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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 1,243 records · Page 69

In situ X-ray and IR probes relevant to Earth science at the Advanced Light Source at Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory

Access to synchrotron X-ray facilities has become an important aspect for many disciplines in experimental Earth science. This is especially important for studies that rely on probing samples in situ under natural conditions different from the ones found at the surface of the Earth. The non-ambient condition Earth science program at the Advanced Light Source (ALS), Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, offers a variety of tools utilizing the infra-red and hard X-ray spectrum that allow Earth scientists to probe Earth and environmental materials at variable conditions of pressure, stress, temperature, atmospheric composition, and humidity. These facilities are important tools for the user community in that they offer not only considerable capacity (non-ambient condition diffraction) but also complementary (IR spectroscopy, microtomography), and in some cases unique (Laue microdiffraction) instruments. The availability of the ALS’ in situ probes to the Earth science community grows especially critical during the ongoing dark time of the Advanced Photon Source in Chicago, which massively reduces available in situ synchrotron user time in North America.

58 GEOSCIENCES↗

How do energetic ions damage metallic surfaces?

Surface modification under bombardment by energetic ions observed under different conditions in structural and functional materials and can be either unavoidable effect of the conditions or targeted modification to enhance materials properties. Understanding basic mechanisms is necessary for predicting properties changes. The mechanisms activated during ion irradiation are of atomic scale and atomic scale modeling is the most suitable tool to study these processes. In this paper we present results of an extensive simulation program aimed at developing an understanding of primary surface damage in iron by energetic particles. We simulated 25 keV self-ion bombardment of Fe thin films with (100) and (110) surfaces at room temperature. A large number of simulations, ~400, were carried out allow a statistically significant treatment of the results. The particular mechanism of surface damage depends on how the destructive supersonic shock wave generated by the displacement cascade interacts with the free surface. Three basic scenarios were observed, with the limiting cases being damage created far below the surface with little or no impact on the surface itself, and extensive direct surface damage on the timescale of a few picoseconds. In some instances, formation of large <100> vacancy loops beneath the free surface was observed, which may explain some earlier experimental observations.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗

Oncentra brachytherapy planning system

In modern cancer management, treatment planning has progressed as a contemporary tool with all the advances in computing power in recent years. One of the advanced planning tools uses 3-dimensional (3D) data sets for accurate dose distributions in patient prescription. Among these planning processes, brachytherapy has been a very important part of a successful cancer management program, offering clinical benefits with specific or combined treatments with external beam therapy. In this chapter, we mainly discussed the Elekta Oncentra planning system, which is the main treatment planning tool for high-dose rate (HDR) modality in our facility and in many other facilities in the United States. HDR is a technically advanced form of brachytherapy; a high-intensity radiation source (3.6 mm in length) is delivered with step motor in submillimeter precision under computer guidance directly into the tumor areas while minimizing injury to surrounding normal healthy tissue. Oncentra planning is the key component to generate a deliverable brachytherapy procedure, which is executed on the microSelectron V3 remote afterloader treatment system. Creating a highly conformal plan can be a time-consuming task. The development of Oncentra software (version 4.5.3) offers a variety of useful tools that facilitate many of the clinical challenging tasks for planning, such as contouring and image reconstruction, as well as rapid planning calculations with dose and dose volume histogram analysis. Oncentra Brachy module creates workflow and optimizes the planning accuracy for wide varieties of clinical HDR treatments, such as skin, gynecologic (GYN), breast, prostate, and many other applications. The treatment file can also be transferred to the afterloader control station for speedy delivery. The design concept, calculation algorithms, and optimization modules presented some key characteristics to plan and treat the patients effectively and accurately. The dose distribution and accuracy of several clinical sample cases were discussed to illustrate the effectiveness and clinical efficacy. The American Association of Physicists in Medicine brachytherapy reports of TG-43 and TG-186 were also described and compared in evaluations of fundamental calculation methodologies.

62 RADIOLOGY AND NUCLEAR MEDICINE↗

The ABC130 barrel module prototyping programme for the ATLAS strip tracker

For the Phase-II Upgrade of the ATLAS Detector [1], its Inner Detector, consisting of silicon pixel, silicon strip and transition radiation sub-detectors, will be replaced with an all new 100% silicon tracker, composed of a pixel tracker at inner radii and a strip tracker at outer radii. The future ATLAS strip tracker will include 11,000 silicon sensor modules in the central region (barrel) and 7,000 modules in the forward region (end-caps), which are foreseen to be constructed over a period of 3.5 years. The construction of each module consists of a series of assembly and quality control steps, which were engineered to be identical for all production sites. In order to develop the tooling and procedures for assembly and testing of these modules, two series of major prototyping programs were conducted: an early program using readout chips designed using a 250 nm fabrication process (ABCN-250) [2,2] and a subsequent program using a follow-up chip set made using 130 nm processing (ABC130 and HCC130 chips). This second generation of readout chips was used for an extensive prototyping program that produced around 100 barrel-type modules and contributed significantly to the development of the final module layout. This paper gives an overview of the components used in ABC130 barrel modules, their assembly procedure and findings resulting from their tests.

47 OTHER INSTRUMENTATION↗

Toward Evaluating High-Level Synthesis Portability and Performance between Intel and Xilinx FPGAs

Offloading computation from a CPU to a hardware accelerator is becoming a more common solution for improving performance because traditional gains enabled by Moore’s law and Dennard scaling have slowed. GPUs are often used as hardware accelerators, but field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) are gaining traction. FPGAs are beneficial because they allow hardware specific to a particular application to be created. However, they are notoriously difficult to program. To this end, two of the main FPGA manufacturers, Intel and Xilinx, have created tools and frameworks that enable the use of higher level languages to design FPGA hardware. Although Xilinx kernels can be designed by using C/C++, both Intel and Xilinx support the use of OpenCL C to architect FPGA hardware. However, not much is known about the portability and performance between these two device families other than the fact that it is theoretically possible to synthesize a kernel meant for Intel to Xilinx and vice versa.In this work, we evaluate the portability and performance of Intel and Xilinx kernels. We use OpenCL C implementations of a subset of the Rodinia benchmarking suite that were designed for an Intel FPGA and make the necessary modifications to create synthesizable OpenCL C kernels for a Xilinx FPGA. We find that the difficulty of porting certain kernel optimizations varies, depending on the construct. Once the minimum amount of modifications is made to create synthesizable hardware for the Xilinx platform, more nontrivial work is needed to improve performance. However, we find that constructs that are known to be performant for an FPGA should improve performance regardless of the platform; the difficulty comes in deciding how to invoke certain kernel optimizations while also abiding by the constraints enforced by a given platform’s hardware compiler.

Cabrera, Anthony↗

Ravel

Ravel is a tool for analyzing and visualizing parallel execution traces. It deduces a logical structure of parallel program events from the trace records and calculates comparative metrics. It displays the results of this analysis using multiple views at varying levels of detail to allow interactive exploration of the trace.

Source record↗

IREP

A tool for filling C/C++ or Fortran data structures from Lua input tables. IREP reads external program input using the Lua C Library, organizes the input into native language structures, and shares those structures among compiled program objects written in either (or both) C/C++ or Fortran.

Busby, Lee↗

Indira: intent-based networking and rendering for networks (Indira) v1

Intelligent Network Deployment Intent Renderer Application an interactive network assistant that will help us configure a data path between two scientific end-point groups (EPGs) to optimize the transfer of elephant data flows. This tool is able to talk to scientists gather network requirements and then convert to network programming code and automate the end-to-end provisioning.

Pouyoul, Eric↗

ThunderBoltz API

The ThunderBoltz application programming interface (API) code is written in Python and is comprised of a set of tools to facilitate compilation of the ThunderBoltz code, as well as fast assembly and formatting of input files for the ThunderBoltz code, post-processing tools of ThunderBoltz results, plotting tools, and runs/schedules the ThunderBoltz code executable for calculations. The ThunderBoltz API code is utilized for importing and manipulating input cross section sets, input conditions, and any other simulation settings made available within the ThunderBoltz input deck via user-defined settings or via automatic generation. The API comes with a set of plotting capabilities of input cross sections, results from ThunderBoltz, and post-processed results carried out with the API.

Park, Ryan↗

CIGEN

CIGEN is a tool that finds input ranges that cause high compiler-induced numerical inconsistencies in numerical programs written in a compiled language. Numerical program behavior may diverge when they are compiled and ran differently. Many factors, such as different hardware architectures (for example, the x87 FPU with its 80-bit registers), different compilers, or different optimization flags may cause the results of floating-point computations to become inconsistent. This kind of inconsistencies are known as compiler-induced numerical inconsistencies. Given a program with floating-point inputs and an output,

Laguna Peralta, Ignacio↗

maranasgroup/KETCHUP

Repository for Kinetic Estimation Tool Capturing Heterogeneous Datasets Using Pyomo (KETCHUP), a flexible parameter estimation tool that leverages a primal-dual interior-point algorithm to solve a nonlinear programming (NLP) problem that identifies a set of parameters capable of recapitulating the steady-state fluxes and concentrations in wild-type and perturbed metabolic networks.

Suthers, Patrick↗

Advancement of DOE's EnergyPlus Building Energy Simulation Payment

EnergyPlus{sup TM} is a new generation computer software analysis tool that has been developed, tested, and commercialized to support DOE's Building Technologies (BT) Program in terms of whole-building, component, and systems R&D (http://www.energyplus.gov). It is also being used to support evaluation and decision making of zero energy building (ZEB) energy efficiency and supply technologies during new building design and existing building retrofits. The 5-year project was managed by the National Energy Technology Laboratory and was divided into 5 budget period between 2006 and 2011. During the project period, 11 versions of EnergyPlus were released. This report summarizes work performed by an EnergyPlus development team led by the University of Central Florida's Florida Solar Energy Center (UCF/FSEC). The team members consist of DHL Consulting, C. O. Pedersen Associates, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Oklahoma State University, GARD Analytics, Inc., and WrightSoft Corporation. The project tasks involved new feature development, testing and validation, user support and training, and general EnergyPlus support. The team developed 146 new features during the 5-year period to advance the EnergyPlus capabilities. Annual contributions of new features are 7 in budget period 1, 19 in period 2, 36 in period 3, 41 in period 4, and 43 in period 5, respectively. The testing and validation task focused on running test suite and publishing report, developing new IEA test suite cases, testing and validating new source code, addressing change requests, and creating and testing installation package. The user support and training task provided support for users and interface developers, and organized and taught workshops. The general support task involved upgrading StarTeam (team sharing) software and updating existing utility software. The project met the DOE objectives and completed all tasks successfully. Although the EnergyPlus software was enhanced significantly under this project, more enhancements are needed for further improvement to ensure that EnergyPlus is able to simulate the latest technologies and perform desired HAVC system operations for the development of next generation HVAC systems. Additional development will be performed under a new 5-year project managed by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗

The ACTS Center for Software Sustainability

This report covers the activities carried out by the project The ACTS Center for Software Sustainability, whose proposal was submitted to ASCR in 2007. These activities have their roots in the project Advanced Computational Testing Software (ACTS) Toolkit, which was part of the DOE2000 Program. Driven by the state of the software, the technology and the nature of the tools in the Toolkit, the project was reformulated in a project that better represented the goals and activities within ACTS, An Expanded Framework for the Advanced CompuTational Software (ACTS) Collection. At the heart of this project was the consolidation of lessons learned and demands from the computational science community that guided us to the creation of the now well-known DOE ACTS Collection. The goal of the project was to increase the pay-off of DOE ASCR investment in the development of the general purpose tools in the DOE ACTS Collection, reduce the duplication of efforts, and minimize the development time of high-end computer applications while maximizing the life of the codes.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗

Energy-efficient Public Procurement: Best Practice in Program Delivery

This document illustrates the key issues and considerations involved in implementing energy-efficient public procurement. Our primary sources of information have been our partners in the Super Efficient Equipment and Appliance Deployment (SEAD) Initiative Procurement Working Group. Where applicable, we have highlighted specific ways in which working group participants have successfully overcome barriers to delivering effective programs. The following key points emerge from this analysis of programs for energy-efficient public procurement. Lessons for both developed and developing programs are highlighted throughout the guide. 1. Policy: Policy provides the initiative to begin a transition from first cost to life-cycle cost based purchasing methods and culture. Effective policy is well-communicated, establishes accountability from top to bottom of organizations and simplifies the processes necessary to comply. Flexibility and responsiveness are essential in policy development and implementation. Mandatory and voluntary policies may complement one another. 2. Procurement Criteria: Procurement staff must be confident that energy-efficient procurement criteria offer the best long-term value for their organization’s money and represent real environmental gains. Involving multiple stakeholders at the early stages of the criteria creation process can result in greater levels of cooperation from private industry. Criteria should make comparison of products easy for purchasers and require minimal additional calculations. Criteria will need to be regularly updated to reflect market developments. 3. Training: Resources for the creation of training programs are usually very limited, but well-targeted training is necessary in order for a program to be effective. Training must emphasize a process that is efficient for purchasers and simplifies compliance. Purchaser resources and policy must be well designed for training to be effective. Training program development is an excellent opportunity for collaboration amongst public authorities. 4. Procurement Processes: Many tools and guides intended to help buyers comply with energy-efficient procurement policy are designed without detailed knowledge of the procurement process. A deeper understanding of purchasing pathways allows resources to be better directed. Current research by national and international bodies aims to analyze purchasing pathways and can assist in developing future resources.

25 ENERGY STORAGE↗

Materials for Energy Conversion: Materials for Energy Conversion and Storage

The main objective of this collaborative research project was to identify a formulation and develop a catalyst for electro-oxidation of ethanol. Ethanol is one of the most mass-produced biofuels, and such catalysts will enable the development of Direct Ethanol Fuel Cell technology and through it, will interconnect fuel cells with biofuels. Several catalysts for direct electrochemical oxidation of ethanol have been selected on the principles of rational desig from the knowledge build in studying aqueous oxidation of ethanol. The program involved fundamental study of ethanol oxidation in liquid media, and particularly in alakine solutions. The lessons learned from the heterogeneous catalysis of ethanol thermal oxidation have been applied to the design of an electrocatalyst for direct ethanol fuel cells. The successful chemical compositions are based on PdZn and NiZn allows. The studies reveled the role of the transition metal oxide phase as a co-catalyst and the role of the active support material. To complete the set of materials for ethanol fuel cell, this program also invested n the development of ctalysts for oxygen reduction that are selective against alcohol oxidation. Non-platinum ctalysts based on pyrolyzed macrocycles or similar composites have been studied. This program included also the development of stuctured supports as an integral part of the catalyst development. A new family of materials has been designed based on mesoporous silica templating with synthetic carbon resulting in hierarchicaly porous structure. Structure-to-property relationship of catalysis and catalysts has been the center of this program. This have been engaged in both surface and bulk level and pursued with the tools avialble at the academic institutions and at LANSCE at LANL. The structural studies have been built in interaction with a computational effort on the basis of DFT approach to materials structure and reactivity.

08 HYDROGEN↗

2016 Geothermal Technologies Office Annual Report

This report highlights project successes and continued efforts in all of our program areas – EGS, Hydrothermal, Low-Temperature, and Systems Analysis – which are flanked by useful tools and resources and links to more information. Such highlights include FORGE and EGS successes, projects reducing geothermal costs and risks, and advancements in technology research and development.

15 GEOTHERMAL ENERGY↗

A Review of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act Smart Grid Projects and Their Implications for China

The Chinese government has paid growing attention to renewable energy development and has set ambitious goals for carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions reduction and energy savings. Smart grid (SG) technologies have been regarded as emerging ways to integrate renewable energy and to help achieve these climate and energy goals. This report first reviews completed SG demonstrations under the U.S. American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA); especially two key programs: the SG Investment Grant (SGIG) and the SG Demonstration Project (SGDP). Under the SGIG, the larger of the two programs, over $3.4 billion was used to help industry deploy existing advanced SG technologies and tools to improve grid performance and reduce costs. Including industry investment, a total of $8 billion was spent on 99 cost-shared projects, which involved more than 200 participating electric utilities and other organizations. These projects aimed to modernize the electric grid, strengthen cyber security, improve interoperability, and collect comprehensive data on SG operations and benefits.

29 ENERGY PLANNING, POLICY, AND ECONOMY↗

A High-Fidelity Approach for the Simulation of Flow-Induced Vibration

Flow-induced vibration (FIV) is a widespread problem in energy systems becausethey rely on fluid movement for energy conversion. Vibrating structures may be damaged as fatigue or wear occur. Given the importance of reliable components in the nuclear industry, flow-induced vibrations have long been a major concern in the safety and operation of nuclear reactors. In particular,nuclear fuel and steam generators have been known to suffer from flow-induced vibrations and related failures. Over the past five years, the Nuclear EnergyAdvanced Modeling and Simulation program has developed the integrated multiphysics code suite SHARP. The goal of developing such a tool is to perform multiphysics modeling of the components inside a reactor core, the full reactor core or portions of it, and be able to achieve that with various levelsof fidelity. This flexibility allows users to select the appropriate level of fidelity for their computational resources and design constraints.In particular SHARP contains high-fidelity single-physics codes for structural mechanics and fluid mechanics calculations: the structural mechanics implicit code Diablo and the computational fluid dynamics spectral element code Nek5000. Both codes are state-of-the-art.highly scalable (up to millions of processors in the case of Nek5000) tools that have been extensively validated. These tools form a strong basis on which to build an FIV modeling capability.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗