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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 19 records
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2016

Laboratory biological safety cabinet (BSC) explosion

Scientists at universities across Iraq are actively working to report actual incidents and accidents occurring in their laboratories in order to raise awareness and encourage openness, leading to widespread adoption of robust Chemical Safety and Security (CSS) practices. This manuscript is the first in a series of five case studies describing laboratory incidents and accidents in Iraqi university laboratories in order to share lessons learned and minimize the possibility of similar incidents in the future. In this study, we describe a serious event that resulted in a postgraduate student sustaining serious injuries when the biological safety cabinet (BSC) she was using exploded. Of particular note, the paper highlights how a combination of failures and deficiencies at many levels within an organization and its technical community (rather than a single piece of faulty equipment or the careless behavior of one person) can lead to a dangerous, potentially life-threatening incident. By openly sharing what happened along with the lessons learned from the accident, we hope to minimize the possibility of another researcher being injured in a similar incident in the future.

biological safety cabinet↗
DOE OSTI2016

Strategic Planning as a Competitive Advantage by Using the BSC as a Management Tool: a Case Study in Application of Radioisotope Technology at IPEN - 16400

Strategic planning is one of the most important management tools for organizational decision making. The nuclear area represents a segment of energy production used by many countries in America, Europe and Asia. It is known that in the future nuclear energy can be a major exit to the global energy crisis. The aim of this research was to use the Balanced Scorecard (BSC) as a strategic tool for decision making in a teaching and research institution of the nuclear area - Nuclear and Energy Research Institute (IPEN), located in the city of Sao Paulo, which belongs to the National Nuclear Energy Commission (CNEN) in Brazil. The methodology used in this academic doctoral study was a case study, which considered the period of research from December 2012 to December 2015. The main results expected from this case study are: the improvement of information flow, the view, the increased visibility of an organization providing education and especially research in relation to published works, increased interaction among IPEN and the main global research institutes and centers, increasing academic production of technical articles, indicator improvement, improving the monitoring of management actions, among others. Given the expected results one can conclude that this study will be of great value to the IPEN and also for the Brazilian energy sector, as it will allow and contribute to the dissemination and demystification of nuclear power as an energy source of mankind, its peaceful applications and for the management activity of knowledge and innovation production in the nuclear area of IPEN. (authors)

12 MANAGEMENT OF RADIOACTIVE AND NON-RADIOACTIVE W↗
NASA NTRS1990

SATCOM antenna siting study on a P-3C using the NEC-BSC V3.1

The location of a UHF SATCOM antenna on a P-3C aircraft is studied using the NEC-Basic Scattering Code V3.1 (NEC-BSC3). The NEC-BSC3 is a computer code based on the uniform theory of diffraction. The code is first validated for this application using scale model measurements. In general, the comparisons are good except in 10 degree regions near the nose and tail of the aircraft. Patterns for various antenna locations are analyzed to achieve a prescripted performance.

Bensman, D.↗
DOE OSTI2025

Biomass to bio-energy supply chain: Economic viability, case studies, challenges and policy implications in India

Biomass supply chain (BSC) management is an integral part of renewable energy projects, which include biomass-harvesting, collection, storage, processing and transportation to the bio-energy plants. The sustainability concept identifies economy, environment, and society as the three principal pillars of bioenergy. With an effective BSC implemented, all three dimensions of sustainability can be attained. Although, there’s been extensive research on the environmental sustainability of BSC, the economic aspects are under-represented in existing literature. So, an elaborate analysis on the economic viability of BSCs developed worldwide and those in India is critical, and needs to be studied. This review conducts a detailed accounting of the economic aspects of a BSC which includes the existing challenges in designing an environmental-cum-economically efficient BSC and strategies to address the issues. The Indian context has been studied on the BSC models, highlighting their shortcomings, while encapsulating the essential insights from global BSC models for a cost-effective BSC-to-bioenergy in India. Here, this review also emphasizes the policies supporting the BSC in India and forecasts the future biomass demand and supply. This review will provide stakeholders with critical insights on BSC and related challenges and assist them to investigate and devise strategies for successful implementation of BSCs in India.

Biomass↗
DOE OSTI2020

High Layer Uniformity of Two-Dimensional Materials Demonstrated Surprisingly from Broad Features in Surface Electron Diffraction

Paradoxically, a very broad diffraction background, named the bell-shaped-component (BSC), has been established as a feature of graphene growth. Recent diffraction studies as a function of electron energy have shown that the BSC is not related to scattering interference. Here, additional experiments are carried out as a function of temperature over the range in which single-layer graphene (SLG) grows. Quantitative fitting of the profiles shows that the BSC follows the increase of the Gr(10) spot, proving directly that the BSC indicates high-quality graphene. Additional metal deposition experiments provide more information about the BSC. The BSC is insensitive to metal deposition, and it increases with metal intercalation, because a more uniform interface forms between graphene and SiC. These experiments support the conclusion that the BSC originates from electron confinement within SLG, and surprisingly, it is an excellent measure of graphene uniformity.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
NASA NTRS2024

Life Cycle Assessment and Design of LignoBlock: A Lignin Bound Block on the Path Towards a Green Transition of the Construction Industry

Lignin-based biopolymer-bound soil composites (BSCs) are a new class of sustainable construction materials that utilize a bio-based biopolymer — lignin — as a binder. Prior use of lignin suggests that lignin is a promising candidate for the development of bio-based construction materials. Inspired by these applications, lignin-based BSCs were developed using lignoboost lignin, lignoforce lignin, alkali lignin, and hydrolysis lignin. Uni-axial compressive testing of lignin-based BSC shows that the compressive strength for these BSCs range from 1.6–8.1 MPa, which makes them appropriate for low compressive strength construction applications. We performed a life cycle assessment (LCA) of lignin-based BSC, with the functional unit being a CMU-sized block ( V =6423 cm -3 ). The major advantage of BSC lies in the elimination of ordinary portland cement, which is common to many construction materials, including many forms of concrete. Furthermore, the use of lignin in lignin-based BSC results in carbon sequestration (lignin ≈ 60 wt% carbon), potentially making construction materials made from lignin-based BSC carbon negative. Additionally, a design guide for estimating the life cycle carbon footprint of lignin-based BSC for a required compressive strength was developed. By utilizing the results from material tests and the LCA, designers are now able to use lignin effectively in construction applications, as they can now design lignin-based BSC for a target compressive strength with a full understanding of the life cycle carbon footprint implications.

Lignin↗
DOE OSTI2021

Broad background in electron diffraction of 2D materials as a signature of their superior quality

Abstract An unusually broad bell-shaped component (BSC) has been previously observed in surface electron diffraction on different types of 2D systems. It was suggested to be an indicator of uniformity of epitaxial graphene (Gr) and hexagonal boron nitride (hBN). In the current study we use low-energy electron microscopy and micro-diffraction to directly relate the BSC to the crystal quality of the diffracting 2D material. Specially designed lateral heterostructures were used to map the spatial evolution of the diffraction profile across different 2D materials, namely pure hBN, BCN alloy and pure Gr, where the alloy region exhibits deteriorated structural coherency. The presented results show that the BSC intensity has a minimum in the alloyed region, consequently showing that BSC is sensitive to the lateral domain size and homogeneity of the material under examination. This is further confirmed by the presence of a larger number of sharp moiré spots when the BSC is most pronounced in the pure hBN and Gr regions. Consequently, it is proposed that the BSC can be used as a diagnostic tool for determining the quality of the 2D materials.

77 NANOSCIENCE AND NANOTECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2015

WE-EF-210-05: Diagnosis and Quantification of Liver Steatosis with Quantitative Ultrasound Backscatter Technique

Purpose: Nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is the most common cause of chronic liver disease in the United States, affects 30% of adult Americans and may progress to more serious diseases. Liver biopsy is the standard method for diagnosing NAFLD. MRI can accurately diagnose and quantify hepatic steatosis but is expensive. Sonography with qualitative interpretation by radiologists is lower cost, more accessible but less sensitive for detection. The objective of this study, using MRI proton density fat fraction (PDFF) as reference, is to assess the accuracy for diagnosing and quantifying steatosis with two quantitative US parameters-- backscatter coefficient (BSC) and attenuation coefficient (AC)--derived from RF signals using the calibration phantom technique. Methods: We performed a prospective, cross-sectional analysis of a cohort of adults (n=204) with NAFLD (MRI-PDFF≥5%) and without NAFLD (controls). Subjects underwent MRI-PDFF and BSC and AC US analyses of the liver on the same day. Patients were randomly assigned to training (n=102, mean age 51±17 years, mean body mass index 31±7 kg/m{sup 2}) and validation (n=102, mean age 49±17 years, body mass index 30±6 kg/m{sup 2}) groups; 69% of patients in each group had NAFLD. Results: BSC provided AUC 0.98 (95% CI 0.95–1.00, p<0.0001) for diagnosis of NAFLD; the optimal BSC cut-off provided sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative predictive values (PPV, NPV) of 87%, 91%, 95%, and 76%, respectively. AC provided AUC 0.89 (95% CI 0.81–0.96, p<0.0001) for diagnosis of steatosis; the optimal AC cut-off provided sensitivity, specificity, PPV, NPV of 80%, 84%, 92%, and 66%, respectively. BSC and AC both correlated significantly with MRI-PDFF (P<0.0001). Conclusion: QUS BSC and AC can accurately diagnose and quantify hepatic steatosis, using MRI-PDFF as reference. With further validation, QUS may emerge as an inexpensive, widely available tool for NAFLD assessment. General support: NIH R01 CA111289, K23 -DK090303, AmerGastroAssoc Found, TF Williams Scholarship, S3000 scanner loaned by Siemens, Sucampo, JA Hartford Found, Atlantic Philanthropies Amer Gastroenterological Assoc. Agencies had no role in design/conduct of study, collection, management, analysis or interpretation of the data; preparation, review, or approval of the manuscript.

60 APPLIED LIFE SCIENCES↗
NASA NTRS1985

Modeling canopy reflectance and microwave backscattering coefficient

Various approaches to model canopy reflectance (CR) in the visible/infrared region and backscattering coefficient (BSC) in the microwave region are compared and contrasted. It is noted that BSC can be related to CR in the source direction (the 'hot spot' direction). By assuming a frequency dependent leaf reflectance and transmittance it is shown that the observed dependence of BSC on leaf area index, leaf angle distribution, angle of incidence, soil moisture content, and frequency can be simulated by a CR model. Thus both BSC and CR can, in principle, be calculated using a single model which has essentially the same parameters as many CR models do.

Goel, N. S.↗
NASA NTRS1985

A preliminary report on the measurements of forest canopies with C-band radar scatterometer at NASA/NSTL

This paper presents preliminary results of C-band radar scatterometer measurements of forest canopies of southeastern forests in the vicinity of NASA/NSTL. The results are as follows: (1) the radar backscattering coefficients (BSC) of deciduous forests such as oak, maple, blackgum, and cypress are higher than those of coniferous forests such as slash pine plantation and natural pine; (2) at a large incidence angle, where polarization effect is significant, and by ranging measurement, the VV polarization BSC obtain peak value at the first few meters from the canopy top and decrease rather quickly, while the HH polarization BSC obtain peak value at longer distances from the canopy top and decrease rather slowly through the canopy; and (3) using the active radar calibrator for tree canopy attenuation measurement of a dense and a sparse live oak, it is found that the tree canopies with higher attenuations have higher BSC for all three polarizations, with VV polarization containing the largest differential (2.2 dB).

Wu, S. T.↗
NASA NTRS1991

SATCOM antenna siting study on P-3C aircraft, volume 1

The NEC-BSC (Basic Scattering Code) was used to study the performance of a SATCOM antenna on a P-3C aircraft. After plate cylinder fields are added to version 3.1 of the NEC-BSC, it is shown that the NEC-BSC can be used to accurately predict the performance of a SATCOM antenna system on a P-3C aircraft. The study illustrates that the NEC-BSC gives good results when compared with scale model measurements provided by Boeing and Lockheed.

Bensman, D. A.↗
DOE OSTI2014

Building America Case Study: Meeting DOE Challenge Home Program Certification, Chicago, Illinois; Denver, Colorado; Devens, Massachusetts (Fact Sheet)

The purpose of this project was to evaluate integrated packages of advanced measures in individual test homes to assess their performance with respect to Building America Program goals, specifically compliance with the DOE Challenge Home Program. BSC consulted on the construction of five test houses by three Cold Climate production builders in three separate US cities. BSC worked with the builders to develop a design package tailored to the cost-related impacts for each builder. Therefore, the resulting design packages do vary from builder to builder. BSC provided support through this research project on the design, construction and performance testing of the five test homes. Overall, the builders have concluded that the energy related upgrades (either through the prescriptive or performance path) represent reasonable upgrades. The builders commented that while not every improvement in specification was cost effective (as in a reasonable payback period), many were improvements that could improve the marketability of the homes and serve to attract more energy efficiency discerning prospective homeowners. However, the builders did express reservations on the associated checklists and added certifications. An increase in administrative time was observed with all builders. The checklists and certifications also inherently increase cost due to: 1. Adding services to the scope of work for various trades, such as HERS Rater, HVAC contractor. 2. Increased material costs related to the checklists, especially the EPA Indoor airPLUS and EPA WaterSense Efficient Hot Water Distribution requirement.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI↗
DOE OSTI2018

An Exchange-Correlation Functional Capturing Bulk Surface and Confinement Physics

Due to its balance of accuracy and computational cost, density functional theory has become the method of choice for computing the electronic structure and related properties of materials. However, present-day semilocal approximations to the exchange-correlation energy of density functional theory break down for materials containing d and f electrons. In this report we summarize our progress in addressing this issue. We describe the construction of the BSC exchange-correlation functional within the subsystem functional formalism which enables us to capture bulk, surface, and confinement physics with a single exchange-correlation functional. We report on the initial assessment of this functional within the jellium surface system and demonstrate that the BSC functional captures the confinement physics more accurately than standard semilocal exchange-correlation functionals. We conclude by outlining our future research objectives which focus on refining the functional form of the BSC functional and achieving significantly more accurate energetics of materials containing f and d electrons than existing semilocal functionals.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2019

Semi-local Density Functional Approximations for Bulk, Surface, and Confinement Physics

Due to its balance of accuracy and computational cost, density functional theory has become the method of choice for computing the electronic structure and related properties of materials. However, present-day semi-local approximations to the exchange-correlation energy of density functional theory break down for materials containing d and f electrons. In this report we summarize the results of our research efforts within the LDRD 200202 titled "Making density functional theory work for all materials" in addressing this issue. Our efforts are grouped into two research thrusts. In the first thrust, we develop an exchange-correlation functional (BSC functional) within the subsystem functional formalism. It enables us to capture bulk, surface, and confinement physics with a single, semi-local exchange-correlation functional in density functional theory calculations. We present the analytical properties of the BSC functional and demonstrate that the BSC functional is able to capture confinement physics more accurately than standard semi-local exchange-correlation functionals. The second research thrust focusses on developing a database for transition metal binary compounds. The database consists of materials properties (formation energies, ground-state energies, lattice constants, and elastic constants) of 26 transition metal elements and 89 transition metal alloys. It serves as a reference for benchmarking computational models (such as lower-level modeling methods and exchange-correlation functionals). We expect that our database will significantly impact the materials science community. We conclude with a brief discussion on the future research directions and impact of our results.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
NASA NTRS2005

The Highest L(sub X)/L(sub opt) Sources in the ROSAT All-Sky Survey

The purpose of our program was to identify new and interesting soft X-ray sources from the Bright Source Catalog of the ROSAT All-Sky Survey. Our intent was to use XMM to observe a sample of BSC objects that had been identified as less than 10% likely to be associated with any object in the USNO-A2.0 catalog (Rutledge et al. 2000). We requested a single 5-ks pointing for each of 32 sources in this category in order to make a systematic examination of the properties of these sources. Ultimately, we hoped to identify new isolated neutron stars from within this population. Our requested observations were scheduled for execution at the end of Cycle 2, for two of our targets only (selected by sky position). A two-target sample does not allow for the statistical investigation that we originally proposed; however, based on the identification of the BSC object in the XMM data, an improved position, and reevaluation of likely off-band counterparts, it does enable a source-by-source evaluation of whether the BSC object is an isolated neutron star (INS).

Kulkarni, Shrinivas R.↗