8,673 research outputs found
Insertion loss measuring apparatus having transformer means connected across a pair of bolometers Patent
High impedance alternating current sensing transformer device between two bolometers for measuring insertion loss of test componen
The COLD-SAT Experiment for Cryogenic Fluid Management Technology
Future national space transportation missions will depend on the use of cryogenic fluid management technology development needs for these missions. In-space testing will be conducted in order to show low gravity cryogenic fluid management concepts and to acquire a technical data base. Liquid H2 is the preferred test fluid due to its propellant use. The design of COLD-SAT (Cryogenic On-orbit Liquid Depot Storage, Acquisition, and Transfer Satellite), an Expendable Launch Vehicle (ELV) launched orbital spacecraft that will perform subcritical liquid H2 storage and transfer experiments under low gravity conditions is studied. An Atlas launch vehicle will place COLD-SAT into a circular orbit, and the 3-axis controlled spacecraft bus will provide electric power, experiment control, and data management, attitude control, and propulsive accelerations for the experiments. Low levels of acceleration will provide data on the effects that low gravity might have on the heat and mass transfer processes used. The experiment module will contain 3 liquid H2 tanks; fluid transfer, pressurization and venting equipment; and instrumentation
Host-Parasite Co-evolution and Optimal Mutation Rates for Semi-conservative Quasispecies
In this paper, we extend a model of host-parasite co-evolution to incorporate
the semi-conservative nature of DNA replication for both the host and the
parasite. We find that the optimal mutation rate for the semi-conservative and
conservative hosts converge for realistic genome lengths, thus maintaining the
admirable agreement between theory and experiment found previously for the
conservative model and justifying the conservative approximation in some cases.
We demonstrate that, while the optimal mutation rate for a conservative and
semi-conservative parasite interacting with a given immune system is similar to
that of a conservative parasite, the properties away from this optimum differ
significantly. We suspect that this difference, coupled with the requirement
that a parasite optimize survival in a range of viable hosts, may help explain
why semi-conservative viruses are known to have significantly lower mutation
rates than their conservative counterparts
Computation of aircraft component flow fields at transonic Mach numbers using a three-dimensional Navier-Stokes algorithm
A computer analysis was developed for calculating steady (or unsteady) three-dimensional aircraft component flow fields. This algorithm, called ENS3D, can compute the flow field for the following configurations: diffuser duct/thrust nozzle, isolated wing, isolated fuselage, wing/fuselage with or without integrated inlet and exhaust, nacelle/inlet, nacelle (fuselage) afterbody/exhaust jet, complete transport engine installation, and multicomponent configurations using zonal grid generation technique. Solutions can be obtained for subsonic, transonic, or hypersonic freestream speeds. The algorithm can solve either the Euler equations for inviscid flow, the thin shear layer Navier-Stokes equations for viscous flow, or the full Navier-Stokes equations for viscous flow. The flow field solution is determined on a body-fitted computational grid. A fully-implicit alternating direction implicit method is employed for the solution of the finite difference equations. For viscous computations, either a two layer eddy-viscosity turbulence model or the k-epsilon two equation transport model can be used to achieve mathematical closure
Comparison of electrically driven lasers for space power transmission
High-power lasers in space could provide power for a variety of future missions such as spacecraft electric power requirements and laser propulsion. This study investigates four electrically pumped laser systems, all scaled to 1-MW laser output, that could provide power to spacecraft. The four laser systems are krypton fluoride, copper vapor, laser diode array, and carbon dioxide. Each system was powered by a large solar photovoltaic array which, in turn, provided power for the appropriate laser power conditioning subsystem. Each system was block-diagrammed, and the power and efficiency were found for each subsystem block component. The copper vapor system had the lowest system efficiency (6 percent). The CO2 laser was found to be the most readily scalable but has the disadvantage of long laser wavelength
Stochastic gain in population dynamics
We introduce an extension of the usual replicator dynamics to adaptive
learning rates. We show that a population with a dynamic learning rate can gain
an increased average payoff in transient phases and can also exploit external
noise, leading the system away from the Nash equilibrium, in a reasonance-like
fashion. The payoff versus noise curve resembles the signal to noise ratio
curve in stochastic resonance. Seen in this broad context, we introduce another
mechanism that exploits fluctuations in order to improve properties of the
system. Such a mechanism could be of particular interest in economic systems.Comment: accepted for publication in Phys. Rev. Let
Do columnar defects produce bulk pinning?
From magneto-optical imaging performed on heavy-ion irradiated YBaCuO single
crystals, it is found that at fields and temperatures where strong single
vortex pinning by individual irradiation-induced amorphous columnar defects is
to be expected, vortex motion is limited by the nucleation of vortex kinks at
the specimen surface rather than by half-loop nucleation in the bulk. In the
material bulk, vortex motion occurs through (easy) kink sliding. Depinning in
the bulk determines the screening current only at fields comparable to or
larger than the matching field, at which the majority of moving vortices is not
trapped by an ion track.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figures, submitted to Physical Review Letter
Chaos driven fusion enhancement factor at astrophysical energies
We perform molecular dynamics simulations to assess the screening effects by
bound target electrons in low energy nuclear reactions in laboratories. Quantum
effects corresponding to the Pauli and Heisenberg principle are enforced by
constraints. We show that the enhancement of the average cross section and of
its variance is due to the perturbations induced by the electrons.This gives a
correlation between the maximum amplitudes of the inter-nuclear oscillational
motion and the enhancement factor. It suggests that the chaotic behavior of the
electronic motion affects the magnitude of the enhancement factor.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure
Preliminary design and cost of a 1-megawatt solar-pumped iodide laser space-to-space transmission station
A preliminary conceptual design of a space-based solar pumped iodide laser emitting 1 megawatt of laser power for space-to-space power transmission is described. A near parabolic solar collector focuses sunlight onto the t-C4F9I (perfluoro-t butyl iodide) lasant within a transverse flow optical cavity. Using waste heat, a thermal system was designed to supply compressor and auxiliary power. System components were designed with weight and cost estimates assigned. Although cost is very approximate, the cost comparison of individual system components leads to valuable insights for future research. In particular, it was found that laser efficiency was not a dominant cost or weight factor, the dominant factor being the laser cavity and laser transmission optics. The manufacturing cost was approx. two thirds of the total cost with transportation to orbit the remainder. The flowing nonrenewable lasant comprised 20% of the total life cycle cost of the system and thus was not a major cost factor. The station mass was 92,000 kg without lasant, requiring approx. four shuttle flights to low Earth orbit where an orbital transfer vehicle will transport it to the final altitude of 6378 km
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