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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

Frontier Job-Centric Telemetry Dataset

Comprehensive analysis of high-performance computing (HPC) systems requires linking workload execution to system behavior. This kind of analysis is vital for diagnosing performance issues, managing capacity, detecting anomalous workloads, and understanding how applications interact with system hardware. This job-centric telemetry dataset unifies scheduler job records with node-level measurements, enabling direct association between workloads and their corresponding power, thermal, and performance characteristics. It contains sanitized, scheduler related metadata for 152,400 individual jobs that ran on the Frontier supercomputer and ended on selected days throughout 2024 and 2025, a subpopulation of ~6.8% of the total number of allocated jobs with non-zero run time on the system over that same period. Each is linked with files that contain telemetry time series records of the power utilization and temperature behavior of its allocated nodes and their processors during the run time of the job. Where available, a portion of the job files also contain network performance time series. Jobs are sampled from select days that reflect normal levels of user activity and possess job size distributions with large numbers of leadership class jobs (>20% of Frontier nodes). Jobs in this dataset attempt to best represent successful user workflows.

32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATI

Enabling Reliable, Fault-Tolerant Autonomous Lunar Habitats with High-Performance Spaceflight Computing

The lunar surface presents unfavorable constraints and harsh living conditions. To address these challenges, autonomous habitats will require complex integrated systems that combine advanced software, high-performance hardware, and cutting-edge sensors to ensure sustainability, safety, and operational efficiency. Consequently, maintaining a sustainable presence on the Moon requires reliable infrastructure and efficient development, precise monitoring, and utilization of resources within a lunar installation. These elements are essential not only to ensure that lunar settlement can be long-term, self-sustaining, and resource-efficient, but also to serve as a foundation for future missions and eventual human habitation on Mars. Humans are not native to the Moon; therefore, our survival and ability to thrive will depend on autonomous systems that can foster safety and resilience through high-availability architectures, graceful degradation, and highly fault-tolerant spaceflight hardware capable of continuing operation during failures. This requires advanced human-rated distributed systems architectures with specialized electronics, scalable capabilities, and an integrated design approach. Unlike current practices focused on short-term missions and regularly maintained components, permanent lunar compute systems must be designed for extended operations beyond mission durations. This paper explores the necessity of transitioning toward fault- tolerant, highly autonomous hardware systems designed for multi-year missions. It also identifies critical subsystems that require high levels of autonomy, supported by radiation-hardened processors and extreme thermal loads, which are essential to mitigate long-term degradation and ensure sustainable lunar habitation. Finally, the paper aligns with NASA’s identified Civil Space Shortfalls, particularly in high-performance onboard computing, advanced data acquisition, extreme-environment avionics, radiation monitoring and countermeasures, and autonomous health management. It proposes NASA’s new High-Performance Spaceflight Computing (HPSC) processor as a turnkey solution, delivering 100 times the performance-per-watt of legacy rad-hard CPUs and enabling onboard AI, edge computing, and fault-tolerant features essential for sustained lunar autonomy and beyond.

Sarkis S Mikaelian

PyJMAK: An Open-Source Python Toolkit for Modeling Solid-State Metallurgical Phase Transformations

Accurate prediction of metallurgical phase transformations is an essential basis for autonomous optimization and rapid part qualification. Several methods can be used to estimate the evolution of phase fractions such as JMAK kinetics-based models, phase-field models, thermodynamic models, and data-driven machine learning models. Thermodynamic and phase-field-based methodologies solve multiphysics equations requiring numerous calibration parameters and significant computational resources. As a result, the computation domain is limited to a point or on order of micron-meters. The data-driven models rely on large datasets from experiments and simulations. While the JMAK model only provides information about phase fraction evolution, it can predict this evolution in near real-time using thermal history and thermodynamic data without restriction on the domain. JMAK models have been popularly used by researchers to model phase transformations occuring during additive manufacturing or over arbitrary temperature profiles. Commercial proprietary software such as Abaqus and Ansys or closed-source in-house implementations offer the ability to model JMAK based kinetics to predict phase transformation. However, these software packages are not open-source or freely available for use and development in conjunction with manufacturing machines, sensors, and machine learning algorithms. In addition, the use of the model is restricted by a license token. In contrast, given temperature profiles at multiple points in the domain, this Python-based PyJMAK model can compute phase evolution in parallel due to its stand-alone modular, voxel-based structure, and it can be executed on high-performance computing resources without any license restrictions.

Prabhune, Bhagya [Oak Ridge National Laboratory (O

Integrating DOE ASCR Computing into HEPCloud through GlideinWMS

Fermilab's HEPCloud facility expands the laboratory's computing capacity by provisioning resources beyond the local grid, using GlideinWMS to deliver pilots to where experiments such as CMS and DUNE run. The High-Performance Computing (HPC) facilities of the DOE Office of Advanced Scientific Computing Research (ASCR) are a growing part of that pool. HEPCloud currently provisions NERSC over SSH, but NERSC is moving away from that path as it adopts multi-factor authentication and directs automated access to its Superfacility API and the DOE Integrated Research Infrastructure (IRI) APIs. Maintaining and extending access across the ASCR ecosystem now requires provisioning through these interfaces. This work adds new pilot submission paths to GlideinWMS for the NERSC Superfacility API, IRI, and Globus Compute. Each uses the provisioning model GlideinWMS already applies to batch resources, so experiments can run on ASCR computing resources without changes to their existing workflows. This work finally presents a comparison of the paths to guide which interfaces are best suited for different workflows.

Majumder, Meghanto [U. Houston (main)]

CAHS: Context-Aware Homology Search

Protein homology search is foundational to bioinformatics: it supports annotation transfer, structure/function inference, and evolutionary analysis over rapidly expanding sequence repositories (e.g., UniProtKB). Profile hidden Markov models (pHMMs), as implemented in HMMER, remain the most widely trusted approach because they provide statistically calibrated E-values; however, their gap behavior is fixed once a profile is trained, despite biological evidence that insertion/deletion tolerance varies across flexible loops and intrinsically disordered regions. We present CAHS (Context-Aware Homology Search), a lightweight query-time adapter for pHMM search that incorporates learned and biologically motivated signals without changing HMMER's downstream search pipeline or its calibrated E-value reporting. Given a query sequence, CAHS computes per-residue representations from a protein language model and a disorder predictor, maps these to profile coordinates, and modulates only match-state transition rows (gap-open and gap-extension probabilities) while preserving Plan7 constraints. We comprehensively evaluate CAHS across six structurally diverse protein families and multi-domain architectures against a 570k-sequence target corpus. CAHS expands detection capability, retrieving thousands of additional remote homologs at relaxed thresholds by maintaining alignment quality through flexible regions. For multi-domain proteins, context-aware modulation resolves 94% of fragmented alignments. Crucially, CAHS preserves hit-set invariance at stringent operating points (E<10-10), demonstrating increased statistical confidence without inflating false positives. Furthermore, sharper statistical distinction between homologs and background noise during early filter stages yields up to a 3.87× acceleration in end-to-end wall-clock time on high-performance computing clusters. Overall, CAHS illustrates a practical AI-for-science design pattern: augmenting a trusted probabilistic model with query-specific learned signals to improve interpretable, reproducible inference in data-rich biology.

Bhattaram, Swethasree [Georgia Institute of Techno

Graph Identification of Proteins in Tomograms (GRIP-Tomo) 2.0: Topologically aware classification for proteins

Cryo-electron tomography (cryo-ET) enables structural characterization of biomolecules under near-native conditions. Existing approaches for interpreting the resulting three-dimensional volumes are computationally expensive and have difficulty interpreting density associated with small proteins/complexes. To explore alternate approaches for identifying proteins in cryo-ET data we pursued a Graph Network and topologically invariant approach. Here, we report on a fast algorithm that classifies particles by searching for nuances of evolutionarily conversed motifs and the geometrical characteristics of protein structure. GRIP-Tomo 2.0 is a machine-learning pipeline that extracts interpretable topological features of protein structures within noisy experimental backgrounds. Compared to version 1.0, the new pipeline includes three upgrades that significantly improve performance including synthetic tomogram generation simulating realistic noise, graph-based persistent feature extraction as protein fingerprints, and high-performance computing acceleration. GRIP-Tomo 2.0 achieves over 90% accuracy in classifying between proteins and noise using both real and synthetic datasets which represents a foundational step toward advancing cryo-ET workflows and empowering automated visual proteomics.

Li, Chengxuan

AutoBEM: A scalable framework for nationwide building energy simulation and retrofit evaluation in the United States

This paper presents AutoBEM, an integrated, automated framework for nationwide building energy modeling and retrofit evaluation in the United States. Unlike prior UBEM platforms that either rely primarily on representative stock sampling or operate at city scale, AutoBEM automates the generation of building-resolved, physics-based EnergyPlus/OpenStudio simulation models at national scale using GIS-derived geometry, prototype-based assumptions, and standardized scalable workflows. Leveraging the Model America dataset and high-performance computing, AutoBEM generates and simulates energy models for 122.9 million buildings, representing 97.8% of the U.S. building stock. These models are being made publicly and freely available as the Model America v1.0 (MAv1) dataset. AutoBEM supports detailed, building-level assessments of energy consumption, CO2 emissions, and post-processed anthropogenic heat emissions (AHE), and evaluates 151 energy conservation measures (ECMs) using localized utility pricing and building characteristics. In addition, AutoBEM incorporates both typical and future climate conditions through integration with Typical Meteorological Year (TMY) and Future TMY (fTMY) weather data derived from IPCC scenarios. In a case study of Phoenix, Arizona, AutoBEM identified several high-efficiency HVAC upgrades and selected envelope measures with short modeled payback periods (1.5 years) for certain building types and standards. Simulations under future climate scenarios (SSP5–RCP8.5) project an 11.3% increase in electricity use and a 32% reduction in natural gas demand by 2100, underscoring the need for climate-adaptive retrofit planning. By enabling reproducible, bottom-up, and location-specific analysis at scale, AutoBEM provides a step toward a national digital twin of the built environment and supports data-driven screening and planning for decarbonization, resilience, and energy equity.

Li, Hang [ORNL] (ORCID:0000000306001920)

Distributed Resilience in High-Energy Physics Data Acquisition

Historical experience in the High-Performance Computing community teaches us that as computing systems grow, the instance of failures goes from rare to a regular occurrence. A survey of the growth in the size and complexity of Data AcQuisition (DAQ) networks in High-Energy Physics (HEP) experiments reveals that these networks are scaling exponentially, trending to a point where automated fault handling should be considered over the current manual practice, especially given the rarity of data such as in DUNE's mission to observe core-collapse supernovae. We propose a general system, DiDAQt, which is designed to provide fault detection and handling in HEP DAQs specifically, through MPI-like primitives that allow it to be added easily to existing systems. We evaluate the scalability and response time of a prototype on the FABRIC national testbed, with results indicating sufficient scalability for current and near-future DAQs as well as practical response times (under 1 microsecond decision time).

Wolosewicz, A. [IIT, Chicago]

Unitary Qubit Lattice Algorithms for Plasma Physics

This final technical report summarizes research conducted under DOE Award DE-SC0021653 to develop unitary Quantum Lattice Algorithms for modeling electromagnetic wave propagation and scattering in complex media, including plasmas. The project developed and validated quantum-inspired formulations of Maxwell's equations that preserve unitary evolution and can be evaluated on classical high-performance computing systems while providing a foundation for future quantum-computing implementations. Major accomplishments include the development of two- and three-dimensional algorithms for electromagnetic scattering; scalable, distributed-memory implementations demonstrated on the Perlmutter supercomputer; formulations for nonlinear lossless fluid dynamics and cold, lossless, inhomogeneous magnetized plasmas; and an explicit quantum algorithm for a time-discretized Lorenz model. Simulations reproduced a range of characteristic wave phenomena, including transient effects that are not readily apparent in conventional frequency-domain studies, demonstrating the effectiveness of the proposed approach for modeling complex electromagnetic and plasma systems. The work establishes a unified theoretical and computational framework for quantum and quantum-inspired simulation and provides a foundation for future implementation on fault-tolerant quantum systems.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY

Onset of Fluidization in MP-PIC Simulations using MFIX-Exa

Fluidized bed reactors are used across a variety of industries, including for energy processes like pyrolysis that result in low-cost energy products. Design and scale-up of fluidized beds is de-risked by modeling and simulation, utilizing tools like NETL’s MFIX-Exa High-Performance Computing (HPC) code for reacting multiphase flow. This report summarizes an investigation into the breadth of problems to which MFIX-Exa may be applied, specifically with regard to low fluid velocities and the onset of fluidization. A simple fluidization study is conducted both experimentally and numerically for particles of interest, then reactor simulations are compared to cold flow experiments for uniform distributor plates. Approaches for modeling bubble caps are also presented.

discrete particle method

Evaluation of LLVM Flang for Production HPC Applications and Modern Fortran Features

In 2025, LLVM released its first Flang Fortran compiler version considered ready for widespread evaluation. We know of no published assessment of Flang compiling a workload- derived portfolio of high-performance computing (HPC) applications. We address this gap using workload data from the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC), which supports more than 10,000 scientists on approximately 1,000 projects. The NERSC workload analyses identify many Fortran components in heavily used applications. We selected 10 such packages with available source code. We compiled them with Flang 22.1.3 on NERSC’s Perlmutter system. Six compiled without code modifications, though some required build-system changes. Three compiled after minor source edits, mostly to address Fortran standard violations. One built only without OpenMP enabled. We evaluated seven additional packages selected for their use of, or enablement of, standard Fortran parallel features: multi-image execution and do concurrent. Six such codes compiled with most or all unit tests passing.

Rasmussen, Katherine

Two-Level Sketching Alternating Anderson Acceleration for Complex Physics Applications

We present a novel two-level sketching extension of the Alternating Anderson–Picard (AAP) method for accelerating fixed-point iterations in challenging single- and multiphysics simulations governed by discretized PDEs. Our approach combines a static, physics-based projection that reduces the least-squares (LS) problem to the most informative field (e.g., via Schur-complement insight) with a dynamic, algebraic sketching stage driven by a backward stability analysis under Lipschitz continuity. We introduce inexpensive estimators for stability thresholds and cache-aware randomized selection strategies to balance computational cost against memory access overhead. The resulting algorithm solves reduced LS systems in place, minimizes memory footprints, and seamlessly alternates between low-cost Picard updates and Anderson mixing. Implemented in Julia, our two-level sketching AAP achieves up to 50% time-to-solution reductions compared to standard Anderson acceleration—without degrading convergence rates—on benchmark problems including Stokes, 𝑝-Laplacian, bidomain, and Navier–Stokes formulations at varying problem sizes. These results demonstrate the method’s robustness, scalability, and potential for integration into high-performance scientific computing frameworks. Our implementation is available open source in the AAP.jl library.

Barnafi, Nicolas [University of Chile, Santiago]

Distributed quantum approximate optimization algorithm on a quantum-centric supercomputing architecture

Quantum approximate optimization algorithm (QAOA) has shown promise in solving combinatorial optimization problems by providing quantum speedup on near-term gate-based quantum computing systems. However, QAOA faces challenges for high-dimensional problems due to the large number of qubits required and the complexity of deep circuits, limiting its scalability for real-world applications. In this study, we present a distributed QAOA (DQAOA), which leverages distributed computing strategies to decompose a large computational workload into smaller tasks that require fewer qubits and shallower circuits than are necessary to solve the original problem. These sub-problems are processed using a combination of high-performance and quantum computing resources. The global solution is iteratively updated by aggregating sub-solutions, allowing convergence toward the optimal solution. We demonstrate that DQAOA can handle considerably large-scale optimization problems (e.g., 1000-bit problem), achieving a high solution quality and short time-to-solution, outperforming existing strategies. Furthermore, we realize DQAOA on a quantum-centric supercomputing architecture, paving the way for practical applications of gate-based quantum computers in real-world optimization tasks. To extend DQAOA’s applicability to materials science, we further develop an active learning algorithm integrated with our DQAOA (AL-DQAOA), which involves machine learning, DQAOA, and active data production in an iterative loop. We successfully optimize photonic structures using AL-DQAOA, indicating that solving real-world optimization problems using gate-based quantum computing is feasible. We expect the proposed DQAOA to be applicable to a wide range of optimization problems and AL-DQAOA to find broader applications in material design.

Kim, Seongmin [ORNL] (ORCID:0000000159063004)

Harnessing Quantum Computing for Energy Materials: Opportunities and Challenges

Developing high-performance materials is critical for diverse energy applications to increase efficiency, improve sustainability and reduce costs. Classical computational methods have enabled important breakthroughs in energy materials development, but they face scaling and time-complexity limitations, particularly for high-dimensional or strongly correlated material systems. Quantum computing (QC) promises to offer a paradigm shift by exploiting quantum bits with their superposition and entanglement to address challenging problems intractable for classical approaches. This Perspective discusses the opportunities in leveraging QC to advance energy materials research and the challenges QC faces in solving complex and high-dimensional problems. We present cases on how QC, when combined with classical computing methods, can be used for the design and simulation of practical energy materials. We also outline the outlook for error-corrected, fault-tolerant QC capable of achieving predictive accuracy and quantum advantage for complex material systems.

Algorithms

Operando microscopy for neuromorphic hardware

Microscopy techniques can uncover the physical properties and dynamic behaviours of materials, driving the discovery of emergent phenomena and guiding the design of next-generation computing hardware. As artificial intelligence becomes pervasive, the demand for high-performance materials to support sustainable information technologies is growing. Here, this Review highlights state-of-the-art imaging from electron and X-ray to optical techniques to probe the dynamics of neuromorphic materials, including operando characterization of devices. We examine design principles for neuromorphic materials, along with obstacles that hinder their development. Emphasis is placed on spatially and temporally resolved approaches that capture state changes including phase transitions, ferroic switching and spin-wave propagation that emulate biological components such as neurons, synapses and their connectivity. We discuss challenges in operando characterization and the integration of artificial intelligence-driven analysis for feedback-guided material discovery. Finally, we outline opportunities for real-time imaging of neuromorphic systems, paving the way towards adaptive, brain-inspired hardware.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND

Strong Thermoset Regolith UV-Curable Composite Technology (STRUCT) Overview

Future lunar surface missions require construction materials that can be manufactured in situ using lo-cal resources while operating under extreme environmental conditions. Many Lunar material demands can be solved solely with regolith by compacting or sintering. And yet past Lunar missions rely on polymeric materials, and sustained Lunar missions must reduce Earth-supplied polymers dependence. Dual-cure (Ultraviolet (UV) and thermal) polymer-regolith composites offer a promising pathway by leveraging solar UV radiation, moderate thermal in-put, and regolith. Mission mass limits, power availability and energy constraints on the lunar surface further motivate low-energy processing and curing strategies for surface construction materials. The Strong Thermoset Regolith UV-Curable Composite Technology (STRUCT) project has successfully synthesized and demonstrated dual-cure photopolymer resins derivable from in-situ resources [3]. Morphological, thermal, and mechanical characterization show that the newly formulated UV curable resin systems integrates well with lunar regolith simulants. Processing and chemistry changes, and computational analysis advanced the composite design. X-ray CT scanned and computational analysis demonstrate that resin, regolith and additives are well incorporated. The large fraction of regolith, 95% by mass, large char yield (82% mass), low thermal conductivity (0.26 W/m/K), confirm this material as a promising high-performance thermal and structural material.

thermal conductivity

Design, Development, and Test of the Advanced Apollo Orbital Assembly System

As spaceflight moves toward commercial solutions for Crew Vehicles and Space Stations, opportunity exists to lower costs with novel designs. Probe and cone docking systems provide a lightweight, low cost, and high-performance docking solution. This work revisits the Apollo probe and cone design and modifies it for the requirements of today’s computer-controlled spacecraft. This new system is called the Advanced Apollo Orbital Assembly (APOA) system, and is intended to support satellite, cargo, and space station assembly missions. A simulation of the APOA was programmed, components were sized, and a design was created by scaling the probe to the size of an EELV Secondary Payload Adapter (ESPA) tunnel. Prototype test hardware was 3D printed using Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM) methods with Polylactic Acid (PLA) material. Testing of the APOA-ESPA was conducted at Marshall Space Flight Center’s (MSFC) Flat Floor, and a test-correlated simulation is used to evaluate a Monte-Carlo of Initial Contact Conditions (ICC’s) to establish baseline performance. The successful development, test, and correlation of the APOA-ESPA proves the design validity and increases Technology Readiness Level (TRL) from 2 to 4. This work opens the door to construction of an APOA-ESPA from flight like materials, and to develop a larger scale prototype APOA. When the full scale APOA is incorporated with the Common Berthing Mechanism (CBM), becomes the Hybrid Berthing System (HBS), which allows for berthing without a robotic arm.

Berthing

Asynchronous transfer mode link performance over ground networks

The results of an experiment to determine the feasibility of using asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) technology to support advanced spacecraft missions that require high-rate ground communications and, in particular, full-motion video are reported. Potential nodes in such a ground network include Deep Space Network (DSN) antenna stations, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and a set of national and international end users. The experiment simulated a lunar microrover, lunar lander, the DSN ground communications system, and distributed science users. The users were equipped with video-capable workstations. A key feature was an optical fiber link between two high-performance workstations equipped with ATM interfaces. Video was also transmitted through JPL's institutional network to a user 8 km from the experiment. Variations in video depending on the networks and computers were observed, the results are reported.

Chow, E. T.