Search NASA⌕ Search

SEARCH · Search NASA

Results for “splitting methods”

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.

Quote a phrase for an exact phrase match. Source license links do not imply unrestricted reuse.

At least 1,117 records · Page 62

Demonstration of photoreactor platform for on-sun unassisted photoelectrochemical hydrogen generation with tandem III–V photoelectrodes

Photoelectrochemical (PEC) water splitting is a direct solar-driven technology that converts solar energy to storable chemical energy in the form of hydrogen. In addition to semiconductor and catalyst development for improved photoelectrodes, designing reactors for testing and operation of PEC systems under inherently dynamic outdoor solar illumination is necessary to further the commercial viability of PEC technology. Herein, we present a versatile photoreactor system mounted on a solar tracker for outdoor PEC testing and demonstrate unassisted PEC water splitting under real world on-sun conditions. GaInP 2 /GaAs tandem absorber photoelectrodes with a MoS 2 catalyst were fabricated and exhibit >8% solar-to-hydrogen efficiency. On-sun efficiency and stability of the photoelectrodes were characterized on both sunny and partly cloudy days with continuous monitoring of insolation and weather conditions. Furthermore, the versatile photoreactor and outdoor PEC testing capabilities and methods presented here can accelerate the development of other solar fuel generating systems and technologies.

solar fuels↗

Foreground-Immune Cosmic Microwave Background Lensing with Shear-Only Reconstruction

Cosmic microwave background (CMB) lensing from current and upcoming wide-field CMB experiments such as AdvACT, SPT-3G and Simons Observatory relies heavily on temperature (versus polarization). In this regime, foreground contamination to the temperature map produces significant lensing biases, which cannot be fully controlled by multifrequency component separation, masking, or bias hardening. Here in this Letter, we split the standard CMB lensing quadratic estimator into a new set of optimal “multipole” estimators. On large scales, these multipole estimators reduce to the known magnification and shear estimators, and a new shear B-mode estimator. We leverage the different symmetries of the lensed CMB and extragalactic foregrounds to argue that the shear-only estimator should be approximately immune to extragalactic foregrounds. We build a new method to compute, separately and without noise, the primary, secondary, and trispectrum biases to CMB lensing from foreground simulations. Using this method, we demonstrate that the shear estimator is, indeed, insensitive to extragalactic foregrounds, even when applied to a single-frequency temperature map contaminated with cosmic infrared background, thermal Sunyaev-Zel’dovich, kinematic Sunyaev-Zel’dovich, and radio point sources. This dramatic reduction in foreground biases allows us to include higher temperature multipoles than with the standard quadratic estimator, thus, increasing the total lensing signal-to-noise ratio beyond the quadratic estimator. In addition, magnification-only and shear B-mode estimators provide useful diagnostics for potential residuals.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

Determination of Strain Rate Sensitivity of Micro-struts Manufactured Using the Selective Laser Melting Method

Micro-lattice structures manufactured using the selective laser melting (SLM) process provides the opportunity to realize optimal cellular materials for impact energy absorption. In this paper, strain rate-dependent material properties are measured for stainless steel 316L SLM micro-lattice struts in the strain rate range of 10{sup −3} to 6000 s{sup −1}. At high strain rates, a novel version of the split Hopkinson Bar has been developed. Strain rate-dependent materials data have been used in Cowper–Symonds material model, and the scope and limit of this model in the context of SLM struts have been discussed. Strain rate material data and the Cowper–Symonds model have been applied to the finite element analysis of a micro-lattice block subjected to drop weight impact loading. The model output has been compared to experimental results, and it has been shown that the increase in crush stress due to impact loading is mainly the result of strain rate material behavior. Hence, a systematic methodology has been developed to investigate the impact energy absorption of a micro-lattice structure manufactured using additive layer manufacture (SLM). This methodology can be extended to other micro-lattice materials and configurations, and to other impact conditions.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗

Convolution Lagrangian perturbation theory for biased tracers beyond general relativity

We compare analytic predictions for real and Fourier space two-point statistics for biased tracers from a variety of Lagrangian perturbation theory approaches against those from state of the art N-body simulations in f(R) Hu-Sawicki and the nDGP braneworld modified gravity theories. We show that the novel physics of gravitational collapse in scalar tensor theories with the chameleon or the Vainshtein screening mechanism can be effectively factored in with bias parameters analytically predicted using the peak-background split formalism when updated to include the environmental sensitivity of modified gravity theories as well as changes to the halo mass function. Here, we demonstrate that convolution Lagrangian perturbation theory (CLPT) and standard perturbation theory (SPT) approaches provide accurate analytic methods to predict the correlation function and power spectra, respectively, for biased tracers in modified gravity models and are able to characterize both the baryon acoustic oscillation, power-law, and small scale regimes needed for upcoming galaxy surveys such as DESI, Euclid, LSST and WFIRST.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

Catalytic Selective Oxidations with Porous Transition Metal Oxides

This final report covers work done concerning oxidation catalysis over the past year. There are three major areas involving synthesis, characterization, and catalysis. The synthetic focus has been on porous metal oxides. Full characterization of these systems using a variety of methods has been done using ex-situ, in situ, and operando conditions. A major goal of the work has been to study the mechanisms of catalytic oxidations including identification of reaction intermediates. Specific applications besides oxidations concern electrocatalytic water splitting, water harvesting, CO 2 capture, and environmental catalysis.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗

FedADMP: A Joint Anomaly Detection and Mobility Prediction Framework via Federated Learning

With the proliferation of mobile devices and smart cameras, detecting anomalies and predicting their mobility are critical for enhancing safety in ubiquitous computing systems. Due to data privacy regulations and limited communication bandwidth, it is infeasible to collect, transmit, and store all data from mobile devices at a central location. To overcome this challenge, we propose FedADMP, a federated learning based joint Anomaly Detection and Mobility Prediction framework. FedADMP adaptively splits the training process between the server and clients to reduce computation loads on clients. To protect the privacy of user data, clients in FedADMP upload only intermediate model parameters to the cloud server. We also develop a differential privacy method to prevent the cloud server and external attackers from inferring private information during the model upload procedure. Extensive experiments using real-world datasets show that FedADMP consistently outperforms existing methods.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗

Flow Applications of the Least Squares Finite Element Method

The main thrust of the effort has been towards the development, analysis and implementation of the least-squares finite element method (LSFEM) for fluid dynamics and electromagnetics applications. In the past year, there were four major accomplishments: 1) special treatments in computational fluid dynamics and computational electromagnetics, such as upwinding, numerical dissipation, staggered grid, non-equal order elements, operator splitting and preconditioning, edge elements, and vector potential are unnecessary; 2) the analysis of the LSFEM for most partial differential equations can be based on the bounded inverse theorem; 3) the finite difference and finite volume algorithms solve only two Maxwell equations and ignore the divergence equations; and 4) the first numerical simulation of three-dimensional Marangoni-Benard convection was performed using the LSFEM.

Jiang, Bo-Nan↗

NASA Tech Briefs, March 2008

Topics covered include: WRATS Integrated Data Acquisition System; Breadboard Signal Processor for Arraying DSN Antennas; Digital Receiver Phase Meter; Split-Block Waveguide Polarization Twist for 220 to 325 GHz; Nano-Multiplication-Region Avalanche Photodiodes and Arrays; Tailored Asymmetry for Enhanced Coupling to WGM Resonators; Disabling CNT Electronic Devices by Use of Electron Beams; Conical Bearingless Motor/Generators; Integrated Force Method for Indeterminate Structures; Carbon-Nanotube-Based Electrodes for Biomedical Applications; Compact Directional Microwave Antenna for Localized Heating; Using Hyperspectral Imagery to Identify Turfgrass Stresses; Shaping Diffraction-Grating Grooves to Optimize Efficiency; Low-Light-Shift Cesium Fountain without Mechanical Shutters; Magnetic Compensation for Second-Order Doppler Shift in LITS; Nanostructures Exploit Hybrid-Polariton Resonances; Microfluidics, Chromatography, and Atomic-Force Microscopy; Model of Image Artifacts from Dust Particles; Pattern-Recognition System for Approaching a Known Target; Orchestrator Telemetry Processing Pipeline; Scheme for Quantum Computing Immune to Decoherence; Spin-Stabilized Microsatellites with Solar Concentrators; Phase Calibration of Antenna Arrays Aimed at Spacecraft; Ring Bus Architecture for a Solid-State Recorder; and Image Compression Algorithm Altered to Improve Stereo Ranging.

Source record↗

Evaluation of Satellite-Based Upper Troposphere Cloud Top Height Retrievals in Multilayer Cloud Conditions During TC4

Upper troposphere cloud top heights (CTHs), restricted to cloud top pressures (CTPs) less than 500 hPa, inferred using four satellite retrieval methods applied to Twelfth Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES-12) data are evaluated using measurements during the July August 2007 Tropical Composition, Cloud and Climate Coupling Experiment (TC4). The four methods are the single-layer CO2-absorption technique (SCO2AT), a modified CO2-absorption technique (MCO2AT) developed for improving both single-layered and multilayered cloud retrievals, a standard version of the Visible Infrared Solar-infrared Split-window Technique (old VISST), and a new version of VISST (new VISST) recently developed to improve cloud property retrievals. They are evaluated by comparing with ER-2 aircraft-based Cloud Physics Lidar (CPL) data taken during 9 days having extensive upper troposphere cirrus, anvil, and convective clouds. Compared to the 89% coverage by upper tropospheric clouds detected by the CPL, the SCO2AT, MCO2AT, old VISST, and new VISST retrieved CTPs less than 500 hPa in 76, 76, 69, and 74% of the matched pixels, respectively. Most of the differences are due to subvisible and optically thin cirrus clouds occurring near the tropopause that were detected only by the CPL. The mean upper tropospheric CTHs for the 9 days are 14.2 (+/- 2.1) km from the CPL and 10.7 (+/- 2.1), 12.1 (+/- 1.6), 9.7 (+/- 2.9), and 11.4 (+/- 2.8) km from the SCO2AT, MCO2AT, old VISST, and new VISST, respectively. Compared to the CPL, the MCO2AT CTHs had the smallest mean biases for semitransparent high clouds in both single-layered and multilayered situations whereas the new VISST CTHs had the smallest mean biases when upper clouds were opaque and optically thick. The biases for all techniques increased with increasing numbers of cloud layers. The transparency of the upper layer clouds tends to increase with the numbers of cloud layers.

Chang, Fu-Lung↗

Symmetry breaking forms split-off flat bands in quantum oxides controlling metal versus insulator phases

The crystal structure used as input to electronic structure calculation of conventionally bonded solids consists primarily of the standard crystallographic degrees of freedom. Quantum solids sometimes have additional microscopic degrees of freedom (m-DOF) nested within the crystallographic structure. These might include local motifs including positional (Peierls dimers, deformed octahedra, Jahn-Teller distortions), magnetic (local moment configurations) and dipolar (local ferroelectric configurations). Such motifs can be observed experimentally via local probes that avoid averaging, and theoretically as distinct total energy lowering features relative to more simplified “average crystallographic structures”. Here we examine the ability of electronic structure methods independent of strong correlation physics to explain the broad phenomenology of metal-insulator selectivity in quantum oxides by energy-lowering symmetry breaking. We do this by avoiding the restriction of considering only (i) electron-electron interactions in a fixed unresponsive lattice—as done in Mott strong correlation explanations—allowing, however, (ii) local positional and magnetic motifs that coexist within a crystallographic landscape. We find in a broad range of quantum oxides with different symmetry breaking modes the formation of split-off flat bands that can also control metallic versus insulating characteristics. The split-off band effect is common to magnetic and non-magnetic materials, including both binary and ternary oxides. One finds that when such local symmetry breaking motifs are considered in mean-field-like (e.g. density functional theory) electronic structure calculations of quantum oxides, they explain many of the observed trends in metal vs insulator phases discussed otherwise in prior literature via strong correlation in symmetry unbroken view.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗

System and method for curved light sheet projection during two-photon polymerization

A laser-based manufacturing system is disclosed for fabricating non-planar three-dimensional layers. The system may have a laser for producing a laser beam with a plurality of optical wavelengths. An optically dispersive element may be used for receiving the laser beam and splitting the beam into a plurality of distinct beam components, wherein each beam component has spatially separated optical spectral components. A phase mask may be used which is configured to receive at least one of the beam components emerging from the dispersive element and to create a modified beam. One or more focusing elements may then be used to receive the modified beam emerging from the phase mask and to focus the modified beam into a non-planar light sheet for use in fabricating a part.

Saha, Sourabh Kumar↗

Theoretical Treatment of the Coriolis Effect Using Hyperspherical Coordinates, with Application to the Ro-Vibrational Spectrum of Ozone

Here, several alternative methods for the description of the interaction between rotation and vibration are compared and contrasted using hyperspherical coordinates for a triatomic molecule. These methods differ by the choice of the z -axis and by the assumption of a prolate or oblate rotor shape of the molecule. For each case, a block-structure of the rotational–vibrational Hamiltonian matrix is derived and analyzed, and the advantages and disadvantages of each method are made explicit. This theory is then employed to compute ro-vibrational spectra of singly substituted ozone; roughly, 600 vibrational states of 16 O 18 O 16 O and 16 O 16 O 18 O isomers combined, with rotational excitations up to J = 5 and both inversion parities (21600 coupled ro-vibrational states in total). Splittings between the states of different parities, so-called K -doublings, are calculated and analyzed. The roles of the asymmetric-top rotor term and the Coriolis coupling term are determined individually, and it is found that they both affect these splittings, but in the opposite directions. Thus, the two effects partially cancel out, and the residual splittings are relatively small. Energies of the ro-vibrational states reported in this work for 16 O 18 O 16 O and 16 O 16 O 18 O are in excellent agreement with literature (available for low-vibrational excitation). New data obtained here for the highly excited vibrational states enable the first systematic study of the Coriolis effect in symmetric and asymmetric isotopomers of ozone.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗

Splitting amplitudes at N 3 LO in QCD

In the limit where partons become collinear to each other, scattering amplitudes factorize into a product of universal, process-independent building blocks and scattering amplitudes involving fewer partons. We compute these universal building blocks — known as splitting amplitudes — for two collinear QCD partons up to third loop order in QCD. Our results describe arbitrary time-like splitting processes. Due to the violation of strict collinear factorization in space-like splitting processes, we specifically present space-like splitting amplitudes for three-parton QCD scattering amplitudes at third loop order. To achieve our results, we perform a collinear expansion of three-loop scattering amplitudes using a new expansion-by-subgraph technology, which is based on the method of regions.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗

Magnetic Field Effects on Transport Through a Strongly Correlated Dot Coupled to Luttinger Leads

The effects of the magnetic field and intralead electron interaction on the transport have been investigated in the Kondo regime by means of the nonequilibrium Green functions with the equation of motion method. The numerical results show that for weak intralead interaction, in addition to the Kondo dip zero bias, the differential conductance shows two peaks separated from the origin by the Zeeman energy. When the intralead interaction becomes moderately strong, the Zeeman splitting peaks turn into Zeeman splitting dips. With the further increase in the intralead interaction, all the dips disappear and the differential conductance is characterized by a power law scaling in bias voltage in the limit of the strong intralead interaction. Our results are valuable for analyzing transport in carbon nanotubes.

77 NANOSCIENCE AND NANOTECHNOLOGY↗

A Segregated Approach for Modeling the Electrochemistry in the 3-D Microstructure of Li-Ion Batteries and Its Acceleration Using Block Preconditioners

Abstract Battery performance is strongly correlated with electrode microstructure. Electrode materials for lithium-ion batteries have complex microstructure geometries that require millions of degrees of freedom to solve the electrochemical system at the microstructure scale. A fast-iterative solver with an appropriate preconditioner is then required to simulate large representative volume in a reasonable time. In this work, a finite element electrochemical model is developed to resolve the concentration and potential within the electrode active materials and the electrolyte domains at the microstructure scale, with an emphasis on numerical stability and scaling performances. The block Gauss-Seidel (BGS) numerical method is implemented because the system of equations within the electrodes is coupled only through the nonlinear Butler–Volmer equation, which governs the electrochemical reaction at the interface between the domains. The best solution strategy found in this work consists of splitting the system into two blocks—one for the concentration and one for the potential field—and then performing block generalized minimal residual preconditioned with algebraic multigrid, using the FEniCS and the Portable, Extensible Toolkit for Scientific Computation libraries. Significant improvements in terms of time to solution (six times faster) and memory usage (halving) are achieved compared with the MUltifrontal Massively Parallel sparse direct Solver. Additionally, BGS experiences decent strong parallel scaling within the electrode domains. Last, the system of equations is modified to specifically address numerical instability induced by electrolyte depletion, which is particularly valuable for simulating fast-charge scenarios relevant for automotive application.

25 ENERGY STORAGE↗

Microstructurally Strained Pyrochlore–Perovskite Biphasic Electrocatalysts for the Oxygen Evolution Reaction

Efficiency of water splitting for hydrogen production is often limited by the sluggish kinetics of multiple electronic transfers required in the heterogeneous oxygen evolution reaction (OER). Catalyst design for reducing the high OER overpotential remains a major scientific challenge. Lattice-strain engineering, a method for tuning the electronic structure and surface geometric configuration of active sites, may greatly affect the interaction between adsorbates and catalytic surfaces for high activity and stability. Here, in this study, we present the synthesis of biphasic oxides of YPrSrRuMnO x , which consists of distinct phases of Y 2 Ru 2 O 7 pyrochlore and (Pr 0.7 Sr 0.3 )MnO 3 perovskite, and the development of a suitable analytical approach to study the strain–catalytic property relationship. Linear sweep voltammetry results reveal that the biphasic oxide exhibits approximately 3.1 times greater mass activity and 2.4 times larger turnover frequency (TOF) than single-phase Y 2 Ru 2 O 7 in the 0.1 M HClO 4 electrolyte. The biphasic catalyst is also about 3 times more stable than the single-phase oxide under acidic conditions. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, nitrogen isotherm, and electrochemical surface area analyses indicate that the oxidation state, specific surface area, and electrochemical surface area do not cause enough difference in the observed enhancement of OER performance. We examined the effects of microstrain on electrocatalysis, originating from lattice mismatch between different phases, using three different structural models. Specifically, we compared the Williamson–Hall method, standard stress–strain analysis, and Rietveld refinement in analyzing the structure–property relationship. Strain mapping using geometric phase analysis (GPA) further revealed significant microstrain and lattice dislocations localized near phase boundaries in the biphasic oxide, in contrast to the uniform strain in single-phase materials. The results reveal that the increased microstrain correlates well with the improved OER performance, as the biphasic oxide catalyst exhibits 2–3 times greater microstrain than Y 2 Ru 2 O 7 pyrochlore.

electrocatalysts↗

Theory of the hyperfine structure of the S states of muonic tritium

The hyperfine structure of the energy spectrum of the S levels of muonic tritium has been calculated using the quasi-potential method in quantum electrodynamics (QED). The α{sup 5}- and α{sup 6}-order effects on the polarization of vacuum, the structure and recoil of the nucleus, and relativistic corrections have been taken into account. The obtained numerical values of hyperfine splittings of 239.819 meV (1S state) and 29.965 meV (2S state) can be treated as reliable estimates for comparing with future experimental data of the CREMA collaboration, and hyperfine structure interval Δ{sub 12} = 8ΔE{sup hfs} (2S)–ΔE{sup hfs} (1S) =–0.100 meV can be used for verifying the QED predictions. The resultant precision values of hyperfine splitting are also important for calculating the rates of formation of (μ dt) mesomolecules in muonic catalysis reactions.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗

Improved algorithms for circulation-control airfoils in transonic flow

A zonal model for aerodynamic analysis of two-dimensional transonic circulation control airfoils has been developed. The present approach combines a transonic full potential method for the global flow field and an integral boundary layer method for regions of the airfoil excluding the wall jet with a parabolized Navier-Stokes code for resolving the wall jet region beyond the slot. Existing methods suffer from two deficiencies: the insensitivity of the calculation to small changes in the Coanda surface geometry; and the inability to predict the shock structure of the underexpanded supersonic wall jets. The present wall jet procedure involves a pressure-split approach in the streamwise sense to enable noniterative solution of the coupled continuity and normal momentum equations for increased surface sensitivity and allows for expansion of applications to sonic slot exit conditions. Encouraging results are obtained in comparison with experimental data for two circulation airfoils with subsonic wall jets.

Dvorak, Frank A.↗