Uncertainty Quantification of a Rotorcraft Conceptual Sizing Toolsuite

A computational framework to support the quantification of system uncertainties and sensitivities for rotorcraft applications is presented using the NASA Design and Analysis of Rotorcraft (NDARC) conceptual sizing tool. A 90 passenger conceptual tiltrotor configuration was used for case demonstration in the modeling of uncertainties in NDARCs emission module. A non-intrusive forward propagation uncertainty quantification approach was applied to ensemble simulations using a Monte Carlo methodology with stratified Latin hypercube sampling. An off-the-shelf software, DAKOTA, which supports trade studies and design space exploration, including optimization, surrogate modeling and uncertainty analysis was used to address the research goals. A toolsuite was further developed incorporating DAKOTA with automated design processes and methods using function wrappers to execute program routines including support for data post-processing. Uncertainties in rotorcraft emissions modeling using the Average Temperature Response metric for a set mission profile were studied. It was shown that for the current study, using the base-line best estimate modeling parameters for the Average Temperature Response metric, NDARC under-estimates the effects of emissions when compared with results from Monte Carlo simulations. A global sensitivity analysis was further undertaken to quantify the contribution of the various emission species on output sensitivity, hence uncertainty. The work demonstrates that the developed toolsuite is robust and will support the quantification of system uncertainties and sensitivities in future rotorcraft design efforts

Improved Aircraft Environmental Impact Segmentation via Metric Learning

Accurate modeling of aircraft environmental impact is pivotal to the design of operational procedures and policies to mitigate negative aviation environmental impact. Aircraft environmental impact segmentation is a process which clusters aircraft types that have similar environmental impact characteristics based on a set of aircraft features. This practice helps model a large population of aircraft types with insufficient aircraft noise and performance models and contributes to better understanding of aviation environmental impact. Through measuring the similarity between aircraft types, distance metric is the kernel of aircraft segmentation. Traditional ways of aircraft segmentation use plain distance metrics and assign equal weight to all features in an unsupervised clustering process. In this work, we utilize weakly-supervised metric learning and partial information on aircraft fuel burn, emissions, and noise to learn weighted distance metrics for aircraft environmental impact segmentation. We show in a comprehensive case study that the tailored distance metrics can indeed make aircraft segmentation better reflect the actual environmental impact of aircraft. The metric learning approach can help refine a number of similar data-driven analytical studies in aviation.Comment: 32 pages, 11 figure

The Global Potential for CO2 Emissions Reduction from Jet Engine Passenger Aircraft

We analyze the costs of CO2 emissions mitigation measures available to aviation using a global aviation systems model. In that context, we discuss the relationship between mitigation potential and scenario characteristics, and how these interact with policy measures that increase the effective price of fuel, for example, ICAO’s CORSIA emissions offset scheme. We find that global fuel lifecycle CO2 emissions per revenue passenger km could be reduced by 1.9% to 3.0% per year on average by the use of a combination of cost-effective measures, for oil prices which reach $75 to$185 per barrel by 2050. Smaller additional emissions reductions, of the order of 0.1% per year, are possible if carbon prices of $50 to$150/tCO2 are assumed by 2050. These outcomes strongly depend on assumptions about biofuels, which account for about half of the reduction potential by 2050. Absolute reductions in emissions are limited by the relative lack of mitigation options for long-haul flights, coupled with strong demand growth

A Compressed Sensing Approach to Uncertainty Propagation for Approximately Additive Functions

Computational models for numerically simulating physical systems are increasingly being used to support decision-making processes in engineering. Processes such as design decisions, policy level analyses, and experimental design settings are often guided by information gained from computational modeling capabilities. To ensure effective application of results obtained through numerical simulation of computational models, uncertainty in model inputs must be propagated to uncertainty in model outputs. For expensive computational models, the many thousands of model evaluations required for traditional Monte Carlo based techniques for uncertainty propagation can be prohibitive. This paper presents a novel methodology for constructing surrogate representations of computational models via compressed sensing. Our approach exploits the approximate additivity inherent in many engineering computational modeling capabilities. We demonstrate our methodology on some analytical functions, with comparison to the Gaussian process regression, and a cooled gas turbine blade application. We also provide some possible methods to build uncertainty information for our approach. The results of these applications reveal substantial computational savings over traditional Monte Carlo simulation with negligible loss of accuracy

A Compressed Sensing Approach to Uncertainty Propagation for Approximately Additive Functions

Computational models for numerically simulating physical systems are increasingly being used to support decision-making processes in engineering. Processes such as design decisions, policy level analyses, and experimental design settings are often guided by information gained from computational modeling capabilities. To ensure effective application of results obtained through numerical simulation of computational models, uncertainty in model inputs must be propagated to uncertainty in model outputs. For expensive computational models, the many thousands of model evaluations required for traditional Monte Carlo based techniques for uncertainty propagation can be prohibitive. This paper presents a novel methodology for constructing surrogate representations of computational models via compressed sensing. Our approach exploits the approximate additivity inherent in many engineering computational modeling capabilities. We demonstrate our methodology on some analytical functions, with comparison to the Gaussian process regression, and a cooled gas turbine blade application. We also provide some possible methods to build uncertainty information for our approach. The results of these applications reveal substantial computational savings over traditional Monte Carlo simulation with negligible loss of accuracy

Proceedings of the Fifteenth Annual Software Engineering Workshop

The Software Engineering Laboratory (SEL) is an organization sponsored by GSFC and created for the purpose of investigating the effectiveness of software engineering technologies when applied to the development of applications software. The goals of the SEL are: (1) to understand the software development process in the GSFC environment; (2) to measure the effect of various methodologies, tools, and models on this process; and (3) to identify and then to apply successful development practices. Fifteen papers were presented at the Fifteenth Annual Software Engineering Workshop in five sessions: (1) SEL at age fifteen; (2) process improvement; (3) measurement; (4) reuse; and (5) process assessment. The sessions were followed by two panel discussions: (1) experiences in implementing an effective measurement program; and (2) software engineering in the 1980's. A summary of the presentations and panel discussions is given

Automated Validation of State-Based Client-Centric Isolation with TLA ⁺

Clear consistency guarantees on data are paramount for the design and implementation of distributed systems. When implementing distributed applications, developers require approaches to verify the data consistency guarantees of an implementation choice. Crooks et al. define a state-based and client-centric model of database isolation. This paper formalizes this state-based model in, reproduces their examples and shows how to model check runtime traces and algorithms with this formalization. The formalized model in enables semi-automatic model checking for different implementation alternatives for transactional operations and allows checking of conformance to isolation levels. We reproduce examples of the original paper and confirm the isolation guarantees of the combination of the well-known 2-phase locking and 2-phase commit algorithms. Using model checking this formalization can also help finding bugs in incorrect specifications. This improves feasibility of automated checking of isolation guarantees in synthesized synchronization implementations and it provides an environment for experimenting with new designs.</p

Proceedings of the 22nd Conference on Formal Methods in Computer-Aided Design – FMCAD 2022

The Conference on Formal Methods in Computer-Aided Design (FMCAD) is an annual conference on the theory and applications of formal methods in hardware and system verification. FMCAD provides a leading forum to researchers in academia and industry for presenting and discussing groundbreaking methods, technologies, theoretical results, and tools for reasoning formally about computing systems. FMCAD covers formal aspects of computer-aided system design including verification, specification, synthesis, and testing

Proceedings of the 22nd Conference on Formal Methods in Computer-Aided Design – FMCAD 2022

The Conference on Formal Methods in Computer-Aided Design (FMCAD) is an annual conference on the theory and applications of formal methods in hardware and system verification. FMCAD provides a leading forum to researchers in academia and industry for presenting and discussing groundbreaking methods, technologies, theoretical results, and tools for reasoning formally about computing systems. FMCAD covers formal aspects of computer-aided system design including verification, specification, synthesis, and testing