Physics Commons^™

Dual-Axis Solar Tracker, Bryan Kennedy

All Undergraduate Projects

Renewable energies, and fuels that are not fossil fuel-based, are one of the prolific topics of debate in modern society. With climate change now becoming a primary focus for scientists and innovators of today, one of the areas for the largest amount of potential and growth is that of the capturing and utilization of Solar Energy. This method involves using a mechanical system to track the progression of the sun as it traverses the sky throughout the day. A dual-axis solar tracker such as the one designed and built for this project, can follow the sun both azimuthally and in …

New Facet Of Solar Activities Revealed By High-Resolution Imaging At He I 10830 Å, Zhicheng Zeng

Dissertations

Major solar activities such as major flares and associated coronal mass ejections (CMEs), have a great impact on space weather, which requires us to develop the ability to predict them. Despite the extensive studies already made, however, many basic processes, such as energy accumulation processes in solar active regions and the triggering mechanism of solar activities, are still not well understood.

One reason why the basic processes are hard to be understood is that the large-scale activities are complicated, involving many small-scale energy releases, making it hard to understand the basic picture of the events. Small-scale solar activities, such as …

Construction And Improvement Of A Scheffler Reflector And Thermal Storage Device, Jason Rapp

Physics

We constructed and successfully tested a 2 m2 parabolic dish solar concentrator (Scheffler Concentrator) to focus sunlight onto a stationary target. Present efforts are to decrease the construction complexity and cost of the concentrator. In order to store solar heat, we also constructed and are testing a thermal storage device made of sand (for thermal mass), and pumice (for insulation). Preliminary tests indicate thermal retention times of many hours. Present efforts are to increase accessible power, and structural integrity.

Design And Application Of Near Infrared Tunable Filter For Atst And Nst, Jun Ma

Dissertations

This thesis includes the following sections: a general design of the Near Infrared Tunable Filter (NIRTF) of Advanced Technology Solar Telescope (ATST) project and the Near Infrared Imaging Magnetograph (IRIM) of the New Solar Telescope (NST), the design of achromatic waveplates, the narrowband continuum observation of a Sunspot at 1.56 µm using IRIM instruments, and the coronal hole observation using the Digital Vector Magnetograph (VMG) at Big Bear Solar Observatory (BBSO).

A near infrared tunable filter system is designed with detailed optical parameters for each component in the system. Among these components, the achromatic waveplates, which used to be an …

High Resolution Solar Observations In The Context Of Space Weather Prediction, Guo Yang

Dissertations

Space weather has a great impact on the Earth and human life. It is important to study and monitor active regions on the solar surface and ultimately to predict space weather based on the Sun's activity. In this study, a system that uses the full power of speckle masking imaging by parallel processing to obtain high-spatial resolution images of the solar surface in near real-time has been developed and built. The application of this system greatly improves the ability to monitor the evolution of solar active regions and to predict the adverse effects of space weather. The data obtained by …