815 research outputs found
The structure of the accretion disk in NGC 4258 derived from observations of its water vapor masers
A wealth of new information about the structure of the maser disk in NGC 4258
has been obtained from a series of 18 VLBA observations spanning three years,
as well as from 32 additional epochs of spectral monitoring data from 1994 to
the present, acquired with the VLA, Effelsberg, and GBT. The warp of the disk
has been defined precisely. The thickness of the maser disk has been measured
to be 12 microarcseconds (FWHM), which is slightly smaller than previously
quoted upper limits. Under the assumption that the masers trace the true
vertical distribution of material in the disk, from the condition of
hydrostatic equilibrium the sound speed is 1.5 km/s, corresponding to a thermal
temperature of 600K. The accelerations of the high velocity maser components
have been accurately measured for many features on both the blue and red side
of the spectrum. The azimuthal offsets of these masers from the midline (the
line through the disk in the plane of the sky) and derived projected offsets
from the midline based on the warp model correspond well with the measured
offsets. This result suggests that the masers are well described as discrete
clumps of masing gas, which accurately trace the Keplerian motion of the disk.
However, we have continued to search for evidence of apparent motions caused by
``phase effects.'' This work provides the foundation for refining the estimate
of the distance to NGC 4258 through measurements of feature acceleration and
proper motion. The refined estimate of this distance is expected to be
announced in the near future.Comment: 8 pages, 5 figures, to appear in proceedings of IAU Symposium 242
"Astrophysical Masers and their Environments", held in Alice Springs, March
200
Toward a New Distance to the Active Galaxy NGC 4258: II. Centripetal Accelerations and Investigation of Spiral Structure
We report measurements of centripetal accelerations of maser spectral
components of NGC 4258 for 51 epochs spanning 1994 to 2004. This is the second
paper of a series, in which the goal is determination of a new geometric maser
distance to NGC 4258 accurate to possibly ~3%. We measure accelerations using a
formal analysis method that involves simultaneous decomposition of maser
spectra for all epochs into multiple, Gaussian components. Components are
coupled between epochs by linear drifts (accelerations) from their centroid
velocities at a reference epoch. For high-velocity emission, accelerations lie
in the range -0.7 to +0.7 km/s/yr indicating an origin within 13 degrees of the
disk midline (the perpendicular to the line-of-sight to the black hole).
Comparison of high-velocity emission projected positions in VLBI images, with
those derived from acceleration data, provides evidence that masers trace real
gas dynamics. High-velocity emission accelerations do not support a model of
trailing shocks associated with spiral arms in the disk. However, we find
strengthened evidence for spatial periodicity in high-velocity emission, of
wavelength 0.75 mas. This supports suggestions of spiral structure due to
density waves in the nuclear accretion disk of an active galaxy. Accelerations
of low-velocity (systemic) emission lie in the range 7.7 to 8.9 km/s/yr,
consistent with emission originating from a concavity where the thin, warped
disk is tangent to the line-of-sight. A trend in accelerations of low-velocity
emission as a function of Doppler velocity may be associated with disk geometry
and orientation, or with the presence of spiral structure.Comment: Accepted to ApJ, 48 pages and 20 figure
Velocity Profiles in Slowly Sheared Bubble Rafts
Measurements of average velocity profiles in a bubble raft subjected to slow,
steady-shear demonstrate the coexistence between a flowing state and a jammed
state similar to that observed for three-dimensional foams and emulsions
[Coussot {\it et al,}, Phys. Rev. Lett. {\bf 88}, 218301 (2002)]. For
sufficiently slow shear, the flow is generated by nonlinear topological
rearrangements. We report on the connection between this short-time motion of
the bubbles and the long-time averages. We find that velocity profiles for
individual rearrangement events fluctuate, but a smooth, average velocity is
reached after averaging over only a relatively few events.Comment: typos corrected, figures revised for clarit
Simulation of Plasticity in Nanocrystalline Silicon
Molecular dynamics investigation of plasticity in a model nanocrystalline silicon system demonstrates that inelastic deformation localizes in intergranular regions. The carriers of plasticity in these regions are atomic environments that can be described as high-density liquid-like amorphous silicon. During fully developed flow, plasticity is confined to system-spanning intergranular zones of easy flow. As an active flow zone rotates out of the plane of maximum resolved shear stress during deformation to large strain, new zones of easy flow are formed. Compatibility of the microstructure is accommodated by processes such as grain rotation and formation of new grains. Nano-scale voids or cracks may form if there emerge stress concentrations that cannot be relaxed by a mechanism that simultaneously preserves microstructural compatibility
Dynamics of Viscoplastic Deformation in Amorphous Solids
We propose a dynamical theory of low-temperature shear deformation in
amorphous solids. Our analysis is based on molecular-dynamics simulations of a
two-dimensional, two-component noncrystalline system. These numerical
simulations reveal behavior typical of metallic glasses and other viscoplastic
materials, specifically, reversible elastic deformation at small applied
stresses, irreversible plastic deformation at larger stresses, a stress
threshold above which unbounded plastic flow occurs, and a strong dependence of
the state of the system on the history of past deformations. Microscopic
observations suggest that a dynamically complete description of the macroscopic
state of this deforming body requires specifying, in addition to stress and
strain, certain average features of a population of two-state shear
transformation zones. Our introduction of these new state variables into the
constitutive equations for this system is an extension of earlier models of
creep in metallic glasses. In the treatment presented here, we specialize to
temperatures far below the glass transition, and postulate that irreversible
motions are governed by local entropic fluctuations in the volumes of the
transformation zones. In most respects, our theory is in good quantitative
agreement with the rich variety of phenomena seen in the simulations.Comment: 16 pages, 9 figure
Strain Hardening of Polymer Glasses: Entanglements, Energetics, and Plasticity
Simulations are used to examine the microscopic origins of strain hardening
in polymer glasses. While stress-strain curves for a wide range of temperature
can be fit to the functional form predicted by entropic network models, many
other results are fundamentally inconsistent with the physical picture
underlying these models. Stresses are too large to be entropic and have the
wrong trend with temperature. The most dramatic hardening at large strains
reflects increases in energy as chains are pulled taut between entanglements
rather than a change in entropy. A weak entropic stress is only observed in
shape recovery of deformed samples when heated above the glass transition.
While short chains do not form an entangled network, they exhibit partial shape
recovery, orientation, and strain hardening. Stresses for all chain lengths
collapse when plotted against a microscopic measure of chain stretching rather
than the macroscopic stretch. The thermal contribution to the stress is
directly proportional to the rate of plasticity as measured by breaking and
reforming of interchain bonds. These observations suggest that the correct
microscopic theory of strain hardening should be based on glassy state physics
rather than rubber elasticity.Comment: 15 pages, 12 figures: significant revision
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Toward a New Geometric Distance to the Active Galaxy NGC 4258. II. Centripetal Accelerations and Investigation of Spiral Structure
We report measurements of centripetal accelerations of maser spectral components of NGC 4258 for 51 epochs spanning 1994 to 2004. This is the second paper of a series, in which the goal is the determination of a new geometric maser distance to NGC 4258, accurate to possibly ~3%. We measure accelerations using a formal analysis method that involves simultaneous decomposition of maser spectra for all epochs into multiple, Gaussian components. Components are coupled between epochs by linear drifts (accelerations) from their centroid velocities at a reference epoch. For high-velocity emission, accelerations lie in the range , indicating an origin within 13° of the disk midline (the perpendicular to the line of sight [LOS] to the black hole). Comparison of the projected positions of high-velocity emission in VLBI images with those derived from acceleration data provides evidence that masers trace real gas dynamics. High-velocity emission accelerations do not support a model of trailing shocks associated with spiral arms in the disk. However, we find strengthened evidence for spatial periodicity in high-velocity emission, of wavelength 0.75 mas. This supports suggestions of spiral structure due to density waves in the nuclear accretion disk of an active galaxy. Accelerations of low-velocity (systemic) emission lie in the range , consistent with emission originating from a concavity where the thin, warped disk is tangent to the LOS. A trend in accelerations of low-velocity emission, as a function of Doppler velocity, may be associated with disk geometry and orientation or with the presence of spiral structure.Astronom
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Toward a New Geometric Distance To the Active Galaxy NGC 4258. III. Final Results and The Hubble Constant
We report a new geometric maser distance estimate to the active galaxy NGC 4258. The data for the new model are maser line-of-sight (LOS) velocities and sky positions from 18 epochs of very long baseline interferometry observations, and LOS accelerations measured from a 10 yr monitoring program of the 22 GHz maser emission of NGC 4258. The new model includes both disk warping and confocal elliptical maser orbits with differential precession. The distance to NGC 4258 is , a 3% uncertainty including formal fitting and systematic terms. The resulting Hubble constant, based on the use of the Cepheid variables in NGC 4258 to recalibrate the Cepheid distance scale, is .Astronom
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