Application of Fast Pressure Sensitive Paint in Hypervelocity Flow

The development of fast responding pressure sensitive paints for measurements in high-enthalpy, hypersonic flows is reported. Data are obtained for at plate boundary layers in an impulse facility with typical test gas times on the order of hundreds of microseconds. The fast pressure sensitive paint is found to have the required response time and sufficient signal level to visualize vortical boundary layer structures in a Mach 5.12 freestream. The flow behind protuberance strips with different geometries is evaluated with measurements of the vortex frequency and diameter, as well as breakdown distance. Comparisons with static pressure measurements made using pressure taps show differences of up to a factor of three, and calibration sources as well as an alternative lifetime measurement method remain to be investigated

Blade Tip Pressure Measurements Using Pressure Sensitive Paint

This paper discusses the application of pressure sensitive paint using laser-based excitation for measurement of the upper surface pressure distribution on the tips of rotor blades in hover and simulated forward flight. The testing was conducted in the Rotor Test Cell and the 14- by 22-ft Subsonic Tunnel at the NASA Langley Research Center on the General Rotor Model System (GRMS) test stand. The Mach-scaled rotor contained three chordwise rows of dynamic pressure transducers for comparison with PSP measurements. The rotor had an 11 ft 1 in. diameter, 5.45 in. main chord and a swept, tapered tip. Three thrust conditions were examined in hover, C(sub T) = 0.004, 0.006 and 0.008. In forward flight, an additional thrust condition, C(sub T) = 0.010 was also examined. All four thrust conditions in forward flight were conducted at an advance ratio of 0.35

Deployment of a Pressure Sensitive Paint System for Measuring Global Surface Pressures on Rotorcraft Blades in Simulated Forward Flight

This paper will present details of a Pressure Sensitive Paint (PSP) system for measuring global surface pressures on the tips of rotorcraft blades in simulated forward flight at the 14- x 22-Foot Subsonic Tunnel at the NASA Langley Research Center. The system was designed to use a pulsed laser as an excitation source and PSP data was collected using the lifetime-based approach. With the higher intensity of the laser, this allowed PSP images to be acquired during a single laser pulse, resulting in the collection of crisp images that can be used to determine blade pressure at a specific instant in time. This is extremely important in rotorcraft applications as the blades experience dramatically different flow fields depending on their position in the rotor disk. Testing of the system was performed using the U.S. Army General Rotor Model System equipped with four identical blades. Two of the blades were instrumented with pressure transducers to allow for comparison of the results obtained from the PSP. Preliminary results show that the PSP agrees both qualitatively and quantitatively with both the expected results as well as with the pressure taps. Several areas of improvement have been indentified and are currently being developed

Deployment of a Pressure Sensitive Paint System for Measuring Global Surface Pressures on Rotorcraft Blades in Simulated Forward Flight: Preliminary PSP Results from Test 581 in the 14- by 22-Foot Subsonic Tunnel

This report will present details of a Pressure Sensitive Paint (PSP) system for measuring global surface pressures on the tips of rotorcraft blades in simulated forward flight at the 14- x 22-Foot Subsonic Tunnel. The system was designed to use a pulsed laser as an excitation source and PSP data was collected using the lifetime-based approach. With the higher intensity of the laser, this allowed PSP images to be acquired during a single laser pulse, resulting in the collection of crisp images that can be used to determine blade pressure at a specific instant in time. This is extremely important in rotorcraft applications as the blades experience dramatically different flow fields depending on their position in the rotor disk. Testing of the system was performed using the U.S. Army General Rotor Model System equipped with four identical blades. Two of the blades were instrumented with pressure transducers to allow for comparison of the results obtained from the PSP. This report will also detail possible improvements to the system

Quantum-statistical transport phenomena in memristive computing architectures

The advent of reliable, nanoscale memristive components is promising for next generation compute-in-memory paradigms, however, the intrinsic variability in these devices has prevented widespread adoption. Here we show coherent electron wave functions play a pivotal role in the nanoscale transport properties of these emerging, non-volatile memories. By characterizing both filamentary and non-filamentary memristive devices as disordered Anderson systems, the switching characteristics and intrinsic variability arise directly from the universality of electron transport in disordered media. Our framework suggests localization phenomena in nanoscale, solid-state memristive systems are directly linked to circuit level performance. We discuss how quantum conductance fluctuations in the active layer set a lower bound on device variability. This finding implies there is a fundamental quantum limit on the reliability of memristive devices, and electron coherence will play a decisive role in surpassing or maintaining Moore's Law with these systems.Comment: 13 pages, 6 figure

Prioritising surveillance for alien organisms transported as stowaways on ships travelling to South Africa

The global shipping network facilitates the transportation and introduction of marine and terrestrial organisms to regions where they are not native, and some of these organisms become invasive. South Africa was used as a case study to evaluate the potential for shipping to contribute to the introduction and establishment of marine and terrestrial alien species (i.e. establishment debt) and to assess how this varies across shipping routes and seasons. As a proxy for the number of species introduced (i.e. 'colonisation pressure') shipping movement data were used to determine, for each season, the number of ships that visited South African ports from foreign ports and the number of days travelled between ports. Seasonal marine and terrestrial environmental similarity between South African and foreign ports was then used to estimate the likelihood that introduced species would establish. These data were used to determine the seasonal relative contribution of shipping routes to South Africa's marine and terrestrial establishment debt. Additionally, distribution data were used to identify marine and terrestrial species that are known to be invasive elsewhere and which might be introduced to each South African port through shipping routes that have a high relative contribution to establishment debt. Shipping routes from Asian ports, especially Singapore, have a particularly high relative contribution to South Africa's establishment debt, while among South African ports, Durban has the highest risk of being invaded. There was seasonal variation in the shipping routes that have a high relative contribution to the establishment debt of the South African ports. The presented method provides a simple way to prioritise surveillance effort and our results indicate that, for South Africa, port-specific prevention strategies should be developed, a large portion of the available resources should be allocated to Durban, and seasonal variations and their consequences for prevention strategies should be explored further. (Résumé d'auteur