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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 667 records · Page 37
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS2010

Optimal Low Energy Earth-Moon Transfers

The optimality of a low-energy Earth-Moon transfer is examined for the first time using primer vector theory. An optimal control problem is formed with the following free variables: the location, time, and magnitude of the transfer insertion burn, and the transfer time. A constraint is placed on the initial state of the spacecraft to bind it to a given initial orbit around a first body, and on the final state of the spacecraft to limit its Keplerian energy with respect to a second body. Optimal transfers in the system are shown to meet certain conditions placed on the primer vector and its time derivative. A two point boundary value problem containing these necessary conditions is created for use in targeting optimal transfers. The two point boundary value problem is then applied to the ballistic lunar capture problem, and an optimal trajectory is shown. Additionally, the ballistic lunar capture trajectory is examined to determine whether one or more additional impulses may improve on the cost of the transfer.

Griesemer, Paul Ricord↗
DOE OSTI2025

Off-shell vertices in heavy particle effective theories and B → Dπℓν

We study the modifications to decay amplitudes in heavy to heavy semileptonic decays with multiple hadrons in the final state due to intermediate heavy hadrons being off-shell or having a finite width. Combining Heavy Hadron Chiral Perturbation Theory (HHχPT) with a BCFW on-shell factorization formula, we show that these effects induce O (1/M) corrections to the standard results computed in the narrow-width approximation and therefore are important in extracting form factors from data. A combination of perturbative unitarity, analyticity, and reparameterization invariance fully determine these corrections in terms of known Isgur-Wise functions without the need to introduce new form factors. In doing so, we develop a novel technique to compute the boundary term at complex infinity in the BCFW formula for theories with derivatively coupled scalars. While we have used the $\overline{B}$ → Dπℓν decay as an example, these techniques can generally be applied to effective field theories with (multiple) distinct reference vectors. Article PDF

Chiral Lagrangian↗
NASA NTRS1972

Precomputed state dependent digital control of a nuclear rocket engine

A control method applicable to multiple-input multiple-output nonlinear time-invariant systems in which desired behavior can be expressed explicitly as a trajectory in system state space is developed. The precomputed state dependent control method is basically a synthesis technique in which a suboptimal control law is developed off-line, prior to system operation. This law is obtained by conducting searches at a finite number of points in state space, in the vicinity of some desired trajectory, to obtain a set of constant control vectors which tend to return the system to the desired trajectory. These vectors are used to evaluate the unknown coefficients in a control law having an assumed hyperellipsoidal form. The resulting coefficients constitute the heart of the controller and are used in the on-line computation of control vectors. Two examples of PSDC are given prior to the more detailed description of the NERVA control system development.

Johnson, M. R.↗
NASA NTRS1972

A computer-aided regulator design.

A unified computer-aided method for the design of linear and nonlinear regulators is discussed. The general mathematical programming approach considered involves the determination of a vector that solves the problem of minimizing the objective function subject to constraints. Classical design problems stated are related to stability design, dominant mode design, and comprehensive design. A computer algorithm is also developed.

Karmarkar, J. S.↗
NASA NTRS1974

Three-axis attitude control for solar-powered electric propulsion spacecraft

Spacecraft utilizing solar electric propulsion (SEP) for certain long-term interplanetary missions will depend on large, flexible solar arrays. The resulting spacecraft configurations present some complex flight control problems. Questions regarding a general design approach are discussed along with options for three-axis control forces, tradeoffs for three-axis control forces, controllers for SEP attitude control, sensors for SEP attitude control, aspects of nonrigid vehicle interaction with attitude control, thrust vector control SEP dynamics, and mass expulsion control SEP dynamics. It is found that the state-of-the-art of control system design is mature enough to support an SEP project.

Bouvier, H. K.↗
NASA NTRS1976

Elliptic integral solutions to a class of space flight optimization problems

This paper is initially concerned with the minimum-time, exoatmospheric flight of a rocket with constant thrust acceleration magnitude, as in the cases of nuclear and solar electric propulsion. Gravitational acceleration is assumed to be a constant scalar multiple of the radius vector, plus a correction term which is a given function of time. The solution to the state equations is obtained in terms of elliptic integrals. A method is presented for the solution of the two-point boundary-condition problem associated with orbital transfer. At most, the latter method requires iteration upon final time, angle of injection, and two other parameters which are bounded. An example problem is provided which involves a rocket with very low thrust and a spiraling trajectory of many revolutions, but an altitude change of only several hundred miles above the earth. Finally, the original elliptic integral solution is extended to a larger class of low and intermediate thrust problems with constant thrust magnitude, mass decreasing with time, and an inverse square gravitational force.

Andrus, J. F.↗
NASA NTRS2014

Analytical Model for Steady Flow through a Finite Channel with One Porous Wall with Arbitrary Variable Suction or Injection

This paper presents an exact solution of two-dimensional laminar flow through a finite length channel with one porous wall. It improves upon previous solutions by (1) satisfying the no-slip boundary condition at the channel dead end, (2) adding a turbulent term to the porous wall boundary condition, (3) allowing for arbitrary variable suction or injection across the porous wall, and (4) model validation against new cryogenic liquid hydrogen and oxygen experimental data. Of particular interest in the current work is the modeling of cryogenic propellant flow through a porous liquid acquisition device (LAD) screen and channel inside a propellant tank. First, a detailed review of the literature is presented for previously attempted solutions to channel flow with one porous wall. Next, the governing equations, boundary conditions, and model assumptions are used to derive the analytical flow solution and present general model results for pressure and velocity fields within the channel. Then, the model solution is compared with horizontal LAD channel flow data in liquid oxygen as well as vertical LAD channel flow data in an inverted outflow configuration in liquid hydrogen. Model results are used to update the static cryogenic bubble point pressure model with a dynamic bubble point term which factors in enhanced convection and cooling at the screen during propellant outflow. Convective heat transfer at the LAD screen during outflow is also quantified by comparing model and data. The new analytical flow solution with the dynamic bubble point model is shown to compare well with available cryogenic experimental data

Navier Stokes Equations↗
NASA NTRS2021

Mars 2020 Perseverance Entry Controller Design and Flight Reconstruction

On February 18th, 2021, NASA landed Perseverance on the Jezero crater (on Mars). An entry Guidance, Navigation, and Control (GNC) system delivered the vehicle to the desired landing ellipse. The navigation filter propagated position and attitude states initialized from cruise using Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU) measurements. The entry guidance modulated the lift vector through bank commands to reach the parachute deploy conditions. The entry controller commanded the propulsive Reaction Control System (RCS) to track the bank commands while doing rate damping on angle-of-attack and sideslip. This paper describes the design and the as-flown performance of the entry controller.

Way, David W.↗
NASA NTRS2000

Stennis Space Center Environmental Geographic Information System

As NASA's lead center for rocket propulsion testing, the John C. Stennis Space Center (SSC) monitors and assesses the off-site impacts of such testing through its Environmental Office (SSC-EO) using acoustical models and ancillary data. The SSC-EO has developed a geographical database, called the SSC Environmental Geographic Information System (SSC-EGIS), that covers an eight-county area bordering the NASA facility. Through the SSC-EGIS, the Enivronmental Office inventories, assesses, and manages the nearly 139,000 acres that comprise Stennis Space Center and its surrounding acoustical buffer zone. The SSC-EGIS contains in-house data as well as a wide range of data obtained from outside sources, including private agencies and local, county, state, and U.S. government agencies. The database comprises cadastral/geodetic, hydrology, infrastructure, geo-political, physical geography, and socio-economic vector and raster layers. The imagery contained in the database is varied, including low-resolution imagery, such as Landsat TM and SPOT; high-resolution imagery, such as IKONOS and AVIRIS; and aerial photographs. The SSC-EGIS has been an integral part of several major projects and the model upon which similar EGIS's will be developed for other NASA facilities. The Corps of Engineers utilized the SSC-EGIS in a plan to establish wetland mitigation sites within the SSC buffer zone. Mississippi State University employed the SSC-EGIS in a preliminary study to evaluate public access points within the buffer zone. The SSC-EO has also expressly used the SSC-EGIS to assess noise pollution modeling, land management/wetland mitigation assessment, environmental hazards mapping, and protected areas mapping for archaeological sites and for threatened and endangered species habitats. The SSC-EO has several active and planned projects that will also make use of the SSC-EGIS during this and the coming fiscal year.

Lovely, Janette↗
DOE OSTI2025

A Finite Element Method for Compressible and Turbulent Multiphase Flow Instabilities with Heat Transfer

We present a new finite element framework for modeling compressible, turbulent multiphase flows with heat transfer. For two-fluid systems with a free surface, the Volume of Fluid (VOF) method is implemented without the need for interface reconstruction, while turbulence is resolved using a dynamic Vreman large eddy simulation (LES) model. Unlike most two-phase VOF studies, which neglect heat transfer, the present approach incorporates energy transport equations within the VOF formulation to account for heat exchange, an effect particularly important in turbulent flows. Conjugate heat transfer is often challenging in finite volume methods, which require explicit specification of heat fluxes at the solid–fluid interface, limiting accuracy and predictive capability. By contrast, the finite element formulation does not require heat flux inputs, allowing more accurate and robust simulation of heat transfer between solids and fluids. The method is demonstrated through three representative cases. First, a two-fluid instability with a single-mode perturbation is simulated and validated against analytical growth rates. Second, conjugate heat transfer is examined in a high-temperature flow over a cold metal cylinder, with validation performed both quantitatively—via pressure coefficient comparisons with experimental data—and qualitatively using vector field topology. Finally, compressible spray injection and breakup are modeled, demonstrating the ability of the framework to capture interfacial dynamics and atomization under turbulent, high-speed conditions. In the compressible spray injection and breakup case, the results indicate that the finite element formulation achieved higher predictive accuracy and robustness than the finite-volume method. With the same mesh resolution, the FEM reduced the root mean square error (RMSE) and mean absolute percentage error (MAPE) from 6.96 mm and 26.0% (for the FVM) to 4.85 mm and 12.7%, respectively, demonstrating improved accuracy and robustness in capturing interfacial dynamics and heat transfer. The study also introduced vector field topology to visualize and interpret coherent flow structures and instabilities, offering insights beyond conventional scalar-field analyses.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗
NASA NTRS1994

Theoretical Investigation of Wave-Vector-Dependent Analytical and Numerical Formulations of the Interband Impact-Ionization Transition Rate for Electron in Bulk Silicon and GaAs

The electron interband impact-ionization rate for both silicon and gallium arsenide is calculated using an ensemble Monte Carlo simulation with the expressed purpose of comparing different formulations of the interband ionization transition rate. Specifically, three different treatments of the transition rate are examined: the traditional Keldysh formula, a new k-dependent analytical formulation first derived by W. Quade, E Scholl, and M. Rudan, and a more exact, numerical method of Y. Wang and K. F. Brennan. Although the completely numerical formulation contains no adjustable parameters and as such provides a very reliable result, it is highly computationally intensive. Alternatively, the Keldysh formula, although inherently simple and computationally efficient, fails to include the k dependence as well as the details of the energy band structure. The k-dependent analytical formulation of Quade and co-workers overcomes the limitations of both of these models but at the expense of some new parameterization. It is found that the k-dependent analytical method of Quade and co-workers produces very similar results to those obtained with (he completely numerical model for some quantities. Specifically, both models predict that the effective threshold for impact ionization in GaAs and silicon is quite soft, that the majority of ionization events originate from the second conduction band in both materials, and that the transition rate is k dependent. Therefore, it is concluded that the k-dependent analytical model can qualitatively reproduce results similar to those obtained with the numerical model yet with far greater computational efficiency. Nevertheless, there exist some important drawbacks to the k-dependent analytical model of Quade and co-workers: These are that it does not accurately reproduce the quantum yield data for bulk silicon, it requires determination of a new parameter, related physically to (he overlap integrals of the Bloch state which can only be adjusted by comparison to experiment, and fails to account for any wave-vector dependence of the overlap integrals. As such [he transition rate may be overestimated at those points for which "near vertical," small change in k, transitions occur.

Kolnik, Jan↗
NASA NTRS1994

Theoretical investigation of wave-vector-dependent analytical and numerical formulations of the interband impact-ionization transition rate for electrons in bulk silicon and GaAs

The electron interband impact-ionization rate for both silicon and gallium arsenide is calculated using an ensemble Monte Carlo simulation with the expressed purpose of comparing different formulations of the interband ionization transition rate. Specifically, three different treatments of the transition rate are examined: the traditional Keldysh formula, a new k-dependent analytical formulation first derived by W. Quade, E. Scholl, and M. Rudan (1993), and a more exact, numerical method of Y. Wang and K. F. Brennan (1994). Although the completely numerical formulation contains no adjustable parameters and as such provides a very reliable result, it is highly computationally intensive. Alternatively, the Keldysh formular, although inherently simple and computationally efficient, fails to include the k dependence as well as the details of the energy band structure. The k-dependent analytical formulation of Quade and co-workers overcomes the limitations of both of these models but at the expense of some new parameterization. It is found that the k-dependent analytical method of Quade and co-workers produces very similar results to those obtained with the completely numerical model for some quantities. Specifically, both models predict that the effective threshold for impact ionization in GaAs and silicon is quite soft, that the majority of ionization events originate from the second conduction band in both materials, and that the transition rate is k dependent. Therefore, it is concluded that the k-dependent analytical model can qualitatively reproduce results similar to those obtained with the numerical model yet with far greater computational efficiency. Nevertheless, there exist some important drawbacks to the k-dependent analytical model of Quade and co-workers: These are that it does not accurately reproduce the quantum yield data for bulk silicon, it requires determination of a new parameter, related physically to the overlap intergrals of the Bloch state which can only be adjusted by comparison to experiment, and fails to account for any wave-vector dependence of the overlap integrals. As such the transition rate may be overestimated at those points for which 'near vertical,' small change in k, transitions occur.

Kolnik, Jan↗
DOE OSTI2025

Multistate resistance in TaN/(Hf,Zr)O 2 /Ta ferroelectric tunnel junctions

Ferroelectric tunnel junctions (FTJs) utilizing hafnium zirconium oxide (HZO) have emerged as promising non-volatile memory elements for microelectronics, compatible with back end of line (BEOL) complementary–metal–oxide semiconductor fabrication. This study investigates asymmetric electrode TaN/HZO/Ta devices with a 6 nm thick HZO layer as FTJs for multistate resistive memory applications. The individual FTJs exhibit a resistance ratio exceeding 10× when utilized as a binary state device, with pulsing between −1.7 and +1.4 V to set the high resistance state (HRS) and low resistance state (LRS), respectively. Following with reduced write voltage pulses allows the ferroelectric device to operate with a selection of over 32 distinct resistance states (2 5 bits) between the LRS and HRS. This work then explores the stability of the resistance states during write/read pulse cycling, along with the stability of the state after multiple read pulses. Accessing the multibit state shows stability within 50 reads with the binary state remaining stable for more than 4000 reads pulses. With their multistate tunability and versatility, FTJs hold promise as BEOL memory elements for compute-in-memory (CiM) arrays, binary digital memory, or weighted vector matrix multiplication applications with low power consumption during computations.

CMOS↗
NASA NTRS2022

The X-Ray Polarization View of Mrk 421 in an Average Flux State as Observed By the Imaging X-Ray Polarimetry Explorer

Particle acceleration mechanisms in supermassive black hole jets, such as shock acceleration, magnetic reconnection, and turbulence, are expected to have observable signatures in the multiwavelength polarization properties of blazars. The recent launch of the Imaging X-Ray Polarimetry Explorer (IXPE) enables us, for the first time, to use polarization in the X-ray band (2–8 keV) to probe the properties of the jet synchrotron emission in high-synchrotron-peaked BL Lac objects (HSPs). We report the discovery of X-ray linear polarization (degree Π x = 15% ± 2% and electric vector position angle ψ x = 35° ± 4°) from the jet of the HSP Mrk 421 in an average X-ray flux state. At the same time, the degree of polarization at optical, infrared, and millimeter wavelengths was found to be lower by at least a factor of 3. During the IXPE pointing, the X-ray flux of the source increased by a factor of 2.2, while the polarization behavior was consistent with no variability. The higher level of Π x compared to longer wavelengths, and the absence of significant polarization variability, suggest a shock is the most likely X-ray emission site in the jet of Mrk 421 during the observation. The multiwavelength polarization properties are consistent with an energy-stratified electron population, where the particles emitting at longer wavelengths are located farther from the acceleration site, where they experience a more disordered magnetic field.

acceleration of particles↗
NASA NTRS2001

Relative Navigation for Formation Flying of Spacecraft

This paper presents a robust and efficient approach for relative navigation and attitude estimation of spacecraft flying in formation. This approach uses measurements from a new optical sensor that provides a line of sight vector from the master spacecraft to the secondary satellite. The overall system provides a novel, reliable, and autonomous relative navigation and attitude determination system, employing relatively simple electronic circuits with modest digital signal processing requirements and is fully independent of any external systems. Experimental calibration results are presented, which are used to achieve accurate line of sight measurements. State estimation for formation flying is achieved through an optimal observer design. Also, because the rotational and translational motions are coupled through the observation vectors, three approaches are suggested to separate both signals just for stability analysis. Simulation and experimental results indicate that the combined sensor/estimator approach provides accurate relative position and attitude estimates.

Alonso, Roberto↗
DOE OSTI2025

Probing quantum phenomena through photoproduction in relativistic heavy-ion collisions

Photoproduction in ultra-peripheral relativistic heavy-ion collisions displays many unique features, often involving quantum mechanical coherence and two-source interference between photon emission from the two ions. We review the recent experimental results from RHIC and the LHC and theoretical studies of coherent vector meson photoproduction, emphasizing the quantum mechanical aspects of the interactions and the entanglement between the final state particles. These studies enrich our understanding of non-local realism, underscore the critical role of the polarization of the photon source, quantum interference and nuclear effect on the gluon distribution. It paves a way for quantitatively probing the quantum nature of these high-energy nuclear collisions.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗