Transcript NASA Programs at Duke University

NASA Programs at Duke University
Presented at NASA and North Carolina:
Building Stronger Partnerships
24 April 2002
Centennial Campus, North Carolina State University
NASA Strategic Enterprises
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Biological and Physical Research
Human Exploration and Development of Space
Aerospace Technology
Earth Science
Space Science
Educational Initiatives
Duke’s Strengths
• Medical Center and School of Medicine
• Strong sciences departments
• Small but outstanding Pratt School of
Engineering
• New Nicholas School of the Environment and
Earth Sciences
• Highly ranked private university
Breadth of Activity at Duke University
NASA currently funds research activities in eight departments in four schools.
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Pratt School of Engineering
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Nicholas School of the Environment and Earth Sciences
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Earth and Ocean Sciences
Duke Marine Lab
The School of Medicine
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Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science
Civil and Environmental Engineering
Electrical and Computer Engineering
Duke Center For Hyperbaric Medicine And Environmental Physiology
Arts & Sciences
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Physics
Biology
Research Activities at Duke
• Prebreathe Reduction Protocol (PRP) Trials
• Effects of Precipitation Variability and Desertification on
Water Dynamics in Arid Lands: A Patch and Landscape
Modeling
• Intense Lightning-Generated Electromagnetic Fields
• Modeling of Unsteady Three-Dimensional Flows in
Multistage Machines
• The Mechanics of Flapping Flight
• The Influence of Irrigation on Warm Season Precipitation in
the Great Plains
• The Impacts of Land-Use/Land-Cover in Amazonia on
Hydrometeorological Processes at Different Spatial and
Temporal Scales
• An Investigation of the Geometrical Sealing Properties of
Inflatable Structures Used for Space Solar Power
Generation
Can Increased Evapotranspiration Due to Irrigation in the Great Plains Alter Regional Climate?
Stuart Rojstaczer, Duke University, PI
NASA Land Surface Hydrology Program
Goal and approach: Understand the feedbacks between landscape change and climate in an area
that has been intensely irrigated over the last five decades. Compare precipitation patterns in
summer months with patterns of intense irrigation. Use rain gage and radar data, as well as
numerical models.
Results:
The cool, wet surface
increases low-level
instability, triggering
storms. We estimate that
an additional 6% to 18%
of summer precipitation
attributable to irrigation
falls ~90 km downwind
of the irrigated region.
Figure 1. Texas Panhandle.
Irrigated area outlined in black.
Gauging stations in yellow and
white.
Figure 2. Variability in precipitation (from radar
data): c) 1st half summer 1997; f) 2nd half
summer 1997; g) summers of 1996 and 1997
combined.
NASA Prebreathe Reduction Protocol (PRP) Study
Principal Investigator: Richard D. Vann, Ph.D.
Center for Hyperbaric Medicine and Environmental Physiology
Duke University Medical Center
Funded through NASA Cooperative Agreement NCC 9-83
• Scenario - Astronauts must decompress from normal International Space Station (ISS)
pressure of 14.7 psia (1 atmosphere; equal to sea level) to work outside in space suits with
an internal pressure of 4.3 psia (1/3 atmosphere).
• Problem - Pressure change is great enough to cause decompression sickness (DCS pain, neurological dysfunction, possibly even death) from nitrogen (N2) bubbles.
• Standard Solution - Breathe oxygen (O2) prior to decompression (“prebreathe”) to washout
N2 from tissues and reduce DCS risk.
• Complication - Standard Space Shuttle O2 prebreathe is too long for the number of
spacewalks required to construct and maintain the ISS.
• Solution - We showed exercise during O2 prebreathe increased N2 washout and reduced
prebreathe time. We developed a procedure used on 12 ISS space walks since July 2001.
• Current Goal - Further optimize the exercise/prebreathe protocol for speed and safety.
Aeromechanics Research at Duke:
The GUIde III Consortium
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High cycle fatigue of turbomachinery blading has large economic cost
to airlines,engine companies, is a safety issue, and is a readiness
problem for the military
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NASA, The U.S. Air Force, Engine Manufacturers have formed the
GUIde Consortium to fund university researchers investigating HCF
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Industrial steering committee insures that work will produce data and
methods that will be useful to engine companies and military
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Consortium is organized by investigator at Carnegie Mellon University,
insuring research has appropriate intellectual content
Modeling Multistage Aerodynamics of
Turbomachinery
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Understanding aerodynamics is key
to predicting and controlling HCF in
engines.
Most aerodynamic models do not
include multistage effects
“Physical Variability, Ecosystem Response and Biogeochemical
Consequences in the Pacific Ocean: Understanding Oceanic Carbon
Cycling between 1950-2000”
Modeling and Data Analysis in the EOS Interdisciplinary Science Program (EOS/IDS)
PI: Richard T. Barber (Nicholas School of the Environment and Earth Sciences, Duke University)
Co-Investigators: Fei Chai (U. Maine), Yi Chao (JPL-Cal Tech) and T-H Peng (AOML/NOAA)
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• Predictive understanding of the ocean's role in carbon cycling requires the ability to
specify how variability in temperature, winds or circulation affects the partitioning of
carbon between the atmosphere, surface mixed layer and deep ocean.
• To better understand how physical variability affects carbon partitioning in the
Pacific Ocean, especially on interannual and decadal time scales, we used a
physical-biogeochemical model to produce a 50-year (1950-2000) retrospective
analysis for the Pacific Ocean. The 10-component biogeochemical model simulates
an oceanic food web including the major biological and chemical processes.
• The 50-year analysis shows the variability of phytoplankton blooms and
atmospheric CO2 drawdown caused by physical variability at the temporal and
spatial scale of El Niño/La Niña events.
• Most excitingly, we have also resolved low-frequency changes in carbon
partitioning associated with the Pacific Decadal Oscillation, a large-scale 18 – 30
year cycle of upper ocean dynamics.
The Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) is a low-frequency pattern of Pacific climate variability. During
the warm phase of the PDO, the pattern has cool SST anomalies in the central North Pacific and warm
anomalies along the west coast of North America. The PDO tends to stay in phase (negative or positive)
for decades at a time (18-30 yr period). When the PDO and El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) are both
in the warm phase, as happened during the 1997-98 ENSO event, the anomalies in temperature and density
can be extremely large in the equatorial Pacific. The PDO may have changed sign in the last year or so.
How the sea-to-air CO2 flux will respond to these altered physical conditions in the equatorial Pacific has
important consequences for atmospheric carbon partitioning.
Fig. 1: Typical wintertime Sea Surface Temperature (colors), Sea Level Pressure (contours) and surface
windstress (arrows) anomaly patterns during warm and cool phases of PDO, the upper panel. The Pacific
Decadal Oscillation (PDO) Index, the lower panel, is defined as the leading principal component of North
Pacific monthly sea surface temperature variability (poleward of 20 oN for the 1900-93 period).
Fig.2: The normalized PDO index and modeled primary production (integrated
from the surface to 120m) for the region of 5S-5N and 90W-180 between 1962
and 2000. During the negative PDO, before 1978, the equatorial Pacific was
cooler and our model indicates that primary productivity was higher, resulting
in reduced equatorial outgassing of CO2 to the atmosphere. Throughout the
1980s and 1990s, the PDO was in the positive phase and, therefore, productivity
in general was lower.
Roni Avissar - Duke CEE
Project Title: A Study of
Teleconnections Using a Nested
Global Climate Model - Regional
Climate Model and Satellite
Observations
Project Description:
Similar to the effects of ElNino, Prof. Avissar finds that
deforestation in the Amazon
has a significant impact on
the hydrometeorology of the
planet. This study is
conducted with a new
generation of hydroclimate
numerical model [the OceanLand-Atmosphere Model
(OLAM) developed at Duke
University by the PI and his
team], capable of telescoping
between regional and global
scales using a series of nested,
two-way interacting grids.
Duke will continue to be active in a number of
strategic enterprises
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Biological and Physical Research
Human Exploration and Development of Space
Aerospace Technology
Earth Science
Space Science