81,115 research outputs found
Bridges Structural Health Monitoring and Deterioration Detection Synthesis of Knowledge and Technology
INE/AUTC 10.0
Development and Characterisation of a Gas System and its Associated Slow-Control System for an ATLAS Small-Strip Thin Gap Chamber Testing Facility
A quality assurance and performance qualification laboratory was built at
McGill University for the Canadian-made small-strip Thin Gap Chamber (sTGC)
muon detectors produced for the 2019-2020 ATLAS experiment muon spectrometer
upgrade. The facility uses cosmic rays as a muon source to ionise the quenching
gas mixture of pentane and carbon dioxide flowing through the sTGC detector. A
gas system was developed and characterised for this purpose, with a simple and
efficient gas condenser design utilizing a Peltier thermoelectric cooler (TEC).
The gas system was tested to provide the desired 45 vol% pentane concentration.
For continuous operations, a state-machine system was implemented with alerting
and remote monitoring features to run all cosmic-ray data-acquisition
associated slow-control systems, such as high/low voltage, gas system and
environmental monitoring, in a safe and continuous mode, even in the absence of
an operator.Comment: 23 pages, LaTeX, 14 figures, 4 tables, proof corrections for Journal
of Instrumentation (JINST), including corrected Fig. 8b
Active cooling control of the CLEO detector using a hydrocarbon coolant farm
We describe a novel approach to particle-detector cooling in which a modular
farm of active coolant-control platforms provides independent and regulated
heat removal from four recently upgraded subsystems of the CLEO detector: the
ring-imaging Cherenkov detector, the drift chamber, the silicon vertex
detector, and the beryllium beam pipe. We report on several aspects of the
system: the suitability of using the aliphatic-hydrocarbon solvent PF(TM)-200IG
as a heat-transfer fluid, the sensor elements and the mechanical design of the
farm platforms, a control system that is founded upon a commercial programmable
logic controller employed in industrial process-control applications, and a
diagnostic system based on virtual instrumentation. We summarize the system's
performance and point out the potential application of the design to future
high-energy physics apparatus.Comment: 21 pages, LaTeX, 5 PostScript figures; version accepted for
publication in Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research
Compound-Specific δ^(34)S Analysis of Volatile Organics by Coupled GC/Multicollector-ICPMS
We have developed a highly sensitive and robust method for the analysis of δ^(34)S in individual organic compounds by coupled gas chromatography (GC) and multicollector inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (MC-ICPMS). The system requires minimal alteration of commercial hardware and is amenable to virtually all sample introduction methods. Isobaric interference from O_2^+ is minimized by employing dry plasma conditions and is cleanly resolved at all masses using medium resolution on the Thermo Neptune MC-ICPMS. Correction for mass bias is accomplished using standard−sample bracketing with peaks of SF6 reference gas. The precision of measured δ^(34)S values approaches 0.1‰ for analytes containing >40 pmol S and is better than 0.5‰ for those containing as little as 6 pmol S. This is within a factor of 2 of theoretical shot-noise limits. External accuracy is better than 0.3‰. Integrating only the center of chromatographic peaks, rather than the entire peak, offers significant gain in precision and chromatographic resolution with minimal effect on accuracy but requires further study for verification as a routine method. Coelution of organic compounds that do not contain S can cause degraded analytical precision. Analyses of crude oil samples show wide variability in δ^(34)S and demonstrate the robustness and precision of the method in complex environmental samples
Application of a portable FTIR for measuring on-road emissions
The objective of this work was the development of an onroad
in-vehicle emissions measurement technique
utilizing a relatively new, commercial, portable Fourier
Transform Infra-Red (FTIR) Spectrometer capable of
identifying and measuring (at approximately 3 second
intervals) up to 51 different compounds. The FTIR was
installed in a medium class EURO1 spark ignition
passenger vehicle in order to measure on-road
emissions. The vehicle was also instrumented to allow
the logging of engine speed, road speed, global position,
throttle position, air-fuel ratio, air flow and fuel flow in
addition to engine, exhaust and catalyst temperatures.
This instrumentation allowed the calculation of massbased
emissions from the volume-based concentrations
measured by the FTIR. To validate the FTIR data, the
instrument was used to measure emissions from an
engine subjected to a real-world drive cycle using an AC
dynamometer. Standard analyzers were operated
simultaneously for comparison with the FTIR and the
standard analyzer results showed that most pollutants
(NOx, CO2, CO) were within ~10% of a standard analyzer
during steady state conditions and within 20% during
transients. The exception to this was total HC which was
generally 50% or less than actual total HC, but this was
due to the limited number of hydrocarbons measured by
the FTIR. In addition to the regulated emissions, five
toxic hydrocarbon species were analyzed and found to
be sensitive to cold starts in varying proportions. Finally,
FTIR data was compared to results from a commercially
available on-road measurement system (Horiba OBS-
1000), and there was good agreement
Aqua: AIRS, AMSU, HSB, AMSR-E, CERES, MODIS
This brochure provides an overview of the Aqua spacecraft, instruments, science, and data products Aqua, Latin for water, is a NASA Earth Science satellite mission named for the large amount of information that the mission is collecting about the Earth's water cycle, including evaporation from the oceans, water vapor in the atmosphere, clouds, precipitation, soil moisture, sea ice, land ice, and snow cover on the land and ice. Additional variables also measured by Aqua include radiative energy fluxes, aerosols, vegetation cover on the land, phytoplankton and dissolved organic matter in the oceans, and air, land, and water temperatures. Note: this guide was produced before Aqua was launched; for the most recent information on Aqua, go to http://aqua.nasa.gov. Educational levels: Undergraduate lower division, Undergraduate upper division, Graduate or professional, Informal education
Performance of a UTC FW-4S solid propellant rocket motor under the command effects of simulated altitude and rotational spin
One United Technology Center FW-4S solid-propellant rocket motor was fired at an average simulated altitude of 103,000 ft while spinning about its axial centerline at 180 rpm. The objectives of the test program were to determine motor altitude ballistic performance including the measurement of the nonaxial thrust vector and to demonstrate structural integrity of the motor case and nozzle. These objectives are presented and discussed
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