Acetylene terminated matrix resins

The synthesis of resins with terminal acetylene groups has provided a promising technology to yield high performance structural materials. Because these resins cure through an addition reaction, no volatile by-products are produced during the processing. The cured products have high thermal stability and good properties retention after exposure to humidity. Resins with a wide variety of different chemical structures between the terminal acetylene groups are synthesized and their mechanical properties studied. The ability of the acetylene cured polymers to give good mechanical properties is demonstrated by the resins with quinoxaline structures. Processibility of these resins can be manipulated by varying the chain length between the acetylene groups or by blending in different amounts of reactive deluents. Processing conditions similar to the state-of-the-art epoxy can be attained by using backbone structures like ether-sulfone or bis-phenol-A. The wide range of mechanical properties and processing conditions attainable by this class of resins should allow them to be used in a wide variety of applications

On the Correct Convergence of Complex Langevin Simulations for Polynomial Actions

There are problems in physics and particularly in field theory which are defined by complex valued weight functions $e^{-S}$ where $S$ is a polynomial action $S: R^n \rightarrow C$. The conditions under which a convergent complex Langevin calculation correctly simulates such integrals are discussed. All conditions on the process which are used to prove proper convergence are defined in the stationary limit.Comment: 8 pages, LaTeX file, preprint UNIGRAZ-UTP 29-09-9

Extending the record of lacustrine phases beyond the last interglacial for Lake Eyre in central Australia using luminescence dating

We show with multiple luminescence dating techniques that the sedimentary record for Lake Eyre, Australia\u27s largest lake, extends beyond 200 thousand years (ka) to Marine Isotope Stage (MIS) 7. Transgressive clayey sand and finely laminated clays overlying the Miocene Etadunna Formation in Lake Eyre North document the deep-lake phases of central South Australia in the past. Until now, unresolved chronology has hampered our ability to interpret these sedimentary records, which are important for understanding the timing of the wettest phase of central Australia\u27s late Quaternary climate. In this study, we apply quartz optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) dating, thermally-transferred OSL (TT-OSL) dating and K-feldspar post infrared infrared stimulated luminescence (pIRIR) dating to lake-floor sediments near Williams Point in Madigan Gulf to provide new age constraint for the lacustrine sediments of Lake Eyre. Methodological studies on quartz and K-feldspar demonstrate that these luminescence dating procedures are suitable for the Lake Eyre lacustrine samples and produce consistent replicate ages. A Bayesian model applied to the new dating results provides a chronological model of lacustrine deposition and shows that the transgressive clayey sand were deposited 221 ± 19 ka to 201 ± 10 ka and that the deep-water sediments were laid down in early MIS 6 (191 ± 9 ka to 181 ± 9 ka). We also find evidence for a potential depositional hiatus in mid MIS 6 and the likely formation of a palaeo-playa later in MIS 6 from 158 ± 11 ka to 143 ± 15 ka. In contrast, the MIS 5 sediments are characterised by oscillating deep- and shallow-water lacustrine units deposited 130 ± 16 ka to 113 ± 20 ka. This study is the first of its kind to provide evidence for a wet desert interior in Australia beyond the last glacial cycle using comprehensive numerical dating. Our results show that past deep-lake episodes of central South Australia, which were previously thought to represent peak interglacial conditions, are actually associated with both warm interglacial and cold glacial periods, with all the wettest episodes generally coinciding with the intervening periods between the glacial and interglacial maximums. We assume from these results that orbital forcing is not a first order control for the long-term dynamics of the Lake Eyre basin and the Indo-Australian monsoon. The high lake-level events of Lake Eyre are well correlated with millennial-scale cooling events and stadials of the North Atlantic, and coincide with weakened episodes/events for the East Asia summer monsoon. This may imply an important role for the northern high latitudes in influencing the Indo-Australian monsoon, which may be associated with a southward migration of the Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ) during cooling periods in the North Atlantic

On the weak coupling spectrum of N=2 supersymmetric SU(n) gauge theory

The weak coupling spectrum of BPS saturated states of pure $N=2$ supersymmetric SU$(n)$ gauge theory is investigated. The method uses known results on the dyon spectrum of the analogous theory with $N=4$ supersymmetry, along with the action on these states of the semi-classical monodromy transformations. For dyons whose magnetic charge is not a simple root of the Lie algebra, it is found that the weak coupling region is divided into a series of domains, for which the dyons have different electric charge, separated by walls on which the dyons decay. The proposed spectrum is shown to be consistent with the exact solution of the theory at strong coupling in the sense that the states at weak coupling can account for the singularities at strong coupling.Comment: 19 pages, plain tex with macro included, 6 figures included using psfig.te

Composition and Self-Adaptation of Service-Based Systems with Feature Models

The adoption of mechanisms for reusing software in pervasive systems has not yet become standard practice. This is because the use of pre-existing software requires the selection, composition and adaptation of prefabricated software parts, as well as the management of some complex problems such as guaranteeing high levels of efficiency and safety in critical domains. In addition to the wide variety of services, pervasive systems are composed of many networked heterogeneous devices with embedded software. In this work, we promote the safe reuse of services in service-based systems using two complementary technologies, Service-Oriented Architecture and Software Product Lines. In order to do this, we extend both the service discovery and composition processes defined in the DAMASCo framework, which currently does not deal with the service variability that constitutes pervasive systems. We use feature models to represent the variability and to self-adapt the services during the composition in a safe way taking context changes into consideration. We illustrate our proposal with a case study related to the driving domain of an Intelligent Transportation System, handling the context information of the environment.Work partially supported by the projects TIN2008-05932, TIN2008-01942, TIN2012-35669, TIN2012-34840 and CSD2007-0004 funded by Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness and FEDER; P09-TIC-05231 and P11-TIC-7659 funded by Andalusian Government; and FP7-317731 funded by EU. Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tec

Phase space structures and ionization dynamics of hydrogen atom in elliptically polarized microwaves

The multiphoton ionization of hydrogen atoms in a strong elliptically polarized microwave field exhibits complex features that are not observed for ionization in circular and linear polarized fields. Experimental data reveal high sensitivity of ionization dynamics to the small changes of the field polarization. The multidimensional nature of the problem makes widely used diagnostics of dynamics, such as Poincar\'{e} surfaces of section, impractical. We analyze the phase space dynamics using finite time stability analysis rendered by the fast Lyapunov Indicators technique. The concept of zero--velocity surface is used to initialize the calculations and visualize the dynamics. Our analysis provides stability maps calculated for the initial energy at the maximum and below the saddle of the zero-velocity surface. We estimate qualitatively the dependence of ionization thresholds on the parameters of the applied field, such as polarization and scaled amplitude

Infrared phonons and specific heat in Ba3Cr2O8

We report on the phonon spectrum of Ba3Cr2O8 determined by infrared spectroscopy, and on specific heat measurements across the Jahn-Teller transition in magnetic fields up to 9 T. Phonon modes split below the Jahn-Teller transition, which occurs at T_{JT} = 70 K as detected by specific heat measurements. The field-dependent specific heat data is analyzed in terms of the contributions from lattice, magnetic and orbital degrees of freedom. In contrast to the isostructural compound Sr3Cr2O8 our analysis does not indicate the existence of orbital fluctuations below the Jahn-Teller transition in Ba3Cr2O8.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure

Redox-mediated bypass of restriction point via skipping of G1pm

BACKGROUND: It is well known that cancer cells bypass the restriction point, R, and undergo uncontrolled cell proliferation. HYPOTHESIS AND EVIDENCE: We suggest here that fibrosarcoma cells enter G(1ps )directly from M, skipping G(1pm), hence bypassing R, in response to redox modulation. Evidence is presented from the published literature that demonstrate a shortening of the cycle period of transformed fibroblasts (SV-3T3) compared to the nontransformed 3T3 fibroblasts, corresponding to the duration of G(1pm )in the 3T3 fibroblasts. Evidence is also presented that demonstrate that redox modulation can induce the CUA-4 fibroblasts to bypass R, resulting in a cycle period closely corresponding to the cycle period of fibrosarcoma cells (HT1080). CONCLUSION: The evidence supports our hypothesis that a low internal redox potential can cause fibrosarcoma cells to skip the G(1pm )phase of the cell cycle

Covariant derivative expansion of fermionic effective action at high temperatures

We derive the fermionic contribution to the 1-loop effective action for A_4 and A_i fields at high temperatures, assuming that gluon fields are slowly varying but allowing for an arbitrary amplitude of A_4.Comment: RevTex 4, 11 pages, 3 figures. Version 2: Typos corrected; magnetic fields restricted to parallel sector. Version accepted for publication in PR