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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 127 records · Page 7
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2021

Electro-optical measurement of intense electric field on a high energy pulsed power accelerator

We describe a direct electro-optical approach to measuring a strong 118 MV/m narrow pulse width (~ 33 ns) electric field in the magnetically insulated transmission line (MITL) of a pulsed power accelerator. To date, this is the highest direct external electric field measured electro-optically in a pulsed power accelerator, and it is between two to three orders of magnitude higher than values reported in comparable high energy scientific experiments. The MITL electric field is one of the most important operating parameters in an accelerator and is critical to understanding the properties of the radiation output. However, accurately measuring these high fields using conventional pulsed power diagnostics is difficult due to the strength of interfering particles and fields. Our approach uses a free-space laser beam with a dielectric crystal sensor that is highly immune to electromagnetic interference and does not require an external calibration. Here we focus on device theory, operating parameters, laboratory and pulsed power accelerator experiments as well as challenges that were overcome in the measurement environment.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2022

Materials and Fuels Complex FY-22 – FY-26 Five-Year Mission Strategy

The Idaho National Laboratory (INL), through its designated mission of advancing innovative nuclear energy solutions, is actively engaged in the research, development, demonstration and deployment of advanced nuclear technology. Key to the success of INL’s mission is the Materials and Fuels Complex (MFC), the only complex in the U.S. that hosts a world-class assemblage of facilities, capabilities and instruments for handling, testing, and characterizing nuclear fuel and radioactive materials. Driven by its mission/vision of “Engineering and Experiments that Drive the World’s Nuclear Energy Future,” MFC is at the center of INL’s – and indeed the Department of Energy’s – advanced nuclear technology development initiatives, providing essential capabilities such as research-scale high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU) fuel production, reactor demonstration facilities, post-irradiation examination, and transient irradiation testing. Furthermore, MFC provides an ideal environment for test beds that are utilized for research, development and demonstration (RD&D) activities on used fuel treatment, nuclear non-proliferation, forensics, and nuclear power sources used for space exploration missions conducted by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).

11 NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE AND FUEL MATERIALS↗
DOE OSTI2020

Radiation Source Localization Using Surrogate Models Constructed from 3-D Monte Carlo Transport Physics Simulations

Recent research has focused on the development of surrogate models for radiation source localization in a simulated urban domain. We employ the Monte Carlo N-Particle (MCNP) code to provide high- delity simulations of radiation transport within an urban domain. The model is constructed to employ a source location (x, y, z) as input and return the estimated count rate for a set of speci ed detector locations. Because MCNP simulations are computationally expensive, we develop e cient and accurate surrogate models of the detector responses. We construct surrogate models using Gaussian processes (GP) and neural networks (NN) that we train and verify using the MCNP simulations. The trained surrogate models provide an e cient framework for Bayesian inference and experimental design. We employ Delayed Rejection Adaptive Metropolis (DRAM), a Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) algorithm, to infer the location and intensity of an unknown source. The DRAM results yield a posterior probability distribution for the source's location conditioned on the observed detector count rates. The posterior distribution exhibits regions of high and low probability within the simulated environment identifying potential source locations. In this manner, we can quantify the source location to within at least one of these regions of high probability in the considered cases. Employing these methods, we are able to reduce the space of potential source locations by at least 60%.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗
DOE OSTI2025

Design and Construction of the CMS Outer Tracker for the Phase-2 Upgrade

The High Luminosity LHC (HL-LHC) is expected to deliver an integrated luminosity of 3000-4000~fb$^{-1}$ after 10 years of operation with peak instantaneous luminosity reaching about 5-7.5$\times10^{34}$cm$^{-2}$s$^{-1}$. During Long Shutdown 3, several components of the CMS detector will undergo major changes, called Phase-2 upgrades, to be able to operate in the challenging environment of the HL-LHC. The current CMS tracker will be replaced. The Phase-2 Outer Tracker (OT) will have high radiation tolerance, higher granularity, and the capability to handle higher data rates. Moreover, the OT will provide tracking information to the Level-1 trigger, for the first time at hadron colliders, allowing trigger rates to be kept at a sustainable level without sacrificing physics potential. For this, the OT will be made of modules with two closely spaced silicon sensors read out by front-end ASICs, which can correlate hits in the two sensors creating short track segments (stubs), used for tracking in the L1 track finder. The modules come in two flavors: strip-strip (2S) and pixel-strip (PS), containing different sensor configurations and multiple ASICs. This contribution will present the design of the Phase-2 OT, the first results with pre-production devices, and the quality assurance procedures used to ensure the functionality of the modules: from fulfilling the precision specification of the module assembly procedure to ensuring the proper communication among the module's ASICs.

43 PARTICLE ACCELERATORS↗
DOE OSTI2020

The CMS Outer Tracker for the High Luminosity LHC

The High Luminosity LHC (HL-LHC) is expected to deliver an integrated luminosity of 3000 - 4000 fb -1 in its lifetime with peak instantaneous luminosities reaching about 5 - 7.5×10 34 cm -2 s -1 . During the Long Shutdown 3 period, several components of the CMS detector will undergo major changes, called Phase-2 upgrades, to be able to operate in the challenging environment of the HL-LHC, including the replacement of the entire silicon tracker. The Phase-2 Outer Tracker (OT) will have high radiation tolerance, higher granularity, and the capability to handle higher data rates. Another key feature of the OT will be to provide tracking information to the Level-1 trigger, allowing trigger rates to be kept at a sustainable level without sacrificing physics potential. For this, the OT will be made of modules that have two closely spaced sensors read out by the same electronics, which can correlate hits in the two sensors creating short track segments called ”stubs”. The stubs will be used for tracking at 40 MHz. In this contribution, the design of the CMS Phase-2 OT, the technological choices, and highlights of research and development activities are reported.

Ravera, Fabio↗
DOE OSTI2025

Design and construction of the CMS Outer Tracker for the phase-2 upgrade

The High-Luminosity LHC (HL-LHC) is expected to deliver an integrated luminosity of 3000–4000 fb −1 over 10 years of operation with the peak instantaneous luminosity reaching about 5–7.5 × 1 0 34 cm −2 s −1 . During Long Shutdown 3, several components of the CMS detector will undergo major improvements, called Phase-2 upgrades, to be able to operate in the challenging environment of the HL-LHC. The current CMS tracker will be replaced. The Phase-2 Outer Tracker (OT) will have increased radiation tolerance, higher granularity, and the capability to handle higher data rates. Moreover, the OT will provide tracking information to the Level-1 trigger for the first time at a hadron collider, allowing trigger rates to be kept at a sustainable level without sacrificing physics potential. For this, the OT will be made of modules with two closely-spaced silicon sensors read out by front-end ASICs that can correlate hits in the two sensors to create short track segments, used in the Level-1 track finder. The modules come in two flavors: strip-strip and pixel-strip, containing different sensor configurations and multiple ASICs. This contribution presents the Phase-2 OT, the finalization of the OT module design, and the quality assurance and control procedures used to ensure that the modules fulfill both the specifications from the assembly steps as well as the proper communication among the ASICs.

Zoi, Irene [Fermilab] (ORCID:0000000257389446)↗
DOE OSTI2023

Decision-making Framework to Support the End-of-Life Management of High-Activity Radioactive Sources

Sealed radioactive sources are used for an extremely wide range of purposes, including as radiation sources in various nuclear facilities, universities, hospitals, biomedical and industrial applications, as well as for geological prospecting and exploration. The proper management of these sealed radioactive sources once they have reached their end-of-life is still a global challenge. Very few field-tested Mobile Hot Cells (MHC) exist in the world to support the end-of-life management of disused high-activity radioactive sources. One of the critical challenges that a source recovery team encounters on each site is to find adequate space, and access to that space to complete the staging and recapture process with a MHC; this process is tedious, uncertain, and time-consuming. Therefore, it is essential to understand the planning and management of the MHC setup and takedown. Currently, there isn't an single capable planning tool that will provide an effective medium to plan, inform, educate, and communicate knowledge about the environment where the MHC will be deployed. We present a novel approach for the planning and management of the deployment of the MHC to several different sites that relies on technology. Furthermore, this planning tool will support collaboration, promote information sharing, and foster better decision making processes, resulting in a more efficient, and reliable setup and source recovery with the MHC.

61 RADIATION PROTECTION AND DOSIMETRY↗
DOE OSTI2021

Neutron radiation hardness of aluminum gallium nitride UV LEDs at various wavelengths

Radiation hard diagnostics are critical to the success of nuclear fusion at National Ignition Facility, Z, ITER, and prolonged space explorations. We have first demonstrated the exceptional proton radiation hardness of initial GaN devices and qualified their space flight and deployment for missions such as the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna and International Space Station. We have further conducted neutron radiation hardness experiments at Los Alamos Neutron Science Center by opening a new high fluence beam station. During 2014–2016, we irradiated multiple Aluminum Gallium Nitride (AlGaN) LEDs with a maximum fluence of 2.4 × 1013 neutrons/cm2 in 3 years and generated 54 161 current–voltage (I–V) scan traces. Our data processing program analyzes each and all I–V traces. In addition, we retrieved local temperature records to analyze and remove temperature effects in the outdoor environment. The I–V curve families of AlGaN UV LEDs with emitting wavelengths of 265, 275, and 310 nm were compared. The I–V curves of 265 nm AlGaN UV LEDs have the smallest deviations from the average value, while the I–V curves for 310 nm AlGaN LEDs showed the largest deviations from the average value. We have reached another important recommendation for the optimal use of multiple AlGaN optoelectronic devices or imaging arrays for inertially confined fusion diagnostics: Shorter wavelength devices at 265 nm exhibit more consistent radiation hardness performance than the 310 nm devices. Higher aluminum content LEDs or AlxGa1–xN devices with higher mole fraction x for generating shorter wavelengths have better radiation hardness for fusion diagnostics.

Sun, K. -X. (ORCID:0000000224659235)↗
DOE OSTI2022

Longevity evaluation of SiC based alpha voltaic batteries with surface alpha sources

The alpha emitting actinide 241 Am is electrodeposited on the surface of the Pt electrode of in-house fabricated SiC Schottky diodes. With 17 nCi 241 Am directly coated on the top of a device, the 2-pi geometry yields a high energy (5.486 MeV) and a long-term irradiation accumulating to a high fluence (1.6 × 10 9 alpha particles’ infusion/month). The forward, reverse I/V, and dark current, are periodically measured to monitor key characteristics of device durability for any sign of degradation over time. The direct deposition of actinides on the surface of the device also enables the evaluation of radiation damage through alpha particles’ energy spectroscopic performance, which shows a clear spectrum degradation that can be reversed by optical excitation of the device prior to spectrum acquisition. As an analytical aide, the device performance is also simulated by Allpix 2 . Lastly, this study provides an insight into the durability of 4H-SiC as an energy converter option for alpha-voltaic batteries and the survivability in the other harsh environment found in nuclear fuel cycle, high energy physics, fission, fusion, and space exploration where rad-hard sensors are required.

Americium↗
DOE OSTI2026

Evaluating radiation impact on transmon qubits in above and underground facilities

Superconducting qubits can be sensitive to energy deposits caused by cosmic rays and ambient radioactivity. While previous studies have explored correlated effects in time and space due to cosmic ray interactions, we present the first direct comparison of a transmon qubit’s performance measured at two distinct sites: the above-ground SQMS facility (Fermilab, US) and the deep-underground Gran Sasso Laboratory (Italy). Despite the stark difference in radiation levels, we observe a similar average qubit relaxation time of approximately 80 microseconds at both locations. To investigate radiation-induced events, we employ a fast decay detection protocol, comparing the relative rates of events between the two environments. Although intrinsic noise remains the dominant source of errors in superconducting qubits, our analysis revealed a significant excess of radiation-induced events for high-coherence transmon qubits operated above-ground. Finally, using γ-ray sources with increasing activity levels, we evaluate the qubit response in a controlled low-background environment.

De Dominicis, Francesco [GSSI, Aquila; INFN, LNS]↗
DOE OSTI2024

DG-IMEX method for a two-moment model for radiation transport in the $\mathscr{O}$($v$/$c$) limit

Here, we consider neutral particle systems described by moments of a phase-space density and propose a realizability-preserving numerical method to evolve a spectral two-moment model for particles interacting with a background fluid moving with nonrelativistic velocities. The system of nonlinear moment equations, with special relativistic corrections to $\mathscr{O}$($v$/$c$), expresses a balance between phase-space advection and collisions and includes velocity-dependent terms that account for spatial advection, Doppler shift, and angular aberration. The model is conservative for the correct $\mathscr{O}$($v$/$c$) Eulerian-frame number density and is consistent, to $\mathscr{O}$($v$/$c$), with Eulerian-frame energy and momentum conservation. This model is closely related to the one promoted by Lowrie et al. and similar to models currently used to study transport phenomena in large-scale simulations of astrophysical environments. The proposed numerical method is designed to preserve moment realizability, which guarantees that the moments correspond to a nonnegative phase-space density. The realizability-preserving scheme consists of the following key components: (i) a strong stability-preserving implicit-explicit (IMEX) time-integration method; (ii) a discontinuous Galerkin (DG) phase-space discretization with carefully constructed numerical uxes; (iii) a realizability-preserving implicit collision update; and(iv) a realizability-enforcing limiter. In time integration, nonlinearity of the moment model necessitates solution of nonlinear equations, which we formulate as fixed-point problems and solve with tailored iterative solvers that preserve moment realizability with guaranteed global convergence. We also analyze the simultaneous Eulerian-frame number and energy conservation properties of the semi-discrete DG scheme and propose a "spectral redistribution" scheme that promotes Eulerian-frame energy conservation. Through numerical experiments, we demonstrate the accuracy and robustness of this DG-IMEX method and investigate its Eulerian-frame energy conservation properties.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2020

Design and out-of-pile testing of a novel irradiation experiment vehicle to support qualification of nuclear thermal propulsion components

Fission power systems have demonstrated higher thermal energy density per unit mass than chemical systems. High mass specific energy density offers advantages in space thermal propulsion applications. In the 1960s, nuclear thermal propulsion (NTP) development included the ROVER/NERVA program, in which full-scale prototype reactors were tested on the ground using hydrogen as the reactor coolant and propellant. NTP systems are being revisited, with expectations of improved performance resulting from improved fuel materials, allowing propellant temperatures near 2,800 K and over 20 thermal propulsion cycles. An apparatus has been developed to test NTP fuel materials in a research reactor at temperature and in a radiation environment typical of the NTP application. Here, this paper presents the design constraints, preliminary scoping thermal analysis, and basic thermal qualification testing for the out-of-pile experiment set apparatus, or OUTSET.

33 ADVANCED PROPULSION SYSTEMS↗
DOE OSTI2024

Design and construction of the CMS Outer Tracker for the Phase-2 Upgrade

The High Luminosity LHC (HL-LHC) is expected to deliver an integrated luminosity of $3000-4000\;$fb$^{-1}$ after 10 years of operation with peak instantaneous luminosity reaching about $5-7.5\times10^{34}$cm$^{-2}$s$^{-1}$. During Long Shutdown 3, several components of the CMS detector will undergo major changes, called Phase-2 upgrades, to be able to operate in the challenging environment of the HL-LHC. The current CMS silicon strip tracker has to be replaced with a new detector. The Phase-2 Outer Tracker (OT) will have high radiation tolerance, higher granularity and the capability to handle higher data rates. Another key feature of the OT will be to provide tracking information to the Level-1 trigger, allowing trigger rates to be kept at a sustainable level without sacrificing physics potential. For this, the OT will be made out of modules which have two closely spaced sensors read out by front-end ASICs, which can correlate hits in the two sensors creating short track segments, called stubs. The stubs will be used for tracking in the L1 track finder. In this contribution, the design of the CMS Phase-2 OT, the technological choices and first results with prototype devices are reported.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗
DOE OSTI2020

Thermal Insulation for a High Temperature Molten Salt Storage Tank in a CSP Plant

A ternary molten chloride has been suggested as a high temperature (550-720 °C) sensible heat storage medium for a two-tank system. An effective thermal insulation is proposed to provide an opportunity for the fabrication of both the hot and cold storage tanks from lower cost metals, e.g. A240-347H, by maintaining the tank wall below 500 °C. To achieve this, the hot storage tank mainly comprises of inner shell (11.4 cm of a refractory brick as liner (KX-99®), 30 cm of insulation brick) and outer metal shell, where 5 cm of frozen layer of PCM800 (NaCl), and 5 cm of ceramic wool fill the annular space between the shells. Another layer of ceramic wool was introduced at the outer side of the metal shell to keep the temperature lower than 60 °C. ANSYS Fluent was used for the numerical study of the cool down behavior of the system during idle period when tank is quarter-filled. The heat transfer modes were considered as radiation and natural convection heat transfer from the hot molten salt at 720 °C, conduction through the solid layers and convection heat transfer from the outer shell to the environment at 15 °C. The results showed that the proposed insulation system including a frozen layer of PCM800 maintains the temperature at the metal wall lower than 500 °C, and lower than 60°C at the outer side of the tank. Apart from the insulation property of the frozen layer of PCM800, it absorbs any leak of hot molten salt, acting as a barrier between salt and the metal shell. The thermal performance analysis provide an insight into the benefits of the multilayer insulation.

41 EE - Solar Energy Technologies Office (EE-4S)↗
DOE OSTI2020

Thermal Insulation for a High Temperature Molten Salt Storage Tank in a CSP Plant: Preprint

A ternary molten chloride has been suggested as a high temperature (550-720 °C) sensible heat storage medium for a two-tank system. An effective thermal insulation is proposed to provide an opportunity for the fabrication of both the hot and cold storage tanks from lower cost metals, e.g. A240-347H, by maintaining the tank wall below 500 °C. To achieve this, the hot storage tank mainly comprises of inner shell (11.4 cm of a refractory brick as liner (KX-99 ®), 30 cm of insulation brick) and outer metal shell, where 5 cm of frozen layer of PCM800 (NaCl), and 5 cm of ceramic wool fill the annular space between the shells. Another layer of ceramic wool was introduced at the outer side of the metal shell to keep the temperature lower than 60 °C. ANSYS Fluent was used for the numerical study of the cool down behavior of the system during idle period when tank is quarter-filled. The heat transfer modes were considered as radiation and natural convection heat transfer from the hot molten salt at 720 °C, conduction through the solid layers and convection heat transfer from the outer shell to the environment at 15 °C. The results showed that the proposed insulation system including a frozen layer of PCM800 maintains the temperature at the metal wall lower than 500 °C, and lower than 60 °C at the outer side of the tank. Apart from the insulation property of the frozen layer of PCM800, it absorbs any leak of hot molten salt, acting as a barrier between salt and the metal shell. The thermal performance analysis provide an insight into the benefits of the multilayer insulation.

41 EE - Solar Energy Technologies Office (EE-4S)↗
DOE OSTI2021

Long-Term Effects of Very Low Dose Particle Radiation on Gene Expression in the Heart: Degenerative Disease Risks

Compared to low doses of gamma irradiation (γ-IR), high-charge-and-energy (HZE) particle IR may have different biological response thresholds in cardiac tissue at lower doses, and these effects may be IR type and dose dependent. Three- to four-month-old female CB6F1/Hsd mice were exposed once to one of four different doses of the following types of radiation: γ-IR 137Cs (40-160 cGy, 0.662 MeV), 14Si-IR (4-32 cGy, 260 MeV/n), or 22Ti-IR (3-26 cGy, 1 GeV/n). At 16 months post-exposure, animals were sacrificed and hearts were harvested and archived as part of the NASA Space Radiation Tissue Sharing Forum. These heart tissue samples were used in our study for RNA isolation and microarray hybridization. Functional annotation of twofold up/down differentially expressed genes (DEGs) and bioinformatics analyses revealed the following: (i) there were no clear lower IR thresholds for HZE- or γ-IR; (ii) there were 12 common DEGs across all 3 IR types; (iii) these 12 overlapping genes predicted various degrees of cardiovascular, pulmonary, and metabolic diseases, cancer, and aging; and (iv) these 12 genes revealed an exclusive non-linear DEG pattern in 14Si- and 22Ti-IR-exposed hearts, whereas two-thirds of γ-IR-exposed hearts revealed a linear pattern of DEGs. Thus, our study may provide experimental evidence of excess relative risk (ERR) quantification of low/very low doses of full-body space-type IR-associated degenerative disease development.

63 RADIATION, THERMAL, AND OTHER ENVIRON. POLLUTAN↗
DOE OSTI2022

Information Content of a Synergy of Ground-Based and Space-Based Infrared Sounders. Part I: Clear-Sky Environments

Abstract Profiles of atmospheric temperature and water vapor from remotely sensed platforms provide critical observations within the temporal and spatial gaps of the radiosonde network. The 2017 National Academies of Science Decadal Survey highlighted that observations of the planetary boundary layer (PBL) from the current space-based observing system are not of the necessary accuracy or resolution for monitoring and predicting high-impact weather phenomena. One possible solution to improving observations of the PBL is supplementing the existing space-based observing system with a network of ground-based profilers. A synthetic information content study is developed utilizing profiles from the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) program sites at the Southern Great Plains (SGP), east North Atlantic (ENA), and North Slope of Alaska (NSA) to assess the benefits, in terms of degrees of freedom (DOF), vertical resolution, and uncertainties, of a synergy between the ground-based Atmospheric Emitted Radiance Interferometer (AERI) with space-based hyperspectral infrared (IR) sounders. A combination of AERI with any of the three polar-orbiting IR sounders: the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS), the Cross-track Infrared Sounder (CrIS), or the Infrared Atmospheric Sounding Interferometer (IASI), results in a DOF increase of 30%–40% in the surface-to-700-hPa layer compared to the space-based instrument alone. Introducing AERI measurements to the observing system also results in significant improvements to vertical resolution and uncertainties in the bottom 1000 m of the atmosphere compared to CrIS measurements alone. A synergy of CrIS and AERI exceeds the 1-km-vertical-resolution goal set by the Decadal Survey in the lowest 1000 m.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2024

Design and construction of the CMS Outer Tracker for the Phase-2 Upgrade

he High Luminosity LHC (HL-LHC) is expected to deliver an integrated luminosity of $3000-4000$~fb$^{-1}$ after 10 years of operation with peak instantaneous luminosity reaching about $5-7.5\times10^{34}$cm$^{-2}$s$^{-1}$. During Long Shutdown 3, several components of the CMS detector will undergo major changes, called Phase-2 upgrade, to be able to operate in the challenging environment of the HL-LHC. The current CMS silicon strip tracker has to be replaced with a new detector. The Phase-2 Outer Tracker (OT) will have higher radiation tolerance, higher granularity, and the capability to handle higher data rates compared to the current system. Another key feature of the OT will be to provide tracking information to the Level-1 (L1) trigger, allowing trigger rates to be kept at a sustainable level without sacrificing physics potential. For this, the OT will be made out of modules with two closely spaced sensors read out by front-end ASICs, which can correlate hits in the two sensors creating short track segments called stubs. The stubs will be used for tracking in the L1 track finder. The modules come in two flavors: strip-strip (2S) and pixel-strip (PS), which contain different sensor configurations and multiple ASICs. In this contribution, the design of the CMS Phase-2 OT, the technological choices, and the quality assurance (QA) procedures used to ensure the functionality of the modules will be reported. The contribution will cover the first results with pre-production devices and the different aspects taken into account during the QA: from fulfilling the precision specification of the module assembly procedure to ensuring the proper communication between the different ASICs on the module. The module noise performance is also checked and the full module functionality is verified at different temperatures.

Zoi, Irene↗