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NASA NTRS1997

Large-Scale Impact Cratering and Early Earth Evolution

The surface of the Moon attests to the importance of large-scale impact in its early crustal evolution. Previous models of the effects of a massive bombardment on terrestrial crustal evolution have relied on analogies with the Moon, with allowances for the presence of water and a thinner lithosphere. It is now apparent that strict lunar-terrestrial analogies are incorrect because of the "differential scaling" of crater dimensions and melt volumes with event size and planetary gravity. Impact melt volumes and "ancient cavity dimensions for specific impacts were modeled according to previous procedures. In the terrestrial case, the melt volume (V(sub m)) exceeds that of the transient cavity (V(sub tc)) at diameters > or = 400 km. This condition is reached on the Moon only with transient cavity diameters > or = 3000 km, equivalent to whole Moon melting. The melt volumes in these large impact events are minimum estimates, since, at these sizes, the higher temperature of the target rocks at depth will increase melt production. Using the modification-scaling relation of Croft, a transient cavity diameter of about 400 km in the terrestrial environment corresponds to an expected final impact "basin" diameter of about 900 km. Such a "basin" would be comparable in dimensions to the lunar basin Orientale. This 900-km "basin" on the early Earth, however, would not have had the appearance of Orientale. It would have been essentially a melt pool, and, morphologically, would have had more in common with the palimpsests structures on Callisto and Ganymede. With the terrestrial equivalents to the large multiring basins of the Moon being manifested as muted palimpsest-like structures filled with impact melt, it is unlikely they played a role in establishing the freeboard on the early Earth. The composition of the massive impact melt sheets (> 10 (exp 7) cu km) produced in "basin-forming" events on the early Earth would have most likely ranged from basaltic to more mafic for the largest impacts, where the melt volume would have reached well into the mantle. Any contribution from adiabatic melting or shock heating of the asthenosphere would have had similar mafic compositions. The depth of the melt sheets is unknown but would have been in the multilkilometer range. Bodies of basaltic melt > or = 300 m thick differentiate in the terrestrial environment, with the degree of differentiation being a function of the thickness of the body. We therefore expect that these thick, closed-system melt pools would have differentiated into an ultramafic-mafic base and felsic top. If only 10% of the impact melt produced in a single event creating a 400-km diameter transient cavity evolved into felsic differentiates, they would be comparable in volume to the Columbia River basalts. It has been estimated that at least 200 impact events of this size or larger occurred on the early Earth during a period of heavy bombardment. We speculate that these massive differentiated melt sheets may have had a role in the formation of the initial felsic component of the Earth's crust. Additional information is contained in the original.

Grieve, R. A. F.↗

NASA NTRS2017

Relationship of Powder Feedstock Variability to Microstructure and Defects in Selective Laser Melted Alloy 718

Powder-bed additive manufacturing processes use fine powders to build parts layer by layer. For selective laser melted (SLM) Alloy 718, the powders that are available off-the-shelf are in the 10-45 or 15-45 micron size range. A comprehensive investigation of sixteen powders from these typical ranges and two off-nominal-sized powders is underway to gain insight into the impact of feedstock on processing, durability and performance of 718 SLM space-flight hardware. This talk emphasizes an aspect of this work: the impact of powder variability on the microstructure and defects observed in the as-fabricated and full heated material, where lab-scale components were built using vendor recommended parameters. These typical powders exhibit variation in composition, percentage of fines, roughness, morphology and particle size distribution. How these differences relate to the melt-pool size, porosity, grain structure, precipitate distributions, and inclusion content will be presented and discussed in context of build quality and powder acceptance.

Characterization↗

NASA NTRS2026

Hybrid Modeling Study on Grain Evolution in the Metal Welding Process and Its Potential Lunar Application

Metal is most commonly used structural material in a wide range of spacecraft, and welding is the principal method for joining metal components into functional systems. However, conducting welding experiments under extreme environments—such as microgravity or vacuum conditions in space—is prohibitively expensive and experimentally challenging. To overcome these limitations, multi-physics computational welding models provide a cost-effective and versatile alternative. In this work, the authors have developed a coupled thermal (fluid) microstructure simulation framework to model metal welding under varying gravity conditions. The framework integrates a mixed-mode heat transfer formulation (conduction, convection, and radiation) with molten pool fluid dynamics, enabling accurate prediction of temperature fields and weld-pool geometry. A grain growth model is further incorporated to capture the spatial and temporal evolution of microstructure, including grain size distribution and morphological transitions during solidification. This approach provides detailed insight into molten pool evolution and grain-level microstructure development throughout the welding process. By explicitly parameterizing environmental conditions, the model supports extrapolation to off-Earth manufacturing scenarios such as welding on the lunar surface. Tantalum—chosen in this study due to its high melting point, oxidation resistance, and mechanical stability at elevated temperatures—serves as the material system for model demonstration. Beyond Tantalum, the integrated multi-physics framework offers broad applicability for predictive welding simulations of various structural and refractory metals or alloys used in extreme terrestrial or extraterrestrial environments.

kinetic Monte Carlo (SPPARKS)↗

NASA NTRS2002

Effect of Magnetic Fields on g-jitter Induced Convection and Solute Striation During Space Processing of Single Crystals

A 2-D finite element model is presented for the melt growth of single crystals in a microgravity environment with a superimposed DC magnetic field. The model is developed based on the deforming finite element methodology and is capable of predicting the phenomena of the steady and transient convective flows, heat transfer, solute distribution, and solid-liquid interface morphology associated with the melt growth of single crystals in microgravity with and without an applied magnetic field. Numerical simulations were carried out for a wide range of parameters including idealized microgravity conditions, the synthesized g-jitter and the real g-jitter data taken by on-board accelerometers during space flights. The results reveal that the time varying g-jitter disturbances, although small in magnitude, cause an appreciable convective flow in the liquid pool, which in turn produces detrimental effects during the space processing of single crystal growth. An applied magnetic field of appropriate strength, superimposed on microgravity, can be very effective in suppressing the deleterious effects resulting from the g-jitter disturbances.

deGroh, H. C.↗

NASA NTRS2006

Chromite-Plagioclase Assemblages as a New Shock Indicator; Implications for the Shock and Thermal Histories of Ordinary Chondrites

Chromite in ordinary chondrites (OC) can be used as a shock indicator. A survey of 76 equilibrated H, L and LL chondrites shows that unshocked chromite grains occur in equant, subhedral and rounded morphologies surrounded by silicate or intergrown with metallic Fe-Ni and/or troilite. Some unmelted chromite grains are fractured or crushed during whole-rock brecciation. Others are transected by opaque veins; the veins form when impacts cause localized heating of metal-troilite intergrowths above the Fe-FeS eutectic (988 C), mobilization of metal-troilite melts, and penetration of the melt into fractures in chromite grains. Chromite-plagioclase assemblages occur in nearly every shock-stage S3-S6 OC; the assemblages range in size from 20-300 microns and consist of 0.2-20-micron-size euhedral, subhedral, anhedral and rounded chromite grains surrounded by plagioclase or glass of plagioclase composition. Plagioclase has a low impedance to shock compression. Heat from shock-melted plagioclase caused adjacent chromite grains to melt; chromite grains crystallized from this melt. Those chromite grains in the assemblages that are completely surrounded by plagioclase are generally richer in Al2O3, than unmelted, matrix chromite grains in the same meteorite. Chromite veinlets (typically 0.5-2 microns thick and 10-300 microns long) occur typically in the vicinity of chromite-plagioclase assemblages. The veinlets formed from chromite-plagioclase melts that were injected into fractures in neighboring silicate grains; chromite crystallized in the fractures and the residual plagioclase-rich melt continued to flow, eventually pooling to form plagioclase-rich melt pockets. Chromite-rich chondrules (consisting mainly of olivine, plagioclase-normative mesostasis, and 5-15 vol.% chromite) occur in many shocked OC and OC regolith breccias but they are absent from primitive type-3 OC. They may have formed by impact melting chromite, plagioclase and adjacent mafic silicates during higher-energy shock events. The melt was jetted from the impact site and formed droplets due to surface tension. Crystallization of these droplets may have commenced in flight, prior to landing on the parent-body surface. Chromite-plagioclase assemblages and chromite veinlets occur in 25 out of 25 shock-stage S1 OC of petrologic type 5 and 6 that I examined. Although these rocks contain unstrained olivine with sharp optical extinction, most possess other shock indicators such as extensive silicate darkening, numerous occurrences of metallic Cu, polycrystalline troilite, and opaque veins. It seems likely that these rocks were shocked to levels at least as high as shock-stage S3 and then annealed by heat generated during the shock event. During annealing, the olivine crystal lattices healed but other shock indicators survived. Published Ar-Ar age data for some SI OC indicate that many shock and annealing events occurred very early in the history of the parent asteroids. The common occurrence of shocked and annealed OC is consistent with collisions being a major mechanism responsible for metamorphosing OC.

Rubin, Alan E.↗

NASA NTRS2015

Multiscale and Multiphysics Modeling of Additive Manufacturing of Advanced Materials

The objective of this proposed project is to research and develop a prediction tool for advanced additive manufacturing (AAM) processes for advanced materials and develop experimental methods to provide fundamental properties and establish validation data. Aircraft structures and engines demand materials that are stronger, useable at much higher temperatures, provide less acoustic transmission, and enable more aeroelastic tailoring than those currently used. Significant improvements in properties can only be achieved by processing the materials under nonequilibrium conditions, such as AAM processes. AAM processes encompass a class of processes that use a focused heat source to create a melt pool on a substrate. Examples include Electron Beam Freeform Fabrication and Direct Metal Deposition. These types of additive processes enable fabrication of parts directly from CAD drawings. To achieve the desired material properties and geometries of the final structure, assessing the impact of process parameters and predicting optimized conditions with numerical modeling as an effective prediction tool is necessary. The targets for the processing are multiple and at different spatial scales, and the physical phenomena associated occur in multiphysics and multiscale. In this project, the research work has been developed to model AAM processes in a multiscale and multiphysics approach. A macroscale model was developed to investigate the residual stresses and distortion in AAM processes. A sequentially coupled, thermomechanical, finite element model was developed and validated experimentally. The results showed the temperature distribution, residual stress, and deformation within the formed deposits and substrates. A mesoscale model was developed to include heat transfer, phase change with mushy zone, incompressible free surface flow, solute redistribution, and surface tension. Because of excessive computing time needed, a parallel computing approach was also tested. In addition, after investigating various methods, a Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics Model (SPH Model) was developed to model wire feeding process. Its computational efficiency and simple architecture makes it more robust and flexible than other models. More research on material properties may be needed to realistically model the AAM processes. A microscale model was developed to investigate heterogeneous nucleation, dendritic grain growth, epitaxial growth of columnar grains, columnar-to-equiaxed transition, grain transport in melt, and other properties. The orientations of the columnar grains were almost perpendicular to the laser motion's direction. Compared to the similar studies in the literature, the multiple grain morphology modeling result is in the same order of magnitude as optical morphologies in the experiment. Experimental work was conducted to validate different models. An infrared camera was incorporated as a process monitoring and validating tool to identify the solidus and mushy zones during deposition. The images were successfully processed to identify these regions. This research project has investigated multiscale and multiphysics of the complex AAM processes thus leading to advanced understanding of these processes. The project has also developed several modeling tools and experimental validation tools that will be very critical in the future of AAM process qualification and certification.

Liou, Frank↗