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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS2007

A Contrast in Use of Metrics in Earth Science Data Systems

In recent years there has been a surge in the number of systems for processing, archiving and distributing remotely sensed data. Such systems, working independently as well as in collaboration, have been contributing greatly to the advances in the scientific understanding of the Earth system, as well as utilization of the data for nationally and internationally important applications. Among such systems, we consider those that are developed by or under the sponsorship of NASA to fulfill one of its strategic objectives: "Study Earth from space to advance scientific understanding and meet societal needs." NASA's Earth science data systems are of varying size and complexity depending on the requirements they are intended to meet. Some data systems are regarded as NASA's "Core Capabilities" that provide the basic infrastructure for processing, archiving and distributing a set of data products to a large and diverse user community in a robust and reliable manner. Other data systems constitute "Community Capabilities". These provide specialized and innovative services to data users and/or research products offering new scientific insight. Such data systems are generally supported by NASA through peer reviewed competition. Examples of Core Capabilities are 1. Earth Observing Data and Information System (EOSDIS) with its Distributed Active Archive Centers (DAACs), Science Investigator-led Processing Systems (SIPSs), and the EOS Clearing House (ECHO); 2. Tropical Rainfall Measurement Mission (TRMM) Science Data and Information System (TSDIS); 3. Ocean Data Processing System (ODPS); and 4. CloudSat Data Processing Center. Examples of Community Capabilities are projects under the Research, Education and Applications Solutions Network (REASON), and Advancing Collaborative Connections for Earth System Science (ACCESS) Programs. In managing these data system capabilities, it is necessary to have well-established goals and to measure progress relative to them. Progress is measured through "metrics", which can be a combination of quantitative as well as qualitative assessments. The specific metrics of interest depend on the user of the metrics as well as the type of data system. The users of metrics can be data system managers, program managers, funding agency or the public. Data system managers need metrics for assessing and improving the performance of the system and for future planning. Program managers need metrics to assess progress and the value of the data systems sponsored by them. Also, there is a difference in the metrics needed for core capabilities that tend to be more complex, larger and longer-term compared to community capabilities and the community capabilities that tend to be simpler, smaller and shorter-term. Even among community capabilities there are differences; hence the same set of metrics does not apply to all. Some provide data products to users, some provide services that enable better utilization of data or interoperability among other systems, and some are a part of a larger project where provision of data or services is only a minor activity. There is also a contrast between metrics used for internal and external purposes. Examples of internal purposes are: ensuring that the system meets its requirements, and planning for evolution and growth. Examples of external purposes are: providing to sponsors indicators of success of the systems, demonstrating the contributions of the system to overall program success, etc. This paper will consider EOSDIS, REASON and ACCESS programs to show the various types of metrics needed and how they need to be tailored to the types of data systems while maintaining the overall management goals of measuring progress and contributions made by the data systems.

Ramapriyan, Hampapuram↗
DOE OSTI2018

Process Development for Selective Laser Melting of Molybdenum

This report presents a process development effort aimed at both identifying operating parameters for producing high quality Molybdenum components via Selective Laser Melting (SLM) and developing a framework for understanding parameter interactions and enabling informed decision-making in parameter selection. At the core of this effort was mapping of SLM process inputs to build outcomes, for which there are application-based constraints, e.g. final part density, surface finish, and dimensional accuracy. Process mapping in additive manufacturing is currently the subject of intense research efforts at many institutions, both experimentally and through computational modeling; this was an experimentally driven research effort, which was carried out with an understanding of the importance of the underlying mechanisms that are inherent to the SLM process, such as the impact of laser power and scan speed on melt pool morphology, as well as solidification dynamics. Results revealed promising avenues for mapping of SLM process parameters for Molybdenum and quantitatively reinforced ideas derived from observations of part quality, i.e. density, mass, surface roughness.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2017

Precessing Jet and Large Dust Grains in the V380 Ori NE Star-forming Region

The V380 Ori NE bipolar outflow was imaged in the SiO and CO J=1→0 lines, and dense cores in L1641 were observed in the 2.0–0.89 mm continuum. The highly collimated SiO jet shows point-symmetric oscillation patterns in both position and velocity, which suggests that the jet axis is precessing and the driving source may belong to a non-coplanar binary system. By considering the position and velocity variabilities together, accurate jet parameters were derived. The protostellar system is viewed nearly edge-on, and the jet has a flow speed of ∼35 km s{sup −1} and a precession period of ∼1600 years. The CO outflow length gives a dynamical timescale of ∼6300 years, and the protostar must be extremely young. The inferred binary separation of 6–70 au implies that this protobinary system may have been formed through the disk instability process. The continuum spectra of L1641 dense cores indicate that the emission comes from dust, and the fits with modified blackbody functions give emissivity power indices of β = 0.3–2.2. The emissivity index shows a positive correlation with the molecular line width, but no strong correlation with bolometric luminosity or temperature. V380 Ori NE has a particularly low value of β = 0.3, which tentatively suggests the presence of millimeter-sized dust grains. Because the dust growth takes millions of years, much longer than the protostellar age, this core may have produced large grains in the starless core stage. HH 34 MMS and HH 147 MMS also have low emissivity indices.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
NASA NTRS1982

Studies of lunar regolith dynamics using measurements of cosmogenic radionuclides in lunar rocks, soils and cores

The present investigation is concerned with two types of measurements. The first deals with the use of Al-26 to define regolith gardening processes which have occurred in the upper portion of the lunar cores that were collected both by the deep drilling and drive tube operations. The second portion of the study involves the use of Mn-53 and Al-26 concentrations to determine the surface exposure histories of individual rocks over the past ten million years. It is found that during the past two million years, 15011 has had a history of simple gardening with an accumulation rate of 2 cm/m.y. The Apollo 15 Station 2 boulder appears to have been in place for about five million years. The 'shadowed' soil (75237) shows a shielding effect of about 40%. The Apollo 16 Station 9 boulder appears to have been in place for about four million years and thus is apparently not related to the South Ray Crater event.

Fruchter, J. S.↗
NASA NTRS1989

Soil developments in polar deserts: Implications for exobiology and future Mars missions

Chemical alterations, weathering, and diagenesis of soil profiles from the dry valleys of Antarctica were studied as analogs of regolith development for the Martian regolith. Chemical weathering processes play an important part in soil development within the dry valleys of Antarctica. A suite of core samples were studied which were taken within the valley floors in addition to samples taken in the vicinity of evaporite and brine ponds. Analysis of water soluable cations and anions from core samples were performed along with petrographic analysis of selected samples. It was shown that ionic transport processes operate primarily above the permafrost zone. Abundances of the water soluable ions reflect the nature of secondary minerals produced by evaporation and weathering. Chloride, calcium, and sodium abundances for soils from the cores within the North and South Forks of Wright Valley, reflect the secondary mineralogy of the soil columns. Calculations for Na, Ca, and Cl abundances reflect the appearance of halite and antarcticite. In areas where excess Ca is present, X-ray diffraction studies show the presence of gypsum. It is well known that the Martian surface conditions may be favorable for chemical weathering. Primary silicates would be expected to be reactive with any ground water. It seems likely that Martian subsurface water is available to assist in the weathering of the primary minerals. Such weathering could result in the formation of clays, sulfates, carbonates, hydrates, halides, and zeolites. The dry valley cores have shown that they maybe excellent analogs to weathering processes on the near-surface of Mars. Since movement of water within the near-surface region clearly results in chemical weathering, leaching, and salt formation in the dry valleys, similar processes are probably operating within the Martian regolith.

Gibson, Everett K., Jr.↗
NASA NTRS1993

Airborne derivation of microburst alerts from ground-based Terminal Doppler Weather Radar information: A flight evaluation

An element of the NASA/FAA windshear program is the integration of ground-based microburst information on the flight deck, to support airborne windshear alerting and microburst avoidance. NASA conducted a windshear flight test program in the summer of 1991 during which airborne processing of Terminal Doppler Weather Radar (TDWR) data was used to derive microburst alerts. Microburst information was extracted from TDWR, transmitted to a NASA Boeing 737 in flight via data link, and processed to estimate the windshear hazard level (F-factor) that would be experienced by the aircraft in each microburst. The microburst location and F-factor were used to derive a situation display and alerts. The situation display was successfully used to maneuver the aircraft for microburst penetrations, during which atmospheric 'truth' measurements were made. A total of 19 penetrations were made of TDWR-reported microburst locations, resulting in 18 airborne microburst alerts from the TDWR data and two microburst alerts from the airborne reactive windshear detection system. The primary factors affecting alerting performance were spatial offset of the flight path from the region of strongest shear, differences in TDWR measurement altitude and airplane penetration altitude, and variations in microburst outflow profiles. Predicted and measured F-factors agreed well in penetrations near microburst cores. Although improvements in airborne and ground processing of the TDWR measurements would be required to support an airborne executive-level alerting protocol, the practicality of airborne utilization of TDWR data link data has been demonstrated.

Hinton, David A.↗
DOE OSTI2022

Experimentally validated high-fidelity simulations of a liquid jet in supersonic crossflow

Here, utilizing recent advancements in computational schemes for compressible, multiphase flows, this work features a parametric study of a pure liquid jet in supersonic crossflow that involves simulating the atomization process for four values of momentum-flux ratio. These simulations are validated against experimental results measured with high-speed X-ray imaging, which confirm the accuracy of the numerical approach. Also, the effect of numerical resolution on some flow behavior is investigated, revealing convergence of the jet shape and surface instability wavelength. Analysis of the resulting sprays includes statistical descriptions of the liquid distribution, liquid structures created through breakup, interfacial instabilities, and dominant flow features. As the flowrate increases, the spray penetrates further, it becomes more disperse, and less liquid impacts the wall, but the droplet size distribution changes little. The wavelength of instabilities on the windward side of the jet diverges from measured trends in subsonic crossflows. In a visualization of the time-averaged flow, counter-rotating vortices are observed along the jet core and in the wake, affecting the process of primary atomization and early droplet trajectories.

42 ENGINEERING↗
DOE OSTI2025

High-Speed and High-Quality Field Welding Repair Based on Advanced Non-Destructive Evaluation and Numerical Modeling

Creep strength-enhanced ferritic (CSEF) steels such as Grade 91 (9Cr-1Mo-V) and Grade 92 (Fe-9Cr-2W-0.5Mo) steels are widely used in the fossil-fuel-fired and nuclear power plants. The weld integrity of these steels is crucial for power plants' safe and reliable operations. Due to harsh service conditions, the steel weld can become susceptible to environmental degradation. Field welding repair is used to restore the degraded weld’s performance where a controlled temper-bead welding technique is commonly used to temper the freshly formed martensite during welding. However, knowledge of weld repairability is limited and experimental trial and error optimization to achieve desired microstructure and joint properties is expensive and time-consuming. Many existing computational models, e.g., finite element models, are limited to solving heat conduction equation and ignoring convective heat transfer due to molten metal flow. These models can result in over-prediction of peak temperatures of weld pool and heat-affected zone (HAZ), which in turn can affect the accuracy of tempering prediction. Moreover, these finite element models require an input of the deposit profiles in advance and thus limits the usability of these models. Here, a molten pool-based, multi-pass multi-layer model has been developed based on computational fluid dynamics (CFD) approach with the Volume of Fluid (VOF) method. The model calculates the bead formation, thereby eliminating the need for pre-determined bead profiles required by finite element models. For computational efficiency, a coordinate system attached to the moving heat source is utilized. A subroutine is developed to convert the temperature profiles in the reference frame stationary to the heat source to that stationary to the workpiece. The converted thermal cycles are then imported into a microstructure model to compute the tempering kinetics and resultant hardness using a Johnson-Mehl-Avrami-Kolmogorov (JMAK), and modified Grange-Baughman parameter. The modeling approach is first developed and validated on single- and multi-pass deposition of stainless steel filler metal onto a SA-533 high strength steel substrate. The models are then applied to a multi-pass V-groove repair weld of Grade 91 steel plate as well as directed energy deposition of Grade 92 steel. Non-destructive characterization of microstructures was performed on Grade 91 and 92 steel welds. Two welding processes, cold metal transfer (CMT) and flux-cored arc welding (FCAW), were investigated for the Grade 91 steel weld samples. For the Grade 92 weld samples, three different heat inputs (low, medium, and high) of gas tungsten arc welding (GTAW) were utilized to replicate traditional field welding processes. The non-destructive evaluation (NDE) method used for this research was immersion ultrasonic testing (UT) using a micro-resolution ultrasonic imaging methodology specifically designed to operate in the through-transmission configuration operating at 20 MHz of frequency. The system used a focused ultrasonic beam spot size diameter between 250-300 μm, and a 6 μm laser vibrometer spot size for detection, to produce highly defined images with longitudinal and mode-converted shear waves. From the micro-resolution ultrasonic C-scan images, three microstructural regions, i.e., weld metal (WM), HAZ, and base metal (BM), were clearly identifiable. Various levels of ultrasonic amplitudes distributed over the three regions were correlated with electron beam backscattered diffraction (EBSD) images using grain size, grain boundaries, and dislocation densities. The results showed that areas with relatively higher ultrasonic amplitude levels were associated with smaller grains and higher dislocation densities, while areas with lower amplitude levels were associated with larger grains and lower dislocation densities. In addition, ultrasonic velocity data obtained across the three different weld microstructural regions of Grade 91 test samples were correlated with optical metallographic images and hardness measurements. The results showed distinctive decreases in ultrasonic velocity and hardness over the HAZ region, where weld failures often occur during service.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2018

The Origin of r-process Elements in the Milky Way

Some of the heavy elements, such as gold and europium (Eu), are almost exclusively formed by the rapid neutron capture process (r-process). However, it is still unclear which astrophysical site between core-collapse supernovae and neutron star–neutron star (NS–NS) mergers produced most of the r-process elements in the universe. Galactic chemical evolution (GCE) models can test these scenarios by quantifying the frequency and yields required to reproduce the amount of europium (Eu) observed in galaxies. Although NS–NS mergers have become popular candidates, their required frequency (or rate) needs to be consistent with that obtained from gravitational wave measurements. We address the first NS–NS merger detected by LIGO/Virgo (GW170817) and its associated gamma-ray burst and analyze their implication for the origin of r-process elements. The range of NS–NS merger rate densities of 320–4740 Gpc -3 yr -1 provided by LIGO/Virgo is remarkably consistent with the range required by GCE to explain the Eu abundances in the Milky Way with NS–NS mergers, assuming the solar r-process abundance pattern for the ejecta. Under the same assumption, this event has produced about 1–5 Earth masses of Eu, and 3–13 Earth masses of gold. When using theoretical calculations to derive Eu yields, constraining the role of NS–NS mergers becomes more challenging because of nuclear astrophysics uncertainties. This is the first study that directly combines nuclear physics uncertainties with GCE calculations. Finally, if GW170817 is a representative event, NS–NS mergers can produce Eu in sufficient amounts and are likely to be the main r-process site.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2017

Formation of diamonds in laser-compressed hydrocarbons at planetary interior conditions

The effects of hydrocarbon reactions and diamond precipitation on the internal structure and evolution of icy giant planets such as Neptune and Uranus have been discussed for more than three decades. Inside these celestial bodies, simple hydrocarbons such as methane, which are highly abundant in the atmospheres, are believed to undergo structural transitions that release hydrogen from deeper layers and may lead to compact stratified cores. Indeed, from the surface towards the core, the isentropes of Uranus and Neptune intersect a temperature–pressure regime in which methane first transforms into a mixture of hydrocarbon polymers, whereas, in deeper layers, a phase separation into diamond and hydrogen may be possible. Here in this paper, we show experimental evidence for this phase separation process obtained by in situ X-ray diffraction from polystyrene (C 8 H 8 ) n samples dynamically compressed to conditions around 150 GPa and 5,000 K; these conditions resemble the environment around 10,000 km below the surfaces of Neptune and Uranus. Our findings demonstrate the necessity of high pressures for initiating carbon–hydrogen separation and imply that diamond precipitation may require pressures about ten times as high as previously indicated by static compression experiments. In conclusion, our results will inform mass–radius relationships of carbon-bearing exoplanets, provide constraints for their internal layer structure and improve evolutionary models of Uranus and Neptune, in which carbon–hydrogen separation could influence the convective heat transport.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
NASA NTRS1994

Space Generic Open Avionics Architecture (SGOAA) standard specification

This standard establishes the Space Generic Open Avionics Architecture (SGOAA). The SGOAA includes a generic functional model, processing structural model, and an architecture interface model. This standard defines the requirements for applying these models to the development of spacecraft core avionics systems. The purpose of this standard is to provide an umbrella set of requirements for applying the generic architecture models to the design of a specific avionics hardware/software processing system. This standard defines a generic set of system interface points to facilitate identification of critical services and interfaces. It establishes the requirement for applying appropriate low level detailed implementation standards to those interfaces points. The generic core avionics functions and processing structural models provided herein are robustly tailorable to specific system applications and provide a platform upon which the interface model is to be applied.

Wray, Richard B.↗
DOE OSTI2017

Long-Term Stewardship at Hanford - 17023

The Hanford Site's Long-Term Stewardship (LTS) Program is responsible for 220 square miles of the Site's River Corridor, which includes 1,527 waste sites, 6 Manhattan Project Era production reactors that have been placed in interim safe storage, and 46 miles of Columbia River shoreline. More than 24,000 cleanup and historic documents have been identified, indexed, and tagged in the LTS records and document libraries. The LTS program, operated by the Mission Support Alliance, LLC (MSA) manages and provides surveillance and maintenance of facilities and institutional controls and all associated monitoring to ensure continued protectiveness of human health and the environment. Since 2010, through collaborative efforts with DOE and its prime contractors, land in 14 geographic areas and six cocooned reactor facilities were transitioned (mid-contract) from the River Corridor Closure Contractor to the LTS program. This accomplishment relied heavily on Site contractors and DOE working together to address challenges. Other stakeholders were informed of LTS progress through the Hanford LTS web site, presentations, and briefings. Hanford's LTS program is responsible for ensuring the protectiveness of cleanup remedies and the management of institutional controls once cleanup objectives have been achieved. LTS accomplishes this by adhering to post-cleanup requirements specified in the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act of 1980 (CERCLA) and the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act of 1976 (RCRA) cleanup decision documents. The LTS program conducted inspection and surveillance and maintenance (S and M) activities of the cocooned 105-F Reactor in October 2014 and the other five reactors in 2015 and 2016. Reactor entries and internal inspections typically are conducted at 5-year intervals to assess the condition of the structures and evaluate potential deterioration of the reactor core, shield walls, and roof. The cocooning process is designed to protect the reactor for 75 years while radioactive decay continues, ultimately making the structures safe for demolition and removal. The results of the recent 5-year inspections allowed DOE to negotiate an extended 10-year inspection cycle, which led to a $5 million avoidance in lifecycle inspection costs. Hanford's LTS program is successfully shifting from a program focused on transitioning land and waste sites to a program focused on data management and S and M activities for those buildings and waste sites within the program. This paper will highlight the accomplishments and collaborative efforts in addressing the challenges faced by Hanford's LTS program. (authors)

12 MANAGEMENT OF RADIOACTIVE AND NON-RADIOACTIVE W↗
DOE OSTI2023

Mechanistic Insights into Processive Polyethylene Hydrogenolysis through In Situ NMR

Chemical polymer upcycling by processive catalysts is a promising plastic waste remediation strategy, with the capability of producing selective, high-value products from waste plastics with minimal energy input. We previously designed a novel processive catalyst with a mesoporous SiO 2 shell/Pt nanoparticle/SiO 2 core architecture (mSiO 2 /Pt/SiO 2 ) that deconstructs polyolefins within narrow pores. Here, in this paper, we elucidate the mechanism of processive polyolefin hydrogenolysis using in situ magic-angle spinning (MAS) nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy and coarse-grained molecular dynamics simulations. We observe that most polyethylene–Pt interactions do not lead to C–C bond cleavage but rather to the release of the polymer via a dehydrogenation–rehydrogenation cycle. The porous architecture increases the likelihood that a released polymer is later cleaved and enables the catalyst to perform multiple successive cleavages to the same polymer chain. Both experiment and simulation show that the extent of processivity is strongly correlated with the length of the pores, with longer pores leading to a higher processivity.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
DOE OSTI2020

Comparison of continuum and cross-core theories of dynamic strain aging

Dynamic strain aging (DSA) is the process of solute atoms segregating around dislocations on the timescale of loading. Continuum theories of DSA derived from elasticity theory have been shown to severely overpredict both the timescale and strengthening of DSA. Recently, cross-core theory was developed to reconcile this gap, invoking a special single-atomic-hop diffusion mechanism across the core of an extended dislocation. In this work, we show that the classical continuum theory expression for the rate of solute segregation is in error. After correcting this error, we show that continuum theory predictions match cross-core theory when the elevated diffusivity near the dislocation core is accounted for. Finally, our findings indicate that continuum theory is still a useful tool for studying dislocation-solute interactions.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
NASA NTRS2015

No-Oven, No-Autoclave Composite Processing

Very large composite structures, such as those used in NASA's Space Launch System, push the boundaries imposed by current autoclaves. New technology is needed to maintain composite performance and free manufacturing engineers from the restraints of curing equipment size limitations. Recent efforts on a Phase II project by Cornerstone Research Group, Inc. (CRG), have advanced the technology and manufacturing readiness levels of a unique two-part epoxy resin system. Designed for room-temperature infusion of a dry carbon preform, the system includes a no-heat-added cure that delivers 350 F composite performance in a matter of hours. This no-oven, no-autoclave (NONA) composite processing eliminates part-size constraints imposed by infrastructure and lowers costs by increasing throughput and reducing capital-specific, process-flow bottlenecks. As a result of the Phase II activity, NONA materials and processes were used to make high-temperature composite tooling suitable for further production of carbon-epoxy laminates and honeycomb/ sandwich-structure composites with an aluminum core. The technology platform involves tooling design, resin infusion processing, composite part design, and resin chemistry. The various technology elements are combined to achieve a fully cured part. The individual elements are not unusual, but they are combined in such a way that enables proper management of the heat generated by the epoxy resin during cure. The result is a self-cured carbon/ epoxy composite part that is mechanically and chemically stable at temperatures up to 350 F. As a result of the successful SBIR effort, CRG has launched NONA Composites as a spinoff subsidiary. The company sells resin to end users, fabricates finished goods for customers, and sells composite tooling made with NONA materials and processes to composite manufacturers.

Rauscher, Michael D.↗
DOE OSTI2019

Promoting Noncovalent Intermolecular Interactions Using a C 60 Core Particle in Aqueous PC60s-Covered Colloids for Ultraefficient Photoinduced Particle Activity

We report that noncovalent intermolecular interactions in nanomaterials, such as van der Waals effects, allow adjustment of the nanoscopic size of compounds and their conformation in molecular crystal regimes. These strong interactions permit small particle sizes to be maintained as the crystals grow. In particular, these effects can be leveraged in the confined/reinforcing phase of molecules. With this in mind, we used C 60 molecules as a core particle in single-PC60 surfactant-covered colloid in a water-processable system. Compared with our previous results based on a PC 61 BM core-PC60 shell particle, the PC60-C 60 colloid had a considerably smaller spherical structure due to the increased intermolecular interactions between C 60 (fullerene) molecules. Interestingly, the conformation of C 60 aggregates was altered depending on the mixed solvents and their volume fraction in the organic phase, which strongly affected the structural properties of the PC60-C 60 colloids. The particle facilitated strong interactions with a p-type core sphere when it was introduced as the shell part of a p-n heterojunction particle. This direct interaction provided effective electronic communication between p- and n-type particles, resulting in ultraefficient photonic properties, particularly in charge separation in aqueous heterostructured colloids. Lastly, this enabled the development of an extremely efficient photovoltaic device with a 6.74% efficiency, which could provide the basis for creating high-performance water-processable solar cells based on p-n heterostructured NPs.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2018

Safeguards Challenges for Molten Salt Reactors

There are now a wide variety of molten salt reactor (MSR) technologies being proposed or developed that are gaining international interest and momentum toward deployment. There are two sub-categories of this class of reactors - those that are liquid fueled (i.e., the molten salt is both the fuel and the coolant) and those that have solid fuel with the molten salt used as coolant only. The liquid-fueled MSRs present unique challenges to current safeguards approaches. These challenges exist because there are currently no conceptual approaches to applying safeguards to unique, tightly coupled nuclear energy systems with the reactor core, balance of plant, and fuel cycle (everything else including salt processing and material separations) combined in a single facility. The application of safeguards to liquid-fueled MSRs will have to take into consideration several technical factors including: The homogeneous mixture of fuel, coolant, fission products, and actinides (with the attendant extremely high radiation field); Continuous variation in isotopic concentrations in the fuel salt, including removal (passive or active) of fission products, rare earth elements, and noble metals; High operating temperatures of the fuel salt; Online processing where some fraction of the inventory can be removed while the reactor is operational; Unique refueling schemes, including the ability to continuously feed the core with fresh fissile or fertile material; The presence of frozen fuel, potentially requiring a different safeguards process from the liquid fuel; and The presence of fuel outside the vessel. Additionally, If the thorium fuel cycle is employed, there will be additional complications since the resulting radiation signatures will be different from those of the uranium-based fuel cycle. The existing IAEA inspection regimes are based on the uranium-plutonium fuel cycle, item counting for nuclear reactors, and bulk material accountancy for the front and back end of the nuclear fuel cycle. These techniques and associated instrumentation for bulk accountancy have been developed predominantly for enrichment, fuel fabrication, and aqueous reprocessing. However, none of these bulk accountancy measures can be directly applied to liquid-fueled MSRs. This paper will explore some of the possible challenges in applying safeguards to molten salt reactors.

Kovacic, Donald N↗
DOE OSTI2018

SeTe alloy semiconductor core optical fibers

Highlights: • Phosphate glass-clad Se{sub 0.5}Te{sub 0.5} semiconductor core optical fibers were fabricated. • Crystalline Se{sub 0.5}Te{sub 0.5} semiconductor core optical fibers were successfully obtained. • The fibers can detect light incident on it from at any point along its entire length. • The fibers can be used as stress sensing without the use of optical probing signals. - Abstract: Se{sub 0.5}Te{sub 0.5} semiconductor core optical fibers with phosphate glass cladding were fabricated by using a reactive molten core approach. The core was found to be amorphous with some oxygen diffusing in from the cladding glass. Crystalline Se{sub 0.5}Te{sub 0.5} (c-Se{sub 0.5}Te{sub 0.5}) semiconductor core fibers were obtained by a post-drawing annealing process. Significant disparities in conductivity under stress and without stress were observed in c-Se{sub 0.5}Te{sub 0.5} semiconductor core fibers. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first time that stress sensing can be realized in c-Se{sub 0.5}Te{sub 0.5} semiconductor core optical fibers. This is in contrast to all previous work on stress sensing using fibers, which require the use of optical probing signals. In addition, it is found that more than 60 times change in conductivity between dark and illuminated states in c-Se{sub 0.5}Te{sub 0.5} semiconductor core fibers. These results demonstrate that c-Se{sub 0.5}Te{sub 0.5} semiconductor core optical fibers have promising applications in stress sensor, photodetector, and optical switch.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗