Time Series Analysis in Flight Flutter Testing at the Air Force Flight Test Center: Concepts and Results

The Air Force Flight Test Center (AFFTC) flight flutter facility is described. Concepts of using a minicomputer-based time series analyzer and a modal analysis software package for flight flutter testing are examined. The results of several evaluations of the software package are given. The reasons for employing a minimum phase concept in analyzing response only signals are discussed. The use of a Laplace algorithm is shown to be effective for the modal analysis of time histories in flutter testing. Sample results from models and flight tests are provided. The limitations inherent in time series analysis methods are discussed, and the need for effective noise reduction techniques is noted. The use of digital time series analysis techniques in flutter testing is shown to be fast, accurate, and cost effective

EVS: Head-up or Head Down? Evaluation of Crew Procedure and Human Factors for Enhanced Vision Systems

Feasibility of an EVS head-down procedure is examined that may provide the same operational benefits under low visibility as the FAA rule on Enhanced Flight Visibility that requires the use of a head-up display (HUD). The main element of the described EVS head-down procedure is the crew procedure within cockpit for flying the approach. The task sharing between Pilot-Flying and Pilot-Not-Flying is arranged such that multiple head-up/head-down transitions can be avoided. The pilot-flying is using the head-down display for acquisition of the necessary visual cues in the EVS image. The pilot-not-flying is monitoring the instruments and looking for the outside visual cues

Anisotropy crossover in the frustrated Hubbard model on four-chain cylinders

Motivated by dimensional crossover in layered organic ${\kappa}$ salts, we determine the phase diagram of a system of four periodically coupled Hubbard chains with frustration at half filling as a function of the interchain hopping ${t_{\perp}/t}$ and interaction strength ${U/t}$ at a fixed ratio of frustration and interchain hopping ${t'/t_{\perp}=-0.5}$. We cover the range from the one-dimensional limit of uncoupled chains (${t_{\perp}/t=0.0}$) to the isotropic model (${t_{\perp}/t=1.0}$). For strong ${U/t}$, we find an antiferromagnetic insulator; in the weak-to-moderate-interaction regime, the phase diagram features quasi-one-dimensional antiferromagnetic behavior, an incommensurate spin-density wave, and a metallic phase as ${t_{\perp}/t}$ is increased. We characterize the phases through their magnetic ordering, dielectric response, and dominant static correlations. Our analysis is based primarily on a variant of the density-matrix renormalization-group algorithm based on an efficient hybrid-real-momentum-space formulation, in which we can treat relatively large lattices albeit of a limited width. This is complemented by a variational cluster approximation study with a cluster geometry corresponding to the cylindrical lattice allowing us to directly compare the two methods for this geometry. As an outlook, we make contact with work studying dimensional crossover in the full two-dimensional system.Comment: 16 pages, 16 figure

Pulse shape simulation for segmented true-coaxial HPGe detectors

A new package to simulate the formation of electrical pulses in segmented true-coaxial high purity germanium detectors is presented. The computation of the electric field and weighting potentials inside the detector as well as of the trajectories of the charge carriers is described. In addition, the treatment of bandwidth limitations and noise are discussed. Comparison of simulated to measured pulses, obtained from an 18-fold segmented detector operated inside a cryogenic test facility, are presented.Comment: 20 pages, 16 figure

Scaling Invariance in a Time-Dependent Elliptical Billiard

We study some dynamical properties of a classical time-dependent elliptical billiard. We consider periodically moving boundary and collisions between the particle and the boundary are assumed to be elastic. Our results confirm that although the static elliptical billiard is an integrable system, after to introduce time-dependent perturbation on the boundary the unlimited energy growth is observed. The behaviour of the average velocity is described using scaling arguments

Requirements for contractility in disordered cytoskeletal bundles

Actomyosin contractility is essential for biological force generation, and is well understood in highly organized structures such as striated muscle. Additionally, actomyosin bundles devoid of this organization are known to contract both in vivo and in vitro, which cannot be described by standard muscle models. To narrow down the search for possible contraction mechanisms in these systems, we investigate their microscopic symmetries. We show that contractile behavior requires non-identical motors that generate large enough forces to probe the nonlinear elastic behavior of F-actin. This suggests a role for filament buckling in the contraction of these bundles, consistent with recent experimental results on reconstituted actomyosin bundles.Comment: 10 pages, 6 figures; text shortene

Contractile units in disordered actomyosin bundles arise from F-actin buckling

Bundles of filaments and motors are central to contractility in cells. The classic example is striated muscle, where actomyosin contractility is mediated by highly organized sarcomeres which act as fundamental contractile units. However, many contractile bundles in vivo and in vitro lack sarcomeric organization. Here we propose a model for how contractility can arise in actomyosin bundles without sarcomeric organization and validate its predictions with experiments on a reconstituted system. In the model, internal stresses in frustrated arrangements of motors with diverse velocities cause filaments to buckle, leading to overall shortening. We describe the onset of buckling in the presence of stochastic actin-myosin detachment and predict that buckling-induced contraction occurs in an intermediate range of motor densities. We then calculate the size of the "contractile units" associated with this process. Consistent with these results, our reconstituted actomyosin bundles contract at relatively high motor density, and we observe buckling at the predicted length scale.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures, Supporting text and movies attache

Extinctions and Correlations for Uniformly Discrete Point Processes with Pure Point Dynamical Spectra

The paper investigates how correlations can completely specify a uniformly discrete point process. The setting is that of uniformly discrete point sets in real space for which the corresponding dynamical hull is ergodic. The first result is that all of the essential physical information in such a system is derivable from its $n$-point correlations, $n= 2, 3, >...$. If the system is pure point diffractive an upper bound on the number of correlations required can be derived from the cycle structure of a graph formed from the dynamical and Bragg spectra. In particular, if the diffraction has no extinctions, then the 2 and 3 point correlations contain all the relevant information.Comment: 16 page

QCD near the Light Cone

Starting from the QCD Lagrangian, we present the QCD Hamiltonian for near light cone coordinates. We study the dynamics of the gluonic zero modes of this Hamiltonian. The strong coupling solutions serve as a basis for the complete problem. We discuss the importance of zero modes for the confinement mechanism.Comment: 32 pages, ReVTeX, 2 Encapsulated PostScript figure