 82 unique steel alloy compositions, variations of thermo-mechanical processing steps and temperatures (homogenization, normalization and tempering cycles), test conditions and outcomes. Detailed data processing steps such as visualization and exploratory analysis, including univariate and bivariate analysis, different clustering techniques used to segment the data, statistical post-hoc analysis to verify significance of the findings, feature engineering to identify predictors of importance, and predictive modeling with cross-validation were performed. The outcome of analysis at each step was reviewed in the context of the domain knowledge of this class of steel, to see if there were underlying physical mechanisms that explain statistical relationships. Data analytics techniques and their parameters were fine-tuned to facilitate interpretation of the results as aligned with the insights from domain experts. Here, the ensemble predictive modeling using Random Forest regressor and post-hoc means comparison corroborated domain knowledge on the role of Co which is known to increase strength of steel alloys through solid-solution strengthening and to affect diffusion of alloying elements and precipitates. Alloys with Co content of 0.7–8 wt% had significantly higher mean strength than the ones without (while having Cr locked within 10–11 wt% range in either group and keeping other compositional element ratios fixed). End products of the computational techniques exploration are presented as the tools that can be used in iterative workflow of materials development and testing.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2015

Physical Uncertainty Bounds (PUB)

This paper introduces and motivates the need for a new methodology for determining upper bounds on the uncertainties in simulations of engineered systems due to limited fidelity in the composite continuum-level physics models needed to simulate the systems. We show that traditional uncertainty quantification methods provide, at best, a lower bound on this uncertainty. We propose to obtain bounds on the simulation uncertainties by first determining bounds on the physical quantities or processes relevant to system performance. By bounding these physics processes, as opposed to carrying out statistical analyses of the parameter sets of specific physics models or simply switching out the available physics models, one can obtain upper bounds on the uncertainties in simulated quantities of interest.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2018

Stochastic simulation of predictive space–time scenarios of wind speed using observations and physical model outputs

We propose a statistical space-time model for predicting atmospheric wind speed based on deterministic numerical weather predictions and historical measurements. We consider a Gaussian multivariate space-time framework that combines multiple sources of past physical model outputs and measurements in order to produce a probabilistic wind speed forecast within the prediction window. We illustrate this strategy on wind speed forecasts during several months in 2012 for a region near the Great Lakes in the United States. The results show that the prediction is improved in the mean-squared sense relative to the numerical forecasts as well as in probabilistic scores. Moreover, the samples are shown to produce realistic wind scenarios based on sample spectra and space-time correlation structure.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
NASA NTRS1997

Determining Functional Reliability of Pyrotechnic Mechanical Devices

This paper describes a new approach for evaluating mechanical performance and predicting the mechanical functional reliability of pyrotechnic devices. Not included are other possible failure modes, such as the initiation of the pyrotechnic energy source. The requirement of hundreds or thousands of consecutive, successful tests on identical components for reliability predictions, using the generally accepted go/no-go statistical approach routinely ignores physics of failure. The approach described in this paper begins with measuring, understanding and controlling mechanical performance variables. Then, the energy required to accomplish the function is compared to that delivered by the pyrotechnic energy source to determine mechanical functional margin. Finally, the data collected in establishing functional margin is analyzed to predict mechanical functional reliability, using small-sample statistics. A careful application of this approach can provide considerable cost improvements and understanding over that of go/no-go statistics. Performance and the effects of variables can be defined, and reliability predictions can be made by evaluating 20 or fewer units. The application of this approach to a pin puller used on a successful NASA mission is provided as an example.

Bement, Laurence J.↗
NASA NTRS1990

On the Response of the Special Sensor Microwave/Imager to the Marine Environment: Implications for Atmospheric Parameter Retrievals

A reasonably rigorous basis for understanding and extracting the physical information content of Special Sensor Microwave/Imager (SSM/I) satellite images of the marine environment is provided. To this end, a comprehensive algebraic parameterization is developed for the response of the SSM/I to a set of nine atmospheric and ocean surface parameters. The brightness temperature model includes a closed-form approximation to microwave radiative transfer in a non-scattering atmosphere and fitted models for surface emission and scattering based on geometric optics calculations for the roughened sea surface. The combined model is empirically tuned using suitable sets of SSM/I data and coincident surface observations. The brightness temperature model is then used to examine the sensitivity of the SSM/I to realistic variations in the scene being observed and to evaluate the theoretical maximum precision of global SSM/I retrievals of integrated water vapor, integrated cloud liquid water, and surface wind speed. A general minimum-variance method for optimally retrieving geophysical parameters from multichannel brightness temperature measurements is outlined, and several global statistical constraints of the type required by this method are computed. Finally, a unified set of efficient statistical and semi-physical algorithms is presented for obtaining fields of surface wind speed, integrated water vapor, cloud liquid water, and precipitation from SSM/I brightness temperature data. Features include: a semi-physical method for retrieving integrated cloud liquid water at 15 km resolution and with rms errors as small as approximately 0.02 kg/sq m; a 3-channel statistical algorithm for integrated water vapor which was constructed so as to have improved linear response to water vapor and reduced sensitivity to precipitation; and two complementary indices of precipitation activity (based on 37 GHz attenuation and 85 GHz scattering, respectively), each of which are relatively insensitive to variations in other environmental parameters.

Petty, Grant W.↗
NASA NTRS1976

Environmental parameters of the Tennessee River in Alabama. 2: Physical, chemical, and biological parameters

Physical, chemical and biological water quality data from five sites in the Tennessee River, two in Guntersville Reservoir and three in Wheeler Reservoir were correlated with climatological data for three annual cycles. Two of the annual cycles are for the years prior to the Browns Ferry Nuclear Power Plant operations and one is for the first 14 months of Plant operations. A comparison of the results of the annual cycles indicates that two distinct physical conditions in the reservoirs occur, one during the warm months when the reservoirs are at capacity and one during the colder winter months when the reservoirs have been drawn-down for water storage during the rainy months and for weed control. The wide variations of physical and chemical parameters to which the biological organisms are subjected on an annual basis control the biological organisms and their population levels. A comparison of the parameters of the site below the Power plant indicates that the heated effluent from the plant operating with two of the three reactors has not had any effect on the organisms at this site. Recommendations given include the development of prediction mathematical models (statistical analysis) for the physical and chemical parameters under specific climatological conditions which affect biological organisms. Tabulated data of chemical analysis of water and organism populations studied is given.

Rosing, L. M.↗
DOE OSTI2022

A phase-shift-periodic parallel boundary condition for low-magnetic-shear scenarios

Abstract We formulate a generalized periodic boundary condition as a limit of the standard twist-and-shift parallel boundary condition that is suitable for simulations of plasmas with low magnetic shear. This is done by applying a phase shift in the binormal direction when crossing the parallel boundary. While this phase shift can be set to zero without loss of generality in the local flux-tube limit when employing the twist-and-shift boundary condition, we show that this is not the most general case when employing periodic parallel boundaries, and may not even be the most desirable. A non-zero phase shift can be used to avoid the convective cells that plague simulations of the three-dimensional Hasegawa–Wakatani system, and is shown to have measurable effects in periodic low-magnetic-shear gyrokinetic simulations. We propose a numerical program where a sampling of periodic simulations at random pseudo-irrational flux surfaces are used to determine physical observables in a statistical sense. This approach can serve as an alternative to applying the twist-and-shift boundary condition to low-magnetic-shear scenarios, which, while more straightforward, can be computationally demanding.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2012

THE SLOAN DIGITAL SKY SURVEY QUASAR LENS SEARCH. V. FINAL CATALOG FROM THE SEVENTH DATA RELEASE

We present the final statistical sample of lensed quasars from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) Quasar Lens Search (SQLS). The well-defined statistical lens sample consists of 26 lensed quasars brighter than i = 19.1 and in the redshift range of 0.6 < z < 2.2 selected from 50,826 spectroscopically confirmed quasars in the SDSS Data Release 7 (DR7), where we restrict the image separation range to 1'' < {theta} < 20'' and the i-band magnitude differences in two images to be smaller than 1.25 mag. The SDSS DR7 quasar catalog also contains 36 additional lenses identified with various techniques. In addition to these lensed quasars, we have identified 81 pairs of quasars from follow-up spectroscopy, 26 of which are physically associated binary quasars. The statistical lens sample covers a wide range of image separations, redshifts, and magnitudes, and therefore is suitable for systematic studies of cosmological parameters and surveys of the structure and evolution of galaxies and quasars.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2025

OpenUniverse2024: a shared, simulated view of the sky for the next generation of cosmological surveys

The OpenUniverse2024 simulation suite is a cross-collaboration effort to produce matched simulated imaging for multiple surveys as they would observe a common simulated sky. Both the simulated data and associated tools used to produce it are intended to uniquely enable a wide range of studies to maximize the science potential of the next generation of cosmological surveys. We have produced simulated imaging for approximately 70 deg 2 of the Vera C. Rubin Observatory Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST) Wide-Fast-Deep survey and the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope High-Latitude Wide-Area Survey, as well as overlapping versions of the ELAIS-S1 Deep-Drilling Field for LSST and the High-Latitude Time-Domain Survey for Roman. OpenUniverse2024 includes (i) an early version of the updated extragalactic model called Diffsky, which substantially improves the realism of optical and infrared photometry of objects, compared to previous versions of these models; (ii) updated transient models that extend through the wavelength range probed by Roman and Rubin; and (iii) improved survey, telescope, and instrument realism based on up-to-date survey plans and known properties of the instruments. It is built on a new and updated suite of simulation tools that improves the ease of consistently simulating multiple observatories viewing the same sky. The approximately 400 TB of synthetic survey imaging and simulated universe catalogs are publicly available, and we preview some scientific uses of the simulations.

large-scale structure of Universe↗
DOE OSTI2021

Exact representations of many-body interactions with restricted-Boltzmann-machine neural networks

Restricted Boltzmann machines (RBMs) are simple statistical models defined on a bipartite graph which have been successfully used in studying more complicated many-body systems, both classical and quantum. In this work, we exploit the representation power of RBMs to provide an exact decomposition of many-body contact interactions into one-body operators coupled to discrete auxiliary fields. This construction generalizes the well known Hirsch's transform used for the Hubbard model to more complicated theories such as pionless effective field theory in nuclear physics, which we analyze in detail. Finally, we also discuss possible applications of our mapping for quantum annealing applications and conclude with some implications for RBM parameter optimization through machine learning.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2018

Advances in utilizing event based data structures for neutron scattering experiments

This article strives to expand on existing work to demonstrate advancements in data processing made available using event mode measurements. Most spallation neutron sources in the world have data acquisition systems that provide event recording. The new science that is enabled by utilizing event mode has only begun to be explored. In the past, these studies were difficult to perform because histograms forced dealing with either large chunks of time or a large number of files. With event based data collection, data can be explored and rebinned long after the measurement has completed. This article will review some of the principles of event data and how the method opens up new possibilities for in situ measurements, highlighting techniques that can be used to explore changes in the data. We also demonstrate the statistical basis for determining data quality and address the challenge of determining how long to measure mid-measurement. Lastly, we demonstrate a model independent method of grouping data via hierarchical clustering methods that can be used to improve calibration, reduction, and data exploration.

74 ATOMIC AND MOLECULAR PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2012

On spectroscopy for a whole Abelian model

Postulated on the whole meaning a whole abelian gauge symmetry is being introduced. Various physical areas as complexity, statistical mechanics, quantum mechanics are partially supporting this approach where the whole is at origin. However, the reductionist crisis given by quark confinement definitely sustains this insight. It says that fundamental parts can not be seen isolatedely. Consequently, there is an experimental situation where the parts should be substituted by something more. This makes us to look for writing the wholeness principle under gauge theory. For this, one reinterprets the gauge parameter where instead of compensating fields it is organizing a systemic gauge symmetry. Now, it introduces a fields set {l_brace}A{sub {mu}I}{r_brace} rotating under a common gauge symmetry. Thus, given a fields collection {l_brace}A{sub {mu}I}{r_brace} as origin, the effort at this work is to investigate on its spectroscopy. Analyze for the abelian case the correspondent involved quanta. Understand that for a whole model diversity replaces elementarity. Derive the associated quantum numbers as spin, mass, charge, discrete symmetries in terms of such systemic symmetry. Observe how the particles diversity is manifested in terms of wholeness.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2020

Modeling regional precipitation over the Indus River basin of Pakistan using statistical downscaling

Complex processes govern spatiotemporal distribution of precipitation within the high-mountainous headwater regions (commonly known as the upper Indus basin (UIB)), of the Indus River basin of Pakistan. Reliable precipitation simulations particularly over the UIB present a major scientific challenge due to regional complexity and inadequate observational coverage. Here, we present a statistical downscaling approach to model observed precipitation of the entire Indus basin, with a focus on UIB within available data constraints. Taking advantage of recent high altitude (HA) observatories, we perform precipitation regionalization using K-means cluster analysis to demonstrate effectiveness of low-altitude stations to provide useful precipitation inferences over more uncertain and hydrologically important HA of the UIB. We further employ generalized linear models (GLM) with gamma and Tweedie distributions to identify major dynamic and thermodynamic drivers from a reanalysis dataset within a robust cross-validation framework that explain observed spatiotemporal precipitation patterns across the Indus basin. Final statistical models demonstrate higher predictability to resolve precipitation variability over wetter southern Himalayans and different lower Indus regions, by mainly using different dynamic predictors. The modeling framework also shows an adequate performance over more complex and uncertain trans-Himalayans and the northwestern regions of the UIB, particularly during the seasons dominated by the westerly circulations. However, the cryosphere-dominated trans-Himalayan regions, which largely govern the basin hydrology, require relatively complex models that contain dynamic and thermodynamic circulations. Furthermore, we also analyzed relevant atmospheric circulations during precipitation anomalies over the UIB, to evaluate physical consistency of the statistical models, as an additional measure of reliability. Overall, our results suggest that such circulation-based statistical downscaling has the potential to improve our understanding towards distinct features of the regional-scale precipitation across the upper and lower Indus basin. Additionally, such understanding should help to assess the response of this complex, data-scarce, and climate-sensitive river basin amid future climatic changes, to serve communal and scientific interests.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗