2,308 research outputs found
Influence of blade aerodynamic model on prediction of helicopter rotor aeroacoustic signatures
Brown’s vorticity transport model has been used to investigate how the local blade aerodynamic model influences the quality of the prediction of the high-frequency airloads associated with blade–vortex interactions, and thus the accuracy with which the acoustic signature of a helicopter rotor can be predicted. The vorticity transport model can accurately resolve the structure of the wake of the rotor and allows significant flexibility in the way that the blade loading can be represented. The Second Higher-Harmonic Control Aeroacoustics Rotor Test was initiated to provide experimental insight into the acoustic signature of a rotor in cases of strong blade–vortex interaction. Predictions of two models for the local blade aerodynamics are compared with the test data. A marked improvement in accuracy of the predicted high-frequency airloads and acoustic signature is obtained when a lifting-chord model for the blade aerodynamics is used instead of a lifting-line-type approach. Errors in the amplitude and phase of the acoustic peaks are reduced, and the quality of the prediction is affected to a lesser extent by the computational resolution of the wake, with the lifting-chord model producing the best representation of the distribution of sound pressure below the rotor
Biases in the Quasar Mass-Luminosity Plane
We find that the recently reported departure from the Eddington luminosity
limit for the highest quasar black hole masses at a given redshift is an
artifact due to biases in black hole mass measurements. This sub-Eddington
boundary (with non-unity slope) in the quasar mass-luminosity plane was
initially reported by Steinhardt & Elvis (2010a) using the FWHM-based black
hole mass catalogue of Shen et al. (2008). However, the significance of the
boundary is reduced when the FWHM-based mass-scaling relationship is
recalibrated following Wang et al. (2009) and using the most updated
reverberation mapping estimates of black hole masses. Furthermore, this
boundary is not seen using mass estimates based on the line dispersion of the
same quasars' MgII emission lines. Thus, the initial report of a sub-Eddington
boundary with non-unity slope was due to biases in estimating masses using the
FWHM of a fit of one or two Gaussians to quasar MgII emission lines. We provide
evidence that using the line dispersion of the MgII line produces less biased
black hole mass estimates.Comment: 11 pages, 10 figures, Accepted for publication in MNRA
Influence of blade aerodynamic model on the prediction of helicopter high-frequency airloads
Brown’s vorticity transport model has been used to investigate the influence of the blade aerodynamic model on the accuracy with which the high-frequency airloads associated with helicopter blade–vortex interactions can be predicted. The model yields an accurate representation of the wake structure yet allows significant flexibility in the way that the blade loading can be represented. A simple lifting-line model and a somewhat more sophisticated liftingchord model, based on unsteady thin aerofoil theory, are compared. A marked improvement in the accuracy of the predicted high-frequency airloads of the higher harmonic control aeroacoustic rotor is obtained when the liftingchord model is used instead of the lifting-line approach, and the quality of the prediction is affected less by the computational resolution of the wake. The lifting-line model overpredicts the amplitude of the lift response to blade–vortex interactions as the computational grid is refined, exposing the fundamental deficiencies in this approach when modeling the aerodynamic response of the blade to interactions with vortices that are much smaller than its chord. The airloads that are predicted using the lifting-chord model are relatively insensitive to the resolution of the computation, and there are fundamental reasons to believe that properly converged numerical solutions may be attainable using this approach
A Description of Quasar Variability Measured Using Repeated SDSS and POSS Imaging
We provide a quantitative description and statistical interpretation of the
optical continuum variability of quasars. The Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS)
has obtained repeated imaging in five UV-to-IR photometric bands for 33,881
spectroscopically confirmed quasars. About 10,000 quasars have an average of 60
observations in each band obtained over a decade along Stripe 82 (S82), whereas
the remaining ~25,000 have 2-3 observations due to scan overlaps. The observed
time lags span the range from a day to almost 10 years, and constrain quasar
variability at rest-frame time lags of up to 4 years, and at rest-frame
wavelengths from 1000A to 6000A. We publicly release a user-friendly catalog of
quasars from the SDSS Data Release 7 that have been observed at least twice in
SDSS or once in both SDSS and the Palomar Observatory Sky Survey, and we use it
to analyze the ensemble properties of quasar variability. Based on a damped
random walk (DRW) model defined by a characteristic time scale and an
asymptotic variability amplitude that scale with the luminosity, black hole
mass, and rest wavelength for individual quasars calibrated in S82, we can
fully explain the ensemble variability statistics of the non-S82 quasars such
as the exponential distribution of large magnitude changes. All available data
are consistent with the DRW model as a viable description of the optical
continuum variability of quasars on time scales of ~5-2000 days in the rest
frame. We use these models to predict the incidence of quasar contamination in
transient surveys such as those from PTF and LSST.Comment: 33 pages, 19 figures, replaced with accepted version. Catalog is
available at http://www.astro.washington.edu/users/ivezic/macleod/qso_dr7
The Sloan Digital Sky Survey Reverberation Mapping Project: Ensemble Spectroscopic Variability of Quasar Broad Emission Lines
We explore the variability of quasars in the MgII and Hbeta broad emission
lines and UV/optical continuum emission using the Sloan Digital Sky Survey
Reverberation Mapping project (SDSS-RM). This is the largest spectroscopic
study of quasar variability to date: our study includes 29 spectroscopic epochs
from SDSS-RM over months, containing 357 quasars with MgII and 41 quasars
with Hbeta . On longer timescales, the study is also supplemented with
two-epoch data from SDSS-I/II. The SDSS-I/II data include an additional
quasars with MgII and 572 quasars with Hbeta. The MgII emission line is
significantly variable ( 10% on 100-day timescales), a necessary
prerequisite for its use for reverberation mapping studies. The data also
confirm that continuum variability increases with timescale and decreases with
luminosity, and the continuum light curves are consistent with a damped
random-walk model on rest-frame timescales of days. We compare the
emission-line and continuum variability to investigate the structure of the
broad-line region. Broad-line variability shows a shallower increase with
timescale compared to the continuum emission, demonstrating that the broad-line
transfer function is not a -function. Hbeta is more variable than MgII
(roughly by a factor of ), suggesting different excitation mechanisms,
optical depths and/or geometrical configuration for each emission line. The
ensemble spectroscopic variability measurements enabled by the SDSS-RM project
have important consequences for future studies of reverberation mapping and
black hole mass estimation of quasars.Comment: 20 pages, 25 figures. ApJ accepted: minor revisions following referee
repor
Concepts and characteristics of the 'COST Reference Microplasma Jet'
Biomedical applications of non-equilibrium atmospheric pressure plasmas have attracted intense interest in the past few years. Many plasma sources of diverse design have been proposed for these applications, but the relationship between source characteristics and application performance is not well-understood, and indeed many sources are poorly characterized. This circumstance is an impediment to progress in application development. A reference source with well-understood and highly reproducible characteristics may be an important tool in this context. Researchers around the world should be able to compare the characteristics of their own sources and also their results with this device. In this paper, we describe such a reference source, developed from the simple and robust micro-scaled atmospheric pressure plasma jet (μ-APPJ) concept. This development occurred under the auspices of COST Action MP1101 'Biomedical Applications of Atmospheric Pressure Plasmas'. Gas contamination and power measurement are shown to be major causes of irreproducible results in earlier source designs. These problems are resolved in the reference source by refinement of the mechanical and electrical design and by specifying an operating protocol. These measures are shown to be absolutely necessary for reproducible operation. They include the integration of current and voltage probes into the jet. The usual combination of matching unit and power supply is replaced by an integrated LC power coupling circuit and a 5 W single frequency generator. The design specification and operating protocol for the reference source are being made freely available
Disclosing the Radio Loudness Distribution Dichotomy in Quasars: An Unbiased Monte Carlo Approach Applied to the SDSS-FIRST Quasar Sample
We investigate the dichotomy in the radio loudness distribution of quasars by
modelling their radio emission and various selection effects using a Monte
Carlo approach. The existence of two physically distinct quasar populations,
the radio-loud and radio-quiet quasars, is controversial and over the last
decade a bimodal distribution of radio loudness of quasars has been both
affirmed and disputed. We model the quasar radio luminosity distribution with
simple unimodal and bimodal distribution functions. The resulting simulated
samples are compared to a fiducial sample of 8,300 quasars drawn from the SDSS
DR7 Quasar Catalog and combined with radio observations from the FIRST survey.
Our results indicate that the SDSS-FIRST sample is best described by a radio
loudness distribution which consists of two components, with 12+/-1 % of
sources in the radio-loud component. On the other hand, the evidence for a
local minimum in the loudness distribution (bimodality) is not strong and we
find that previous claims for its existence were probably affected by the
incompleteness of the FIRST survey close to its faint limit. We also
investigate the redshift and luminosity dependence of the radio loudness
distribution and find tentative evidence that at high redshift radio-loud
quasars were rarer, on average "louder", and exhibited a smaller range in radio
loudness. In agreement with other recent work, we conclude that the SDSS-FIRST
sample strongly suggests that the radio loudness distribution of quasars is not
a universal function, and that more complex models than presented here are
needed to fully explain available observations.Comment: Accepted for publication in ApJ; 13 pages, 10 figure
X-ray and Multiwavelength Insights into the Nature of Weak Emission-Line Quasars at Low Redshift
(Abridged) We report on the X-ray and multiwavelength properties of 11
radio-quiet quasars with weak or no emission lines identified by the Sloan
Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) with redshift z=0.4-2.5. The distribution of relative
X-ray brightness for our low-redshift weak-line quasar (WLQ) candidates is
significantly different from that of typical radio-quiet quasars, having an
excess of X-ray weak sources, but it is consistent with that of high-redshift
WLQs. The X-ray weak sources generally show similar UV emission-line properties
to those of the X-ray weak quasar PHL 1811; they may belong to the notable
class of PHL 1811 analogs. The average X-ray spectrum of these sources is
somewhat harder than that of typical radio-quiet quasars. Several other
low-redshift WLQ candidates have normal ratios of X-ray-to-optical/UV flux, and
their average X-ray spectral properties are also similar to those of typical
radio-quiet quasars. The X-ray weak and X-ray normal WLQ candidates may belong
to the same subset of quasars having high-ionization "shielding gas" covering
most of the wind-dominated broad emission-line region, but be viewed at
different inclinations. The mid-infrared-to-X-ray spectral energy distributions
(SEDs) of these sources are generally consistent with those of typical SDSS
quasars, showing that they are not likely to be BL Lac objects with
relativistically boosted continua and diluted emission lines. However, one
source in our X-ray observed sample is remarkably strong in X-rays, indicating
that a small fraction of low-redshift WLQ candidates may actually be BL Lacs
residing in the radio-faint tail of the BL Lac population. We also investigate
universal selection criteria for WLQs over a wide range of redshift, finding
that it is not possible to select WLQ candidates in a fully consistent way
using different prominent emission lines as a function of redshift.Comment: ApJ in press; 26 pages, 11 figures and 7 tables. The full Table 3 is
available upon reques
Quasar Selection Based on Photometric Variability
We develop a method for separating quasars from other variable point sources
using SDSS Stripe 82 light curve data for ~10,000 variable objects. To
statistically describe quasar variability, we use a damped random walk model
parametrized by a damping time scale, tau, and an asymptotic amplitude
(structure function), SF_inf. With the aid of an SDSS spectroscopically
confirmed quasar sample, we demonstrate that variability selection in typical
extragalactic fields with low stellar density can deliver complete samples with
reasonable purity (or efficiency, E). Compared to a selection method based
solely on the slope of the structure function, the inclusion of the tau
information boosts E from 60% to 75% while maintaining a highly complete sample
(98%) even in the absence of color information. For a completeness of C=90%, E
is boosted from 80% to 85%. Conversely, C improves from 90% to 97% while
maintaining E=80% when imposing a lower limit on tau. With the aid of color
selection, the purity can be further boosted to 96%, with C= 93%. Hence,
selection methods based on variability will play an important role in the
selection of quasars with data provided by upcoming large sky surveys, such as
Pan-STARRS and the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST). For a typical
(simulated) LSST cadence over 10 years and a photometric accuracy of 0.03 mag
(achieved at i~22), C is expected to be 88% for a simple sample selection
criterion of tau>100 days. In summary, given an adequate survey cadence,
photometric variability provides an even better method than color selection for
separating quasars from stars.Comment: (v2) 50 pages, accepted to Ap
Selecting Quasars by their Intrinsic Variability
We present a new and simple technique for selecting extensive, complete and
pure quasar samples, based on their intrinsic variability. We parametrize the
single-band variability by a power-law model for the light-curve structure
function, with amplitude A and power-law index gamma. We show that quasars can
be efficiently separated from other non-variable and variable sources by the
location of the individual sources in the A-gamma plane. We use ~60 epochs of
imaging data, taken over ~5 years, from the SDSS stripe 82 (S82) survey, where
extensive spectroscopy provides a reference sample of quasars, to demonstrate
the power of variability as a quasar classifier in multi-epoch surveys. For
UV-excess selected objects, variability performs just as well as the standard
SDSS color selection, identifying quasars with a completeness of 90% and a
purity of 95%. In the redshift range 2.5<z<3, where color selection is known to
be problematic, variability can select quasars with a completeness of 90% and a
purity of 96%. This is a factor of 5-10 times more pure than existing
color-selection of quasars in this redshift range. Selecting objects from a
broad griz color box without u-band information, variability selection in S82
can afford completeness and purity of 92%, despite a factor of 30 more
contaminants than quasars in the color-selected feeder sample. This confirms
that the fraction of quasars hidden in the 'stellar locus' of color-space is
small. To test variability selection in the context of Pan-STARRS 1 (PS1) we
created mock PS1 data by down-sampling the S82 data to just 6 epochs over 3
years. Even with this much sparser time sampling, variability is an
encouragingly efficient classifier. For instance, a 92% pure and 44% complete
quasar candidate sample is attainable from the above -selected catalog.Comment: 16 pages, 9 color figures and 5 tables - v3: Equations corrected and
text updated (see Erratum for details of corrections). Erratum:
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2010ApJ...721.1941S Original Paper:
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2010ApJ...714.1194
- …