User Manual for the PROTEUS Mesh Tools

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Smith, Micheal A.; Shemon, Emily R.

2015-06-01

This report describes the various mesh tools that are provided with the PROTEUS code giving both descriptions of the input and output. In many cases the examples are provided with a regression test of the mesh tools. The most important mesh tools for any user to consider using are the MT_MeshToMesh.x and the MT_RadialLattice.x codes. The former allows the conversion between most mesh types handled by PROTEUS while the second allows the merging of multiple (assembly) meshes into a radial structured grid. Note that the mesh generation process is recursive in nature and that each input specific for a givenmore » mesh tool (such as .axial or .merge) can be used as “mesh” input for any of the mesh tools discussed in this manual.« less

LBMD : a layer-based mesh data structure tailored for generic API infrastructures.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Ebeida, Mohamed S.; Knupp, Patrick Michael

2010-11-01

A new mesh data structure is introduced for the purpose of mesh processing in Application Programming Interface (API) infrastructures. This data structure utilizes a reduced mesh representation to increase its ability to handle significantly larger meshes compared to full mesh representation. In spite of the reduced representation, each mesh entity (vertex, edge, face, and region) is represented using a unique handle, with no extra storage cost, which is a crucial requirement in most API libraries. The concept of mesh layers makes the data structure more flexible for mesh generation and mesh modification operations. This flexibility can have a favorable impactmore » in solver based queries of finite volume and multigrid methods. The capabilities of LBMD make it even more attractive for parallel implementations using Message Passing Interface (MPI) or Graphics Processing Units (GPUs). The data structure is associated with a new classification method to relate mesh entities to their corresponding geometrical entities. The classification technique stores the related information at the node level without introducing any ambiguities. Several examples are presented to illustrate the strength of this new data structure.« less

Documentation for MeshKit - Reactor Geometry (&mesh) Generator

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Jain, Rajeev; Mahadevan, Vijay

2015-09-30

This report gives documentation for using MeshKit’s Reactor Geometry (and mesh) Generator (RGG) GUI and also briefly documents other algorithms and tools available in MeshKit. RGG is a program designed to aid in modeling and meshing of complex/large hexagonal and rectilinear reactor cores. RGG uses Argonne’s SIGMA interfaces, Qt and VTK to produce an intuitive user interface. By integrating a 3D view of the reactor with the meshing tools and combining them into one user interface, RGG streamlines the task of preparing a simulation mesh and enables real-time feedback that reduces accidental scripting mistakes that could waste hours of meshing.more » RGG interfaces with MeshKit tools to consolidate the meshing process, meaning that going from model to mesh is as easy as a button click. This report is designed to explain RGG v 2.0 interface and provide users with the knowledge and skills to pilot RGG successfully. Brief documentation of MeshKit source code, tools and other algorithms available are also presented for developers to extend and add new algorithms to MeshKit. RGG tools work in serial and parallel and have been used to model complex reactor core models consisting of conical pins, load pads, several thousands of axially varying material properties of instrumentation pins and other interstices meshes.« less

NeuroTessMesh: A Tool for the Generation and Visualization of Neuron Meshes and Adaptive On-the-Fly Refinement.

PubMed

Garcia-Cantero, Juan J; Brito, Juan P; Mata, Susana; Bayona, Sofia; Pastor, Luis

2017-01-01

Gaining a better understanding of the human brain continues to be one of the greatest challenges for science, largely because of the overwhelming complexity of the brain and the difficulty of analyzing the features and behavior of dense neural networks. Regarding analysis, 3D visualization has proven to be a useful tool for the evaluation of complex systems. However, the large number of neurons in non-trivial circuits, together with their intricate geometry, makes the visualization of a neuronal scenario an extremely challenging computational problem. Previous work in this area dealt with the generation of 3D polygonal meshes that approximated the cells' overall anatomy but did not attempt to deal with the extremely high storage and computational cost required to manage a complex scene. This paper presents NeuroTessMesh, a tool specifically designed to cope with many of the problems associated with the visualization of neural circuits that are comprised of large numbers of cells. In addition, this method facilitates the recovery and visualization of the 3D geometry of cells included in databases, such as NeuroMorpho, and provides the tools needed to approximate missing information such as the soma's morphology. This method takes as its only input the available compact, yet incomplete, morphological tracings of the cells as acquired by neuroscientists. It uses a multiresolution approach that combines an initial, coarse mesh generation with subsequent on-the-fly adaptive mesh refinement stages using tessellation shaders. For the coarse mesh generation, a novel approach, based on the Finite Element Method, allows approximation of the 3D shape of the soma from its incomplete description. Subsequently, the adaptive refinement process performed in the graphic card generates meshes that provide good visual quality geometries at a reasonable computational cost, both in terms of memory and rendering time. All the described techniques have been integrated into NeuroTessMesh, available to the scientific community, to generate, visualize, and save the adaptive resolution meshes.

Automated Generation of Finite-Element Meshes for Aircraft Conceptual Design

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Li, Wu; Robinson, Jay

2016-01-01

This paper presents a novel approach for automated generation of fully connected finite-element meshes for all internal structural components and skins of a given wing-body geometry model, controlled by a few conceptual-level structural layout parameters. Internal structural components include spars, ribs, frames, and bulkheads. Structural layout parameters include spar/rib locations in wing chordwise/spanwise direction and frame/bulkhead locations in longitudinal direction. A simple shell thickness optimization problem with two load conditions is used to verify versatility and robustness of the automated meshing process. The automation process is implemented in ModelCenter starting from an OpenVSP geometry and ending with a NASTRAN 200 solution. One subsonic configuration and one supersonic configuration are used for numerical verification. Two different structural layouts are constructed for each configuration and five finite-element meshes of different sizes are generated for each layout. The paper includes various comparisons of solutions of 20 thickness optimization problems, as well as discussions on how the optimal solutions are affected by the stress constraint bound and the initial guess of design variables.

Improvements to the Unstructured Mesh Generator MESH3D

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Thomas, Scott D.; Baker, Timothy J.; Cliff, Susan E.

1999-01-01

The AIRPLANE process starts with an aircraft geometry stored in a CAD system. The surface is modeled with a mesh of triangles and then the flow solver produces pressures at surface points which may be integrated to find forces and moments. The biggest advantage is that the grid generation bottleneck of the CFD process is eliminated when an unstructured tetrahedral mesh is used. MESH3D is the key to turning around the first analysis of a CAD geometry in days instead of weeks. The flow solver part of AIRPLANE has proven to be robust and accurate over a decade of use at NASA. It has been extensively validated with experimental data and compares well with other Euler flow solvers. AIRPLANE has been applied to all the HSR geometries treated at Ames over the course of the HSR program in order to verify the accuracy of other flow solvers. The unstructured approach makes handling complete and complex geometries very simple because only the surface of the aircraft needs to be discretized, i.e. covered with triangles. The volume mesh is created automatically by MESH3D. AIRPLANE runs well on multiple platforms. Vectorization on the Cray Y-MP is reasonable for a code that uses indirect addressing. Massively parallel computers such as the IBM SP2, SGI Origin 2000, and the Cray T3E have been used with an MPI version of the flow solver and the code scales very well on these systems. AIRPLANE can run on a desktop computer as well. AIRPLANE has a future. The unstructured technologies developed as part of the HSR program are now targeting high Reynolds number viscous flow simulation. The pacing item in this effort is Navier-Stokes mesh generation.

Polyhedral meshing in numerical analysis of conjugate heat transfer

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sosnowski, Marcin; Krzywanski, Jaroslaw; Grabowska, Karolina; Gnatowska, Renata

2018-06-01

Computational methods have been widely applied in conjugate heat transfer analysis. The very first and crucial step in such research is the meshing process which consists in dividing the analysed geometry into numerous small control volumes (cells). In Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) applications it is desirable to use the hexahedral cells as the resulting mesh is characterized by low numerical diffusion. Unfortunately generating such mesh can be a very time-consuming task and in case of complicated geometry - it may not be possible to generate cells of good quality. Therefore tetrahedral cells have been implemented into commercial pre-processors. Their advantage is the ease of its generation even in case of very complex geometry. On the other hand tetrahedrons cannot be stretched excessively without decreasing the mesh quality factor, so significantly larger number of cells has to be used in comparison to hexahedral mesh in order to achieve a reasonable accuracy. Moreover the numerical diffusion of tetrahedral elements is significantly higher. Therefore the polyhedral cells are proposed within the paper in order to combine the advantages of hexahedrons (low numerical diffusion resulting in accurate solution) and tetrahedrons (rapid semi-automatic generation) as well as to overcome the disadvantages of both the above mentioned mesh types. The major benefit of polyhedral mesh is that each individual cell has many neighbours, so gradients can be well approximated. Polyhedrons are also less sensitive to stretching than tetrahedrons which results in better mesh quality leading to improved numerical stability of the model. In addition, numerical diffusion is reduced due to mass exchange over numerous faces. This leads to a more accurate solution achieved with a lower cell count. Therefore detailed comparison of numerical modelling results concerning conjugate heat transfer using tetrahedral and polyhedral meshes is presented in the paper.

Grid generation for the solution of partial differential equations

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Eiseman, Peter R.; Erlebacher, Gordon

1989-01-01

A general survey of grid generators is presented with a concern for understanding why grids are necessary, how they are applied, and how they are generated. After an examination of the need for meshes, the overall applications setting is established with a categorization of the various connectivity patterns. This is split between structured grids and unstructured meshes. Altogether, the categorization establishes the foundation upon which grid generation techniques are developed. The two primary categories are algebraic techniques and partial differential equation techniques. These are each split into basic parts, and accordingly are individually examined in some detail. In the process, the interrelations between the various parts are accented. From the established background in the primary techniques, consideration is shifted to the topic of interactive grid generation and then to adaptive meshes. The setting for adaptivity is established with a suitable means to monitor severe solution behavior. Adaptive grids are considered first and are followed by adaptive triangular meshes. Then the consideration shifts to the temporal coupling between grid generators and PDE-solvers. To conclude, a reflection upon the discussion, herein, is given.

Grid generation for the solution of partial differential equations

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Eiseman, Peter R.; Erlebacher, Gordon

1987-01-01

A general survey of grid generators is presented with a concern for understanding why grids are necessary, how they are applied, and how they are generated. After an examination of the need for meshes, the overall applications setting is established with a categorization of the various connectivity patterns. This is split between structured grids and unstructured meshes. Altogether, the categorization establishes the foundation upon which grid generation techniques are developed. The two primary categories are algebraic techniques and partial differential equation techniques. These are each split into basic parts, and accordingly are individually examined in some detail. In the process, the interrelations between the various parts are accented. From the established background in the primary techniques, consideration is shifted to the topic of interactive grid generation and then to adaptive meshes. The setting for adaptivity is established with a suitable means to monitor severe solution behavior. Adaptive grids are considered first and are followed by adaptive triangular meshes. Then the consideration shifts to the temporal coupling between grid generators and PDE-solvers. To conclude, a reflection upon the discussion, herein, is given.

Diffuse interface simulation of bubble rising process: a comparison of adaptive mesh refinement and arbitrary lagrange-euler methods

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wang, Ye; Cai, Jiejin; Li, Qiong; Yin, Huaqiang; Yang, Xingtuan

2018-06-01

Gas-liquid two phase flow exists in several industrial processes and light-water reactors (LWRs). A diffuse interface based finite element method with two different mesh generation methods namely, the Adaptive Mesh Refinement (AMR) and the Arbitrary Lagrange Euler (ALE) methods is used to model the shape and velocity changes in a rising bubble. Moreover, the calculating speed and mesh generation strategies of AMR and ALE are contrasted. The simulation results agree with the Bhagat's experiments, indicating that both mesh generation methods can simulate the characteristics of bubble accurately. We concluded that: the small bubble rises as elliptical with oscillation, whereas a larger bubble (11 mm > d > 7 mm) rises with a morphology between the elliptical and cap type with a larger oscillation. When the bubble is large (d > 11 mm), it rises up as a cap type, and the amplitude becomes smaller. Moreover, it takes longer to achieve the stable shape from the ellipsoid to the spherical cap type with the increase of the bubble diameter. The results also show that for smaller diameter case, the ALE method uses fewer grids and has a faster calculation speed, but the AMR method can solve the case of a large geometry deformation efficiently.

Advances in Parallelization for Large Scale Oct-Tree Mesh Generation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

O'Connell, Matthew; Karman, Steve L.

2015-01-01

Despite great advancements in the parallelization of numerical simulation codes over the last 20 years, it is still common to perform grid generation in serial. Generating large scale grids in serial often requires using special "grid generation" compute machines that can have more than ten times the memory of average machines. While some parallel mesh generation techniques have been proposed, generating very large meshes for LES or aeroacoustic simulations is still a challenging problem. An automated method for the parallel generation of very large scale off-body hierarchical meshes is presented here. This work enables large scale parallel generation of off-body meshes by using a novel combination of parallel grid generation techniques and a hybrid "top down" and "bottom up" oct-tree method. Meshes are generated using hardware commonly found in parallel compute clusters. The capability to generate very large meshes is demonstrated by the generation of off-body meshes surrounding complex aerospace geometries. Results are shown including a one billion cell mesh generated around a Predator Unmanned Aerial Vehicle geometry, which was generated on 64 processors in under 45 minutes.

Coupling LaGrit unstructured mesh generation and model setup with TOUGH2 flow and transport: A case study

DOE PAGES

Sentis, Manuel Lorenzo; Gable, Carl W.

2017-06-15

Furthermore, there are many applications in science and engineering modeling where an accurate representation of a complex model geometry in the form of a mesh is important. In applications of flow and transport in subsurface porous media, this is manifest in models that must capture complex geologic stratigraphy, structure (faults, folds, erosion, deposition) and infrastructure (tunnels, boreholes, excavations). Model setup, defined as the activities of geometry definition, mesh generation (creation, optimization, modification, refine, de-refine, smooth), assigning material properties, initial conditions and boundary conditions requires specialized software tools to automate and streamline the process. In addition, some model setup tools willmore » provide more utility if they are designed to interface with and meet the needs of a particular flow and transport software suite. A control volume discretization that uses a two point flux approximation is for example most accurate when the underlying control volumes are 2D or 3D Voronoi tessellations. In this paper we will present the coupling of LaGriT, a mesh generation and model setup software suite and TOUGH2 to model subsurface flow problems and we show an example of how LaGriT can be used as a model setup tool for the generation of a Voronoi mesh for the simulation program TOUGH2. To generate the MESH file for TOUGH2 from the LaGriT output a standalone module Lagrit2Tough2 was developed, which is presented here and will be included in a future release of LaGriT. Here in this paper an alternative method to generate a Voronoi mesh for TOUGH2 with LaGriT is presented and thanks to the modular and command based structure of LaGriT this method is well suited to generating a mesh for complex models.« less

Coupling LaGrit unstructured mesh generation and model setup with TOUGH2 flow and transport: A case study

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sentís, Manuel Lorenzo; Gable, Carl W.

2017-11-01

There are many applications in science and engineering modeling where an accurate representation of a complex model geometry in the form of a mesh is important. In applications of flow and transport in subsurface porous media, this is manifest in models that must capture complex geologic stratigraphy, structure (faults, folds, erosion, deposition) and infrastructure (tunnels, boreholes, excavations). Model setup, defined as the activities of geometry definition, mesh generation (creation, optimization, modification, refine, de-refine, smooth), assigning material properties, initial conditions and boundary conditions requires specialized software tools to automate and streamline the process. In addition, some model setup tools will provide more utility if they are designed to interface with and meet the needs of a particular flow and transport software suite. A control volume discretization that uses a two point flux approximation is for example most accurate when the underlying control volumes are 2D or 3D Voronoi tessellations. In this paper we will present the coupling of LaGriT, a mesh generation and model setup software suite and TOUGH2 (Pruess et al., 1999) to model subsurface flow problems and we show an example of how LaGriT can be used as a model setup tool for the generation of a Voronoi mesh for the simulation program TOUGH2. To generate the MESH file for TOUGH2 from the LaGriT output a standalone module Lagrit2Tough2 was developed, which is presented here and will be included in a future release of LaGriT. In this paper an alternative method to generate a Voronoi mesh for TOUGH2 with LaGriT is presented and thanks to the modular and command based structure of LaGriT this method is well suited to generating a mesh for complex models.

Development of a Dynamically Configurable, Object-Oriented Framework for Distributed, Multi-modal Computational Aerospace Systems Simulation: Second Year Progress Report

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Afjeh, Abdollah A.; Reed, John A.

2003-01-01

Mesh generation has long been recognized as a bottleneck in the CFD process. While much research on automating the volume mesh generation process have been relatively successful,these methods rely on appropriate initial surface triangulation to work properly. Surface discretization has been one of the least automated steps in computational simulation due to its dependence on implicitly defined CAD surfaces and curves. Differences in CAD peometry engines manifest themselves in discrepancies in their interpretation of the same entities. This lack of "good" geometry causes significant problems for mesh generators, requiring users to "repair" the CAD geometry before mesh generation. The problem is exacerbated when CAD geometry is translated to other forms (e.g., IGES )which do not include important topological and construction information in addition to entity geometry. One technique to avoid these problems is to access the CAD geometry directly from the mesh generating software, rather than through files. By accessing the geometry model (not a discretized version) in its native environment, t h s a proach avoids translation to a format which can deplete the model of topological information. Our approach to enable models developed in the Denali software environment to directly access CAD geometry and functions is through an Application Programming Interface (API) known as CAPRI. CAPRI provides a layer of indirection through which CAD-specific data may be accessed by an application program using CAD-system neutral C and FORTRAN language function calls. CAPRI supports a general set of CAD operations such as truth testing, geometry construction and entity queries.

Remodeling characteristics and collagen distribution in synthetic mesh materials explanted from human subjects after abdominal wall reconstruction: an analysis of remodeling characteristics by patient risk factors and surgical site classifications

PubMed Central

Cavallo, Jaime A.; Roma, Andres A.; Jasielec, Mateusz S.; Ousley, Jenny; Creamer, Jennifer; Pichert, Matthew D.; Baalman, Sara; Frisella, Margaret M.; Matthews, Brent D.

2014-01-01

Background The purpose of this study was to evaluate the associations between patient characteristics or surgical site classifications and the histologic remodeling scores of synthetic meshes biopsied from their abdominal wall repair sites in the first attempt to generate a multivariable risk prediction model of non-constructive remodeling. Methods Biopsies of the synthetic meshes were obtained from the abdominal wall repair sites of 51 patients during a subsequent abdominal re-exploration. Biopsies were stained with hematoxylin and eosin, and evaluated according to a semi-quantitative scoring system for remodeling characteristics (cell infiltration, cell types, extracellular matrix deposition, inflammation, fibrous encapsulation, and neovascularization) and a mean composite score (CR). Biopsies were also stained with Sirius Red and Fast Green, and analyzed to determine the collagen I:III ratio. Based on univariate analyses between subject clinical characteristics or surgical site classification and the histologic remodeling scores, cohort variables were selected for multivariable regression models using a threshold p value of ≤0.200. Results The model selection process for the extracellular matrix score yielded two variables: subject age at time of mesh implantation, and mesh classification (c-statistic = 0.842). For CR score, the model selection process yielded two variables: subject age at time of mesh implantation and mesh classification (r2 = 0.464). The model selection process for the collagen III area yielded a model with two variables: subject body mass index at time of mesh explantation and pack-year history (r2 = 0.244). Conclusion Host characteristics and surgical site assessments may predict degree of remodeling for synthetic meshes used to reinforce abdominal wall repair sites. These preliminary results constitute the first steps in generating a risk prediction model that predicts the patients and clinical circumstances for which non-constructive remodeling of an abdominal wall repair site with synthetic mesh reinforcement is most likely to occur. PMID:24442681

MeSH Now: automatic MeSH indexing at PubMed scale via learning to rank.

PubMed

Mao, Yuqing; Lu, Zhiyong

2017-04-17

MeSH indexing is the task of assigning relevant MeSH terms based on a manual reading of scholarly publications by human indexers. The task is highly important for improving literature retrieval and many other scientific investigations in biomedical research. Unfortunately, given its manual nature, the process of MeSH indexing is both time-consuming (new articles are not immediately indexed until 2 or 3 months later) and costly (approximately ten dollars per article). In response, automatic indexing by computers has been previously proposed and attempted but remains challenging. In order to advance the state of the art in automatic MeSH indexing, a community-wide shared task called BioASQ was recently organized. We propose MeSH Now, an integrated approach that first uses multiple strategies to generate a combined list of candidate MeSH terms for a target article. Through a novel learning-to-rank framework, MeSH Now then ranks the list of candidate terms based on their relevance to the target article. Finally, MeSH Now selects the highest-ranked MeSH terms via a post-processing module. We assessed MeSH Now on two separate benchmarking datasets using traditional precision, recall and F 1 -score metrics. In both evaluations, MeSH Now consistently achieved over 0.60 in F-score, ranging from 0.610 to 0.612. Furthermore, additional experiments show that MeSH Now can be optimized by parallel computing in order to process MEDLINE documents on a large scale. We conclude that MeSH Now is a robust approach with state-of-the-art performance for automatic MeSH indexing and that MeSH Now is capable of processing PubMed scale documents within a reasonable time frame. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/CBBresearch/Lu/Demo/MeSHNow/ .

A Domain-Decomposed Multilevel Method for Adaptively Refined Cartesian Grids with Embedded Boundaries

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Aftosmis, M. J.; Berger, M. J.; Adomavicius, G.

2000-01-01

Preliminary verification and validation of an efficient Euler solver for adaptively refined Cartesian meshes with embedded boundaries is presented. The parallel, multilevel method makes use of a new on-the-fly parallel domain decomposition strategy based upon the use of space-filling curves, and automatically generates a sequence of coarse meshes for processing by the multigrid smoother. The coarse mesh generation algorithm produces grids which completely cover the computational domain at every level in the mesh hierarchy. A series of examples on realistically complex three-dimensional configurations demonstrate that this new coarsening algorithm reliably achieves mesh coarsening ratios in excess of 7 on adaptively refined meshes. Numerical investigations of the scheme's local truncation error demonstrate an achieved order of accuracy between 1.82 and 1.88. Convergence results for the multigrid scheme are presented for both subsonic and transonic test cases and demonstrate W-cycle multigrid convergence rates between 0.84 and 0.94. Preliminary parallel scalability tests on both simple wing and complex complete aircraft geometries shows a computational speedup of 52 on 64 processors using the run-time mesh partitioner.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Sentis, Manuel Lorenzo; Gable, Carl W.

Furthermore, there are many applications in science and engineering modeling where an accurate representation of a complex model geometry in the form of a mesh is important. In applications of flow and transport in subsurface porous media, this is manifest in models that must capture complex geologic stratigraphy, structure (faults, folds, erosion, deposition) and infrastructure (tunnels, boreholes, excavations). Model setup, defined as the activities of geometry definition, mesh generation (creation, optimization, modification, refine, de-refine, smooth), assigning material properties, initial conditions and boundary conditions requires specialized software tools to automate and streamline the process. In addition, some model setup tools willmore » provide more utility if they are designed to interface with and meet the needs of a particular flow and transport software suite. A control volume discretization that uses a two point flux approximation is for example most accurate when the underlying control volumes are 2D or 3D Voronoi tessellations. In this paper we will present the coupling of LaGriT, a mesh generation and model setup software suite and TOUGH2 to model subsurface flow problems and we show an example of how LaGriT can be used as a model setup tool for the generation of a Voronoi mesh for the simulation program TOUGH2. To generate the MESH file for TOUGH2 from the LaGriT output a standalone module Lagrit2Tough2 was developed, which is presented here and will be included in a future release of LaGriT. Here in this paper an alternative method to generate a Voronoi mesh for TOUGH2 with LaGriT is presented and thanks to the modular and command based structure of LaGriT this method is well suited to generating a mesh for complex models.« less

NeuroTessMesh: A Tool for the Generation and Visualization of Neuron Meshes and Adaptive On-the-Fly Refinement

PubMed Central

Garcia-Cantero, Juan J.; Brito, Juan P.; Mata, Susana; Bayona, Sofia; Pastor, Luis

2017-01-01

Gaining a better understanding of the human brain continues to be one of the greatest challenges for science, largely because of the overwhelming complexity of the brain and the difficulty of analyzing the features and behavior of dense neural networks. Regarding analysis, 3D visualization has proven to be a useful tool for the evaluation of complex systems. However, the large number of neurons in non-trivial circuits, together with their intricate geometry, makes the visualization of a neuronal scenario an extremely challenging computational problem. Previous work in this area dealt with the generation of 3D polygonal meshes that approximated the cells’ overall anatomy but did not attempt to deal with the extremely high storage and computational cost required to manage a complex scene. This paper presents NeuroTessMesh, a tool specifically designed to cope with many of the problems associated with the visualization of neural circuits that are comprised of large numbers of cells. In addition, this method facilitates the recovery and visualization of the 3D geometry of cells included in databases, such as NeuroMorpho, and provides the tools needed to approximate missing information such as the soma’s morphology. This method takes as its only input the available compact, yet incomplete, morphological tracings of the cells as acquired by neuroscientists. It uses a multiresolution approach that combines an initial, coarse mesh generation with subsequent on-the-fly adaptive mesh refinement stages using tessellation shaders. For the coarse mesh generation, a novel approach, based on the Finite Element Method, allows approximation of the 3D shape of the soma from its incomplete description. Subsequently, the adaptive refinement process performed in the graphic card generates meshes that provide good visual quality geometries at a reasonable computational cost, both in terms of memory and rendering time. All the described techniques have been integrated into NeuroTessMesh, available to the scientific community, to generate, visualize, and save the adaptive resolution meshes. PMID:28690511

Development of a Flexible Framework of Common Hypersonic Navier-Strokes Meshes for the Space Shuttle Orbiter

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Alter, Stephen J.; Reuthler, James J.; McDaniel, Ryan D.

2003-01-01

A flexible framework for the development of block structured volume grids for hypersonic Navier-Stokes flow simulations was developed for analysis of the Shuttle Orbiter Columbia. The development of the flexible framework, resulted in an ability to quickly generate meshes to directly correlate solutions contributed by participating groups on a common surface mesh, providing confidence for the extension of the envelope of solutions and damage scenarios. The framework draws on the experience of NASA Langely and NASA Ames Research Centers in structured grid generation, and consists of a grid generation process that is implemented through a division of responsibilities. The nominal division of labor consisted of NASA Johnson Space Center coordinating the damage scenarios to be analyzed by the Aerothermodynamics Columbia Accident Investigation (CAI) team, Ames developing the surface grids that described the computational volume about the orbiter, and Langely improving grid quality of Ames generated data and constructing the final volume grids. Distributing the work among the participants in the Aerothermodynamic CIA team resulted in significantly less time required to construct complete meshes than possible by any individual participant. The approach demonstrated that the One-NASA grid generation team could sustain the demand for new meshes to explore new damage scenarios within a aggressive timeline.

Patterning of polymer nanofiber meshes by electrospinning for biomedical applications

PubMed Central

Neves, Nuno M; Campos, Rui; Pedro, Adriano; Cunha, José; Macedo, Francisco; Reis, Rui L

2007-01-01

The end-product of the electrospinning process is typically a randomly aligned fiber mesh or membrane. This is a result of the electric field generated between the drop of polymer solution at the needle and the collector. The developed electric field causes the stretching of the fibers and their random deposition. By judicious selection of the collector architecture, it is thus possible to develop other morphologies on the nanofiber meshes. The aim of this work is to prepare fiber meshes using various patterned collectors with specific dimensions and designs and to evaluate how those patterns can affect the properties of the meshes relevant to biomedical applications. This study aims at verifying whether it is possible to control the architecture of the fiber meshes by tailoring the geometry of the collector. Three different metallic collector topographies are used to test this hypothesis. Electrospun nonwoven patterned meshes of polyethylene oxide (PEO) and poly(ε-capro-lactone) (PCL) were successfully prepared. Those fiber meshes were analyzed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). Both mechanical properties of the meshes and cell contacting experiments were performed to test the effect of the produced patterns over the properties of the meshes relevant for biomedical applications. The present study will evaluate cell adhesion sensitivity to the patterns generated and the effect of those patterns on the tensile properties of the fiber meshes. PMID:18019842

Automatic Mesh Generation of Hybrid Mesh on Valves in Multiple Positions in Feedline Systems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Ross, Douglass H.; Ito, Yasushi; Dorothy, Fredric W.; Shih, Alan M.; Peugeot, John

2010-01-01

Fluid flow simulations through a valve often require evaluation of the valve in multiple opening positions. A mesh has to be generated for the valve for each position and compounding. The problem is the fact that the valve is typically part of a larger feedline system. In this paper, we propose to develop a system to create meshes for feedline systems with parametrically controlled valve openings. Herein we outline two approaches to generate the meshes for a valve in a feedline system at multiple positions. There are two issues that must be addressed. The first is the creation of the mesh on the valve for multiple positions. The second is the generation of the mesh for the total feedline system including the valve. For generation of the mesh on the valve, we will describe the use of topology matching and mesh generation parameter transfer. For generation of the total feedline system, we will describe two solutions that we have implemented. In both cases the valve is treated as a component in the feedline system. In the first method the geometry of the valve in the feedline system is replaced with a valve at a different opening position. Geometry is created to connect the valve to the feedline system. Then topology for the valve is created and the portion of the topology for the valve is topology matched to the standard valve in a different position. The mesh generation parameters are transferred and then the volume mesh for the whole feedline system is generated. The second method enables the user to generate the volume mesh on the valve in multiple open positions external to the feedline system, to insert it into the volume mesh of the feedline system, and to reduce the amount of computer time required for mesh generation because only two small volume meshes connecting the valve to the feedline mesh need to be updated.

Merging Surface Reconstructions of Terrestrial and Airborne LIDAR Range Data

DTIC Science & Technology

2009-05-19

Mangan and R. Whitaker. Partitioning 3D surface meshes using watershed segmentation . IEEE Trans. on Visualization and Computer Graphics, 5(4), pp...Jain, and A. Zakhor. Data Processing Algorithms for Generating Textured 3D Building Facade Meshes from Laser Scans and Camera Images. International...acquired set of overlapping range images into a single mesh [2,9,10]. However, due to the volume of data involved in large scale urban modeling, data

Unstructured mesh generation and adaptivity

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mavriplis, D. J.

1995-01-01

An overview of current unstructured mesh generation and adaptivity techniques is given. Basic building blocks taken from the field of computational geometry are first described. Various practical mesh generation techniques based on these algorithms are then constructed and illustrated with examples. Issues of adaptive meshing and stretched mesh generation for anisotropic problems are treated in subsequent sections. The presentation is organized in an education manner, for readers familiar with computational fluid dynamics, wishing to learn more about current unstructured mesh techniques.

Mesh morphing for finite element analysis of implant positioning in cementless total hip replacements.

PubMed

Bah, Mamadou T; Nair, Prasanth B; Browne, Martin

2009-12-01

Finite element (FE) analysis of the effect of implant positioning on the performance of cementless total hip replacements (THRs) requires the generation of multiple meshes to account for positioning variability. This process can be labour intensive and time consuming as CAD operations are needed each time a specific orientation is to be analysed. In the present work, a mesh morphing technique is developed to automate the model generation process. The volume mesh of a baseline femur with the implant in a nominal position is deformed as the prosthesis location is varied. A virtual deformation field, obtained by solving a linear elasticity problem with appropriate boundary conditions, is applied. The effectiveness of the technique is evaluated using two metrics: the percentages of morphed elements exceeding an aspect ratio of 20 and an angle of 165 degrees between the adjacent edges of each tetrahedron. Results show that for 100 different implant positions, the first and second metrics never exceed 3% and 3.5%, respectively. To further validate the proposed technique, FE contact analyses are conducted using three selected morphed models to predict the strain distribution in the bone and the implant micromotion under joint and muscle loading. The entire bone strain distribution is well captured and both percentages of bone volume with strain exceeding 0.7% and bone average strains are accurately computed. The results generated from the morphed mesh models correlate well with those for models generated from scratch, increasing confidence in the methodology. This morphing technique forms an accurate and efficient basis for FE based implant orientation and stability analysis of cementless hip replacements.

Grid generation and surface modeling for CFD

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Connell, Stuart D.; Sober, Janet S.; Lamson, Scott H.

1995-01-01

When computing the flow around complex three dimensional configurations, the generation of the mesh is the most time consuming part of any calculation. With some meshing technologies this can take of the order of a man month or more. The requirement for a number of design iterations coupled with ever decreasing time allocated for design leads to the need for a significant acceleration of this process. Of the two competing approaches, block-structured and unstructured, only the unstructured approach will allow fully automatic mesh generation directly from a CAD model. Using this approach coupled with the techniques described in this paper, it is possible to reduce the mesh generation time from man months to a few hours on a workstation. The desire to closely couple a CFD code with a design or optimization algorithm requires that the changes to the geometry be performed quickly and in a smooth manner. This need for smoothness necessitates the use of Bezier polynomials in place of the more usual NURBS or cubic splines. A two dimensional Bezier polynomial based design system is described.

Quantitative 3-D Imaging, Segmentation and Feature Extraction of the Respiratory System in Small Mammals for Computational Biophysics Simulations

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Trease, Lynn L.; Trease, Harold E.; Fowler, John

2007-03-15

One of the critical steps toward performing computational biology simulations, using mesh based integration methods, is in using topologically faithful geometry derived from experimental digital image data as the basis for generating the computational meshes. Digital image data representations contain both the topology of the geometric features and experimental field data distributions. The geometric features that need to be captured from the digital image data are three-dimensional, therefore the process and tools we have developed work with volumetric image data represented as data-cubes. This allows us to take advantage of 2D curvature information during the segmentation and feature extraction process.more » The process is basically: 1) segmenting to isolate and enhance the contrast of the features that we wish to extract and reconstruct, 2) extracting the geometry of the features in an isosurfacing technique, and 3) building the computational mesh using the extracted feature geometry. “Quantitative” image reconstruction and feature extraction is done for the purpose of generating computational meshes, not just for producing graphics "screen" quality images. For example, the surface geometry that we extract must represent a closed water-tight surface.« less

Method of generating a surface mesh

DOEpatents

Shepherd, Jason F [Albuquerque, NM; Benzley, Steven [Provo, UT; Grover, Benjamin T [Tracy, CA

2008-03-04

A method and machine-readable medium provide a technique to generate and modify a quadrilateral finite element surface mesh using dual creation and modification. After generating a dual of a surface (mesh), a predetermined algorithm may be followed to generate and modify a surface mesh of quadrilateral elements. The predetermined algorithm may include the steps of generating two-dimensional cell regions in dual space, determining existing nodes in primal space, generating new nodes in the dual space, and connecting nodes to form the quadrilateral elements (faces) for the generated and modifiable surface mesh.

Dynamic Mesh Adaptation for Front Evolution Using Discontinuous Galerkin Based Weighted Condition Number Mesh Relaxation

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Greene, Patrick T.; Schofield, Samuel P.; Nourgaliev, Robert

2016-06-21

A new mesh smoothing method designed to cluster mesh cells near a dynamically evolving interface is presented. The method is based on weighted condition number mesh relaxation with the weight function being computed from a level set representation of the interface. The weight function is expressed as a Taylor series based discontinuous Galerkin projection, which makes the computation of the derivatives of the weight function needed during the condition number optimization process a trivial matter. For cases when a level set is not available, a fast method for generating a low-order level set from discrete cell-centered elds, such as amore » volume fraction or index function, is provided. Results show that the low-order level set works equally well for the weight function as the actual level set. Meshes generated for a number of interface geometries are presented, including cases with multiple level sets. Dynamic cases for moving interfaces are presented to demonstrate the method's potential usefulness to arbitrary Lagrangian Eulerian (ALE) methods.« less

Approaches to the automatic generation and control of finite element meshes

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Shephard, Mark S.

1987-01-01

The algorithmic approaches being taken to the development of finite element mesh generators capable of automatically discretizing general domains without the need for user intervention are discussed. It is demonstrated that because of the modeling demands placed on a automatic mesh generator, all the approaches taken to date produce unstructured meshes. Consideration is also given to both a priori and a posteriori mesh control devices for automatic mesh generators as well as their integration with geometric modeling and adaptive analysis procedures.

Array-based Hierarchical Mesh Generation in Parallel

DOE PAGES

Ray, Navamita; Grindeanu, Iulian; Zhao, Xinglin; ...

2015-11-03

In this paper, we describe an array-based hierarchical mesh generation capability through uniform refinement of unstructured meshes for efficient solution of PDE's using finite element methods and multigrid solvers. A multi-degree, multi-dimensional and multi-level framework is designed to generate the nested hierarchies from an initial mesh that can be used for a number of purposes such as multi-level methods to generating large meshes. The capability is developed under the parallel mesh framework “Mesh Oriented dAtaBase” a.k.a MOAB. We describe the underlying data structures and algorithms to generate such hierarchies and present numerical results for computational efficiency and mesh quality. Inmore » conclusion, we also present results to demonstrate the applicability of the developed capability to a multigrid finite-element solver.« less

Method of modifying a volume mesh using sheet extraction

DOEpatents

Borden, Michael J [Albuquerque, NM; Shepherd, Jason F [Albuquerque, NM

2007-02-20

A method and machine-readable medium provide a technique to modify a hexahedral finite element volume mesh using dual generation and sheet extraction. After generating a dual of a volume stack (mesh), a predetermined algorithm may be followed to modify the volume mesh of hexahedral elements. The predetermined algorithm may include the steps of determining a sheet of hexahedral mesh elements, generating nodes for merging, and merging the nodes to delete the sheet of hexahedral mesh elements and modify the volume mesh.

A comparative study on different methods of automatic mesh generation of human femurs.

PubMed

Viceconti, M; Bellingeri, L; Cristofolini, L; Toni, A

1998-01-01

The aim of this study was to evaluate comparatively five methods for automating mesh generation (AMG) when used to mesh a human femur. The five AMG methods considered were: mapped mesh, which provides hexahedral elements through a direct mapping of the element onto the geometry; tetra mesh, which generates tetrahedral elements from a solid model of the object geometry; voxel mesh which builds cubic 8-node elements directly from CT images; and hexa mesh that automatically generated hexahedral elements from a surface definition of the femur geometry. The various methods were tested against two reference models: a simplified geometric model and a proximal femur model. The first model was useful to assess the inherent accuracy of the meshes created by the AMG methods, since an analytical solution was available for the elastic problem of the simplified geometric model. The femur model was used to test the AMG methods in a more realistic condition. The femoral geometry was derived from a reference model (the "standardized femur") and the finite element analyses predictions were compared to experimental measurements. All methods were evaluated in terms of human and computer effort needed to carry out the complete analysis, and in terms of accuracy. The comparison demonstrated that each tested method deserves attention and may be the best for specific situations. The mapped AMG method requires a significant human effort but is very accurate and it allows a tight control of the mesh structure. The tetra AMG method requires a solid model of the object to be analysed but is widely available and accurate. The hexa AMG method requires a significant computer effort but can also be used on polygonal models and is very accurate. The voxel AMG method requires a huge number of elements to reach an accuracy comparable to that of the other methods, but it does not require any pre-processing of the CT dataset to extract the geometry and in some cases may be the only viable solution.

Solid Hydrocarbon Assisted Reduction: A New Process of Generating Micron Scale Metal Particles

DTIC Science & Technology

2015-03-01

Figure 4.  Stainless Steel Mesh and Sample Containment ................................. 14  Figure 5.  Zero Background XRD Sample Holder...from the oven. Later experiments with iron oxide employed T304 stainless steel mesh, basically fashioned into the same shape as that shown for...200X200S0021W48T by TWP Inc. in Berkeley, California. The stainless steel mesh was folded in three segments similar to the Grafoil it replaced. 14 Figure 4

LibIsopach

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Brunhart-Lupo, Nicholas

2016-12-06

LibIsopach is a toolkit for high performance distributed immersive visualization, leveraging modern OpenGL. It features a multi-process scenegraph, explicit instance rendering, mesh generation, and three-dimensional user interaction event processing.

Update on Development of Mesh Generation Algorithms in MeshKit

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Jain, Rajeev; Vanderzee, Evan; Mahadevan, Vijay

2015-09-30

MeshKit uses a graph-based design for coding all its meshing algorithms, which includes the Reactor Geometry (and mesh) Generation (RGG) algorithms. This report highlights the developmental updates of all the algorithms, results and future work. Parallel versions of algorithms, documentation and performance results are reported. RGG GUI design was updated to incorporate new features requested by the users; boundary layer generation and parallel RGG support were added to the GUI. Key contributions to the release, upgrade and maintenance of other SIGMA1 libraries (CGM and MOAB) were made. Several fundamental meshing algorithms for creating a robust parallel meshing pipeline in MeshKitmore » are under development. Results and current status of automated, open-source and high quality nuclear reactor assembly mesh generation algorithms such as trimesher, quadmesher, interval matching and multi-sweeper are reported.« less

Orbital and maxillofacial computer aided surgery: patient-specific finite element models to predict surgical outcomes.

PubMed

Luboz, Vincent; Chabanas, Matthieu; Swider, Pascal; Payan, Yohan

2005-08-01

This paper addresses an important issue raised for the clinical relevance of Computer-Assisted Surgical applications, namely the methodology used to automatically build patient-specific finite element (FE) models of anatomical structures. From this perspective, a method is proposed, based on a technique called the mesh-matching method, followed by a process that corrects mesh irregularities. The mesh-matching algorithm generates patient-specific volume meshes from an existing generic model. The mesh regularization process is based on the Jacobian matrix transform related to the FE reference element and the current element. This method for generating patient-specific FE models is first applied to computer-assisted maxillofacial surgery, and more precisely, to the FE elastic modelling of patient facial soft tissues. For each patient, the planned bone osteotomies (mandible, maxilla, chin) are used as boundary conditions to deform the FE face model, in order to predict the aesthetic outcome of the surgery. Seven FE patient-specific models were successfully generated by our method. For one patient, the prediction of the FE model is qualitatively compared with the patient's post-operative appearance, measured from a computer tomography scan. Then, our methodology is applied to computer-assisted orbital surgery. It is, therefore, evaluated for the generation of 11 patient-specific FE poroelastic models of the orbital soft tissues. These models are used to predict the consequences of the surgical decompression of the orbit. More precisely, an average law is extrapolated from the simulations carried out for each patient model. This law links the size of the osteotomy (i.e. the surgical gesture) and the backward displacement of the eyeball (the consequence of the surgical gesture).

Finite element meshing approached as a global minimization process

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

WITKOWSKI,WALTER R.; JUNG,JOSEPH; DOHRMANN,CLARK R.

2000-03-01

The ability to generate a suitable finite element mesh in an automatic fashion is becoming the key to being able to automate the entire engineering analysis process. However, placing an all-hexahedron mesh in a general three-dimensional body continues to be an elusive goal. The approach investigated in this research is fundamentally different from any other that is known of by the authors. A physical analogy viewpoint is used to formulate the actual meshing problem which constructs a global mathematical description of the problem. The analogy used was that of minimizing the electrical potential of a system charged particles within amore » charged domain. The particles in the presented analogy represent duals to mesh elements (i.e., quads or hexes). Particle movement is governed by a mathematical functional which accounts for inter-particles repulsive, attractive and alignment forces. This functional is minimized to find the optimal location and orientation of each particle. After the particles are connected a mesh can be easily resolved. The mathematical description for this problem is as easy to formulate in three-dimensions as it is in two- or one-dimensions. The meshing algorithm was developed within CoMeT. It can solve the two-dimensional meshing problem for convex and concave geometries in a purely automated fashion. Investigation of the robustness of the technique has shown a success rate of approximately 99% for the two-dimensional geometries tested. Run times to mesh a 100 element complex geometry were typically in the 10 minute range. Efficiency of the technique is still an issue that needs to be addressed. Performance is an issue that is critical for most engineers generating meshes. It was not for this project. The primary focus of this work was to investigate and evaluate a meshing algorithm/philosophy with efficiency issues being secondary. The algorithm was also extended to mesh three-dimensional geometries. Unfortunately, only simple geometries were tested before this project ended. The primary complexity in the extension was in the connectivity problem formulation. Defining all of the interparticle interactions that occur in three-dimensions and expressing them in mathematical relationships is very difficult.« less

Quasi-automatic 3D finite element model generation for individual single-rooted teeth and periodontal ligament.

PubMed

Clement, R; Schneider, J; Brambs, H-J; Wunderlich, A; Geiger, M; Sander, F G

2004-02-01

The paper demonstrates how to generate an individual 3D volume model of a human single-rooted tooth using an automatic workflow. It can be implemented into finite element simulation. In several computational steps, computed tomography data of patients are used to obtain the global coordinates of the tooth's surface. First, the large number of geometric data is processed with several self-developed algorithms for a significant reduction. The most important task is to keep geometrical information of the real tooth. The second main part includes the creation of the volume model for tooth and periodontal ligament (PDL). This is realized with a continuous free form surface of the tooth based on the remaining points. Generating such irregular objects for numerical use in biomechanical research normally requires enormous manual effort and time. The finite element mesh of the tooth, consisting of hexahedral elements, is composed of different materials: dentin, PDL and surrounding alveolar bone. It is capable of simulating tooth movement in a finite element analysis and may give valuable information for a clinical approach without the restrictions of tetrahedral elements. The mesh generator of FE software ANSYS executed the mesh process for hexahedral elements successfully.

The 3-D unstructured mesh generation using local transformations

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Barth, Timothy J.

1993-01-01

The topics are presented in viewgraph form and include the following: 3D combinatorial edge swapping; 3D incremental triangulation via local transformations; a new approach to multigrid for unstructured meshes; surface mesh generation using local transforms; volume triangulations; viscous mesh generation; and future directions.

Automatic Texture Reconstruction of 3d City Model from Oblique Images

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kang, Junhua; Deng, Fei; Li, Xinwei; Wan, Fang

2016-06-01

In recent years, the photorealistic 3D city models are increasingly important in various geospatial applications related to virtual city tourism, 3D GIS, urban planning, real-estate management. Besides the acquisition of high-precision 3D geometric data, texture reconstruction is also a crucial step for generating high-quality and visually realistic 3D models. However, most of the texture reconstruction approaches are probably leading to texture fragmentation and memory inefficiency. In this paper, we introduce an automatic framework of texture reconstruction to generate textures from oblique images for photorealistic visualization. Our approach include three major steps as follows: mesh parameterization, texture atlas generation and texture blending. Firstly, mesh parameterization procedure referring to mesh segmentation and mesh unfolding is performed to reduce geometric distortion in the process of mapping 2D texture to 3D model. Secondly, in the texture atlas generation step, the texture of each segmented region in texture domain is reconstructed from all visible images with exterior orientation and interior orientation parameters. Thirdly, to avoid color discontinuities at boundaries between texture regions, the final texture map is generated by blending texture maps from several corresponding images. We evaluated our texture reconstruction framework on a dataset of a city. The resulting mesh model can get textured by created texture without resampling. Experiment results show that our method can effectively mitigate the occurrence of texture fragmentation. It is demonstrated that the proposed framework is effective and useful for automatic texture reconstruction of 3D city model.

Full-Carpet Design of a Low-Boom Demonstrator Concept

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Ordaz, Irian; Wintzer, Mathias; Rallabhandi, Sriram K.

2015-01-01

The Cart3D adjoint-based design framework is used to mitigate the undesirable o -track sonic boom properties of a demonstrator concept designed for low-boom directly under the flight path. First, the requirements of a Cart3D design mesh are determined using a high-fidelity mesh adapted to minimize the discretization error of the CFD analysis. Low-boom equivalent area targets are then generated at the under-track and one off-track azimuthal position for the baseline configuration. The under-track target is generated using a trim- feasible low-boom target generation process, ensuring that the final design is not only low-boom, but also trimmed at the specified flight condition. The o -track equivalent area target is generated by minimizing the A-weighted loudness using an efficient adjoint-based approach. The configuration outer mold line is then parameterized and optimized to match the off-body pressure distributions prescribed by the low-boom targets. The numerical optimizer uses design gradients which are calculated using the Cart3D adjoint- based design capability. Optimization constraints are placed on the geometry to satisfy structural feasibility. The low-boom properties of the final design are verified using the adaptive meshing approach. This analysis quantifies the error associated with the CFD mesh that is used for design. Finally, an alternate mesh construction and target positioning approach offering greater computational efficiency is demonstrated and verified.

An eFTD-VP framework for efficiently generating patient-specific anatomically detailed facial soft tissue FE mesh for craniomaxillofacial surgery simulation

PubMed Central

Zhang, Xiaoyan; Kim, Daeseung; Shen, Shunyao; Yuan, Peng; Liu, Siting; Tang, Zhen; Zhang, Guangming; Zhou, Xiaobo; Gateno, Jaime

2017-01-01

Accurate surgical planning and prediction of craniomaxillofacial surgery outcome requires simulation of soft tissue changes following osteotomy. This can only be achieved by using an anatomically detailed facial soft tissue model. The current state-of-the-art of model generation is not appropriate to clinical applications due to the time-intensive nature of manual segmentation and volumetric mesh generation. The conventional patient-specific finite element (FE) mesh generation methods are to deform a template FE mesh to match the shape of a patient based on registration. However, these methods commonly produce element distortion. Additionally, the mesh density for patients depends on that of the template model. It could not be adjusted to conduct mesh density sensitivity analysis. In this study, we propose a new framework of patient-specific facial soft tissue FE mesh generation. The goal of the developed method is to efficiently generate a high-quality patient-specific hexahedral FE mesh with adjustable mesh density while preserving the accuracy in anatomical structure correspondence. Our FE mesh is generated by eFace template deformation followed by volumetric parametrization. First, the patient-specific anatomically detailed facial soft tissue model (including skin, mucosa, and muscles) is generated by deforming an eFace template model. The adaptation of the eFace template model is achieved by using a hybrid landmark-based morphing and dense surface fitting approach followed by a thin-plate spline interpolation. Then, high-quality hexahedral mesh is constructed by using volumetric parameterization. The user can control the resolution of hexahedron mesh to best reflect clinicians’ need. Our approach was validated using 30 patient models and 4 visible human datasets. The generated patient-specific FE mesh showed high surface matching accuracy, element quality, and internal structure matching accuracy. They can be directly and effectively used for clinical simulation of facial soft tissue change. PMID:29027022

An eFTD-VP framework for efficiently generating patient-specific anatomically detailed facial soft tissue FE mesh for craniomaxillofacial surgery simulation.

PubMed

Zhang, Xiaoyan; Kim, Daeseung; Shen, Shunyao; Yuan, Peng; Liu, Siting; Tang, Zhen; Zhang, Guangming; Zhou, Xiaobo; Gateno, Jaime; Liebschner, Michael A K; Xia, James J

2018-04-01

Accurate surgical planning and prediction of craniomaxillofacial surgery outcome requires simulation of soft tissue changes following osteotomy. This can only be achieved by using an anatomically detailed facial soft tissue model. The current state-of-the-art of model generation is not appropriate to clinical applications due to the time-intensive nature of manual segmentation and volumetric mesh generation. The conventional patient-specific finite element (FE) mesh generation methods are to deform a template FE mesh to match the shape of a patient based on registration. However, these methods commonly produce element distortion. Additionally, the mesh density for patients depends on that of the template model. It could not be adjusted to conduct mesh density sensitivity analysis. In this study, we propose a new framework of patient-specific facial soft tissue FE mesh generation. The goal of the developed method is to efficiently generate a high-quality patient-specific hexahedral FE mesh with adjustable mesh density while preserving the accuracy in anatomical structure correspondence. Our FE mesh is generated by eFace template deformation followed by volumetric parametrization. First, the patient-specific anatomically detailed facial soft tissue model (including skin, mucosa, and muscles) is generated by deforming an eFace template model. The adaptation of the eFace template model is achieved by using a hybrid landmark-based morphing and dense surface fitting approach followed by a thin-plate spline interpolation. Then, high-quality hexahedral mesh is constructed by using volumetric parameterization. The user can control the resolution of hexahedron mesh to best reflect clinicians' need. Our approach was validated using 30 patient models and 4 visible human datasets. The generated patient-specific FE mesh showed high surface matching accuracy, element quality, and internal structure matching accuracy. They can be directly and effectively used for clinical simulation of facial soft tissue change.

Dynamic mesh adaptation for front evolution using discontinuous Galerkin based weighted condition number relaxation

DOE PAGES

Greene, Patrick T.; Schofield, Samuel P.; Nourgaliev, Robert

2017-01-27

A new mesh smoothing method designed to cluster cells near a dynamically evolving interface is presented. The method is based on weighted condition number mesh relaxation with the weight function computed from a level set representation of the interface. The weight function is expressed as a Taylor series based discontinuous Galerkin projection, which makes the computation of the derivatives of the weight function needed during the condition number optimization process a trivial matter. For cases when a level set is not available, a fast method for generating a low-order level set from discrete cell-centered fields, such as a volume fractionmore » or index function, is provided. Results show that the low-order level set works equally well as the actual level set for mesh smoothing. Meshes generated for a number of interface geometries are presented, including cases with multiple level sets. Lastly, dynamic cases with moving interfaces show the new method is capable of maintaining a desired resolution near the interface with an acceptable number of relaxation iterations per time step, which demonstrates the method's potential to be used as a mesh relaxer for arbitrary Lagrangian Eulerian (ALE) methods.« less

A tuned mesh-generation strategy for image representation based on data-dependent triangulation.

PubMed

Li, Ping; Adams, Michael D

2013-05-01

A mesh-generation framework for image representation based on data-dependent triangulation is proposed. The proposed framework is a modified version of the frameworks of Rippa and Garland and Heckbert that facilitates the development of more effective mesh-generation methods. As the proposed framework has several free parameters, the effects of different choices of these parameters on mesh quality are studied, leading to the recommendation of a particular set of choices for these parameters. A mesh-generation method is then introduced that employs the proposed framework with these best parameter choices. This method is demonstrated to produce meshes of higher quality (both in terms of squared error and subjectively) than those generated by several competing approaches, at a relatively modest computational and memory cost.

Efficient generation of discontinuity-preserving adaptive triangulations from range images.

PubMed

Garcia, Miguel Angel; Sappa, Angel Domingo

2004-10-01

This paper presents an efficient technique for generating adaptive triangular meshes from range images. The algorithm consists of two stages. First, a user-defined number of points is adaptively sampled from the given range image. Those points are chosen by taking into account the surface shapes represented in the range image in such a way that points tend to group in areas of high curvature and to disperse in low-variation regions. This selection process is done through a noniterative, inherently parallel algorithm in order to gain efficiency. Once the image has been subsampled, the second stage applies a two and one half-dimensional Delaunay triangulation to obtain an initial triangular mesh. To favor the preservation of surface and orientation discontinuities (jump and crease edges) present in the original range image, the aforementioned triangular mesh is iteratively modified by applying an efficient edge flipping technique. Results with real range images show accurate triangular approximations of the given range images with low processing times.

A method to generate conformal finite-element meshes from 3D measurements of microstructurally small fatigue-crack propagation [A method to generate conformal finite-element meshes from 3D measurements of microstructurally small fatigue-crack propagation: 3D Meshes of Microstructurally Small Crack Growth

DOE PAGES

Spear, Ashley D.; Hochhalter, Jacob D.; Cerrone, Albert R.; ...

2016-04-27

In an effort to reproduce computationally the observed evolution of microstructurally small fatigue cracks (MSFCs), a method is presented for generating conformal, finite-element (FE), volume meshes from 3D measurements of MSFC propagation. The resulting volume meshes contain traction-free surfaces that conform to incrementally measured 3D crack shapes. Grain morphologies measured using near-field high-energy X-ray diffraction microscopy are also represented within the FE volume meshes. Proof-of-concept simulations are performed to demonstrate the utility of the mesh-generation method. The proof-of-concept simulations employ a crystal-plasticity constitutive model and are performed using the conformal FE meshes corresponding to successive crack-growth increments. Although the simulationsmore » for each crack increment are currently independent of one another, they need not be, and transfer of material-state information among successive crack-increment meshes is discussed. The mesh-generation method was developed using post-mortem measurements, yet it is general enough that it can be applied to in-situ measurements of 3D MSFC propagation.« less

A method to generate conformal finite-element meshes from 3D measurements of microstructurally small fatigue-crack propagation [A method to generate conformal finite-element meshes from 3D measurements of microstructurally small fatigue-crack propagation: 3D Meshes of Microstructurally Small Crack Growth

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Spear, Ashley D.; Hochhalter, Jacob D.; Cerrone, Albert R.

In an effort to reproduce computationally the observed evolution of microstructurally small fatigue cracks (MSFCs), a method is presented for generating conformal, finite-element (FE), volume meshes from 3D measurements of MSFC propagation. The resulting volume meshes contain traction-free surfaces that conform to incrementally measured 3D crack shapes. Grain morphologies measured using near-field high-energy X-ray diffraction microscopy are also represented within the FE volume meshes. Proof-of-concept simulations are performed to demonstrate the utility of the mesh-generation method. The proof-of-concept simulations employ a crystal-plasticity constitutive model and are performed using the conformal FE meshes corresponding to successive crack-growth increments. Although the simulationsmore » for each crack increment are currently independent of one another, they need not be, and transfer of material-state information among successive crack-increment meshes is discussed. The mesh-generation method was developed using post-mortem measurements, yet it is general enough that it can be applied to in-situ measurements of 3D MSFC propagation.« less

A mesh regeneration method using quadrilateral and triangular elements for compressible flows

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Vemaganti, G. R.; Thornton, E. A.

1989-01-01

An adaptive remeshing method using both triangular and quadrilateral elements suitable for high-speed viscous flows is presented. For inviscid flows, the method generates completely unstructured meshes. For viscous flows, structured meshes are generated for boundary layers, and unstructured meshes are generated for inviscid flow regions. Examples of inviscid and viscous adaptations for high-speed flows are presented.

Real-time terrain storage generation from multiple sensors towards mobile robot operation interface.

PubMed

Song, Wei; Cho, Seoungjae; Xi, Yulong; Cho, Kyungeun; Um, Kyhyun

2014-01-01

A mobile robot mounted with multiple sensors is used to rapidly collect 3D point clouds and video images so as to allow accurate terrain modeling. In this study, we develop a real-time terrain storage generation and representation system including a nonground point database (PDB), ground mesh database (MDB), and texture database (TDB). A voxel-based flag map is proposed for incrementally registering large-scale point clouds in a terrain model in real time. We quantize the 3D point clouds into 3D grids of the flag map as a comparative table in order to remove the redundant points. We integrate the large-scale 3D point clouds into a nonground PDB and a node-based terrain mesh using the CPU. Subsequently, we program a graphics processing unit (GPU) to generate the TDB by mapping the triangles in the terrain mesh onto the captured video images. Finally, we produce a nonground voxel map and a ground textured mesh as a terrain reconstruction result. Our proposed methods were tested in an outdoor environment. Our results show that the proposed system was able to rapidly generate terrain storage and provide high resolution terrain representation for mobile mapping services and a graphical user interface between remote operators and mobile robots.

Real-Time Terrain Storage Generation from Multiple Sensors towards Mobile Robot Operation Interface

PubMed Central

Cho, Seoungjae; Xi, Yulong; Cho, Kyungeun

2014-01-01

A mobile robot mounted with multiple sensors is used to rapidly collect 3D point clouds and video images so as to allow accurate terrain modeling. In this study, we develop a real-time terrain storage generation and representation system including a nonground point database (PDB), ground mesh database (MDB), and texture database (TDB). A voxel-based flag map is proposed for incrementally registering large-scale point clouds in a terrain model in real time. We quantize the 3D point clouds into 3D grids of the flag map as a comparative table in order to remove the redundant points. We integrate the large-scale 3D point clouds into a nonground PDB and a node-based terrain mesh using the CPU. Subsequently, we program a graphics processing unit (GPU) to generate the TDB by mapping the triangles in the terrain mesh onto the captured video images. Finally, we produce a nonground voxel map and a ground textured mesh as a terrain reconstruction result. Our proposed methods were tested in an outdoor environment. Our results show that the proposed system was able to rapidly generate terrain storage and provide high resolution terrain representation for mobile mapping services and a graphical user interface between remote operators and mobile robots. PMID:25101321

A software platform for continuum modeling of ion channels based on unstructured mesh

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tu, B.; Bai, S. Y.; Chen, M. X.; Xie, Y.; Zhang, L. B.; Lu, B. Z.

2014-01-01

Most traditional continuum molecular modeling adopted finite difference or finite volume methods which were based on a structured mesh (grid). Unstructured meshes were only occasionally used, but an increased number of applications emerge in molecular simulations. To facilitate the continuum modeling of biomolecular systems based on unstructured meshes, we are developing a software platform with tools which are particularly beneficial to those approaches. This work describes the software system specifically for the simulation of a typical, complex molecular procedure: ion transport through a three-dimensional channel system that consists of a protein and a membrane. The platform contains three parts: a meshing tool chain for ion channel systems, a parallel finite element solver for the Poisson-Nernst-Planck equations describing the electrodiffusion process of ion transport, and a visualization program for continuum molecular modeling. The meshing tool chain in the platform, which consists of a set of mesh generation tools, is able to generate high-quality surface and volume meshes for ion channel systems. The parallel finite element solver in our platform is based on the parallel adaptive finite element package PHG which wass developed by one of the authors [1]. As a featured component of the platform, a new visualization program, VCMM, has specifically been developed for continuum molecular modeling with an emphasis on providing useful facilities for unstructured mesh-based methods and for their output analysis and visualization. VCMM provides a graphic user interface and consists of three modules: a molecular module, a meshing module and a numerical module. A demonstration of the platform is provided with a study of two real proteins, the connexin 26 and hemolysin ion channels.

Gaussian curvature analysis allows for automatic block placement in multi-block hexahedral meshing.

PubMed

Ramme, Austin J; Shivanna, Kiran H; Magnotta, Vincent A; Grosland, Nicole M

2011-10-01

Musculoskeletal finite element analysis (FEA) has been essential to research in orthopaedic biomechanics. The generation of a volumetric mesh is often the most challenging step in a FEA. Hexahedral meshing tools that are based on a multi-block approach rely on the manual placement of building blocks for their mesh generation scheme. We hypothesise that Gaussian curvature analysis could be used to automatically develop a building block structure for multi-block hexahedral mesh generation. The Automated Building Block Algorithm incorporates principles from differential geometry, combinatorics, statistical analysis and computer science to automatically generate a building block structure to represent a given surface without prior information. We have applied this algorithm to 29 bones of varying geometries and successfully generated a usable mesh in all cases. This work represents a significant advancement in automating the definition of building blocks.

Development of a Flexible Framework for Hypersonic Navier-Stoke Space Shuttle Orbiter Meshes

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Alter, Stephen J.; Reuthler, James J.; McDaniel, Ryan D.

2004-01-01

A flexible framework constructing block structured volume grids for hypersonic Navier-Strokes flow simulations was developed for the analysis of the Shuttle Orbiter Columbia. The development of the framework, which was partially basedon the requirements of the primary flow solvers used resulted in an ability to directly correlate solutions contributed by participating groups on a common surface mesh. A foundation was built through the assessment of differences between differnt solvers, which provided confidence for independent assessment of other damage scenarios by team members. The framework draws on the experience of NASA Langley and NASA Ames Research Centers in structured grid generation, and consists of a grid generation, and consist of a grid generation process implemented through a division of responsibilities. The nominal division of labor consisted of NASA Johnson Space Center coordinating the damage scenarios to be analyzed by the Aerothermodynamics Columbia Accident Investigation (ACAI) team, Ames developing the surface grids that described the computational volume about the Orbiter, and Langley improving grid quality of Ames generated data and constructing the final computational volume grids. Distributing the work among the participant in th ACAI team resulted in significantl less time required to construct complete meshes than possible by any individual participant. The approach demonstrated that the One-NASA grid generation team could sustain the demand of for five new meshes to explore new damage scenarios within an aggressive time-line.

An adaptive moving finite volume scheme for modeling flood inundation over dry and complex topography

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhou, Feng; Chen, Guoxian; Huang, Yuefei; Yang, Jerry Zhijian; Feng, Hui

2013-04-01

A new geometrical conservative interpolation on unstructured meshes is developed for preserving still water equilibrium and positivity of water depth at each iteration of mesh movement, leading to an adaptive moving finite volume (AMFV) scheme for modeling flood inundation over dry and complex topography. Unlike traditional schemes involving position-fixed meshes, the iteration process of the AFMV scheme moves a fewer number of the meshes adaptively in response to flow variables calculated in prior solutions and then simulates their posterior values on the new meshes. At each time step of the simulation, the AMFV scheme consists of three parts: an adaptive mesh movement to shift the vertices position, a geometrical conservative interpolation to remap the flow variables by summing the total mass over old meshes to avoid the generation of spurious waves, and a partial differential equations(PDEs) discretization to update the flow variables for a new time step. Five different test cases are presented to verify the computational advantages of the proposed scheme over nonadaptive methods. The results reveal three attractive features: (i) the AMFV scheme could preserve still water equilibrium and positivity of water depth within both mesh movement and PDE discretization steps; (ii) it improved the shock-capturing capability for handling topographic source terms and wet-dry interfaces by moving triangular meshes to approximate the spatial distribution of time-variant flood processes; (iii) it was able to solve the shallow water equations with a relatively higher accuracy and spatial-resolution with a lower computational cost.

Fast segmentation and high-quality three-dimensional volume mesh creation from medical images for diffuse optical tomography

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Jermyn, Michael; Ghadyani, Hamid; Mastanduno, Michael A.; Turner, Wes; Davis, Scott C.; Dehghani, Hamid; Pogue, Brian W.

2013-08-01

Multimodal approaches that combine near-infrared (NIR) and conventional imaging modalities have been shown to improve optical parameter estimation dramatically and thus represent a prevailing trend in NIR imaging. These approaches typically involve applying anatomical templates from magnetic resonance imaging/computed tomography/ultrasound images to guide the recovery of optical parameters. However, merging these data sets using current technology requires multiple software packages, substantial expertise, significant time-commitment, and often results in unacceptably poor mesh quality for optical image reconstruction, a reality that represents a significant roadblock for translational research of multimodal NIR imaging. This work addresses these challenges directly by introducing automated digital imaging and communications in medicine image stack segmentation and a new one-click three-dimensional mesh generator optimized for multimodal NIR imaging, and combining these capabilities into a single software package (available for free download) with a streamlined workflow. Image processing time and mesh quality benchmarks were examined for four common multimodal NIR use-cases (breast, brain, pancreas, and small animal) and were compared to a commercial image processing package. Applying these tools resulted in a fivefold decrease in image processing time and 62% improvement in minimum mesh quality, in the absence of extra mesh postprocessing. These capabilities represent a significant step toward enabling translational multimodal NIR research for both expert and nonexpert users in an open-source platform.

Investigation of Advanced Counterrotation Blade Configuration Concepts for High Speed Turboprop Systems. Task 3: Advanced Fan Section Grid Generator Final Report and Computer Program User's Manual

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Crook, Andrew J.; Delaney, Robert A.

1991-01-01

A procedure is studied for generating three-dimensional grids for advanced turbofan engine fan section geometries. The procedure constructs a discrete mesh about engine sections containing the fan stage, an arbitrary number of axisymmetric radial flow splitters, a booster stage, and a bifurcated core/bypass flow duct with guide vanes. The mesh is an h-type grid system, the points being distributed with a transfinite interpolation scheme with axial and radial spacing being user specified. Elliptic smoothing of the grid in the meridional plane is a post-process option. The grid generation scheme is consistent with aerodynamic analyses utilizing the average-passage equation system developed by Dr. John Adamczyk of NASA Lewis. This flow solution scheme requires a series of blade specific grids each having a common axisymmetric mesh, but varying in the circumferential direction according to the geometry of the specific blade row.

Strategies Toward Automation of Overset Structured Surface Grid Generation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Chan, William M.

2017-01-01

An outline of a strategy for automation of overset structured surface grid generation on complex geometries is described. The starting point of the process consists of an unstructured surface triangulation representation of the geometry derived from a native CAD, STEP, or IGES definition, and a set of discretized surface curves that captures all geometric features of interest. The procedure for surface grid generation is decomposed into an algebraic meshing step, a hyperbolic meshing step, and a gap-filling step. This paper will focus primarily on the high-level plan with details on the algebraic step. The algorithmic procedure for the algebraic step involves analyzing the topology of the network of surface curves, distributing grid points appropriately on these curves, identifying domains bounded by four curves that can be meshed algebraically, concatenating the resulting grids into fewer patches, and extending appropriate boundaries of the concatenated grids to provide proper overlap. Results are presented for grids created on various aerospace vehicle components.

Method of modifying a volume mesh using sheet insertion

DOEpatents

Borden, Michael J [Albuquerque, NM; Shepherd, Jason F [Albuquerque, NM

2006-08-29

A method and machine-readable medium provide a technique to modify a hexahedral finite element volume mesh using dual generation and sheet insertion. After generating a dual of a volume stack (mesh), a predetermined algorithm may be followed to modify (refine) the volume mesh of hexahedral elements. The predetermined algorithm may include the steps of locating a sheet of hexahedral mesh elements, determining a plurality of hexahedral elements within the sheet to refine, shrinking the plurality of elements, and inserting a new sheet of hexahedral elements adjacently to modify the volume mesh. Additionally, another predetermined algorithm using mesh cutting may be followed to modify a volume mesh.

Boundary Recovery For Delaunay Tetrahedral Meshes Using Local Topological Transformations

PubMed Central

Ghadyani, Hamid; Sullivan, John; Wu, Ziji

2009-01-01

Numerous high-quality, volume mesh-generation systems exist. However, no strategy can address all geometry situations without some element qualities being compromised. Many 3D mesh generation algorithms are based on Delaunay tetrahedralization which frequently fails to preserve the input boundary surface topology. For biomedical applications, this surface preservation can be critical as they usually contain multiple material regions of interest coherently connected. In this paper we present an algorithm as a post-processing method that optimizes local regions of compromised element quality and recovers the original boundary surface facets (triangles) regardless of the original mesh generation strategy. The algorithm carves out a small sub-volume in the vicinity of the missing boundary facet or compromised element, creating a cavity. If the task is to recover a surface boundary facet, a natural exit hole in the cavity will be present. This hole is patched with the missing boundary surface face first followed by other patches to seal the cavity. If the task was to improve a compromised region, then the cavity is already sealed. Every triangular facet of the cavity shell is classified as an active face and can be connected to another shell node creating a tetrahedron. In the process the base of the tetrahedron is removed from the active face list and potentially 3 new active faces are created. This methodology is the underpinnings of our last resort method. Each active face can be viewed as the trunk of a tree. An exhaustive breath and depth search will identify all possible tetrahedral combinations to uniquely fill the cavity. We have streamlined this recursive process reducing the time complexity by orders of magnitude. The original surfaces boundaries (internal and external) are fully restored and the quality of compromised regions improved. PMID:20305743

Updates to Simulation of a Single-Element Lean-Direct Injection Combustor Using Arbitary Polyhedral Meshes

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Wey, Thomas; Liu, Nan-Suey

2015-01-01

This paper summarizes the procedures of (1) generating control volumes anchored at the nodes of a mesh; and (2) generating staggered control volumes via mesh reconstructions, in terms of either mesh realignment or mesh refinement, as well as presents sample results from their applications to the numerical solution of a single-element LDI combustor using a releasable edition of the National Combustion Code (NCC).

Note: Radial-thrust combo metal mesh foil bearing for microturbomachinery.

PubMed

Park, Cheol Hoon; Choi, Sang Kyu; Hong, Doo Euy; Yoon, Tae Gwang; Lee, Sung Hwi

2013-10-01

This Note proposes a novel radial-thrust combo metal mesh foil bearing (MMFB). Although MMFBs have advantages such as higher stiffness and damping over conventional air foil bearings, studies related to MMFBs have been limited to radial MMFBs. The novel combo MMFB is composed of a radial top foil, thrust top foils, and a ring-shaped metal mesh damper--fabricated by compressing a copper wire mesh--with metal mesh thrust pads for the thrust bearing at both side faces. In this study, the combo MMFB was fabricated in half-split type to support the rotor for a micro gas turbine generator. The manufacture and assembly process for the half-split-type combo MMFB is presented. In addition, to verify the proposed combo MMFB, motoring test results up to 250,000 rpm and axial displacements as a function of rotational speed are presented.

Parallel performance optimizations on unstructured mesh-based simulations

DOE PAGES

Sarje, Abhinav; Song, Sukhyun; Jacobsen, Douglas; ...

2015-06-01

This paper addresses two key parallelization challenges the unstructured mesh-based ocean modeling code, MPAS-Ocean, which uses a mesh based on Voronoi tessellations: (1) load imbalance across processes, and (2) unstructured data access patterns, that inhibit intra- and inter-node performance. Our work analyzes the load imbalance due to naive partitioning of the mesh, and develops methods to generate mesh partitioning with better load balance and reduced communication. Furthermore, we present methods that minimize both inter- and intranode data movement and maximize data reuse. Our techniques include predictive ordering of data elements for higher cache efficiency, as well as communication reduction approaches.more » We present detailed performance data when running on thousands of cores using the Cray XC30 supercomputer and show that our optimization strategies can exceed the original performance by over 2×. Additionally, many of these solutions can be broadly applied to a wide variety of unstructured grid-based computations.« less

An automatic generation of non-uniform mesh for CFD analyses of image-based multiscale human airway models

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Miyawaki, Shinjiro; Tawhai, Merryn H.; Hoffman, Eric A.; Lin, Ching-Long

2014-11-01

The authors have developed a method to automatically generate non-uniform CFD mesh for image-based human airway models. The sizes of generated tetrahedral elements vary in both radial and longitudinal directions to account for boundary layer and multiscale nature of pulmonary airflow. The proposed method takes advantage of our previously developed centerline-based geometry reconstruction method. In order to generate the mesh branch by branch in parallel, we used the open-source programs Gmsh and TetGen for surface and volume meshes, respectively. Both programs can specify element sizes by means of background mesh. The size of an arbitrary element in the domain is a function of wall distance, element size on the wall, and element size at the center of airway lumen. The element sizes on the wall are computed based on local flow rate and airway diameter. The total number of elements in the non-uniform mesh (10 M) was about half of that in the uniform mesh, although the computational time for the non-uniform mesh was about twice longer (170 min). The proposed method generates CFD meshes with fine elements near the wall and smooth variation of element size in longitudinal direction, which are required, e.g., for simulations with high flow rate. NIH Grants R01-HL094315, U01-HL114494, and S10-RR022421. Computer time provided by XSEDE.

Selective separation of oil and water with mesh membranes by capillarity.

PubMed

Yu, Yuanlie; Chen, Hua; Liu, Yun; Craig, Vincent S J; Lai, Zhiping

2016-09-01

The separation of oil and water from wastewater generated in the oil-production industries, as well as in frequent oil spillage events, is important in mitigating severe environmental and ecological damage. Additionally, a wide arrange of industrial processes require oils or fats to be removed from aqueous systems. The immiscibility of oil and water allows for the wettability of solid surfaces to be engineered to achieve the separation of oil and water through capillarity. Mesh membranes with extreme, selective wettability can efficiently remove oil or water from oil/water mixtures through a simple filtration process using gravity. A wide range of different types of mesh membranes have been successfully rendered with extreme wettability and applied to oil/water separation in the laboratory. These mesh materials have typically shown good durability, stability as well as reusability, which makes them promising candidates for an ever widening range of practical applications. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Domain decomposition by the advancing-partition method for parallel unstructured grid generation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Banihashemi, legal representative, Soheila (Inventor); Pirzadeh, Shahyar Z. (Inventor)

2012-01-01

In a method for domain decomposition for generating unstructured grids, a surface mesh is generated for a spatial domain. A location of a partition plane dividing the domain into two sections is determined. Triangular faces on the surface mesh that intersect the partition plane are identified. A partition grid of tetrahedral cells, dividing the domain into two sub-domains, is generated using a marching process in which a front comprises only faces of new cells which intersect the partition plane. The partition grid is generated until no active faces remain on the front. Triangular faces on each side of the partition plane are collected into two separate subsets. Each subset of triangular faces is renumbered locally and a local/global mapping is created for each sub-domain. A volume grid is generated for each sub-domain. The partition grid and volume grids are then merged using the local-global mapping.

Calculation of grain boundary normals directly from 3D microstructure images

DOE PAGES

Lieberman, E. J.; Rollett, A. D.; Lebensohn, R. A.; ...

2015-03-11

The determination of grain boundary normals is an integral part of the characterization of grain boundaries in polycrystalline materials. These normal vectors are difficult to quantify due to the discretized nature of available microstructure characterization techniques. The most common method to determine grain boundary normals is by generating a surface mesh from an image of the microstructure, but this process can be slow, and is subject to smoothing issues. A new technique is proposed, utilizing first order Cartesian moments of binary indicator functions, to determine grain boundary normals directly from a voxelized microstructure image. In order to validate the accuracymore » of this technique, the surface normals obtained by the proposed method are compared to those generated by a surface meshing algorithm. Specifically, the local divergence between the surface normals obtained by different variants of the proposed technique and those generated from a surface mesh of a synthetic microstructure constructed using a marching cubes algorithm followed by Laplacian smoothing is quantified. Next, surface normals obtained with the proposed method from a measured 3D microstructure image of a Ni polycrystal are used to generate grain boundary character distributions (GBCD) for Σ3 and Σ9 boundaries, and compared to the GBCD generated using a surface mesh obtained from the same image. Finally, the results show that the proposed technique is an efficient and accurate method to determine voxelized fields of grain boundary normals.« less

High-Fidelity Geometric Modeling and Mesh Generation for Mechanics Characterization of Polycrystalline Materials

DTIC Science & Technology

2014-10-26

From the parameterization results, we extract adaptive and anisotropic T-meshes for the further T- spline surface construction. Finally, a gradient flow...field-based method [7, 12] to generate adaptive and anisotropic quadrilateral meshes, which can be used as the control mesh for high-order T- spline ...parameterization results, we extract adaptive and anisotropic T-meshes for the further T- spline surface construction. Finally, a gradient flow-based

A universal algorithm for an improved finite element mesh generation Mesh quality assessment in comparison to former automated mesh-generators and an analytic model.

PubMed

Kaminsky, Jan; Rodt, Thomas; Gharabaghi, Alireza; Forster, Jan; Brand, Gerd; Samii, Madjid

2005-06-01

The FE-modeling of complex anatomical structures is not solved satisfyingly so far. Voxel-based as opposed to contour-based algorithms allow an automated mesh generation based on the image data. Nonetheless their geometric precision is limited. We developed an automated mesh-generator that combines the advantages of voxel-based generation with improved representation of the geometry by displacement of nodes on the object-surface. Models of an artificial 3D-pipe-section and a skullbase were generated with different mesh-densities using the newly developed geometric, unsmoothed and smoothed voxel generators. Compared to the analytic calculation of the 3D-pipe-section model the normalized RMS error of the surface stress was 0.173-0.647 for the unsmoothed voxel models, 0.111-0.616 for the smoothed voxel models with small volume error and 0.126-0.273 for the geometric models. The highest element-energy error as a criterion for the mesh quality was 2.61x10(-2) N mm, 2.46x10(-2) N mm and 1.81x10(-2) N mm for unsmoothed, smoothed and geometric voxel models, respectively. The geometric model of the 3D-skullbase resulted in the lowest element-energy error and volume error. This algorithm also allowed the best representation of anatomical details. The presented geometric mesh-generator is universally applicable and allows an automated and accurate modeling by combining the advantages of the voxel-technique and of improved surface-modeling.

Highly Symmetric and Congruently Tiled Meshes for Shells and Domes

PubMed Central

Rasheed, Muhibur; Bajaj, Chandrajit

2016-01-01

We describe the generation of all possible shell and dome shapes that can be uniquely meshed (tiled) using a single type of mesh face (tile), and following a single meshing (tiling) rule that governs the mesh (tile) arrangement with maximal vertex, edge and face symmetries. Such tiling arrangements or congruently tiled meshed shapes, are frequently found in chemical forms (fullerenes or Bucky balls, crystals, quasi-crystals, virus nano shells or capsids), and synthetic shapes (cages, sports domes, modern architectural facades). Congruently tiled meshes are both aesthetic and complete, as they support maximal mesh symmetries with minimal complexity and possess simple generation rules. Here, we generate congruent tilings and meshed shape layouts that satisfy these optimality conditions. Further, the congruent meshes are uniquely mappable to an almost regular 3D polyhedron (or its dual polyhedron) and which exhibits face-transitive (and edge-transitive) congruency with at most two types of vertices (each type transitive to the other). The family of all such congruently meshed polyhedra create a new class of meshed shapes, beyond the well-studied regular, semi-regular and quasi-regular classes, and their duals (platonic, Catalan and Johnson). While our new mesh class is infinite, we prove that there exists a unique mesh parametrization, where each member of the class can be represented by two integer lattice variables, and moreover efficiently constructable. PMID:27563368

User's guide to PMESH: A grid-generation program for single-rotation and counterrotation advanced turboprops

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Warsi, Saif A.

1989-01-01

A detailed operating manual is presented for a grid generating program that produces 3-D meshes for advanced turboprops. The code uses both algebraic and elliptic partial differential equation methods to generate single rotation and counterrotation, H or C type meshes for the z - r planes and H type for the z - theta planes. The code allows easy specification of geometrical constraints (such as blade angle, location of bounding surfaces, etc.), mesh control parameters (point distribution near blades and nacelle, number of grid points desired, etc.), and it has good runtime diagnostics. An overview is provided of the mesh generation procedure, sample input dataset with detailed explanation of all input, and example meshes.

Automated hexahedral mesh generation from biomedical image data: applications in limb prosthetics.

PubMed

Zachariah, S G; Sanders, J E; Turkiyyah, G M

1996-06-01

A general method to generate hexahedral meshes for finite element analysis of residual limbs and similar biomedical geometries is presented. The method utilizes skeleton-based subdivision of cross-sectional domains to produce simple subdomains in which structured meshes are easily generated. Application to a below-knee residual limb and external prosthetic socket is described. The residual limb was modeled as consisting of bones, soft tissue, and skin. The prosthetic socket model comprised a socket wall with an inner liner. The geometries of these structures were defined using axial cross-sectional contour data from X-ray computed tomography, optical scanning, and mechanical surface digitization. A tubular surface representation, using B-splines to define the directrix and generator, is shown to be convenient for definition of the structure geometries. Conversion of cross-sectional data to the compact tubular surface representation is direct, and the analytical representation simplifies geometric querying and numerical optimization within the mesh generation algorithms. The element meshes remain geometrically accurate since boundary nodes are constrained to lie on the tubular surfaces. Several element meshes of increasing mesh density were generated for two residual limbs and prosthetic sockets. Convergence testing demonstrated that approximately 19 elements are required along a circumference of the residual limb surface for a simple linear elastic model. A model with the fibula absent compared with the same geometry with the fibula present showed differences suggesting higher distal stresses in the absence of the fibula. Automated hexahedral mesh generation algorithms for sliced data represent an advancement in prosthetic stress analysis since they allow rapid modeling of any given residual limb and optimization of mesh parameters.

Practical implementation of tetrahedral mesh reconstruction in emission tomography

PubMed Central

Boutchko, R.; Sitek, A.; Gullberg, G. T.

2014-01-01

This paper presents a practical implementation of image reconstruction on tetrahedral meshes optimized for emission computed tomography with parallel beam geometry. Tetrahedral mesh built on a point cloud is a convenient image representation method, intrinsically three-dimensional and with a multi-level resolution property. Image intensities are defined at the mesh nodes and linearly interpolated inside each tetrahedron. For the given mesh geometry, the intensities can be computed directly from tomographic projections using iterative reconstruction algorithms with a system matrix calculated using an exact analytical formula. The mesh geometry is optimized for a specific patient using a two stage process. First, a noisy image is reconstructed on a finely-spaced uniform cloud. Then, the geometry of the representation is adaptively transformed through boundary-preserving node motion and elimination. Nodes are removed in constant intensity regions, merged along the boundaries, and moved in the direction of the mean local intensity gradient in order to provide higher node density in the boundary regions. Attenuation correction and detector geometric response are included in the system matrix. Once the mesh geometry is optimized, it is used to generate the final system matrix for ML-EM reconstruction of node intensities and for visualization of the reconstructed images. In dynamic PET or SPECT imaging, the system matrix generation procedure is performed using a quasi-static sinogram, generated by summing projection data from multiple time frames. This system matrix is then used to reconstruct the individual time frame projections. Performance of the new method is evaluated by reconstructing simulated projections of the NCAT phantom and the method is then applied to dynamic SPECT phantom and patient studies and to a dynamic microPET rat study. Tetrahedral mesh-based images are compared to the standard voxel-based reconstruction for both high and low signal-to-noise ratio projection datasets. The results demonstrate that the reconstructed images represented as tetrahedral meshes based on point clouds offer image quality comparable to that achievable using a standard voxel grid while allowing substantial reduction in the number of unknown intensities to be reconstructed and reducing the noise. PMID:23588373

Practical implementation of tetrahedral mesh reconstruction in emission tomography

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Boutchko, R.; Sitek, A.; Gullberg, G. T.

2013-05-01

This paper presents a practical implementation of image reconstruction on tetrahedral meshes optimized for emission computed tomography with parallel beam geometry. Tetrahedral mesh built on a point cloud is a convenient image representation method, intrinsically three-dimensional and with a multi-level resolution property. Image intensities are defined at the mesh nodes and linearly interpolated inside each tetrahedron. For the given mesh geometry, the intensities can be computed directly from tomographic projections using iterative reconstruction algorithms with a system matrix calculated using an exact analytical formula. The mesh geometry is optimized for a specific patient using a two stage process. First, a noisy image is reconstructed on a finely-spaced uniform cloud. Then, the geometry of the representation is adaptively transformed through boundary-preserving node motion and elimination. Nodes are removed in constant intensity regions, merged along the boundaries, and moved in the direction of the mean local intensity gradient in order to provide higher node density in the boundary regions. Attenuation correction and detector geometric response are included in the system matrix. Once the mesh geometry is optimized, it is used to generate the final system matrix for ML-EM reconstruction of node intensities and for visualization of the reconstructed images. In dynamic PET or SPECT imaging, the system matrix generation procedure is performed using a quasi-static sinogram, generated by summing projection data from multiple time frames. This system matrix is then used to reconstruct the individual time frame projections. Performance of the new method is evaluated by reconstructing simulated projections of the NCAT phantom and the method is then applied to dynamic SPECT phantom and patient studies and to a dynamic microPET rat study. Tetrahedral mesh-based images are compared to the standard voxel-based reconstruction for both high and low signal-to-noise ratio projection datasets. The results demonstrate that the reconstructed images represented as tetrahedral meshes based on point clouds offer image quality comparable to that achievable using a standard voxel grid while allowing substantial reduction in the number of unknown intensities to be reconstructed and reducing the noise.

Grain Boundary Conformed Volumetric Mesh Generation from a Three-Dimensional Voxellated Polycrystalline Microstructure

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lee, Myeong-Jin; Jeon, Young-Ju; Son, Ga-Eun; Sung, Sihwa; Kim, Ju-Young; Han, Heung Nam; Cho, Soo Gyeong; Jung, Sang-Hyun; Lee, Sukbin

2018-07-01

We present a new comprehensive scheme for generating grain boundary conformed, volumetric mesh elements from a three-dimensional voxellated polycrystalline microstructure. From the voxellated image of a polycrystalline microstructure obtained from the Monte Carlo Potts model in the context of isotropic normal grain growth simulation, its grain boundary network is approximated as a curvature-maintained conformal triangular surface mesh using a set of in-house codes. In order to improve the surface mesh quality and to adjust mesh resolution, various re-meshing techniques in a commercial software are applied to the approximated grain boundary mesh. It is found that the aspect ratio, the minimum angle and the Jacobian value of the re-meshed surface triangular mesh are successfully improved. Using such an enhanced surface mesh, conformal volumetric tetrahedral elements of the polycrystalline microstructure are created using a commercial software, again. The resultant mesh seamlessly retains the short- and long-range curvature of grain boundaries and junctions as well as the realistic morphology of the grains inside the polycrystal. It is noted that the proposed scheme is the first to successfully generate three-dimensional mesh elements for polycrystals with high enough quality to be used for the microstructure-based finite element analysis, while the realistic characteristics of grain boundaries and grains are maintained from the corresponding voxellated microstructure image.

Grain Boundary Conformed Volumetric Mesh Generation from a Three-Dimensional Voxellated Polycrystalline Microstructure

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lee, Myeong-Jin; Jeon, Young-Ju; Son, Ga-Eun; Sung, Sihwa; Kim, Ju-Young; Han, Heung Nam; Cho, Soo Gyeong; Jung, Sang-Hyun; Lee, Sukbin

2018-03-01

We present a new comprehensive scheme for generating grain boundary conformed, volumetric mesh elements from a three-dimensional voxellated polycrystalline microstructure. From the voxellated image of a polycrystalline microstructure obtained from the Monte Carlo Potts model in the context of isotropic normal grain growth simulation, its grain boundary network is approximated as a curvature-maintained conformal triangular surface mesh using a set of in-house codes. In order to improve the surface mesh quality and to adjust mesh resolution, various re-meshing techniques in a commercial software are applied to the approximated grain boundary mesh. It is found that the aspect ratio, the minimum angle and the Jacobian value of the re-meshed surface triangular mesh are successfully improved. Using such an enhanced surface mesh, conformal volumetric tetrahedral elements of the polycrystalline microstructure are created using a commercial software, again. The resultant mesh seamlessly retains the short- and long-range curvature of grain boundaries and junctions as well as the realistic morphology of the grains inside the polycrystal. It is noted that the proposed scheme is the first to successfully generate three-dimensional mesh elements for polycrystals with high enough quality to be used for the microstructure-based finite element analysis, while the realistic characteristics of grain boundaries and grains are maintained from the corresponding voxellated microstructure image.

Adaptive Skin Meshes Coarsening for Biomolecular Simulation

PubMed Central

Shi, Xinwei; Koehl, Patrice

2011-01-01

In this paper, we present efficient algorithms for generating hierarchical molecular skin meshes with decreasing size and guaranteed quality. Our algorithms generate a sequence of coarse meshes for both the surfaces and the bounded volumes. Each coarser surface mesh is adaptive to the surface curvature and maintains the topology of the skin surface with guaranteed mesh quality. The corresponding tetrahedral mesh is conforming to the interface surface mesh and contains high quality tetrahedral that decompose both the interior of the molecule and the surrounding region (enclosed in a sphere). Our hierarchical tetrahedral meshes have a number of advantages that will facilitate fast and accurate multigrid PDE solvers. Firstly, the quality of both the surface triangulations and tetrahedral meshes is guaranteed. Secondly, the interface in the tetrahedral mesh is an accurate approximation of the molecular boundary. In particular, all the boundary points lie on the skin surface. Thirdly, our meshes are Delaunay meshes. Finally, the meshes are adaptive to the geometry. PMID:21779137

Geo-PUMMA: Urban and Periurban Landscape Representation Toolbox for Hydrological Distributed Modeling

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sanzana, Pedro; Gironas, Jorge; Braud, Isabelle; Branger, Flora; Rodriguez, Fabrice; Vargas, Ximena; Hitschfeld, Nancy; Francisco Munoz, Jose

2016-04-01

In addition to land use changes, the process of urbanization can modify the direction of the surface and sub-surface flows, generating complex environments and increasing the types of connectivity between pervious and impervious areas. Thus, hydrological pathways in urban and periurban areas are significantly affected by artificial elements like channels, pipes, streets and other elements of storm water systems. This work presents Geo-PUMMA, a new GIS toolbox to generate vectorial meshes for distributed hydrological modeling and extract the drainage network in urban and periurban terrain. Geo-PUMMA gathers spatial information maps (e.g. cadastral, soil types, geology and digital elevation models) to produce Hydrological Response Units (HRU) and Urban Hydrological Elements (UHE). Geo-PUMMA includes tools to improve the initial mesh derived from GIS layers intersection in order to respect geometrical constraints, which ensures numerical stability while preserving the shape of the initial HRUs and minimizing the small elements to lower computing times. The geometrical constraints taken into account include: elements convexity, limitation of the number of sliver elements (e.g. roads) and of very small or very large elements. This toolbox allows the representation of basins at small scales (0.1-10km2), as it takes into account the hydrological connectivity of the main elements explicitly, and improves the representation of water pathways compared with classical raster approaches. Geo-PUMMA also allows the extraction of basin morphologic properties such as the width function, the area function and the imperviousness function. We applied this new toolbox to two periurban catchments: the Mercier catchment located near Lyon, France, and the Estero El Guindo catchment located in the Andean piedmont in the Maipo River, Chile. We use the capability of Geo-PUMMA to generate three different meshes. The first one is the initial mesh derived from the direct intersection of GIS layers. The second one is based on fine triangulation of HRUs and is considered the best one we can obtain (reference mesh). The third one is the recommended mesh, preserving the shape of the initial HRUs and limiting the number of elements. The representation of the drainage network and its morphological properties is compared between the three meshes. This comparison shows that the drainage network representation is particularly improved at small to medium spatial scales when using the recommended meshes (i.e. 120-150 m for the El Guindo catchment and 80-150 m for the Mercier catchment). The results also show that the recommended mesh correctly represents the main features of the drainage network as compared to the reference mesh. KEYWORDS: GRASS-GIS, Computer-assisted mesh generation, periurban catchments

Nanowire mesh solar fuels generator

DOEpatents

Yang, Peidong; Chan, Candace; Sun, Jianwei; Liu, Bin

2016-05-24

This disclosure provides systems, methods, and apparatus related to a nanowire mesh solar fuels generator. In one aspect, a nanowire mesh solar fuels generator includes (1) a photoanode configured to perform water oxidation and (2) a photocathode configured to perform water reduction. The photocathode is in electrical contact with the photoanode. The photoanode may include a high surface area network of photoanode nanowires. The photocathode may include a high surface area network of photocathode nanowires. In some embodiments, the nanowire mesh solar fuels generator may include an ion conductive polymer infiltrating the photoanode and the photocathode in the region where the photocathode is in electrical contact with the photoanode.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Bakosi, Jozsef; Christon, Mark A.; Francois, Marianne M.

Progress is reported on computational capabilities for the grid-to-rod-fretting (GTRF) problem of pressurized water reactors. Numeca's Hexpress/Hybrid mesh generator is demonstrated as an excellent alternative to generating computational meshes for complex flow geometries, such as in GTRF. Mesh assessment is carried out using standard industrial computational fluid dynamics practices. Hydra-TH, a simulation code developed at LANL for reactor thermal-hydraulics, is demonstrated on hybrid meshes, containing different element types. A series of new Hydra-TH calculations has been carried out collecting turbulence statistics. Preliminary results on the newly generated meshes are discussed; full analysis will be documented in the L3 milestone, THM.CFD.P5.05,more » Sept. 2012.« less

Influence of mesh structure on 2D full shallow water equations and SCS Curve Number simulation of rainfall/runoff events

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Caviedes-Voullième, Daniel; García-Navarro, Pilar; Murillo, Javier

2012-07-01

SummaryHydrological simulation of rain-runoff processes is often performed with lumped models which rely on calibration to generate storm hydrographs and study catchment response to rain. In this paper, a distributed, physically-based numerical model is used for runoff simulation in a mountain catchment. This approach offers two advantages. The first is that by using shallow-water equations for runoff flow, there is less freedom to calibrate routing parameters (as compared to, for example, synthetic hydrograph methods). The second, is that spatial distributions of water depth and velocity can be obtained. Furthermore, interactions among the various hydrological processes can be modeled in a physically-based approach which may depend on transient and spatially distributed factors. On the other hand, the undertaken numerical approach relies on accurate terrain representation and mesh selection, which also affects significantly the computational cost of the simulations. Hence, we investigate the response of a gauged catchment with this distributed approach. The methodology consists of analyzing the effects that the mesh has on the simulations by using a range of meshes. Next, friction is applied to the model and the response to variations and interaction with the mesh is studied. Finally, a first approach with the well-known SCS Curve Number method is studied to evaluate its behavior when coupled with a shallow-water model for runoff flow. The results show that mesh selection is of great importance, since it may affect the results in a magnitude as large as physical factors, such as friction. Furthermore, results proved to be less sensitive to roughness spatial distribution than to mesh properties. Finally, the results indicate that SCS-CN may not be suitable for simulating hydrological processes together with a shallow-water model.

Pressure Mapping and Efficiency Analysis of an EPPLER 857 Hydrokinetic Turbine

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Clark, Tristan

A conceptual energy ship is presented to provide renewable energy. The ship, driven by the wind, drags a hydrokinetic turbine through the water. The power generated is used to run electrolysis on board, taking the resultant hydrogen back to shore to be used as an energy source. The basin efficiency (Power/thrust*velocity) of the Hydrokinetic Turbine (HTK) plays a vital role in this process. In order to extract the maximum allowable power from the flow, the blades need to be optimized. The structural analysis of the blade is important, as the blade will undergo high pressure loads from the water. A procedure for analysis of a preliminary Hydrokinetic Turbine blade design is developed. The blade was designed by a non-optimized Blade Element Momentum Theory (BEMT) code. Six simulations were run, with varying mesh resolution, turbulence models, and flow region size. The procedure was developed that provides detailed explanation for the entire process, from geometry and mesh generation to post-processing analysis tools. The efficiency results from the simulations are used to study the mesh resolution, flow region size, and turbulence models. The results are compared to the BEMT model design targets. Static pressure maps are created that can be used for structural analysis of the blades.

A finite element conjugate gradient FFT method for scattering

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Collins, Jeffery D.; Zapp, John; Hsa, Chang-Yu; Volakis, John L.

1990-01-01

An extension of a two dimensional formulation is presented for a three dimensional body of revolution. With the introduction of a Fourier expansion of the vector electric and magnetic fields, a coupled two dimensional system is generated and solved via the finite element method. An exact boundary condition is employed to terminate the mesh and the fast fourier transformation (FFT) is used to evaluate the boundary integrals for low O(n) memory demand when an iterative solution algorithm is used. By virtue of the finite element method, the algorithm is applicable to structures of arbitrary material composition. Several improvements to the two dimensional algorithm are also described. These include: (1) modifications for terminating the mesh at circular boundaries without distorting the convolutionality of the boundary integrals; (2) the development of nonproprietary mesh generation routines for two dimensional applications; (3) the development of preprocessors for interfacing SDRC IDEAS with the main algorithm; and (4) the development of post-processing algorithms based on the public domain package GRAFIC to generate two and three dimensional gray level and color field maps.

MeSH indexing based on automatically generated summaries.

PubMed

Jimeno-Yepes, Antonio J; Plaza, Laura; Mork, James G; Aronson, Alan R; Díaz, Alberto

2013-06-26

MEDLINE citations are manually indexed at the U.S. National Library of Medicine (NLM) using as reference the Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) controlled vocabulary. For this task, the human indexers read the full text of the article. Due to the growth of MEDLINE, the NLM Indexing Initiative explores indexing methodologies that can support the task of the indexers. Medical Text Indexer (MTI) is a tool developed by the NLM Indexing Initiative to provide MeSH indexing recommendations to indexers. Currently, the input to MTI is MEDLINE citations, title and abstract only. Previous work has shown that using full text as input to MTI increases recall, but decreases precision sharply. We propose using summaries generated automatically from the full text for the input to MTI to use in the task of suggesting MeSH headings to indexers. Summaries distill the most salient information from the full text, which might increase the coverage of automatic indexing approaches based on MEDLINE. We hypothesize that if the results were good enough, manual indexers could possibly use automatic summaries instead of the full texts, along with the recommendations of MTI, to speed up the process while maintaining high quality of indexing results. We have generated summaries of different lengths using two different summarizers, and evaluated the MTI indexing on the summaries using different algorithms: MTI, individual MTI components, and machine learning. The results are compared to those of full text articles and MEDLINE citations. Our results show that automatically generated summaries achieve similar recall but higher precision compared to full text articles. Compared to MEDLINE citations, summaries achieve higher recall but lower precision. Our results show that automatic summaries produce better indexing than full text articles. Summaries produce similar recall to full text but much better precision, which seems to indicate that automatic summaries can efficiently capture the most important contents within the original articles. The combination of MEDLINE citations and automatically generated summaries could improve the recommendations suggested by MTI. On the other hand, indexing performance might be dependent on the MeSH heading being indexed. Summarization techniques could thus be considered as a feature selection algorithm that might have to be tuned individually for each MeSH heading.

Adjoint-Based Mesh Adaptation for the Sonic Boom Signature Loudness

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Rallabhandi, Sriram K.; Park, Michael A.

2017-01-01

The mesh adaptation functionality of FUN3D is utilized to obtain a mesh optimized to calculate sonic boom ground signature loudness. During this process, the coupling between the discrete-adjoints of the computational fluid dynamics tool FUN3D and the atmospheric propagation tool sBOOM is exploited to form the error estimate. This new mesh adaptation methodology will allow generation of suitable meshes adapted to reduce the estimated errors in the ground loudness, which is an optimization metric employed in supersonic aircraft design. This new output-based adaptation could allow new insights into meshing for sonic boom analysis and design, and complements existing output-based adaptation techniques such as adaptation to reduce estimated errors in off-body pressure functional. This effort could also have implications for other coupled multidisciplinary adjoint capabilities (e.g., aeroelasticity) as well as inclusion of propagation specific parameters such as prevailing winds or non-standard atmospheric conditions. Results are discussed in the context of existing methods and appropriate conclusions are drawn as to the efficacy and efficiency of the developed capability.

Conversion of Component-Based Point Definition to VSP Model and Higher Order Meshing

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Ordaz, Irian

2011-01-01

Vehicle Sketch Pad (VSP) has become a powerful conceptual and parametric geometry tool with numerous export capabilities for third-party analysis codes as well as robust surface meshing capabilities for computational fluid dynamics (CFD) analysis. However, a capability gap currently exists for reconstructing a fully parametric VSP model of a geometry generated by third-party software. A computer code called GEO2VSP has been developed to close this gap and to allow the integration of VSP into a closed-loop geometry design process with other third-party design tools. Furthermore, the automated CFD surface meshing capability of VSP are demonstrated for component-based point definition geometries in a conceptual analysis and design framework.

2D Automatic body-fitted structured mesh generation using advancing extraction method

USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

This paper presents an automatic mesh generation algorithm for body-fitted structured meshes in Computational Fluids Dynamics (CFD) analysis using the Advancing Extraction Method (AEM). The method is applicable to two-dimensional domains with complex geometries, which have the hierarchical tree-like...

2D automatic body-fitted structured mesh generation using advancing extraction method

USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

This paper presents an automatic mesh generation algorithm for body-fitted structured meshes in Computational Fluids Dynamics (CFD) analysis using the Advancing Extraction Method (AEM). The method is applicable to two-dimensional domains with complex geometries, which have the hierarchical tree-like...

Parallel Performance Optimizations on Unstructured Mesh-based Simulations

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Sarje, Abhinav; Song, Sukhyun; Jacobsen, Douglas

2015-01-01

© The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. This paper addresses two key parallelization challenges the unstructured mesh-based ocean modeling code, MPAS-Ocean, which uses a mesh based on Voronoi tessellations: (1) load imbalance across processes, and (2) unstructured data access patterns, that inhibit intra- and inter-node performance. Our work analyzes the load imbalance due to naive partitioning of the mesh, and develops methods to generate mesh partitioning with better load balance and reduced communication. Furthermore, we present methods that minimize both inter- and intranode data movement and maximize data reuse. Our techniques include predictive ordering of data elements for higher cachemore » efficiency, as well as communication reduction approaches. We present detailed performance data when running on thousands of cores using the Cray XC30 supercomputer and show that our optimization strategies can exceed the original performance by over 2×. Additionally, many of these solutions can be broadly applied to a wide variety of unstructured grid-based computations.« less

An ODE-Based Wall Model for Turbulent Flow Simulations

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Berger, Marsha J.; Aftosmis, Michael J.

2017-01-01

Fully automated meshing for Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes Simulations, Mesh generation for complex geometry continues to be the biggest bottleneck in the RANS simulation process; Fully automated Cartesian methods routinely used for inviscid simulations about arbitrarily complex geometry; These methods lack of an obvious & robust way to achieve near wall anisotropy; Goal: Extend these methods for RANS simulation without sacrificing automation, at an affordable cost; Note: Nothing here is limited to Cartesian methods, and much becomes simpler in a body-fitted setting.

Stereo matching and view interpolation based on image domain triangulation.

PubMed

Fickel, Guilherme Pinto; Jung, Claudio R; Malzbender, Tom; Samadani, Ramin; Culbertson, Bruce

2013-09-01

This paper presents a new approach for stereo matching and view interpolation problems based on triangular tessellations suitable for a linear array of rectified cameras. The domain of the reference image is initially partitioned into triangular regions using edge and scale information, aiming to place vertices along image edges and increase the number of triangles in textured regions. A region-based matching algorithm is then used to find an initial disparity for each triangle, and a refinement stage is applied to change the disparity at the vertices of the triangles, generating a piecewise linear disparity map. A simple post-processing procedure is applied to connect triangles with similar disparities generating a full 3D mesh related to each camera (view), which are used to generate new synthesized views along the linear camera array. With the proposed framework, view interpolation reduces to the trivial task of rendering polygonal meshes, which can be done very fast, particularly when GPUs are employed. Furthermore, the generated views are hole-free, unlike most point-based view interpolation schemes that require some kind of post-processing procedures to fill holes.

Trimming Line Design using New Development Method and One Step FEM

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chung, Wan-Jin; Park, Choon-Dal; Yang, Dong-yol

2005-08-01

In most of automobile panel manufacturing, trimming is generally performed prior to flanging. To find feasible trimming line is crucial in obtaining accurate edge profile after flanging. Section-based method develops blank along section planes and find trimming line by generating loop of end points. This method suffers from inaccurate results for regions with out-of-section motion. On the other hand, simulation-based method can produce more accurate trimming line by iterative strategy. However, due to limitation of time and lack of information in initial die design, it is still not widely accepted in the industry. In this study, new fast method to find feasible trimming line is proposed. One step FEM is used to analyze the flanging process because we can define the desired final shape after flanging and most of strain paths are simple in flanging. When we use one step FEM, the main obstacle is the generation of initial guess. Robust initial guess generation method is developed to handle bad-shaped mesh, very different mesh size and undercut part. The new method develops 3D triangular mesh in propagational way from final mesh onto the drawing tool surface. Also in order to remedy mesh distortion during development, energy minimization technique is utilized. Trimming line is extracted from the outer boundary after one step FEM simulation. This method shows many benefits since trimming line can be obtained in the early design stage. The developed method is successfully applied to the complex industrial applications such as flanging of fender and door outer.

ESCHER: An interactive mesh-generating editor for preparing finite-element input

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Oakes, W. R., Jr.

1984-01-01

ESCHER is an interactive mesh generation and editing program designed to help the user create a finite-element mesh, create additional input for finite-element analysis, including initial conditions, boundary conditions, and slidelines, and generate a NEUTRAL FILE that can be postprocessed for input into several finite-element codes, including ADINA, ADINAT, DYNA, NIKE, TSAAS, and ABUQUS. Two important ESCHER capabilities, interactive geometry creation and mesh archival storge are described in detail. Also described is the interactive command language and the use of interactive graphics. The archival storage and restart file is a modular, entity-based mesh data file. Modules of this file correspond to separate editing modes in the mesh editor, with data definition syntax preserved between the interactive commands and the archival storage file. Because ESCHER was expected to be highly interactive, extensive user documentation was provided in the form of an interactive HELP package.

Loft: An Automated Mesh Generator for Stiffened Shell Aerospace Vehicles

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Eldred, Lloyd B.

2011-01-01

Loft is an automated mesh generation code that is designed for aerospace vehicle structures. From user input, Loft generates meshes for wings, noses, tanks, fuselage sections, thrust structures, and so on. As a mesh is generated, each element is assigned properties to mark the part of the vehicle with which it is associated. This property assignment is an extremely powerful feature that enables detailed analysis tasks, such as load application and structural sizing. This report is presented in two parts. The first part is an overview of the code and its applications. The modeling approach that was used to create the finite element meshes is described. Several applications of the code are demonstrated, including a Next Generation Launch Technology (NGLT) wing-sizing study, a lunar lander stage study, a launch vehicle shroud shape study, and a two-stage-to-orbit (TSTO) orbiter. Part two of the report is the program user manual. The manual includes in-depth tutorials and a complete command reference.

Adaptive Multilinear Tensor Product Wavelets

DOE PAGES

Weiss, Kenneth; Lindstrom, Peter

2015-08-12

Many foundational visualization techniques including isosurfacing, direct volume rendering and texture mapping rely on piecewise multilinear interpolation over the cells of a mesh. However, there has not been much focus within the visualization community on techniques that efficiently generate and encode globally continuous functions defined by the union of multilinear cells. Wavelets provide a rich context for analyzing and processing complicated datasets. In this paper, we exploit adaptive regular refinement as a means of representing and evaluating functions described by a subset of their nonzero wavelet coefficients. We analyze the dependencies involved in the wavelet transform and describe how tomore » generate and represent the coarsest adaptive mesh with nodal function values such that the inverse wavelet transform is exactly reproduced via simple interpolation (subdivision) over the mesh elements. This allows for an adaptive, sparse representation of the function with on-demand evaluation at any point in the domain. In conclusion, we focus on the popular wavelets formed by tensor products of linear B-splines, resulting in an adaptive, nonconforming but crack-free quadtree (2D) or octree (3D) mesh that allows reproducing globally continuous functions via multilinear interpolation over its cells.« less

3D Compressible Melt Transport with Adaptive Mesh Refinement

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Dannberg, Juliane; Heister, Timo

2015-04-01

Melt generation and migration have been the subject of numerous investigations, but their typical time and length-scales are vastly different from mantle convection, which makes it difficult to study these processes in a unified framework. The equations that describe coupled Stokes-Darcy flow have been derived a long time ago and they have been successfully implemented and applied in numerical models (Keller et al., 2013). However, modelling magma dynamics poses the challenge of highly non-linear and spatially variable material properties, in particular the viscosity. Applying adaptive mesh refinement to this type of problems is particularly advantageous, as the resolution can be increased in mesh cells where melt is present and viscosity gradients are high, whereas a lower resolution is sufficient in regions without melt. In addition, previous models neglect the compressibility of both the solid and the fluid phase. However, experiments have shown that the melt density change from the depth of melt generation to the surface leads to a volume increase of up to 20%. Considering these volume changes in both phases also ensures self-consistency of models that strive to link melt generation to processes in the deeper mantle, where the compressibility of the solid phase becomes more important. We describe our extension of the finite-element mantle convection code ASPECT (Kronbichler et al., 2012) that allows for solving additional equations describing the behaviour of silicate melt percolating through and interacting with a viscously deforming host rock. We use the original compressible formulation of the McKenzie equations, augmented by an equation for the conservation of energy. This approach includes both melt migration and melt generation with the accompanying latent heat effects. We evaluate the functionality and potential of this method using a series of simple model setups and benchmarks, comparing results of the compressible and incompressible formulation and showing the potential of adaptive mesh refinement when applied to melt migration. Our model of magma dynamics provides a framework for modelling processes on different scales and investigating links between processes occurring in the deep mantle and melt generation and migration. This approach could prove particularly useful applied to modelling the generation of komatiites or other melts originating in greater depths. Keller, T., D. A. May, and B. J. P. Kaus (2013), Numerical modelling of magma dynamics coupled to tectonic deformation of lithosphere and crust, Geophysical Journal International, 195 (3), 1406-1442. Kronbichler, M., T. Heister, and W. Bangerth (2012), High accuracy mantle convection simulation through modern numerical methods, Geophysical Journal International, 191 (1), 12-29.

Meshing of a Spiral Bevel Gearset with 3D Finite Element Analysis

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bibel, George D.; Handschuh, Robert

1996-01-01

Recent advances in spiral bevel gear geometry and finite element technology make it practical to conduct a structural analysis and analytically roll the gearset through mesh. With the advent of user specific programming linked to 3D solid modelers and mesh generators, model generation has become greatly automated. Contact algorithms available in general purpose finite element codes eliminate the need for the use and alignment of gap elements. Once the gearset is placed in mesh, user subroutines attached to the FE code easily roll the gearset through mesh. The method is described in detail. Preliminary results for a gearset segment showing the progression of the contact lineload is given as the gears roll through mesh.

Minimizing finite-volume discretization errors on polyhedral meshes

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Mouly, Quentin; Evrard, Fabien; van Wachem, Berend; Denner, Fabian

2017-11-01

Tetrahedral meshes are widely used in CFD to simulate flows in and around complex geometries, as automatic generation tools now allow tetrahedral meshes to represent arbitrary domains in a relatively accessible manner. Polyhedral meshes, however, are an increasingly popular alternative. While tetrahedron have at most four neighbours, the higher number of neighbours per polyhedral cell leads to a more accurate evaluation of gradients, essential for the numerical resolution of PDEs. The use of polyhedral meshes, nonetheless, introduces discretization errors for finite-volume methods: skewness and non-orthogonality, which occur with all sorts of unstructured meshes, as well as errors due to non-planar faces, specific to polygonal faces with more than three vertices. Indeed, polyhedral mesh generation algorithms cannot, in general, guarantee to produce meshes free of non-planar faces. The presented work focuses on the quantification and optimization of discretization errors on polyhedral meshes in the context of finite-volume methods. A quasi-Newton method is employed to optimize the relevant mesh quality measures. Various meshes are optimized and CFD results of cases with known solutions are presented to assess the improvements the optimization approach can provide.

Note: Radial-thrust combo metal mesh foil bearing for microturbomachinery

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Park, Cheol Hoon; Choi, Sang Kyu; Hong, Doo Euy; Yoon, Tae Gwang; Lee, Sung Hwi

2013-10-01

This Note proposes a novel radial-thrust combo metal mesh foil bearing (MMFB). Although MMFBs have advantages such as higher stiffness and damping over conventional air foil bearings, studies related to MMFBs have been limited to radial MMFBs. The novel combo MMFB is composed of a radial top foil, thrust top foils, and a ring-shaped metal mesh damper—fabricated by compressing a copper wire mesh—with metal mesh thrust pads for the thrust bearing at both side faces. In this study, the combo MMFB was fabricated in half-split type to support the rotor for a micro gas turbine generator. The manufacture and assembly process for the half-split-type combo MMFB is presented. In addition, to verify the proposed combo MMFB, motoring test results up to 250 000 rpm and axial displacements as a function of rotational speed are presented.

Effect of catalysts on dc corona discharge poisoning

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pekárek, S.

2011-02-01

The processes of ozone generation in non-thermal plasma produced by an electrical discharge in air at atmospheric pressure are burdened by the presence of nitrogen oxides, which on the one hand contribute to ozone generation and on the other hand are responsible for unpleasant discharge poisoning. The term discharge poisoning refers to the situation when the discharge ozone formation completely breaks down. Discharge poisoning can be affected by placing a catalyst in the discharge chamber. For the dc hollow needle to mesh corona discharge enhanced by the flow of air through the needle electrode we studied the effect of titanium dioxide TiO2, ZSM-5 zeolite or Cu++ZSM-5 zeolite on discharge poisoning by monitoring the ozone, nitrogen monoxide and nitrogen dioxide discharge production. We found that placing globules of any of these catalysts on the mesh decreases the energy density of the onset of discharge poisoning, and this energy density is smallest for a discharge with globules of a TiO2 on the mesh.

Dynamic mesh for TCAD modeling with ECORCE

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Michez, A.; Boch, J.; Touboul, A.; Saigné, F.

2016-08-01

Mesh generation for TCAD modeling is challenging. Because densities of carriers can change by several orders of magnitude in thin areas, a significant change of the solution can be observed for two very similar meshes. The mesh must be defined at best to minimize this change. To address this issue, a criterion based on polynomial interpolation on adjacent nodes is proposed that adjusts accurately the mesh to the gradients of Degrees of Freedom. Furthermore, a dynamic mesh that follows changes of DF in DC and transient mode is a powerful tool for TCAD users. But, in transient modeling, adding nodes to a mesh induces oscillations in the solution that appears as spikes at the current collected at the contacts. This paper proposes two schemes that solve this problem. Examples show that using these techniques, the dynamic mesh generator of the TCAD tool ECORCE handle semiconductors devices in DC and transient mode.

Unstructured and adaptive mesh generation for high Reynolds number viscous flows

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mavriplis, Dimitri J.

1991-01-01

A method for generating and adaptively refining a highly stretched unstructured mesh suitable for the computation of high-Reynolds-number viscous flows about arbitrary two-dimensional geometries was developed. The method is based on the Delaunay triangulation of a predetermined set of points and employs a local mapping in order to achieve the high stretching rates required in the boundary-layer and wake regions. The initial mesh-point distribution is determined in a geometry-adaptive manner which clusters points in regions of high curvature and sharp corners. Adaptive mesh refinement is achieved by adding new points in regions of large flow gradients, and locally retriangulating; thus, obviating the need for global mesh regeneration. Initial and adapted meshes about complex multi-element airfoil geometries are shown and compressible flow solutions are computed on these meshes.

LIMSI @ 2014 Clinical Decision Support Track

DTIC Science & Technology

2014-11-01

MeSH and BoW runs) was based on the automatic generation of disease hypotheses for which we used data from OrphaNet [4] and the Disease Symptom Knowledge...with the MeSH terms of the top 5 disease hypotheses generated for the case reports. Compared to the other participants we achieved low scores...clinical question types. Query expansion (for both MeSH and BoW runs) was based on the automatic generation of disease hypotheses for which we used data

High-fidelity simulations of blast loadings in urban environments using an overset meshing strategy

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wang, X.; Remotigue, M.; Arnoldus, Q.; Janus, M.; Luke, E.; Thompson, D.; Weed, R.; Bessette, G.

2017-05-01

Detailed blast propagation and evolution through multiple structures representing an urban environment were simulated using the code Loci/BLAST, which employs an overset meshing strategy. The use of overset meshes simplifies mesh generation by allowing meshes for individual component geometries to be generated independently. Detailed blast propagation and evolution through multiple structures, wave reflection and interaction between structures, and blast loadings on structures were simulated and analyzed. Predicted results showed good agreement with experimental data generated by the US Army Engineer Research and Development Center. Loci/BLAST results were also found to compare favorably to simulations obtained using the Second-Order Hydrodynamic Automatic Mesh Refinement Code (SHAMRC). The results obtained demonstrated that blast reflections in an urban setting significantly increased the blast loads on adjacent buildings. Correlations of computational results with experimental data yielded valuable insights into the physics of blast propagation, reflection, and interaction under an urban setting and verified the use of Loci/BLAST as a viable tool for urban blast analysis.

Method for generating a mesh representation of a region characterized by a trunk and a branch thereon

DOEpatents

Shepherd, Jason [Albuquerque, NM; Mitchell, Scott A [Albuquerque, NM; Jankovich, Steven R [Anaheim, CA; Benzley, Steven E [Provo, UT

2007-05-15

The present invention provides a meshing method, called grafting, that lifts the prior art constraint on abutting surfaces, including surfaces that are linking, source/target, or other types of surfaces of the trunk volume. The grafting method locally modifies the structured mesh of the linking surfaces allowing the mesh to conform to additional surface features. Thus, the grafting method can provide a transition between multiple sweep directions extending sweeping algorithms to 23/4-D solids. The method is also suitable for use with non-sweepable volumes; the method provides a transition between meshes generated by methods other than sweeping as well.

Scalable hierarchical PDE sampler for generating spatially correlated random fields using nonmatching meshes: Scalable hierarchical PDE sampler using nonmatching meshes

DOE PAGES

Osborn, Sarah; Zulian, Patrick; Benson, Thomas; ...

2018-01-30

This work describes a domain embedding technique between two nonmatching meshes used for generating realizations of spatially correlated random fields with applications to large-scale sampling-based uncertainty quantification. The goal is to apply the multilevel Monte Carlo (MLMC) method for the quantification of output uncertainties of PDEs with random input coefficients on general and unstructured computational domains. We propose a highly scalable, hierarchical sampling method to generate realizations of a Gaussian random field on a given unstructured mesh by solving a reaction–diffusion PDE with a stochastic right-hand side. The stochastic PDE is discretized using the mixed finite element method on anmore » embedded domain with a structured mesh, and then, the solution is projected onto the unstructured mesh. This work describes implementation details on how to efficiently transfer data from the structured and unstructured meshes at coarse levels, assuming that this can be done efficiently on the finest level. We investigate the efficiency and parallel scalability of the technique for the scalable generation of Gaussian random fields in three dimensions. An application of the MLMC method is presented for quantifying uncertainties of subsurface flow problems. Here, we demonstrate the scalability of the sampling method with nonmatching mesh embedding, coupled with a parallel forward model problem solver, for large-scale 3D MLMC simulations with up to 1.9·109 unknowns.« less

Scalable hierarchical PDE sampler for generating spatially correlated random fields using nonmatching meshes: Scalable hierarchical PDE sampler using nonmatching meshes

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Osborn, Sarah; Zulian, Patrick; Benson, Thomas

This work describes a domain embedding technique between two nonmatching meshes used for generating realizations of spatially correlated random fields with applications to large-scale sampling-based uncertainty quantification. The goal is to apply the multilevel Monte Carlo (MLMC) method for the quantification of output uncertainties of PDEs with random input coefficients on general and unstructured computational domains. We propose a highly scalable, hierarchical sampling method to generate realizations of a Gaussian random field on a given unstructured mesh by solving a reaction–diffusion PDE with a stochastic right-hand side. The stochastic PDE is discretized using the mixed finite element method on anmore » embedded domain with a structured mesh, and then, the solution is projected onto the unstructured mesh. This work describes implementation details on how to efficiently transfer data from the structured and unstructured meshes at coarse levels, assuming that this can be done efficiently on the finest level. We investigate the efficiency and parallel scalability of the technique for the scalable generation of Gaussian random fields in three dimensions. An application of the MLMC method is presented for quantifying uncertainties of subsurface flow problems. Here, we demonstrate the scalability of the sampling method with nonmatching mesh embedding, coupled with a parallel forward model problem solver, for large-scale 3D MLMC simulations with up to 1.9·109 unknowns.« less

Local meshing plane analysis as a source of information about the gear quality

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Mączak, Jędrzej

2013-07-01

In the paper the application of the local meshing plane concept is discussed and applied for detecting of tooth degradation due to fatigue, and for overall gear quality assessment. Knowing the kinematic properties of the machine (i.e. gear tooth numbers) it is possible to modify the diagnostic signal in such a manner that its fragments will be linked to different rotating parts. This allows for presentation of either raw or processed gearbox signal in a form of three dimensional map on the plane "pinion teeth×gear teeth", called local meshing plane. The meshing plane in Cartesian coordinates z1×z2 allows for precise location and assessment of gear faults in terms of meshing quality of consecutive tooth pairs. Although the method was applied to simulated signals generated by the gearbox model, similar results were obtained for the measurement signals recorded during the back-to-back test stand experiment. The described method could be used for assessing the manufacturing quality of gears, the assembly quality as well as for the gear failure evaluation during normal exploitation.

MeSH indexing based on automatically generated summaries

PubMed Central

2013-01-01

Background MEDLINE citations are manually indexed at the U.S. National Library of Medicine (NLM) using as reference the Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) controlled vocabulary. For this task, the human indexers read the full text of the article. Due to the growth of MEDLINE, the NLM Indexing Initiative explores indexing methodologies that can support the task of the indexers. Medical Text Indexer (MTI) is a tool developed by the NLM Indexing Initiative to provide MeSH indexing recommendations to indexers. Currently, the input to MTI is MEDLINE citations, title and abstract only. Previous work has shown that using full text as input to MTI increases recall, but decreases precision sharply. We propose using summaries generated automatically from the full text for the input to MTI to use in the task of suggesting MeSH headings to indexers. Summaries distill the most salient information from the full text, which might increase the coverage of automatic indexing approaches based on MEDLINE. We hypothesize that if the results were good enough, manual indexers could possibly use automatic summaries instead of the full texts, along with the recommendations of MTI, to speed up the process while maintaining high quality of indexing results. Results We have generated summaries of different lengths using two different summarizers, and evaluated the MTI indexing on the summaries using different algorithms: MTI, individual MTI components, and machine learning. The results are compared to those of full text articles and MEDLINE citations. Our results show that automatically generated summaries achieve similar recall but higher precision compared to full text articles. Compared to MEDLINE citations, summaries achieve higher recall but lower precision. Conclusions Our results show that automatic summaries produce better indexing than full text articles. Summaries produce similar recall to full text but much better precision, which seems to indicate that automatic summaries can efficiently capture the most important contents within the original articles. The combination of MEDLINE citations and automatically generated summaries could improve the recommendations suggested by MTI. On the other hand, indexing performance might be dependent on the MeSH heading being indexed. Summarization techniques could thus be considered as a feature selection algorithm that might have to be tuned individually for each MeSH heading. PMID:23802936

Quality assessment of two- and three-dimensional unstructured meshes and validation of an upwind Euler flow solver

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Woodard, Paul R.; Batina, John T.; Yang, Henry T. Y.

1992-01-01

Quality assessment procedures are described for two-dimensional unstructured meshes. The procedures include measurement of minimum angles, element aspect ratios, stretching, and element skewness. Meshes about the ONERA M6 wing and the Boeing 747 transport configuration are generated using an advancing front method grid generation package of programs. Solutions of Euler's equations for these meshes are obtained at low angle-of-attack, transonic conditions. Results for these cases, obtained as part of a validation study demonstrate accuracy of an implicit upwind Euler solution algorithm.

Automated generation of image products for Mars Exploration Rover Mission tactical operations

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Alexander, Doug; Zamani, Payam; Deen, Robert; Andres, Paul; Mortensen, Helen

2005-01-01

This paper will discuss, from design to implementation, the methodologies applied to MIPL's automated pipeline processing as a 'system of systems' integrated with the MER GDS. Overviews of the interconnected product generating systems will also be provided with emphasis on interdependencies, including those for a) geometric rectificationn of camera lens distortions, b) generation of stereo disparity, c) derivation of 3-dimensional coordinates in XYZ space, d) generation of unified terrain meshes, e) camera-to-target ranging (distance) and f) multi-image mosaicking.

V-Man Generation for 3-D Real Time Animation. Chapter 5

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Nebel, Jean-Christophe; Sibiryakov, Alexander; Ju, Xiangyang

2007-01-01

The V-Man project has developed an intuitive authoring and intelligent system to create, animate, control and interact in real-time with a new generation of 3D virtual characters: The V-Men. It combines several innovative algorithms coming from Virtual Reality, Physical Simulation, Computer Vision, Robotics and Artificial Intelligence. Given a high-level task like "walk to that spot" or "get that object", a V-Man generates the complete animation required to accomplish the task. V-Men synthesise motion at runtime according to their environment, their task and their physical parameters, drawing upon its unique set of skills manufactured during the character creation. The key to the system is the automated creation of realistic V-Men, not requiring the expertise of an animator. It is based on real human data captured by 3D static and dynamic body scanners, which is then processed to generate firstly animatable body meshes, secondly 3D garments and finally skinned body meshes.

Three Dimensional Projection Environment for Molecular Design and Surgical Simulation

DTIC Science & Technology

2011-08-01

bypasses the cumbersome meshing process . The deformation model is only comprised of mass nodes, which are generated by sampling the object volume before...force should minimize the penetration volume, the haptic feedback force is derived directly. Additionally, a post- processing technique is developed to...render distinct physi-cal tissue properties across different interaction areas. The proposed approach does not require any pre- processing and is

2D automatic body-fitted structured mesh generation using advancing extraction method

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhang, Yaoxin; Jia, Yafei

2018-01-01

This paper presents an automatic mesh generation algorithm for body-fitted structured meshes in Computational Fluids Dynamics (CFD) analysis using the Advancing Extraction Method (AEM). The method is applicable to two-dimensional domains with complex geometries, which have the hierarchical tree-like topography with extrusion-like structures (i.e., branches or tributaries) and intrusion-like structures (i.e., peninsula or dikes). With the AEM, the hierarchical levels of sub-domains can be identified, and the block boundary of each sub-domain in convex polygon shape in each level can be extracted in an advancing scheme. In this paper, several examples were used to illustrate the effectiveness and applicability of the proposed algorithm for automatic structured mesh generation, and the implementation of the method.

An Adaptive Mesh Algorithm: Mesh Structure and Generation

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Scannapieco, Anthony J.

2016-06-21

The purpose of Adaptive Mesh Refinement is to minimize spatial errors over the computational space not to minimize the number of computational elements. The additional result of the technique is that it may reduce the number of computational elements needed to retain a given level of spatial accuracy. Adaptive mesh refinement is a computational technique used to dynamically select, over a region of space, a set of computational elements designed to minimize spatial error in the computational model of a physical process. The fundamental idea is to increase the mesh resolution in regions where the physical variables are represented bymore » a broad spectrum of modes in k-space, hence increasing the effective global spectral coverage of those physical variables. In addition, the selection of the spatially distributed elements is done dynamically by cyclically adjusting the mesh to follow the spectral evolution of the system. Over the years three types of AMR schemes have evolved; block, patch and locally refined AMR. In block and patch AMR logical blocks of various grid sizes are overlaid to span the physical space of interest, whereas in locally refined AMR no logical blocks are employed but locally nested mesh levels are used to span the physical space. The distinction between block and patch AMR is that in block AMR the original blocks refine and coarsen entirely in time, whereas in patch AMR the patches change location and zone size with time. The type of AMR described herein is a locally refi ned AMR. In the algorithm described, at any point in physical space only one zone exists at whatever level of mesh that is appropriate for that physical location. The dynamic creation of a locally refi ned computational mesh is made practical by a judicious selection of mesh rules. With these rules the mesh is evolved via a mesh potential designed to concentrate the nest mesh in regions where the physics is modally dense, and coarsen zones in regions where the physics is modally sparse.« less

An adaptive simplex cut-cell method for high-order discontinuous Galerkin discretizations of elliptic interface problems and conjugate heat transfer problems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sun, Huafei; Darmofal, David L.

2014-12-01

In this paper we propose a new high-order solution framework for interface problems on non-interface-conforming meshes. The framework consists of a discontinuous Galerkin (DG) discretization, a simplex cut-cell technique, and an output-based adaptive scheme. We first present a DG discretization with a dual-consistent output evaluation for elliptic interface problems on interface-conforming meshes, and then extend the method to handle multi-physics interface problems, in particular conjugate heat transfer (CHT) problems. The method is then applied to non-interface-conforming meshes using a cut-cell technique, where the interface definition is completely separate from the mesh generation process. No assumption is made on the interface shape (other than Lipschitz continuity). We then equip our strategy with an output-based adaptive scheme for an accurate output prediction. Through numerical examples, we demonstrate high-order convergence for elliptic interface problems and CHT problems with both smooth and non-smooth interface shapes.

Topological patterns of mesh textures in serpentinites

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Miyazawa, M.; Suzuki, A.; Shimizu, H.; Okamoto, A.; Hiraoka, Y.; Obayashi, I.; Tsuji, T.; Ito, T.

2017-12-01

Serpentinization is a hydration process that forms serpentine minerals and magnetite within the oceanic lithosphere. Microfractures crosscut these minerals during the reactions, and the structures look like mesh textures. It has been known that the patterns of microfractures and the system evolutions are affected by the hydration reaction and fluid transport in fractures and within matrices. This study aims at quantifying the topological patterns of the mesh textures and understanding possible conditions of fluid transport and reaction during serpentinization in the oceanic lithosphere. Two-dimensional simulation by the distinct element method (DEM) generates fracture patterns due to serpentinization. The microfracture patterns are evaluated by persistent homology, which measures features of connected components of a topological space and encodes multi-scale topological features in the persistence diagrams. The persistence diagrams of the different mesh textures are evaluated by principal component analysis to bring out the strong patterns of persistence diagrams. This approach help extract feature values of fracture patterns from high-dimensional and complex datasets.

Shape optimization of three-dimensional stamped and solid automotive components

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Botkin, M. E.; Yang, R.-J.; Bennett, J. A.

1987-01-01

The shape optimization of realistic, 3-D automotive components is discussed. The integration of the major parts of the total process: modeling, mesh generation, finite element and sensitivity analysis, and optimization are stressed. Stamped components and solid components are treated separately. For stamped parts a highly automated capability was developed. The problem description is based upon a parameterized boundary design element concept for the definition of the geometry. Automatic triangulation and adaptive mesh refinement are used to provide an automated analysis capability which requires only boundary data and takes into account sensitivity of the solution accuracy to boundary shape. For solid components a general extension of the 2-D boundary design element concept has not been achieved. In this case, the parameterized surface shape is provided using a generic modeling concept based upon isoparametric mapping patches which also serves as the mesh generator. Emphasis is placed upon the coupling of optimization with a commercially available finite element program. To do this it is necessary to modularize the program architecture and obtain shape design sensitivities using the material derivative approach so that only boundary solution data is needed.

Graph Partitioning for Parallel Applications in Heterogeneous Grid Environments

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bisws, Rupak; Kumar, Shailendra; Das, Sajal K.; Biegel, Bryan (Technical Monitor)

2002-01-01

The problem of partitioning irregular graphs and meshes for parallel computations on homogeneous systems has been extensively studied. However, these partitioning schemes fail when the target system architecture exhibits heterogeneity in resource characteristics. With the emergence of technologies such as the Grid, it is imperative to study the partitioning problem taking into consideration the differing capabilities of such distributed heterogeneous systems. In our model, the heterogeneous system consists of processors with varying processing power and an underlying non-uniform communication network. We present in this paper a novel multilevel partitioning scheme for irregular graphs and meshes, that takes into account issues pertinent to Grid computing environments. Our partitioning algorithm, called MiniMax, generates and maps partitions onto a heterogeneous system with the objective of minimizing the maximum execution time of the parallel distributed application. For experimental performance study, we have considered both a realistic mesh problem from NASA as well as synthetic workloads. Simulation results demonstrate that MiniMax generates high quality partitions for various classes of applications targeted for parallel execution in a distributed heterogeneous environment.

The optimization of high resolution topographic data for 1D hydrodynamic models

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ales, Ronovsky; Michal, Podhoranyi

2016-06-01

The main focus of our research presented in this paper is to optimize and use high resolution topographical data (HRTD) for hydrological modelling. Optimization of HRTD is done by generating adaptive mesh by measuring distance of coarse mesh and the surface of the dataset and adapting the mesh from the perspective of keeping the geometry as close to initial resolution as possible. Technique described in this paper enables computation of very accurate 1-D hydrodynamic models. In the paper, we use HEC-RAS software as a solver. For comparison, we have chosen the amount of generated cells/grid elements (in whole discretization domain and selected cross sections) with respect to preservation of the accuracy of the computational domain. Generation of the mesh for hydrodynamic modelling is strongly reliant on domain size and domain resolution. Topographical dataset used in this paper was created using LiDAR method and it captures 5.9km long section of a catchment of the river Olše. We studied crucial changes in topography for generated mesh. Assessment was done by commonly used statistical and visualization methods.

Automated quadrilateral surface discretization method and apparatus usable to generate mesh in a finite element analysis system

DOEpatents

Blacker, Teddy D.

1994-01-01

An automatic quadrilateral surface discretization method and apparatus is provided for automatically discretizing a geometric region without decomposing the region. The automated quadrilateral surface discretization method and apparatus automatically generates a mesh of all quadrilateral elements which is particularly useful in finite element analysis. The generated mesh of all quadrilateral elements is boundary sensitive, orientation insensitive and has few irregular nodes on the boundary. A permanent boundary of the geometric region is input and rows are iteratively layered toward the interior of the geometric region. Also, an exterior permanent boundary and an interior permanent boundary for a geometric region may be input and the rows are iteratively layered inward from the exterior boundary in a first counter clockwise direction while the rows are iteratively layered from the interior permanent boundary toward the exterior of the region in a second clockwise direction. As a result, a high quality mesh for an arbitrary geometry may be generated with a technique that is robust and fast for complex geometric regions and extreme mesh gradations.

The optimization of high resolution topographic data for 1D hydrodynamic models

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Ales, Ronovsky, E-mail: ales.ronovsky@vsb.cz; Michal, Podhoranyi

2016-06-08

The main focus of our research presented in this paper is to optimize and use high resolution topographical data (HRTD) for hydrological modelling. Optimization of HRTD is done by generating adaptive mesh by measuring distance of coarse mesh and the surface of the dataset and adapting the mesh from the perspective of keeping the geometry as close to initial resolution as possible. Technique described in this paper enables computation of very accurate 1-D hydrodynamic models. In the paper, we use HEC-RAS software as a solver. For comparison, we have chosen the amount of generated cells/grid elements (in whole discretization domainmore » and selected cross sections) with respect to preservation of the accuracy of the computational domain. Generation of the mesh for hydrodynamic modelling is strongly reliant on domain size and domain resolution. Topographical dataset used in this paper was created using LiDAR method and it captures 5.9km long section of a catchment of the river Olše. We studied crucial changes in topography for generated mesh. Assessment was done by commonly used statistical and visualization methods.« less

Mesh Generation via Local Bisection Refinement of Triangulated Grids

DTIC Science & Technology

2015-06-01

Science and Technology Organisation DSTO–TR–3095 ABSTRACT This report provides a comprehensive implementation of an unstructured mesh generation method...and Technology Organisation 506 Lorimer St, Fishermans Bend, Victoria 3207, Australia Telephone: 1300 333 362 Facsimile: (03) 9626 7999 c© Commonwealth...their behaviour is critically linked to Maubach’s method and the data structures N and T . The top- level mesh refinement algorithm is also presented

A spring system method for a mesh generation problem

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Romanov, A.

2018-04-01

A new direct method for the 2d-mesh generation for a simply-connected domain using a spring system is observed. The method can be used with other methods to modify a mesh for growing solid problems. Advantages and disadvantages of the method are shown. Different types of boundary conditions are explored. The results of modelling for different target domains are given. Some applications for composite materials are studied.

Unstructured mesh methods for CFD

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Peraire, J.; Morgan, K.; Peiro, J.

1990-01-01

Mesh generation methods for Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) are outlined. Geometric modeling is discussed. An advancing front method is described. Flow past a two engine Falcon aeroplane is studied. An algorithm and associated data structure called the alternating digital tree, which efficiently solves the geometric searching problem is described. The computation of an initial approximation to the steady state solution of a given poblem is described. Mesh generation for transient flows is described.

Quality assessment of two- and three-dimensional unstructured meshes and validation of an upwind Euler flow solver

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Woodard, Paul R.; Yang, Henry T. Y.; Batina, John T.

1992-01-01

Quality assessment procedures are described for two-dimensional and three-dimensional unstructured meshes. The procedures include measurement of minimum angles, element aspect ratios, stretching, and element skewness. Meshes about the ONERA M6 wing and the Boeing 747 transport configuration are generated using an advancing front method grid generation package of programs. Solutions of Euler's equations for these meshes are obtained at low angle-of-attack, transonic conditions. Results for these cases, obtained as part of a validation study demonstrate the accuracy of an implicit upwind Euler solution algorithm.

Pre and post processing using the IBM 3277 display station graphics attachment (RPQ7H0284)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Burroughs, S. H.; Lawlor, M. B.; Miller, I. M.

1978-01-01

A graphical interactive procedure operating under TSO and utilizing two CRT display terminals is shown to be an effective means of accomplishing mesh generation, establishing boundary conditions, and reviewing graphic output for finite element analysis activity.

Simplified generation of biomedical 3D surface model data for embedding into 3D portable document format (PDF) files for publication and education.

PubMed

Newe, Axel; Ganslandt, Thomas

2013-01-01

The usefulness of the 3D Portable Document Format (PDF) for clinical, educational, and research purposes has recently been shown. However, the lack of a simple tool for converting biomedical data into the model data in the necessary Universal 3D (U3D) file format is a drawback for the broad acceptance of this new technology. A new module for the image processing and rapid prototyping framework MeVisLab does not only provide a platform-independent possibility to create surface meshes out of biomedical/DICOM and other data and to export them into U3D--it also lets the user add meta data to these meshes to predefine colors and names that can be processed by a PDF authoring software while generating 3D PDF files. Furthermore, the source code of the respective module is available and well documented so that it can easily be modified for own purposes.

An efficient predictor-corrector-based dynamic mesh method for multi-block structured grid with extremely large deformation and its applications

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Guo, Tongqing; Chen, Hao; Lu, Zhiliang

2018-05-01

Aiming at extremely large deformation, a novel predictor-corrector-based dynamic mesh method for multi-block structured grid is proposed. In this work, the dynamic mesh generation is completed in three steps. At first, some typical dynamic positions are selected and high-quality multi-block grids with the same topology are generated at those positions. Then, Lagrange interpolation method is adopted to predict the dynamic mesh at any dynamic position. Finally, a rapid elastic deforming technique is used to correct the small deviation between the interpolated geometric configuration and the actual instantaneous one. Compared with the traditional methods, the results demonstrate that the present method shows stronger deformation ability and higher dynamic mesh quality.

Finite-element 3D simulation tools for high-current relativistic electron beams

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Humphries, Stanley; Ekdahl, Carl

2002-08-01

The DARHT second-axis injector is a challenge for computer simulations. Electrons are subject to strong beam-generated forces. The fields are fully three-dimensional and accurate calculations at surfaces are critical. We describe methods applied in OmniTrak, a 3D finite-element code suite that can address DARHT and the full range of charged-particle devices. The system handles mesh generation, electrostatics, magnetostatics and self-consistent particle orbits. The MetaMesh program generates meshes of conformal hexahedrons to fit any user geometry. The code has the unique ability to create structured conformal meshes with cubic logic. Organized meshes offer advantages in speed and memory utilization in the orbit and field solutions. OmniTrak is a versatile charged-particle code that handles 3D electric and magnetic field solutions on independent meshes. The program can update both 3D field solutions from the calculated beam space-charge and current-density. We shall describe numerical methods for orbit tracking on a hexahedron mesh. Topics include: 1) identification of elements along the particle trajectory, 2) fast searches and adaptive field calculations, 3) interpolation methods to terminate orbits on material surfaces, 4) automatic particle generation on multiple emission surfaces to model space-charge-limited emission and field emission, 5) flexible Child law algorithms, 6) implementation of the dual potential model for 3D magnetostatics, and 7) assignment of charge and current from model particle orbits for self-consistent fields.

Stress adapted embroidered meshes with a graded pattern design for abdominal wall hernia repair

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hahn, J.; Bittrich, L.; Breier, A.; Spickenheuer, A.

2017-10-01

Abdominal wall hernias are one of the most relevant injuries of the digestive system with 25 million patients in 2013. Surgery is recommended primarily using allogenic non-absorbable wrap-knitted meshes. These meshes have in common that their stress-strain behaviour is not adapted to the anisotropic behaviour of native abdominal wall tissue. The ideal mesh should possess an adequate mechanical behaviour and a suitable porosity at the same time. An alternative fabrication method to wrap-knitting is the embroidery technology with a high flexibility in pattern design and adaption of mechanical properties. In this study, a pattern generator was created for pattern designs consisting of a base and a reinforcement pattern. The embroidered mesh structures demonstrated different structural and mechanical characteristics. Additionally, the investigation of the mechanical properties exhibited an anisotropic mechanical behaviour for the embroidered meshes. As a result, the investigated pattern generator and the embroidery technology allow the production of stress adapted mesh structures that are a promising approach for hernia reconstruction.

LayTracks3D: A new approach for meshing general solids using medial axis transform

DOE PAGES

Quadros, William Roshan

2015-08-22

This study presents an extension of the all-quad meshing algorithm called LayTracks to generate high quality hex-dominant meshes of general solids. LayTracks3D uses the mapping between the Medial Axis (MA) and the boundary of the 3D domain to decompose complex 3D domains into simpler domains called Tracks. Tracks in 3D have no branches and are symmetric, non-intersecting, orthogonal to the boundary, and the shortest path from the MA to the boundary. These properties of tracks result in desired meshes with near cube shape elements at the boundary, structured mesh along the boundary normal with any irregular nodes restricted to themore » MA, and sharp boundary feature preservation. The algorithm has been tested on a few industrial CAD models and hex-dominant meshes are shown in the Results section. Work is underway to extend LayTracks3D to generate all-hex meshes.« less

Box truss analysis and technology development. Task 1: Mesh analysis and control

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bachtell, E. E.; Bettadapur, S. S.; Coyner, J. V.

1985-01-01

An analytical tool was developed to model, analyze and predict RF performance of box truss antennas with reflective mesh surfaces. The analysis system is unique in that it integrates custom written programs for cord tied mesh surfaces, thereby drastically reducing the cost of analysis. The analysis system is capable of determining the RF performance of antennas under any type of manufacturing or operating environment by integrating together the various disciplines of design, finite element analysis, surface best fit analysis and RF analysis. The Integrated Mesh Analysis System consists of six separate programs: The Mesh Tie System Model Generator, The Loadcase Generator, The Model Optimizer, The Model Solver, The Surface Topography Solver and The RF Performance Solver. Additionally, a study using the mesh analysis system was performed to determine the effect of on orbit calibration, i.e., surface adjustment, on a typical box truss antenna.

Anisotropic adaptive mesh generation in two dimensions for CFD

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Borouchaki, H.; Castro-Diaz, M.J.; George, P.L.

This paper describes the extension of the classical Delaunay method in the case where anisotropic meshes are required such as in CFD when the modelized physic is strongly directional. The way in which such a mesh generation method can be incorporated in an adaptative loop of CFD as well as the case of multicriterium adaptation are discussed. Several concrete application examples are provided to illustrate the capabilities of the proposed method.

Mesh control information of windmill designed by Solidwork program

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Mulyana, T.; Sebayang, D.; Rafsanjani, A. M. D.; Adani, J. H. D.; Muhyiddin, Y. S.

2017-12-01

This paper presents the mesh control information imposed on the windmill already designed. The accuracy of Simulation results is influenced by the quality of the created mesh. However, compared to the quality of the mesh is made, the simulation time running will be done software also increases. The smaller the size of the elements created when making the mesh, the better the mesh quality will be generated. When adjusting the mesh size, there is a slider that acts as the density regulator of the element. SolidWorks Simulation also has Mesh Control facility. Features that can adjust mesh density only in the desired part. The best results of mesh control obtained for both static and thermal simulation have ratio 1.5.

MeshVoro: A Three-Dimensional Voronoi Mesh Building Tool for the TOUGH Family of Codes

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Freeman, C. M.; Boyle, K. L.; Reagan, M.

2013-09-30

Few tools exist for creating and visualizing complex three-dimensional simulation meshes, and these have limitations that restrict their application to particular geometries and circumstances. Mesh generation needs to trend toward ever more general applications. To that end, we have developed MeshVoro, a tool that is based on the Voro (Rycroft 2009) library and is capable of generating complex threedimensional Voronoi tessellation-based (unstructured) meshes for the solution of problems of flow and transport in subsurface geologic media that are addressed by the TOUGH (Pruess et al. 1999) family of codes. MeshVoro, which includes built-in data visualization routines, is a particularly usefulmore » tool because it extends the applicability of the TOUGH family of codes by enabling the scientifically robust and relatively easy discretization of systems with challenging 3D geometries. We describe several applications of MeshVoro. We illustrate the ability of the tool to straightforwardly transform a complex geological grid into a simulation mesh that conforms to the specifications of the TOUGH family of codes. We demonstrate how MeshVoro can describe complex system geometries with a relatively small number of grid blocks, and we construct meshes for geometries that would have been practically intractable with a standard Cartesian grid approach. We also discuss the limitations and appropriate applications of this new technology.« less

Generating Inviscid and Viscous Fluid-Flow Simulations over an Aircraft Surface Using a Fluid-Flow Mesh

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Rodriguez, David L. (Inventor); Sturdza, Peter (Inventor)

2013-01-01

Fluid-flow simulation over a computer-generated aircraft surface is generated using inviscid and viscous simulations. A fluid-flow mesh of fluid cells is obtained. At least one inviscid fluid property for the fluid cells is determined using an inviscid fluid simulation that does not simulate fluid viscous effects. A set of intersecting fluid cells that intersects the aircraft surface are identified. One surface mesh polygon of the surface mesh is identified for each intersecting fluid cell. A boundary-layer prediction point for each identified surface mesh polygon is determined. At least one boundary-layer fluid property for each boundary-layer prediction point is determined using the at least one inviscid fluid property of the corresponding intersecting fluid cell and a boundary-layer simulation that simulates fluid viscous effects. At least one updated fluid property for at least one fluid cell is determined using the at least one boundary-layer fluid property and the inviscid fluid simulation.

DRACO-STEM: An Automatic Tool to Generate High-Quality 3D Meshes of Shoot Apical Meristem Tissue at Cell Resolution

PubMed Central

Cerutti, Guillaume; Ali, Olivier; Godin, Christophe

2017-01-01

Context: The shoot apical meristem (SAM), origin of all aerial organs of the plant, is a restricted niche of stem cells whose growth is regulated by a complex network of genetic, hormonal and mechanical interactions. Studying the development of this area at cell level using 3D microscopy time-lapse imaging is a newly emerging key to understand the processes controlling plant morphogenesis. Computational models have been proposed to simulate those mechanisms, however their validation on real-life data is an essential step that requires an adequate representation of the growing tissue to be carried out. Achievements: The tool we introduce is a two-stage computational pipeline that generates a complete 3D triangular mesh of the tissue volume based on a segmented tissue image stack. DRACO (Dual Reconstruction by Adjacency Complex Optimization) is designed to retrieve the underlying 3D topological structure of the tissue and compute its dual geometry, while STEM (SAM Tissue Enhanced Mesh) returns a faithful triangular mesh optimized along several quality criteria (intrinsic quality, tissue reconstruction, visual adequacy). Quantitative evaluation tools measuring the performance of the method along those different dimensions are also provided. The resulting meshes can be used as input and validation for biomechanical simulations. Availability: DRACO-STEM is supplied as a package of the open-source multi-platform plant modeling library OpenAlea (http://openalea.github.io/) implemented in Python, and is freely distributed on GitHub (https://github.com/VirtualPlants/draco-stem) along with guidelines for installation and use. PMID:28424704

High-Fidelity Geometric Modeling and Mesh Generation for Mechanics Characterization of Polycrystalline Materials

DTIC Science & Technology

2015-01-07

and anisotropic quadrilateral meshes, which can be used as the control mesh for high-order T- spline surface modeling. Archival publications (published...anisotropic T-meshes for the further T- spline surface construction. Finally, a gradient flow-based method is developed to improve the T-mesh quality...shade-off. Halos are bright or dark thin regions around the boundary of the sample. These false edges around the object make many segmentation

Computational performance of Free Mesh Method applied to continuum mechanics problems

PubMed Central

YAGAWA, Genki

2011-01-01

The free mesh method (FMM) is a kind of the meshless methods intended for particle-like finite element analysis of problems that are difficult to handle using global mesh generation, or a node-based finite element method that employs a local mesh generation technique and a node-by-node algorithm. The aim of the present paper is to review some unique numerical solutions of fluid and solid mechanics by employing FMM as well as the Enriched Free Mesh Method (EFMM), which is a new version of FMM, including compressible flow and sounding mechanism in air-reed instruments as applications to fluid mechanics, and automatic remeshing for slow crack growth, dynamic behavior of solid as well as large-scale Eigen-frequency of engine block as applications to solid mechanics. PMID:21558753

A constrained Delaunay discretization method for adaptively meshing highly discontinuous geological media

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wang, Yang; Ma, Guowei; Ren, Feng; Li, Tuo

2017-12-01

A constrained Delaunay discretization method is developed to generate high-quality doubly adaptive meshes of highly discontinuous geological media. Complex features such as three-dimensional discrete fracture networks (DFNs), tunnels, shafts, slopes, boreholes, water curtains, and drainage systems are taken into account in the mesh generation. The constrained Delaunay triangulation method is used to create adaptive triangular elements on planar fractures. Persson's algorithm (Persson, 2005), based on an analogy between triangular elements and spring networks, is enriched to automatically discretize a planar fracture into mesh points with varying density and smooth-quality gradient. The triangulated planar fractures are treated as planar straight-line graphs (PSLGs) to construct piecewise-linear complex (PLC) for constrained Delaunay tetrahedralization. This guarantees the doubly adaptive characteristic of the resulted mesh: the mesh is adaptive not only along fractures but also in space. The quality of elements is compared with the results from an existing method. It is verified that the present method can generate smoother elements and a better distribution of element aspect ratios. Two numerical simulations are implemented to demonstrate that the present method can be applied to various simulations of complex geological media that contain a large number of discontinuities.

An Approach to Quad Meshing Based On Cross Valued Maps and the Ginzburg-Landau Theory

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Viertel, Ryan; Osting, Braxton

2017-08-01

A generalization of vector fields, referred to as N-direction fields or cross fields when N=4, has been recently introduced and studied for geometry processing, with applications in quadrilateral (quad) meshing, texture mapping, and parameterization. We make the observation that cross field design for two-dimensional quad meshing is related to the well-known Ginzburg-Landau problem from mathematical physics. This identification yields a variety of theoretical tools for efficiently computing boundary-aligned quad meshes, with provable guarantees on the resulting mesh, for example, the number of mesh defects and bounds on the defect locations. The procedure for generating the quad mesh is to (i)more » find a complex-valued "representation" field that minimizes the Dirichlet energy subject to a boundary constraint, (ii) convert the representation field into a boundary-aligned, smooth cross field, (iii) use separatrices of the cross field to partition the domain into four sided regions, and (iv) mesh each of these four-sided regions using standard techniques. Under certain assumptions on the geometry of the domain, we prove that this procedure can be used to produce a cross field whose separatrices partition the domain into four sided regions. To solve the energy minimization problem for the representation field, we use an extension of the Merriman-Bence-Osher (MBO) threshold dynamics method, originally conceived as an algorithm to simulate motion by mean curvature, to minimize the Ginzburg-Landau energy for the optimal representation field. Lastly, we demonstrate the method on a variety of test domains.« less

Effects of mesh style and grid convergence on particle deposition in bifurcating airway models with comparisons to experimental data.

PubMed

Longest, P Worth; Vinchurkar, Samir

2007-04-01

A number of research studies have employed a wide variety of mesh styles and levels of grid convergence to assess velocity fields and particle deposition patterns in models of branching biological systems. Generating structured meshes based on hexahedral elements requires significant time and effort; however, these meshes are often associated with high quality solutions. Unstructured meshes that employ tetrahedral elements can be constructed much faster but may increase levels of numerical diffusion, especially in tubular flow systems with a primary flow direction. The objective of this study is to better establish the effects of mesh generation techniques and grid convergence on velocity fields and particle deposition patterns in bifurcating respiratory models. In order to achieve this objective, four widely used mesh styles including structured hexahedral, unstructured tetrahedral, flow adaptive tetrahedral, and hybrid grids have been considered for two respiratory airway configurations. Initial particle conditions tested are based on the inlet velocity profile or the local inlet mass flow rate. Accuracy of the simulations has been assessed by comparisons to experimental in vitro data available in the literature for the steady-state velocity field in a single bifurcation model as well as the local particle deposition fraction in a double bifurcation model. Quantitative grid convergence was assessed based on a grid convergence index (GCI), which accounts for the degree of grid refinement. The hexahedral mesh was observed to have GCI values that were an order of magnitude below the unstructured tetrahedral mesh values for all resolutions considered. Moreover, the hexahedral mesh style provided GCI values of approximately 1% and reduced run times by a factor of 3. Based on comparisons to empirical data, it was shown that inlet particle seedings should be consistent with the local inlet mass flow rate. Furthermore, the mesh style was found to have an observable effect on cumulative particle depositions with the hexahedral solution most closely matching empirical results. Future studies are needed to assess other mesh generation options including various forms of the hybrid configuration and unstructured hexahedral meshes.

Adaptive Meshing Techniques for Viscous Flow Calculations on Mixed Element Unstructured Meshes

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mavriplis, D. J.

1997-01-01

An adaptive refinement strategy based on hierarchical element subdivision is formulated and implemented for meshes containing arbitrary mixtures of tetrahendra, hexahendra, prisms and pyramids. Special attention is given to keeping memory overheads as low as possible. This procedure is coupled with an algebraic multigrid flow solver which operates on mixed-element meshes. Inviscid flows as well as viscous flows are computed an adaptively refined tetrahedral, hexahedral, and hybrid meshes. The efficiency of the method is demonstrated by generating an adapted hexahedral mesh containing 3 million vertices on a relatively inexpensive workstation.

Multichannel error correction code decoder

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Wagner, Paul K.; Ivancic, William D.

1993-01-01

A brief overview of a processing satellite for a mesh very-small-aperture (VSAT) communications network is provided. The multichannel error correction code (ECC) decoder system, the uplink signal generation and link simulation equipment, and the time-shared decoder are described. The testing is discussed. Applications of the time-shared decoder are recommended.

Array-based, parallel hierarchical mesh refinement algorithms for unstructured meshes

DOE PAGES

Ray, Navamita; Grindeanu, Iulian; Zhao, Xinglin; ...

2016-08-18

In this paper, we describe an array-based hierarchical mesh refinement capability through uniform refinement of unstructured meshes for efficient solution of PDE's using finite element methods and multigrid solvers. A multi-degree, multi-dimensional and multi-level framework is designed to generate the nested hierarchies from an initial coarse mesh that can be used for a variety of purposes such as in multigrid solvers/preconditioners, to do solution convergence and verification studies and to improve overall parallel efficiency by decreasing I/O bandwidth requirements (by loading smaller meshes and in memory refinement). We also describe a high-order boundary reconstruction capability that can be used tomore » project the new points after refinement using high-order approximations instead of linear projection in order to minimize and provide more control on geometrical errors introduced by curved boundaries.The capability is developed under the parallel unstructured mesh framework "Mesh Oriented dAtaBase" (MOAB Tautges et al. (2004)). We describe the underlying data structures and algorithms to generate such hierarchies in parallel and present numerical results for computational efficiency and effect on mesh quality. Furthermore, we also present results to demonstrate the applicability of the developed capability to study convergence properties of different point projection schemes for various mesh hierarchies and to a multigrid finite-element solver for elliptic problems.« less

A mesh generation and machine learning framework for Drosophila gene expression pattern image analysis

PubMed Central

2013-01-01

Background Multicellular organisms consist of cells of many different types that are established during development. Each type of cell is characterized by the unique combination of expressed gene products as a result of spatiotemporal gene regulation. Currently, a fundamental challenge in regulatory biology is to elucidate the gene expression controls that generate the complex body plans during development. Recent advances in high-throughput biotechnologies have generated spatiotemporal expression patterns for thousands of genes in the model organism fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster. Existing qualitative methods enhanced by a quantitative analysis based on computational tools we present in this paper would provide promising ways for addressing key scientific questions. Results We develop a set of computational methods and open source tools for identifying co-expressed embryonic domains and the associated genes simultaneously. To map the expression patterns of many genes into the same coordinate space and account for the embryonic shape variations, we develop a mesh generation method to deform a meshed generic ellipse to each individual embryo. We then develop a co-clustering formulation to cluster the genes and the mesh elements, thereby identifying co-expressed embryonic domains and the associated genes simultaneously. Experimental results indicate that the gene and mesh co-clusters can be correlated to key developmental events during the stages of embryogenesis we study. The open source software tool has been made available at http://compbio.cs.odu.edu/fly/. Conclusions Our mesh generation and machine learning methods and tools improve upon the flexibility, ease-of-use and accuracy of existing methods. PMID:24373308

[Skeleton extractions and applications].

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Quadros, William Roshan

2010-05-01

This paper focuses on the extraction of skeletons of CAD models and its applications in finite element (FE) mesh generation. The term 'skeleton of a CAD model' can be visualized as analogous to the 'skeleton of a human body'. The skeletal representations covered in this paper include medial axis transform (MAT), Voronoi diagram (VD), chordal axis transform (CAT), mid surface, digital skeletons, and disconnected skeletons. In the literature, the properties of a skeleton have been utilized in developing various algorithms for extracting skeletons. Three main approaches include: (1) the bisection method where the skeleton exists at equidistant from at leastmore » two points on boundary, (2) the grassfire propagation method in which the skeleton exists where the opposing fronts meet, and (3) the duality method where the skeleton is a dual of the object. In the last decade, the author has applied different skeletal representations in all-quad meshing, hex meshing, mid-surface meshing, mesh size function generation, defeaturing, and decomposition. A brief discussion on the related work from other researchers in the area of tri meshing, tet meshing, and anisotropic meshing is also included. This paper concludes by summarizing the strengths and weaknesses of the skeleton-based approaches in solving various geometry-centered problems in FE mesh generation. The skeletons have proved to be a great shape abstraction tool in analyzing the geometric complexity of CAD models as they are symmetric, simpler (reduced dimension), and provide local thickness information. However, skeletons generally require some cleanup, and stability and sensitivity of the skeletons should be controlled during extraction. Also, selecting a suitable application-specific skeleton and a computationally efficient method of extraction is critical.« less

Semiautomated, Reproducible Batch Processing of Soy

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Thoerne, Mary; Byford, Ivan W.; Chastain, Jack W.; Swango, Beverly E.

2005-01-01

A computer-controlled apparatus processes batches of soybeans into one or more of a variety of food products, under conditions that can be chosen by the user and reproduced from batch to batch. Examples of products include soy milk, tofu, okara (an insoluble protein and fiber byproduct of soy milk), and whey. Most processing steps take place without intervention by the user. This apparatus was developed for use in research on processing of soy. It is also a prototype of other soy-processing apparatuses for research, industrial, and home use. Prior soy-processing equipment includes household devices that automatically produce soy milk but do not automatically produce tofu. The designs of prior soy-processing equipment require users to manually transfer intermediate solid soy products and to press them manually and, hence, under conditions that are not consistent from batch to batch. Prior designs do not afford choices of processing conditions: Users cannot use previously developed soy-processing equipment to investigate the effects of variations of techniques used to produce soy milk (e.g., cold grinding, hot grinding, and pre-cook blanching) and of such process parameters as cooking times and temperatures, grinding times, soaking times and temperatures, rinsing conditions, and sizes of particles generated by grinding. In contrast, the present apparatus is amenable to such investigations. The apparatus (see figure) includes a processing tank and a jacketed holding or coagulation tank. The processing tank can be capped by either of two different heads and can contain either of two different insertable mesh baskets. The first head includes a grinding blade and heating elements. The second head includes an automated press piston. One mesh basket, designated the okara basket, has oblong holes with a size equivalent to about 40 mesh [40 openings per inch (.16 openings per centimeter)]. The second mesh basket, designated the tofu basket, has holes of 70 mesh [70 openings per inch (.28 openings per centimeter)] and is used in conjunction with the press-piston head. Supporting equipment includes a soy-milk heat exchanger for maintaining selected coagulation temperatures, a filter system for separating okara from other particulate matter and from soy milk, two pumps, and various thermocouples, flowmeters, level indicators, pressure sensors, valves, tubes, and sample ports

A Linear-Elasticity Solver for Higher-Order Space-Time Mesh Deformation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Diosady, Laslo T.; Murman, Scott M.

2018-01-01

A linear-elasticity approach is presented for the generation of meshes appropriate for a higher-order space-time discontinuous finite-element method. The equations of linear-elasticity are discretized using a higher-order, spatially-continuous, finite-element method. Given an initial finite-element mesh, and a specified boundary displacement, we solve for the mesh displacements to obtain a higher-order curvilinear mesh. Alternatively, for moving-domain problems we use the linear-elasticity approach to solve for a temporally discontinuous mesh velocity on each time-slab and recover a continuous mesh deformation by integrating the velocity. The applicability of this methodology is presented for several benchmark test cases.

Generation of three-dimensional body-fitted coordinates using hyperbolic partial differential equations

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Steger, J. L.; Rizk, Y. M.

1985-01-01

An efficient numerical mesh generation scheme capable of creating orthogonal or nearly orthogonal grids about moderately complex three dimensional configurations is described. The mesh is obtained by marching outward from a user specified grid on the body surface. Using spherical grid topology, grids have been generated about full span rectangular wings and a simplified space shuttle orbiter.

Video Vectorization via Tetrahedral Remeshing.

PubMed

Wang, Chuan; Zhu, Jie; Guo, Yanwen; Wang, Wenping

2017-02-09

We present a video vectorization method that generates a video in vector representation from an input video in raster representation. A vector-based video representation offers the benefits of vector graphics, such as compactness and scalability. The vector video we generate is represented by a simplified tetrahedral control mesh over the spatial-temporal video volume, with color attributes defined at the mesh vertices. We present novel techniques for simplification and subdivision of a tetrahedral mesh to achieve high simplification ratio while preserving features and ensuring color fidelity. From an input raster video, our method is capable of generating a compact video in vector representation that allows a faithful reconstruction with low reconstruction errors.

An advancing front Delaunay triangulation algorithm designed for robustness

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mavriplis, D. J.

1992-01-01

A new algorithm is described for generating an unstructured mesh about an arbitrary two-dimensional configuration. Mesh points are generated automatically by the algorithm in a manner which ensures a smooth variation of elements, and the resulting triangulation constitutes the Delaunay triangulation of these points. The algorithm combines the mathematical elegance and efficiency of Delaunay triangulation algorithms with the desirable point placement features, boundary integrity, and robustness traditionally associated with advancing-front-type mesh generation strategies. The method offers increased robustness over previous algorithms in that it cannot fail regardless of the initial boundary point distribution and the prescribed cell size distribution throughout the flow-field.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Clough, Katy; Figueras, Pau; Finkel, Hal

In this work, we introduce GRChombo: a new numerical relativity code which incorporates full adaptive mesh refinement (AMR) using block structured Berger-Rigoutsos grid generation. The code supports non-trivial 'many-boxes-in-many-boxes' mesh hierarchies and massive parallelism through the message passing interface. GRChombo evolves the Einstein equation using the standard BSSN formalism, with an option to turn on CCZ4 constraint damping if required. The AMR capability permits the study of a range of new physics which has previously been computationally infeasible in a full 3 + 1 setting, while also significantly simplifying the process of setting up the mesh for these problems. Wemore » show that GRChombo can stably and accurately evolve standard spacetimes such as binary black hole mergers and scalar collapses into black holes, demonstrate the performance characteristics of our code, and discuss various physics problems which stand to benefit from the AMR technique.« less

Selection criteria of the addendum modification coefficients of spur gear pairs with smaller number of pinion teeth

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Atanasiu, V.; Oprişan, C.; Leohchi, D.

2016-08-01

A design procedure for the optimum distribution of the addendum modification coefficients of spur gear pairs with smaller number of pinion teeth is presented for the case of a fixed centred distance. The geometrical, kinematics and load capacity criteria are considered in the design analysis. The geometric and kinematics criteria are used to prevent the negative phenomena of the generating and engagement processes. The relation between the contact pressure of meshing teeth and specific sliding are analysed in relation with addendum modification coefficients. A dynamic model is developed to simulate the load sharing characteristics through a mesh cycle. The specific phenomenon of contact tooth pairs alternation during mesh cycle is integrated in this dynamic load modelling. A comparative study is included, which shows the effects of the distribution factor of the addendum modification coefficients on the contact surface characteristics of the gear pairs.

Hexahedral mesh generation via the dual arrangement of surfaces

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Mitchell, S.A.; Tautges, T.J.

1997-12-31

Given a general three-dimensional geometry with a prescribed quadrilateral surface mesh, the authors consider the problem of constructing a hexahedral mesh of the geometry whose boundary is exactly the prescribed surface mesh. Due to the specialized topology of hexahedra, this problem is more difficult than the analogous one for tetrahedra. Folklore has maintained that a surface mesh must have a constrained structure in order for there to exist a compatible hexahedral mesh. However, they have proof that a surface mesh need only satisfy mild parity conditions, depending on the topology of the three-dimensional geometry, for there to exist a compatiblemore » hexahedral mesh. The proof is based on the realization that a hexahedral mesh is dual to an arrangement of surfaces, and the quadrilateral surface mesh is dual to the arrangement of curves bounding these surfaces. The proof is constructive and they are currently developing an algorithm called Whisker Weaving (WW) that mirrors the proof steps. Given the bounding curves, WW builds the topological structure of an arrangement of surfaces having those curves as its boundary. WW progresses in an advancing front manner. Certain local rules are applied to avoid structures that lead to poor mesh quality. Also, after the arrangement is constructed, additional surfaces are inserted to separate features, so e.g., no two hexahedra share more than one quadrilateral face. The algorithm has generated meshes for certain non-trivial problems, but is currently unreliable. The authors are exploring strategies for consistently selecting which portion of the surface arrangement to advance based on the existence proof. This should lead us to a robust algorithm for arbitrary geometries and surface meshes.« less

Hybrid Grid Techniques for Propulsion Applications

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Koomullil, Roy P.; Soni, Bharat K.; Thornburg, Hugh J.

1996-01-01

During the past decade, computational simulation of fluid flow for propulsion activities has progressed significantly, and many notable successes have been reported in the literature. However, the generation of a high quality mesh for such problems has often been reported as a pacing item. Hence, much effort has been expended to speed this portion of the simulation process. Several approaches have evolved for grid generation. Two of the most common are structured multi-block, and unstructured based procedures. Structured grids tend to be computationally efficient, and have high aspect ratio cells necessary for efficently resolving viscous layers. Structured multi-block grids may or may not exhibit grid line continuity across the block interface. This relaxation of the continuity constraint at the interface is intended to ease the grid generation process, which is still time consuming. Flow solvers supporting non-contiguous interfaces require specialized interpolation procedures which may not ensure conservation at the interface. Unstructured or generalized indexing data structures offer greater flexibility, but require explicit connectivity information and are not easy to generate for three dimensional configurations. In addition, unstructured mesh based schemes tend to be less efficient and it is difficult to resolve viscous layers. Recently hybrid or generalized element solution and grid generation techniques have been developed with the objective of combining the attractive features of both structured and unstructured techniques. In the present work, recently developed procedures for hybrid grid generation and flow simulation are critically evaluated, and compared to existing structured and unstructured procedures in terms of accuracy and computational requirements.

Numerical simulation of aerodynamic characteristics of multi-element wing with variable flap

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lv, Hongyan; Zhang, Xinpeng; Kuang, Jianghong

2017-10-01

Based on the Reynolds averaged Navier-Stokes equation, the mesh generation technique and the geometric modeling method, the influence of the Spalart-Allmaras turbulence model on the aerodynamic characteristics is investigated. In order to study the typical configuration of aircraft, a similar DLR-F11 wing is selected. Firstly, the 3D model of wing is established, and the 3D model of plane flight, take-off and landing is established. The mesh structure of the flow field is constructed and the mesh is generated by mesh generation software. Secondly, by comparing the numerical simulation with the experimental data, the prediction of the aerodynamic characteristics of the multi section airfoil in takeoff and landing stage is validated. Finally, the two flap deflection angles of take-off and landing are calculated, which provide useful guidance for the aerodynamic characteristics of the wing and the flap angle design of the wing.

Evaluation and correction of laser-scanned point clouds

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Teutsch, Christian; Isenberg, Tobias; Trostmann, Erik; Weber, Michael; Berndt, Dirk; Strothotte, Thomas

2005-01-01

The digitalization of real-world objects is of great importance in various application domains. E.g. in industrial processes quality assurance is very important. Geometric properties of workpieces have to be measured. Traditionally, this is done with gauges which is somewhat subjective and time-consuming. We developed a robust optical laser scanner for the digitalization of arbitrary objects, primary, industrial workpieces. As measuring principle we use triangulation with structured lighting and a multi-axis locomotor system. Measurements on the generated data leads to incorrect results if the contained error is too high. Therefore, processes for geometric inspection under non-laboratory conditions are needed that are robust in permanent use and provide high accuracy as well as high operation speed. The many existing methods for polygonal mesh optimization produce very esthetic 3D models but often require user interaction and are limited in processing speed and/or accuracy. Furthermore, operations on optimized meshes consider the entire model and pay only little attention to individual measurements. However, many measurements contribute to parts or single scans with possibly strong differences between neighboring scans being lost during mesh construction. Also, most algorithms consider unsorted point clouds although the scanned data is structured through device properties and measuring principles. We use this underlying structure to achieve high processing speeds and extract intrinsic system parameters and use them for fast pre-processing.

Using the GeoFEST Faulted Region Simulation System

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Parker, Jay W.; Lyzenga, Gregory A.; Donnellan, Andrea; Judd, Michele A.; Norton, Charles D.; Baker, Teresa; Tisdale, Edwin R.; Li, Peggy

2004-01-01

GeoFEST (the Geophysical Finite Element Simulation Tool) simulates stress evolution, fault slip and plastic/elastic processes in realistic materials, and so is suitable for earthquake cycle studies in regions such as Southern California. Many new capabilities and means of access for GeoFEST are now supported. New abilities include MPI-based cluster parallel computing using automatic PYRAMID/Parmetis-based mesh partitioning, automatic mesh generation for layered media with rectangular faults, and results visualization that is integrated with remote sensing data. The parallel GeoFEST application has been successfully run on over a half-dozen computers, including Intel Xeon clusters, Itanium II and Altix machines, and the Apple G5 cluster. It is not separately optimized for different machines, but relies on good domain partitioning for load-balance and low communication, and careful writing of the parallel diagonally preconditioned conjugate gradient solver to keep communication overhead low. Demonstrated thousand-step solutions for over a million finite elements on 64 processors require under three hours, and scaling tests show high efficiency when using more than (order of) 4000 elements per processor. The source code and documentation for GeoFEST is available at no cost from Open Channel Foundation. In addition GeoFEST may be used through a browser-based portal environment available to approved users. That environment includes semi-automated geometry creation and mesh generation tools, GeoFEST, and RIVA-based visualization tools that include the ability to generate a flyover animation showing deformations and topography. Work is in progress to support simulation of a region with several faults using 16 million elements, using a strain energy metric to adapt the mesh to faithfully represent the solution in a region of widely varying strain.

Combining 3d Volume and Mesh Models for Representing Complicated Heritage Buildings

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tsai, F.; Chang, H.; Lin, Y.-W.

2017-08-01

This study developed a simple but effective strategy to combine 3D volume and mesh models for representing complicated heritage buildings and structures. The idea is to seamlessly integrate 3D parametric or polyhedral models and mesh-based digital surfaces to generate a hybrid 3D model that can take advantages of both modeling methods. The proposed hybrid model generation framework is separated into three phases. Firstly, after acquiring or generating 3D point clouds of the target, these 3D points are partitioned into different groups. Secondly, a parametric or polyhedral model of each group is generated based on plane and surface fitting algorithms to represent the basic structure of that region. A "bare-bones" model of the target can subsequently be constructed by connecting all 3D volume element models. In the third phase, the constructed bare-bones model is used as a mask to remove points enclosed by the bare-bones model from the original point clouds. The remaining points are then connected to form 3D surface mesh patches. The boundary points of each surface patch are identified and these boundary points are projected onto the surfaces of the bare-bones model. Finally, new meshes are created to connect the projected points and original mesh boundaries to integrate the mesh surfaces with the 3D volume model. The proposed method was applied to an open-source point cloud data set and point clouds of a local historical structure. Preliminary results indicated that the reconstructed hybrid models using the proposed method can retain both fundamental 3D volume characteristics and accurate geometric appearance with fine details. The reconstructed hybrid models can also be used to represent targets in different levels of detail according to user and system requirements in different applications.

An improved nearly-orthogonal structured mesh generation system with smoothness control functions

USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

This paper presents an improved nearly-orthogonal structured mesh generation system with a set of smoothness control functions, which were derived based on the ratio between the Jacobian of the transformation matrix and the Jacobian of the metric tensor. The proposed smoothness control functions are...

SU-E-J-108: Solving the Chinese Postman Problem for Effective Contour Deformation

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Yang, J; Zhang, L; Balter, P

2015-06-15

Purpose: To develop a practical approach for accurate contour deformation when deformable image registration (DIR) is used for atlas-based segmentation or contour propagation in image-guided radiotherapy. Methods: A contour deformation approach was developed on the basis of 3D mesh operations. The 2D contours represented by a series of points in each slice were first converted to a 3D triangular mesh, which was deformed by the deformation vectors resulting from DIR. A set of parallel 2D planes then cut through the deformed 3D mesh, generating unordered points and line segments, which should be reorganized into a set of 2D contour points.more » It was realized that the reorganization problem was equivalent to solving the Chinese Postman Problem (CPP) by traversing a graph built from the unordered points with the least cost. Alternatively, deformation could be applied to a binary mask converted from the original contours. The deformed binary mask was then converted back into contours at the CT slice locations. We performed a qualitative comparison to validate the mesh-based approach against the image-based approach. Results: The DIR could considerably change the 3D mesh, making complicated 2D contour representations after deformation. CPP was able to effectively reorganize the points in 2D planes no matter how complicated the 2D contours were. The mesh-based approach did not require a post-processing of the contour, thus accurately showing the actual deformation in DIR. The mesh-based approach could keep some fine details and resulted in smoother contours than the image-based approach did, especially for the lung structure. Image-based approach appeared to over-process contours and suffered from image resolution limits. The mesh-based approach was integrated into in-house DIR software for use in routine clinic and research. Conclusion: We developed a practical approach for accurate contour deformation. The efficiency of this approach was demonstrated in both clinic and research applications. This work was partially supported by Cancer Prevention & Research Institute of Texas (CPRIT) RP110562.« less

Multi-Scale Human Respiratory System Simulations to Study Health Effects of Aging, Disease, and Inhaled Substances

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kunz, Robert; Haworth, Daniel; Dogan, Gulkiz; Kriete, Andres

2006-11-01

Three-dimensional, unsteady simulations of multiphase flow, gas exchange, and particle/aerosol deposition in the human lung are reported. Surface data for human tracheo-bronchial trees are derived from CT scans, and are used to generate three- dimensional CFD meshes for the first several generations of branching. One-dimensional meshes for the remaining generations down to the respiratory units are generated using branching algorithms based on those that have been proposed in the literature, and a zero-dimensional respiratory unit (pulmonary acinus) model is attached at the end of each terminal bronchiole. The process is automated to facilitate rapid model generation. The model is exercised through multiple breathing cycles to compute the spatial and temporal variations in flow, gas exchange, and particle/aerosol deposition. The depth of the 3D/1D transition (at branching generation n) is a key parameter, and can be varied. High-fidelity models (large n) are run on massively parallel distributed-memory clusters, and are used to generate physical insight and to calibrate/validate the 1D and 0D models. Suitably validated lower-order models (small n) can be run on single-processor PC’s with run times that allow model-based clinical intervention for individual patients.

Adaptive grid methods for RLV environment assessment and nozzle analysis

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Thornburg, Hugh J.

1996-01-01

Rapid access to highly accurate data about complex configurations is needed for multi-disciplinary optimization and design. In order to efficiently meet these requirements a closer coupling between the analysis algorithms and the discretization process is needed. In some cases, such as free surface, temporally varying geometries, and fluid structure interaction, the need is unavoidable. In other cases the need is to rapidly generate and modify high quality grids. Techniques such as unstructured and/or solution-adaptive methods can be used to speed the grid generation process and to automatically cluster mesh points in regions of interest. Global features of the flow can be significantly affected by isolated regions of inadequately resolved flow. These regions may not exhibit high gradients and can be difficult to detect. Thus excessive resolution in certain regions does not necessarily increase the accuracy of the overall solution. Several approaches have been employed for both structured and unstructured grid adaption. The most widely used involve grid point redistribution, local grid point enrichment/derefinement or local modification of the actual flow solver. However, the success of any one of these methods ultimately depends on the feature detection algorithm used to determine solution domain regions which require a fine mesh for their accurate representation. Typically, weight functions are constructed to mimic the local truncation error and may require substantial user input. Most problems of engineering interest involve multi-block grids and widely disparate length scales. Hence, it is desirable that the adaptive grid feature detection algorithm be developed to recognize flow structures of different type as well as differing intensity, and adequately address scaling and normalization across blocks. These weight functions can then be used to construct blending functions for algebraic redistribution, interpolation functions for unstructured grid generation, forcing functions to attract/repel points in an elliptic system, or to trigger local refinement, based upon application of an equidistribution principle. The popularity of solution-adaptive techniques is growing in tandem with unstructured methods. The difficultly of precisely controlling mesh densities and orientations with current unstructured grid generation systems has driven the use of solution-adaptive meshing. Use of derivatives of density or pressure are widely used for construction of such weight functions, and have been proven very successful for inviscid flows with shocks. However, less success has been realized for flowfields with viscous layers, vortices or shocks of disparate strength. It is difficult to maintain the appropriate mesh point spacing in the various regions which require a fine spacing for adequate resolution. Mesh points often migrate from important regions due to refinement of dominant features. An example of this is the well know tendency of adaptive methods to increase the resolution of shocks in the flowfield around airfoils, but in the incorrect location due to inadequate resolution of the stagnation region. This problem has been the motivation for this research.

Free Mesh Method: fundamental conception, algorithms and accuracy study

PubMed Central

YAGAWA, Genki

2011-01-01

The finite element method (FEM) has been commonly employed in a variety of fields as a computer simulation method to solve such problems as solid, fluid, electro-magnetic phenomena and so on. However, creation of a quality mesh for the problem domain is a prerequisite when using FEM, which becomes a major part of the cost of a simulation. It is natural that the concept of meshless method has evolved. The free mesh method (FMM) is among the typical meshless methods intended for particle-like finite element analysis of problems that are difficult to handle using global mesh generation, especially on parallel processors. FMM is an efficient node-based finite element method that employs a local mesh generation technique and a node-by-node algorithm for the finite element calculations. In this paper, FMM and its variation are reviewed focusing on their fundamental conception, algorithms and accuracy. PMID:21558752

Mesh refinement in finite element analysis by minimization of the stiffness matrix trace

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Kittur, Madan G.; Huston, Ronald L.

1989-01-01

Most finite element packages provide means to generate meshes automatically. However, the user is usually confronted with the problem of not knowing whether the mesh generated is appropriate for the problem at hand. Since the accuracy of the finite element results is mesh dependent, mesh selection forms a very important step in the analysis. Indeed, in accurate analyses, meshes need to be refined or rezoned until the solution converges to a value so that the error is below a predetermined tolerance. A-posteriori methods use error indicators, developed by using the theory of interpolation and approximation theory, for mesh refinements. Some use other criterions, such as strain energy density variation and stress contours for example, to obtain near optimal meshes. Although these methods are adaptive, they are expensive. Alternatively, a priori methods, until now available, use geometrical parameters, for example, element aspect ratio. Therefore, they are not adaptive by nature. An adaptive a-priori method is developed. The criterion is that the minimization of the trace of the stiffness matrix with respect to the nodal coordinates, leads to a minimization of the potential energy, and as a consequence provide a good starting mesh. In a few examples the method is shown to provide the optimal mesh. The method is also shown to be relatively simple and amenable to development of computer algorithms. When the procedure is used in conjunction with a-posteriori methods of grid refinement, it is shown that fewer refinement iterations and fewer degrees of freedom are required for convergence as opposed to when the procedure is not used. The mesh obtained is shown to have uniform distribution of stiffness among the nodes and elements which, as a consequence, leads to uniform error distribution. Thus the mesh obtained meets the optimality criterion of uniform error distribution.

Integration of Mesh Optimization with 3D All-Hex Mesh Generation, LDRD Subcase 3504340000, Final Report

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

KNUPP,PATRICK; MITCHELL,SCOTT A.

1999-11-01

In an attempt to automatically produce high-quality all-hex meshes, we investigated a mesh improvement strategy: given an initial poor-quality all-hex mesh, we iteratively changed the element connectivity, adding and deleting elements and nodes, and optimized the node positions. We found a set of hex reconnection primitives. We improved the optimization algorithms so they can untangle a negative-Jacobian mesh, even considering Jacobians on the boundary, and subsequently optimize the condition number of elements in an untangled mesh. However, even after applying both the primitives and optimization we were unable to produce high-quality meshes in certain regions. Our experiences suggest that manymore » boundary configurations of quadrilaterals admit no hexahedral mesh with positive Jacobians, although we have no proof of this.« less

Combining spray nozzle simulators with meshes: characterization of rainfall intensity and drop properties

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Carvalho, Sílvia C. P.; de Lima, João L. M. P.; de Lima, M. Isabel P.

2013-04-01

Rainfall simulators can be a powerful tool to increase our understanding of hydrological and geomorphological processes. Nevertheless, rainfall simulators' design and operation might be rather demanding, for achieving specific rainfall intensity distributions and drop characteristics. The pressurized simulators have some advantages over the non-pressurized simulators: drops do not rely on gravity to reach terminal velocity, but are sprayed out under pressure; pressurized simulators also yield a broad range of drop sizes in comparison with drop-formers simulators. The main purpose of this study was to explore in the laboratory the potential of combining spray nozzle simulators with meshes in order to change rainfall characteristics (rainfall intensity and diameters and fall speed of drops). Different types of spray nozzles were tested, such as single full-cone and multiple full-cone nozzles. The impact of the meshes on the simulated rain was studied by testing different materials (i.e. plastic and steel meshes), square apertures and wire thicknesses, and different vertical distances between the nozzle and the meshes underneath. The diameter and fall speed of the rain drops were measured using a Laser Precipitation Monitor (Thies Clima). The rainfall intensity range and coefficients of uniformity of the sprays and the drop size distribution, fall speed and kinetic energy were analysed. Results show that when meshes intercept drop trajectories the spatial distribution of rainfall intensity and the drop size distribution are affected. As the spray nozzles generate typically small drop sizes and narrow drop size distributions, meshes can be used to promote the formation of bigger drops and random their landing positions.

Integrated Design Engineering Analysis (IDEA) Environment Automated Generation of Structured CFD Grids using Topology Methods

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Kamhawi, Hilmi N.

2012-01-01

This report documents the work performed from March 2010 to March 2012. The Integrated Design and Engineering Analysis (IDEA) environment is a collaborative environment based on an object-oriented, multidisciplinary, distributed framework using the Adaptive Modeling Language (AML) as a framework and supporting the configuration design and parametric CFD grid generation. This report will focus on describing the work in the area of parametric CFD grid generation using novel concepts for defining the interaction between the mesh topology and the geometry in such a way as to separate the mesh topology from the geometric topology while maintaining the link between the mesh topology and the actual geometry.

MESH2D Grid generator design and use

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Flach, G. P.

Mesh2d is a Fortran90 program originally designed to generate two-dimensional structured grids of the form [x(i),y(i,j)] where [x,y] are grid coordinates identified by indices (i,j). x-coordinates depending only on index i implies strictly vertical x-grid lines, whereas the y-grid lines can undulate. Mesh2d also assigns an integer material type to each grid cell, mtyp(i,j), in a user-specified manner. The complete grid is specified through three separate input files defining the x(i), y(i,j), and mtyp(i,j) variations. Since the original development effort, Mesh2d has been extended to more general two-dimensional structured grids of the form [x(i,j),(i,j)].

Hemodynamics model of fluid–solid interaction in internal carotid artery aneurysms

PubMed Central

Fu-Yu, Wang; Lei, Liu; Xiao-Jun, Zhang; Hai-Yue, Ju

2010-01-01

The objective of this study is to present a relatively simple method to reconstruct cerebral aneurysms as 3D numerical grids. The method accurately duplicates the geometry to provide computer simulations of the blood flow. Initial images were obtained by using CT angiography and 3D digital subtraction angiography in DICOM format. The image was processed by using MIMICS software, and the 3D fluid model (blood flow) and 3D solid model (wall) were generated. The subsequent output was exported to the ANSYS workbench software to generate the volumetric mesh for further hemodynamic study. The fluid model was defined and simulated in CFX software while the solid model was calculated in ANSYS software. The force data calculated firstly in the CFX software were transferred to the ANSYS software, and after receiving the force data, total mesh displacement data were calculated in the ANSYS software. Then, the mesh displacement data were transferred back to the CFX software. The data exchange was processed in workbench software. The results of simulation could be visualized in CFX-post. Two examples of grid reconstruction and blood flow simulation for patients with internal carotid artery aneurysms were presented. The wall shear stress, wall total pressure, and von Mises stress could be visualized. This method seems to be relatively simple and suitable for direct use by neurosurgeons or neuroradiologists, and maybe a practical tool for planning treatment and follow-up of patients after neurosurgical or endovascular interventions with 3D angiography. PMID:20812022

Hemodynamics model of fluid-solid interaction in internal carotid artery aneurysms.

PubMed

Bai-Nan, Xu; Fu-Yu, Wang; Lei, Liu; Xiao-Jun, Zhang; Hai-Yue, Ju

2011-01-01

The objective of this study is to present a relatively simple method to reconstruct cerebral aneurysms as 3D numerical grids. The method accurately duplicates the geometry to provide computer simulations of the blood flow. Initial images were obtained by using CT angiography and 3D digital subtraction angiography in DICOM format. The image was processed by using MIMICS software, and the 3D fluid model (blood flow) and 3D solid model (wall) were generated. The subsequent output was exported to the ANSYS workbench software to generate the volumetric mesh for further hemodynamic study. The fluid model was defined and simulated in CFX software while the solid model was calculated in ANSYS software. The force data calculated firstly in the CFX software were transferred to the ANSYS software, and after receiving the force data, total mesh displacement data were calculated in the ANSYS software. Then, the mesh displacement data were transferred back to the CFX software. The data exchange was processed in workbench software. The results of simulation could be visualized in CFX-post. Two examples of grid reconstruction and blood flow simulation for patients with internal carotid artery aneurysms were presented. The wall shear stress, wall total pressure, and von Mises stress could be visualized. This method seems to be relatively simple and suitable for direct use by neurosurgeons or neuroradiologists, and maybe a practical tool for planning treatment and follow-up of patients after neurosurgical or endovascular interventions with 3D angiography.

Digital relief generation from 3D models

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wang, Meili; Sun, Yu; Zhang, Hongming; Qian, Kun; Chang, Jian; He, Dongjian

2016-09-01

It is difficult to extend image-based relief generation to high-relief generation, as the images contain insufficient height information. To generate reliefs from three-dimensional (3D) models, it is necessary to extract the height fields from the model, but this can only generate bas-reliefs. To overcome this problem, an efficient method is proposed to generate bas-reliefs and high-reliefs directly from 3D meshes. To produce relief features that are visually appropriate, the 3D meshes are first scaled. 3D unsharp masking is used to enhance the visual features in the 3D mesh, and average smoothing and Laplacian smoothing are implemented to achieve better smoothing results. A nonlinear variable scaling scheme is then employed to generate the final bas-reliefs and high-reliefs. Using the proposed method, relief models can be generated from arbitrary viewing positions with different gestures and combinations of multiple 3D models. The generated relief models can be printed by 3D printers. The proposed method provides a means of generating both high-reliefs and bas-reliefs in an efficient and effective way under the appropriate scaling factors.

Performance of Minicomputers in Finite Element Analysis Pre and Post Processing.

DTIC Science & Technology

1980-07-29

points, and 78 rectangular plate elements. It was generated using the BULKM mesh generation program, which is a part of the GIFTS -5 system [3]. c...The program used, DECOM, is part of the GIFTS system. It uses a hyper-(partitioned) matrix generalization of the Cholesky decomposition algorithm. d...Pub. 2018, Oct. 77. 3. Kamel, H.A. and McCabe, M.W., GIFTS : Graphics Oriented Interactive Finite Element Time-Sharing System. Structural Mechanics

Research Trend Visualization by MeSH Terms from PubMed.

PubMed

Yang, Heyoung; Lee, Hyuck Jai

2018-05-30

Motivation : PubMed is a primary source of biomedical information comprising search tool function and the biomedical literature from MEDLINE which is the US National Library of Medicine premier bibliographic database, life science journals and online books. Complimentary tools to PubMed have been developed to help the users search for literature and acquire knowledge. However, these tools are insufficient to overcome the difficulties of the users due to the proliferation of biomedical literature. A new method is needed for searching the knowledge in biomedical field. Methods : A new method is proposed in this study for visualizing the recent research trends based on the retrieved documents corresponding to a search query given by the user. The Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) are used as the primary analytical element. MeSH terms are extracted from the literature and the correlations between them are calculated. A MeSH network, called MeSH Net, is generated as the final result based on the Pathfinder Network algorithm. Results : A case study for the verification of proposed method was carried out on a research area defined by the search query (immunotherapy and cancer and "tumor microenvironment"). The MeSH Net generated by the method is in good agreement with the actual research activities in the research area (immunotherapy). Conclusion : A prototype application generating MeSH Net was developed. The application, which could be used as a "guide map for travelers", allows the users to quickly and easily acquire the knowledge of research trends. Combination of PubMed and MeSH Net is expected to be an effective complementary system for the researchers in biomedical field experiencing difficulties with search and information analysis.

Spectral turning bands for efficient Gaussian random fields generation on GPUs and accelerators

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hunger, L.; Cosenza, B.; Kimeswenger, S.; Fahringer, T.

2015-11-01

A random field (RF) is a set of correlated random variables associated with different spatial locations. RF generation algorithms are of crucial importance for many scientific areas, such as astrophysics, geostatistics, computer graphics, and many others. Current approaches commonly make use of 3D fast Fourier transform (FFT), which does not scale well for RF bigger than the available memory; they are also limited to regular rectilinear meshes. We introduce random field generation with the turning band method (RAFT), an RF generation algorithm based on the turning band method that is optimized for massively parallel hardware such as GPUs and accelerators. Our algorithm replaces the 3D FFT with a lower-order, one-dimensional FFT followed by a projection step and is further optimized with loop unrolling and blocking. RAFT can easily generate RF on non-regular (non-uniform) meshes and efficiently produce fields with mesh sizes bigger than the available device memory by using a streaming, out-of-core approach. Our algorithm generates RF with the correct statistical behavior and is tested on a variety of modern hardware, such as NVIDIA Tesla, AMD FirePro and Intel Phi. RAFT is faster than the traditional methods on regular meshes and has been successfully applied to two real case scenarios: planetary nebulae and cosmological simulations.

Mesh infrastructure for coupled multiprocess geophysical simulations

DOE PAGES

Garimella, Rao V.; Perkins, William A.; Buksas, Mike W.; ...

2014-01-01

We have developed a sophisticated mesh infrastructure capability to support large scale multiphysics simulations such as subsurface flow and reactive contaminant transport at storage sites as well as the analysis of the effects of a warming climate on the terrestrial arctic. These simulations involve a wide range of coupled processes including overland flow, subsurface flow, freezing and thawing of ice rich soil, accumulation, redistribution and melting of snow, biogeochemical processes involving plant matter and finally, microtopography evolution due to melting and degradation of ice wedges below the surface. In addition to supporting the usual topological and geometric queries about themore » mesh, the mesh infrastructure adds capabilities such as identifying columnar structures in the mesh, enabling deforming of the mesh subject to constraints and enabling the simultaneous use of meshes of different dimensionality for subsurface and surface processes. The generic mesh interface is capable of using three different open source mesh frameworks (MSTK, MOAB and STKmesh) under the hood allowing the developers to directly compare them and choose one that is best suited for the application's needs. We demonstrate the results of some simulations using these capabilities as well as present a comparison of the performance of the different mesh frameworks.« less

Evaluation of a 3D point cloud tetrahedral tomographic reconstruction method

PubMed Central

Pereira, N F; Sitek, A

2011-01-01

Tomographic reconstruction on an irregular grid may be superior to reconstruction on a regular grid. This is achieved through an appropriate choice of the image space model, the selection of an optimal set of points and the use of any available prior information during the reconstruction process. Accordingly, a number of reconstruction-related parameters must be optimized for best performance. In this work, a 3D point cloud tetrahedral mesh reconstruction method is evaluated for quantitative tasks. A linear image model is employed to obtain the reconstruction system matrix and five point generation strategies are studied. The evaluation is performed using the recovery coefficient, as well as voxel- and template-based estimates of bias and variance measures, computed over specific regions in the reconstructed image. A similar analysis is performed for regular grid reconstructions that use voxel basis functions. The maximum likelihood expectation maximization reconstruction algorithm is used. For the tetrahedral reconstructions, of the five point generation methods that are evaluated, three use image priors. For evaluation purposes, an object consisting of overlapping spheres with varying activity is simulated. The exact parallel projection data of this object are obtained analytically using a parallel projector, and multiple Poisson noise realizations of these exact data are generated and reconstructed using the different point generation strategies. The unconstrained nature of point placement in some of the irregular mesh-based reconstruction strategies has superior activity recovery for small, low-contrast image regions. The results show that, with an appropriately generated set of mesh points, the irregular grid reconstruction methods can out-perform reconstructions on a regular grid for mathematical phantoms, in terms of the performance measures evaluated. PMID:20736496

Evaluation of a 3D point cloud tetrahedral tomographic reconstruction method

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pereira, N. F.; Sitek, A.

2010-09-01

Tomographic reconstruction on an irregular grid may be superior to reconstruction on a regular grid. This is achieved through an appropriate choice of the image space model, the selection of an optimal set of points and the use of any available prior information during the reconstruction process. Accordingly, a number of reconstruction-related parameters must be optimized for best performance. In this work, a 3D point cloud tetrahedral mesh reconstruction method is evaluated for quantitative tasks. A linear image model is employed to obtain the reconstruction system matrix and five point generation strategies are studied. The evaluation is performed using the recovery coefficient, as well as voxel- and template-based estimates of bias and variance measures, computed over specific regions in the reconstructed image. A similar analysis is performed for regular grid reconstructions that use voxel basis functions. The maximum likelihood expectation maximization reconstruction algorithm is used. For the tetrahedral reconstructions, of the five point generation methods that are evaluated, three use image priors. For evaluation purposes, an object consisting of overlapping spheres with varying activity is simulated. The exact parallel projection data of this object are obtained analytically using a parallel projector, and multiple Poisson noise realizations of these exact data are generated and reconstructed using the different point generation strategies. The unconstrained nature of point placement in some of the irregular mesh-based reconstruction strategies has superior activity recovery for small, low-contrast image regions. The results show that, with an appropriately generated set of mesh points, the irregular grid reconstruction methods can out-perform reconstructions on a regular grid for mathematical phantoms, in terms of the performance measures evaluated.

Osseointegrated dental implants produced via microwave processing

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kutty, Muralithran G.

This research is a comprehensive effort to develop osseointegrated dental implants via microwave processing. A net-shape microwave sintering procedure was employed to fabricate dental implants. Commercial pure titanium powders (-100, -200 and -325 mesh sizes) were used in this work. This process eliminates the need for machining of implants and prevents contamination. The idea was to take advantage of the peculiar way microwave couple with metallic powders, i.e. generating heat in the interior of the sample and dissipating it away through the surface. The desired features for an implant, a dense core with surface pores, is not possible via conventional sintering. Coating with hydroxyapatite via electrodeposition and chemical combustion vapor deposition was also attempted to further enhance the bioactivity of this layer. Surface roughness and area were measured using a non-contact surface profilometer to further describe the unique surface. In-vitro studies, conducted using osteoblast cells extracted from neonatal rat calvarial, showed improved cell growth on all the uncoated porous samples. However, the highest cell growth was observed on the -200 mesh size samples. The higher surface area of the -200 mesh samples is attributed to this observation. This work was able to identify the processing parameters for titanium in microwave and establishes the importance of surface area as a key parameter for cell growth on porous surfaces as compared to surface roughness.

Performance effects of irregular communications patterns on massively parallel multiprocessors

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Saltz, Joel; Petiton, Serge; Berryman, Harry; Rifkin, Adam

1991-01-01

A detailed study of the performance effects of irregular communications patterns on the CM-2 was conducted. The communications capabilities of the CM-2 were characterized under a variety of controlled conditions. In the process of carrying out the performance evaluation, extensive use was made of a parameterized synthetic mesh. In addition, timings with unstructured meshes generated for aerodynamic codes and a set of sparse matrices with banded patterns on non-zeroes were performed. This benchmarking suite stresses the communications capabilities of the CM-2 in a range of different ways. Benchmark results demonstrate that it is possible to make effective use of much of the massive concurrency available in the communications network.

Airplane Mesh Development with Grid Density Studies

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Cliff, Susan E.; Baker, Timothy J.; Thomas, Scott D.; Lawrence, Scott L.; Rimlinger, Mark J.

1999-01-01

Automatic Grid Generation Wish List Geometry handling, including CAD clean up and mesh generation, remains a major bottleneck in the application of CFD methods. There is a pressing need for greater automation in several aspects of the geometry preparation in order to reduce set up time and eliminate user intervention as much as possible. Starting from the CAD representation of a configuration, there may be holes or overlapping surfaces which require an intensive effort to establish cleanly abutting surface patches, and collections of many patches may need to be combined for more efficient use of the geometrical representation. Obtaining an accurate and suitable body conforming grid with an adequate distribution of points throughout the flow-field, for the flow conditions of interest, is often the most time consuming task for complex CFD applications. There is a need for a clean unambiguous definition of the CAD geometry. Ideally this would be carried out automatically by smart CAD clean up software. One could also define a standard piece-wise smooth surface representation suitable for use by computational methods and then create software to translate between the various CAD descriptions and the standard representation. Surface meshing remains a time consuming, user intensive procedure. There is a need for automated surface meshing, requiring only minimal user intervention to define the overall density of mesh points. The surface mesher should produce well shaped elements (triangles or quadrilaterals) whose size is determined initially according to the surface curvature with a minimum size for flat pieces, and later refined by the user in other regions if necessary. Present techniques for volume meshing all require some degree of user intervention. There is a need for fully automated and reliable volume mesh generation. In addition, it should be possible to create both surface and volume meshes that meet guaranteed measures of mesh quality (e.g. minimum and maximum angle, stretching ratios, etc.).

Tangle-Free Mesh Motion for Ablation Simulations

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Droba, Justin

2016-01-01

Problems involving mesh motion-which should not be mistakenly associated with moving mesh methods, a class of adaptive mesh redistribution techniques-are of critical importance in numerical simulations of the thermal response of melting and ablative materials. Ablation is the process by which material vaporizes or otherwise erodes due to strong heating. Accurate modeling of such materials is of the utmost importance in design of passive thermal protection systems ("heatshields") for spacecraft, the layer of the vehicle that ensures survival of crew and craft during re-entry. In an explicit mesh motion approach, a complete thermal solve is first performed. Afterwards, the thermal response is used to determine surface recession rates. These values are then used to generate boundary conditions for an a posteriori correction designed to update the location of the mesh nodes. Most often, linear elastic or biharmonic equations are used to model this material response, traditionally in a finite element framework so that complex geometries can be simulated. A simple scheme for moving the boundary nodes involves receding along the surface normals. However, for all but the simplest problem geometries, evolution in time following such a scheme will eventually bring the mesh to intersect and "tangle" with itself, inducing failure. This presentation demonstrates a comprehensive and sophisticated scheme that analyzes the local geometry of each node with help from user-provided clues to eliminate the tangle and enable simulations on a wide-class of difficult problem geometries. The method developed is demonstrated for linear elastic equations but is general enough that it may be adapted to other modeling equations. The presentation will explicate the inner workings of the tangle-free mesh motion algorithm for both two and three-dimensional meshes. It will show abstract examples of the method's success, including a verification problem that demonstrates its accuracy and correctness. The focus of the presentation will be on the algorithm; specifics on how the techniques may be used in spacecraft design will be not discussed.

Retention of Sputtered Molybdenum on Ion Engine Discharge Chamber Surfaces

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Sovey, James S.; Dever, Joyce A.; Power, John L.

2001-01-01

Grit-blasted anode surfaces are commonly used in ion engines to ensure adherence of sputtered coatings. Next generation ion engines will require higher power levels, longer operating times, and thus there will likely be thicker sputtered coatings on their anode surfaces than observed to date on 2.3 kW-class xenon ion engines. The thickness of coatings on the anode of a 10 kW, 40-centimeter diameter thruster, for example, may be 22 micrometers or more after extended operation. Grit-blasted wire mesh, titanium, and aluminum coupons were coated with molybdenum at accelerated rates to establish coating stability after the deposition process and after thermal cycling tests. These accelerated deposition rates are roughly three orders of magnitude more rapid than the rates at which the screen grid is sputtered in a 2.3 kW-class, 30-centimeter diameter ion engine. Using both RF and DC sputtering processes, the molybdenum coating thicknesses ranged from 8 to 130 micrometers, and deposition rates from 1.8 micrometers per hour to 5.1 micrometers per hour. In all cases, the molybdenum coatings were stable after the deposition process, and there was no evidence of spalling of the coatings after 20 cycles from about -60 to +320 C. The stable, 130 micrometer molybdenum coating on wire mesh is 26 times thicker than the thickest coating found on the anode of a 2.3 kW, xenon ion engine that was tested for 8200 hr. Additionally, this coating on wire mesh coupon is estimated to be a factor of greater than 4 thicker than one would expect to obtain on the anode of the next generation ion engine which may have xenon throughputs as high as 550 kg.

Unstructured Polyhedral Mesh Thermal Radiation Diffusion

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Palmer, T.S.; Zika, M.R.; Madsen, N.K.

2000-07-27

Unstructured mesh particle transport and diffusion methods are gaining wider acceptance as mesh generation, scientific visualization and linear solvers improve. This paper describes an algorithm that is currently being used in the KULL code at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory to solve the radiative transfer equations. The algorithm employs a point-centered diffusion discretization on arbitrary polyhedral meshes in 3D. We present the results of a few test problems to illustrate the capabilities of the radiation diffusion module.

GeneMesh: a web-based microarray analysis tool for relating differentially expressed genes to MeSH terms.

PubMed

Jani, Saurin D; Argraves, Gary L; Barth, Jeremy L; Argraves, W Scott

2010-04-01

An important objective of DNA microarray-based gene expression experimentation is determining inter-relationships that exist between differentially expressed genes and biological processes, molecular functions, cellular components, signaling pathways, physiologic processes and diseases. Here we describe GeneMesh, a web-based program that facilitates analysis of DNA microarray gene expression data. GeneMesh relates genes in a query set to categories available in the Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) hierarchical index. The interface enables hypothesis driven relational analysis to a specific MeSH subcategory (e.g., Cardiovascular System, Genetic Processes, Immune System Diseases etc.) or unbiased relational analysis to broader MeSH categories (e.g., Anatomy, Biological Sciences, Disease etc.). Genes found associated with a given MeSH category are dynamically linked to facilitate tabular and graphical depiction of Entrez Gene information, Gene Ontology information, KEGG metabolic pathway diagrams and intermolecular interaction information. Expression intensity values of groups of genes that cluster in relation to a given MeSH category, gene ontology or pathway can be displayed as heat maps of Z score-normalized values. GeneMesh operates on gene expression data derived from a number of commercial microarray platforms including Affymetrix, Agilent and Illumina. GeneMesh is a versatile web-based tool for testing and developing new hypotheses through relating genes in a query set (e.g., differentially expressed genes from a DNA microarray experiment) to descriptors making up the hierarchical structure of the National Library of Medicine controlled vocabulary thesaurus, MeSH. The system further enhances the discovery process by providing links between sets of genes associated with a given MeSH category to a rich set of html linked tabular and graphic information including Entrez Gene summaries, gene ontologies, intermolecular interactions, overlays of genes onto KEGG pathway diagrams and heatmaps of expression intensity values. GeneMesh is freely available online at http://proteogenomics.musc.edu/genemesh/.

Compressible magma/mantle dynamics: 3-D, adaptive simulations in ASPECT

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Dannberg, Juliane; Heister, Timo

2016-12-01

Melt generation and migration are an important link between surface processes and the thermal and chemical evolution of the Earth's interior. However, their vastly different timescales make it difficult to study mantle convection and melt migration in a unified framework, especially for 3-D global models. And although experiments suggest an increase in melt volume of up to 20 per cent from the depth of melt generation to the surface, previous computations have neglected the individual compressibilities of the solid and the fluid phase. Here, we describe our extension of the finite element mantle convection code ASPECT that adds melt generation and migration. We use the original compressible formulation of the McKenzie equations, augmented by an equation for the conservation of energy. Applying adaptive mesh refinement to this type of problems is particularly advantageous, as the resolution can be increased in areas where melt is present and viscosity gradients are high, whereas a lower resolution is sufficient in regions without melt. Together with a high-performance, massively parallel implementation, this allows for high-resolution, 3-D, compressible, global mantle convection simulations coupled with melt migration. We evaluate the functionality and potential of this method using a series of benchmarks and model setups, compare results of the compressible and incompressible formulation, and show the effectiveness of adaptive mesh refinement when applied to melt migration. Our model of magma dynamics provides a framework for modelling processes on different scales and investigating links between processes occurring in the deep mantle and melt generation and migration. This approach could prove particularly useful applied to modelling the generation of komatiites or other melts originating in greater depths. The implementation is available in the Open Source ASPECT repository.

An Interactive Preliminary Design System of High Speed Forebody and Inlet Flows

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Liou, May-Fun; Benson, Thomas J.; Trefny, Charles J.

2010-01-01

This paper demonstrates a simulation-based aerodynamic design process of high speed inlet. A genetic algorithm is integrated into the design process to facilitate the single objective optimization. The objective function is the total pressure recovery and is obtained by using a PNS solver for its computing efficiency. The system developed uses existing software of geometry definition, mesh generation and CFD analysis. The process which produces increasingly desirable design in each genetic evolution over many generations is automatically carried out. A generic two-dimensional inlet is created as a showcase to demonstrate the capabilities of this tool. A parameterized study of geometric shape and size of the showcase is also presented.

Lattice Cleaving: A Multimaterial Tetrahedral Meshing Algorithm with Guarantees

PubMed Central

Bronson, Jonathan; Levine, Joshua A.; Whitaker, Ross

2014-01-01

We introduce a new algorithm for generating tetrahedral meshes that conform to physical boundaries in volumetric domains consisting of multiple materials. The proposed method allows for an arbitrary number of materials, produces high-quality tetrahedral meshes with upper and lower bounds on dihedral angles, and guarantees geometric fidelity. Moreover, the method is combinatoric so its implementation enables rapid mesh construction. These meshes are structured in a way that also allows grading, to reduce element counts in regions of homogeneity. Additionally, we provide proofs showing that both element quality and geometric fidelity are bounded using this approach. PMID:24356365

Computations of Aerodynamic Performance Databases Using Output-Based Refinement

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Nemec, Marian; Aftosmis, Michael J.

2009-01-01

Objectives: Handle complex geometry problems; Control discretization errors via solution-adaptive mesh refinement; Focus on aerodynamic databases of parametric and optimization studies: 1. Accuracy: satisfy prescribed error bounds 2. Robustness and speed: may require over 105 mesh generations 3. Automation: avoid user supervision Obtain "expert meshes" independent of user skill; and Run every case adaptively in production settings.

Decay of grid turbulence in superfluid helium-4: Mesh dependence

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yang, J.; Ihas, G. G.

2018-03-01

Temporal decay of grid turbulence is experimentally studied in superfluid 4He in a large square channel. The second sound attenuation method is used to measure the turbulent vortex line density (L) with a phase locked tracking technique to minimize frequency shift effects induced by temperature fluctuations. Two different grids (0.8 mm and 3.0 mm mesh) are pulled to generate turbulence. Different power laws for decaying behavior are predicted by a theory. According to this theory, L should decay as t‑11/10 when the length scale of energy containing eddies grows from the grid mesh size to the size of the channel. At later time, after the energy containing eddy size becomes comparable to the channel, L should follow t‑3/2. Our recent experimental data exhibit evidence for t‑11/10 during the early time and t‑2 instead of t‑3/2 for later time. Moreover, a consistent bump/plateau feature is prominent between the two decay regimes for smaller (0.8 mm) grid mesh holes but absent with a grid mesh hole of 3.0 mm. This implies that in the large channel different types of turbulence are generated, depending on mesh hole size (mesh Reynolds number) compared to channel Reynolds number.

Assessment of Near-Field Sonic Boom Simulation Tools

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Casper, J. H.; Cliff, S. E.; Thomas, S. D.; Park, M. A.; McMullen, M. S.; Melton, J. E.; Durston, D. A.

2008-01-01

A recent study for the Supersonics Project, within the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, has been conducted to assess current in-house capabilities for the prediction of near-field sonic boom. Such capabilities are required to simulate the highly nonlinear flow near an aircraft, wherein a sonic-boom signature is generated. There are many available computational fluid dynamics codes that could be used to provide the near-field flow for a sonic boom calculation. However, such codes have typically been developed for applications involving aerodynamic configuration, for which an efficiently generated computational mesh is usually not optimum for a sonic boom prediction. Preliminary guidelines are suggested to characterize a state-of-the-art sonic boom prediction methodology. The available simulation tools that are best suited to incorporate into that methodology are identified; preliminary test cases are presented in support of the selection. During this phase of process definition and tool selection, parallel research was conducted in an attempt to establish criteria that link the properties of a computational mesh to the accuracy of a sonic boom prediction. Such properties include sufficient grid density near shocks and within the zone of influence, which are achieved by adaptation and mesh refinement strategies. Prediction accuracy is validated by comparison with wind tunnel data.

MOAB : a mesh-oriented database.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Tautges, Timothy James; Ernst, Corey; Stimpson, Clint

A finite element mesh is used to decompose a continuous domain into a discretized representation. The finite element method solves PDEs on this mesh by modeling complex functions as a set of simple basis functions with coefficients at mesh vertices and prescribed continuity between elements. The mesh is one of the fundamental types of data linking the various tools in the FEA process (mesh generation, analysis, visualization, etc.). Thus, the representation of mesh data and operations on those data play a very important role in FEA-based simulations. MOAB is a component for representing and evaluating mesh data. MOAB can storemore » structured and unstructured mesh, consisting of elements in the finite element 'zoo'. The functional interface to MOAB is simple yet powerful, allowing the representation of many types of metadata commonly found on the mesh. MOAB is optimized for efficiency in space and time, based on access to mesh in chunks rather than through individual entities, while also versatile enough to support individual entity access. The MOAB data model consists of a mesh interface instance, mesh entities (vertices and elements), sets, and tags. Entities are addressed through handles rather than pointers, to allow the underlying representation of an entity to change without changing the handle to that entity. Sets are arbitrary groupings of mesh entities and other sets. Sets also support parent/child relationships as a relation distinct from sets containing other sets. The directed-graph provided by set parent/child relationships is useful for modeling topological relations from a geometric model or other metadata. Tags are named data which can be assigned to the mesh as a whole, individual entities, or sets. Tags are a mechanism for attaching data to individual entities and sets are a mechanism for describing relations between entities; the combination of these two mechanisms is a powerful yet simple interface for representing metadata or application-specific data. For example, sets and tags can be used together to describe geometric topology, boundary condition, and inter-processor interface groupings in a mesh. MOAB is used in several ways in various applications. MOAB serves as the underlying mesh data representation in the VERDE mesh verification code. MOAB can also be used as a mesh input mechanism, using mesh readers included with MOAB, or as a translator between mesh formats, using readers and writers included with MOAB. The remainder of this report is organized as follows. Section 2, 'Getting Started', provides a few simple examples of using MOAB to perform simple tasks on a mesh. Section 3 discusses the MOAB data model in more detail, including some aspects of the implementation. Section 4 summarizes the MOAB function API. Section 5 describes some of the tools included with MOAB, and the implementation of mesh readers/writers for MOAB. Section 6 contains a brief description of MOAB's relation to the TSTT mesh interface. Section 7 gives a conclusion and future plans for MOAB development. Section 8 gives references cited in this report. A reference description of the full MOAB API is contained in Section 9.« less

A Generalized Framework for Constrained Design Optimization of General Supersonic Configurations Using Adjoint Based Sensitivity Derivatives

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Karman, Steve L., Jr.

2011-01-01

The Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate (ARMD) sent out an NASA Research Announcement (NRA) for proposals soliciting research and technical development. The proposed research program was aimed at addressing the desired milestones and outcomes of ROA (ROA-2006) Subtopic A.4.1.1 Advanced Computational Methods. The second milestone, SUP.1.06.02 Robust, validated mesh adaptation and error quantification for near field Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD), was addressed by the proposed research. Additional research utilizing the direct links to geometry through a CAD interface enabled by this work will allow for geometric constraints to be applied and address the final milestone, SUP2.07.06 Constrained low-drag supersonic aerodynamic design capability. The original product of the proposed research program was an integrated system of tools that can be used for the mesh mechanics required for rapid high fidelity analysis and for design of supersonic cruise vehicles. These Euler and Navier-Stokes volume grid manipulation tools were proposed to efficiently use parallel processing. The mesh adaptation provides a systematic approach for achieving demonstrated levels of accuracy in the solutions. NASA chose to fund only the mesh generation/adaptation portion of the proposal. So this report describes the completion of the proposed tasks for mesh creation, manipulation and adaptation as it pertains to sonic boom prediction of supersonic configurations.

Modeling Geometry and Progressive Failure of Material Interfaces in Plain Weave Composites

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hsu, Su-Yuen; Cheng, Ron-Bin

2010-01-01

A procedure combining a geometrically nonlinear, explicit-dynamics contact analysis, computer aided design techniques, and elasticity-based mesh adjustment is proposed to efficiently generate realistic finite element models for meso-mechanical analysis of progressive failure in textile composites. In the procedure, the geometry of fiber tows is obtained by imposing a fictitious expansion on the tows. Meshes resulting from the procedure are conformal with the computed tow-tow and tow-matrix interfaces but are incongruent at the interfaces. The mesh interfaces are treated as cohesive contact surfaces not only to resolve the incongruence but also to simulate progressive failure. The method is employed to simulate debonding at the material interfaces in a ceramic-matrix plain weave composite with matrix porosity and in a polymeric matrix plain weave composite without matrix porosity, both subject to uniaxial cyclic loading. The numerical results indicate progression of the interfacial damage during every loading and reverse loading event in a constant strain amplitude cyclic process. However, the composites show different patterns of damage advancement.

Design of Software for Design of Finite Element for Structural Analysis. Ph.D. Thesis - Stuttgart Univ., 22 Nov. 1983

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Helfrich, Reinhard

1987-01-01

The concepts of software engineering which allow a user of the finite element method to describe a model, to collect and to check the model data in a data base as well as to form the matrices required for a finite element calculation are examined. Next the components of the model description are conceived including the mesh tree, the topology, the configuration, the kinematic boundary conditions, the data for each element, and the loads. The possibilities for description and review of the data are considered. The concept of the segments for the modularization of the programs follows the components of the model description. The significance of the mesh tree as a globular guiding structure will be understood in view of the principle of the unity of the model, the mesh tree, and the data base. The user-friendly aspects of the software system will be summarized: the principle of language communication, the data generators, error processing, and data security.

Unstructured 3D Delaunay mesh generation applied to planes, trains and automobiles

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Blake, Kenneth R.; Spragle, Gregory S.

1993-01-01

Technical issues associated with domain-tessellation production, including initial boundary node triangulation and volume mesh refinement, are presented for the 'TGrid' 3D Delaunay unstructured grid generation program. The approach employed is noted to be capable of preserving predefined triangular surface facets in the final tessellation. The capabilities of the approach are demonstrated by generating grids about an entire fighter aircraft configuration, a train, and a wind tunnel model of an automobile.

3D active shape models of human brain structures: application to patient-specific mesh generation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ravikumar, Nishant; Castro-Mateos, Isaac; Pozo, Jose M.; Frangi, Alejandro F.; Taylor, Zeike A.

2015-03-01

The use of biomechanics-based numerical simulations has attracted growing interest in recent years for computer-aided diagnosis and treatment planning. With this in mind, a method for automatic mesh generation of brain structures of interest, using statistical models of shape (SSM) and appearance (SAM), for personalised computational modelling is presented. SSMs are constructed as point distribution models (PDMs) while SAMs are trained using intensity profiles sampled from a training set of T1-weighted magnetic resonance images. The brain structures of interest are, the cortical surface (cerebrum, cerebellum & brainstem), lateral ventricles and falx-cerebri membrane. Two methods for establishing correspondences across the training set of shapes are investigated and compared (based on SSM quality): the Coherent Point Drift (CPD) point-set registration method and B-spline mesh-to-mesh registration method. The MNI-305 (Montreal Neurological Institute) average brain atlas is used to generate the template mesh, which is deformed and registered to each training case, to establish correspondence over the training set of shapes. 18 healthy patients' T1-weightedMRimages form the training set used to generate the SSM and SAM. Both model-training and model-fitting are performed over multiple brain structures simultaneously. Compactness and generalisation errors of the BSpline-SSM and CPD-SSM are evaluated and used to quantitatively compare the SSMs. Leave-one-out cross validation is used to evaluate SSM quality in terms of these measures. The mesh-based SSM is found to generalise better and is more compact, relative to the CPD-based SSM. Quality of the best-fit model instance from the trained SSMs, to test cases are evaluated using the Hausdorff distance (HD) and mean absolute surface distance (MASD) metrics.

A Framework for Parallel Unstructured Grid Generation for Complex Aerodynamic Simulations

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Zagaris, George; Pirzadeh, Shahyar Z.; Chrisochoides, Nikos

2009-01-01

A framework for parallel unstructured grid generation targeting both shared memory multi-processors and distributed memory architectures is presented. The two fundamental building-blocks of the framework consist of: (1) the Advancing-Partition (AP) method used for domain decomposition and (2) the Advancing Front (AF) method used for mesh generation. Starting from the surface mesh of the computational domain, the AP method is applied recursively to generate a set of sub-domains. Next, the sub-domains are meshed in parallel using the AF method. The recursive nature of domain decomposition naturally maps to a divide-and-conquer algorithm which exhibits inherent parallelism. For the parallel implementation, the Master/Worker pattern is employed to dynamically balance the varying workloads of each task on the set of available CPUs. Performance results by this approach are presented and discussed in detail as well as future work and improvements.

Users manual for AUTOMESH-2D: A program of automatic mesh generation for two-dimensional scattering analysis by the finite element method

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hua, Chongyu; Volakis, John L.

1990-01-01

AUTOMESH-2D is a computer program specifically designed as a preprocessor for the scattering analysis of two dimensional bodies by the finite element method. This program was developed due to a need for reproducing the effort required to define and check the geometry data, element topology, and material properties. There are six modules in the program: (1) Parameter Specification; (2) Data Input; (3) Node Generation; (4) Element Generation; (5) Mesh Smoothing; and (5) Data File Generation.

Terrain-driven unstructured mesh development through semi-automatic vertical feature extraction

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bilskie, Matthew V.; Coggin, David; Hagen, Scott C.; Medeiros, Stephen C.

2015-12-01

A semi-automated vertical feature terrain extraction algorithm is described and applied to a two-dimensional, depth-integrated, shallow water equation inundation model. The extracted features describe what are commonly sub-mesh scale elevation details (ridge and valleys), which may be ignored in standard practice because adequate mesh resolution cannot be afforded. The extraction algorithm is semi-automated, requires minimal human intervention, and is reproducible. A lidar-derived digital elevation model (DEM) of coastal Mississippi and Alabama serves as the source data for the vertical feature extraction. Unstructured mesh nodes and element edges are aligned to the vertical features and an interpolation algorithm aimed at minimizing topographic elevation error assigns elevations to mesh nodes via the DEM. The end result is a mesh that accurately represents the bare earth surface as derived from lidar with element resolution in the floodplain ranging from 15 m to 200 m. To examine the influence of the inclusion of vertical features on overland flooding, two additional meshes were developed, one without crest elevations of the features and another with vertical features withheld. All three meshes were incorporated into a SWAN+ADCIRC model simulation of Hurricane Katrina. Each of the three models resulted in similar validation statistics when compared to observed time-series water levels at gages and post-storm collected high water marks. Simulated water level peaks yielded an R2 of 0.97 and upper and lower 95% confidence interval of ∼ ± 0.60 m. From the validation at the gages and HWM locations, it was not clear which of the three model experiments performed best in terms of accuracy. Examination of inundation extent among the three model results were compared to debris lines derived from NOAA post-event aerial imagery, and the mesh including vertical features showed higher accuracy. The comparison of model results to debris lines demonstrates that additional validation techniques are necessary for state-of-the-art flood inundation models. In addition, the semi-automated, unstructured mesh generation process presented herein increases the overall accuracy of simulated storm surge across the floodplain without reliance on hand digitization or sacrificing computational cost.

National Combustion Code, a Multidisciplinary Combustor Design System, Will Be Transferred to the Commercial Sector

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Steele, Gynelle C.

1999-01-01

The NASA Lewis Research Center and Flow Parametrics will enter into an agreement to commercialize the National Combustion Code (NCC). This multidisciplinary combustor design system utilizes computer-aided design (CAD) tools for geometry creation, advanced mesh generators for creating solid model representations, a common framework for fluid flow and structural analyses, modern postprocessing tools, and parallel processing. This integrated system can facilitate and enhance various phases of the design and analysis process.

Simulating Soft Shadows with Graphics Hardware,

DTIC Science & Technology

1997-01-15

This radiance texture is analogous to the mesh of radiosity values computed in a radiosity algorithm. Unlike a radiosity algorithm, however, our...discretely. Several researchers have explored continuous visibility methods for soft shadow computation and radiosity mesh generation. With this approach...times of several seconds [9]. Most radiosity methods discretize each surface into a mesh of elements and then use discrete methods such as ray

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Bakosi, Jozsef; Christon, Mark A.; Francois, Marianne M.

This report describes the work carried out for completion of the Thermal Hydraulics Methods (THM) Level 3 Milestone THM.CFD.P5.05 for the Consortium for Advanced Simulation of Light Water Reactors (CASL). A series body-fitted computational meshes have been generated by Numeca's Hexpress/Hybrid, a.k.a. 'Spider', meshing technology for the V5H 3x3 and 5x5 rod bundle geometry used to compute the fluid dynamics of grid-to-rod fretting (GTRF). Spider is easy to use, fast, and automatically generates high-quality meshes for extremely complex geometries, required for the GTRF problem. Hydra-TH has been used to carry out large-eddy simulations on both 3x3 and 5x5 geometries, usingmore » different mesh resolutions. The results analyzed show good agreement with Star-CCM+ simulations and experimental data.« less

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Bakosi, Jozsef; Christon, Mark A.; Francois, Marianne M.

This report describes the work carried out for completion of the Thermal Hydraulics Methods (THM) Level 3 Milestone THM.CFD.P5.05 for the Consortium for Advanced Simulation of Light Water Reactors (CASL). A series of body-fitted computational meshes have been generated by Numeca's Hexpress/Hybrid, a.k.a. 'Spider', meshing technology for the V5H 3 x 3 and 5 x 5 rod bundle geometries and subsequently used to compute the fluid dynamics of grid-to-rod fretting (GTRF). Spider is easy to use, fast, and automatically generates high-quality meshes for extremely complex geometries, required for the GTRF problem. Hydra-TH has been used to carry out large-eddy simulationsmore » on both 3 x 3 and 5 x 5 geometries, using different mesh resolutions. The results analyzed show good agreement with Star-CCM+ simulations and experimental data.« less

Evaluation of optical data gained by ARAMIS-measurement of abdominal wall movements for an anisotropic pattern design of stress-adapted hernia meshes produced by embroidery technology

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Breier, A.; Bittrich, L.; Hahn, J.; Spickenheuer, A.

2017-10-01

For the sustainable repair of abdominal wall hernia the application of hernia meshes is required. One reason for the relapse of hernia after surgery is seen in an inadequate adaption of the mechanical properties of the mesh to the movements of the abdominal wall. Differences in the stiffness of the mesh and the abdominal tissue cause tension, friction and stress resulting in a deficient tissue response and subsequently in a recurrence of a hernia, preferentially in the marginal area of the mesh. Embroidery technology enables a targeted influence on the mechanical properties of the generated textile structure by a directed thread deposition. Textile parameters like stitch density, alignment and angle can be changed easily and locally in the embroidery pattern to generate a space-resolved mesh with mechanical properties adapted to the requirement of the surrounding tissue. To determine those requirements the movements of the abdominal wall and the resulting distortions need to be known. This study was conducted to gain optical data of the abdominal wall movements by non-invasive ARAMIS-measurement on 39 test persons to estimate direction and value of the major strains.

Methods for prismatic/tetrahedral grid generation and adaptation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Kallinderis, Y.

1995-01-01

The present work involves generation of hybrid prismatic/tetrahedral grids for complex 3-D geometries including multi-body domains. The prisms cover the region close to each body's surface, while tetrahedra are created elsewhere. Two developments are presented for hybrid grid generation around complex 3-D geometries. The first is a new octree/advancing front type of method for generation of the tetrahedra of the hybrid mesh. The main feature of the present advancing front tetrahedra generator that is different from previous such methods is that it does not require the creation of a background mesh by the user for the determination of the grid-spacing and stretching parameters. These are determined via an automatically generated octree. The second development is a method for treating the narrow gaps in between different bodies in a multiply-connected domain. This method is applied to a two-element wing case. A High Speed Civil Transport (HSCT) type of aircraft geometry is considered. The generated hybrid grid required only 170 K tetrahedra instead of an estimated two million had a tetrahedral mesh been used in the prisms region as well. A solution adaptive scheme for viscous computations on hybrid grids is also presented. A hybrid grid adaptation scheme that employs both h-refinement and redistribution strategies is developed to provide optimum meshes for viscous flow computations. Grid refinement is a dual adaptation scheme that couples 3-D, isotropic division of tetrahedra and 2-D, directional division of prisms.

Streaming simplification of tetrahedral meshes.

PubMed

Vo, Huy T; Callahan, Steven P; Lindstrom, Peter; Pascucci, Valerio; Silva, Cláudio T

2007-01-01

Unstructured tetrahedral meshes are commonly used in scientific computing to represent scalar, vector, and tensor fields in three dimensions. Visualization of these meshes can be difficult to perform interactively due to their size and complexity. By reducing the size of the data, we can accomplish real-time visualization necessary for scientific analysis. We propose a two-step approach for streaming simplification of large tetrahedral meshes. Our algorithm arranges the data on disk in a streaming, I/O-efficient format that allows coherent access to the tetrahedral cells. A quadric-based simplification is sequentially performed on small portions of the mesh in-core. Our output is a coherent streaming mesh which facilitates future processing. Our technique is fast, produces high quality approximations, and operates out-of-core to process meshes too large for main memory.

Cell Adhesion Minimization by a Novel Mesh Culture Method Mechanically Directs Trophoblast Differentiation and Self-Assembly Organization of Human Pluripotent Stem Cells.

PubMed

Okeyo, Kennedy Omondi; Kurosawa, Osamu; Yamazaki, Satoshi; Oana, Hidehiro; Kotera, Hidetoshi; Nakauchi, Hiromitsu; Washizu, Masao

2015-10-01

Mechanical methods for inducing differentiation and directing lineage specification will be instrumental in the application of pluripotent stem cells. Here, we demonstrate that minimization of cell-substrate adhesion can initiate and direct the differentiation of human pluripotent stem cells (hiPSCs) into cyst-forming trophoblast lineage cells (TLCs) without stimulation with cytokines or small molecules. To precisely control cell-substrate adhesion area, we developed a novel culture method where cells are cultured on microstructured mesh sheets suspended in a culture medium such that cells on mesh are completely out of contact with the culture dish. We used microfabricated mesh sheets that consisted of open meshes (100∼200 μm in pitch) with narrow mesh strands (3-5 μm in width) to provide support for initial cell attachment and growth. We demonstrate that minimization of cell adhesion area achieved by this culture method can trigger a sequence of morphogenetic transformations that begin with individual hiPSCs attached on the mesh strands proliferating to form cell sheets by self-assembly organization and ultimately differentiating after 10-15 days of mesh culture to generate spherical cysts that secreted human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG) hormone and expressed caudal-related homeobox 2 factor (CDX2), a specific marker of trophoblast lineage. Thus, this study demonstrates a simple and direct mechanical approach to induce trophoblast differentiation and generate cysts for application in the study of early human embryogenesis and drug development and screening.

Generation Algorithm of Discrete Line in Multi-Dimensional Grids

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Du, L.; Ben, J.; Li, Y.; Wang, R.

2017-09-01

Discrete Global Grids System (DGGS) is a kind of digital multi-resolution earth reference model, in terms of structure, it is conducive to the geographical spatial big data integration and mining. Vector is one of the important types of spatial data, only by discretization, can it be applied in grids system to make process and analysis. Based on the some constraint conditions, this paper put forward a strict definition of discrete lines, building a mathematic model of the discrete lines by base vectors combination method. Transforming mesh discrete lines issue in n-dimensional grids into the issue of optimal deviated path in n-minus-one dimension using hyperplane, which, therefore realizing dimension reduction process in the expression of mesh discrete lines. On this basis, we designed a simple and efficient algorithm for dimension reduction and generation of the discrete lines. The experimental results show that our algorithm not only can be applied in the two-dimensional rectangular grid, also can be applied in the two-dimensional hexagonal grid and the three-dimensional cubic grid. Meanwhile, when our algorithm is applied in two-dimensional rectangular grid, it can get a discrete line which is more similar to the line in the Euclidean space.

A chimera grid scheme. [multiple overset body-conforming mesh system for finite difference adaptation to complex aircraft configurations

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Steger, J. L.; Dougherty, F. C.; Benek, J. A.

1983-01-01

A mesh system composed of multiple overset body-conforming grids is described for adapting finite-difference procedures to complex aircraft configurations. In this so-called 'chimera mesh,' a major grid is generated about a main component of the configuration and overset minor grids are used to resolve all other features. Methods for connecting overset multiple grids and modifications of flow-simulation algorithms are discussed. Computational tests in two dimensions indicate that the use of multiple overset grids can simplify the task of grid generation without an adverse effect on flow-field algorithms and computer code complexity.

A Method for Thermal Analysis of Spiral Bevel Gears

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Handschuh, Robert F.; Kicher, Thomas P.

1994-01-01

A modeling method for analyzing the three-dimensional thermal behavior of spiral bevel gears has been developed. The model surfaces are generated through application of differential geometry to the manufacturing process for face-milled spiral bevel gears. Contact on the gear surface is found by combining tooth contact analysis with three-dimensional Hertzian theory. The tooth contact analysis provides the principle curvatures and orientations of the two surfaces. This information is then used directly in the Hertzian analysis to find the contact size and maximum pressure. Heat generation during meshing is determined as a function of the applied load, sliding velocity, and coefficient of friction. Each of these factors change as the point of contact changes during meshing. A nonlinear finite element program was used to conduct the heat transfer analysis. This program permitted the time- and position-varying boundary conditions, found in operation, to be applied to a one-tooth model. An example model and analytical results are presented.

Towards a theory of automated elliptic mesh generation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Cordova, J. Q.

1992-01-01

The theory of elliptic mesh generation is reviewed and the fundamental problem of constructing computational space is discussed. It is argued that the construction of computational space is an NP-Complete problem and therefore requires a nonstandard approach for its solution. This leads to the development of graph-theoretic, combinatorial optimization and integer programming algorithms. Methods for the construction of two dimensional computational space are presented.

New Computer Simulations of Macular Neural Functioning

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Ross, Muriel D.; Doshay, D.; Linton, S.; Parnas, B.; Montgomery, K.; Chimento, T.

1994-01-01

We use high performance graphics workstations and supercomputers to study the functional significance of the three-dimensional (3-D) organization of gravity sensors. These sensors have a prototypic architecture foreshadowing more complex systems. Scaled-down simulations run on a Silicon Graphics workstation and scaled-up, 3-D versions run on a Cray Y-MP supercomputer. A semi-automated method of reconstruction of neural tissue from serial sections studied in a transmission electron microscope has been developed to eliminate tedious conventional photography. The reconstructions use a mesh as a step in generating a neural surface for visualization. Two meshes are required to model calyx surfaces. The meshes are connected and the resulting prisms represent the cytoplasm and the bounding membranes. A finite volume analysis method is employed to simulate voltage changes along the calyx in response to synapse activation on the calyx or on calyceal processes. The finite volume method insures that charge is conserved at the calyx-process junction. These and other models indicate that efferent processes act as voltage followers, and that the morphology of some afferent processes affects their functioning. In a final application, morphological information is symbolically represented in three dimensions in a computer. The possible functioning of the connectivities is tested using mathematical interpretations of physiological parameters taken from the literature. Symbolic, 3-D simulations are in progress to probe the functional significance of the connectivities. This research is expected to advance computer-based studies of macular functioning and of synaptic plasticity.

Laparoscopic repair of incisional and ventral hernias with the new type of meshes: randomized control trial.

PubMed

Grubnik, Vladimir V; Grubnik, Aleksandra V; Vorotyntseva, Kseniya O

2014-06-01

Laparoscopic incisional and ventral hernia repair (LIVHR) was first reported by Le Blanc and Booth in 1993. Many studies are available in the literature that have shown that laparoscopic repair of incisional and ventral hernia is preferred over open repair because of lower recurrence rates (less than 10%), less wound morbidity, less pain, and early return to work. To identify the long-term outcomes between the different types of meshes and two techniques of mesh fixation, i.e., tacks (method Double crown) and transfascial polypropylene sutures. A total of 92 patients underwent LIVHR at our department between January 2009 and August 2012. The hernias were umbilical in 26 patients, paraumbilical in 15 patients and incisional in 51 patients. All patients admitted for LIVHR were randomized to either group I (tacker fixation of ePTFE meshes) or group II (suture fixation of meshes with nitinol frame) using computer-generated random numbers with block randomization and sealed envelopes for concealed allocation. The mean mesh fixation time was significantly higher in the tacker fixation group (117 ±15 min vs. 72 ±6 min, p < 0.01). There were no conversions in either group. The median postoperative hospital stay was 3.5 ±1.5 days. All patients were followed up at 1, 3, 6, 12 and every 6 months thereafter postoperatively. There were 5 recurrences in the study population. In group I there were 4 patients with recurrence, and only 1 patient in the group with meshes with a nitinol frame. Meshes of the new generation with a nitinol framework can significantly improve laparoscopic ventral hernia repair. The fixation of these meshes is very simple using 3-4 transfascial sutures. The absence of shrinkage of these meshes makes the probability of recurrence minimal. Absence of tackers allows postoperative pain to be minimized. We consider that these new meshes can significantly improve laparoscopic ventral hernia repair.

Numerical simulation of tides in Ontario Lacus

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Vincent, David; Karatekin, Ozgür

2015-04-01

Hydrocarbons liquid filled lakes has been recently detected on Titan's surface. Most of these lakes are located in the northern latitudes but there is a substantial lake in the southern latitudes: Ontario Lacus. This lake gets our attention because of possible shoreline changes suggested by Cassini flybys over Ontario Lacus between September 2005 (T7) et January 2010 (T65). The shoreline changes could be due to evaporation-precipitation processes but could also be a consequence of tides. Previous studies showed that the maximal tidal amplitudes of Ontario Lacus would be about 0.2m (for an uniform bathymetry of 20m). In this study we simulate tidal amplitude and currents with SLIM (Second-generation Louvain-la-Neuve Ice-ocean Model, http://sites.uclouvain.be/slim/ ) which resolves 2D shallow water equation on an unstructured mesh. Unstructured mesh prevents problems like mesh discontinuities at poles and allows higher accuracy at some place like coast or straits without drastically increasing computing costs. The tide generating force modeled in this work is the gradient of tidal potential due to titan's obliquity and titan's orbital eccentricity around Saturn (other contribution such as sun tide generating force are unheeded). The uncertain input parameters such as the wind direction and amplitude, bottom friction and thermo-physical properties of hydrocarbons liquids are varied within their expected ranges. SAR data analysis can result in different bathymetry according to the method. We proceed simulations for different bathymetries: tidal amplitudes doesn't change but this is not the case for tidal currents. Using a recent bathymetry deduced from most recent RADAR/SAR observations and a finer mesh, the peak-to peak tidal amplitudes are calculated to be up to 0.6 m. which is more than a factor two larger than the previous results. The maximal offshore tidal currents magnitude is about 0.06 m/s.

On the application of hybrid meshes in hydraulic machinery CFD simulations

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Schlipf, M.; Tismer, A.; Riedelbauch, S.

2016-11-01

The application of two different hybrid mesh types for the simulation of a Francis runner for automated optimization processes without user input is investigated. Those mesh types are applied to simplified test cases such as flow around NACA airfoils to identify the special mesh resolution effects with reduced complexity, like rotating cascade flows, as they occur in a turbomachine runner channel. The analysis includes the application of those different meshes on the geometries by keeping defined quality criteria and exploring the influences on the simulation results. All results are compared with reference values gained by simulations with blockstructured hexahedron meshes and the same numerical scheme. This avoids additional inaccuracies caused by further numerical and experimental measurement methods. The results show that a simulation with hybrid meshes built up by a blockstructured domain with hexahedrons around the blade in combination with a tetrahedral far field in the channel is sufficient to get results which are almost as accurate as the results gained by the reference simulation. Furthermore this method is robust enough for automated processes without user input and enables comparable meshes in size, distribution and quality for different similar geometries as occurring in optimization processes.

The complete digital workflow in fixed prosthodontics: a systematic review.

PubMed

Joda, Tim; Zarone, Fernando; Ferrari, Marco

2017-09-19

The continuous development in dental processing ensures new opportunities in the field of fixed prosthodontics in a complete virtual environment without any physical model situations. The aim was to compare fully digitalized workflows to conventional and/or mixed analog-digital workflows for the treatment with tooth-borne or implant-supported fixed reconstructions. A PICO strategy was executed using an electronic (MEDLINE, EMBASE, Google Scholar) plus manual search up to 2016-09-16 focusing on RCTs investigating complete digital workflows in fixed prosthodontics with regard to economics or esthetics or patient-centered outcomes with or without follow-up or survival/success rate analysis as well as complication assessment of at least 1 year under function. The search strategy was assembled from MeSH-Terms and unspecific free-text words: {(("Dental Prosthesis" [MeSH]) OR ("Crowns" [MeSH]) OR ("Dental Prosthesis, Implant-Supported" [MeSH])) OR ((crown) OR (fixed dental prosthesis) OR (fixed reconstruction) OR (dental bridge) OR (implant crown) OR (implant prosthesis) OR (implant restoration) OR (implant reconstruction))} AND {("Computer-Aided Design" [MeSH]) OR ((digital workflow) OR (digital technology) OR (computerized dentistry) OR (intraoral scan) OR (digital impression) OR (scanbody) OR (virtual design) OR (digital design) OR (cad/cam) OR (rapid prototyping) OR (monolithic) OR (full-contour))} AND {("Dental Technology" [MeSH) OR ((conventional workflow) OR (lost-wax-technique) OR (porcelain-fused-to-metal) OR (PFM) OR (implant impression) OR (hand-layering) OR (veneering) OR (framework))} AND {(("Study, Feasibility" [MeSH]) OR ("Survival" [MeSH]) OR ("Success" [MeSH]) OR ("Economics" [MeSH]) OR ("Costs, Cost Analysis" [MeSH]) OR ("Esthetics, Dental" [MeSH]) OR ("Patient Satisfaction" [MeSH])) OR ((feasibility) OR (efficiency) OR (patient-centered outcome))}. Assessment of risk of bias in selected studies was done at a 'trial level' including random sequence generation, allocation concealment, blinding, completeness of outcome data, selective reporting, and other bias using the Cochrane Collaboration tool. A judgment of risk of bias was assigned if one or more key domains had a high or unclear risk of bias. An official registration of the systematic review was not performed. The systematic search identified 67 titles, 32 abstracts thereof were screened, and subsequently, three full-texts included for data extraction. Analysed RCTs were heterogeneous without follow-up. One study demonstrated that fully digitally produced dental crowns revealed the feasibility of the process itself; however, the marginal precision was lower for lithium disilicate (LS2) restorations (113.8 μm) compared to conventional metal-ceramic (92.4 μm) and zirconium dioxide (ZrO2) crowns (68.5 μm) (p < 0.05). Another study showed that leucite-reinforced glass ceramic crowns were esthetically favoured by the patients (8/2 crowns) and clinicians (7/3 crowns) (p < 0.05). The third study investigated implant crowns. The complete digital workflow was more than twofold faster (75.3 min) in comparison to the mixed analog-digital workflow (156.6 min) (p < 0.05). No RCTs could be found investigating multi-unit fixed dental prostheses (FDP). The number of RCTs testing complete digital workflows in fixed prosthodontics is low. Scientifically proven recommendations for clinical routine cannot be given at this time. Research with high-quality trials seems to be slower than the industrial progress of available digital applications. Future research with well-designed RCTs including follow-up observation is compellingly necessary in the field of complete digital processing.

Numerical modeling of landslide-generated tsunami using adaptive unstructured meshes

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wilson, Cian; Collins, Gareth; Desousa Costa, Patrick; Piggott, Matthew

2010-05-01

Landslides impacting into or occurring under water generate waves, which can have devastating environmental consequences. Depending on the characteristics of the landslide the waves can have significant amplitude and potentially propagate over large distances. Linear models of classical earthquake-generated tsunamis cannot reproduce the highly nonlinear generation mechanisms required to accurately predict the consequences of landslide-generated tsunamis. Also, laboratory-scale experimental investigation is limited to simple geometries and short time-scales before wave reflections contaminate the data. Computational fluid dynamics models based on the nonlinear Navier-Stokes equations can simulate landslide-tsunami generation at realistic scales. However, traditional chessboard-like structured meshes introduce superfluous resolution and hence the computing power required for such a simulation can be prohibitively high, especially in three dimensions. Unstructured meshes allow the grid spacing to vary rapidly from high resolution in the vicinity of small scale features to much coarser, lower resolution in other areas. Combining this variable resolution with dynamic mesh adaptivity allows such high resolution zones to follow features like the interface between the landslide and the water whilst minimising the computational costs. Unstructured meshes are also better suited to representing complex geometries and bathymetries allowing more realistic domains to be simulated. Modelling multiple materials, like water, air and a landslide, on an unstructured adaptive mesh poses significant numerical challenges. Novel methods of interface preservation must be considered and coupled to a flow model in such a way that ensures conservation of the different materials. Furthermore this conservation property must be maintained during successive stages of mesh optimisation and interpolation. In this paper we validate a new multi-material adaptive unstructured fluid dynamics model against the well-known Lituya Bay landslide-generated wave experiment and case study [1]. In addition, we explore the effect of physical parameters, such as the shape, velocity and viscosity of the landslide, on wave amplitude and run-up, to quantify their influence on the landslide-tsunami hazard. As well as reproducing the experimental results, the model is shown to have excellent conservation and bounding properties. It also requires fewer nodes than an equivalent resolution fixed mesh simulation, therefore minimising at least one aspect of the computational cost. These computational savings are directly transferable to higher dimensions and some initial three dimensional results are also presented. These reproduce the experiments of DiRisio et al. [2], where an 80cm long landslide analogue was released from the side of an 8.9m diameter conical island in a 50 × 30m tank of water. The resulting impact between the landslide and the water generated waves with an amplitude of 1cm at wave gauges around the island. The range of scales that must be considered in any attempt to numerically reproduce this experiment makes it an ideal case study for our multi-material adaptive unstructured fluid dynamics model. [1] FRITZ, H. M., MOHAMMED, F., & YOO, J. 2009. Lituya Bay Landslide Impact Generated Mega-Tsunami 50th Anniversary. Pure and Applied Geophysics, 166(1), 153-175. [2] DIRISIO, M., DEGIROLAMO, P., BELLOTTI, G., PANIZZO, A., ARISTODEMO, F.,

On the Use of CAD-Native Predicates and Geometry in Surface Meshing

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Aftosmis, M. J.

1999-01-01

Several paradigms for accessing computer-aided design (CAD) geometry during surface meshing for computational fluid dynamics are discussed. File translation, inconsistent geometry engines, and nonnative point construction are all identified as sources of nonrobustness. The paper argues in favor of accessing CAD parts and assemblies in their native format, without translation, and for the use of CAD-native predicates and constructors in surface mesh generation. The discussion also emphasizes the importance of examining the computational requirements for exact evaluation of triangulation predicates during surface meshing.

Numerical analysis method for linear induction machines.

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Elliott, D. G.

1972-01-01

A numerical analysis method has been developed for linear induction machines such as liquid metal MHD pumps and generators and linear motors. Arbitrary phase currents or voltages can be specified and the moving conductor can have arbitrary velocity and conductivity variations from point to point. The moving conductor is divided into a mesh and coefficients are calculated for the voltage induced at each mesh point by unit current at every other mesh point. Combining the coefficients with the mesh resistances yields a set of simultaneous equations which are solved for the unknown currents.

Using Global Plate Velocity Boundary Conditions for Embedded Regional Geodynamic Models: Application to 3-D Modeling of the Early Rifting of the South Atlantic

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Taramón, Jorge M.; Morgan, Jason P.; Pérez-Gussinyé, Marta

2016-04-01

The treatment of far-field boundary conditions is one of the most poorly resolved issues for regional modeling of geodynamic processes. In viscous flow, the choice of far-field boundary conditions often strongly shapes the large-scale structure of a geosimulation. The mantle velocity field along the sidewalls and base of a modeling region is typically much more poorly known than the geometry of past global motions of the surface plates as constrained by global plate motion reconstructions. For regional rifting models it has become routine to apply highly simplified 'plate spreading' or 'uniform rifting' boundary conditions to a 3-D model that limits its ability to simulate the geodynamic evolution of a specific rifted margin. One way researchers are exploring the sensitivity of regional models to uncertain boundary conditions is to use a nested modeling approach in which a global model is used to determine a large-scale flow pattern that is imposed as a constraint along the boundaries of the region to be modeled. Here we explore the utility of a different approach that takes advantage of the ability of finite element models to use unstructured meshes than can embed much higher resolution sub-regions. Here we demonstrate the workflow and code tools that we created to generate this unstructured mesh: solver based on springs, guide-mesh and routines to improve the quality, e.g., closeness to a regular tetrahedron, of the tetrahedral elements of the mesh. Note that the same routines are used to generate a new mesh in the remeshing of a distorted Lagrangian mesh. In our initial project to validate this approach, we create a global spherical shell mesh in which a higher resolution sub-region is created around the nascent South Atlantic Rifting Margin. Global Plate motion BCs and plate boundaries are applied for the time of the onset of rifting, continuing through several 10s of Ma of rifting. Thermal, compositional, and melt-related buoyancy forces are only non-zero within the high-resolution sub-region, elsewhere, motions are constrained by surface plate-motion constraints. The total number of unknowns needed to solve an embedded regional model with this approach is less than 1/3 larger than that needed for a structured-mesh solution on a Cartesian or spherical cap sub-regional mesh. Here we illustrate the steps within this workflow for modeling the potential mantle flow associated with the early rifting evolution of the South Atlantic, in particular studying the potential effects of a 'Parana Plume' during the transition from rift to drift.

DETERIORATION IN BIOMECHANICAL PROPERTIES OF THE VAGINA FOLLOWING IMPLANTATION OF A HIGH STIFFNESS PROLAPSE MESH

PubMed Central

Feola, Andrew; Abramowitch, Steven; Jallah, Zegbeh; Stein, Suzan; Barone, William; Palcsey, Stacy; Moalli, Pamela

2012-01-01

Objective Define the impact of prolapse mesh on the biomechanical properties of the vagina by comparing the prototype Gynemesh PS (Ethicon, Somerville, NJ) to 2 new generation lower stiffness meshes, SmartMesh (Coloplast, Minneapolis, MN) and UltraPro (Ethicon). Design A study employing a non-human primate model Setting University of Pittsburgh Population 45 parous rhesus macaques Methods Meshes were implanted via sacrocolpexy after hysterectomy and compared to Sham. Because its stiffness is highly directional UltraPro was implanted in two directions: UltraPro Perpendicular (less stiff) and UltraPro Parallel (more stiff), with the indicated direction referring to the blue orientation lines. The mesh-vaginal complex (MVC) was excised en toto after 3 months. Main Outcome Measures Active mechanical properties were quantified as contractile force generated in the presence of 120 mM KCl. Passive mechanical properties (a tissues ability to resist an applied force) were measured using a multi-axial protocol. Results Vaginal contractility decreased 80% following implantation with the Gynemesh PS (p=0.001), 48% after SmartMesh (p=0.001), 68% after UltraPro parallel (p=0.001) and was highly variable after UltraPro perpendicular (p =0.16). The tissue contribution to the passive mechanical behavior of the MVC was drastically reduced for Gynemesh PS (p=0.003) but not SmartMesh (p=0.9) or UltraPro independent of the direction of implantation (p=0.68 and p=0.66, respectively). Conclusions Deterioration of the mechanical properties of the vagina was highest following implantation with the stiffest mesh, Gynemesh PS. Such a decrease associated with implantation of a device of increased stiffness is consistent with findings from other systems employing prostheses for support. PMID:23240801

Deterioration in biomechanical properties of the vagina following implantation of a high-stiffness prolapse mesh.

PubMed

Feola, A; Abramowitch, S; Jallah, Z; Stein, S; Barone, W; Palcsey, S; Moalli, P

2013-01-01

To define the impact of prolapse mesh on the biomechanical properties of the vagina by comparing the prototype Gynemesh PS (Ethicon) to two new-generation lower stiffness meshes, SmartMesh (Coloplast) and UltraPro (Ethicon). A study employing a nonhuman primate model. University of Pittsburgh, PA, USA. Forty-five parous rhesus macaques. Meshes were implanted via sacrocolpopexy after hysterectomy and compared with sham. Because its stiffness is highly directional, UltraPro was implanted in two directions: UltraPro Perpendicular (less stiff) and UltraPro Parallel (more stiff), with the indicated direction referring to the position of the blue orientation lines relative to the longitudinal axis of the vagina. The mesh-vaginal complex (MVC) was excised in toto after 3 months. Active mechanical properties were quantified as the contractile force generated in the presence of 120 mmol/l KCl. Passive mechanical properties (a tissue's ability to resist an applied force) were measured using a multiaxial protocol. Vaginal contractility decreased by 80% following implantation with the Gynemesh PS (P = 0.001), 48% after SmartMesh (P = 0.001), 68% after UltraPro Parallel (P = 0.001) and was highly variable after UltraPro Perpendicular (P = 0.16). The tissue contribution to the passive mechanical behaviour of the MVC was drastically reduced for Gynemesh PS (P = 0.003), but not for SmartMesh (P = 0.9) or UltraPro independent of the direction of implantation (P = 0.68 and P = 0.66, respectively). Deterioration of the mechanical properties of the vagina was highest following implantation with the stiffest mesh, Gynemesh PS. Such a decrease associated with implantation of a device of increased stiffness is consistent with findings from other systems employing prostheses for support. © 2013 The Authors BJOG An International Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology © 2013 RCOG.

Three-dimensional structural analysis using interactive graphics

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Biffle, J.; Sumlin, H. A.

1975-01-01

The application of computer interactive graphics to three-dimensional structural analysis was described, with emphasis on the following aspects: (1) structural analysis, and (2) generation and checking of input data and examination of the large volume of output data (stresses, displacements, velocities, accelerations). Handling of three-dimensional input processing with a special MESH3D computer program was explained. Similarly, a special code PLTZ may be used to perform all the needed tasks for output processing from a finite element code. Examples were illustrated.

Extending a CAD-Based Cartesian Mesh Generator for the Lattice Boltzmann Method

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Cantrell, J Nathan; Inclan, Eric J; Joshi, Abhijit S

2012-01-01

This paper describes the development of a custom preprocessor for the PaRAllel Thermal Hydraulics simulations using Advanced Mesoscopic methods (PRATHAM) code based on an open-source mesh generator, CartGen [1]. PRATHAM is a three-dimensional (3D) lattice Boltzmann method (LBM) based parallel flow simulation software currently under development at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. The LBM algorithm in PRATHAM requires a uniform, coordinate system-aligned, non-body-fitted structured mesh for its computational domain. CartGen [1], which is a GNU-licensed open source code, already comes with some of the above needed functionalities. However, it needs to be further extended to fully support the LBM specificmore » preprocessing requirements. Therefore, CartGen is being modified to (i) be compiler independent while converting a neutral-format STL (Stereolithography) CAD geometry to a uniform structured Cartesian mesh, (ii) provide a mechanism for PRATHAM to import the mesh and identify the fluid/solid domains, and (iii) provide a mechanism to visually identify and tag the domain boundaries on which to apply different boundary conditions.« less

Capu and Spire assemble a cytoplasmic actin mesh that maintains microtubule organization in the Drosophila oocyte.

PubMed

Dahlgaard, Katja; Raposo, Alexandre A S F; Niccoli, Teresa; St Johnston, Daniel

2007-10-01

Mutants in the actin nucleators Cappuccino and Spire disrupt the polarized microtubule network in the Drosophila oocyte that defines the anterior-posterior axis, suggesting that microtubule organization depends on actin. Here, we show that Cappuccino and Spire organize an isotropic mesh of actin filaments in the oocyte cytoplasm. capu and spire mutants lack this mesh, whereas overexpressed truncated Cappuccino stabilizes the mesh in the presence of Latrunculin A and partially rescues spire mutants. Spire overexpression cannot rescue capu mutants, but prevents actin mesh disassembly at stage 10B and blocks late cytoplasmic streaming. We also show that the actin mesh regulates microtubules indirectly, by inhibiting kinesin-dependent cytoplasmic flows. Thus, the Capu pathway controls alternative states of the oocyte cytoplasm: when active, it assembles an actin mesh that suppresses kinesin motility to maintain a polarized microtubule cytoskeleton. When inactive, unrestrained kinesin movement generates flows that wash microtubules to the cortex.

Generating a Simulated Fluid Flow over a Surface Using Anisotropic Diffusion

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Rodriguez, David L. (Inventor); Sturdza, Peter (Inventor)

2016-01-01

A fluid-flow simulation over a computer-generated surface is generated using a diffusion technique. The surface is comprised of a surface mesh of polygons. A boundary-layer fluid property is obtained for a subset of the polygons of the surface mesh. A gradient vector is determined for a selected polygon, the selected polygon belonging to the surface mesh but not one of the subset of polygons. A maximum and minimum diffusion rate is determined along directions determined using the gradient vector corresponding to the selected polygon. A diffusion-path vector is defined between a point in the selected polygon and a neighboring point in a neighboring polygon. An updated fluid property is determined for the selected polygon using a variable diffusion rate, the variable diffusion rate based on the minimum diffusion rate, maximum diffusion rate, and the gradient vector.

Analysis of dynamic behavior of multiple-stage planetary gear train used in wind driven generator.

PubMed

Wang, Jungang; Wang, Yong; Huo, Zhipu

2014-01-01

A dynamic model of multiple-stage planetary gear train composed of a two-stage planetary gear train and a one-stage parallel axis gear is proposed to be used in wind driven generator to analyze the influence of revolution speed and mesh error on dynamic load sharing characteristic based on the lumped parameter theory. Dynamic equation of the model is solved using numerical method to analyze the uniform load distribution of the system. It is shown that the load sharing property of the system is significantly affected by mesh error and rotational speed; load sharing coefficient and change rate of internal and external meshing of the system are of obvious difference from each other. The study provides useful theoretical guideline for the design of the multiple-stage planetary gear train of wind driven generator.

Analysis of Dynamic Behavior of Multiple-Stage Planetary Gear Train Used in Wind Driven Generator

PubMed Central

Wang, Jungang; Wang, Yong; Huo, Zhipu

2014-01-01

A dynamic model of multiple-stage planetary gear train composed of a two-stage planetary gear train and a one-stage parallel axis gear is proposed to be used in wind driven generator to analyze the influence of revolution speed and mesh error on dynamic load sharing characteristic based on the lumped parameter theory. Dynamic equation of the model is solved using numerical method to analyze the uniform load distribution of the system. It is shown that the load sharing property of the system is significantly affected by mesh error and rotational speed; load sharing coefficient and change rate of internal and external meshing of the system are of obvious difference from each other. The study provides useful theoretical guideline for the design of the multiple-stage planetary gear train of wind driven generator. PMID:24511295

Monte Carlo design of optimal wire mesh collimator for breast tumor imaging process

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Saad, W. H. M.; Roslan, R. E.; Mahdi, M. A.; Choong, W.-S.; Saion, E.; Saripan, M. I.

2011-08-01

This paper presents the modeling of breast tumor imaging process using wire mesh collimator gamma camera. Previous studies showed that the wire mesh collimator has a potential to improve the sensitivity of the tumor detection. In this paper, we extend our research significantly, to find an optimal configuration of the wire mesh collimator specifically for semi-compressed breast tumor detection, by looking into four major factors: weight, sensitivity, spatial resolution and tumor contrast. The numbers of layers in the wire mesh collimator is varied to optimize the collimator design. The statistical variations of the results are studied by simulating multiple realizations for each experiment using different starting random numbers. All the simulation environments are modeled using Monte Carlo N-Particle Code (MCNP). The quality of the detection is measured directly by comparing the sensitivity, spatial resolution and tumor contrast of the images produced by the wire mesh collimator and benchmarked that with a standard multihole collimator. The proposed optimal configuration of the wire mesh collimator is optimized by selecting the number of layers in wire mesh collimator, where the tumor contrast shows a relatively comparable value to the multihole collimator, when it is tested with uniformly semi-compressed breast phantom. The wire mesh collimator showed higher number of sensitivity because of its loose arrangement while the spatial resolution of wire mesh collimator does not shows much different compared to the multihole collimator. With a relatively good tumor contrast and spatial resolution, and increased in sensitivity, a new proposed wire mesh collimator gives a significant improvement in the wire mesh collimator design for breast cancer imaging process. The proposed collimator configuration is reduced to 44.09% from the total multihole collimator weight.

Spectral-element simulations of wave propagation in complex exploration-industry models: Mesh generation and forward simulations

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Nissen-Meyer, T.; Luo, Y.; Morency, C.; Tromp, J.

2008-12-01

Seismic-wave propagation in exploration-industry settings has seen major research and development efforts for decades, yet large-scale applications have often been limited to 2D or 3D finite-difference, (visco- )acoustic wave propagation due to computational limitations. We explore the possibility of including all relevant physical signatures in the wavefield using the spectral- element method (SPECFEM3D, SPECFEM2D), thereby accounting for acoustic, (visco-)elastic, poroelastic, anisotropic wave propagation in meshes which honor all crucial discontinuities. Mesh design is the crux of the problem, and we use CUBIT (Sandia Laboratories) to generate unstructured quadrilateral 2D and hexahedral 3D meshes for these complex background models. While general hexahedral mesh generation is an unresolved problem, we are able to accommodate most of the relevant settings (e.g., layer-cake models, salt bodies, overthrusting faults, and strong topography) with respectively tailored workflows. 2D simulations show localized, characteristic wave effects due to these features that shall be helpful in designing survey acquisition geometries in a relatively economic fashion. We address some of the fundamental issues this comprehensive modeling approach faces regarding its feasibility: Assessing geological structures in terms of the necessity to honor the major structural units, appropriate velocity model interpolation, quality control of the resultant mesh, and computational cost for realistic settings up to frequencies of 40 Hz. The solution to this forward problem forms the basis for subsequent 2D and 3D adjoint tomography within this context, which is the subject of a companion paper.

Developing a Learning Algorithm-Generated Empirical Relaxer

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Mitchell, Wayne; Kallman, Josh; Toreja, Allen

2016-03-30

One of the main difficulties when running Arbitrary Lagrangian-Eulerian (ALE) simulations is determining how much to relax the mesh during the Eulerian step. This determination is currently made by the user on a simulation-by-simulation basis. We present a Learning Algorithm-Generated Empirical Relaxer (LAGER) which uses a regressive random forest algorithm to automate this decision process. We also demonstrate that LAGER successfully relaxes a variety of test problems, maintains simulation accuracy, and has the potential to significantly decrease both the person-hours and computational hours needed to run a successful ALE simulation.

A knowledge-driven approach to biomedical document conceptualization.

PubMed

Zheng, Hai-Tao; Borchert, Charles; Jiang, Yong

2010-06-01

Biomedical document conceptualization is the process of clustering biomedical documents based on ontology-represented domain knowledge. The result of this process is the representation of the biomedical documents by a set of key concepts and their relationships. Most of clustering methods cluster documents based on invariant domain knowledge. The objective of this work is to develop an effective method to cluster biomedical documents based on various user-specified ontologies, so that users can exploit the concept structures of documents more effectively. We develop a flexible framework to allow users to specify the knowledge bases, in the form of ontologies. Based on the user-specified ontologies, we develop a key concept induction algorithm, which uses latent semantic analysis to identify key concepts and cluster documents. A corpus-related ontology generation algorithm is developed to generate the concept structures of documents. Based on two biomedical datasets, we evaluate the proposed method and five other clustering algorithms. The clustering results of the proposed method outperform the five other algorithms, in terms of key concept identification. With respect to the first biomedical dataset, our method has the F-measure values 0.7294 and 0.5294 based on the MeSH ontology and gene ontology (GO), respectively. With respect to the second biomedical dataset, our method has the F-measure values 0.6751 and 0.6746 based on the MeSH ontology and GO, respectively. Both results outperforms the five other algorithms in terms of F-measure. Based on the MeSH ontology and GO, the generated corpus-related ontologies show informative conceptual structures. The proposed method enables users to specify the domain knowledge to exploit the conceptual structures of biomedical document collections. In addition, the proposed method is able to extract the key concepts and cluster the documents with a relatively high precision. Copyright 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Microscreen radiation shield for thermoelectric generator

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Hunt, T.K.; Novak, R.F.; McBride, J.R.

1990-08-14

This patent describes a radiation shield adapted to be interposed between a reaction zone and a means for condensing an alkali metal vapor in a thermoelectric generator for converting heat energy directly to electrical energy. The radiation shield comprises woven wire mesh screen, the spacing between the wires forming the mesh screen being such that the radiation shield reflects thermal radiation while permitting the passage of alkali metal vapor therethrough.

Impact of solids on composite materials

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bronson, Arturo; Maldonado, Jerry; Chern, Tzong; Martinez, Francisco; Mccord-Medrano, Johnnie; Roschke, Paul N.

1987-01-01

The failure modes of composite materials as a result of low velocity impact were investigated by simulating the impact with a finite element analysis. An important facet of the project is the modeling of the impact of a solid onto cylindrical shells composed of composite materials. The model under development will simulate the delamination sustained when a composite material encounters impact from another rigid body. The computer equipment was installed, the computer network tested, and a finite element method model was developed to compare results with known experimental data. The model simulated the impact of a steel rod onto a rotating shaft. Pre-processing programs (GMESH and TANVEL) were developed to generate node and element data for the input into the three dimensional, dynamic finite element analysis code (DYNA3D). The finite element mesh was configured with a fine mesh near the impact zone and a coarser mesh for the impacting rod and the regions surrounding the impacting zone. For the computer simulation, five impacting loads were used to determine the time history of the stresses, the scribed surface areas, and the amount of ridging. The processing time of the computer codes amounted from 1 to 4 days. The calculated surface area were within 6-12 percent, relative error when compated to the actual scratch area.

Nanofiber Orientation and Surface Functionalization Modulate Human Mesenchymal Stem Cell Behavior In Vitro

PubMed Central

Kolambkar, Yash M.; Bajin, Mehmet; Wojtowicz, Abigail; Hutmacher, Dietmar W.; García, Andrés J.

2014-01-01

Electrospun nanofiber meshes have emerged as a new generation of scaffold membranes possessing a number of features suitable for tissue regeneration. One of these features is the flexibility to modify their structure and composition to orchestrate specific cellular responses. In this study, we investigated the effects of nanofiber orientation and surface functionalization on human mesenchymal stem cell (hMSC) migration and osteogenic differentiation. We used an in vitro model to examine hMSC migration into a cell-free zone on nanofiber meshes and mitomycin C treatment to assess the contribution of proliferation to the observed migration. Poly (ɛ-caprolactone) meshes with oriented topography were created by electrospinning aligned nanofibers on a rotating mandrel, while randomly oriented controls were collected on a stationary collector. Both aligned and random meshes were coated with a triple-helical, type I collagen-mimetic peptide, containing the glycine-phenylalanine-hydroxyproline-glycine-glutamate-arginine (GFOGER) motif. Our results indicate that nanofiber GFOGER peptide functionalization and orientation modulate cellular behavior, individually, and in combination. GFOGER significantly enhanced the migration, proliferation, and osteogenic differentiation of hMSCs on nanofiber meshes. Aligned nanofiber meshes displayed increased cell migration along the direction of fiber orientation compared to random meshes; however, fiber alignment did not influence osteogenic differentiation. Compared to each other, GFOGER coating resulted in a higher proliferation-driven cell migration, whereas fiber orientation appeared to generate a larger direct migratory effect. This study demonstrates that peptide surface modification and topographical cues associated with fiber alignment can be used to direct cellular behavior on nanofiber mesh scaffolds, which may be exploited for tissue regeneration. PMID:24020454

Examples of finite element mesh generation using SDRC IDEAS

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Zapp, John; Volakis, John L.

1990-01-01

IDEAS (Integrated Design Engineering Analysis Software) offers a comprehensive package for mechanical design engineers. Due to its multifaceted capabilities, however, it can be manipulated to serve the needs of electrical engineers, also. IDEAS can be used to perform the following tasks: system modeling, system assembly, kinematics, finite element pre/post processing, finite element solution, system dynamics, drafting, test data analysis, and project relational database.

Procedure for Adapting Direct Simulation Monte Carlo Meshes

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Woronowicz, Michael S.; Wilmoth, Richard G.; Carlson, Ann B.; Rault, Didier F. G.

1992-01-01

A technique is presented for adapting computational meshes used in the G2 version of the direct simulation Monte Carlo method. The physical ideas underlying the technique are discussed, and adaptation formulas are developed for use on solutions generated from an initial mesh. The effect of statistical scatter on adaptation is addressed, and results demonstrate the ability of this technique to achieve more accurate results without increasing necessary computational resources.

Manual for automatic generation of finite element models of spiral bevel gears in mesh

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bibel, G. D.; Reddy, S.; Kumar, A.

1994-01-01

The goal of this research is to develop computer programs that generate finite element models suitable for doing 3D contact analysis of faced milled spiral bevel gears in mesh. A pinion tooth and a gear tooth are created and put in mesh. There are two programs: Points.f and Pat.f to perform the analysis. Points.f is based on the equation of meshing for spiral bevel gears. It uses machine tool settings to solve for an N x M mesh of points on the four surfaces, pinion concave and convex, and gear concave and convex. Points.f creates the file POINTS.OUT, an ASCI file containing N x M points for each surface. (N is the number of node points along the length of the tooth, and M is nodes along the height.) Pat.f reads POINTS.OUT and creates the file tl.out. Tl.out is a series of PATRAN input commands. In addition to the mesh density on the tooth face, additional user specified variables are the number of finite elements through the thickness, and the number of finite elements along the tooth full fillet. A full fillet is assumed to exist for both the pinion and gear.

Combined carbon mesh and small graphite fiber brush anodes to enhance and stabilize power generation in microbial fuel cells treating domestic wastewater

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wu, Shijia; He, Weihua; Yang, Wulin; Ye, Yaoli; Huang, Xia; Logan, Bruce E.

2017-07-01

Microbial fuel cells (MFCs) need to have a compact architecture, but power generation using low strength domestic wastewater is unstable for closely-spaced electrode designs using thin anodes (flat mesh or small diameter graphite fiber brushes) due to oxygen crossover from the cathode. A composite anode configuration was developed to improve performance, by joining the mesh and brushes together, with the mesh used to block oxygen crossover to the brushes, and the brushes used to stabilize mesh potentials. In small, fed-batch MFCs (28 mL), the composite anode produced 20% higher power densities than MFCs using only brushes, and 150% power densities compared to carbon mesh anodes. In continuous flow tests at short hydraulic retention times (HRTs, 2 or 4 h) using larger MFCs (100 mL), composite anodes had stable performance, while brush anode MFCs exhibited power overshoot in polarization tests. Both configurations exhibited power overshoot at a longer HRT of 8 h due to lower effluent CODs. The use of composite anodes reduced biomass growth on the cathode (1.9 ± 0.2 mg) compared to only brushes (3.1 ± 0.3 mg), and increased coulombic efficiencies, demonstrating that they successfully reduced oxygen contamination of the anode and the bio-fouling of cathode.

Optical Breast Shape Capture and Finite Element Mesh Generation for Electrical Impedance Tomography

PubMed Central

Forsyth, J.; Borsic, A.; Halter, R.J.; Hartov, A.; Paulsen, K.D.

2011-01-01

X-Ray mammography is the standard for breast cancer screening. The development of alternative imaging modalities is desirable because Mammograms expose patients to ionizing radiation. Electrical Impedance Tomography (EIT) may be used to determine tissue conductivity, a property which is an indicator of cancer presence. EIT is also a low-cost imaging solution and does not involve ionizing radiation. In breast EIT, impedance measurements are made using electrodes placed on the surface of the patient’s breast. The complex conductivity of the volume of the breast is estimated by a reconstruction algorithm. EIT reconstruction is a severely ill-posed inverse problem. As a result, noisy instrumentation and incorrect modelling of the electrodes and domain shape produce significant image artefacts. In this paper, we propose a method that has the potential to reduce these errors by accurately modelling the patient breast shape. A 3D hand-held optical scanner is used to acquire the breast geometry and electrode positions. We develop methods for processing the data from the scanner and producing volume meshes accurately matching the breast surface and electrode locations, which can be used for image reconstruction. We demonstrate this method for a plaster breast phantom and a human subject. Using this approach will allow patient-specific finite element meshes to be generated which has the potential to improve the clinical value of EIT for breast cancer diagnosis. PMID:21646711

Two-phase flow pattern measurements with a wire mesh sensor in a direct steam generating solar thermal collector

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Berger, Michael; Mokhtar, Marwan; Zahler, Christian; Willert, Daniel; Neuhäuser, Anton; Schleicher, Eckhard

2017-06-01

At Industrial Solar's test facility in Freiburg (Germany), two phase flow patterns have been measured by using a wire mesh sensor from Helmholtz Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf (HZDR). Main purpose of the measurements was to compare observed two-phase flow patterns with expected flow patterns from models. The two-phase flow pattern is important for the design of direct steam generating solar collectors. Vibrations should be avoided in the peripheral piping, and local dry-outs or large circumferential temperature gradients should be prevented in the absorber tubes. Therefore, the choice of design for operation conditions like mass flow and steam quality are an important step in the engineering process of such a project. Results of a measurement with the wire mesh sensor are the flow pattern and the plug or slug frequency at the given operating conditions. Under the assumption of the collector power, which can be assumed from previous measurements at the same collector and adaption with sun position and incidence angle modifier, also the slip can be evaluated for a wire mesh sensor measurement. Measurements have been performed at different mass flows and pressure levels. Transient behavior has been tested for flashing, change of mass flow, and sudden changes of irradiation (cloud simulation). This paper describes the measurements and the method of evaluation. Results are shown as extruded profiles in top view and in side view. Measurement and model are compared. The tests have been performed at low steam quality, because of the limits of the test facility. Conclusions and implications for possible future measurements at larger collectors are also presented in this paper.

A massively parallel adaptive scheme for melt migration in geodynamics computations

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Dannberg, Juliane; Heister, Timo; Grove, Ryan

2016-04-01

Melt generation and migration are important processes for the evolution of the Earth's interior and impact the global convection of the mantle. While they have been the subject of numerous investigations, the typical time and length-scales of melt transport are vastly different from global mantle convection, which determines where melt is generated. This makes it difficult to study mantle convection and melt migration in a unified framework. In addition, modelling magma dynamics poses the challenge of highly non-linear and spatially variable material properties, in particular the viscosity. We describe our extension of the community mantle convection code ASPECT that adds equations describing the behaviour of silicate melt percolating through and interacting with a viscously deforming host rock. We use the original compressible formulation of the McKenzie equations, augmented by an equation for the conservation of energy. This approach includes both melt migration and melt generation with the accompanying latent heat effects, and it incorporates the individual compressibilities of the solid and the fluid phase. For this, we derive an accurate and stable Finite Element scheme that can be combined with adaptive mesh refinement. This is particularly advantageous for this type of problem, as the resolution can be increased in mesh cells where melt is present and viscosity gradients are high, whereas a lower resolution is sufficient in regions without melt. Together with a high-performance, massively parallel implementation, this allows for high resolution, 3d, compressible, global mantle convection simulations coupled with melt migration. Furthermore, scalable iterative linear solvers are required to solve the large linear systems arising from the discretized system. Finally, we present benchmarks and scaling tests of our solver up to tens of thousands of cores, show the effectiveness of adaptive mesh refinement when applied to melt migration and compare the compressible and incompressible formulation. We then apply our software to large-scale 3d simulations of melting and melt transport in mantle plumes interacting with the lithosphere. Our model of magma dynamics provides a framework for modelling processes on different scales and investigating links between processes occurring in the deep mantle and melt generation and migration. The presented implementation is available online under an Open Source license together with an extensive documentation.

Effect of boundary representation on viscous, separated flows in a discontinuous-Galerkin Navier-Stokes solver

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Nelson, Daniel A.; Jacobs, Gustaaf B.; Kopriva, David A.

2016-08-01

The effect of curved-boundary representation on the physics of the separated flow over a NACA 65(1)-412 airfoil is thoroughly investigated. A method is presented to approximate curved boundaries with a high-order discontinuous-Galerkin spectral element method for the solution of the Navier-Stokes equations. Multiblock quadrilateral element meshes are constructed with the grid generation software GridPro. The boundary of a NACA 65(1)-412 airfoil, defined by a cubic natural spline, is piecewise-approximated by isoparametric polynomial interpolants that represent the edges of boundary-fitted elements. Direct numerical simulation of the airfoil is performed on a coarse mesh and fine mesh with polynomial orders ranging from four to twelve. The accuracy of the curve fitting is investigated by comparing the flows computed on curved-sided meshes with those given by straight-sided meshes. Straight-sided meshes yield irregular wakes, whereas curved-sided meshes produce a regular Karman street wake. Straight-sided meshes also produce lower lift and higher viscous drag as compared with curved-sided meshes. When the mesh is refined by reducing the sizes of the elements, the lift decrease and viscous drag increase are less pronounced. The differences in the aerodynamic performance between the straight-sided meshes and the curved-sided meshes are concluded to be the result of artificial surface roughness introduced by the piecewise-linear boundary approximation provided by the straight-sided meshes.

A semi-automatic computer-aided method for surgical template design

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chen, Xiaojun; Xu, Lu; Yang, Yue; Egger, Jan

2016-02-01

This paper presents a generalized integrated framework of semi-automatic surgical template design. Several algorithms were implemented including the mesh segmentation, offset surface generation, collision detection, ruled surface generation, etc., and a special software named TemDesigner was developed. With a simple user interface, a customized template can be semi- automatically designed according to the preoperative plan. Firstly, mesh segmentation with signed scalar of vertex is utilized to partition the inner surface from the input surface mesh based on the indicated point loop. Then, the offset surface of the inner surface is obtained through contouring the distance field of the inner surface, and segmented to generate the outer surface. Ruled surface is employed to connect inner and outer surfaces. Finally, drilling tubes are generated according to the preoperative plan through collision detection and merging. It has been applied to the template design for various kinds of surgeries, including oral implantology, cervical pedicle screw insertion, iliosacral screw insertion and osteotomy, demonstrating the efficiency, functionality and generality of our method.

A semi-automatic computer-aided method for surgical template design

PubMed Central

Chen, Xiaojun; Xu, Lu; Yang, Yue; Egger, Jan

2016-01-01

This paper presents a generalized integrated framework of semi-automatic surgical template design. Several algorithms were implemented including the mesh segmentation, offset surface generation, collision detection, ruled surface generation, etc., and a special software named TemDesigner was developed. With a simple user interface, a customized template can be semi- automatically designed according to the preoperative plan. Firstly, mesh segmentation with signed scalar of vertex is utilized to partition the inner surface from the input surface mesh based on the indicated point loop. Then, the offset surface of the inner surface is obtained through contouring the distance field of the inner surface, and segmented to generate the outer surface. Ruled surface is employed to connect inner and outer surfaces. Finally, drilling tubes are generated according to the preoperative plan through collision detection and merging. It has been applied to the template design for various kinds of surgeries, including oral implantology, cervical pedicle screw insertion, iliosacral screw insertion and osteotomy, demonstrating the efficiency, functionality and generality of our method. PMID:26843434

A semi-automatic computer-aided method for surgical template design.

PubMed

Chen, Xiaojun; Xu, Lu; Yang, Yue; Egger, Jan

2016-02-04

This paper presents a generalized integrated framework of semi-automatic surgical template design. Several algorithms were implemented including the mesh segmentation, offset surface generation, collision detection, ruled surface generation, etc., and a special software named TemDesigner was developed. With a simple user interface, a customized template can be semi- automatically designed according to the preoperative plan. Firstly, mesh segmentation with signed scalar of vertex is utilized to partition the inner surface from the input surface mesh based on the indicated point loop. Then, the offset surface of the inner surface is obtained through contouring the distance field of the inner surface, and segmented to generate the outer surface. Ruled surface is employed to connect inner and outer surfaces. Finally, drilling tubes are generated according to the preoperative plan through collision detection and merging. It has been applied to the template design for various kinds of surgeries, including oral implantology, cervical pedicle screw insertion, iliosacral screw insertion and osteotomy, demonstrating the efficiency, functionality and generality of our method.

Microelectromechanical timer

DOEpatents

Polosky, Marc A.; Garcia, Ernest J.; Plummer, David W.

2001-01-01

A microminiature timer having an optical readout is disclosed. The timer can be formed by surface micromachining or LIGA processes on a silicon substrate. The timer includes an integral motor (e.g. an electrostatic motor) that can intermittently wind a mainspring to store mechanical energy for driving a train of meshed timing gears at a rate that is regulated by a verge escapement. Each timing gear contains an optical encoder that can be read out with one or more light beams (e.g. from a laser or light-emitting diode) to recover timing information. In the event that electrical power to the timer is temporarily interrupted, the mechanical clock formed by the meshed timing gears and verge escapement can continue to operate, generating accurate timing information that can be read out when the power is restored.

Finite element analysis in fluids; Proceedings of the Seventh International Conference on Finite Element Methods in Flow Problems, University of Alabama, Huntsville, Apr. 3-7, 1989

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Chung, T. J. (Editor); Karr, Gerald R. (Editor)

1989-01-01

Recent advances in computational fluid dynamics are examined in reviews and reports, with an emphasis on finite-element methods. Sections are devoted to adaptive meshes, atmospheric dynamics, combustion, compressible flows, control-volume finite elements, crystal growth, domain decomposition, EM-field problems, FDM/FEM, and fluid-structure interactions. Consideration is given to free-boundary problems with heat transfer, free surface flow, geophysical flow problems, heat and mass transfer, high-speed flow, incompressible flow, inverse design methods, MHD problems, the mathematics of finite elements, and mesh generation. Also discussed are mixed finite elements, multigrid methods, non-Newtonian fluids, numerical dissipation, parallel vector processing, reservoir simulation, seepage, shallow-water problems, spectral methods, supercomputer architectures, three-dimensional problems, and turbulent flows.

Robust moving mesh algorithms for hybrid stretched meshes: Application to moving boundaries problems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Landry, Jonathan; Soulaïmani, Azzeddine; Luke, Edward; Ben Haj Ali, Amine

2016-12-01

A robust Mesh-Mover Algorithm (MMA) approach is designed to adapt meshes of moving boundaries problems. A new methodology is developed from the best combination of well-known algorithms in order to preserve the quality of initial meshes. In most situations, MMAs distribute mesh deformation while preserving a good mesh quality. However, invalid meshes are generated when the motion is complex and/or involves multiple bodies. After studying a few MMA limitations, we propose the following approach: use the Inverse Distance Weighting (IDW) function to produce the displacement field, then apply the Geometric Element Transformation Method (GETMe) smoothing algorithms to improve the resulting mesh quality, and use an untangler to revert negative elements. The proposed approach has been proven efficient to adapt meshes for various realistic aerodynamic motions: a symmetric wing that has suffered large tip bending and twisting and the high-lift components of a swept wing that has moved to different flight stages. Finally, the fluid flow problem has been solved on meshes that have moved and they have produced results close to experimental ones. However, for situations where moving boundaries are too close to each other, more improvements need to be made or other approaches should be taken, such as an overset grid method.

Generating a Simulated Fluid Flow Over an Aircraft Surface Using Anisotropic Diffusion

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Rodriguez, David L. (Inventor); Sturdza, Peter (Inventor)

2013-01-01

A fluid-flow simulation over a computer-generated aircraft surface is generated using a diffusion technique. The surface is comprised of a surface mesh of polygons. A boundary-layer fluid property is obtained for a subset of the polygons of the surface mesh. A pressure-gradient vector is determined for a selected polygon, the selected polygon belonging to the surface mesh but not one of the subset of polygons. A maximum and minimum diffusion rate is determined along directions determined using a pressure gradient vector corresponding to the selected polygon. A diffusion-path vector is defined between a point in the selected polygon and a neighboring point in a neighboring polygon. An updated fluid property is determined for the selected polygon using a variable diffusion rate, the variable diffusion rate based on the minimum diffusion rate, maximum diffusion rate, and angular difference between the diffusion-path vector and the pressure-gradient vector.

Automated variance reduction for MCNP using deterministic methods.

PubMed

Sweezy, J; Brown, F; Booth, T; Chiaramonte, J; Preeg, B

2005-01-01

In order to reduce the user's time and the computer time needed to solve deep penetration problems, an automated variance reduction capability has been developed for the MCNP Monte Carlo transport code. This new variance reduction capability developed for MCNP5 employs the PARTISN multigroup discrete ordinates code to generate mesh-based weight windows. The technique of using deterministic methods to generate importance maps has been widely used to increase the efficiency of deep penetration Monte Carlo calculations. The application of this method in MCNP uses the existing mesh-based weight window feature to translate the MCNP geometry into geometry suitable for PARTISN. The adjoint flux, which is calculated with PARTISN, is used to generate mesh-based weight windows for MCNP. Additionally, the MCNP source energy spectrum can be biased based on the adjoint energy spectrum at the source location. This method can also use angle-dependent weight windows.

Beta Testing of CFD Code for the Analysis of Combustion Systems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Yee, Emma; Wey, Thomas

2015-01-01

A preliminary version of OpenNCC was tested to assess its accuracy in generating steady-state temperature fields for combustion systems at atmospheric conditions using three-dimensional tetrahedral meshes. Meshes were generated from a CAD model of a single-element lean-direct injection combustor, and the latest version of OpenNCC was used to calculate combustor temperature fields. OpenNCC was shown to be capable of generating sustainable reacting flames using a tetrahedral mesh, and the subsequent results were compared to experimental results. While nonreacting flow results closely matched experimental results, a significant discrepancy was present between the code's reacting flow results and experimental results. When wide air circulation regions with high velocities were present in the model, this appeared to create inaccurately high temperature fields. Conversely, low recirculation velocities caused low temperature profiles. These observations will aid in future modification of OpenNCC reacting flow input parameters to improve the accuracy of calculated temperature fields.

Long range alpha particle detector

DOEpatents

MacArthur, Duncan W.; Wolf, Michael A.; McAtee, James L.; Unruh, Wesley P.; Cucchiara, Alfred L.; Huchton, Roger L.

1993-01-01

An alpha particle detector capable of detecting alpha radiation from distant sources. In one embodiment, a high voltage is generated in a first electrically conductive mesh while a fan draws air containing air molecules ionized by alpha particles through an air passage and across a second electrically conductive mesh. The current in the second electrically conductive mesh can be detected and used for measurement or alarm. The detector can be used for area, personnel and equipment monitoring.

Long range alpha particle detector

DOEpatents

MacArthur, D.W.; Wolf, M.A.; McAtee, J.L.; Unruh, W.P.; Cucchiara, A.L.; Huchton, R.L.

1993-02-02

An alpha particle detector capable of detecting alpha radiation from distant sources. In one embodiment, a high voltage is generated in a first electrically conductive mesh while a fan draws air containing air molecules ionized by alpha particles through an air passage and across a second electrically conductive mesh. The current in the second electrically conductive mesh can be detected and used for measurement or alarm. The detector can be used for area, personnel and equipment monitoring.

Three Dimensional Grid Generation for Complex Configurations - Recent Progress

DTIC Science & Technology

1988-03-01

Navier/Stokes finite difference calculations currently of interest. It has been amply demonstrated that the viability of a numerical solution depends...such as advanced fighters or logistic transports, where a multiblock mesh, for example, is necessary. There exist numerous reports and books on the...MESHES I 3.10 ADAPTIVE GRID SCHEMES 10 3.11 REFERENCES 12 4. CONTRIBUTIONS 13 4.1 SOLICITATION AND OVERVIEW 13 4.2 LESSONS LEARNED IN THE MESH

Design optimization for active twist rotor blades

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Mok, Ji Won

This dissertation introduces the process of optimizing active twist rotor blades in the presence of embedded anisotropic piezo-composite actuators. Optimum design of active twist blades is a complex task, since it involves a rich design space with tightly coupled design variables. The study presents the development of an optimization framework for active helicopter rotor blade cross-sectional design. This optimization framework allows for exploring a rich and highly nonlinear design space in order to optimize the active twist rotor blades. Different analytical components are combined in the framework: cross-sectional analysis (UM/VABS), an automated mesh generator, a beam solver (DYMORE), a three-dimensional local strain recovery module, and a gradient based optimizer within MATLAB. Through the mathematical optimization problem, the static twist actuation performance of a blade is maximized while satisfying a series of blade constraints. These constraints are associated with locations of the center of gravity and elastic axis, blade mass per unit span, fundamental rotating blade frequencies, and the blade strength based on local three-dimensional strain fields under worst loading conditions. Through pre-processing, limitations of the proposed process have been studied. When limitations were detected, resolution strategies were proposed. These include mesh overlapping, element distortion, trailing edge tab modeling, electrode modeling and foam implementation of the mesh generator, and the initial point sensibility of the current optimization scheme. Examples demonstrate the effectiveness of this process. Optimization studies were performed on the NASA/Army/MIT ATR blade case. Even though that design was built and shown significant impact in vibration reduction, the proposed optimization process showed that the design could be improved significantly. The second example, based on a model scale of the AH-64D Apache blade, emphasized the capability of this framework to explore the nonlinear design space of complex planform. Especially for this case, detailed design is carried out to make the actual blade manufacturable. The proposed optimization framework is shown to be an effective tool to design high authority active twist blades to reduce vibration in future helicopter rotor blades.

Discretization-dependent model for weakly connected excitable media

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Arroyo, Pedro André; Alonso, Sergio; Weber dos Santos, Rodrigo

2018-03-01

Pattern formation has been widely observed in extended chemical and biological processes. Although the biochemical systems are highly heterogeneous, homogenized continuum approaches formed by partial differential equations have been employed frequently. Such approaches are usually justified by the difference of scales between the heterogeneities and the characteristic spatial size of the patterns. Under different conditions, for example, under weak coupling, discrete models are more adequate. However, discrete models may be less manageable, for instance, in terms of numerical implementation and mesh generation, than the associated continuum models. Here we study a model to approach discreteness which permits the computer implementation on general unstructured meshes. The model is cast as a partial differential equation but with a parameter that depends not only on heterogeneities sizes, as in the case of quasicontinuum models, but also on the discretization mesh. Therefore, we refer to it as a discretization-dependent model. We validate the approach in a generic excitable media that simulates three different phenomena: the propagation of action membrane potential in cardiac tissue, in myelinated axons of neurons, and concentration waves in chemical microemulsions.

A medical software system for volumetric analysis of cerebral pathologies in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data.

PubMed

Egger, Jan; Kappus, Christoph; Freisleben, Bernd; Nimsky, Christopher

2012-08-01

In this contribution, a medical software system for volumetric analysis of different cerebral pathologies in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data is presented. The software system is based on a semi-automatic segmentation algorithm and helps to overcome the time-consuming process of volume determination during monitoring of a patient. After imaging, the parameter settings-including a seed point-are set up in the system and an automatic segmentation is performed by a novel graph-based approach. Manually reviewing the result leads to reseeding, adding seed points or an automatic surface mesh generation. The mesh is saved for monitoring the patient and for comparisons with follow-up scans. Based on the mesh, the system performs a voxelization and volume calculation, which leads to diagnosis and therefore further treatment decisions. The overall system has been tested with different cerebral pathologies-glioblastoma multiforme, pituitary adenomas and cerebral aneurysms- and evaluated against manual expert segmentations using the Dice Similarity Coefficient (DSC). Additionally, intra-physician segmentations have been performed to provide a quality measure for the presented system.

Making High-Pass Filters For Submillimeter Waves

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Siegel, Peter H.; Lichtenberger, John A.

1991-01-01

Micromachining-and-electroforming process makes rigid metal meshes with cells ranging in size from 0.002 in. to 0.05 in. square. Series of steps involving cutting, grinding, vapor deposition, and electroforming creates self-supporting, electrically thick mesh. Width of holes typically 1.2 times cutoff wavelength of dominant waveguide mode in hole. To obtain sharp frequency-cutoff characteristic, thickness of mesh made greater than one-half of guide wavelength of mode in hole. Meshes used as high-pass filters (dichroic plates) for submillimeter electromagnetic waves. Process not limited to square silicon wafers. Round wafers also used, with slightly more complication in grinding periphery. Grid in any pattern produced in electroforming mandrel. Any platable metal or alloy used for mesh.

ImageParser: a tool for finite element generation from three-dimensional medical images

PubMed Central

Yin, HM; Sun, LZ; Wang, G; Yamada, T; Wang, J; Vannier, MW

2004-01-01

Background The finite element method (FEM) is a powerful mathematical tool to simulate and visualize the mechanical deformation of tissues and organs during medical examinations or interventions. It is yet a challenge to build up an FEM mesh directly from a volumetric image partially because the regions (or structures) of interest (ROIs) may be irregular and fuzzy. Methods A software package, ImageParser, is developed to generate an FEM mesh from 3-D tomographic medical images. This software uses a semi-automatic method to detect ROIs from the context of image including neighboring tissues and organs, completes segmentation of different tissues, and meshes the organ into elements. Results The ImageParser is shown to build up an FEM model for simulating the mechanical responses of the breast based on 3-D CT images. The breast is compressed by two plate paddles under an overall displacement as large as 20% of the initial distance between the paddles. The strain and tangential Young's modulus distributions are specified for the biomechanical analysis of breast tissues. Conclusion The ImageParser can successfully exact the geometry of ROIs from a complex medical image and generate the FEM mesh with customer-defined segmentation information. PMID:15461787

Simulation of a Single-Element Lean-Direct Injection Combustor Using Arbitrary Polyhedral Mesh

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Wey, Thomas; Liu, Nan-Suey

2012-01-01

This paper summarizes procedures of generating the arbitrary polyhedral mesh as well as presents sample results from its application to the numerical solution of a single-element LDI combustor using a preliminary version of the new OpenNCC.

Three-Dimensional Geometric Modeling of Membrane-bound Organelles in Ventricular Myocytes: Bridging the Gap between Microscopic Imaging and Mathematical Simulation

PubMed Central

Yu, Zeyun; Holst, Michael J.; Hayashi, Takeharu; Bajaj, Chandrajit L.; Ellisman, Mark H.; McCammon, J. Andrew; Hoshijima, Masahiko

2009-01-01

A general framework of image-based geometric processing is presented to bridge the gap between three-dimensional (3D) imaging that provides structural details of a biological system and mathematical simulation where high-quality surface or volumetric meshes are required. A 3D density map is processed in the order of image pre-processing (contrast enhancement and anisotropic filtering), feature extraction (boundary segmentation and skeletonization), and high-quality and realistic surface (triangular) and volumetric (tetrahedral) mesh generation. While the tool-chain described is applicable to general types of 3D imaging data, the performance is demonstrated specifically on membrane-bound organelles in ventricular myocytes that are imaged and reconstructed with electron microscopic (EM) tomography and two-photon microscopy (T-PM). Of particular interest in this study are two types of membrane-bound Ca2+-handling organelles, namely, transverse tubules (T-tubules) and junctional sarcoplasmic reticulum (jSR), both of which play an important role in regulating the excitation-contraction (E-C) coupling through dynamic Ca2+ mobilization in cardiomyocytes. PMID:18835449

Three-dimensional geometric modeling of membrane-bound organelles in ventricular myocytes: bridging the gap between microscopic imaging and mathematical simulation.

PubMed

Yu, Zeyun; Holst, Michael J; Hayashi, Takeharu; Bajaj, Chandrajit L; Ellisman, Mark H; McCammon, J Andrew; Hoshijima, Masahiko

2008-12-01

A general framework of image-based geometric processing is presented to bridge the gap between three-dimensional (3D) imaging that provides structural details of a biological system and mathematical simulation where high-quality surface or volumetric meshes are required. A 3D density map is processed in the order of image pre-processing (contrast enhancement and anisotropic filtering), feature extraction (boundary segmentation and skeletonization), and high-quality and realistic surface (triangular) and volumetric (tetrahedral) mesh generation. While the tool-chain described is applicable to general types of 3D imaging data, the performance is demonstrated specifically on membrane-bound organelles in ventricular myocytes that are imaged and reconstructed with electron microscopic (EM) tomography and two-photon microscopy (T-PM). Of particular interest in this study are two types of membrane-bound Ca(2+)-handling organelles, namely, transverse tubules (T-tubules) and junctional sarcoplasmic reticulum (jSR), both of which play an important role in regulating the excitation-contraction (E-C) coupling through dynamic Ca(2+) mobilization in cardiomyocytes.

Mesh Intercomparisons of Fog Water Collected Yield Insight Into the Nature of Fog-Drip Collection Mechanisms

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fernandez, D.; Torregrosa, A.; Weiss-Penzias, P. S.; Oliphant, A. J.; Dodge, C.; Bowman, M.; Wilson, S.; Mairs, A. A.; Gravelle, M.; Barkley, T.

2016-12-01

At multiple sites across central CA, several passive fog water collectors have been deployed for the past 3 years. All of the sites employ standard Raschel polypropylene mesh as the fog collection medium and five of them also integrated a novel polypropylene mesh of German manufacture with a 3-dimensional internal structure. Additionally, six metal mesh manufactured by McMaster-Carr of various hole sizing were coated with a POSS-PEMA substance at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and deployed in parallel with the Raschel mesh at six distinct locations. Finally, fluorine-free versions of the POSS-PEMA substance were generated by NBD Nanotechnology and coated on a much finer mesh substrate. Three of those and one control (uncoated mesh) were deployed at one of the fog collection sites for one season, along with a standard Raschel mesh. Preliminary results from one intercomparison from just one pair of mesh over two seasons seem to reveal a wind speed and also, possibly, a droplet-size dependence on the fog collection efficiency for the mesh. This study will continue to intercompare the various mesh in conjunction with the wind speed and direction data. If a collection efficiency dependence on mesh size or coating is confirmed, it may point to interesting and relevant mechanisms for fog droplet capture and collection hitherto unobserved in field conditions.

Deposition and post-processing techniques for transparent conductive films

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Christoforo, Mark Greyson; Mehra, Saahil; Salleo, Alberto

2017-07-04

In one embodiment, a method is provided for fabrication of a semitransparent conductive mesh. A first solution having conductive nanowires suspended therein and a second solution having nanoparticles suspended therein are sprayed toward a substrate, the spraying forming a mist. The mist is processed, while on the substrate, to provide a semitransparent conductive material in the form of a mesh having the conductive nanowires and nanoparticles. The nanoparticles are configured and arranged to direct light passing through the mesh. Connections between the nanowires provide conductivity through the mesh.

GPU-accelerated Lattice Boltzmann method for anatomical extraction in patient-specific computational hemodynamics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yu, H.; Wang, Z.; Zhang, C.; Chen, N.; Zhao, Y.; Sawchuk, A. P.; Dalsing, M. C.; Teague, S. D.; Cheng, Y.

2014-11-01

Existing research of patient-specific computational hemodynamics (PSCH) heavily relies on software for anatomical extraction of blood arteries. Data reconstruction and mesh generation have to be done using existing commercial software due to the gap between medical image processing and CFD, which increases computation burden and introduces inaccuracy during data transformation thus limits the medical applications of PSCH. We use lattice Boltzmann method (LBM) to solve the level-set equation over an Eulerian distance field and implicitly and dynamically segment the artery surfaces from radiological CT/MRI imaging data. The segments seamlessly feed to the LBM based CFD computation of PSCH thus explicit mesh construction and extra data management are avoided. The LBM is ideally suited for GPU (graphic processing unit)-based parallel computing. The parallel acceleration over GPU achieves excellent performance in PSCH computation. An application study will be presented which segments an aortic artery from a chest CT dataset and models PSCH of the segmented artery.

Laser-structured Janus wire mesh for efficient oil-water separation.

PubMed

Liu, Yu-Qing; Han, Dong-Dong; Jiao, Zhi-Zhen; Liu, Yan; Jiang, Hao-Bo; Wu, Xuan-Hang; Ding, Hong; Zhang, Yong-Lai; Sun, Hong-Bo

2017-11-23

We report here the fabrication of a Janus wire mesh by a combined process of laser structuring and fluorosilane/graphene oxide (GO) modification of the two sides of the mesh, respectively, toward its applications in efficient oil/water separation. Femtosecond laser processing has been employed to make different laser-induced periodic surface structures (LIPSS) on each side of the mesh. Surface modification with fluorosilane on one side and GO on the other side endows the two sides of the Janus mesh with distinct wettability. Thus, one side is superhydrophobic and superoleophilic in air, and the other side is superhydrophilic in air and superoleophobic under water. As a proof of concept, we demonstrated the separation of light/heavy oil and water mixtures using this Janus mesh. To realize an efficient separation, the intrusion pressure that is dominated by the wire mesh framework and the wettability should be taken into account. Our strategy may open up a new way to design and fabricate Janus structures with distinct wettability; and the resultant Janus mesh may find broad applications in the separation of oil contaminants from water.

Technique for Calculating Solution Derivatives With Respect to Geometry Parameters in a CFD Code

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mathur, Sanjay

2011-01-01

A solution has been developed to the challenges of computation of derivatives with respect to geometry, which is not straightforward because these are not typically direct inputs to the computational fluid dynamics (CFD) solver. To overcome these issues, a procedure has been devised that can be used without having access to the mesh generator, while still being applicable to all types of meshes. The basic approach is inspired by the mesh motion algorithms used to deform the interior mesh nodes in a smooth manner when the surface nodes, for example, are in a fluid structure interaction problem. The general idea is to model the mesh edges and nodes as constituting a spring-mass system. Changes to boundary node locations are propagated to interior nodes by allowing them to assume their new equilibrium positions, for instance, one where the forces on each node are in balance. The main advantage of the technique is that it is independent of the volumetric mesh generator, and can be applied to structured, unstructured, single- and multi-block meshes. It essentially reduces the problem down to defining the surface mesh node derivatives with respect to the geometry parameters of interest. For analytical geometries, this is quite straightforward. In the more general case, one would need to be able to interrogate the underlying parametric CAD (computer aided design) model and to evaluate the derivatives either analytically, or by a finite difference technique. Because the technique is based on a partial differential equation (PDE), it is applicable not only to forward mode problems (where derivatives of all the output quantities are computed with respect to a single input), but it could also be extended to the adjoint problem, either by using an analytical adjoint of the PDE or a discrete analog.

The nonlinear modified equation approach to analyzing finite difference schemes

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Klopfer, G. H.; Mcrae, D. S.

1981-01-01

The nonlinear modified equation approach is taken in this paper to analyze the generalized Lax-Wendroff explicit scheme approximation to the unsteady one- and two-dimensional equations of gas dynamics. Three important applications of the method are demonstrated. The nonlinear modified equation analysis is used to (1) generate higher order accurate schemes, (2) obtain more accurate estimates of the discretization error for nonlinear systems of partial differential equations, and (3) generate an adaptive mesh procedure for the unsteady gas dynamic equations. Results are obtained for all three areas. For the adaptive mesh procedure, mesh point requirements for equal resolution of discontinuities were reduced by a factor of five for a 1-D shock tube problem solved by the explicit MacCormack scheme.

A computer program to generate two-dimensional grids about airfoils and other shapes by the use of Poisson's equation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Sorenson, R. L.

1980-01-01

A method for generating two dimensional finite difference grids about airfoils and other shapes by the use of the Poisson differential equation is developed. The inhomogeneous terms are automatically chosen such that two important effects are imposed on the grid at both the inner and outer boundaries. The first effect is control of the spacing between mesh points along mesh lines intersecting the boundaries. The second effect is control of the angles with which mesh lines intersect the boundaries. A FORTRAN computer program has been written to use this method. A description of the program, a discussion of the control parameters, and a set of sample cases are included.

Connectivity-based, all-hexahedral mesh generation method and apparatus

DOEpatents

Tautges, T.J.; Mitchell, S.A.; Blacker, T.D.; Murdoch, P.

1998-06-16

The present invention is a computer-based method and apparatus for constructing all-hexahedral finite element meshes for finite element analysis. The present invention begins with a three-dimensional geometry and an all-quadrilateral surface mesh, then constructs hexahedral element connectivity from the outer boundary inward, and then resolves invalid connectivity. The result of the present invention is a complete representation of hex mesh connectivity only; actual mesh node locations are determined later. The basic method of the present invention comprises the step of forming hexahedral elements by making crossings of entities referred to as ``whisker chords.`` This step, combined with a seaming operation in space, is shown to be sufficient for meshing simple block problems. Entities that appear when meshing more complex geometries, namely blind chords, merged sheets, and self-intersecting chords, are described. A method for detecting invalid connectivity in space, based on repeated edges, is also described, along with its application to various cases of invalid connectivity introduced and resolved by the method. 79 figs.

Connectivity-based, all-hexahedral mesh generation method and apparatus

DOEpatents

Tautges, Timothy James; Mitchell, Scott A.; Blacker, Ted D.; Murdoch, Peter

1998-01-01

The present invention is a computer-based method and apparatus for constructing all-hexahedral finite element meshes for finite element analysis. The present invention begins with a three-dimensional geometry and an all-quadrilateral surface mesh, then constructs hexahedral element connectivity from the outer boundary inward, and then resolves invalid connectivity. The result of the present invention is a complete representation of hex mesh connectivity only; actual mesh node locations are determined later. The basic method of the present invention comprises the step of forming hexahedral elements by making crossings of entities referred to as "whisker chords." This step, combined with a seaming operation in space, is shown to be sufficient for meshing simple block problems. Entities that appear when meshing more complex geometries, namely blind chords, merged sheets, and self-intersecting chords, are described. A method for detecting invalid connectivity in space, based on repeated edges, is also described, along with its application to various cases of invalid connectivity introduced and resolved by the method.

Revisiting the Least-squares Procedure for Gradient Reconstruction on Unstructured Meshes

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mavriplis, Dimitri J.; Thomas, James L. (Technical Monitor)

2003-01-01

The accuracy of the least-squares technique for gradient reconstruction on unstructured meshes is examined. While least-squares techniques produce accurate results on arbitrary isotropic unstructured meshes, serious difficulties exist for highly stretched meshes in the presence of surface curvature. In these situations, gradients are typically under-estimated by up to an order of magnitude. For vertex-based discretizations on triangular and quadrilateral meshes, and cell-centered discretizations on quadrilateral meshes, accuracy can be recovered using an inverse distance weighting in the least-squares construction. For cell-centered discretizations on triangles, both the unweighted and weighted least-squares constructions fail to provide suitable gradient estimates for highly stretched curved meshes. Good overall flow solution accuracy can be retained in spite of poor gradient estimates, due to the presence of flow alignment in exactly the same regions where the poor gradient accuracy is observed. However, the use of entropy fixes has the potential for generating large but subtle discretization errors.

Computing Normal Shock-Isotropic Turbulence Interaction With Tetrahedral Meshes and the Space-Time CESE Method

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Venkatachari, Balaji Shankar; Chang, Chau-Lyan

2016-11-01

The focus of this study is scale-resolving simulations of the canonical normal shock- isotropic turbulence interaction using unstructured tetrahedral meshes and the space-time conservation element solution element (CESE) method. Despite decades of development in unstructured mesh methods and its potential benefits of ease of mesh generation around complex geometries and mesh adaptation, direct numerical or large-eddy simulations of turbulent flows are predominantly carried out using structured hexahedral meshes. This is due to the lack of consistent multi-dimensional numerical formulations in conventional schemes for unstructured meshes that can resolve multiple physical scales and flow discontinuities simultaneously. The CESE method - due to its Riemann-solver-free shock capturing capabilities, non-dissipative baseline schemes, and flux conservation in time as well as space - has the potential to accurately simulate turbulent flows using tetrahedral meshes. As part of the study, various regimes of the shock-turbulence interaction (wrinkled and broken shock regimes) will be investigated along with a study on how adaptive refinement of tetrahedral meshes benefits this problem. The research funding for this paper has been provided by Revolutionary Computational Aerosciences (RCA) subproject under the NASA Transformative Aeronautics Concepts Program (TACP).

Bioprosthetic Mesh in Abdominal Wall Reconstruction

PubMed Central

Baumann, Donald P.; Butler, Charles E.

2012-01-01

Mesh materials have undergone a considerable evolution over the last several decades. There has been enhancement of biomechanical properties, improvement in manufacturing processes, and development of antiadhesive laminate synthetic meshes. The evolution of bioprosthetic mesh materials has markedly changed our indications and methods for complex abdominal wall reconstruction. The authors review the optimal properties of bioprosthetic mesh materials, their evolution over time, and their indications for use. The techniques to optimize outcomes are described using bioprosthetic mesh for complex abdominal wall reconstruction. Bioprosthetic mesh materials clearly have certain advantages over other implantable mesh materials in select indications. Appropriate patient selection and surgical technique are critical to the successful use of bioprosthetic materials for abdominal wall repair. PMID:23372454

Mesh generation for two-dimensional regions using the Tektronix DVST (direct view storage tube) graphics terminal

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Gabrielson, V. K.

1975-01-01

The computer program DVMESH and the use of the Tektronix DVST graphics terminal were described for applications of preparing mesh data for use in various two-dimensional axisymmetric finite element stress analysis and heat transfer codes.

3D surface reconstruction and visualization of the Drosophila wing imaginal disc at cellular resolution

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bai, Linge; Widmann, Thomas; Jülicher, Frank; Dahmann, Christian; Breen, David

2013-01-01

Quantifying and visualizing the shape of developing biological tissues provide information about the morphogenetic processes in multicellular organisms. The size and shape of biological tissues depend on the number, size, shape, and arrangement of the constituting cells. To better understand the mechanisms that guide tissues into their final shape, it is important to investigate the cellular arrangement within tissues. Here we present a data processing pipeline to generate 3D volumetric surface models of epithelial tissues, as well as geometric descriptions of the tissues' apical cell cross-sections. The data processing pipeline includes image acquisition, editing, processing and analysis, 2D cell mesh generation, 3D contourbased surface reconstruction, cell mesh projection, followed by geometric calculations and color-based visualization of morphological parameters. In their first utilization we have applied these procedures to construct a 3D volumetric surface model at cellular resolution of the wing imaginal disc of Drosophila melanogaster. The ultimate goal of the reported effort is to produce tools for the creation of detailed 3D geometric models of the individual cells in epithelial tissues. To date, 3D volumetric surface models of the whole wing imaginal disc have been created, and the apicolateral cell boundaries have been identified, allowing for the calculation and visualization of cell parameters, e.g. apical cross-sectional area of cells. The calculation and visualization of morphological parameters show position-dependent patterns of cell shape in the wing imaginal disc. Our procedures should offer a general data processing pipeline for the construction of 3D volumetric surface models of a wide variety of epithelial tissues.

A multiresolution method for climate system modeling: application of spherical centroidal Voronoi tessellations

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Ringler, Todd; Ju, Lili; Gunzburger, Max

2008-11-14

During the next decade and beyond, climate system models will be challenged to resolve scales and processes that are far beyond their current scope. Each climate system component has its prototypical example of an unresolved process that may strongly influence the global climate system, ranging from eddy activity within ocean models, to ice streams within ice sheet models, to surface hydrological processes within land system models, to cloud processes within atmosphere models. These new demands will almost certainly result in the develop of multiresolution schemes that are able, at least regionally, to faithfully simulate these fine-scale processes. Spherical centroidal Voronoimore » tessellations (SCVTs) offer one potential path toward the development of a robust, multiresolution climate system model components. SCVTs allow for the generation of high quality Voronoi diagrams and Delaunay triangulations through the use of an intuitive, user-defined density function. In each of the examples provided, this method results in high-quality meshes where the quality measures are guaranteed to improve as the number of nodes is increased. Real-world examples are developed for the Greenland ice sheet and the North Atlantic ocean. Idealized examples are developed for ocean–ice shelf interaction and for regional atmospheric modeling. In addition to defining, developing, and exhibiting SCVTs, we pair this mesh generation technique with a previously developed finite-volume method. Our numerical example is based on the nonlinear, shallow water equations spanning the entire surface of the sphere. This example is used to elucidate both the potential benefits of this multiresolution method and the challenges ahead.« less

Monte Carlo charged-particle tracking and energy deposition on a Lagrangian mesh.

PubMed

Yuan, J; Moses, G A; McKenty, P W

2005-10-01

A Monte Carlo algorithm for alpha particle tracking and energy deposition on a cylindrical computational mesh in a Lagrangian hydrodynamics code used for inertial confinement fusion (ICF) simulations is presented. The straight line approximation is used to follow propagation of "Monte Carlo particles" which represent collections of alpha particles generated from thermonuclear deuterium-tritium (DT) reactions. Energy deposition in the plasma is modeled by the continuous slowing down approximation. The scheme addresses various aspects arising in the coupling of Monte Carlo tracking with Lagrangian hydrodynamics; such as non-orthogonal severely distorted mesh cells, particle relocation on the moving mesh and particle relocation after rezoning. A comparison with the flux-limited multi-group diffusion transport method is presented for a polar direct drive target design for the National Ignition Facility. Simulations show the Monte Carlo transport method predicts about earlier ignition than predicted by the diffusion method, and generates higher hot spot temperature. Nearly linear speed-up is achieved for multi-processor parallel simulations.

Creating physically-based three-dimensional microstructures: Bridging phase-field and crystal plasticity models.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Lim, Hojun; Owen, Steven J.; Abdeljawad, Fadi F.

In order to better incorporate microstructures in continuum scale models, we use a novel finite element (FE) meshing technique to generate three-dimensional polycrystalline aggregates from a phase field grain growth model of grain microstructures. The proposed meshing technique creates hexahedral FE meshes that capture smooth interfaces between adjacent grains. Three dimensional realizations of grain microstructures from the phase field model are used in crystal plasticity-finite element (CP-FE) simulations of polycrystalline a -iron. We show that the interface conformal meshes significantly reduce artificial stress localizations in voxelated meshes that exhibit the so-called "wedding cake" interfaces. This framework provides a direct linkmore » between two mesoscale models - phase field and crystal plasticity - and for the first time allows mechanics simulations of polycrystalline materials using three-dimensional hexahedral finite element meshes with realistic topological features.« less

Edge delamination of composite laminates subject to combined tension and torsional loading

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hooper, Steven J.

1990-01-01

Delamination is a common failure mode of laminated composite materials. Edge delamination is important since it results in reduced stiffness and strength of the laminate. The tension/torsion load condition is of particular significance to the structural integrity of composite helicopter rotor systems. Material coupons can easily be tested under this type of loading in servo-hydraulic tension/torsion test stands using techniques very similar to those used for the Edge Delamination Tensile Test (EDT) delamination specimen. Edge delamination of specimens loaded in tension was successfully analyzed by several investigators using both classical laminate theory and quasi-three dimensional (Q3D) finite element techniques. The former analysis technique can be used to predict the total strain energy release rate, while the latter technique enables the calculation of the mixed-mode strain energy release rates. The Q3D analysis is very efficient since it produces a three-dimensional solution to a two-dimensional domain. A computer program was developed which generates PATRAN commands to generate the finite element model. PATRAN is a pre- and post-processor which is commonly used with a variety of finite element programs such as MCS/NASTRAN. The program creates a sufficiently dense mesh at the delamination crack tips to support a mixed-mode fracture mechanics analysis. The program creates a coarse mesh in those regions where the gradients in the stress field are low (away from the delamination regions). A transition mesh is defined between these regions. This program is capable of generating a mesh for an arbitrarily oriented matrix crack. This program significantly reduces the modeling time required to generate these finite element meshes, thus providing a realistic tool with which to investigate the tension torsion problem.

Comparison of the different approaches to generate holograms from data acquired with a Kinect sensor

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kang, Ji-Hoon; Leportier, Thibault; Ju, Byeong-Kwon; Song, Jin Dong; Lee, Kwang-Hoon; Park, Min-Chul

2017-05-01

Data of real scenes acquired in real-time with a Kinect sensor can be processed with different approaches to generate a hologram. 3D models can be generated from a point cloud or a mesh representation. The advantage of the point cloud approach is that computation process is well established since it involves only diffraction and propagation of point sources between parallel planes. On the other hand, the mesh representation enables to reduce the number of elements necessary to represent the object. Then, even though the computation time for the contribution of a single element increases compared to a simple point, the total computation time can be reduced significantly. However, the algorithm is more complex since propagation of elemental polygons between non-parallel planes should be implemented. Finally, since a depth map of the scene is acquired at the same time than the intensity image, a depth layer approach can also be adopted. This technique is appropriate for a fast computation since propagation of an optical wavefront from one plane to another can be handled efficiently with the fast Fourier transform. Fast computation with depth layer approach is convenient for real time applications, but point cloud method is more appropriate when high resolution is needed. In this study, since Kinect can be used to obtain both point cloud and depth map, we examine the different approaches that can be adopted for hologram computation and compare their performance.

Molecular Age-Related Changes in the Anterior Segment of the Eye.

PubMed

Hernandez-Zimbron, Luis Fernando; Gulias-Cañizo, Rosario; Golzarri, María F; Martínez-Báez, Blanca Elizabeth; Quiroz-Mercado, Hugo; Gonzalez-Salinas, Roberto

2017-01-01

To examine the current knowledge about the age-related processes in the anterior segment of the eye at a biological, clinical, and molecular level. We reviewed the available published literature that addresses the aging process of the anterior segment of the eye and its associated molecular and physiological events. We performed a search on PubMed, CINAHL, and Embase using the MeSH terms "eye," "anterior segment," and "age." We generated searches to account for synonyms of these keywords and MESH headings as follows: (1) "Eye" AND "ageing process" OR "anterior segment ageing" and (2) "Anterior segment" AND "ageing process" OR "anterior segment" AND "molecular changes" AND "age." Results . Among the principal causes of age-dependent alterations in the anterior segment of the eye, we found the mutation of the TGF- β gene and loss of autophagy in addition to oxidative stress, which contributes to the pathogenesis of degenerative diseases. In this review, we summarize the current knowledge regarding some of the molecular mechanisms related to aging in the anterior segment of the eye. We also introduce and propose potential roles of autophagy, an important mechanism responsible for maintaining homeostasis and proteostasis under stress conditions in the anterior segment during aging.

Surgical meshes coated with mesenchymal stem cells provide an anti-inflammatory environment by a M2 macrophage polarization.

PubMed

Blázquez, Rebeca; Sánchez-Margallo, Francisco Miguel; Álvarez, Verónica; Usón, Alejandra; Casado, Javier G

2016-02-01

Surgical meshes are widely used in clinics to reinforce soft tissue's defects, and to give support to prolapsed organs. However, the implantation of surgical meshes is commonly related with an inflammatory response being difficult to eradicate without removing the mesh. Here we hypothesize that the combined use of surgical meshes and mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) could be a useful tool to reduce the inflammatory reaction secondary to mesh implantation. In vitro determinations of viability, metabolic activity and immunomodulation assays were performed on MSCs-coated meshes. Magnetic resonance imaging, evaluation by laparoscopic optical system and histology were performed for safety assessment. Finally, flow cytometry and qRT-PCR were used to elucidate the mechanism of action of MSCs-coated meshes. Our results demonstrate the feasibility to obtain MSCs-coated surgical meshes and their cryopreservability to be used as an 'off the shelf' product. These biological meshes fulfill the safety aspects as non-adverse effects were observed when compared to controls. Moreover, both in vitro and in vivo studies demonstrated that, local immunomodulation of implanted meshes is mediated by a macrophage polarization towards an anti-inflammatory phenotype. In conclusion, the combined usage of surgical meshes with MSCs fulfills the safety requirements for a future clinical application, providing an anti-inflammatory environment that could reduce the inflammatory processes commonly observed after surgical mesh implantation. Surgical meshes are medical devices widely used in clinics to resolve hernias and organs' prolapses, among other disorders. However, the implantation of surgical meshes is commonly related with an inflammatory response being difficult to eradicate without removing the mesh, causing pain and discomfort in the patient. Previously, the anti-inflammatory, immunomodulatory and pro-regenerative ability of mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) have been described. To our knowledge, this is the first report where the anti-inflammatory and pro-regenerative ability of MSCs have been successfully applied in combination with surgical meshes, reducing the inflammatory processes commonly observed after mesh implantation. Moreover, our in vitro and in vivo results highlight the safety and efficacy of these bioactive meshes as a 'ready to use' medical product. Copyright © 2015 Acta Materialia Inc. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Discrete Surface Evolution and Mesh Deformation for Aircraft Icing Applications

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Thompson, David; Tong, Xiaoling; Arnoldus, Qiuhan; Collins, Eric; McLaurin, David; Luke, Edward; Bidwell, Colin S.

2013-01-01

Robust, automated mesh generation for problems with deforming geometries, such as ice accreting on aerodynamic surfaces, remains a challenging problem. Here we describe a technique to deform a discrete surface as it evolves due to the accretion of ice. The surface evolution algorithm is based on a smoothed, face-offsetting approach. We also describe a fast algebraic technique to propagate the computed surface deformations into the surrounding volume mesh while maintaining geometric mesh quality. Preliminary results presented here demonstrate the ecacy of the approach for a sphere with a prescribed accretion rate, a rime ice accretion, and a more complex glaze ice accretion.

A hierarchical structure for automatic meshing and adaptive FEM analysis

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Kela, Ajay; Saxena, Mukul; Perucchio, Renato

1987-01-01

A new algorithm for generating automatically, from solid models of mechanical parts, finite element meshes that are organized as spatially addressable quaternary trees (for 2-D work) or octal trees (for 3-D work) is discussed. Because such meshes are inherently hierarchical as well as spatially addressable, they permit efficient substructuring techniques to be used for both global analysis and incremental remeshing and reanalysis. The global and incremental techniques are summarized and some results from an experimental closed loop 2-D system in which meshing, analysis, error evaluation, and remeshing and reanalysis are done automatically and adaptively are presented. The implementation of 3-D work is briefly discussed.

Copper(II)-Mediated Hydrogen Sulfide and Thiol Oxidation to Disulfides and Organic Polysulfanes and Their Reductive Cleavage in Wine: Mechanistic Elucidation and Potential Applications.

PubMed

Kreitman, Gal Y; Danilewicz, John C; Jeffery, David W; Elias, Ryan J

2017-03-29

Fermentation-derived volatile sulfur compounds (VSCs) are undesirable in wine and are often remediated in a process known as copper fining. In the present study, the addition of Cu(II) to model and real wine systems containing hydrogen sulfide (H 2 S) and thiols provided evidence for the generation of disulfides (disulfanes) and organic polysulfanes. Cu(II) fining of a white wine spiked with glutathione, H 2 S, and methanethiol (MeSH) resulted in the generation of MeSH-glutathione disulfide and trisulfane. In the present study, the mechanisms underlying the interaction of H 2 S and thiols with Cu(II) is discussed, and a prospective diagnostic test for releasing volatile sulfur compounds from their nonvolatile forms in wine is investigated. This test utilized a combination of reducing agents, metal chelators, and low-oxygen conditions to promote the release of H 2 S and MeSH, at levels above their reported sensory thresholds, from red and white wines that were otherwise free of sulfidic off-odors at the time of addition.

Unsteady Aero Computation of a 1 1/2 Stage Large Scale Rotating Turbine

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

To, Wai-Ming

2012-01-01

This report is the documentation of the work performed for the Subsonic Rotary Wing Project under the NASA s Fundamental Aeronautics Program. It was funded through Task Number NNC10E420T under GESS-2 Contract NNC06BA07B in the period of 10/1/2010 to 8/31/2011. The objective of the task is to provide support for the development of variable speed power turbine technology through application of computational fluid dynamics analyses. This includes work elements in mesh generation, multistage URANS simulations, and post-processing of the simulation results for comparison with the experimental data. The unsteady CFD calculations were performed with the TURBO code running in multistage single passage (phase lag) mode. Meshes for the blade rows were generated with the NASA developed TCGRID code. The CFD performance is assessed and improvements are recommended for future research in this area. For that, the United Technologies Research Center's 1 1/2 stage Large Scale Rotating Turbine was selected to be the candidate engine configuration for this computational effort because of the completeness and availability of the data.

Computational Systems for Multidisciplinary Applications

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Soni, Bharat; Haupt, Tomasz; Koomullil, Roy; Luke, Edward; Thompson, David

2002-01-01

In this paper, we briefly describe our efforts to develop complex simulation systems. We focus first on four key infrastructure items: enterprise computational services, simulation synthesis, geometry modeling and mesh generation, and a fluid flow solver for arbitrary meshes. We conclude by presenting three diverse applications developed using these technologies.

SLIM: an alternative Web interface for MEDLINE/PubMed searches – a preliminary study

PubMed Central

Muin, Michael; Fontelo, Paul; Liu, Fang; Ackerman, Michael

2005-01-01

Background With the rapid growth of medical information and the pervasiveness of the Internet, online search and retrieval systems have become indispensable tools in medicine. The progress of Web technologies can provide expert searching capabilities to non-expert information seekers. The objective of the project is to create an alternative search interface for MEDLINE/PubMed searches using JavaScript slider bars. SLIM, or Slider Interface for MEDLINE/PubMed searches, was developed with PHP and JavaScript. Interactive slider bars in the search form controlled search parameters such as limits, filters and MeSH terminologies. Connections to PubMed were done using the Entrez Programming Utilities (E-Utilities). Custom scripts were created to mimic the automatic term mapping process of Entrez. Page generation times for both local and remote connections were recorded. Results Alpha testing by developers showed SLIM to be functionally stable. Page generation times to simulate loading times were recorded the first week of alpha and beta testing. Average page generation times for the index page, previews and searches were 2.94 milliseconds, 0.63 seconds and 3.84 seconds, respectively. Eighteen physicians from the US, Australia and the Philippines participated in the beta testing and provided feedback through an online survey. Most users found the search interface user-friendly and easy to use. Information on MeSH terms and the ability to instantly hide and display abstracts were identified as distinctive features. Conclusion SLIM can be an interactive time-saving tool for online medical literature research that improves user control and capability to instantly refine and refocus search strategies. With continued development and by integrating search limits, methodology filters, MeSH terms and levels of evidence, SLIM may be useful in the practice of evidence-based medicine. PMID:16321145

SLIM: an alternative Web interface for MEDLINE/PubMed searches - a preliminary study.

PubMed

Muin, Michael; Fontelo, Paul; Liu, Fang; Ackerman, Michael

2005-12-01

With the rapid growth of medical information and the pervasiveness of the Internet, online search and retrieval systems have become indispensable tools in medicine. The progress of Web technologies can provide expert searching capabilities to non-expert information seekers. The objective of the project is to create an alternative search interface for MEDLINE/PubMed searches using JavaScript slider bars. SLIM, or Slider Interface for MEDLINE/PubMed searches, was developed with PHP and JavaScript. Interactive slider bars in the search form controlled search parameters such as limits, filters and MeSH terminologies. Connections to PubMed were done using the Entrez Programming Utilities (E-Utilities). Custom scripts were created to mimic the automatic term mapping process of Entrez. Page generation times for both local and remote connections were recorded. Alpha testing by developers showed SLIM to be functionally stable. Page generation times to simulate loading times were recorded the first week of alpha and beta testing. Average page generation times for the index page, previews and searches were 2.94 milliseconds, 0.63 seconds and 3.84 seconds, respectively. Eighteen physicians from the US, Australia and the Philippines participated in the beta testing and provided feedback through an online survey. Most users found the search interface user-friendly and easy to use. Information on MeSH terms and the ability to instantly hide and display abstracts were identified as distinctive features. SLIM can be an interactive time-saving tool for online medical literature research that improves user control and capability to instantly refine and refocus search strategies. With continued development and by integrating search limits, methodology filters, MeSH terms and levels of evidence, SLIM may be useful in the practice of evidence-based medicine.

Generation of spiral bevel gears with conjugate tooth surfaces and tooth contact analysis

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Litvin, Faydor L.; Tsung, Wei-Jiung; Lee, Hong-Tao

1987-01-01

A new method for generation of spiral bevel gears is proposed. The main features of this method are as follows: (1) the gear tooth surfaces are conjugated and can transform rotation with zero transmission errors; (2) the tooth bearing contact is localized; (3) the center of the instantaneous contact ellipse moves in a plane that has a fixed orientation; (4) the contact normal performs in the process of meshing a parallel motion; (5) the motion of the contact ellipse provides improved conditions of lubrication; and (6) the gears can be manufactured by use of Gleason's equipment.

Constrained CVT meshes and a comparison of triangular mesh generators

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Nguyen, Hoa; Burkardt, John; Gunzburger, Max

2009-01-01

Mesh generation in regions in Euclidean space is a central task in computational science, and especially for commonly used numerical methods for the solution of partial differential equations, e.g., finite element and finite volume methods. We focus on the uniform Delaunay triangulation of planar regions and, in particular, on how one selects the positions of the vertices of the triangulation. We discuss a recently developed method, based on the centroidal Voronoi tessellation (CVT) concept, for effecting such triangulations and present two algorithms, including one new one, for CVT-based grid generation. We also compare several methods, including CVT-based methods, for triangulatingmore » planar domains. To this end, we define several quantitative measures of the quality of uniform grids. We then generate triangulations of several planar regions, including some having complexities that are representative of what one may encounter in practice. We subject the resulting grids to visual and quantitative comparisons and conclude that all the methods considered produce high-quality uniform grids and that the CVT-based grids are at least as good as any of the others.« less

Simultaneous multiple view high resolution surface geometry acquisition using structured light and mirrors.

PubMed

Basevi, Hector R A; Guggenheim, James A; Dehghani, Hamid; Styles, Iain B

2013-03-25

Knowledge of the surface geometry of an imaging subject is important in many applications. This information can be obtained via a number of different techniques, including time of flight imaging, photogrammetry, and fringe projection profilometry. Existing systems may have restrictions on instrument geometry, require expensive optics, or require moving parts in order to image the full surface of the subject. An inexpensive generalised fringe projection profilometry system is proposed that can account for arbitrarily placed components and use mirrors to expand the field of view. It simultaneously acquires multiple views of an imaging subject, producing a cloud of points that lie on its surface, which can then be processed to form a three dimensional model. A prototype of this system was integrated into an existing Diffuse Optical Tomography and Bioluminescence Tomography small animal imaging system and used to image objects including a mouse-shaped plastic phantom, a mouse cadaver, and a coin. A surface mesh generated from surface capture data of the mouse-shaped plastic phantom was compared with ideal surface points provided by the phantom manufacturer, and 50% of points were found to lie within 0.1mm of the surface mesh, 82% of points were found to lie within 0.2mm of the surface mesh, and 96% of points were found to lie within 0.4mm of the surface mesh.

The aerodynamic characteristics of vortex ingestion for the F/A-18 inlet duct

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Anderson, Bernhard H.

1991-01-01

A Reduced Navier-Stokes (RNS) solution technique was successfully combined with the concept of partitioned geometry and mesh generation to form a very efficient 3D RNS code aimed at the analysis-design engineering environment. Partitioned geometry and mesh generation is a pre-processor to augment existing geometry and grid generation programs which allows the solver to (1) recluster an existing gridlife mesh lattice, and (2) perturb an existing gridfile definition to alter the cross-sectional shape and inlet duct centerline distribution without returning to the external geometry and grid generator. The present results provide a quantitative validation of the initial value space marching 3D RNS procedure and demonstrates accurate predictions of the engine face flow field, with a separation present in the inlet duct as well as when vortex generators are installed to supress flow separation. The present results also demonstrate the ability of the 3D RNS procedure to analyze the flow physics associated with vortex ingestion in general geometry ducts such as the F/A-18 inlet. At the conditions investigated, these interactions are basically inviscid like, i.e., the dominant aerodynamic characteristics have their origin in inviscid flow theory.

Prospects and expectations for unstructured methods

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Baker, Timothy J.

1995-01-01

The last decade has witnessed a vigorous and sustained research effort on unstructured methods for computational fluid dynamics. Unstructured mesh generators and flow solvers have evolved to the point where they are now in use for design purposes throughout the aerospace industry. In this paper we survey the various mesh types, structured as well as unstructured, and examine their relative strengths and weaknesses. We argue that unstructured methodology does offer the best prospect for the next generation of computational fluid dynamics algorithms.

Development of a hip joint model for finite volume simulations.

PubMed

Cardiff, P; Karač, A; FitzPatrick, D; Ivanković, A

2014-01-01

This paper establishes a procedure for numerical analysis of a hip joint using the finite volume method. Patient-specific hip joint geometry is segmented directly from computed tomography and magnetic resonance imaging datasets and the resulting bone surfaces are processed into a form suitable for volume meshing. A high resolution continuum tetrahedral mesh has been generated, where a sandwich model approach is adopted; the bones are represented as a stiffer cortical shells surrounding more flexible cancellous cores. Cartilage is included as a uniform thickness extruded layer and the effect of layer thickness is investigated. To realistically position the bones, gait analysis has been performed giving the 3D positions of the bones for the full gait cycle. Three phases of the gait cycle are examined using a finite volume based custom structural contact solver implemented in open-source software OpenFOAM.

A triangular prism solid and shell interactive mapping element for electromagnetic sheet metal forming process

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Cui, Xiangyang; Li, She; Feng, Hui; Li, Guangyao

2017-05-01

In this paper, a novel triangular prism solid and shell interactive mapping element is proposed to solve the coupled magnetic-mechanical formulation in electromagnetic sheet metal forming process. A linear six-node "Triprism" element is firstly proposed for transient eddy current analysis in electromagnetic field. In present "Triprism" element, shape functions are given explicitly, and a cell-wise gradient smoothing operation is used to obtain the gradient matrices without evaluating derivatives of shape functions. In mechanical field analysis, a shear locking free triangular shell element is employed in internal force computation, and a data mapping method is developed to transfer the Lorentz force on solid into the external forces suffered by shell structure for dynamic elasto-plasticity deformation analysis. Based on the deformed triangular shell structure, a "Triprism" element generation rule is established for updated electromagnetic analysis, which means inter-transformation of meshes between the coupled fields can be performed automatically. In addition, the dynamic moving mesh is adopted for air mesh updating based on the deformation of sheet metal. A benchmark problem is carried out for confirming the accuracy of the proposed "Triprism" element in predicting flux density in electromagnetic field. Solutions of several EMF problems obtained by present work are compared with experiment results and those of traditional method, which are showing excellent performances of present interactive mapping element.

Generation of the 30 M-Mesh Global Digital Surface Model by Alos Prism

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tadono, T.; Nagai, H.; Ishida, H.; Oda, F.; Naito, S.; Minakawa, K.; Iwamoto, H.

2016-06-01

Topographical information is fundamental to many geo-spatial related information and applications on Earth. Remote sensing satellites have the advantage in such fields because they are capable of global observation and repeatedly. Several satellite-based digital elevation datasets were provided to examine global terrains with medium resolutions e.g. the Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM), the global digital elevation model by the Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER GDEM). A new global digital surface model (DSM) dataset using the archived data of the Panchromatic Remote-sensing Instrument for Stereo Mapping (PRISM) onboard the Advanced Land Observing Satellite (ALOS, nicknamed "Daichi") has been completed on March 2016 by Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) collaborating with NTT DATA Corp. and Remote Sensing Technology Center, Japan. This project is called "ALOS World 3D" (AW3D), and its dataset consists of the global DSM dataset with 0.15 arcsec. pixel spacing (approx. 5 m mesh) and ortho-rectified PRISM image with 2.5 m resolution. JAXA is also processing the global DSM with 1 arcsec. spacing (approx. 30 m mesh) based on the AW3D DSM dataset, and partially releasing it free of charge, which calls "ALOS World 3D 30 m mesh" (AW3D30). The global AW3D30 dataset will be released on May 2016. This paper describes the processing status, a preliminary validation result of the AW3D30 DSM dataset, and its public release status. As a summary of the preliminary validation of AW3D30 DSM, 4.40 m (RMSE) of the height accuracy of the dataset was confirmed using 5,121 independent check points distributed in the world.

Aspects of Unstructured Grids and Finite-Volume Solvers for the Euler and Navier-Stokes Equations

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Barth, Timothy J.

1992-01-01

One of the major achievements in engineering science has been the development of computer algorithms for solving nonlinear differential equations such as the Navier-Stokes equations. In the past, limited computer resources have motivated the development of efficient numerical schemes in computational fluid dynamics (CFD) utilizing structured meshes. The use of structured meshes greatly simplifies the implementation of CFD algorithms on conventional computers. Unstructured grids on the other hand offer an alternative to modeling complex geometries. Unstructured meshes have irregular connectivity and usually contain combinations of triangles, quadrilaterals, tetrahedra, and hexahedra. The generation and use of unstructured grids poses new challenges in CFD. The purpose of this note is to present recent developments in the unstructured grid generation and flow solution technology.

Automatic, unstructured mesh optimization for simulation and assessment of tide- and surge-driven hydrodynamics in a longitudinal estuary: St. Johns River

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bacopoulos, Peter

2018-05-01

A localized truncation error analysis with complex derivatives (LTEA+CD) is applied recursively with advanced circulation (ADCIRC) simulations of tides and storm surge for finite element mesh optimization. Mesh optimization is demonstrated with two iterations of LTEA+CD for tidal simulation in the lower 200 km of the St. Johns River, located in northeast Florida, and achieves more than an over 50% decrease in the number of mesh nodes, relating to a twofold increase in efficiency, at a zero cost to model accuracy. The recursively generated meshes using LTEA+CD lead to successive reductions in the global cumulative truncation error associated with the model mesh. Tides are simulated with root mean square error (RMSE) of 0.09-0.21 m and index of agreement (IA) values generally in the 80s and 90s percentage ranges. Tidal currents are simulated with RMSE of 0.09-0.23 m s-1 and IA values of 97% and greater. Storm tide due to Hurricane Matthew 2016 is simulated with RMSE of 0.09-0.33 m and IA values of 75-96%. Analysis of the LTEA+CD results shows the M2 constituent to dominate the node spacing requirement in the St. Johns River, with the M4 and M6 overtides and the STEADY constituent contributing some. Friction is the predominant physical factor influencing the target element size distribution, especially along the main river stem, while frequency (inertia) and Coriolis (rotation) are supplementary contributing factors. The combination of interior- and boundary-type computational molecules, providing near-full coverage of the model domain, renders LTEA+CD an attractive mesh generation/optimization tool for complex coastal and estuarine domains. The mesh optimization procedure using LTEA+CD is automatic and extensible to other finite element-based numerical models. Discussion is provided on the scope of LTEA+CD, the starting point (mesh) of the procedure, the user-specified scaling of the LTEA+CD results, and the iteration (termination) of LTEA+CD for mesh optimization.

Computer aided stress analysis of long bones utilizing computer tomography

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Marom, S.A.

1986-01-01

A computer aided analysis method, utilizing computed tomography (CT) has been developed, which together with a finite element program determines the stress-displacement pattern in a long bone section. The CT data file provides the geometry, the density and the material properties for the generated finite element model. A three-dimensional finite element model of a tibial shaft is automatically generated from the CT file by a pre-processing procedure for a finite element program. The developed pre-processor includes an edge detection algorithm which determines the boundaries of the reconstructed cross-sectional images of the scanned bone. A mesh generation procedure than automatically generatesmore » a three-dimensional mesh of a user-selected refinement. The elastic properties needed for the stress analysis are individually determined for each model element using the radiographic density (CT number) of each pixel with the elemental borders. The elastic modulus is determined from the CT radiographic density by using an empirical relationship from the literature. The generated finite element model, together with applied loads, determined from existing gait analysis and initial displacements, comprise a formatted input for the SAP IV finite element program. The output of this program, stresses and displacements at the model elements and nodes, are sorted and displayed by a developed post-processor to provide maximum and minimum values at selected locations in the model.« less

Large scale generation of micro-droplet array by vapor condensation on mesh screen piece

PubMed Central

Xie, Jian; Xu, Jinliang; He, Xiaotian; Liu, Qi

2017-01-01

We developed a novel micro-droplet array system, which is based on the distinct three dimensional mesh screen structure and sintering and oxidation induced thermal-fluid performance. Mesh screen was sintered on a copper substrate by bonding the two components. Non-uniform residue stress is generated along weft wires, with larger stress on weft wire top location than elsewhere. Oxidation of the sintered package forms micro pits with few nanograsses on weft wire top location, due to the stress corrosion mechanism. Nanograsses grow elsewhere to show hydrophobic behavior. Thus, surface-energy-gradient weft wires are formed. Cooling the structure in a wet air environment nucleates water droplets on weft wire top location, which is more “hydrophilic” than elsewhere. Droplet size is well controlled by substrate temperature, air humidity and cooling time. Because warp wires do not contact copper substrate and there is a larger conductive thermal resistance between warp wire and weft wire, warp wires contribute less to condensation but function as supporting structure. The surface energy analysis of drops along weft wires explains why droplet array can be generated on the mesh screen piece. Because the commercial material is used, the droplet system is cost effective and can be used for large scale utilization. PMID:28054635

Large scale generation of micro-droplet array by vapor condensation on mesh screen piece.

PubMed

Xie, Jian; Xu, Jinliang; He, Xiaotian; Liu, Qi

2017-01-05

We developed a novel micro-droplet array system, which is based on the distinct three dimensional mesh screen structure and sintering and oxidation induced thermal-fluid performance. Mesh screen was sintered on a copper substrate by bonding the two components. Non-uniform residue stress is generated along weft wires, with larger stress on weft wire top location than elsewhere. Oxidation of the sintered package forms micro pits with few nanograsses on weft wire top location, due to the stress corrosion mechanism. Nanograsses grow elsewhere to show hydrophobic behavior. Thus, surface-energy-gradient weft wires are formed. Cooling the structure in a wet air environment nucleates water droplets on weft wire top location, which is more "hydrophilic" than elsewhere. Droplet size is well controlled by substrate temperature, air humidity and cooling time. Because warp wires do not contact copper substrate and there is a larger conductive thermal resistance between warp wire and weft wire, warp wires contribute less to condensation but function as supporting structure. The surface energy analysis of drops along weft wires explains why droplet array can be generated on the mesh screen piece. Because the commercial material is used, the droplet system is cost effective and can be used for large scale utilization.

Large scale generation of micro-droplet array by vapor condensation on mesh screen piece

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Xie, Jian; Xu, Jinliang; He, Xiaotian; Liu, Qi

2017-01-01

We developed a novel micro-droplet array system, which is based on the distinct three dimensional mesh screen structure and sintering and oxidation induced thermal-fluid performance. Mesh screen was sintered on a copper substrate by bonding the two components. Non-uniform residue stress is generated along weft wires, with larger stress on weft wire top location than elsewhere. Oxidation of the sintered package forms micro pits with few nanograsses on weft wire top location, due to the stress corrosion mechanism. Nanograsses grow elsewhere to show hydrophobic behavior. Thus, surface-energy-gradient weft wires are formed. Cooling the structure in a wet air environment nucleates water droplets on weft wire top location, which is more “hydrophilic” than elsewhere. Droplet size is well controlled by substrate temperature, air humidity and cooling time. Because warp wires do not contact copper substrate and there is a larger conductive thermal resistance between warp wire and weft wire, warp wires contribute less to condensation but function as supporting structure. The surface energy analysis of drops along weft wires explains why droplet array can be generated on the mesh screen piece. Because the commercial material is used, the droplet system is cost effective and can be used for large scale utilization.

A Dynamic Mesh-Based Approach to Model Melting and Shape of an ESR Electrode

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Karimi-Sibaki, E.; Kharicha, A.; Bohacek, J.; Wu, M.; Ludwig, A.

2015-10-01

This paper presents a numerical method to investigate the shape of tip and melt rate of an electrode during electroslag remelting process. The interactions between flow, temperature, and electromagnetic fields are taken into account. A dynamic mesh-based approach is employed to model the dynamic formation of the shape of electrode tip. The effect of slag properties such as thermal and electrical conductivities on the melt rate and electrode immersion depth is discussed. The thermal conductivity of slag has a dominant influence on the heat transfer in the system, hence on melt rate of electrode. The melt rate decreases with increasing thermal conductivity of slag. The electrical conductivity of slag governs the electric current path that in turn influences flow and temperature fields. The melting of electrode is a quite unstable process due to the complex interaction between the melt rate, immersion depth, and shape of electrode tip. Therefore, a numerical adaptation of electrode position in the slag has been implemented in order to achieve steady state melting. In fact, the melt rate, immersion depth, and shape of electrode tip are interdependent parameters of process. The generated power in the system is found to be dependent on both immersion depth and shape of electrode tip. In other words, the same amount of power was generated for the systems where the shapes of tip and immersion depth were different. Furthermore, it was observed that the shape of electrode tip is very similar for the systems running with the same ratio of power generation to melt rate. Comparison between simulations and experimental results was made to verify the numerical model.

Method of and apparatus for modeling interactions

DOEpatents

Budge, Kent G.

2004-01-13

A method and apparatus for modeling interactions can accurately model tribological and other properties and accommodate topological disruptions. Two portions of a problem space are represented, a first with a Lagrangian mesh and a second with an ALE mesh. The ALE and Lagrangian meshes are constructed so that each node on the surface of the Lagrangian mesh is in a known correspondence with adjacent nodes in the ALE mesh. The interaction can be predicted for a time interval. Material flow within the ALE mesh can accurately model complex interactions such as bifurcation. After prediction, nodes in the ALE mesh in correspondence with nodes on the surface of the Lagrangian mesh can be mapped so that they are once again adjacent to their corresponding Lagrangian mesh nodes. The ALE mesh can then be smoothed to reduce mesh distortion that might reduce the accuracy or efficiency of subsequent prediction steps. The process, from prediction through mapping and smoothing, can be repeated until a terminal condition is reached.

Evaluation of mechanical properties in metal wire mesh supported selective catalytic reduction (SCR) catalyst structures

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rajath, S.; Siddaraju, C.; Nandakishora, Y.; Roy, Sukumar

2018-04-01

The objective of this research is to evaluate certain specific mechanical properties of certain stainless steel wire mesh supported Selective catalytic reduction catalysts structures wherein the physical properties of the metal wire mesh and also its surface treatments played vital role thereby influencing the mechanical properties. As the adhesion between the stainless steel wire mesh and the catalyst material determines the bond strength and the erosion resistance of catalyst structures, surface modifications of the metal- wire mesh structure in order to facilitate the interface bonding is therefore very important to realize enhanced level of mechanical properties. One way to enhance such adhesion properties, the stainless steel wire mesh is treated with the various acids, i.e., chromic acid, phosphoric acid including certain mineral acids and combination of all those in various molar ratios that could generate surface active groups on metal surface that promotes good interface structure between the metal- wire mesh and metal oxide-based catalyst material and then the stainless steel wire mesh is dipped in the glass powder slurry containing some amount of organic binder. As a result of which the said catalyst material adheres to the metal-wire mesh surface more effectively that improves the erosion profile of supported catalysts structure including bond strength.

Integration of experimental and computational methods for identifying geometric, thermal and diffusive properties of biomaterials

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Weres, Jerzy; Kujawa, Sebastian; Olek, Wiesław; Czajkowski, Łukasz

2016-04-01

Knowledge of physical properties of biomaterials is important in understanding and designing agri-food and wood processing industries. In the study presented in this paper computational methods were developed and combined with experiments to enhance identification of agri-food and forest product properties, and to predict heat and water transport in such products. They were based on the finite element model of heat and water transport and supplemented with experimental data. Algorithms were proposed for image processing, geometry meshing, and inverse/direct finite element modelling. The resulting software system was composed of integrated subsystems for 3D geometry data acquisition and mesh generation, for 3D geometry modelling and visualization, and for inverse/direct problem computations for the heat and water transport processes. Auxiliary packages were developed to assess performance, accuracy and unification of data access. The software was validated by identifying selected properties and using the estimated values to predict the examined processes, and then comparing predictions to experimental data. The geometry, thermal conductivity, specific heat, coefficient of water diffusion, equilibrium water content and convective heat and water transfer coefficients in the boundary layer were analysed. The estimated values, used as an input for simulation of the examined processes, enabled reduction in the uncertainty associated with predictions.

Experimental analysis and numerical modeling of mollusk shells as a three dimensional integrated volume.

PubMed

Faghih Shojaei, M; Mohammadi, V; Rajabi, H; Darvizeh, A

2012-12-01

In this paper, a new numerical technique is presented to accurately model the geometrical and mechanical features of mollusk shells as a three dimensional (3D) integrated volume. For this purpose, the Newton method is used to solve the nonlinear equations of shell surfaces. The points of intersection on the shell surface are identified and the extra interior parts are removed. Meshing process is accomplished with respect to the coordinate of each point of intersection. The final 3D generated mesh models perfectly describe the spatial configuration of the mollusk shells. Moreover, the computational model perfectly matches with the actual interior geometry of the shells as well as their exterior architecture. The direct generation technique is employed to generate a 3D finite element (FE) model in ANSYS 11. X-ray images are taken to show the close similarity of the interior geometry of the models and the actual samples. A scanning electron microscope (SEM) is used to provide information on the microstructure of the shells. In addition, a set of compression tests were performed on gastropod shell specimens to obtain their ultimate compressive strength. A close agreement between experimental data and the relevant numerical results is demonstrated. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

GRAPE- TWO-DIMENSIONAL GRIDS ABOUT AIRFOILS AND OTHER SHAPES BY THE USE OF POISSON'S EQUATION

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Sorenson, R. L.

1994-01-01

The ability to treat arbitrary boundary shapes is one of the most desirable characteristics of a method for generating grids, including those about airfoils. In a grid used for computing aerodynamic flow over an airfoil, or any other body shape, the surface of the body is usually treated as an inner boundary and often cannot be easily represented as an analytic function. The GRAPE computer program was developed to incorporate a method for generating two-dimensional finite-difference grids about airfoils and other shapes by the use of the Poisson differential equation. GRAPE can be used with any boundary shape, even one specified by tabulated points and including a limited number of sharp corners. The GRAPE program has been developed to be numerically stable and computationally fast. GRAPE can provide the aerodynamic analyst with an efficient and consistent means of grid generation. The GRAPE procedure generates a grid between an inner and an outer boundary by utilizing an iterative procedure to solve the Poisson differential equation subject to geometrical restraints. In this method, the inhomogeneous terms of the equation are automatically chosen such that two important effects are imposed on the grid. The first effect is control of the spacing between mesh points along mesh lines intersecting the boundaries. The second effect is control of the angles with which mesh lines intersect the boundaries. Along with the iterative solution to Poisson's equation, a technique of coarse-fine sequencing is employed to accelerate numerical convergence. GRAPE program control cards and input data are entered via the NAMELIST feature. Each variable has a default value such that user supplied data is kept to a minimum. Basic input data consists of the boundary specification, mesh point spacings on the boundaries, and mesh line angles at the boundaries. Output consists of a dataset containing the grid data and, if requested, a plot of the generated mesh. The GRAPE program is written in FORTRAN IV for batch execution and has been implemented on a CDC 6000 series computer with a central memory requirement of approximately 135K (octal) of 60 bit words. For plotted output the commercially available DISSPLA graphics software package is required. The GRAPE program was developed in 1980.

TESS: A RELATIVISTIC HYDRODYNAMICS CODE ON A MOVING VORONOI MESH

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Duffell, Paul C.; MacFadyen, Andrew I., E-mail: pcd233@nyu.edu, E-mail: macfadyen@nyu.edu

2011-12-01

We have generalized a method for the numerical solution of hyperbolic systems of equations using a dynamic Voronoi tessellation of the computational domain. The Voronoi tessellation is used to generate moving computational meshes for the solution of multidimensional systems of conservation laws in finite-volume form. The mesh-generating points are free to move with arbitrary velocity, with the choice of zero velocity resulting in an Eulerian formulation. Moving the points at the local fluid velocity makes the formulation effectively Lagrangian. We have written the TESS code to solve the equations of compressible hydrodynamics and magnetohydrodynamics for both relativistic and non-relativistic fluidsmore » on a dynamic Voronoi mesh. When run in Lagrangian mode, TESS is significantly less diffusive than fixed mesh codes and thus preserves contact discontinuities to high precision while also accurately capturing strong shock waves. TESS is written for Cartesian, spherical, and cylindrical coordinates and is modular so that auxiliary physics solvers are readily integrated into the TESS framework and so that this can be readily adapted to solve general systems of equations. We present results from a series of test problems to demonstrate the performance of TESS and to highlight some of the advantages of the dynamic tessellation method for solving challenging problems in astrophysical fluid dynamics.« less

Coarsening strategies for unstructured multigrid techniques with application to anisotropic problems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Morano, E.; Mavriplis, D. J.; Venkatakrishnan, V.

1995-01-01

Over the years, multigrid has been demonstrated as an efficient technique for solving inviscid flow problems. However, for viscous flows, convergence rates often degrade. This is generally due to the required use of stretched meshes (i.e., the aspect-ratio AR = delta y/delta x is much less than 1) in order to capture the boundary layer near the body. Usual techniques for generating a sequence of grids that produce proper convergence rates on isotopic meshes are not adequate for stretched meshes. This work focuses on the solution of Laplace's equation, discretized through a Galerkin finite-element formulation on unstructured stretched triangular meshes. A coarsening strategy is proposed and results are discussed.

Coarsening Strategies for Unstructured Multigrid Techniques with Application to Anisotropic Problems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Morano, E.; Mavriplis, D. J.; Venkatakrishnan, V.

1996-01-01

Over the years, multigrid has been demonstrated as an efficient technique for solving inviscid flow problems. However, for viscous flows, convergence rates often degrade. This is generally due to the required use of stretched meshes (i.e. the aspect-ratio AR = (delta)y/(delta)x much less than 1) in order to capture the boundary layer near the body. Usual techniques for generating a sequence of grids that produce proper convergence rates on isotropic meshes are not adequate for stretched meshes. This work focuses on the solution of Laplace's equation, discretized through a Galerkin finite-element formulation on unstructured stretched triangular meshes. A coarsening strategy is proposed and results are discussed.

A template-based approach for parallel hexahedral two-refinement

DOE PAGES

Owen, Steven J.; Shih, Ryan M.; Ernst, Corey D.

2016-10-17

Here, we provide a template-based approach for generating locally refined all-hex meshes. We focus specifically on refinement of initially structured grids utilizing a 2-refinement approach where uniformly refined hexes are subdivided into eight child elements. The refinement algorithm consists of identifying marked nodes that are used as the basis for a set of four simple refinement templates. The target application for 2-refinement is a parallel grid-based all-hex meshing tool for high performance computing in a distributed environment. The result is a parallel consistent locally refined mesh requiring minimal communication and where minimum mesh quality is greater than scaled Jacobian 0.3more » prior to smoothing.« less

A template-based approach for parallel hexahedral two-refinement

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Owen, Steven J.; Shih, Ryan M.; Ernst, Corey D.

Here, we provide a template-based approach for generating locally refined all-hex meshes. We focus specifically on refinement of initially structured grids utilizing a 2-refinement approach where uniformly refined hexes are subdivided into eight child elements. The refinement algorithm consists of identifying marked nodes that are used as the basis for a set of four simple refinement templates. The target application for 2-refinement is a parallel grid-based all-hex meshing tool for high performance computing in a distributed environment. The result is a parallel consistent locally refined mesh requiring minimal communication and where minimum mesh quality is greater than scaled Jacobian 0.3more » prior to smoothing.« less

Lattice-like collagen fiber meshwork in the iris stroma of the cat: a possible mechanism to generate the tension directed towards the iris root which is required for pupillary dilatation in the sympathectomized eye.

PubMed

Sakuraba, M; Yun, S; Ichinohe, N; Yonekura, H; Shoumura, K

1999-10-01

NaOH digestion technique for collagen fiber dissection and scanning electron microscopy demonstrated a lattice-like meshwork in the anterior surface of the iris stroma of the cat. The mesh threads were made of collagen fibril bundles. In the constricted pupil, the meshes were square to rhomboid with the diagonals in the direction of the radius or circumference of the iris. In the dilated pupil, however, the meshes were strongly flattened rhomboid or ellipse with a longer diagnoal or axis in the circumferential direction. At the mesh corners facing the pupillary margin or the iris root, the collagen fibril bundles were strongly bent in the iris of the constricted pupil, while they were almost straight or slightly wavy in the iris of the dilated pupil. Accumulation of elasticity tension generated by this small distortion of the iris-mesh threads in the constricted pupil was considered to generate a tension directed towards the iris root, which is required for pupillary dilatation in the sympathectomized eye. On the posterior surface of the iris stroma, numerous thin pleats tightly woven with collagen fibrils traversed straightway through the radial length of the ciliary zone of the iris in both constricted and dilated pupils. The structural changes of these pleats in miosis and mydriasis were very small compared with the meshwork of the anterior aspect of the iris. Therefore, they were considered to work mainly as an iris skeleton.

Crowned spur gears - Methods for generation and Tooth Contact Analysis. II - Generation of the pinion tooth surface by a surface of revolution

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Litvin, F. L.; Handschuh, R. F.; Zhang, J.

1988-01-01

A method for generation of crowned pinion tooth surfaces using a surface of revolution is developed. The crowned pinion meshes with a regular involute gear and has a prescribed parabolic type of transmission errors when the gears operate in the aligned mode. When the gears are misaligned the transmission error remains parabolic with the maximum level still remaining very small (less than 0.34 arc second for the numerical examples). Tooth Contact Analysis (TCA) is used to simulate the conditions of meshing, determine the transmission error, and the bearing contact.

Domain Decomposition By the Advancing-Partition Method for Parallel Unstructured Grid Generation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Pirzadeh, Shahyar Z.; Zagaris, George

2009-01-01

A new method of domain decomposition has been developed for generating unstructured grids in subdomains either sequentially or using multiple computers in parallel. Domain decomposition is a crucial and challenging step for parallel grid generation. Prior methods are generally based on auxiliary, complex, and computationally intensive operations for defining partition interfaces and usually produce grids of lower quality than those generated in single domains. The new technique, referred to as "Advancing Partition," is based on the Advancing-Front method, which partitions a domain as part of the volume mesh generation in a consistent and "natural" way. The benefits of this approach are: 1) the process of domain decomposition is highly automated, 2) partitioning of domain does not compromise the quality of the generated grids, and 3) the computational overhead for domain decomposition is minimal. The new method has been implemented in NASA's unstructured grid generation code VGRID.

Collisionless stellar hydrodynamics as an efficient alternative to N-body methods

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Mitchell, Nigel L.; Vorobyov, Eduard I.; Hensler, Gerhard

2013-01-01

The dominant constituents of the Universe's matter are believed to be collisionless in nature and thus their modelling in any self-consistent simulation is extremely important. For simulations that deal only with dark matter or stellar systems, the conventional N-body technique is fast, memory efficient and relatively simple to implement. However when extending simulations to include the effects of gas physics, mesh codes are at a distinct disadvantage compared to Smooth Particle Hydrodynamics (SPH) codes. Whereas implementing the N-body approach into SPH codes is fairly trivial, the particle-mesh technique used in mesh codes to couple collisionless stars and dark matter to the gas on the mesh has a series of significant scientific and technical limitations. These include spurious entropy generation resulting from discreteness effects, poor load balancing and increased communication overhead which spoil the excellent scaling in massively parallel grid codes. In this paper we propose the use of the collisionless Boltzmann moment equations as a means to model the collisionless material as a fluid on the mesh, implementing it into the massively parallel FLASH Adaptive Mesh Refinement (AMR) code. This approach which we term `collisionless stellar hydrodynamics' enables us to do away with the particle-mesh approach and since the parallelization scheme is identical to that used for the hydrodynamics, it preserves the excellent scaling of the FLASH code already demonstrated on peta-flop machines. We find that the classic hydrodynamic equations and the Boltzmann moment equations can be reconciled under specific conditions, allowing us to generate analytic solutions for collisionless systems using conventional test problems. We confirm the validity of our approach using a suite of demanding test problems, including the use of a modified Sod shock test. By deriving the relevant eigenvalues and eigenvectors of the Boltzmann moment equations, we are able to use high order accurate characteristic tracing methods with Riemann solvers to generate numerical solutions which show excellent agreement with our analytic solutions. We conclude by demonstrating the ability of our code to model complex phenomena by simulating the evolution of a two-armed spiral galaxy whose properties agree with those predicted by the swing amplification theory.

Facile Fabrication of a Polyethylene Mesh for Oil/Water Separation in a Complex Environment.

PubMed

Zhao, Tianyi; Zhang, Dongmei; Yu, Cunming; Jiang, Lei

2016-09-14

Low cost, eco-friendly, and easily scaled-up processes are needed to fabricate efficient oil/water separation materials, especially those useful in harsh environments such as highly acidic, alkaline, and salty environments, to deal with serious oil spills and industrial organic pollutants. Herein, a highly efficient oil/water separation mesh with durable chemical stability was fabricated by simply scratching and pricking a conventional polyethylene (PE) film. Multiscaled morphologies were obtained by this scratching and pricking process and provided the mesh with a special wettability performance termed superhydrophobicity, superoleophilicity, and low water adhesion, while the inert chemical properties of PE delivered chemical etching resistance to the fabricated mesh. In addition to a highly efficient oil/corrosive liquid separation, the fabricated PE mesh was also reusable and exhibited ultrafast oil/water separation solely by gravity. The easy operation, chemical durability, reusability, and efficiency of the novel PE mesh give it high potential for use in industrial and consumer applications.

dfnWorks: A discrete fracture network framework for modeling subsurface flow and transport

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Hyman, Jeffrey D.; Karra, Satish; Makedonska, Nataliia

DFNWORKS is a parallelized computational suite to generate three-dimensional discrete fracture networks (DFN) and simulate flow and transport. Developed at Los Alamos National Laboratory over the past five years, it has been used to study flow and transport in fractured media at scales ranging from millimeters to kilometers. The networks are created and meshed using DFNGEN, which combines FRAM (the feature rejection algorithm for meshing) methodology to stochastically generate three-dimensional DFNs with the LaGriT meshing toolbox to create a high-quality computational mesh representation. The representation produces a conforming Delaunay triangulation suitable for high performance computing finite volume solvers in anmore » intrinsically parallel fashion. Flow through the network is simulated in dfnFlow, which utilizes the massively parallel subsurface flow and reactive transport finite volume code PFLOTRAN. A Lagrangian approach to simulating transport through the DFN is adopted within DFNTRANS to determine pathlines and solute transport through the DFN. Example applications of this suite in the areas of nuclear waste repository science, hydraulic fracturing and CO 2 sequestration are also included.« less

dfnWorks: A discrete fracture network framework for modeling subsurface flow and transport

DOE PAGES

Hyman, Jeffrey D.; Karra, Satish; Makedonska, Nataliia; ...

2015-11-01

DFNWORKS is a parallelized computational suite to generate three-dimensional discrete fracture networks (DFN) and simulate flow and transport. Developed at Los Alamos National Laboratory over the past five years, it has been used to study flow and transport in fractured media at scales ranging from millimeters to kilometers. The networks are created and meshed using DFNGEN, which combines FRAM (the feature rejection algorithm for meshing) methodology to stochastically generate three-dimensional DFNs with the LaGriT meshing toolbox to create a high-quality computational mesh representation. The representation produces a conforming Delaunay triangulation suitable for high performance computing finite volume solvers in anmore » intrinsically parallel fashion. Flow through the network is simulated in dfnFlow, which utilizes the massively parallel subsurface flow and reactive transport finite volume code PFLOTRAN. A Lagrangian approach to simulating transport through the DFN is adopted within DFNTRANS to determine pathlines and solute transport through the DFN. Example applications of this suite in the areas of nuclear waste repository science, hydraulic fracturing and CO 2 sequestration are also included.« less

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Duchaineau, M.; Wolinsky, M.; Sigeti, D.E.

Real-time terrain rendering for interactive visualization remains a demanding task. We present a novel algorithm with several advantages over previous methods: our method is unusually stingy with polygons yet achieves real-time performance and is scalable to arbitrary regions and resolutions. The method provides a continuous terrain mesh of specified triangle count having provably minimum error in restricted but reasonably general classes of permissible meshes and error metrics. Our method provides an elegant solution to guaranteeing certain elusive types of consistency in scenes produced by multiple scene generators which share a common finest-resolution database but which otherwise operate entirely independently. Thismore » consistency is achieved by exploiting the freedom of choice of error metric allowed by the algorithm to provide, for example, multiple exact lines-of-sight in real-time. Our methods rely on an off-line pre-processing phase to construct a multi-scale data structure consisting of triangular terrain approximations enhanced ({open_quotes}thickened{close_quotes}) with world-space error information. In real time, this error data is efficiently transformed into screen-space where it is used to guide a greedy top-down triangle subdivision algorithm which produces the desired minimal error continuous terrain mesh. Our algorithm has been implemented and it operates at real-time rates.« less

Grouper: a compact, streamable triangle mesh data structure.

PubMed

Luffel, Mark; Gurung, Topraj; Lindstrom, Peter; Rossignac, Jarek

2014-01-01

We present Grouper: an all-in-one compact file format, random-access data structure, and streamable representation for large triangle meshes. Similarly to the recently published SQuad representation, Grouper represents the geometry and connectivity of a mesh by grouping vertices and triangles into fixed-size records, most of which store two adjacent triangles and a shared vertex. Unlike SQuad, however, Grouper interleaves geometry with connectivity and uses a new connectivity representation to ensure that vertices and triangles can be stored in a coherent order that enables memory-efficient sequential stream processing. We present a linear-time construction algorithm that allows streaming out Grouper meshes using a small memory footprint while preserving the initial ordering of vertices. As a part of this construction, we show how the problem of assigning vertices and triangles to groups reduces to a well-known NP-hard optimization problem, and present a simple yet effective heuristic solution that performs well in practice. Our array-based Grouper representation also doubles as a triangle mesh data structure that allows direct access to vertices and triangles. Storing only about two integer references per triangle--i.e., less than the three vertex references stored with each triangle in a conventional indexed mesh format--Grouper answers both incidence and adjacency queries in amortized constant time. Our compact representation enables data-parallel processing on multicore computers, instant partitioning and fast transmission for distributed processing, as well as efficient out-of-core access. We demonstrate the versatility and performance benefits of Grouper using a suite of example meshes and processing kernels.

Evaluation of flotation for purification of pyrite for use in thermal batteries

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Guidotti, R. A.; Reinhardt, F. W.

1992-07-01

The purification of pyrite (FeS2) used in Li-alloy/FeS2 thermal batteries by the physical process of flotation was evaluated for reduction of the quartz impurity. The process was compared to the standard process of leaching with concentrated hydrofluoric acid. Flotation was an attractive alternative because it avoided many of the safety and environmental concerns posed by the use of concentrated HF. The effects of particle size and initial purity of the pyrite feed material upon the final purity and yield of the product concentrate were examined for batch sizes from 3.5 to 921 kg. Feed materials as coarse as 8 mm and as fine as -325 mesh were treated; the coarse pyrite was ground wet in a rod mill or dry in a vibratory mill to -230 mesh prior to flotation. Both the HF-leached and the flotation-treated pyrite were leached with HCI (1:1 v/v) to remove acid-soluble impurities. The flotation-purified pyrite concentrates were formulated into catholytes; their electrochemical performance was evaluated in both single cells and 5-cell batteries for comparison to data generated under the same discharge conditions for catholytes formulated with HF/HCI purified pyrite.

GENIE(++): A Multi-Block Structured Grid System

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Williams, Tonya; Nadenthiran, Naren; Thornburg, Hugh; Soni, Bharat K.

1996-01-01

The computer code GENIE++ is a continuously evolving grid system containing a multitude of proven geometry/grid techniques. The generation process in GENIE++ is based on an earlier version. The process uses several techniques either separately or in combination to quickly and economically generate sculptured geometry descriptions and grids for arbitrary geometries. The computational mesh is formed by using an appropriate algebraic method. Grid clustering is accomplished with either exponential or hyperbolic tangent routines which allow the user to specify a desired point distribution. Grid smoothing can be accomplished by using an elliptic solver with proper forcing functions. B-spline and Non-Uniform Rational B-splines (NURBS) algorithms are used for surface definition and redistribution. The built in sculptured geometry definition with desired distribution of points, automatic Bezier curve/surface generation for interior boundaries/surfaces, and surface redistribution is based on NURBS. Weighted Lagrance/Hermite transfinite interpolation methods, interactive geometry/grid manipulation modules, and on-line graphical visualization of the generation process are salient features of this system which result in a significant time savings for a given geometry/grid application.

A new multiscale air quality transport model (Fluidity, 4.1.9) using fully unstructured anisotropic adaptive mesh technology

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zheng, J.; Zhu, J.; Wang, Z.; Fang, F.; Pain, C. C.; Xiang, J.

2015-06-01

A new anisotropic hr-adaptive mesh technique has been applied to modelling of multiscale transport phenomena, which is based on a discontinuous Galerkin/control volume discretization on unstructured meshes. Over existing air quality models typically based on static-structured grids using a locally nesting technique, the advantage of the anisotropic hr-adaptive model has the ability to adapt the mesh according to the evolving pollutant distribution and flow features. That is, the mesh resolution can be adjusted dynamically to simulate the pollutant transport process accurately and effectively. To illustrate the capability of the anisotropic adaptive unstructured mesh model, three benchmark numerical experiments have been setup for two-dimensional (2-D) transport phenomena. Comparisons have been made between the results obtained using uniform resolution meshes and anisotropic adaptive resolution meshes.

Generation of a crowned pinion tooth surface by a surface of revolution

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Litvin, F. L.; Zhang, J.; Handschuh, R. F.

1988-01-01

A method of generating crowned pinion tooth surfaces using a surface of revolution is developed. The crowned pinion meshes with a regular involute gear and has a prescribed parabolic type of transmission errors when the gears operate in the aligned mode. When the gears are misaligned the transmission error remains parabolic with the maximum level still remaining very small (less than 0.34 arc sec for the numerical examples). Tooth contact analysis (TCA) is used to simulate the conditions of meshing, determine the transmission error, and determine the bearing contact.

Helical gears with circular arc teeth: Generation, geometry, precision and adjustment to errors, computer aided simulation of conditions of meshing and bearing contact

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Litvin, Faydor L.; Tsay, Chung-Biau

1987-01-01

The authors have proposed a method for the generation of circular arc helical gears which is based on the application of standard equipment, worked out all aspects of the geometry of the gears, proposed methods for the computer aided simulation of conditions of meshing and bearing contact, investigated the influence of manufacturing and assembly errors, and proposed methods for the adjustment of gears to these errors. The results of computer aided solutions are illustrated with computer graphics.

Drag Prediction for the DLR-F6 Wing/Body and DPW Wing using CFL3D and OVERFLOW Overset Mesh

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Sclanfani, Anthony J.; Vassberg, John C.; Harrison, Neal A.; DeHaan, Mark A.; Rumsey, Christopher L.; Rivers, S. Melissa; Morrison, Joseph H.

2007-01-01

A series of overset grids was generated in response to the 3rd AIAA CFD Drag Prediction Workshop (DPW-III) which preceded the 25th Applied Aerodynamics Conference in June 2006. DPW-III focused on accurate drag prediction for wing/body and wing-alone configurations. The grid series built for each configuration consists of a coarse, medium, fine, and extra-fine mesh. The medium mesh is first constructed using the current state of best practices for overset grid generation. The medium mesh is then coarsened and enhanced by applying a factor of 1.5 to each (I,J,K) dimension. The resulting set of parametrically equivalent grids increase in size by a factor of roughly 3.5 from one level to the next denser level. CFD simulations were performed on the overset grids using two different RANS flow solvers: CFL3D and OVERFLOW. The results were post-processed using Richardson extrapolation to approximate grid converged values of lift, drag, pitching moment, and angle-of-attack at the design condition. This technique appears to work well if the solution does not contain large regions of separated flow (similar to that seen n the DLR-F6 results) and appropriate grid densities are selected. The extra-fine grid data helped to establish asymptotic grid convergence for both the OVERFLOW FX2B wing/body results and the OVERFLOW DPW-W1/W2 wing-alone results. More CFL3D data is needed to establish grid convergence trends. The medium grid was utilized beyond the grid convergence study by running each configuration at several angles-of-attack so drag polars and lift/pitching moment curves could be evaluated. The alpha sweep results are used to compare data across configurations as well as across flow solvers. With the exception of the wing/body drag polar, the two codes compare well qualitatively showing consistent incremental trends and similar wing pressure comparisons.

Patient-specific geometrical modeling of orthopedic structures with high efficiency and accuracy for finite element modeling and 3D printing.

PubMed

Huang, Huajun; Xiang, Chunling; Zeng, Canjun; Ouyang, Hanbin; Wong, Kelvin Kian Loong; Huang, Wenhua

2015-12-01

We improved the geometrical modeling procedure for fast and accurate reconstruction of orthopedic structures. This procedure consists of medical image segmentation, three-dimensional geometrical reconstruction, and assignment of material properties. The patient-specific orthopedic structures reconstructed by this improved procedure can be used in the virtual surgical planning, 3D printing of real orthopedic structures and finite element analysis. A conventional modeling consists of: image segmentation, geometrical reconstruction, mesh generation, and assignment of material properties. The present study modified the conventional method to enhance software operating procedures. Patient's CT images of different bones were acquired and subsequently reconstructed to give models. The reconstruction procedures were three-dimensional image segmentation, modification of the edge length and quantity of meshes, and the assignment of material properties according to the intensity of gravy value. We compared the performance of our procedures to the conventional procedures modeling in terms of software operating time, success rate and mesh quality. Our proposed framework has the following improvements in the geometrical modeling: (1) processing time: (femur: 87.16 ± 5.90 %; pelvis: 80.16 ± 7.67 %; thoracic vertebra: 17.81 ± 4.36 %; P < 0.05); (2) least volume reduction (femur: 0.26 ± 0.06 %; pelvis: 0.70 ± 0.47, thoracic vertebra: 3.70 ± 1.75 %; P < 0.01) and (3) mesh quality in terms of aspect ratio (femur: 8.00 ± 7.38 %; pelvis: 17.70 ± 9.82 %; thoracic vertebra: 13.93 ± 9.79 %; P < 0.05) and maximum angle (femur: 4.90 ± 5.28 %; pelvis: 17.20 ± 19.29 %; thoracic vertebra: 3.86 ± 3.82 %; P < 0.05). Our proposed patient-specific geometrical modeling requires less operating time and workload, but the orthopedic structures were generated at a higher rate of success as compared with the conventional method. It is expected to benefit the surgical planning of orthopedic structures with less operating time and high accuracy of modeling.

3D Voronoi grid dedicated software for modeling gas migration in deep layered sedimentary formations with TOUGH2-TMGAS

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bonduà, Stefano; Battistelli, Alfredo; Berry, Paolo; Bortolotti, Villiam; Consonni, Alberto; Cormio, Carlo; Geloni, Claudio; Vasini, Ester Maria

2017-11-01

As is known, a full three-dimensional (3D) unstructured grid permits a great degree of flexibility when performing accurate numerical reservoir simulations. However, when the Integral Finite Difference Method (IFDM) is used for spatial discretization, constraints (arising from the required orthogonality between the segment connecting the blocks nodes and the interface area between blocks) pose difficulties in the creation of grids with irregular shaped blocks. The full 3D Voronoi approach guarantees the respect of IFDM constraints and allows generation of grids conforming to geological formations and structural objects and at the same time higher grid resolution in volumes of interest. In this work, we present dedicated pre- and post-processing gridding software tools for the TOUGH family of numerical reservoir simulators, developed by the Geothermal Research Group of the DICAM Department, University of Bologna. VORO2MESH is a new software coded in C++, based on the voro++ library, allowing computation of the 3D Voronoi tessellation for a given domain and the creation of a ready to use TOUGH2 MESH file. If a set of geological surfaces is available, the software can directly generate the set of Voronoi seed points used for tessellation. In order to reduce the number of connections and so to decrease computation time, VORO2MESH can produce a mixed grid with regular blocks (orthogonal prisms) and irregular blocks (polyhedron Voronoi blocks) at the point of contact between different geological formations. In order to visualize 3D Voronoi grids together with the results of numerical simulations, the functionality of the TOUGH2Viewer post-processor has been extended. We describe an application of VORO2MESH and TOUGH2Viewer to validate the two tools. The case study deals with the simulation of the migration of gases in deep layered sedimentary formations at basin scale using TOUGH2-TMGAS. A comparison between the simulation performances of unstructured and structured grids is presented.

Computational approach to seasonal changes of living leaves.

PubMed

Tang, Ying; Wu, Dong-Yan; Fan, Jing

2013-01-01

This paper proposes a computational approach to seasonal changes of living leaves by combining the geometric deformations and textural color changes. The geometric model of a leaf is generated by triangulating the scanned image of a leaf using an optimized mesh. The triangular mesh of the leaf is deformed by the improved mass-spring model, while the deformation is controlled by setting different mass values for the vertices on the leaf model. In order to adaptively control the deformation of different regions in the leaf, the mass values of vertices are set to be in proportion to the pixels' intensities of the corresponding user-specified grayscale mask map. The geometric deformations as well as the textural color changes of a leaf are used to simulate the seasonal changing process of leaves based on Markov chain model with different environmental parameters including temperature, humidness, and time. Experimental results show that the method successfully simulates the seasonal changes of leaves.

Sentiment Analysis of Web Sites Related to Vaginal Mesh Use in Pelvic Reconstructive Surgery.

PubMed

Hobson, Deslyn T G; Meriwether, Kate V; Francis, Sean L; Kinman, Casey L; Stewart, J Ryan

2018-05-02

The purpose of this study was to utilize sentiment analysis to describe online opinions toward vaginal mesh. We hypothesized that sentiment in legal Web sites would be more negative than that in medical and reference Web sites. We generated a list of relevant key words related to vaginal mesh and searched Web sites using the Google search engine. Each unique uniform resource locator (URL) was sorted into 1 of 6 categories: "medical", "legal", "news/media", "patient generated", "reference", or "unrelated". Sentiment of relevant Web sites, the primary outcome, was scored on a scale of -1 to +1, and mean sentiment was compared across all categories using 1-way analysis of variance. Tukey test evaluated differences between category pairs. Google searches of 464 unique key words resulted in 11,405 URLs. Sentiment analysis was performed on 8029 relevant URLs (3472 legal, 1625 "medical", 1774 "reference", 666 "news media", 492 "patient generated"). The mean sentiment for all relevant Web sites was +0.01 ± 0.16; analysis of variance revealed significant differences between categories (P < 0.001). Web sites categorized as "legal" and "news/media" had a slightly negative mean sentiment, whereas those categorized as "medical," "reference," and "patient generated" had slightly positive mean sentiments. Tukey test showed differences between all category pairs except the "medical" versus "reference" in comparison with the largest mean difference (-0.13) seen in the "legal" versus "reference" comparison. Web sites related to vaginal mesh have an overall mean neutral sentiment, and Web sites categorized as "medical," "reference," and "patient generated" have significantly higher sentiment scores than related Web sites in "legal" and "news/media" categories.

Computed tomography landmark-based semi-automated mesh morphing and mapping techniques: generation of patient specific models of the human pelvis without segmentation.

PubMed

Salo, Zoryana; Beek, Maarten; Wright, David; Whyne, Cari Marisa

2015-04-13

Current methods for the development of pelvic finite element (FE) models generally are based upon specimen specific computed tomography (CT) data. This approach has traditionally required segmentation of CT data sets, which is time consuming and necessitates high levels of user intervention due to the complex pelvic anatomy. The purpose of this research was to develop and assess CT landmark-based semi-automated mesh morphing and mapping techniques to aid the generation and mechanical analysis of specimen-specific FE models of the pelvis without the need for segmentation. A specimen-specific pelvic FE model (source) was created using traditional segmentation methods and morphed onto a CT scan of a different (target) pelvis using a landmark-based method. The morphed model was then refined through mesh mapping by moving the nodes to the bone boundary. A second target model was created using traditional segmentation techniques. CT intensity based material properties were assigned to the morphed/mapped model and to the traditionally segmented target models. Models were analyzed to evaluate their geometric concurrency and strain patterns. Strains generated in a double-leg stance configuration were compared to experimental strain gauge data generated from the same target cadaver pelvis. CT landmark-based morphing and mapping techniques were efficiently applied to create a geometrically multifaceted specimen-specific pelvic FE model, which was similar to the traditionally segmented target model and better replicated the experimental strain results (R(2)=0.873). This study has shown that mesh morphing and mapping represents an efficient validated approach for pelvic FE model generation without the need for segmentation. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

A mesh gradient technique for numerical optimization

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Willis, E. A., Jr.

1973-01-01

A class of successive-improvement optimization methods in which directions of descent are defined in the state space along each trial trajectory are considered. The given problem is first decomposed into two discrete levels by imposing mesh points. Level 1 consists of running optimal subarcs between each successive pair of mesh points. For normal systems, these optimal two-point boundary value problems can be solved by following a routine prescription if the mesh spacing is sufficiently close. A spacing criterion is given. Under appropriate conditions, the criterion value depends only on the coordinates of the mesh points, and its gradient with respect to those coordinates may be defined by interpreting the adjoint variables as partial derivatives of the criterion value function. In level 2, the gradient data is used to generate improvement steps or search directions in the state space which satisfy the boundary values and constraints of the given problem.

Guided bone generation in a rabbit mandible model after periosteal expansion with an osmotic tissue expander.

PubMed

Abrahamsson, Peter; Isaksson, Sten; Andersson, Gunilla

2011-11-01

To evaluate the space-maintaining capacity of titanium mesh covered by a collagen membrane after soft tissue expansion on the lateral border of the mandible in rabbits, and to assess bone quantity and quality using autogenous particulate bone or bone-substitute (Bio-Oss(®) ), and if soft tissue ingrowth can be avoided by covering the mesh with a collagen membrane. In 11 rabbits, a self-inflatable soft tissue expander was placed under the lateral mandibular periosteum via an extra-oral approach. After 2 weeks, the expanders were removed and a particulated onlay bone graft and deproteinized bovine bone mineral (DBBM) (Bio-Oss(®) ) were placed in the expanded area and covered by a titanium mesh. The bone and DBBM were separated in two compartments under the mesh with a collagen membrane in between. The mesh was then covered with a collagen membrane. After 3 months, the animals were sacrificed and specimens were collected for histology. The osmotic soft tissue expander created a subperiosteal pocket and a ridge of new bone formed at the edges of the expanded periosteum in all sites. After the healing period of 3 months, no soft tissue dehiscence was recorded. The mean bone fill was 58.1±18% in the bone grafted area and 56.9±13.7% in the DBBM area. There was no significant difference between the autologous bone graft and the DDBM under the titanium mesh with regard to the total bone area or the mineralized bone area. Scanning electron microscopy showed that new bone was growing in direct contact with the DBBM particles and the titanium mesh. There is a soft tissue ingrowth even after soft tissue expansion and protection of the titanium mesh with a collagen membrane. This study confirms that an osmotic soft tissue expander creates a surplus of periosteum and soft tissue, and that new bone can subsequently be generated under a titanium mesh with the use of an autologous bone graft or DBBM. © 2011 John Wiley & Sons A/S.

Theory of gearing

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Litvin, Faydor L.

1989-01-01

Basic mathematical problems on the theory of gearing are covered in this book, such as the necessary and sufficient conditions of envelope existence, relations between principal curvatures and directions for surfaces of mating gears. Also included are singularities of surfaces accompanied by undercutting the process of generation, the phenomena of envelope of lines of contact, and the principles for generation of conjugate surfaces. Special attention is given to the algorithms for computer aided simulation of meshing and tooth contact. This edition was complemented with the results of research recently performed by the author and his doctoral students. The book contains sample problems and also problems for the reader to solve.

Quantification of Gear Tooth Damage by Optimal Tracking of Vibration Signatures

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Choy, F. K.; Veillette, R. J.; Polyshchuk, V.; Braun, M. J.; Hendricks, R. C.

1996-01-01

This paper presents a technique for quantifying the wear or damage of gear teeth in a transmission system. The procedure developed in this study can be applied as a part of either an onboard machine health-monitoring system or a health diagnostic system used during regular maintenance. As the developed methodology is based on analysis of gearbox vibration under normal operating conditions, no shutdown or special modification of operating parameters is required during the diagnostic process. The process of quantifying the wear or damage of gear teeth requires a set of measured vibration data and a model of the gear mesh dynamics. An optimization problem is formulated to determine the profile of a time-varying mesh stiffness parameter for which the model output approximates the measured data. The resulting stiffness profile is then related to the level of gear tooth wear or damage. The procedure was applied to a data set generated artificially and to another obtained experimentally from a spiral bevel gear test rig. The results demonstrate the utility of the procedure as part of an overall health-monitoring system.

Domain Decomposition By the Advancing-Partition Method

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Pirzadeh, Shahyar Z.

2008-01-01

A new method of domain decomposition has been developed for generating unstructured grids in subdomains either sequentially or using multiple computers in parallel. Domain decomposition is a crucial and challenging step for parallel grid generation. Prior methods are generally based on auxiliary, complex, and computationally intensive operations for defining partition interfaces and usually produce grids of lower quality than those generated in single domains. The new technique, referred to as "Advancing Partition," is based on the Advancing-Front method, which partitions a domain as part of the volume mesh generation in a consistent and "natural" way. The benefits of this approach are: 1) the process of domain decomposition is highly automated, 2) partitioning of domain does not compromise the quality of the generated grids, and 3) the computational overhead for domain decomposition is minimal. The new method has been implemented in NASA's unstructured grid generation code VGRID.

Characterizing mesh size distributions (MSDs) in thermosetting materials using a high-pressure system.

PubMed

Larché, J-F; Seynaeve, J-M; Voyard, G; Bussière, P-O; Gardette, J-L

2011-04-21

The thermoporosimetry method was adapted to determine the mesh size distribution of an acrylate thermoset clearcoat. This goal was achieved by increasing the solvent rate transfer by increasing the pressure and temperature. A comparison of the results obtained using this approach with those obtained by DMA (dynamic mechanical analysis) underlined the accuracy of thermoporosimetry in characterizing the macromolecular architecture of thermosets. The thermoporosimetry method was also used to analyze the effects of photoaging on cross-linking, which result from the photodegradation of the acrylate thermoset. It was found that the formation of a three-dimensional network followed by densification generates a modification of the average mesh size that leads to a dramatic decrease of the meshes of the polymer.

An 8-node tetrahedral finite element suitable for explicit transient dynamic simulations

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Key, S.W.; Heinstein, M.W.; Stone, C.M.

1997-12-31

Considerable effort has been expended in perfecting the algorithmic properties of 8-node hexahedral finite elements. Today the element is well understood and performs exceptionally well when used in modeling three-dimensional explicit transient dynamic events. However, the automatic generation of all-hexahedral meshes remains an elusive achievement. The alternative of automatic generation for all-tetrahedral finite element is a notoriously poor performer, and the 10-node quadratic tetrahedral finite element while a better performer numerically is computationally expensive. To use the all-tetrahedral mesh generation extant today, the authors have explored the creation of a quality 8-node tetrahedral finite element (a four-node tetrahedral finite elementmore » enriched with four midface nodal points). The derivation of the element`s gradient operator, studies in obtaining a suitable mass lumping and the element`s performance in applications are presented. In particular, they examine the 80node tetrahedral finite element`s behavior in longitudinal plane wave propagation, in transverse cylindrical wave propagation, and in simulating Taylor bar impacts. The element only samples constant strain states and, therefore, has 12 hourglass modes. In this regard, it bears similarities to the 8-node, mean-quadrature hexahedral finite element. Given automatic all-tetrahedral meshing, the 8-node, constant-strain tetrahedral finite element is a suitable replacement for the 8-node hexahedral finite element and handbuilt meshes.« less

Simulation of a Single-Element Lean-Direct Injection Combustor Using a Polyhedral Mesh Derived from Hanging-Node Elements

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Wey, Thomas; Liu, Nan-Suey

2013-01-01

This paper summarizes the procedures of generating a polyhedral mesh derived from hanging-node elements as well as presents sample results from its application to the numerical solution of a single element lean direct injection (LDI) combustor using an open-source version of the National Combustion Code (NCC).

2D Mesh Manipulation

DTIC Science & Technology

2011-11-01

the Poisson form of the equations can also be generated by manipulating the computational space , so forcing functions become superfluous . The...ABSTRACT Unstructured methods for region discretization have become common in computational fluid dynamics (CFD) analysis because of certain benefits...application of Winslow elliptic smoothing equations to unstructured meshes. It has been shown that it is not necessary for the computational space of

A manual for PARTI runtime primitives

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Berryman, Harry; Saltz, Joel

1990-01-01

Primitives are presented that are designed to help users efficiently program irregular problems (e.g., unstructured mesh sweeps, sparse matrix codes, adaptive mesh partial differential equations solvers) on distributed memory machines. These primitives are also designed for use in compilers for distributed memory multiprocessors. Communications patterns are captured at runtime, and the appropriate send and receive messages are automatically generated.

Next Generation Robust Low Noise Seismometer for Nuclear Monitoring

DTIC Science & Technology

2008-09-01

of four fine platinum mesh electrodes, two anodes, and two cathodes, separated by thin polymer mesh or laser-perforated mica spacers. The stack is...cell (Abramocvich and Daragan, 1992-94): ⎟ ⎠ ⎞ ⎜ ⎝ ⎛ −− )exp(1 00 kT qU l eSDc =I (6) 2008 Monitoring Research Review: Ground-Based

A Deep Penetration Problem Calculation Using AETIUS:An Easy Modeling Discrete Ordinates Transport Code UsIng Unstructured Tetrahedral Mesh, Shared Memory Parallel

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

KIM, Jong Woon; LEE, Young-Ouk

2017-09-01

As computing power gets better and better, computer codes that use a deterministic method seem to be less useful than those using the Monte Carlo method. In addition, users do not like to think about space, angles, and energy discretization for deterministic codes. However, a deterministic method is still powerful in that we can obtain a solution of the flux throughout the problem, particularly as when particles can barely penetrate, such as in a deep penetration problem with small detection volumes. Recently, a new state-of-the-art discrete-ordinates code, ATTILA, was developed and has been widely used in several applications. ATTILA provides the capabilities to solve geometrically complex 3-D transport problems by using an unstructured tetrahedral mesh. Since 2009, we have been developing our own code by benchmarking ATTILA. AETIUS is a discrete ordinates code that uses an unstructured tetrahedral mesh such as ATTILA. For pre- and post- processing, Gmsh is used to generate an unstructured tetrahedral mesh by importing a CAD file (*.step) and visualizing the calculation results of AETIUS. Using a CAD tool, the geometry can be modeled very easily. In this paper, we describe a brief overview of AETIUS and provide numerical results from both AETIUS and a Monte Carlo code, MCNP5, in a deep penetration problem with small detection volumes. The results demonstrate the effectiveness and efficiency of AETIUS for such calculations.

Study of factors governing oil-water separation process using TiO₂ films prepared by spray deposition of nanoparticle dispersions.

PubMed

Gondal, Mohammed A; Sadullah, Muhammad S; Dastageer, Mohamed A; McKinley, Gareth H; Panchanathan, Divya; Varanasi, Kripa K

2014-08-27

Surfaces which possess extraordinary water attraction or repellency depend on surface energy, surface chemistry, and nano- and microscale surface roughness. Synergistic superhydrophilic-underwater superoleophobic surfaces were fabricated by spray deposition of nanostructured TiO2 on stainless steel mesh substrates. The coated meshes were then used to study gravity driven oil-water separation, where only the water from the oil-water mixture is allowed to permeate through the mesh. Oil-water separation efficiencies of up to 99% could be achieved through the coated mesh of pore sizes 50 and 100 μm, compared to no separation at all, that was observed in the case of uncoated meshes of the same material and pore sizes. An adsorbed water on the TiO2 coated surface, formation of a water-film between the wires that form the mesh and the underwater superoleophobicity of the structured surface are the key factors that contribute to the enhanced efficiency observed in oil-water separation. The nature of the oil-water separation process using this coated mesh (in which the mesh allows water to pass through the porous structure but resists wetting by the oil phase) minimizes the fouling of mesh so that the need for frequent replacement of the separating medium is reduced. The fabrication approach presented here can be applied for coating large surface areas and to develop a large-scale oil-water separation facility for oil-field applications and petroleum industries.

Study of variation grain size in desulfurization process of calcined petroleum coke

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pintowantoro, Sungging; Setiawan, Muhammad Arif; Abdul, Fakhreza

2018-04-01

Indonesia is a country with abundant natural resources, such as mineral mining and petroleum. In petroleum processing, crude oil can be processed into a source of fuel energy such as gasoline, diesel, oil, petroleum coke, and others. One of crude oil potentials in Indonesia is petroleum coke. Petroleum coke is a product from oil refining process. Sulfur reducing process in calcined petroleum cokes can be done by desulfurization process. The industries which have potential to become petroleum coke processing consumers are industries of aluminum smelting (anode, graphite block, carbon mortar), iron riser, calcined coke, foundry coke, etc. Sulfur reducing process in calcined petroleum coke can be done by thermal desulfurization process with alkaline substance NaOH. Desulfurization of petroleum coke process can be done in two ways, which are thermal desulfurization and hydrodesulphurization. This study aims to determine the effect of various grain size on sulfur, carbon, and chemical bond which contained by calcined petroleum coke. The raw material use calcined petroleum coke with 0.653% sulfur content. The grain size that used in this research is 50 mesh, then varied to 20 mesh and 100 mesh for each desulfurization process. Desulfurization are tested by ICP, UV-VIS, and FTIR to determine levels of sulfur, carbon, chemical bonding and sulfur dissolved water which contained in the residual washing of calcined petroleum coke. From various grain size that mentioned before, the optimal value is on 100 mesh grain size, where the sulfur content in petroleum coke is 0.24% and carbon content reaches the highest level of 97.8%. Meanwhile for grain size 100 mesh in the desulfurization process is enough to break the chemical bonds of organic sulfur in petroleum coke.

Use of scientific social networking to improve the research strategies of PubMed readers.

PubMed

Evdokimov, Pavel; Kudryavtsev, Alexey; Ilgisonis, Ekaterina; Ponomarenko, Elena; Lisitsa, Andrey

2016-02-18

Keeping up with journal articles on a daily basis is an important activity of scientists engaged in biomedical research. Usually, journal articles and papers in the field of biomedicine are accessed through the Medline/PubMed electronic library. In the process of navigating PubMed, researchers unknowingly generate user-specific reading profiles that can be shared within a social networking environment. This paper examines the structure of the social networking environment generated by PubMed users. A web browser plugin was developed to map [in Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) terms] the reading patterns of individual PubMed users. We developed a scientific social network based on the personal research profiles of readers of biomedical articles. A browser plugin is used to record the digital object identifier or PubMed ID of web pages. Recorded items are posted on the activity feed and automatically mapped to PubMed abstract. Within the activity feed a user can trace back previously browsed articles and insert comments. By calculating the frequency with which specific MeSH occur, the research interests of PubMed users can be visually represented with a tag cloud. Finally, research profiles can be searched for matches between network users. A social networking environment was created using MeSH terms to map articles accessed through the Medline/PubMed online library system. In-network social communication is supported by the recommendation of articles and by matching users with similar scientific interests. The system is available at http://bioknol.org/en/.

Local Synthesis and Tooth Contact Analysis of Face-Milled Spiral Bevel Gears

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Litvin, Faydor L.; Zhang, Yi

1991-01-01

Computerized simulation of meshing and bearing contact for spiral bevel gears and hypoid gears is a significant achievement that could substantially improve the technology and the quality of the gears. An approach to the synthesis of face-milled spiral bevel gears and their tooth contact analysis is presented. The proposed approach is based on the following ideas: application of the principle of local synthesis that provides optimal conditions of meshing and contact at the mean contact point, M, and in the neighborhood of M; and application of relations between principle directions and curvatures for surfaces being in line contact or in point contact. The developed local synthesis of gears provides the following: (1) the required gear ratio at M; (2) a localized bearing contact with the desired direction of the tangent to the contact path on gear tooth surface and the desired length of the major axis of contact ellipse at M; (3) a predesigned parabolic function of a controlled level for transmission errors which enables absorption of linear functions of transmission errors caused by misalignment and reduces the level of vibrations. The proposed approach does not require either the tilt of the head-cutter for the process of generation or modified roll for the pinion generation. Improved conditions of meshing and contact of the gears can be achieved without the above mentioned parameters. A computer program for determination of basic machine-tool settings and tooth contact analysis for the designed gears is presented. The approach is illustrated with a numerical example.

Hydrogen atom kinetics in capacitively coupled plasmas

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Nunomura, Shota; Katayama, Hirotaka; Yoshida, Isao

2017-05-01

Hydrogen (H) atom kinetics has been investigated in capacitively coupled very high frequency (VHF) discharges at powers of 16-780 mW cm-2 and H2 gas pressures of 0.1-2 Torr. The H atom density has been measured using vacuum ultra violet absorption spectroscopy (VUVAS) with a micro-discharge hollow cathode lamp as a VUV light source. The measurements have been performed in two different electrode configurations of discharges: conventional parallel-plate diode and triode with an intermediate mesh electrode. We find that in the triode configuration, the H atom density is strongly reduced across the mesh electrode. The H atom density varies from ˜1012 cm-3 to ˜1010 cm-3 by crossing the mesh with 0.2 mm in thickness and 36% in aperture ratio. The fluid model simulations for VHF discharge plasmas have been performed to study the H atom generation, diffusion and recombination kinetics. The simulations suggest that H atoms are generated in the bulk plasma, by the electron impact dissociation (e + H2 \\to e + 2H) and the ion-molecule reaction (H2 + + H2 \\to {{{H}}}3+ + H). The diffusion of H atoms is strongly limited by a mesh electrode, and thus the mesh geometry influences the spatial distribution of the H atoms. The loss of H atoms is dominated by the surface recombination.

Generation and Computerized Simulation of Meshing and Contact of Modified Involute Helical Gears

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Litvin, Faydor L.; Chen, Ningxin; Lu, Jian

1995-01-01

The design and generation of modified involute helical gears that have a localized and stable bearing contact, and reduced noise and vibration characteristics are described. The localization of the bearing contact is achieved by the mismatch of the two generating surfaces that are used for generation of the pinion and the gear. The reduction of noise and vibration will be achieved by application of a parabolic function of transmission errors that is able to absorb the almost linear function of transmission errors caused by gear misalignment. The meshing and contact of misaligned gear drives can be analyzed by application of computer programs that have been developed. The computations confirmed the effectiveness of the proposed modification of the gear geometry. A numerical example that illustrates the developed theory is provided.

Wire-Mesh-Based Sorber for Removing Contaminants from Air

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Perry, Jay; Roychoudhury, Subir; Walsh, Dennis

2006-01-01

A paper discusses an experimental regenerable sorber for removing CO2 and trace components principally, volatile organic compounds, halocarbons, and NH3 from spacecraft cabin air. This regenerable sorber is a prototype of what is intended to be a lightweight alternative to activated-carbon and zeolite-pellet sorbent beds now in use. The regenerable sorber consists mainly of an assembly of commercially available meshes that have been coated with a specially-formulated washcoat containing zeolites. The zeolites act as the sorbents while the meshes support the zeolite-containing washcoat in a configuration that affords highly effective surface area for exposing the sorbents to flowing air. The meshes also define flow paths characterized by short channel lengths to prevent excessive buildup of flow boundary layers. Flow boundary layer resistance is undesired because it can impede mass and heat transfer. The total weight and volume comparison versus the atmosphere revitalization equipment used onboard the International Space Station for CO2 and trace-component removal will depend upon the design details of the final embodiment. However, the integrated mesh-based CO2 and trace-contaminant removal system is expected to provide overall weight and volume savings by eliminating most of the trace-contaminant control equipment presently used in parallel processing schemes traditionally used for spacecraft. The mesh-based sorbent media enables integrating the two processes within a compact package. For the purpose of regeneration, the sorber can be heated by passing electric currents through the metallic meshes combined with exposure to space vacuum. The minimal thermal mass of the meshes offers the potential for reduced regeneration-power requirements and cycle time required for regeneration compared to regenerable sorption processes now in use.

A novel method for pair-matching using three-dimensional digital models of bone: mesh-to-mesh value comparison.

PubMed

Karell, Mara A; Langstaff, Helen K; Halazonetis, Demetrios J; Minghetti, Caterina; Frelat, Mélanie; Kranioti, Elena F

2016-09-01

The commingling of human remains often hinders forensic/physical anthropologists during the identification process, as there are limited methods to accurately sort these remains. This study investigates a new method for pair-matching, a common individualization technique, which uses digital three-dimensional models of bone: mesh-to-mesh value comparison (MVC). The MVC method digitally compares the entire three-dimensional geometry of two bones at once to produce a single value to indicate their similarity. Two different versions of this method, one manual and the other automated, were created and then tested for how well they accurately pair-matched humeri. Each version was assessed using sensitivity and specificity. The manual mesh-to-mesh value comparison method was 100 % sensitive and 100 % specific. The automated mesh-to-mesh value comparison method was 95 % sensitive and 60 % specific. Our results indicate that the mesh-to-mesh value comparison method overall is a powerful new tool for accurately pair-matching commingled skeletal elements, although the automated version still needs improvement.

A novel mesh processing based technique for 3D plant analysis

PubMed Central

2012-01-01

Background In recent years, imaging based, automated, non-invasive, and non-destructive high-throughput plant phenotyping platforms have become popular tools for plant biology, underpinning the field of plant phenomics. Such platforms acquire and record large amounts of raw data that must be accurately and robustly calibrated, reconstructed, and analysed, requiring the development of sophisticated image understanding and quantification algorithms. The raw data can be processed in different ways, and the past few years have seen the emergence of two main approaches: 2D image processing and 3D mesh processing algorithms. Direct image quantification methods (usually 2D) dominate the current literature due to comparative simplicity. However, 3D mesh analysis provides the tremendous potential to accurately estimate specific morphological features cross-sectionally and monitor them over-time. Result In this paper, we present a novel 3D mesh based technique developed for temporal high-throughput plant phenomics and perform initial tests for the analysis of Gossypium hirsutum vegetative growth. Based on plant meshes previously reconstructed from multi-view images, the methodology involves several stages, including morphological mesh segmentation, phenotypic parameters estimation, and plant organs tracking over time. The initial study focuses on presenting and validating the accuracy of the methodology on dicotyledons such as cotton but we believe the approach will be more broadly applicable. This study involved applying our technique to a set of six Gossypium hirsutum (cotton) plants studied over four time-points. Manual measurements, performed for each plant at every time-point, were used to assess the accuracy of our pipeline and quantify the error on the morphological parameters estimated. Conclusion By directly comparing our automated mesh based quantitative data with manual measurements of individual stem height, leaf width and leaf length, we obtained the mean absolute errors of 9.34%, 5.75%, 8.78%, and correlation coefficients 0.88, 0.96, and 0.95 respectively. The temporal matching of leaves was accurate in 95% of the cases and the average execution time required to analyse a plant over four time-points was 4.9 minutes. The mesh processing based methodology is thus considered suitable for quantitative 4D monitoring of plant phenotypic features. PMID:22553969

Hot zero power reactor calculations using the Insilico code

DOE PAGES

Hamilton, Steven P.; Evans, Thomas M.; Davidson, Gregory G.; ...

2016-03-18

In this paper we describe the reactor physics simulation capabilities of the insilico code. A description of the various capabilities of the code is provided, including detailed discussion of the geometry, meshing, cross section processing, and neutron transport options. Numerical results demonstrate that the insilico SP N solver with pin-homogenized cross section generation is capable of delivering highly accurate full-core simulation of various PWR problems. Comparison to both Monte Carlo calculations and measured plant data is provided.

The National Shipbuilding Research Program, Proceedings of the REAPS Technical Symposium (2nd) held in Palm Beach Shores, Florida, on 24-25 Jun 1975: Full Proceedings

DTIC Science & Technology

1975-06-01

AUTOKON-71 System. Her major tasks include processing Analysis Requests, releasing new system versions, and coordinating program modifications. Some past...for deformed meshes; improvement of crane boom analysis test data and a post-pro- cessing program. I. BACKGROUND 1. What is the AUTOKON System n? a...updates to either enhance or correct the capa- bilities has been generated. Two major sources contribute these updates: the REAPS Analysis Request (AR

An Engineering Solution for Solving Mesh Size Effects in the Simulation of Delamination with Cohesive Zone Models

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Turon, A.; Davila, C. G.; Camanho, P. P.; Costa, J.

2007-01-01

This paper presents a methodology to determine the parameters to be used in the constitutive equations of Cohesive Zone Models employed in the simulation of delamination in composite materials by means of decohesion finite elements. A closed-form expression is developed to define the stiffness of the cohesive layer. A novel procedure that allows the use of coarser meshes of decohesion elements in large-scale computations is also proposed. The procedure ensures that the energy dissipated by the fracture process is computed correctly. It is shown that coarse-meshed models defined using the approach proposed here yield the same results as the models with finer meshes normally used for the simulation of fracture processes.

Front tracking based modeling of the solid grain growth on the adaptive control volume grid

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Seredyński, Mirosław; Łapka, Piotr

2017-07-01

The paper presents the micro-scale model of unconstrained solidification of the grain immersed in under-cooled liquid, based on the front tracking approach. For this length scale, the interface tracked through the domain is meant as the solid-liquid boundary. To prevent generation of huge meshes the energy transport equation is discretized on the adaptive control volume (c.v.) mesh. The coupling of dynamically changing mesh and moving front position is addressed. Preliminary results of simulation of a test case, the growth of single grain, are presented and discussed.

Time-dependent grid adaptation for meshes of triangles and tetrahedra

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Rausch, Russ D.

1993-01-01

This paper presents in viewgraph form a method of optimizing grid generation for unsteady CFD flow calculations that distributes the numerical error evenly throughout the mesh. Adaptive meshing is used to locally enrich in regions of relatively large errors and to locally coarsen in regions of relatively small errors. The enrichment/coarsening procedures are robust for isotropic cells; however, enrichment of high aspect ratio cells may fail near boundary surfaces with relatively large curvature. The enrichment indicator worked well for the cases shown, but in general requires user supervision for a more efficient solution.

Experiments in monthly mean simulation of the atmosphere with a coarse-mesh general circulation model

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Lutz, R. J.; Spar, J.

1978-01-01

The Hansen atmospheric model was used to compute five monthly forecasts (October 1976 through February 1977). The comparison is based on an energetics analysis, meridional and vertical profiles, error statistics, and prognostic and observed mean maps. The monthly mean model simulations suffer from several defects. There is, in general, no skill in the simulation of the monthly mean sea-level pressure field, and only marginal skill is indicated for the 850 mb temperatures and 500 mb heights. The coarse-mesh model appears to generate a less satisfactory monthly mean simulation than the finer mesh GISS model.

Toward automatic finite element analysis

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Kela, Ajay; Perucchio, Renato; Voelcker, Herbert

1987-01-01

Two problems must be solved if the finite element method is to become a reliable and affordable blackbox engineering tool. Finite element meshes must be generated automatically from computer aided design databases and mesh analysis must be made self-adaptive. The experimental system described solves both problems in 2-D through spatial and analytical substructuring techniques that are now being extended into 3-D.

A manual for PARTI runtime primitives, revision 1

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Das, Raja; Saltz, Joel; Berryman, Harry

1991-01-01

Primitives are presented that are designed to help users efficiently program irregular problems (e.g., unstructured mesh sweeps, sparse matrix codes, adaptive mesh partial differential equations solvers) on distributed memory machines. These primitives are also designed for use in compilers for distributed memory multiprocessors. Communications patterns are captured at runtime, and the appropriate send and receive messages are automatically generated.

Latency-Efficient Communication in Wireless Mesh Networks under Consideration of Large Interference Range

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Xin, Qin; Yao, Xiaolan; Engelstad, Paal E.

2010-09-01

Wireless Mesh Networking is an emerging communication paradigm to enable resilient, cost-efficient and reliable services for the future-generation wireless networks. We study here the minimum-latency communication primitive of gossiping (all-to-all communication) in multi-hop ad-hoc Wireless Mesh Networks (WMNs). Each mesh node in the WMN is initially given a message and the objective is to design a minimum-latency schedule such that each mesh node distributes its message to all other mesh nodes. Minimum-latency gossiping problem is well known to be NP-hard even for the scenario in which the topology of the WMN is known to all mesh nodes in advance. In this paper, we propose a new latency-efficient approximation scheme that can accomplish gossiping task in polynomial time units in any ad-hoc WMN under consideration of Large Interference Range (LIR), e.g., the interference range is much larger than the transmission range. To the best of our knowledge, it is first time to investigate such a scenario in ad-hoc WMNs under LIR, our algorithm allows the labels (e.g., identifiers) of the mesh nodes to be polynomially large in terms of the size of the WMN, which is the first time that the scenario of large labels has been considered in ad-hoc WMNs under LIR. Furthermore, our gossiping scheme can be considered as a framework which can be easily implied to the scenario under consideration of mobility-related issues since we assume that the mesh nodes have no knowledge on the network topology even for its neighboring mesh nodes.

Automatic mesh adaptivity for hybrid Monte Carlo/deterministic neutronics modeling of difficult shielding problems

DOE PAGES

Ibrahim, Ahmad M.; Wilson, Paul P.H.; Sawan, Mohamed E.; ...

2015-06-30

The CADIS and FW-CADIS hybrid Monte Carlo/deterministic techniques dramatically increase the efficiency of neutronics modeling, but their use in the accurate design analysis of very large and geometrically complex nuclear systems has been limited by the large number of processors and memory requirements for their preliminary deterministic calculations and final Monte Carlo calculation. Three mesh adaptivity algorithms were developed to reduce the memory requirements of CADIS and FW-CADIS without sacrificing their efficiency improvement. First, a macromaterial approach enhances the fidelity of the deterministic models without changing the mesh. Second, a deterministic mesh refinement algorithm generates meshes that capture as muchmore » geometric detail as possible without exceeding a specified maximum number of mesh elements. Finally, a weight window coarsening algorithm decouples the weight window mesh and energy bins from the mesh and energy group structure of the deterministic calculations in order to remove the memory constraint of the weight window map from the deterministic mesh resolution. The three algorithms were used to enhance an FW-CADIS calculation of the prompt dose rate throughout the ITER experimental facility. Using these algorithms resulted in a 23.3% increase in the number of mesh tally elements in which the dose rates were calculated in a 10-day Monte Carlo calculation and, additionally, increased the efficiency of the Monte Carlo simulation by a factor of at least 3.4. The three algorithms enabled this difficult calculation to be accurately solved using an FW-CADIS simulation on a regular computer cluster, eliminating the need for a world-class super computer.« less

A short note on the use of the red-black tree in Cartesian adaptive mesh refinement algorithms

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hasbestan, Jaber J.; Senocak, Inanc

2017-12-01

Mesh adaptivity is an indispensable capability to tackle multiphysics problems with large disparity in time and length scales. With the availability of powerful supercomputers, there is a pressing need to extend time-proven computational techniques to extreme-scale problems. Cartesian adaptive mesh refinement (AMR) is one such method that enables simulation of multiscale, multiphysics problems. AMR is based on construction of octrees. Originally, an explicit tree data structure was used to generate and manipulate an adaptive Cartesian mesh. At least eight pointers are required in an explicit approach to construct an octree. Parent-child relationships are then used to traverse the tree. An explicit octree, however, is expensive in terms of memory usage and the time it takes to traverse the tree to access a specific node. For these reasons, implicit pointerless methods have been pioneered within the computer graphics community, motivated by applications requiring interactivity and realistic three dimensional visualization. Lewiner et al. [1] provides a concise review of pointerless approaches to generate an octree. Use of a hash table and Z-order curve are two key concepts in pointerless methods that we briefly discuss next.

A Posteriori Bounds for Linear-Functional Outputs of Crouzeix-Raviart Finite Element Discretizations of the Incompressible Stokes Problem

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Patera, Anthony T.; Paraschivoiu, Marius

1998-01-01

We present a finite element technique for the efficient generation of lower and upper bounds to outputs which are linear functionals of the solutions to the incompressible Stokes equations in two space dimensions; the finite element discretization is effected by Crouzeix-Raviart elements, the discontinuous pressure approximation of which is central to our approach. The bounds are based upon the construction of an augmented Lagrangian: the objective is a quadratic "energy" reformulation of the desired output; the constraints are the finite element equilibrium equations (including the incompressibility constraint), and the intersubdomain continuity conditions on velocity. Appeal to the dual max-min problem for appropriately chosen candidate Lagrange multipliers then yields inexpensive bounds for the output associated with a fine-mesh discretization; the Lagrange multipliers are generated by exploiting an associated coarse-mesh approximation. In addition to the requisite coarse-mesh calculations, the bound technique requires solution only of local subdomain Stokes problems on the fine-mesh. The method is illustrated for the Stokes equations, in which the outputs of interest are the flowrate past, and the lift force on, a body immersed in a channel.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Popov, Emilian L.; Pointer, William David

This work assesses the influence of assumptions made when generating a mesh of a wire-wrappedgeometry. The contact region between a wire and its adjacent pin is commonly modeled by eitherembedding the wire to the adjacent pin or trimming the wire so that a gap separates the wire from itsadjacent pin. These models are referred to as close-gap and open-gap approaches herein and are applied totwo geometries. The first geometry consists of a single pin wire-wrapped subchannel. A polyhedral meshand a hexahedral mesh are generated. The second and third geometry are a 7-pin and a 19-pinwire-wrapped bundles meshed with polyhedral elementsmore » only. Pressure drops are obtained with theSTAR-CCM+computational fluid dynamic package. Sensitivity analyses of the mesh density, the meshtype, and the turbulent models are performed. Numerical results show that the best match to theexperimental data and to the Cheng-Todreas correlation is obtained with the combination of a hexahedralmesh, the shear stress transport (SST) turbulent model, and the open-gap approach. In the case of the 7-pingeometry, the best results are obtained with the open-gap approach and the SST turbulent model. The19-pin geometry yields contradictory results to the 7-pin geometry results, and thus will require furtherinvestigations.« less

Direct Replacement of Arbitrary Grid-Overlapping by Non-Structured Grid

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Kao, Kai-Hsiung; Liou, Meng-Sing

1994-01-01

A new approach that uses nonstructured mesh to replace the arbitrarily overlapped structured regions of embedded grids is presented. The present methodology uses the Chimera composite overlapping mesh system so that the physical domain of the flowfield is subdivided into regions which can accommodate easily-generated grid for complex configuration. In addition, a Delaunay triangulation technique generates nonstructured triangular mesh which wraps over the interconnecting region of embedded grids. It is designed that the present approach, termed DRAGON grid, has three important advantages: eliminating some difficulties of the Chimera scheme, such as the orphan points and/or bad quality of interpolation stencils; making grid communication in a fully conservative way; and implementation into three dimensions is straightforward. A computer code based on a time accurate, finite volume, high resolution scheme for solving the compressible Navier-Stokes equations has been further developed to include both the Chimera overset grid and the nonstructured mesh schemes. For steady state problems, the local time stepping accelerates convergence based on a Courant - Friedrichs - Leury (CFL) number near the local stability limit. Numerical tests on representative steady and unsteady supersonic inviscid flows with strong shock waves are demonstrated.

Method and Apparatus for Virtual Interactive Medical Imaging by Multiple Remotely-Located Users

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Ross, Muriel D. (Inventor); Twombly, Ian Alexander (Inventor); Senger, Steven O. (Inventor)

2003-01-01

A virtual interactive imaging system allows the displaying of high-resolution, three-dimensional images of medical data to a user and allows the user to manipulate the images, including rotation of images in any of various axes. The system includes a mesh component that generates a mesh to represent a surface of an anatomical object, based on a set of data of the object, such as from a CT or MRI scan or the like. The mesh is generated so as to avoid tears, or holes, in the mesh, providing very high-quality representations of topographical features of the object, particularly at high- resolution. The system further includes a virtual surgical cutting tool that enables the user to simulate the removal of a piece or layer of a displayed object, such as a piece of skin or bone, view the interior of the object, manipulate the removed piece, and reattach the removed piece if desired. The system further includes a virtual collaborative clinic component, which allows the users of multiple, remotely-located computer systems to collaboratively and simultaneously view and manipulate the high-resolution, three-dimensional images of the object in real-time.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Rebay, S.

This work is devoted to the description of an efficient unstructured mesh generation method entirely based on the Delaunay triangulation. The distinctive characteristic of the proposed method is that point positions and connections are computed simultaneously. This result is achieved by taking advantage of the sequential way in which the Bowyer-Watson algorithm computes the Delaunay triangulation. Two methods are proposed which have great geometrical flexibility, in that they allow us to treat domains of arbitrary shape and topology and to generate arbitrarily nonuniform meshes. The methods are computationally efficient and are applicable both in two and three dimensions. 11 refs.,more » 20 figs., 1 tab.« less

Cellularized cylindrical fiber/hydrogel composites for ligament tissue engineering.

PubMed

Thayer, Patrick S; Dimling, Anna F; Plessl, Daniel S; Hahn, Mariah R; Guelcher, Scott A; Dahlgren, Linda A; Goldstein, Aaron S

2014-01-13

Electrospun meshes suffer from poor cell infiltration and limited thickness, which restrict their use to thin tissue applications. Herein, we demonstrate two complementary processes to overcome these limitations and achieve elastomeric composites that may be suitable for ligament repair. First, C3H10T1/2 mesenchymal stem cells were incorporated into electrospun meshes using a hybrid electrospinning/electrospraying process. Second, electrospun meshes were rolled and formed into composites with an interpenetrating polyethylene glycol (PEG) hydrogel network. Stiffer composites were formed from poly(lactic-co-glycolic acid) (PLGA) meshes, while softer and more elastic composites were formed from poly(ester-urethane urea) (PEUUR) meshes. As-spun PLGA and PEUUR rolled meshes had tensile moduli of 19.2 ± 1.9 and 0.86 ± 0.34 MPa, respectively, which changed to 11.6 ± 4.8 and 1.05 ± 0.39 MPa with the incorporation of a PEG hydrogel phase. In addition, cyclic tensile testing indicated that PEUUR-based composites deformed elastically to at least 10%. Finally, C3H10T1/2 cells incorporated into electrospun meshes survived the addition of the PEG phase and remained viable for up to 5 days. These results indicate that the fabricated cellularized composites are support cyclic mechanical conditioning, and have potential application in ligament repair.

Multi-Resolution Unstructured Grid-Generation for Geophysical Applications on the Sphere

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Engwirda, Darren

2015-01-01

An algorithm for the generation of non-uniform unstructured grids on ellipsoidal geometries is described. This technique is designed to generate high quality triangular and polygonal meshes appropriate for general circulation modelling on the sphere, including applications to atmospheric and ocean simulation, and numerical weather predication. Using a recently developed Frontal-Delaunay-refinement technique, a method for the construction of high-quality unstructured ellipsoidal Delaunay triangulations is introduced. A dual polygonal grid, derived from the associated Voronoi diagram, is also optionally generated as a by-product. Compared to existing techniques, it is shown that the Frontal-Delaunay approach typically produces grids with near-optimal element quality and smooth grading characteristics, while imposing relatively low computational expense. Initial results are presented for a selection of uniform and non-uniform ellipsoidal grids appropriate for large-scale geophysical applications. The use of user-defined mesh-sizing functions to generate smoothly graded, non-uniform grids is discussed.

What is the evidence for the use of biologic or biosynthetic meshes in abdominal wall reconstruction?

PubMed

Köckerling, F; Alam, N N; Antoniou, S A; Daniels, I R; Famiglietti, F; Fortelny, R H; Heiss, M M; Kallinowski, F; Kyle-Leinhase, I; Mayer, F; Miserez, M; Montgomery, A; Morales-Conde, S; Muysoms, F; Narang, S K; Petter-Puchner, A; Reinpold, W; Scheuerlein, H; Smietanski, M; Stechemesser, B; Strey, C; Woeste, G; Smart, N J

2018-04-01

Although many surgeons have adopted the use of biologic and biosynthetic meshes in complex abdominal wall hernia repair, others have questioned the use of these products. Criticism is addressed in several review articles on the poor standard of studies reporting on the use of biologic meshes for different abdominal wall repairs. The aim of this consensus review is to conduct an evidence-based analysis of the efficacy of biologic and biosynthetic meshes in predefined clinical situations. A European working group, "BioMesh Study Group", composed of invited surgeons with a special interest in surgical meshes, formulated key questions, and forwarded them for processing in subgroups. In January 2016, a workshop was held in Berlin where the findings were presented, discussed, and voted on for consensus. Findings were set out in writing by the subgroups followed by consensus being reached. For the review, 114 studies and background analyses were used. The cumulative data regarding biologic mesh under contaminated conditions do not support the claim that it is better than synthetic mesh. Biologic mesh use should be avoided when bridging is needed. In inguinal hernia repair biologic and biosynthetic meshes do not have a clear advantage over the synthetic meshes. For prevention of incisional or parastomal hernias, there is no evidence to support the use of biologic/biosynthetic meshes. In complex abdominal wall hernia repairs (incarcerated hernia, parastomal hernia, infected mesh, open abdomen, enterocutaneous fistula, and component separation technique), biologic and biosynthetic meshes do not provide a superior alternative to synthetic meshes. The routine use of biologic and biosynthetic meshes cannot be recommended.

7th International Meshing Roundtable '98

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Eldred, T.J.

1998-10-01

The goal of the 7th International Meshing Roundtable is to bring together researchers and developers from industry, academia, and government labs in a stimulating, open environment for the exchange of technical information related to the meshing process. In the past, the Roundtable has enjoyed significant participation from each of these groups from a wide variety of countries.

Adaptive and dynamic meshing methods for numerical simulations

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Acikgoz, Nazmiye

For the numerical simulation of many problems of engineering interest, it is desirable to have an automated mesh adaption tool capable of producing high quality meshes with an affordably low number of mesh points. This is important especially for problems, which are characterized by anisotropic features of the solution and require mesh clustering in the direction of high gradients. Another significant issue in meshing emerges in the area of unsteady simulations with moving boundaries or interfaces, where the motion of the boundary has to be accommodated by deforming the computational grid. Similarly, there exist problems where current mesh needs to be adapted to get more accurate solutions because either the high gradient regions are initially predicted inaccurately or they change location throughout the simulation. To solve these problems, we propose three novel procedures. For this purpose, in the first part of this work, we present an optimization procedure for three-dimensional anisotropic tetrahedral grids based on metric-driven h-adaptation. The desired anisotropy in the grid is dictated by a metric that defines the size, shape, and orientation of the grid elements throughout the computational domain. Through the use of topological and geometrical operators, the mesh is iteratively adapted until the final mesh minimizes a given objective function. In this work, the objective function measures the distance between the metric of each simplex and a target metric, which can be either user-defined (a-priori) or the result of a-posteriori error analysis. During the adaptation process, one tries to decrease the metric-based objective function until the final mesh is compliant with the target within a given tolerance. However, in regions such as corners and complex face intersections, the compliance condition was found to be very difficult or sometimes impossible to satisfy. In order to address this issue, we propose an optimization process based on an ad-hoc application of the simulated annealing technique, which improves the likelihood of removing poor elements from the grid. Moreover, a local implementation of the simulated annealing is proposed to reduce the computational cost. Many challenging multi-physics and multi-field problems that are unsteady in nature are characterized by moving boundaries and/or interfaces. When the boundary displacements are large, which typically occurs when implicit time marching procedures are used, degenerate elements are easily formed in the grid such that frequent remeshing is required. To deal with this problem, in the second part of this work, we propose a new r-adaptation methodology. The new technique is valid for both simplicial (e.g., triangular, tet) and non-simplicial (e.g., quadrilateral, hex) deforming grids that undergo large imposed displacements at their boundaries. A two- or three-dimensional grid is deformed using a network of linear springs composed of edge springs and a set of virtual springs. The virtual springs are constructed in such a way as to oppose element collapsing. This is accomplished by confining each vertex to its ball through springs that are attached to the vertex and its projection on the ball entities. The resulting linear problem is solved using a preconditioned conjugate gradient method. The new method is compared with the classical spring analogy technique in two- and three-dimensional examples, highlighting the performance improvements achieved by the new method. Meshes are an important part of numerical simulations. Depending on the geometry and flow conditions, the most suitable mesh for each particular problem is different. Meshes are usually generated by either using a suitable software package or solving a PDE. In both cases, engineering intuition plays a significant role in deciding where clusterings should take place. In addition, for unsteady problems, the gradients vary for each time step, which requires frequent remeshing during simulations. Therefore, in order to minimize user intervention and prevent frequent remeshings, we conclude this work by defining a novel mesh adaptation technique that integrates metric based target mesh definitions with the ball-vertex mesh deformation method. In this new approach, the entire mesh is deformed based on either an a-priori or an a-posteriori error estimator. In other words, nodal points are repositioned upon application of a force field in order to comply with the target mesh or to get more accurate solutions. The method has been tested for two-dimensional problems of a-priori metric definitions as well as for oblique shock clusterings.

DeepMeSH: deep semantic representation for improving large-scale MeSH indexing.

PubMed

Peng, Shengwen; You, Ronghui; Wang, Hongning; Zhai, Chengxiang; Mamitsuka, Hiroshi; Zhu, Shanfeng

2016-06-15

Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) indexing, which is to assign a set of MeSH main headings to citations, is crucial for many important tasks in biomedical text mining and information retrieval. Large-scale MeSH indexing has two challenging aspects: the citation side and MeSH side. For the citation side, all existing methods, including Medical Text Indexer (MTI) by National Library of Medicine and the state-of-the-art method, MeSHLabeler, deal with text by bag-of-words, which cannot capture semantic and context-dependent information well. We propose DeepMeSH that incorporates deep semantic information for large-scale MeSH indexing. It addresses the two challenges in both citation and MeSH sides. The citation side challenge is solved by a new deep semantic representation, D2V-TFIDF, which concatenates both sparse and dense semantic representations. The MeSH side challenge is solved by using the 'learning to rank' framework of MeSHLabeler, which integrates various types of evidence generated from the new semantic representation. DeepMeSH achieved a Micro F-measure of 0.6323, 2% higher than 0.6218 of MeSHLabeler and 12% higher than 0.5637 of MTI, for BioASQ3 challenge data with 6000 citations. The software is available upon request. zhusf@fudan.edu.cn Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online. © The Author 2016. Published by Oxford University Press.

Numerical evaluation of moiré pattern in touch sensor module with electrode mesh structure in oblique view

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pournoury, M.; Zamiri, A.; Kim, T. Y.; Yurlov, V.; Oh, K.

2016-03-01

Capacitive touch sensor screen with the metal materials has recently become qualified for substitution of ITO; however several obstacles still have to be solved. One of the most important issues is moiré phenomenon. The visibility problem of the metal-mesh, in touch sensor module (TSM) is numerically considered in this paper. Based on human eye contract sensitivity function (CSF), moiré pattern of TSM electrode mesh structure is simulated with MATLAB software for 8 inch screen display in oblique view. Standard deviation of the generated moiré by the superposition of electrode mesh and screen image is calculated to find the optimal parameters which provide the minimum moiré visibility. To create the screen pixel array and mesh electrode, rectangular function is used. The filtered image, in frequency domain, is obtained by multiplication of Fourier transform of the finite mesh pattern (product of screen pixel and mesh electrode) with the calculated CSF function for three different observer distances (L=200, 300 and 400 mm). It is observed that the discrepancy between analytical and numerical results is less than 0.6% for 400 mm viewer distance. Moreover, in the case of oblique view due to considering the thickness of the finite film between mesh electrodes and screen, different points of minimum standard deviation of moiré pattern are predicted compared to normal view.

Algebraic grid generation with corner singularities

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Vinokur, M.; Lombard, C. K.

1983-01-01

A simple noniterative algebraic procedure is presented for generating smooth computational meshes on a quadrilateral topology. Coordinate distribution and normal derivative are provided on all boundaries, one of which may include a slope discontinuity. The boundary conditions are sufficient to guarantee continuity of global meshes formed of joined patches generated by the procedure. The method extends to 3-D. The procedure involves a synthesis of prior techniques stretching functions, cubic blending functions, and transfinite interpolation - to which is added the functional form of the corner solution. The procedure introduces the concept of generalized blending, which is implemented as an automatic scaling of the boundary derivatives for effective interpolation. Some implications of the treatment at boundaries for techniques solving elliptic PDE's are discussed in an Appendix.

Tensile behaviors of three-dimensionally free-formable titanium mesh plates for bone graft applications

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

He, Jianmei

2017-11-01

Present metal artificial bones for bone grafts have the problems like too heavy and excessive elastic modulus compared with natural bones. In this study, three-dimensionally (3D) free-formable titanium mesh plates for bone graft applications was introduced to improve these problems. Fundamental mesh shapes and patterns were designed under different base shapes and design parameters through three dimensional CAD tools from higher flexibility and strength points of view. Based on the designed mesh shape and patterns, sample specimens of titanium mesh plates with different base shapes and design variables were manufactured through laser processing. Tensile properties of the sample titanium mesh plates like volume density, tensile elastic modulus were experimentally and analytically evaluated. Experimental results showed that such titanium mesh plates had much higher flexibility and their mechanical properties could be controlled to close to the natural bones. More details on the mechanical properties of titanium mesh plates including compression, bending, torsion and durability will be carried out in future study.

Using SpaceClaimTD Direct for Modeling Components with Complex Geometries for the Thermal Desktop-Based Advanced Stirling Radioisotope Generator Model

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Fabanich, William A., Jr.

2014-01-01

SpaceClaim/TD Direct has been used extensively in the development of the Advanced Stirling Radioisotope Generator (ASRG) thermal model. This paper outlines the workflow for that aspect of the task and includes proposed best practices and lessons learned. The ASRG thermal model was developed to predict component temperatures and power output and to provide insight into the prime contractor's thermal modeling efforts. The insulation blocks, heat collectors, and cold side adapter flanges (CSAFs) were modeled with this approach. The model was constructed using mostly TD finite difference (FD) surfaces/solids. However, some complex geometry could not be reproduced with TD primitives while maintaining the desired degree of geometric fidelity. Using SpaceClaim permitted the import of original CAD files and enabled the defeaturing/repair of those geometries. TD Direct (a SpaceClaim add-on from CRTech) adds features that allowed the "mark-up" of that geometry. These so-called "mark-ups" control how finite element (FE) meshes are to be generated through the "tagging" of features (e.g. edges, solids, surfaces). These tags represent parameters that include: submodels, material properties, material orienters, optical properties, and radiation analysis groups. TD aliases were used for most tags to allow analysis to be performed with a variety of parameter values. "Domain-tags" were also attached to individual and groups of surfaces and solids to allow them to be used later within TD to populate objects like, for example, heaters and contactors. These tools allow the user to make changes to the geometry in SpaceClaim and then easily synchronize the mesh in TD without having to redefine the objects each time as one would if using TDMesher. The use of SpaceClaim/TD Direct helps simplify the process for importing existing geometries and in the creation of high fidelity FE meshes to represent complex parts. It also saves time and effort in the subsequent analysis.

Using SpaceClaim/TD Direct for Modeling Components with Complex Geometries for the Thermal Desktop-Based Advanced Stirling Radioisotope Generator Model

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Fabanich, William

2014-01-01

SpaceClaim/TD Direct has been used extensively in the development of the Advanced Stirling Radioisotope Generator (ASRG) thermal model. This paper outlines the workflow for that aspect of the task and includes proposed best practices and lessons learned. The ASRG thermal model was developed to predict component temperatures and power output and to provide insight into the prime contractors thermal modeling efforts. The insulation blocks, heat collectors, and cold side adapter flanges (CSAFs) were modeled with this approach. The model was constructed using mostly TD finite difference (FD) surfaces solids. However, some complex geometry could not be reproduced with TD primitives while maintaining the desired degree of geometric fidelity. Using SpaceClaim permitted the import of original CAD files and enabled the defeaturing repair of those geometries. TD Direct (a SpaceClaim add-on from CRTech) adds features that allowed the mark-up of that geometry. These so-called mark-ups control how finite element (FE) meshes were generated and allowed the tagging of features (e.g. edges, solids, surfaces). These tags represent parameters that include: submodels, material properties, material orienters, optical properties, and radiation analysis groups. TD aliases were used for most tags to allow analysis to be performed with a variety of parameter values. Domain-tags were also attached to individual and groups of surfaces and solids to allow them to be used later within TD to populate objects like, for example, heaters and contactors. These tools allow the user to make changes to the geometry in SpaceClaim and then easily synchronize the mesh in TD without having to redefine these objects each time as one would if using TD Mesher.The use of SpaceClaim/TD Direct has helped simplify the process for importing existing geometries and in the creation of high fidelity FE meshes to represent complex parts. It has also saved time and effort in the subsequent analysis.

Charged particle tracking through electrostatic wire meshes using the finite element method

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Devlin, L. J.; Karamyshev, O.; Welsch, C. P., E-mail: carsten.welsch@cockcroft.ac.uk

Wire meshes are used across many disciplines to accelerate and focus charged particles, however, analytical solutions are non-exact and few codes exist which simulate the exact fields around a mesh with physical sizes. A tracking code based in Matlab-Simulink using field maps generated using finite element software has been developed which tracks electrons or ions through electrostatic wire meshes. The fields around such a geometry are presented as an analytical expression using several basic assumptions, however, it is apparent that computational calculations are required to obtain realistic values of electric potential and fields, particularly when multiple wire meshes are deployed.more » The tracking code is flexible in that any quantitatively describable particle distribution can be used for both electrons and ions as well as other benefits such as ease of export to other programs for analysis. The code is made freely available and physical examples are highlighted where this code could be beneficial for different applications.« less

Three dimensional unstructured multigrid for the Euler equations

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mavriplis, D. J.

1991-01-01

The three dimensional Euler equations are solved on unstructured tetrahedral meshes using a multigrid strategy. The driving algorithm consists of an explicit vertex-based finite element scheme, which employs an edge-based data structure to assemble the residuals. The multigrid approach employs a sequence of independently generated coarse and fine meshes to accelerate the convergence to steady-state of the fine grid solution. Variables, residuals and corrections are passed back and forth between the various grids of the sequence using linear interpolation. The addresses and weights for interpolation are determined in a preprocessing stage using linear interpolation. The addresses and weights for interpolation are determined in a preprocessing stage using an efficient graph traversal algorithm. The preprocessing operation is shown to require a negligible fraction of the CPU time required by the overall solution procedure, while gains in overall solution efficiencies greater than an order of magnitude are demonstrated on meshes containing up to 350,000 vertices. Solutions using globally regenerated fine meshes as well as adaptively refined meshes are given.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Burke, Timothy P.; Martz, Roger L.; Kiedrowski, Brian C.

New unstructured mesh capabilities in MCNP6 (developmental version during summer 2012) show potential for conducting multi-physics analyses by coupling MCNP to a finite element solver such as Abaqus/CAE[2]. Before these new capabilities can be utilized, the ability of MCNP to accurately estimate eigenvalues and pin powers using an unstructured mesh must first be verified. Previous work to verify the unstructured mesh capabilities in MCNP was accomplished using the Godiva sphere [1], and this work attempts to build on that. To accomplish this, a criticality benchmark and a fuel assembly benchmark were used for calculations in MCNP using both the Constructivemore » Solid Geometry (CSG) native to MCNP and the unstructured mesh geometry generated using Abaqus/CAE. The Big Ten criticality benchmark [3] was modeled due to its geometry being similar to that of a reactor fuel pin. The C5G7 3-D Mixed Oxide (MOX) Fuel Assembly Benchmark [4] was modeled to test the unstructured mesh capabilities on a reactor-type problem.« less

Weakly supervised automatic segmentation and 3D modeling of the knee joint from MR images

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Amami, Amal; Ben Azouz, Zouhour

2013-12-01

Automatic segmentation and 3D modeling of the knee joint from MR images, is a challenging task. Most of the existing techniques require the tedious manual segmentation of a training set of MRIs. We present an approach that necessitates the manual segmentation of one MR image. It is based on a volumetric active appearance model. First, a dense tetrahedral mesh is automatically created on a reference MR image that is arbitrary selected. Second, a pairwise non-rigid registration between each MRI from a training set and the reference MRI is computed. The non-rigid registration is based on a piece-wise affine deformation using the created tetrahedral mesh. The minimum description length is then used to bring all the MR images into a correspondence. An average image and tetrahedral mesh, as well as a set of main modes of variations, are generated using the established correspondence. Any manual segmentation of the average MRI can be mapped to other MR images using the AAM. The proposed approach has the advantage of simultaneously generating 3D reconstructions of the surface as well as a 3D solid model of the knee joint. The generated surfaces and tetrahedral meshes present the interesting property of fulfilling a correspondence between different MR images. This paper shows preliminary results of the proposed approach. It demonstrates the automatic segmentation and 3D reconstruction of a knee joint obtained by mapping a manual segmentation of a reference image.

Graphite tail powder and liquid biofertilizer as trace elements source for ground nut

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hindersah, Reginawanti; Setiawati, M. Rochimi; Fitriatin, B. Natalie; Suryatama, Pujawati; Asmiran, Priyanka; Panatarani, Camellia; Joni, I. Made

2018-02-01

Utilization of graphite tail waste from the mineral beneficiation processing is very important since it contain significant amount of essential minerals which are necessary for plant growth. These mineral are required in biochemical processes and mainly play an important role as cofactor in enzymatic reaction. The objective of this research is to investigate the performance of graphite tail on supporting plant growth and yield of ground nut (Arachishypogeae L.). A field experiment has been performed to test the performance of mixed graphite tail and reduced organic matter dose. The graphite tail size were reduced to various sieved size, -80 mesh, -100 mesh and -200 mesh. The experiment was setup in randomized block design with 4 treatments and 6 replications for each treatment, while the control plot is received without graphite tail. The results demonstrated that reduced organic matter along with -200 mesh tail has potentially decreased plant height at the end of vegetative growth stage, in contrast for to -80 mesh tail amendment increased individual fresh plant biomass. Statistically, there was no change of plant nodule, individual shoot fresh and dry weight, root nodule, number of pod following any mesh of graphite tail amendment. Reducing organic matter while adding graphite tail of 5% did not change bean weight in all plot. In contrast, reduced organic matter along with 80-mesh graphite tail amendment improved the nut yield per plot. This experiment suggests that graphite tail, mainly -80 mesh graphite tail can be possibly used in legume production.

MUTILS - a set of efficient modeling tools for multi-core CPUs implemented in MEX

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Krotkiewski, Marcin; Dabrowski, Marcin

2013-04-01

The need for computational performance is common in scientific applications, and in particular in numerical simulations, where high resolution models require efficient processing of large amounts of data. Especially in the context of geological problems the need to increase the model resolution to resolve physical and geometrical complexities seems to have no limits. Alas, the performance of new generations of CPUs does not improve any longer by simply increasing clock speeds. Current industrial trends are to increase the number of computational cores. As a result, parallel implementations are required in order to fully utilize the potential of new processors, and to study more complex models. We target simulations on small to medium scale shared memory computers: laptops and desktop PCs with ~8 CPU cores and up to tens of GB of memory to high-end servers with ~50 CPU cores and hundereds of GB of memory. In this setting MATLAB is often the environment of choice for scientists that want to implement their own models with little effort. It is a useful general purpose mathematical software package, but due to its versatility some of its functionality is not as efficient as it could be. In particular, the challanges of modern multi-core architectures are not fully addressed. We have developed MILAMIN 2 - an efficient FEM modeling environment written in native MATLAB. Amongst others, MILAMIN provides functions to define model geometry, generate and convert structured and unstructured meshes (also through interfaces to external mesh generators), compute element and system matrices, apply boundary conditions, solve the system of linear equations, address non-linear and transient problems, and perform post-processing. MILAMIN strives to combine the ease of code development and the computational efficiency. Where possible, the code is optimized and/or parallelized within the MATLAB framework. Native MATLAB is augmented with the MUTILS library - a set of MEX functions that implement the computationally intensive, performance critical parts of the code, which we have identified to be bottlenecks. Here, we discuss the functionality and performance of the MUTILS library. Currently, it includes: 1. time and memory efficient assembly of sparse matrices for FEM simulations 2. parallel sparse matrix - vector product with optimizations speficic to symmetric matrices and multiple degrees of freedom per node 3. parallel point in triangle location and point in tetrahedron location for unstructured, adaptive 2D and 3D meshes (useful for 'marker in cell' type of methods) 4. parallel FEM interpolation for 2D and 3D meshes of elements of different types and orders, and for different number of degrees of freedom per node 5. a stand-alone, MEX implementation of the Conjugate Gradients iterative solver 6. interface to METIS graph partitioning and a fast implementation of RCM reordering

Large area nanoscale metal meshes for use as transparent conductive layers.

PubMed

Jin, Yuanhao; Li, Qunqing; Chen, Mo; Li, Guanhong; Zhao, Yudan; Xiao, Xiaoyang; Wang, Jiaping; Jiang, Kaili; Fan, Shoushan

2015-10-21

We report on the experimental realization of using super-aligned carbon nanotubes (SACNTs) as etching masks for the fabrication of large area nanoscale metal meshes. This method can easily be extended to different metals on both rigid and flexible substrates. The as-fabricated metal meshes, including the ones made of gold, copper, and aluminum, are suitable for use as transparent conductive layers (TCLs). The metal meshes, which are similar to the SACNT networks in their dimensional features of tens of nanometers, exhibit compatible performance in terms of optical transmittance and sheet resistance. Moreover, because the metal meshes are fabricated as an integrated material, there is no junction resistance between the interconnected metal nanostructures, which markedly lowers their sheet resistance at high temperatures. The fabrication of such an effective etching mask involves a simple drawing process of the SACNT networks prepared and a common deposition process. This approach should be easy to extend to various research fields and has broad prospects in commercial applications.

Grouper: A Compact, Streamable Triangle Mesh Data Structure

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Luffel, Mark; Gurung, Topraj; Lindstrom, Peter

2014-01-01

Here, we present Grouper: an all-in-one compact file format, random-access data structure, and streamable representation for large triangle meshes. Similarly to the recently published SQuad representation, Grouper represents the geometry and connectivity of a mesh by grouping vertices and triangles into fixed-size records, most of which store two adjacent triangles and a shared vertex. Unlike SQuad, however, Grouper interleaves geometry with connectivity and uses a new connectivity representation to ensure that vertices and triangles can be stored in a coherent order that enables memory-efficient sequential stream processing. We also present a linear-time construction algorithm that allows streaming out Grouper meshesmore » using a small memory footprint while preserving the initial ordering of vertices. In this construction, we show how the problem of assigning vertices and triangles to groups reduces to a well-known NP-hard optimization problem, and present a simple yet effective heuristic solution that performs well in practice. Our array-based Grouper representation also doubles as a triangle mesh data structure that allows direct access to vertices and triangles. Storing only about two integer references per triangle-i.e., less than the three vertex references stored with each triangle in a conventional indexed mesh format-Grouper answers both incidence and adjacency queries in amortized constant time. Our compact representation enables data-parallel processing on multicore computers, instant partitioning and fast transmission for distributed processing, as well as efficient out-of-core access. We demonstrate the versatility and performance benefits of Grouper using a suite of example meshes and processing kernels.« less

Robust and efficient overset grid assembly for partitioned unstructured meshes

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Roget, Beatrice; Sitaraman, Jayanarayanan

2014-03-01

This paper presents a method to perform efficient and automated Overset Grid Assembly (OGA) on a system of overlapping unstructured meshes in a parallel computing environment where all meshes are partitioned into multiple mesh-blocks and processed on multiple cores. The main task of the overset grid assembler is to identify, in parallel, among all points in the overlapping mesh system, at which points the flow solution should be computed (field points), interpolated (receptor points), or ignored (hole points). Point containment search or donor search, an algorithm to efficiently determine the cell that contains a given point, is the core procedure necessary for accomplishing this task. Donor search is particularly challenging for partitioned unstructured meshes because of the complex irregular boundaries that are often created during partitioning.

A Parallel Cartesian Approach for External Aerodynamics of Vehicles with Complex Geometry

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Aftosmis, M. J.; Berger, M. J.; Adomavicius, G.

2001-01-01

This workshop paper presents the current status in the development of a new approach for the solution of the Euler equations on Cartesian meshes with embedded boundaries in three dimensions on distributed and shared memory architectures. The approach uses adaptively refined Cartesian hexahedra to fill the computational domain. Where these cells intersect the geometry, they are cut by the boundary into arbitrarily shaped polyhedra which receive special treatment by the solver. The presentation documents a newly developed multilevel upwind solver based on a flexible domain-decomposition strategy. One novel aspect of the work is its use of space-filling curves (SFC) for memory efficient on-the-fly parallelization, dynamic re-partitioning and automatic coarse mesh generation. Within each subdomain the approach employs a variety reordering techniques so that relevant data are on the same page in memory permitting high-performance on cache-based processors. Details of the on-the-fly SFC based partitioning are presented as are construction rules for the automatic coarse mesh generation. After describing the approach, the paper uses model problems and 3- D configurations to both verify and validate the solver. The model problems demonstrate that second-order accuracy is maintained despite the presence of the irregular cut-cells in the mesh. In addition, it examines both parallel efficiency and convergence behavior. These investigations demonstrate a parallel speed-up in excess of 28 on 32 processors of an SGI Origin 2000 system and confirm that mesh partitioning has no effect on convergence behavior.

Fluorine Generator

DTIC Science & Technology

1975-04-02

Vapor Pressure 7 Dissociation of Fluorine at 4.5 Atmospheres 28 8 -325 Mesh Crystalline Boron, Alfa/Ventron 37 9 -325 Mesh Crystalline Boron, AEE...J^—i^.^/.^.^^;. ma* ^m^*^*ml*mm^mmm’**m*, • ww "-rrm-^r- The significant product, arsenic trifluoride (AsF ), was available in...of the condensation problem, equilibrium was considered at the following precombustor pressures: (1) 0.85 and 4.5 atmospheres , corresponding to the

Visualization of AMR data with multi-level dual-mesh interpolation.

PubMed

Moran, Patrick J; Ellsworth, David

2011-12-01

We present a new technique for providing interpolation within cell-centered Adaptive Mesh Refinement (AMR) data that achieves C(0) continuity throughout the 3D domain. Our technique improves on earlier work in that it does not require that adjacent patches differ by at most one refinement level. Our approach takes the dual of each mesh patch and generates "stitching cells" on the fly to fill the gaps between dual meshes. We demonstrate applications of our technique with data from Enzo, an AMR cosmological structure formation simulation code. We show ray-cast visualizations that include contributions from particle data (dark matter and stars, also output by Enzo) and gridded hydrodynamic data. We also show results from isosurface studies, including surfaces in regions where adjacent patches differ by more than one refinement level. © 2011 IEEE

Combination of ray-tracing and the method of moments for electromagnetic radiation analysis using reduced meshes

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Delgado, Carlos; Cátedra, Manuel Felipe

2018-05-01

This work presents a technique that allows a very noticeable relaxation of the computational requirements for full-wave electromagnetic simulations based on the Method of Moments. A ray-tracing analysis of the geometry is performed in order to extract the critical points with significant contributions. These points are then used to generate a reduced mesh, considering the regions of the geometry that surround each critical point and taking into account the electrical path followed from the source. The electromagnetic analysis of the reduced mesh produces very accurate results, requiring a fraction of the resources that the conventional analysis would utilize.

Implicit solvers for unstructured meshes

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Venkatakrishnan, V.; Mavriplis, Dimitri J.

1991-01-01

Implicit methods for unstructured mesh computations are developed and tested. The approximate system which arises from the Newton-linearization of the nonlinear evolution operator is solved by using the preconditioned generalized minimum residual technique. These different preconditioners are investigated: the incomplete LU factorization (ILU), block diagonal factorization, and the symmetric successive over-relaxation (SSOR). The preconditioners have been optimized to have good vectorization properties. The various methods are compared over a wide range of problems. Ordering of the unknowns, which affects the convergence of these sparse matrix iterative methods, is also investigated. Results are presented for inviscid and turbulent viscous calculations on single and multielement airfoil configurations using globally and adaptively generated meshes.

Improving Unstructured Mesh Partitions for Multiple Criteria Using Mesh Adjacencies

DOE PAGES

Smith, Cameron W.; Rasquin, Michel; Ibanez, Dan; ...

2018-02-13

The scalability of unstructured mesh based applications depends on partitioning methods that quickly balance the computational work while reducing communication costs. Zhou et al. [SIAM J. Sci. Comput., 32 (2010), pp. 3201{3227; J. Supercomput., 59 (2012), pp. 1218{1228] demonstrated the combination of (hyper)graph methods with vertex and element partition improvement for PHASTA CFD scaling to hundreds of thousands of processes. Our work generalizes partition improvement to support balancing combinations of all the mesh entity dimensions (vertices, edges, faces, regions) in partitions with imbalances exceeding 70%. Improvement results are then presented for multiple entity dimensions on up to one million processesmore » on meshes with over 12 billion tetrahedral elements.« less

Improving Unstructured Mesh Partitions for Multiple Criteria Using Mesh Adjacencies

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Smith, Cameron W.; Rasquin, Michel; Ibanez, Dan

The scalability of unstructured mesh based applications depends on partitioning methods that quickly balance the computational work while reducing communication costs. Zhou et al. [SIAM J. Sci. Comput., 32 (2010), pp. 3201{3227; J. Supercomput., 59 (2012), pp. 1218{1228] demonstrated the combination of (hyper)graph methods with vertex and element partition improvement for PHASTA CFD scaling to hundreds of thousands of processes. Our work generalizes partition improvement to support balancing combinations of all the mesh entity dimensions (vertices, edges, faces, regions) in partitions with imbalances exceeding 70%. Improvement results are then presented for multiple entity dimensions on up to one million processesmore » on meshes with over 12 billion tetrahedral elements.« less

Mesh quality oriented 3D geometric vascular modeling based on parallel transport frame.

PubMed

Guo, Jixiang; Li, Shun; Chui, Yim Pan; Qin, Jing; Heng, Pheng Ann

2013-08-01

While a number of methods have been proposed to reconstruct geometrically and topologically accurate 3D vascular models from medical images, little attention has been paid to constantly maintain high mesh quality of these models during the reconstruction procedure, which is essential for many subsequent applications such as simulation-based surgical training and planning. We propose a set of methods to bridge this gap based on parallel transport frame. An improved bifurcation modeling method and two novel trifurcation modeling methods are developed based on 3D Bézier curve segments in order to ensure the continuous surface transition at furcations. In addition, a frame blending scheme is implemented to solve the twisting problem caused by frame mismatch of two successive furcations. A curvature based adaptive sampling scheme combined with a mesh quality guided frame tilting algorithm is developed to construct an evenly distributed, non-concave and self-intersection free surface mesh for vessels with distinct radius and high curvature. Extensive experiments demonstrate that our methodology can generate vascular models with better mesh quality than previous methods in terms of surface mesh quality criteria. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

A novel method of the image processing on irregular triangular meshes

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Vishnyakov, Sergey; Pekhterev, Vitaliy; Sokolova, Elizaveta

2018-04-01

The paper describes a novel method of the image processing based on irregular triangular meshes implementation. The triangular mesh is adaptive to the image content, least mean square linear approximation is proposed for the basic interpolation within the triangle. It is proposed to use triangular numbers to simplify using of the local (barycentric) coordinates for the further analysis - triangular element of the initial irregular mesh is to be represented through the set of the four equilateral triangles. This allows to use fast and simple pixels indexing in local coordinates, e.g. "for" or "while" loops for access to the pixels. Moreover, representation proposed allows to use discrete cosine transform of the simple "rectangular" symmetric form without additional pixels reordering (as it is used for shape-adaptive DCT forms). Furthermore, this approach leads to the simple form of the wavelet transform on triangular mesh. The results of the method application are presented. It is shown that advantage of the method proposed is a combination of the flexibility of the image-adaptive irregular meshes with the simple form of the pixel indexing in local triangular coordinates and the using of the common forms of the discrete transforms for triangular meshes. Method described is proposed for the image compression, pattern recognition, image quality improvement, image search and indexing. It also may be used as a part of video coding (intra-frame or inter-frame coding, motion detection).

Seamless, axially aligned, fiber tubes, meshes, microbundles and gradient biomaterial constructs

PubMed Central

Elia, Roberto; Firpo, Matthew A.; Kaplan, David L.; Peattie, Robert A.

2012-01-01

A new electrospinning apparatus was developed to generate nanofibrous materials with improved organizational control. The system functions by oscillating the deposition signal (ODS) of multiple collectors, allowing significantly improved nanofiber control by manipulating the electric field which drives the electrospinning process. Other electrospinning techniques designed to impart deposited fiber organizational control, such as rotating mandrels or parallel collector systems, do not generate seamless constructs with high quality alignment in sizes large enough for medical devices. In contrast, the ODS collection system produces deposited fiber networks with highly pure alignment in a variety of forms and sizes, including flat (8 × 8 cm2), tubular (1.3 cm diameter), or rope-like microbundle (45 μm diameter) samples. Additionally, the mechanism of our technique allows for scale-up beyond these dimensions. The ODS collection system produced 81.6 % of fibers aligned within 5° of the axial direction, nearly a four-fold improvement over the rotating mandrel technique. The meshes produced from the 9 % (w/v) fibroin/PEO blend demonstrated significant mechanical anisotropy due to the fiber alignment. In 37 °C PBS, aligned samples produced an ultimate tensile strength of 16.47 ± 1.18 MPa, a Young's modulus of 37.33 MPa, and a yield strength of 7.79 ± 1.13 MPa. The material was 300 % stiffer when extended in the direction of fiber alignment and required 20 times the amount of force to be deformed, compared to aligned meshes extended perpendicular to the fiber direction. The ODS technique could be applied to any electrospinnable polymer to overcome the more limited uniformity and induced mechanical strain of rotating mandrel techniques, and greatly surpasses the limited length of standard parallel collector techniques. PMID:22890517

A hybrid computational model to explore the topological characteristics of epithelial tissues.

PubMed

González-Valverde, Ismael; García-Aznar, José Manuel

2017-11-01

Epithelial tissues show a particular topology where cells resemble a polygon-like shape, but some biological processes can alter this tissue topology. During cell proliferation, mitotic cell dilation deforms the tissue and modifies the tissue topology. Additionally, cells are reorganized in the epithelial layer and these rearrangements also alter the polygon distribution. We present here a computer-based hybrid framework focused on the simulation of epithelial layer dynamics that combines discrete and continuum numerical models. In this framework, we consider topological and mechanical aspects of the epithelial tissue. Individual cells in the tissue are simulated by an off-lattice agent-based model, which keeps the information of each cell. In addition, we model the cell-cell interaction forces and the cell cycle. Otherwise, we simulate the passive mechanical behaviour of the cell monolayer using a material that approximates the mechanical properties of the cell. This continuum approach is solved by the finite element method, which uses a dynamic mesh generated by the triangulation of cell polygons. Forces generated by cell-cell interaction in the agent-based model are also applied on the finite element mesh. Cell movement in the agent-based model is driven by the displacements obtained from the deformed finite element mesh of the continuum mechanical approach. We successfully compare the results of our simulations with some experiments about the topology of proliferating epithelial tissues in Drosophila. Our framework is able to model the emergent behaviour of the cell monolayer that is due to local cell-cell interactions, which have a direct influence on the dynamics of the epithelial tissue. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

The Canadian Hydrological Model (CHM): A multi-scale, variable-complexity hydrological model for cold regions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Marsh, C.; Pomeroy, J. W.; Wheater, H. S.

2016-12-01

There is a need for hydrological land surface schemes that can link to atmospheric models, provide hydrological prediction at multiple scales and guide the development of multiple objective water predictive systems. Distributed raster-based models suffer from an overrepresentation of topography, leading to wasted computational effort that increases uncertainty due to greater numbers of parameters and initial conditions. The Canadian Hydrological Model (CHM) is a modular, multiphysics, spatially distributed modelling framework designed for representing hydrological processes, including those that operate in cold-regions. Unstructured meshes permit variable spatial resolution, allowing coarse resolutions at low spatial variability and fine resolutions as required. Model uncertainty is reduced by lessening the necessary computational elements relative to high-resolution rasters. CHM uses a novel multi-objective approach for unstructured triangular mesh generation that fulfills hydrologically important constraints (e.g., basin boundaries, water bodies, soil classification, land cover, elevation, and slope/aspect). This provides an efficient spatial representation of parameters and initial conditions, as well as well-formed and well-graded triangles that are suitable for numerical discretization. CHM uses high-quality open source libraries and high performance computing paradigms to provide a framework that allows for integrating current state-of-the-art process algorithms. The impact of changes to model structure, including individual algorithms, parameters, initial conditions, driving meteorology, and spatial/temporal discretization can be easily tested. Initial testing of CHM compared spatial scales and model complexity for a spring melt period at a sub-arctic mountain basin. The meshing algorithm reduced the total number of computational elements and preserved the spatial heterogeneity of predictions.

a Geometric Processing Workflow for Transforming Reality-Based 3d Models in Volumetric Meshes Suitable for Fea

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gonizzi Barsanti, S.; Guidi, G.

2017-02-01

Conservation of Cultural Heritage is a key issue and structural changes and damages can influence the mechanical behaviour of artefacts and buildings. The use of Finite Elements Methods (FEM) for mechanical analysis is largely used in modelling stress behaviour. The typical workflow involves the use of CAD 3D models made by Non-Uniform Rational B-splines (NURBS) surfaces, representing the ideal shape of the object to be simulated. Nowadays, 3D documentation of CH has been widely developed through reality-based approaches, but the models are not suitable for a direct use in FEA: the mesh has in fact to be converted to volumetric, and the density has to be reduced since the computational complexity of a FEA grows exponentially with the number of nodes. The focus of this paper is to present a new method aiming at generate the most accurate 3D representation of a real artefact from highly accurate 3D digital models derived from reality-based techniques, maintaining the accuracy of the high-resolution polygonal models in the solid ones. The approach proposed is based on a wise use of retopology procedures and a transformation of this model to a mathematical one made by NURBS surfaces suitable for being processed by volumetric meshers typically embedded in standard FEM packages. The strong simplification with little loss of consistency possible with the retopology step is used for maintaining as much coherence as possible between the original acquired mesh and the simplified model, creating in the meantime a topology that is more favourable for the automatic NURBS conversion.

Comment on "A note on generalized radial mesh generation for plasma electronic structure"

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pain, J.-Ch.

2011-12-01

In a recent note, B.G. Wilson and V. Sonnad [1] proposed a very useful closed form expression for the efficient generation of analytic log-linear radial meshes. The central point of the note is an implicit equation for the parameter h, involving Lambert's function W[x]. The authors mention that they are unaware of any direct proof of this equation (they obtained it by re-summing the Taylor expansion of h[α] using high-order coefficients obtained by analytic differentiation of the implicit definition using symbolic manipulation). In the present comment, we propose a direct proof of that equation.

Unconstrained paving and plastering method for generating finite element meshes

DOEpatents

Staten, Matthew L.; Owen, Steven J.; Blacker, Teddy D.; Kerr, Robert

2010-03-02

Computer software for and a method of generating a conformal all quadrilateral or hexahedral mesh comprising selecting an object with unmeshed boundaries and performing the following while unmeshed voids are larger than twice a desired element size and unrecognizable as either a midpoint subdividable or pave-and-sweepable polyhedra: selecting a front to advance; based on sizes of fronts and angles with adjacent fronts, determining which adjacent fronts should be advanced with the selected front; advancing the fronts; detecting proximities with other nearby fronts; resolving any found proximities; forming quadrilaterals or unconstrained columns of hexahedra where two layers cross; and establishing hexahedral elements where three layers cross.

A Numerical Investigation of Two-Different Drosophila Forward Flight Modes

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sahin, Mehmet; Dilek, Ezgi; Erzincanli, Belkis

2016-11-01

The parallel large-scale unstructured finite volume method based on an Arbitrary Lagrangian-Eulerian (ALE) formulation has been applied in order to investigate the near wake structure of Drosophila in forward flight. DISTENE MeshGems-Hexa algorithm based on the octree method is used to generate the all hexahedral mesh for the wing-body combination. The mesh deformation algorithm is based on the indirect radial basis function (RBF) method at each time level while avoiding remeshing in order to enhance numerical robustness. The large-scale numerical simulations are carried out for a flapping Drosophila in forward flight. In the first case, the wing tip-path plane is tilted forward to generate forward force. In the second case, paddling wing motion is used to generate the forward fore. The λ2-criterion proposed by Jeong and Hussain (1995) is used for investigating the time variation of the Eulerian coherent structures in the near wake. The present simulations reveal highly detailed near wake topology for a hovering Drosophila. This is very useful in terms of understanding physics in biological flights which can provide a very useful tool for designing bio-inspired MAVs.

Exploring Discretization Error in Simulation-Based Aerodynamic Databases

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Aftosmis, Michael J.; Nemec, Marian

2010-01-01

This work examines the level of discretization error in simulation-based aerodynamic databases and introduces strategies for error control. Simulations are performed using a parallel, multi-level Euler solver on embedded-boundary Cartesian meshes. Discretization errors in user-selected outputs are estimated using the method of adjoint-weighted residuals and we use adaptive mesh refinement to reduce these errors to specified tolerances. Using this framework, we examine the behavior of discretization error throughout a token database computed for a NACA 0012 airfoil consisting of 120 cases. We compare the cost and accuracy of two approaches for aerodynamic database generation. In the first approach, mesh adaptation is used to compute all cases in the database to a prescribed level of accuracy. The second approach conducts all simulations using the same computational mesh without adaptation. We quantitatively assess the error landscape and computational costs in both databases. This investigation highlights sensitivities of the database under a variety of conditions. The presence of transonic shocks or the stiffness in the governing equations near the incompressible limit are shown to dramatically increase discretization error requiring additional mesh resolution to control. Results show that such pathologies lead to error levels that vary by over factor of 40 when using a fixed mesh throughout the database. Alternatively, controlling this sensitivity through mesh adaptation leads to mesh sizes which span two orders of magnitude. We propose strategies to minimize simulation cost in sensitive regions and discuss the role of error-estimation in database quality.

DeepMeSH: deep semantic representation for improving large-scale MeSH indexing

PubMed Central

Peng, Shengwen; You, Ronghui; Wang, Hongning; Zhai, Chengxiang; Mamitsuka, Hiroshi; Zhu, Shanfeng

2016-01-01

Motivation: Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) indexing, which is to assign a set of MeSH main headings to citations, is crucial for many important tasks in biomedical text mining and information retrieval. Large-scale MeSH indexing has two challenging aspects: the citation side and MeSH side. For the citation side, all existing methods, including Medical Text Indexer (MTI) by National Library of Medicine and the state-of-the-art method, MeSHLabeler, deal with text by bag-of-words, which cannot capture semantic and context-dependent information well. Methods: We propose DeepMeSH that incorporates deep semantic information for large-scale MeSH indexing. It addresses the two challenges in both citation and MeSH sides. The citation side challenge is solved by a new deep semantic representation, D2V-TFIDF, which concatenates both sparse and dense semantic representations. The MeSH side challenge is solved by using the ‘learning to rank’ framework of MeSHLabeler, which integrates various types of evidence generated from the new semantic representation. Results: DeepMeSH achieved a Micro F-measure of 0.6323, 2% higher than 0.6218 of MeSHLabeler and 12% higher than 0.5637 of MTI, for BioASQ3 challenge data with 6000 citations. Availability and Implementation: The software is available upon request. Contact: zhusf@fudan.edu.cn Supplementary information: Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online. PMID:27307646

Methods of Real Time Image Enhancement of Flash LIDAR Data and Navigating a Vehicle Using Flash LIDAR Data

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Vanek, Michael D. (Inventor)

2014-01-01

A method for creating a digital elevation map ("DEM") from frames of flash LIDAR data includes generating a first distance R(sub i) from a first detector i to a first point on a surface S(sub i). After defining a map with a mesh THETA having cells k, a first array S(k), a second array M(k), and a third array D(k) are initialized. The first array corresponds to the surface, the second array corresponds to the elevation map, and the third array D(k) receives an output for the DEM. The surface is projected onto the mesh THETA, so that a second distance R(sub k) from a second point on the mesh THETA to the detector can be found. From this, a height may be calculated, which permits the generation of a digital elevation map. Also, using sequential frames of flash LIDAR data, vehicle control is possible using an offset between successive frames.

Method for Enhancing a Three Dimensional Image from a Plurality of Frames of Flash LIDAR Data

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bulyshev, Alexander (Inventor); Vanek, Michael D. (Inventor); Amzajerdian, Farzin (Inventor)

2013-01-01

A method for enhancing a three dimensional image from frames of flash LIDAR data includes generating a first distance R(sub i) from a first detector i to a first point on a surface S(sub i). After defining a map with a mesh theta having cells k, a first array S(k), a second array M(k), and a third array D(k) are initialized. The first array corresponds to the surface, the second array corresponds to the elevation map, and the third array D(k) receives an output for the DEM. The surface is projected onto the mesh theta, so that a second distance R(sub k) from a second point on the mesh theta to the detector can be found. From this, a height may be calculated, which permits the generation of a digital elevation map. Also, using sequential frames of flash LIDAR data, vehicle control is possible using an offset between successive frames.

An Anisotropic A posteriori Error Estimator for CFD

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Feijóo, Raúl A.; Padra, Claudio; Quintana, Fernando

In this article, a robust anisotropic adaptive algorithm is presented, to solve compressible-flow equations using a stabilized CFD solver and automatic mesh generators. The association includes a mesh generator, a flow solver, and an a posteriori error-estimator code. The estimator was selected among several choices available (Almeida et al. (2000). Comput. Methods Appl. Mech. Engng, 182, 379-400; Borges et al. (1998). "Computational mechanics: new trends and applications". Proceedings of the 4th World Congress on Computational Mechanics, Bs.As., Argentina) giving a powerful computational tool. The main aim is to capture solution discontinuities, in this case, shocks, using the least amount of computational resources, i.e. elements, compatible with a solution of good quality. This leads to high aspect-ratio elements (stretching). To achieve this, a directional error estimator was specifically selected. The numerical results show good behavior of the error estimator, resulting in strongly-adapted meshes in few steps, typically three or four iterations, enough to capture shocks using a moderate and well-distributed amount of elements.

Multi-Physics Demonstration Problem with the SHARP Reactor Simulation Toolkit

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Merzari, E.; Shemon, E. R.; Yu, Y. Q.

This report describes to employ SHARP to perform a first-of-a-kind analysis of the core radial expansion phenomenon in an SFR. This effort required significant advances in the framework Multi-Physics Demonstration Problem with the SHARP Reactor Simulation Toolkit used to drive the coupled simulations, manipulate the mesh in response to the deformation of the geometry, and generate the necessary modified mesh files. Furthermore, the model geometry is fairly complex, and consistent mesh generation for the three physics modules required significant effort. Fully-integrated simulations of a 7-assembly mini-core test problem have been performed, and the results are presented here. Physics models ofmore » a full-core model of the Advanced Burner Test Reactor have also been developed for each of the three physics modules. Standalone results of each of the three physics modules for the ABTR are presented here, which provides a demonstration of the feasibility of the fully-integrated simulation.« less

Numerical modeling of pulsed laser-material interaction and of laser plume dynamics

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Zhao, Qiang; Shi, Yina

2015-03-10

We have developed two-dimensional Arbitrary Lagrangian Eulerian (ALE) code which is used to study the physical processes, the plasma absorption, the crater profile, and the temperature distribution on metallic target and below the surface. The ALE method overcomes problems with Lagrangian moving mesh distortion by mesh smoothing and conservative quantities remapping from Lagrangian mesh to smoothed one. A new second order accurate diffusion solver has been implemented for the thermal conduction and radiation transport on distorted mesh. The results of numerical simulation of pulsed laser ablation are presented. The influences of different processes, such as time evolution of the surfacemore » temperature, interspecies interactions (elastic collisions, recombination-dissociation reaction), interaction with an ambient gas are examined. The study presents particular interest for the analysis of experimental results obtained during pulsed laser ablation.« less

GENSURF: A mesh generator for 3D finite element analysis of surface and corner cracks in finite thickness plates subjected to mode-1 loadings

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Raju, I. S.

1992-01-01

A computer program that generates three-dimensional (3D) finite element models for cracked 3D solids was written. This computer program, gensurf, uses minimal input data to generate 3D finite element models for isotropic solids with elliptic or part-elliptic cracks. These models can be used with a 3D finite element program called surf3d. This report documents this mesh generator. In this manual the capabilities, limitations, and organization of gensurf are described. The procedures used to develop 3D finite element models and the input for and the output of gensurf are explained. Several examples are included to illustrate the use of this program. Several input data files are included with this manual so that the users can edit these files to conform to their crack configuration and use them with gensurf.

Tangle-Free Finite Element Mesh Motion for Ablation Problems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Droba, Justin

2016-01-01

In numerical simulations involving boundaries that evolve in time, the primary challenge is updating the computational mesh to reflect the physical changes in the domain. In particular, the fundamental objective for any such \\mesh motion" scheme is to maintain mesh quality and suppress unphysical geometric anamolies and artifacts. External to a physical process of interest, mesh motion is an added component that determines the specifics of how to move the mesh given certain limited information from the main system. This paper develops a set of boundary conditions designed to eliminate tangling and internal collision within the context of PDE-based mesh motion (linear elasticity). These boundary conditions are developed for two- and three-dimensional meshes. The paper presents detailed algorithms for commonly occuring topological scenarios and explains how to apply them appropriately. Notably, the techniques discussed herein make use of none of the specifics of any particular formulation of mesh motion and thus are more broadly applicable. The two-dimensional algorithms are validated by an extensive verification procedure. Finally, many examples of diverse geometries in both two- and three-dimensions are shown to showcase the capabilities of the tangle-free boundary conditions.

Durable underwater superoleophobic PDDA/halloysite nanotubes decorated stainless steel mesh for efficient oil-water separation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hou, Kun; Zeng, Yicheng; Zhou, Cailong; Chen, Jiahui; Wen, Xiufang; Xu, Shouping; Cheng, Jiang; Lin, Yingguang; Pi, Pihui

2017-09-01

A durable underwater superoleophobic mesh was conveniently prepared by layer-by-layer (LBL) assembly of poly (diallyldimethylammonium chloride) (PDDA) and halloysite nanotubes (HNTs) on a stainless steel mesh. The hierarchical structure and roughness of the PDDA/HNTs coating surface were controlled by adjusting the number of layer deposition cycles. When the PDDA/HNTs coating with 10 deposition cycles was decorated on the mesh with pore size of about 54 μm, the underwater superoleophobic mesh was obtained. The as-prepared underwater superoleophobic PDDA/HNTs decorated mesh exhibits outstanding oil-water separation performance with a separation efficiency of over 97% for various oil/water mixtures, which allowed water to pass through while repelled oil completely. In addition, the as-prepared decorated mesh still maintained high separation efficiency above 97% after repeated 20 separation times for hexane/water mixture or chloroform/water mixture. More importantly, the as-prepared decorated mesh is durable enough to resist chemical and mechanical challenges, such as strong alkaline, salt aqueous and sand abrasion. Therefore, the as-prepared decorated mesh has practical utility in oil-water separation due to its stable oil-water performance, remarkable chemical and mechanical durability and the facile and eco-friendly preparation process.

Implementation of tetrahedral-mesh geometry in Monte Carlo radiation transport code PHITS

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Furuta, Takuya; Sato, Tatsuhiko; Han, Min Cheol; Yeom, Yeon Soo; Kim, Chan Hyeong; Brown, Justin L.; Bolch, Wesley E.

2017-06-01

A new function to treat tetrahedral-mesh geometry was implemented in the particle and heavy ion transport code systems. To accelerate the computational speed in the transport process, an original algorithm was introduced to initially prepare decomposition maps for the container box of the tetrahedral-mesh geometry. The computational performance was tested by conducting radiation transport simulations of 100 MeV protons and 1 MeV photons in a water phantom represented by tetrahedral mesh. The simulation was repeated with varying number of meshes and the required computational times were then compared with those of the conventional voxel representation. Our results show that the computational costs for each boundary crossing of the region mesh are essentially equivalent for both representations. This study suggests that the tetrahedral-mesh representation offers not only a flexible description of the transport geometry but also improvement of computational efficiency for the radiation transport. Due to the adaptability of tetrahedrons in both size and shape, dosimetrically equivalent objects can be represented by tetrahedrons with a much fewer number of meshes as compared its voxelized representation. Our study additionally included dosimetric calculations using a computational human phantom. A significant acceleration of the computational speed, about 4 times, was confirmed by the adoption of a tetrahedral mesh over the traditional voxel mesh geometry.

Implementation of tetrahedral-mesh geometry in Monte Carlo radiation transport code PHITS.

PubMed

Furuta, Takuya; Sato, Tatsuhiko; Han, Min Cheol; Yeom, Yeon Soo; Kim, Chan Hyeong; Brown, Justin L; Bolch, Wesley E

2017-06-21

A new function to treat tetrahedral-mesh geometry was implemented in the particle and heavy ion transport code systems. To accelerate the computational speed in the transport process, an original algorithm was introduced to initially prepare decomposition maps for the container box of the tetrahedral-mesh geometry. The computational performance was tested by conducting radiation transport simulations of 100 MeV protons and 1 MeV photons in a water phantom represented by tetrahedral mesh. The simulation was repeated with varying number of meshes and the required computational times were then compared with those of the conventional voxel representation. Our results show that the computational costs for each boundary crossing of the region mesh are essentially equivalent for both representations. This study suggests that the tetrahedral-mesh representation offers not only a flexible description of the transport geometry but also improvement of computational efficiency for the radiation transport. Due to the adaptability of tetrahedrons in both size and shape, dosimetrically equivalent objects can be represented by tetrahedrons with a much fewer number of meshes as compared its voxelized representation. Our study additionally included dosimetric calculations using a computational human phantom. A significant acceleration of the computational speed, about 4 times, was confirmed by the adoption of a tetrahedral mesh over the traditional voxel mesh geometry.

Computational Approach to Seasonal Changes of Living Leaves

PubMed Central

Wu, Dong-Yan

2013-01-01

This paper proposes a computational approach to seasonal changes of living leaves by combining the geometric deformations and textural color changes. The geometric model of a leaf is generated by triangulating the scanned image of a leaf using an optimized mesh. The triangular mesh of the leaf is deformed by the improved mass-spring model, while the deformation is controlled by setting different mass values for the vertices on the leaf model. In order to adaptively control the deformation of different regions in the leaf, the mass values of vertices are set to be in proportion to the pixels' intensities of the corresponding user-specified grayscale mask map. The geometric deformations as well as the textural color changes of a leaf are used to simulate the seasonal changing process of leaves based on Markov chain model with different environmental parameters including temperature, humidness, and time. Experimental results show that the method successfully simulates the seasonal changes of leaves. PMID:23533545

Finite Element Analysis of Composite Joint Configurations with Gaps and Overlaps

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Krueger, Ronald

2014-01-01

The goal of the current study is to identify scenarios for which thermal and moisture effects become significant in the loading of a composite structure. In the current work, a simple configuration was defined, and material properties were selected. A Fortran routine was created to automate the mesh generation process. The routine was used to create the models for the initial mesh refinement study. A combination of element length and width suitable for further studies was identified. Also, the effect of the overlap length and gap length on computed shear and through-thickness stresses along the bondline of the joints was studied for the mechanical load case. Further, the influence of neighboring gaps and overlaps on these joint stresses was studied and was found to be negligible. The results suggest that for an initial study it is sufficient to focus on one configuration with fixed overlap and gap lengths to study the effects of mechanical, thermal and moisture loading and combinations thereof on computed joint stresses

The Fysics of Filopodia (or The Physics of Philopodia)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Schwarz, Jen; Gopinathan, Ajay; Lee, Kun-Chun; Liu, Andrea; Yang, Louise

2006-03-01

Cell motility is driven by the dynamic reorganization of the cellular cytoskeleton which is composed of actin. Monomeric actin assembles into filaments that grow, shrink, branch and bundle. Branching generates new filaments that form a mesh-like structure that protrudes outward allowing the cell to move somewhere. But how does it know where to move? It has been proposed that filopodia serve as scouts for the cell. Filopodia are bundles of actin filaments that extend out ahead of the rest of the cell to probe its upcoming environment. Recent in vitro experiments [Vignjevic et al., J. Ce ll Bio. 160, 951 (2003)] determine the minimal ingredients required for such a process. We model these experiments analytically and via Monte Carlo simulations to estimate the typical bundle size and length. We also estimate the size of the mesh-like structure from which the filopodia emerge and explain the observed nonmonotonicity of this size as a function of capping protein concentration, which inhibits filament growth.

From video to computation of biological fluid-structure interaction problems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Dillard, Seth I.; Buchholz, James H. J.; Udaykumar, H. S.

2016-04-01

This work deals with the techniques necessary to obtain a purely Eulerian procedure to conduct CFD simulations of biological systems with moving boundary flow phenomena. Eulerian approaches obviate difficulties associated with mesh generation to describe or fit flow meshes to body surfaces. The challenges associated with constructing embedded boundary information, body motions and applying boundary conditions on the moving bodies for flow computation are addressed in the work. The overall approach is applied to the study of a fluid-structure interaction problem, i.e., the hydrodynamics of swimming of an American eel, where the motion of the eel is derived from video imaging. It is shown that some first-blush approaches do not work, and therefore, careful consideration of appropriate techniques to connect moving images to flow simulations is necessary and forms the main contribution of the paper. A combination of level set-based active contour segmentation with optical flow and image morphing is shown to enable the image-to-computation process.

Towards a new multiscale air quality transport model using the fully unstructured anisotropic adaptive mesh technology of Fluidity (version 4.1.9)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zheng, J.; Zhu, J.; Wang, Z.; Fang, F.; Pain, C. C.; Xiang, J.

2015-10-01

An integrated method of advanced anisotropic hr-adaptive mesh and discretization numerical techniques has been, for first time, applied to modelling of multiscale advection-diffusion problems, which is based on a discontinuous Galerkin/control volume discretization on unstructured meshes. Over existing air quality models typically based on static-structured grids using a locally nesting technique, the advantage of the anisotropic hr-adaptive model has the ability to adapt the mesh according to the evolving pollutant distribution and flow features. That is, the mesh resolution can be adjusted dynamically to simulate the pollutant transport process accurately and effectively. To illustrate the capability of the anisotropic adaptive unstructured mesh model, three benchmark numerical experiments have been set up for two-dimensional (2-D) advection phenomena. Comparisons have been made between the results obtained using uniform resolution meshes and anisotropic adaptive resolution meshes. Performance achieved in 3-D simulation of power plant plumes indicates that this new adaptive multiscale model has the potential to provide accurate air quality modelling solutions effectively.

Impact experiments into multiple-mesh targets: Concept development of a lightweight collisional bumper

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hoerz, Friedrich; Cintala, Mark J.; Bernhard, Ronald P.; Cardenas, Frank; Davidson, William; Haynes, Gerald; See, Thomas H.; Winkler, Jerry; Gray, Barry

1993-01-01

The utility of multiple-mesh targets as potential lightweight shields to protect spacecraft in low-Earth orbit against collisional damage is explored. Earlier studies revealed that single meshes comminute hypervelocity impactors with efficiencies comparable to contiguous targets. Multiple interaction of projectile fragments with any number of meshes should lead to increased comminution, deceleration, and dispersion of the projectile, such that all debris exiting the mesh stack possesses low specific energies (ergs/sq cm) that would readily be tolerated by many flight systems. The study is conceptually exploring the sensitivity of major variables such as impact velocity, the specific areal mass (g/sq cm) of the total mesh stack (SM), and the separation distance (S) between individual meshes. Most experiments employed five or ten meshes with total SM typically less than 0.5 the specific mass of the impactor, and silicate glass impactors rather than metal projectiles. While projectile comminution increases with increasing impact velocity due to progressively higher shock stresses, encounters with multiple-meshes at low velocity (1-2 km/s) already lead to significant disruption of the glass impactors, with the resulting fragments being additionally decelerated and dispersed by subsequent meshes, and, unlike most contiguous single-plate bumpers, leading to respectable performance at low velocity. Total specific bumper mass must be the subject of careful trade-off studies; relatively massive bumpers will generate too much debris being dislodged from the bumper itself, while exceptionally lightweight designs will not cause sufficient comminution, deceleration, or dispersion of the impactor. Separation distance was found to be a crucial design parameter, as it controls the dispersion of the fragment cloud. Substantial mass savings could result if maximum separation distances were employed. The total mass of debris dislodged by multiple-mesh stacks is modestly smaller than that of single, contiguous-membrane shields. The cumulative surface area of all penetration holes in multiple mesh stacks is an order of magnitude smaller than that in analog multiple-foil shields, suggesting good long-term performance of the mesh designs. Due to different experimental conditions, direct and quantitative comparison with other lightweight shields is not possible at present.

3D CSEM inversion based on goal-oriented adaptive finite element method

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhang, Y.; Key, K.

2016-12-01

We present a parallel 3D frequency domain controlled-source electromagnetic inversion code name MARE3DEM. Non-linear inversion of observed data is performed with the Occam variant of regularized Gauss-Newton optimization. The forward operator is based on the goal-oriented finite element method that efficiently calculates the responses and sensitivity kernels in parallel using a data decomposition scheme where independent modeling tasks contain different frequencies and subsets of the transmitters and receivers. To accommodate complex 3D conductivity variation with high flexibility and precision, we adopt the dual-grid approach where the forward mesh conforms to the inversion parameter grid and is adaptively refined until the forward solution converges to the desired accuracy. This dual-grid approach is memory efficient, since the inverse parameter grid remains independent from fine meshing generated around the transmitter and receivers by the adaptive finite element method. Besides, the unstructured inverse mesh efficiently handles multiple scale structures and allows for fine-scale model parameters within the region of interest. Our mesh generation engine keeps track of the refinement hierarchy so that the map of conductivity and sensitivity kernel between the forward and inverse mesh is retained. We employ the adjoint-reciprocity method to calculate the sensitivity kernels which establish a linear relationship between changes in the conductivity model and changes in the modeled responses. Our code uses a direcy solver for the linear systems, so the adjoint problem is efficiently computed by re-using the factorization from the primary problem. Further computational efficiency and scalability is obtained in the regularized Gauss-Newton portion of the inversion using parallel dense matrix-matrix multiplication and matrix factorization routines implemented with the ScaLAPACK library. We show the scalability, reliability and the potential of the algorithm to deal with complex geological scenarios by applying it to the inversion of synthetic marine controlled source EM data generated for a complex 3D offshore model with significant seafloor topography.

MapReduce in the Cloud: A Use Case Study for Efficient Co-Occurrence Processing of MEDLINE Annotations with MeSH.

PubMed

Kreuzthaler, Markus; Miñarro-Giménez, Jose Antonio; Schulz, Stefan

2016-01-01

Big data resources are difficult to process without a scaled hardware environment that is specifically adapted to the problem. The emergence of flexible cloud-based virtualization techniques promises solutions to this problem. This paper demonstrates how a billion of lines can be processed in a reasonable amount of time in a cloud-based environment. Our use case addresses the accumulation of concept co-occurrence data in MEDLINE annotation as a series of MapReduce jobs, which can be scaled and executed in the cloud. Besides showing an efficient way solving this problem, we generated an additional resource for the scientific community to be used for advanced text mining approaches.

Multiphase flow modelling of explosive volcanic eruptions using adaptive unstructured meshes

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Jacobs, Christian T.; Collins, Gareth S.; Piggott, Matthew D.; Kramer, Stephan C.

2014-05-01

Explosive volcanic eruptions generate highly energetic plumes of hot gas and ash particles that produce diagnostic deposits and pose an extreme environmental hazard. The formation, dispersion and collapse of these volcanic plumes are complex multiscale processes that are extremely challenging to simulate numerically. Accurate description of particle and droplet aggregation, movement and settling requires a model capable of capturing the dynamics on a range of scales (from cm to km) and a model that can correctly describe the important multiphase interactions that take place. However, even the most advanced models of eruption dynamics to date are restricted by the fixed mesh-based approaches that they employ. The research presented herein describes the development of a compressible multiphase flow model within Fluidity, a combined finite element / control volume computational fluid dynamics (CFD) code, for the study of explosive volcanic eruptions. Fluidity adopts a state-of-the-art adaptive unstructured mesh-based approach to discretise the domain and focus numerical resolution only in areas important to the dynamics, while decreasing resolution where it is not needed as a simulation progresses. This allows the accurate but economical representation of the flow dynamics throughout time, and potentially allows large multi-scale problems to become tractable in complex 3D domains. The multiphase flow model is verified with the method of manufactured solutions, and validated by simulating published gas-solid shock tube experiments and comparing the numerical results against pressure gauge data. The application of the model considers an idealised 7 km by 7 km domain in which the violent eruption of hot gas and volcanic ash high into the atmosphere is simulated. Although the simulations do not correspond to a particular eruption case study, the key flow features observed in a typical explosive eruption event are successfully captured. These include a shock wave resulting from the sudden high-velocity inflow of gas and ash; the formation of a particle-laden plume rising several hundred metres into the atmosphere; the eventual collapse of the plume which generates a volcanic ash fountain and a fast ground-hugging pyroclastic density current; and the growth of a dilute convective region that rises above the ash fountain as a result of buoyancy effects. The results from Fluidity are also compared with results from MFIX, a fixed structured mesh-based multiphase flow code, that uses the same set-up. The key flow features are also captured in MFIX, providing at least some confidence in the plausibility of the numerical results in the absence of quantitative field data. Finally, it is shown by a convergence analysis that Fluidity offers the same solution accuracy for reduced computational cost using an adaptive mesh, compared to the same simulation performed with a uniform fixed mesh.

Efficient workflows for 3D building full-color model reconstruction using LIDAR long-range laser and image-based modeling techniques

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Shih, Chihhsiong

2005-01-01

Two efficient workflow are developed for the reconstruction of a 3D full color building model. One uses a point wise sensing device to sample an unknown object densely and attach color textures from a digital camera separately. The other uses an image based approach to reconstruct the model with color texture automatically attached. The point wise sensing device reconstructs the CAD model using a modified best view algorithm that collects the maximum number of construction faces in one view. The partial views of the point clouds data are then glued together using a common face between two consecutive views. Typical overlapping mesh removal and coarsening procedures are adapted to generate a unified 3D mesh shell structure. A post processing step is then taken to combine the digital image content from a separate camera with the 3D mesh shell surfaces. An indirect uv mapping procedure first divide the model faces into groups within which every face share the same normal direction. The corresponding images of these faces in a group is then adjusted using the uv map as a guidance. The final assembled image is then glued back to the 3D mesh to present a full colored building model. The result is a virtual building that can reflect the true dimension and surface material conditions of a real world campus building. The image based modeling procedure uses a commercial photogrammetry package to reconstruct the 3D model. A novel view planning algorithm is developed to guide the photos taking procedure. This algorithm successfully generate a minimum set of view angles. The set of pictures taken at these view angles can guarantee that each model face shows up at least in two of the pictures set and no more than three. The 3D model can then be reconstructed with minimum amount of labor spent in correlating picture pairs. The finished model is compared with the original object in both the topological and dimensional aspects. All the test cases show exact same topology and reasonably low dimension error ratio. Again proving the applicability of the algorithm.

Initial Comparison of Direct and Legacy Modeling Approaches for Radial Core Expansion Analysis

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Shemon, Emily R.

2016-10-10

Radial core expansion in sodium-cooled fast reactors provides an important reactivity feedback effect. As the reactor power increases due to normal start up conditions or accident scenarios, the core and surrounding materials heat up, causing both grid plate expansion and bowing of the assembly ducts. When the core restraint system is designed correctly, the resulting structural deformations introduce negative reactivity which decreases the reactor power. Historically, an indirect procedure has been used to estimate the reactivity feedback due to structural deformation which relies upon perturbation theory and coupling legacy physics codes with limited geometry capabilities. With advancements in modeling andmore » simulation, radial core expansion phenomena can now be modeled directly, providing an assessment of the accuracy of the reactivity feedback coefficients generated by indirect legacy methods. Recently a new capability was added to the PROTEUS-SN unstructured geometry neutron transport solver to analyze deformed meshes quickly and directly. By supplying the deformed mesh in addition to the base configuration input files, PROTEUS-SN automatically processes material adjustments including calculation of region densities to conserve mass, calculation of isotopic densities according to material models (for example, sodium density as a function of temperature), and subsequent re-homogenization of materials. To verify the new capability of directly simulating deformed meshes, PROTEUS-SN was used to compute reactivity feedback for a series of contrived yet representative deformed configurations for the Advanced Burner Test Reactor design. The indirect legacy procedure was also performed to generate reactivity feedback coefficients for the same deformed configurations. Interestingly, the legacy procedure consistently overestimated reactivity feedbacks by 35% compared to direct simulations by PROTEUS-SN. This overestimation indicates that the legacy procedures are in fact not conservative and could be overestimating reactivity feedback effects that are closely tied to reactor safety. We conclude that there is indeed value in performing direct simulation of deformed meshes despite the increased computational expense. PROTEUS-SN is already part of the SHARP multi-physics toolkit where both thermal hydraulics and structural mechanical feedback modeling can be applied but this is the first comparison of direct simulation to legacy techniques for radial core expansion.« less

Grouper: A Compact, Streamable Triangle Mesh Data Structure.

PubMed

Luffel, Mark; Gurung, Topraj; Lindstrom, Peter; Rossignac, Jarek

2013-05-08

We present Grouper: an all-in-one compact file format, random-access data structure, and streamable representation for large triangle meshes. Similarly to the recently published SQuad representation, Grouper represents the geometry and connectivity of a mesh by grouping vertices and triangles into fixed-size records, most of which store two adjacent triangles and a shared vertex. Unlike SQuad, however, Grouper interleaves geometry with connectivity and uses a new connectivity representation to ensure that vertices and triangles can be stored in a coherent order that enables memory-efficient sequential stream processing. We present a linear-time construction algorithm that allows streaming out Grouper meshes using a small memory footprint while preserving the initial ordering of vertices. As part of this construction, we show how the problem of assigning vertices and triangles to groups reduces to a well-known NP-hard optimization problem, and present a simple yet effective heuristic solution that performs well in practice. Our array-based Grouper representation also doubles as a triangle mesh data structure that allows direct access to vertices and triangles. Storing only about two integer references per triangle, Grouper answers both incidence and adjacency queries in amortized constant time. Our compact representation enables data-parallel processing on multicore computers, instant partitioning and fast transmission for distributed processing, as well as efficient out-of-core access.

Fluid Structure Interaction Techniques For Extrusion And Mixing Processes

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Valette, Rudy; Vergnes, Bruno; Coupez, Thierry

2007-05-01

This work focuses on the development of numerical techniques devoted to the simulation of mixing processes of complex fluids such as twin-screw extrusion or batch mixing. In mixing process simulation, the absence of symmetry of the moving boundaries (the screws or the rotors) implies that their rigid body motion has to be taken into account by using a special treatment We therefore use a mesh immersion technique (MIT), which consists in using a P1+/P1-based (MINI-element) mixed finite element method for solving the velocity-pressure problem and then solving the problem in the whole barrel cavity by imposing a rigid motion (rotation) to nodes found located inside the so called immersed domain, each sub-domain (screw, rotor) being represented by a surface CAD mesh (or its mathematical equation in simple cases). The independent meshes are immersed into a unique background computational mesh by computing the distance function to their boundaries. Intersections of meshes are accounted for, allowing to compute a fill factor usable as for the VOF methodology. This technique, combined with the use of parallel computing, allows to compute the time-dependent flow of generalized Newtonian fluids including yield stress fluids in a complex system such as a twin screw extruder, including moving free surfaces, which are treated by a "level set" and Hamilton-Jacobi method.

A Parallel Ghosting Algorithm for The Flexible Distributed Mesh Database

DOE PAGES

Mubarak, Misbah; Seol, Seegyoung; Lu, Qiukai; ...

2013-01-01

Critical to the scalability of parallel adaptive simulations are parallel control functions including load balancing, reduced inter-process communication and optimal data decomposition. In distributed meshes, many mesh-based applications frequently access neighborhood information for computational purposes which must be transmitted efficiently to avoid parallel performance degradation when the neighbors are on different processors. This article presents a parallel algorithm of creating and deleting data copies, referred to as ghost copies, which localize neighborhood data for computation purposes while minimizing inter-process communication. The key characteristics of the algorithm are: (1) It can create ghost copies of any permissible topological order in amore » 1D, 2D or 3D mesh based on selected adjacencies. (2) It exploits neighborhood communication patterns during the ghost creation process thus eliminating all-to-all communication. (3) For applications that need neighbors of neighbors, the algorithm can create n number of ghost layers up to a point where the whole partitioned mesh can be ghosted. Strong and weak scaling results are presented for the IBM BG/P and Cray XE6 architectures up to a core count of 32,768 processors. The algorithm also leads to scalable results when used in a parallel super-convergent patch recovery error estimator, an application that frequently accesses neighborhood data to carry out computation.« less

High-Performance Flexible Transparent Electrode with an Embedded Metal Mesh Fabricated by Cost-Effective Solution Process.

PubMed

Khan, Arshad; Lee, Sangeon; Jang, Taehee; Xiong, Ze; Zhang, Cuiping; Tang, Jinyao; Guo, L Jay; Li, Wen-Di

2016-06-01

A new structure of flexible transparent electrodes is reported, featuring a metal mesh fully embedded and mechanically anchored in a flexible substrate, and a cost-effective solution-based fabrication strategy for this new transparent electrode. The embedded nature of the metal-mesh electrodes provides a series of advantages, including surface smoothness that is crucial for device fabrication, mechanical stability under high bending stress, strong adhesion to the substrate with excellent flexibility, and favorable resistance against moisture, oxygen, and chemicals. The novel fabrication process replaces vacuum-based metal deposition with an electrodeposition process and is potentially suitable for high-throughput, large-volume, and low-cost production. In particular, this strategy enables fabrication of a high-aspect-ratio (thickness to linewidth) metal mesh, substantially improving conductivity without considerably sacrificing transparency. Various prototype flexible transparent electrodes are demonstrated with transmittance higher than 90% and sheet resistance below 1 ohm sq(-1) , as well as extremely high figures of merit up to 1.5 × 10(4) , which are among the highest reported values in recent studies. Finally using our embedded metal-mesh electrode, a flexible transparent thin-film heater is demonstrated with a low power density requirement, rapid response time, and a low operating voltage. © 2016 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

Large-scale Parallel Unstructured Mesh Computations for 3D High-lift Analysis

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mavriplis, Dimitri J.; Pirzadeh, S.

1999-01-01

A complete "geometry to drag-polar" analysis capability for the three-dimensional high-lift configurations is described. The approach is based on the use of unstructured meshes in order to enable rapid turnaround for complicated geometries that arise in high-lift configurations. Special attention is devoted to creating a capability for enabling analyses on highly resolved grids. Unstructured meshes of several million vertices are initially generated on a work-station, and subsequently refined on a supercomputer. The flow is solved on these refined meshes on large parallel computers using an unstructured agglomeration multigrid algorithm. Good prediction of lift and drag throughout the range of incidences is demonstrated on a transport take-off configuration using up to 24.7 million grid points. The feasibility of using this approach in a production environment on existing parallel machines is demonstrated, as well as the scalability of the solver on machines using up to 1450 processors.

Fault diagnosis for wind turbine planetary ring gear via a meshing resonance based filtering algorithm.

PubMed

Wang, Tianyang; Chu, Fulei; Han, Qinkai

2017-03-01

Identifying the differences between the spectra or envelope spectra of a faulty signal and a healthy baseline signal is an efficient planetary gearbox local fault detection strategy. However, causes other than local faults can also generate the characteristic frequency of a ring gear fault; this may further affect the detection of a local fault. To address this issue, a new filtering algorithm based on the meshing resonance phenomenon is proposed. In detail, the raw signal is first decomposed into different frequency bands and levels. Then, a new meshing index and an MRgram are constructed to determine which bands belong to the meshing resonance frequency band. Furthermore, an optimal filter band is selected from this MRgram. Finally, the ring gear fault can be detected according to the envelope spectrum of the band-pass filtering result. Copyright © 2016 ISA. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

A new anisotropic mesh adaptation method based upon hierarchical a posteriori error estimates

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Huang, Weizhang; Kamenski, Lennard; Lang, Jens

2010-03-01

A new anisotropic mesh adaptation strategy for finite element solution of elliptic differential equations is presented. It generates anisotropic adaptive meshes as quasi-uniform ones in some metric space, with the metric tensor being computed based on hierarchical a posteriori error estimates. A global hierarchical error estimate is employed in this study to obtain reliable directional information of the solution. Instead of solving the global error problem exactly, which is costly in general, we solve it iteratively using the symmetric Gauß-Seidel method. Numerical results show that a few GS iterations are sufficient for obtaining a reasonably good approximation to the error for use in anisotropic mesh adaptation. The new method is compared with several strategies using local error estimators or recovered Hessians. Numerical results are presented for a selection of test examples and a mathematical model for heat conduction in a thermal battery with large orthotropic jumps in the material coefficients.

A mortar formulation including viscoelastic layers for vibration analysis

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Paolini, Alexander; Kollmannsberger, Stefan; Rank, Ernst; Horger, Thomas; Wohlmuth, Barbara

2018-05-01

In order to reduce the transfer of sound and vibrations in structures such as timber buildings, thin elastomer layers can be embedded between their components. The influence of these elastomers on the response of the structures in the low frequency range can be determined accurately by using conforming hexahedral finite elements. Three-dimensional mesh generation, however, is yet a non-trivial task and mesh refinements which may be necessary at the junctions can cause a high computational effort. One remedy is to mesh the components independently from each other and to couple them using the mortar method. Further, the hexahedral mesh for the thin elastomer layer itself can be avoided by integrating its elastic behavior into the mortar formulation. The present paper extends this mortar formulation to take damping into account such that frequency response analyses can be performed more accurately. Finally, the proposed method is verified by numerical examples.

A case study: using social tagging to engage students in learning Medical Subject Headings*

PubMed Central

Bresnahan, Megan; Flynn, David B.; Harzbecker, Joseph; Blanchard, Mary; Ginn, David

2009-01-01

In exploring new ways of teaching students how to use Medical Subject Headings (MeSH), librarians at Boston University's Alumni Medical Library (AML) integrated social tagging into their instruction. These activities were incorporated into the two-credit graduate course, “GMS MS 640: Introduction to Biomedical Information,” required for all students in the graduate medical science program. Hands-on assignments and in-class exercises enabled librarians to present MeSH and the concept of a controlled vocabulary in a familiar and relevant context for the course's Generation Y student population and provided students the opportunity to actively participate in creating their education. At the conclusion of these activities, students were surveyed regarding the clarity of the presentation of the MeSH vocabulary. Analysis of survey responses indicated that 46% found the concept of MeSH to be the clearest concept presented in the in-class intervention. PMID:19404497

Controlling Reflections from Mesh Refinement Interfaces in Numerical Relativity

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Baker, John G.; Van Meter, James R.

2005-01-01

A leading approach to improving the accuracy on numerical relativity simulations of black hole systems is through fixed or adaptive mesh refinement techniques. We describe a generic numerical error which manifests as slowly converging, artificial reflections from refinement boundaries in a broad class of mesh-refinement implementations, potentially limiting the effectiveness of mesh- refinement techniques for some numerical relativity applications. We elucidate this numerical effect by presenting a model problem which exhibits the phenomenon, but which is simple enough that its numerical error can be understood analytically. Our analysis shows that the effect is caused by variations in finite differencing error generated across low and high resolution regions, and that its slow convergence is caused by the presence of dramatic speed differences among propagation modes typical of 3+1 relativity. Lastly, we resolve the problem, presenting a class of finite-differencing stencil modifications which eliminate this pathology in both our model problem and in numerical relativity examples.

Arbitrary-Order Conservative and Consistent Remapping and a Theory of Linear Maps: Part II

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Ullrich, Paul A.; Devendran, Dharshi; Johansen, Hans

2016-04-01

The focus on this series of articles is on the generation of accurate, conservative, consistent, and (optionally) monotone linear offline maps. This paper is the second in the series. It extends on the first part by describing four examples of 2D linear maps that can be constructed in accordance with the theory of the earlier work. The focus is again on spherical geometry, although these techniques can be readily extended to arbitrary manifolds. The four maps include conservative, consistent, and (optionally) monotone linear maps (i) between two finite-volume meshes, (ii) from finite-volume to finite-element meshes using a projection-type approach, (iii)more » from finite-volume to finite-element meshes using volumetric integration, and (iv) between two finite-element meshes. Arbitrary order of accuracy is supported for each of the described nonmonotone maps.« less

Fabrication of durable copper plating superhydrophobic surface with improved corrosion resistance and oil-water separation properties

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhao, Yichao; Xiao, Xinyan; Ye, Zhihao; Ji, Qiang; Xie, Wei

2018-02-01

A mechanical durable superhydrophobic copper-plated stainless steel mesh was successfully fabricated by an electrodeposition process and 1-octadecanethiol modification. The as-prepared superhydrophobic mesh displays water contact angle of 153° and shows excellent anti-corrosion and water-oil separation properties in the condition of 0.1 A/cm2 current density for 35 s. In comparison with bare stainless steel mesh, the corrosion current of the as-prepared superhydrophobic mesh is close to 1/6 of the former. Meanwhile, the as-prepared superhydrophobic mesh could continuously separate oil from oil-water mixtures. The separation efficiency of continuous separation is as high as 96% and shows less than 1% decrease after ten cycles.

LR: Compact connectivity representation for triangle meshes

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Gurung, T; Luffel, M; Lindstrom, P

2011-01-28

We propose LR (Laced Ring) - a simple data structure for representing the connectivity of manifold triangle meshes. LR provides the option to store on average either 1.08 references per triangle or 26.2 bits per triangle. Its construction, from an input mesh that supports constant-time adjacency queries, has linear space and time complexity, and involves ordering most vertices along a nearly-Hamiltonian cycle. LR is best suited for applications that process meshes with fixed connectivity, as any changes to the connectivity require the data structure to be rebuilt. We provide an implementation of the set of standard random-access, constant-time operators formore » traversing a mesh, and show that LR often saves both space and traversal time over competing representations.« less

A superhydrophobic copper mesh as an advanced platform for oil-water separation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ren, Guina; Song, Yuanming; Li, Xiangming; Zhou, Yanli; Zhang, Zhaozhu; Zhu, Xiaotao

2018-01-01

Improving the separation efficiency and simplifying the separation process would be highly desired for oil-water separation yet still challenging. Herein, to address this challenge, we fabricated a superhydrophobic copper mesh by an immersion process and exploited it as an advanced platform for oil-water separation. To realize oil-water separation efficiently, the obtained mesh was enfolded directly to form a boat-like device, and it could also be mounted on an open end of a glass barrel to form the oil skimmer device. For these devices, they can collect the floating oils through the pores of the copper mesh while repelling water completely, and the oil collection efficiency is up to 99.5%. Oils collected in the devices can be easily sucked out into a container for storing, without requiring mechanical handing for recycling. Importantly, the miniature boat and the oil skimmer devices can retain their enhanced oil collection efficiency even after 10 cycles of oil-water separation. Moreover, exploiting its superhydrophobicity under oil, the obtained copper mesh was demonstrated as a novel platform to remove tiny water droplets from oil.

The Data Transfer Kit: A geometric rendezvous-based tool for multiphysics data transfer

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Slattery, S. R.; Wilson, P. P. H.; Pawlowski, R. P.

2013-07-01

The Data Transfer Kit (DTK) is a software library designed to provide parallel data transfer services for arbitrary physics components based on the concept of geometric rendezvous. The rendezvous algorithm provides a means to geometrically correlate two geometric domains that may be arbitrarily decomposed in a parallel simulation. By repartitioning both domains such that they have the same geometric domain on each parallel process, efficient and load balanced search operations and data transfer can be performed at a desirable algorithmic time complexity with low communication overhead relative to other types of mapping algorithms. With the increased development efforts in multiphysicsmore » simulation and other multiple mesh and geometry problems, generating parallel topology maps for transferring fields and other data between geometric domains is a common operation. The algorithms used to generate parallel topology maps based on the concept of geometric rendezvous as implemented in DTK are described with an example using a conjugate heat transfer calculation and thermal coupling with a neutronics code. In addition, we provide the results of initial scaling studies performed on the Jaguar Cray XK6 system at Oak Ridge National Laboratory for a worse-case-scenario problem in terms of algorithmic complexity that shows good scaling on 0(1 x 104) cores for topology map generation and excellent scaling on 0(1 x 105) cores for the data transfer operation with meshes of O(1 x 109) elements. (authors)« less

GPU surface extraction using the closest point embedding

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kim, Mark; Hansen, Charles

2015-01-01

Isosurface extraction is a fundamental technique used for both surface reconstruction and mesh generation. One method to extract well-formed isosurfaces is a particle system; unfortunately, particle systems can be slow. In this paper, we introduce an enhanced parallel particle system that uses the closest point embedding as the surface representation to speedup the particle system for isosurface extraction. The closest point embedding is used in the Closest Point Method (CPM), a technique that uses a standard three dimensional numerical PDE solver on two dimensional embedded surfaces. To fully take advantage of the closest point embedding, it is coupled with a Barnes-Hut tree code on the GPU. This new technique produces well-formed, conformal unstructured triangular and tetrahedral meshes from labeled multi-material volume datasets. Further, this new parallel implementation of the particle system is faster than any known methods for conformal multi-material mesh extraction. The resulting speed-ups gained in this implementation can reduce the time from labeled data to mesh from hours to minutes and benefits users, such as bioengineers, who employ triangular and tetrahedral meshes

Application of closed-form solutions to a mesh point field in silicon solar cells

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Lamorte, M. F.

1985-01-01

A computer simulation method is discussed that provides for equivalent simulation accuracy, but that exhibits significantly lower CPU running time per bias point compared to other techniques. This new method is applied to a mesh point field as is customary in numerical integration (NI) techniques. The assumption of a linear approximation for the dependent variable, which is typically used in the finite difference and finite element NI methods, is not required. Instead, the set of device transport equations is applied to, and the closed-form solutions obtained for, each mesh point. The mesh point field is generated so that the coefficients in the set of transport equations exhibit small changes between adjacent mesh points. Application of this method to high-efficiency silicon solar cells is described; and the method by which Auger recombination, ambipolar considerations, built-in and induced electric fields, bandgap narrowing, carrier confinement, and carrier diffusivities are treated. Bandgap narrowing has been investigated using Fermi-Dirac statistics, and these results show that bandgap narrowing is more pronounced and that it is temperature-dependent in contrast to the results based on Boltzmann statistics.

Efficient Unstructured Cartesian/Immersed-Boundary Method with Local Mesh Refinement to Simulate Flows in Complex 3D Geometries

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

de Zelicourt, Diane; Ge, Liang; Sotiropoulos, Fotis; Yoganathan, Ajit

2008-11-01

Image-guided computational fluid dynamics has recently gained attention as a tool for predicting the outcome of different surgical scenarios. Cartesian Immersed-Boundary methods constitute an attractive option to tackle the complexity of real-life anatomies. However, when such methods are applied to the branching, multi-vessel configurations typically encountered in cardiovascular anatomies the majority of the grid nodes of the background Cartesian mesh end up lying outside the computational domain, increasing the memory and computational overhead without enhancing the numerical resolution in the region of interest. To remedy this situation, the method presented here superimposes local mesh refinement onto an unstructured Cartesian grid formulation. A baseline unstructured Cartesian mesh is generated by eliminating all nodes that reside in the exterior of the flow domain from the grid structure, and is locally refined in the vicinity of the immersed-boundary. The potential of the method is demonstrated by carrying out systematic mesh refinement studies for internal flow problems ranging in complexity from a 90 deg pipe bend to an actual, patient-specific anatomy reconstructed from magnetic resonance.

A Robust and Scalable Software Library for Parallel Adaptive Refinement on Unstructured Meshes

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Lou, John Z.; Norton, Charles D.; Cwik, Thomas A.

1999-01-01

The design and implementation of Pyramid, a software library for performing parallel adaptive mesh refinement (PAMR) on unstructured meshes, is described. This software library can be easily used in a variety of unstructured parallel computational applications, including parallel finite element, parallel finite volume, and parallel visualization applications using triangular or tetrahedral meshes. The library contains a suite of well-designed and efficiently implemented modules that perform operations in a typical PAMR process. Among these are mesh quality control during successive parallel adaptive refinement (typically guided by a local-error estimator), parallel load-balancing, and parallel mesh partitioning using the ParMeTiS partitioner. The Pyramid library is implemented in Fortran 90 with an interface to the Message-Passing Interface (MPI) library, supporting code efficiency, modularity, and portability. An EM waveguide filter application, adaptively refined using the Pyramid library, is illustrated.

Molecular surface mesh generation by filtering electron density map.

PubMed

Giard, Joachim; Macq, Benoît

2010-01-01

Bioinformatics applied to macromolecules are now widely spread and in continuous expansion. In this context, representing external molecular surface such as the Van der Waals Surface or the Solvent Excluded Surface can be useful for several applications. We propose a fast and parameterizable algorithm giving good visual quality meshes representing molecular surfaces. It is obtained by isosurfacing a filtered electron density map. The density map is the result of the maximum of Gaussian functions placed around atom centers. This map is filtered by an ideal low-pass filter applied on the Fourier Transform of the density map. Applying the marching cubes algorithm on the inverse transform provides a mesh representation of the molecular surface.

Particle Analysis Pitfalls

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hughes, David; Dazzo, Tony

2007-01-01

This viewgraph presentation reviews the use of particle analysis to assist in preparing for the 4th Hubble Space Telescope (HST) Servicing mission. During this mission the Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph (STIS) will be repaired. The particle analysis consisted of Finite element mesh creation, Black-body viewfactors generated using I-DEAS TMG Thermal Analysis, Grey-body viewfactors calculated using Markov method, Particle distribution modeled using an iterative Monte Carlo process, (time-consuming); in house software called MASTRAM, Differential analysis performed in Excel, and Visualization provided by Tecplot and I-DEAS. Several tests were performed and are reviewed: Conformal Coat Particle Study, Card Extraction Study, Cover Fastener Removal Particle Generation Study, and E-Graf Vibration Particulate Study. The lessons learned during this analysis are also reviewed.

Comparable Systems Analysis: Design and Operation of Advanced Control Centers

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2011-12-01

This paper examines next generation wide-area cellular such as fourth generation (4G) will be able to support vehicular applications, and how transportation infrastructure may mesh with wireless networks. This report is part of the Connected Vehicle ...

Tooth-meshing-harmonic static-transmission-error amplitudes of helical gears

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Mark, William D.

2018-01-01

The static transmission errors of meshing gear pairs arise from deviations of loaded tooth working surfaces from equispaced perfect involute surfaces. Such deviations consist of tooth-pair elastic deformations and geometric deviations (modifications) of tooth working surfaces. To a very good approximation, the static-transmission-error tooth-meshing-harmonic amplitudes of helical gears are herein expressed by superposition of Fourier transforms of the quantities: (1) the combination of tooth-pair elastic deformations and geometric tooth-pair modifications and (2) fractional mesh-stiffness fluctuations, each quantity (1) and (2) expressed as a function of involute "roll distance." Normalization of the total roll-distance single-tooth contact span to unity allows tooth-meshing-harmonic amplitudes to be computed for different shapes of the above-described quantities (1) and (2). Tooth-meshing harmonics p = 1, 2, … are shown to occur at Fourier-transform harmonic values of Qp, p = 1, 2, …, where Q is the actual (total) contact ratio, thereby verifying its importance in minimizing transmission-error tooth-meshing-harmonic amplitudes. Two individual shapes and two series of shapes of the quantities (1) and (2) are chosen to illustrate a wide variety of shapes. In most cases representative of helical gears, tooth-meshing-harmonic values p = 1, 2, … are shown to occur in Fourier-transform harmonic regions governed by discontinuities arising from tooth-pair-contact initiation and termination, thereby showing the importance of minimizing such discontinuities. Plots and analytical expressions for all such Fourier transforms are presented, thereby illustrating the effects of various types of tooth-working-surface modifications and tooth-pair stiffnesses on transmission-error generation.

Unstructured mesh adaptivity for urban flooding modelling

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hu, R.; Fang, F.; Salinas, P.; Pain, C. C.

2018-05-01

Over the past few decades, urban floods have been gaining more attention due to their increase in frequency. To provide reliable flooding predictions in urban areas, various numerical models have been developed to perform high-resolution flood simulations. However, the use of high-resolution meshes across the whole computational domain causes a high computational burden. In this paper, a 2D control-volume and finite-element flood model using adaptive unstructured mesh technology has been developed. This adaptive unstructured mesh technique enables meshes to be adapted optimally in time and space in response to the evolving flow features, thus providing sufficient mesh resolution where and when it is required. It has the advantage of capturing the details of local flows and wetting and drying front while reducing the computational cost. Complex topographic features are represented accurately during the flooding process. For example, the high-resolution meshes around the buildings and steep regions are placed when the flooding water reaches these regions. In this work a flooding event that happened in 2002 in Glasgow, Scotland, United Kingdom has been simulated to demonstrate the capability of the adaptive unstructured mesh flooding model. The simulations have been performed using both fixed and adaptive unstructured meshes, and then results have been compared with those published 2D and 3D results. The presented method shows that the 2D adaptive mesh model provides accurate results while having a low computational cost.

3D face analysis by using Mesh-LBP feature

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wang, Haoyu; Yang, Fumeng; Zhang, Yuming; Wu, Congzhong

2017-11-01

Objective: Face Recognition is one of the widely application of image processing. Corresponding two-dimensional limitations, such as the pose and illumination changes, to a certain extent restricted its accurate rate and further development. How to overcome the pose and illumination changes and the effects of self-occlusion is the research hotspot and difficulty, also attracting more and more domestic and foreign experts and scholars to study it. 3D face recognition fusing shape and texture descriptors has become a very promising research direction. Method: Our paper presents a 3D point cloud based on mesh local binary pattern grid (Mesh-LBP), then feature extraction for 3D face recognition by fusing shape and texture descriptors. 3D Mesh-LBP not only retains the integrity of the 3D geometry, is also reduces the need for recognition process of normalization steps, because the triangle Mesh-LBP descriptor is calculated on 3D grid. On the other hand, in view of multi-modal consistency in face recognition advantage, construction of LBP can fusing shape and texture information on Triangular Mesh. In this paper, some of the operators used to extract Mesh-LBP, Such as the normal vectors of the triangle each face and vertex, the gaussian curvature, the mean curvature, laplace operator and so on. Conclusion: First, Kinect devices obtain 3D point cloud face, after the pretreatment and normalization, then transform it into triangular grid, grid local binary pattern feature extraction from face key significant parts of face. For each local face, calculate its Mesh-LBP feature with Gaussian curvature, mean curvature laplace operator and so on. Experiments on the our research database, change the method is robust and high recognition accuracy.

On-Board Mining in the Sensor Web

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tanner, S.; Conover, H.; Graves, S.; Ramachandran, R.; Rushing, J.

2004-12-01

On-board data mining can contribute to many research and engineering applications, including natural hazard detection and prediction, intelligent sensor control, and the generation of customized data products for direct distribution to users. The ability to mine sensor data in real time can also be a critical component of autonomous operations, supporting deep space missions, unmanned aerial and ground-based vehicles (UAVs, UGVs), and a wide range of sensor meshes, webs and grids. On-board processing is expected to play a significant role in the next generation of NASA, Homeland Security, Department of Defense and civilian programs, providing for greater flexibility and versatility in measurements of physical systems. In addition, the use of UAV and UGV systems is increasing in military, emergency response and industrial applications. As research into the autonomy of these vehicles progresses, especially in fleet or web configurations, the applicability of on-board data mining is expected to increase significantly. Data mining in real time on board sensor platforms presents unique challenges. Most notably, the data to be mined is a continuous stream, rather than a fixed store such as a database. This means that the data mining algorithms must be modified to make only a single pass through the data. In addition, the on-board environment requires real time processing with limited computing resources, thus the algorithms must use fixed and relatively small amounts of processing time and memory. The University of Alabama in Huntsville is developing an innovative processing framework for the on-board data and information environment. The Environment for On-Board Processing (EVE) and the Adaptive On-board Data Processing (AODP) projects serve as proofs-of-concept of advanced information systems for remote sensing platforms. The EVE real-time processing infrastructure will upload, schedule and control the execution of processing plans on board remote sensors. These plans provide capabilities for autonomous data mining, classification and feature extraction using both streaming and buffered data sources. A ground-based testbed provides a heterogeneous, embedded hardware and software environment representing both space-based and ground-based sensor platforms, including wireless sensor mesh architectures. The AODP project explores the EVE concepts in the world of sensor-networks, including ad-hoc networks of small sensor platforms.

Kinetic solvers with adaptive mesh in phase space

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Arslanbekov, Robert R.; Kolobov, Vladimir I.; Frolova, Anna A.

2013-12-01

An adaptive mesh in phase space (AMPS) methodology has been developed for solving multidimensional kinetic equations by the discrete velocity method. A Cartesian mesh for both configuration (r) and velocity (v) spaces is produced using a “tree of trees” (ToT) data structure. The r mesh is automatically generated around embedded boundaries, and is dynamically adapted to local solution properties. The v mesh is created on-the-fly in each r cell. Mappings between neighboring v-space trees is implemented for the advection operator in r space. We have developed algorithms for solving the full Boltzmann and linear Boltzmann equations with AMPS. Several recent innovations were used to calculate the discrete Boltzmann collision integral with dynamically adaptive v mesh: the importance sampling, multipoint projection, and variance reduction methods. We have developed an efficient algorithm for calculating the linear Boltzmann collision integral for elastic and inelastic collisions of hot light particles in a Lorentz gas. Our AMPS technique has been demonstrated for simulations of hypersonic rarefied gas flows, ion and electron kinetics in weakly ionized plasma, radiation and light-particle transport through thin films, and electron streaming in semiconductors. We have shown that AMPS allows minimizing the number of cells in phase space to reduce the computational cost and memory usage for solving challenging kinetic problems.

Kinetic solvers with adaptive mesh in phase space.

PubMed

Arslanbekov, Robert R; Kolobov, Vladimir I; Frolova, Anna A

2013-12-01

An adaptive mesh in phase space (AMPS) methodology has been developed for solving multidimensional kinetic equations by the discrete velocity method. A Cartesian mesh for both configuration (r) and velocity (v) spaces is produced using a "tree of trees" (ToT) data structure. The r mesh is automatically generated around embedded boundaries, and is dynamically adapted to local solution properties. The v mesh is created on-the-fly in each r cell. Mappings between neighboring v-space trees is implemented for the advection operator in r space. We have developed algorithms for solving the full Boltzmann and linear Boltzmann equations with AMPS. Several recent innovations were used to calculate the discrete Boltzmann collision integral with dynamically adaptive v mesh: the importance sampling, multipoint projection, and variance reduction methods. We have developed an efficient algorithm for calculating the linear Boltzmann collision integral for elastic and inelastic collisions of hot light particles in a Lorentz gas. Our AMPS technique has been demonstrated for simulations of hypersonic rarefied gas flows, ion and electron kinetics in weakly ionized plasma, radiation and light-particle transport through thin films, and electron streaming in semiconductors. We have shown that AMPS allows minimizing the number of cells in phase space to reduce the computational cost and memory usage for solving challenging kinetic problems.

Effects of mesenchymal stem cell and fibroblast coating on immunogenic potential of prosthetic meshes in vitro.

PubMed

Gao, Yue; Krpata, David M; Criss, Cory N; Liu, Lijia; Posielski, Natasza; Rosen, Michael J; Novitsky, Yuri W

2014-08-01

The aim of this study was to reveal the effect of fibroblast or mesenchymal stem cell (MSC) coating on the mesh-induced production of IL-1β, IL-6, and VEGF by macrophages. Four commonly used surgical meshes were tested in this study, including Parietex, SoftMesh, TIGR, and Strattice. One-square-centimeter pieces of each mesh were placed on top of a monolayer of human fibroblasts or rat MSCs. The coating status was monitored with a light microscope. The human promonocytic cell line U937 was induced to differentiate into macrophages (MΦ). Three weeks later, meshes were transferred to new 24-well plates and cocultured with the MΦs for 72 h. Culture medium was collected and analyzed for IL-1β, IL-6, and VEGF production using standard ELISA essays. Parallel mesh samples were fixed with paraformaldehyde or glutaraldehyde for histology or transmission electronic microscopy (TEM) analyses, respectively. Uncoated meshes induced increased production of all three cytokines compared with macrophages cultured alone. HF coating further increased the production of both IL-6 and VEGF but reduced IL-1β production. Except for the SoftMesh group, MSC coating significantly blunted release of all cytokines to levels even lower than with MΦs cultured alone. MΦs tended to deteriorate in the presence of MSCs. Both histology and TEM revealed intimate interactions between cell-coated meshes and MΦs. Cytokine response to fibroblast coating varied, while MSC coating blunted the immunogenic effect of both synthetic and biologic meshes in vitro. Cell coating appears to affect mesh biocompatibility and may become a key process in mesh evolution.

Surface modification of polypropylene mesh devices with cyclodextrin via cold plasma for hernia repair: Characterization and antibacterial properties

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sanbhal, Noor; Mao, Ying; Sun, Gang; Xu, Rui Fang; Zhang, Qian; Wang, Lu

2018-05-01

Light weight polypropylene (PP) mesh is the most widely used implant among all other synthetic meshes for hernia repair. However, infection is the complication associated to all synthetic meshes after hernia repair. Thus, to manage mesh related infection; antibacterial drug is generally loaded to surgical implants to supply drug locally in mesh implanted site. Nevertheless, PP mesh restricts the loading of antibacterial drug at operated area due to its low wettability. The aim of this study was to introduce a novel antimicrobial PP mesh modified with β-cyclodextrine (CD) and loaded with antimicrobial agent for infection prevention. A cold oxygen plasma treatment was able to activate the surfaces of polypropylene fibers, and then CD was incorporated onto the surfaces of PP fibers. Afterward, triclosan, as a model antibacterial agent, was loaded into CD cavity to provide desired antibacterial functions. The modified polypropylene mesh samples CD-Tric-1, CD-Tric-3 exhibited excellent inhibition zone and continuous antibacterial efficacy against E. coli and S. aureus up to 6 and 7 days respectively. Results of AFM, SEM, FTIR and antibacterial tests evidenced that oxygen plasma process is necessary to increase chemical connection between CD molecules and PP fibers. The samples were also characterized by using EDX, XRD, TGA, DSC and water contact angle.

Inverse modeling of rainfall infiltration with a dual permeability approach using different matrix-fracture coupling variants.

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Blöcher, Johanna; Kuraz, Michal

2017-04-01

In this contribution we propose implementations of the dual permeability model with different inter-domain exchange descriptions and metaheuristic optimization algorithms for parameter identification and mesh optimization. We compare variants of the coupling term with different numbers of parameters to test if a reduction of parameters is feasible. This can reduce parameter uncertainty in inverse modeling, but also allow for different conceptual models of the domain and matrix coupling. The different variants of the dual permeability model are implemented in the open-source objective library DRUtES written in FORTRAN 2003/2008 in 1D and 2D. For parameter identification we use adaptations of the particle swarm optimization (PSO) and Teaching-learning-based optimization (TLBO), which are population-based metaheuristics with different learning strategies. These are high-level stochastic-based search algorithms that don't require gradient information or a convex search space. Despite increasing computing power and parallel processing, an overly fine mesh is not feasible for parameter identification. This creates the need to find a mesh that optimizes both accuracy and simulation time. We use a bi-objective PSO algorithm to generate a Pareto front of optimal meshes to account for both objectives. The dual permeability model and the optimization algorithms were tested on virtual data and field TDR sensor readings. The TDR sensor readings showed a very steep increase during rapid rainfall events and a subsequent steep decrease. This was theorized to be an effect of artificial macroporous envelopes surrounding TDR sensors creating an anomalous region with distinct local soil hydraulic properties. One of our objectives is to test how well the dual permeability model can describe this infiltration behavior and what coupling term would be most suitable.

The ADER-DG method for seismic wave propagation and earthquake rupture dynamics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pelties, Christian; Gabriel, Alice; Ampuero, Jean-Paul; de la Puente, Josep; Käser, Martin

2013-04-01

We will present the Arbitrary high-order DERivatives Discontinuous Galerkin (ADER-DG) method for solving the combined elastodynamic wave propagation and dynamic rupture problem. The ADER-DG method enables high-order accuracy in space and time while being implemented on unstructured tetrahedral meshes. A tetrahedral element discretization provides rapid and automatized mesh generation as well as geometrical flexibility. Features as mesh coarsening and local time stepping schemes can be applied to reduce computational efforts without introducing numerical artifacts. The method is well suited for parallelization and large scale high-performance computing since only directly neighboring elements exchange information via numerical fluxes. The concept of fluxes is a key ingredient of the numerical scheme as it governs the numerical dispersion and diffusion properties and allows to accommodate for boundary conditions, empirical friction laws of dynamic rupture processes, or the combination of different element types and non-conforming mesh transitions. After introducing fault dynamics into the ADER-DG framework, we will demonstrate its specific advantages in benchmarking test scenarios provided by the SCEC/USGS Spontaneous Rupture Code Verification Exercise. An important result of the benchmark is that the ADER-DG method avoids spurious high-frequency contributions in the slip rate spectra and therefore does not require artificial Kelvin-Voigt damping, filtering or other modifications of the produced synthetic seismograms. To demonstrate the capabilities of the proposed scheme we simulate an earthquake scenario, inspired by the 1992 Landers earthquake, that includes branching and curved fault segments. Furthermore, topography is respected in the discretized model to capture the surface waves correctly. The advanced geometrical flexibility combined with an enhanced accuracy will make the ADER-DG method a useful tool to study earthquake dynamics on complex fault systems in realistic rheologies.

Thermographic inspection of external thermal insulation systems with mechanical fixing

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Simões, Nuno; Simões, Inês; Serra, Catarina; Tadeu, António

2015-05-01

An External Thermal Insulation Composite System (ETICS) kit may include anchors to mechanically fix the insulation product onto the wall. Using this option increases safety when compared to a simple bonded solution, however, it is more expensive and needs higher labor resources. The insulation product is then coated with rendering, which applied to the insulation material without any air gap. The rendering comprises one or more layers of coats with an embedded reinforcement. The most common multi-coat rendering system presents a base coat applied directly to the insulation product with a glass fiber mesh as reinforcement, followed by a second base coat, before a very thin coat (key coat) that prepares the surface to receive the finishing and decorative coat. The thickness of the rendering system may vary between around 5 to 10 mm. The higher thicknesses may be associated with a reinforcement composed by two layers of glass fiber mesh. The main purpose of this work is to apply infrared thermography (IRT) techniques to 2 ETICS solution (single or double layer of glass fiber mesh) and evaluate its capability in the detection of anchors. The reliability of IRT was tested using an ETICS configuration of expanded cork boards and a rendering system with one or two layers of glass fiber mesh. An active thermography approach was performed in laboratory conditions, in transmission and reflection mode. In the reflection mode halogen lamps and air heater were employed as the thermal stimulus. Air heater was also the source used in the transmission mode tests. The resulting data was processed in both time and frequency domains. In this last approach, phase contrast images were generated and studied.

Isotropic Versus Bipolar Functionalized Biomimetic Artificial Basement Membranes and Their Evaluation in Long-Term Human Cell Co-Culture.

PubMed

Rossi, Angela; Wistlich, Laura; Heffels, Karl-Heinz; Walles, Heike; Groll, Jürgen

2016-08-01

In addition to dividing tissues into compartments, basement membranes are crucial as cell substrates and to regulate cellular behavior. The development of artificial basement membranes is indispensable for the ultimate formation of functional engineered tissues; however, pose a challenge due to their complex structure. Herein, biodegradable electrospun polyester meshes are presented, exhibiting isotropic or bipolar bioactivation as a biomimetic and biofunctional model of the natural basement membrane. In a one-step preparation process, reactive star-shaped prepolymer additives, which generate a hydrophilic fiber surface, are electrospun with cell-adhesion-mediating peptides, derived from major components of the basement membrane. Human skin cells adhere to the functionalized meshes, and long-term co-culture experiments confirm that the artificial basement membranes recapitulate and preserve tissue specific functions. Several layers of immortalized human keratinocytes grow on the membranes, differentiating toward the surface and expressing typical epithelial markers. Fibroblasts migrate into the reticular lamina mimicking part of the mesh. Both cells types begin to produce extracellular matrix proteins and to remodel the initial membrane. It is shown at the example of skin that the artificial basement membrane design provokes biomimetic responses of different cell types and can thus be used as basis for the future development of basement membrane containing tissues. © 2016 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

Toward An Unstructured Mesh Database

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rezaei Mahdiraji, Alireza; Baumann, Peter Peter

2014-05-01

Unstructured meshes are used in several application domains such as earth sciences (e.g., seismology), medicine, oceanography, cli- mate modeling, GIS as approximate representations of physical objects. Meshes subdivide a domain into smaller geometric elements (called cells) which are glued together by incidence relationships. The subdivision of a domain allows computational manipulation of complicated physical structures. For instance, seismologists model earthquakes using elastic wave propagation solvers on hexahedral meshes. The hexahedral con- tains several hundred millions of grid points and millions of hexahedral cells. Each vertex node in the hexahedrals stores a multitude of data fields. To run simulation on such meshes, one needs to iterate over all the cells, iterate over incident cells to a given cell, retrieve coordinates of cells, assign data values to cells, etc. Although meshes are used in many application domains, to the best of our knowledge there is no database vendor that support unstructured mesh features. Currently, the main tool for querying and manipulating unstructured meshes are mesh libraries, e.g., CGAL and GRAL. Mesh li- braries are dedicated libraries which includes mesh algorithms and can be run on mesh representations. The libraries do not scale with dataset size, do not have declarative query language, and need deep C++ knowledge for query implementations. Furthermore, due to high coupling between the implementations and input file structure, the implementations are less reusable and costly to maintain. A dedicated mesh database offers the following advantages: 1) declarative querying, 2) ease of maintenance, 3) hiding mesh storage structure from applications, and 4) transparent query optimization. To design a mesh database, the first challenge is to define a suitable generic data model for unstructured meshes. We proposed ImG-Complexes data model as a generic topological mesh data model which extends incidence graph model to multi-incidence relationships. We instrument ImG model with sets of optional and application-specific constraints which can be used to check validity of meshes for a specific class of object such as manifold, pseudo-manifold, and simplicial manifold. We conducted experiments to measure the performance of the graph database solution in processing mesh queries and compare it with GrAL mesh library and PostgreSQL database on synthetic and real mesh datasets. The experiments show that each system perform well on specific types of mesh queries, e.g., graph databases perform well on global path-intensive queries. In the future, we investigate database operations for the ImG model and design a mesh query language.

Simulation of Locking Space Truss Deployments for a Large Deployable Sparse Aperture Reflector

DTIC Science & Technology

2015-03-01

Dr. Alan Jennings, for his unending patience with my struggles through this entire process . Without his expertise, guidance, and trust I would have...engineer since they are not automatically meshed. Fortunately, the mesh process is quite swift. Figure 13 shows both a linear hexahedral element as well...less than that of the serial process . Therefore, COMSOL’s partially parallelized algorithms will not be sped up as a function of cores added and is

On Reducing Delay in Mesh-Based P2P Streaming: A Mesh-Push Approach

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Liu, Zheng; Xue, Kaiping; Hong, Peilin

The peer-assisted streaming paradigm has been widely employed to distribute live video data on the internet recently. In general, the mesh-based pull approach is more robust and efficient than the tree-based push approach. However, pull protocol brings about longer streaming delay, which is caused by the handshaking process of advertising buffer map message, sending request message and scheduling of the data block. In this paper, we propose a new approach, mesh-push, to address this issue. Different from the traditional pull approach, mesh-push implements block scheduling algorithm at sender side, where the block transmission is initiated by the sender rather than by the receiver. We first formulate the optimal upload bandwidth utilization problem, then present the mesh-push approach, in which a token protocol is designed to avoid block redundancy; a min-cost flow model is employed to derive the optimal scheduling for the push peer; and a push peer selection algorithm is introduced to reduce control overhead. Finally, we evaluate mesh-push through simulation, the results of which show mesh-push outperforms the pull scheduling in streaming delay, and achieves comparable delivery ratio at the same time.

Accelerating Large Data Analysis By Exploiting Regularities

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Moran, Patrick J.; Ellsworth, David

2003-01-01

We present techniques for discovering and exploiting regularity in large curvilinear data sets. The data can be based on a single mesh or a mesh composed of multiple submeshes (also known as zones). Multi-zone data are typical to Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations. Regularities include axis-aligned rectilinear and cylindrical meshes as well as cases where one zone is equivalent to a rigid-body transformation of another. Our algorithms can also discover rigid-body motion of meshes in time-series data. Next, we describe a data model where we can utilize the results from the discovery process in order to accelerate large data visualizations. Where possible, we replace general curvilinear zones with rectilinear or cylindrical zones. In rigid-body motion cases we replace a time-series of meshes with a transformed mesh object where a reference mesh is dynamically transformed based on a given time value in order to satisfy geometry requests, on demand. The data model enables us to make these substitutions and dynamic transformations transparently with respect to the visualization algorithms. We present results with large data sets where we combine our mesh replacement and transformation techniques with out-of-core paging in order to achieve significant speed-ups in analysis.

Calculation of steady and unsteady transonic flow using a Cartesian mesh and gridless boundary conditions with application to aeroelasticity

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kirshman, David

A numerical method for the solution of inviscid compressible flow using an array of embedded Cartesian meshes in conjunction with gridless surface boundary conditions is developed. The gridless boundary treatment is implemented by means of a least squares fitting of the conserved flux variables using a cloud of nodes in the vicinity of the surface geometry. The method allows for accurate treatment of the surface boundary conditions using a grid resolution an order of magnitude coarser than required of typical Cartesian approaches. Additionally, the method does not suffer from issues associated with thin body geometry or extremely fine cut cells near the body. Unlike some methods that consider a gridless (or "meshless") treatment throughout the entire domain, multi-grid acceleration can be effectively incorporated and issues associated with global conservation are alleviated. The "gridless" surface boundary condition provides for efficient and simple problem set up since definition of the body geometry is generated independently from the field mesh, and automatically incorporated into the field discretization of the domain. The applicability of the method is first demonstrated for steady flow of single and multi-element airfoil configurations. Using this method, comparisons with traditional body-fitted grid simulations reveal that steady flow solutions can be obtained accurately with minimal effort associated with grid generation. The method is then extended to unsteady flow predictions. In this application, flow field simulations for the prescribed oscillation of an airfoil indicate excellent agreement with experimental data. Furthermore, it is shown that the phase lag associated with shock oscillation is accurately predicted without the need for a deformable mesh. Lastly, the method is applied to the prediction of transonic flutter using a two-dimensional wing model, in which comparisons with moving mesh simulations yield nearly identical results. As a result, applicability of the method to transient and vibrating fluid-structure interaction problems is established in which the requirement for a deformable mesh is eliminated.

Winner of the society for biomaterials student award in the Ph.D. category for the annual meeting of the society for biomaterials, april 11-14, 2018, Atlanta, GA: Development of a bimodal, in situ crosslinking method to achieve multifactor release from electrospun gelatin.

PubMed

Kishan, Alysha; Walker, Taneidra; Sears, Nick; Wilems, Thomas; Cosgriff-Hernandez, Elizabeth

2018-05-01

To better mimic native tissue microenvironments, current efforts have moved beyond single growth factor delivery to more complex multiple growth factor delivery with distinct release profiles. Electrospun gelatin, a widely investigated drug delivery vehicle, requires postprocessing crosslinking techniques that generate a mesh with uniform crosslinking density, limiting the ability to deliver multiple factors at different rates. Herein, we describe a method to independently control release of multiple factors from a single electrospun gelatin mesh. Two in situ crosslinking modalities, photocrosslinking of methacyrlated gelatin and reactive crosslinking of gelatin with a diisocyanate, are coelectrospun to generate distinct fiber populations with different crosslinking chemistry and density in a single mesh. The photocrosslinked gelatin-methacrylate resulted in a relatively rapid release of a model protein (48 ± 12% at day 1, 96 ± 3% at day 10) due to diffusion of embedded protein from the crosslinked fibers. The reactive crosslinking system displayed a more sustained release (7 ± 5% at day 1, 33 ± 2% at day 10) that was attributed to the conjugation of protein to gelatin with the diisocyanate, requiring degradation of gelatin prior to diffusion out of the fibers. Both modalities displayed tunable release profiles. Subsequent release studies of a cospun mesh with two different crosslinked fiber populations confirmed that the cospun mesh displayed multifactor release with independent release profiles. Overall, this bimodal, in situ crosslinking approach enables the delivery of multiple factors with distinct release kinetics from a single mesh and is expected to have broad utility in tissue engineering. © 2018 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Biomed Mater Res Part A: 106A: 1155-1164, 2018. © 2018 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Multi-Depth-Map Raytracing for Efficient Large-Scene Reconstruction.

PubMed

Arikan, Murat; Preiner, Reinhold; Wimmer, Michael

2016-02-01

With the enormous advances of the acquisition technology over the last years, fast processing and high-quality visualization of large point clouds have gained increasing attention. Commonly, a mesh surface is reconstructed from the point cloud and a high-resolution texture is generated over the mesh from the images taken at the site to represent surface materials. However, this global reconstruction and texturing approach becomes impractical with increasing data sizes. Recently, due to its potential for scalability and extensibility, a method for texturing a set of depth maps in a preprocessing and stitching them at runtime has been proposed to represent large scenes. However, the rendering performance of this method is strongly dependent on the number of depth maps and their resolution. Moreover, for the proposed scene representation, every single depth map has to be textured by the images, which in practice heavily increases processing costs. In this paper, we present a novel method to break these dependencies by introducing an efficient raytracing of multiple depth maps. In a preprocessing phase, we first generate high-resolution textured depth maps by rendering the input points from image cameras and then perform a graph-cut based optimization to assign a small subset of these points to the images. At runtime, we use the resulting point-to-image assignments (1) to identify for each view ray which depth map contains the closest ray-surface intersection and (2) to efficiently compute this intersection point. The resulting algorithm accelerates both the texturing and the rendering of the depth maps by an order of magnitude.

A voxel-based finite element model for the prediction of bladder deformation

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Chai Xiangfei; Herk, Marcel van; Hulshof, Maarten C. C. M.

2012-01-15

Purpose: A finite element (FE) bladder model was previously developed to predict bladder deformation caused by bladder filling change. However, two factors prevent a wide application of FE models: (1) the labor required to construct a FE model with high quality mesh and (2) long computation time needed to construct the FE model and solve the FE equations. In this work, we address these issues by constructing a low-resolution voxel-based FE bladder model directly from the binary segmentation images and compare the accuracy and computational efficiency of the voxel-based model used to simulate bladder deformation with those of a classicalmore » FE model with a tetrahedral mesh. Methods: For ten healthy volunteers, a series of MRI scans of the pelvic region was recorded at regular intervals of 10 min over 1 h. For this series of scans, the bladder volume gradually increased while rectal volume remained constant. All pelvic structures were defined from a reference image for each volunteer, including bladder wall, small bowel, prostate (male), uterus (female), rectum, pelvic bone, spine, and the rest of the body. Four separate FE models were constructed from these structures: one with a tetrahedral mesh (used in previous study), one with a uniform hexahedral mesh, one with a nonuniform hexahedral mesh, and one with a low-resolution nonuniform hexahedral mesh. Appropriate material properties were assigned to all structures and uniform pressure was applied to the inner bladder wall to simulate bladder deformation from urine inflow. Performance of the hexahedral meshes was evaluated against the performance of the standard tetrahedral mesh by comparing the accuracy of bladder shape prediction and computational efficiency. Results: FE model with a hexahedral mesh can be quickly and automatically constructed. No substantial differences were observed between the simulation results of the tetrahedral mesh and hexahedral meshes (<1% difference in mean dice similarity coefficient to manual contours and <0.02 cm difference in mean standard deviation of residual errors). The average equation solving time (without manual intervention) for the first two types of hexahedral meshes increased to 2.3 h and 2.6 h compared to the 1.1 h needed for the tetrahedral mesh, however, the low-resolution nonuniform hexahedral mesh dramatically decreased the equation solving time to 3 min without reducing accuracy. Conclusions: Voxel-based mesh generation allows fast, automatic, and robust creation of finite element bladder models directly from binary segmentation images without user intervention. Even the low-resolution voxel-based hexahedral mesh yields comparable accuracy in bladder shape prediction and more than 20 times faster in computational speed compared to the tetrahedral mesh. This approach makes it more feasible and accessible to apply FE method to model bladder deformation in adaptive radiotherapy.« less

Watermarking on 3D mesh based on spherical wavelet transform.

PubMed

Jin, Jian-Qiu; Dai, Min-Ya; Bao, Hu-Jun; Peng, Qun-Sheng

2004-03-01

In this paper we propose a robust watermarking algorithm for 3D mesh. The algorithm is based on spherical wavelet transform. Our basic idea is to decompose the original mesh into a series of details at different scales by using spherical wavelet transform; the watermark is then embedded into the different levels of details. The embedding process includes: global sphere parameterization, spherical uniform sampling, spherical wavelet forward transform, embedding watermark, spherical wavelet inverse transform, and at last resampling the mesh watermarked to recover the topological connectivity of the original model. Experiments showed that our algorithm can improve the capacity of the watermark and the robustness of watermarking against attacks.

Performing clinical studies involving hernia mesh devices: what every investigator should know about the FDA investigational device exemption (IDE) process.

PubMed

Ashar, B S; Dang, J M; Krause, D; Luke, M C

2011-12-01

The FDA's Center for Devices and Radiological Health (CDRH) is responsible for providing reasonable assurance of safety and effectiveness of all medical devices marketed within the US. To date, CDRH has cleared numerous hernia mesh devices for general use, but has not cleared/approved any mesh devices intended for certain specific uses, such as for infected wounds, hernia prevention, biofilm reduction, or prevention of adhesions. CDRH is requesting that manufacturers seeking specific hernia mesh device labeling claims consult with the Agency to determine the level of evidence necessary for justifying such claims.