1,992 research outputs found
Fixed-range optimum trajectories for short-haul aircraft
An algorithm, based on the energy-state method, is derived for calculating optimum trajectories with a range constraint. The basis of the algorithm is the assumption that optimum trajectories consist of, at most, three segments: an increasing energy segment (climb); a constant energy segment (cruise); and a decreasing energy segment (descent). This assumption allows energy to be used as the independent variable in the increasing and decreasing energy segments, thereby eliminating the integration of a separate adjoint differential equation and simplifying the calculus of variations problem to one requiring only pointwise extremization of algebraic functions. The algorithm is used to compute minimum fuel, minimum time, and minimum direct-operating-cost trajectories, with range as a parameter, for an in-service CTOL aircraft and for an advanced STOL aircraft. For the CTOL aircraft and the minimum-fuel performance function, the optimum controls, consisting of air-speed and engine power setting, are continuous functions of the energy in both climb and descent as well as near the maximum or cruise energy. This is also true for the STOL aircraft except in the descent where at one energy level a nearly constant energy dive segment occurs, yielding a discontinuity in the airspeed at that energy. The reason for this segment appears to be the relatively high fuel flow at idle power of the engines used by this STOL aircraft. Use of a simplified trajectory which eliminates the dive increases the fuel consumption of the total descent trajectory by about 10 percent and the time to fly the descent by about 19 percent compared to the optimum
Optoelectronic and antimicrobial activity of composite zinc oxide and cadmium sulphide quantum dots and application in water treatment
In the present study, we report the synthesis of composite zinc oxide and cadmium sulphidenanoparticles by a chemical route. ZnO–CdS nanocomposites have been gaining much importance as they show fascinating opto-electronic properties such as tunable band gap and the nanomaterials are suitable for fast photon absorption, transportation and collection. The prepared composite nanoparticles have been characterized by UV–VIS absorption, X-ray diffraction (XRD) and TEM, AFM and FTIR observation. UV-VIS optical spectroscopy study has been carried out to determine the band gap of the composite zinc oxide and cadmium sulphide thin film and it shows a blue shift with respect to the bulk value. The nanocomposites show enhanced optio -electronic properties compared to the individual constituents. The band gap of CdS–ZnO nanocomposites depend on various experimental parameters such as reaction time, concentrations of cadmium salt, and also chemical nature of the cadmium salt. The band gap value of the ZnO–CdS nanocrystalline films are obtained in the range of 3.88–4.14 eV which is higher than that of bulk value of ZnO (3.3 eV) and CdS (2.42 eV). The synthesized nanoparticles exhibited high antibacterial activity and can be used for water purification
High Spatial Resolution Thermal-Infrared Spectroscopy with ALES: Resolved Spectra of the Benchmark Brown Dwarf Binary HD 130948BC
We present 2.9-4.1 micron integral field spectroscopy of the L4+L4 brown
dwarf binary HD 130948BC, obtained with the Arizona Lenslets for Exoplanet
Spectroscopy (ALES) mode of the Large Binocular Telescope Interferometer
(LBTI). The HD 130948 system is a hierarchical triple system, in which the G2V
primary is joined by two co-orbiting brown dwarfs. By combining the age of the
system with the dynamical masses and luminosities of the substellar companions,
we can test evolutionary models of cool brown dwarfs and extra-solar giant
planets. Previous near-infrared studies suggest a disagreement between HD
130948BC luminosities and those derived from evolutionary models. We obtained
spatially-resolved, low-resolution (R~20) L-band spectra of HD 130948B and C to
extend the wavelength coverage into the thermal infrared. Jointly using JHK
photometry and ALES L-band spectra for HD 130948BC, we derive atmospheric
parameters that are consistent with parameters derived from evolutionary
models. We leverage the consistency of these atmospheric quantities to favor a
younger age (0.50 \pm 0.07 Gyr) of the system compared to the older age (0.79
\pm 0.22 Gyr) determined with gyrochronology in order to address the luminosity
discrepancy.Comment: 17 pages, 9 figures, Accepted to Ap
Estimates of electronic interaction parameters for LaO compounds (=Ti-Ni) from ab-initio approaches
We have analyzed the ab-initio local density approximation band structure
calculations for the family of perovskite oxides, LaO with =Ti-Ni
within a parametrized nearest neighbor tight-binding model and extracted
various interaction strengths. We study the systematics in these interaction
parameters across the transition metal series and discuss the relevance of
these in a many-body description of these oxides. The results obtained here
compare well with estimates of these parameters obtained via analysis of
electron spectroscopic results in conjunction with the Anderson impurity model.
The dependence of the hopping interaction strength, t, is found to be
approximately .Comment: 18 pages; 1 tex file+9 postscript files (appeared in Phys Rev B Oct
15,1996
A Sample of Very Young Field L Dwarfs and Implications for the Brown Dwarf "Lithium Test" at Early Ages
Using a large sample of optical spectra of late-type dwarfs, we identify a
subset of late-M through L field dwarfs that, because of the presence of
low-gravity features in their spectra, are believed to be unusually young. From
a combined sample of 303 field L dwarfs, we find observationally that
7.6+/-1.6% are younger than 100 Myr. This percentage is in agreement with
theoretical predictions once observing biases are taken into account. We find
that these young L dwarfs tend to fall in the southern hemisphere (Dec < 0 deg)
and may be previously unrecognized, low-mass members of nearby, young
associations like Tucana-Horologium, TW Hydrae, beta Pictoris, and AB Doradus.
We use a homogeneously observed sample of roughly one hundred and fifty
6300-10000 Angstrom spectra of L and T dwarfs taken with the Low-Resolution
Imaging Spectrometer at the W. M. Keck Observatory to examine the strength of
the 6708-A Li I line as a function of spectral type and further corroborate the
trends noted by Kirkpatrick et al. (2000). We use our low-gravity spectra to
investigate the strength of the Li I line as a function of age. The data weakly
suggest that for early- to mid-L dwarfs the line strength reaches a maximum for
a few 100 Myr, whereas for much older (few Gyr) and much younger (<100 Myr) L
dwarfs the line is weaker or undetectable. We show that a weakening of lithium
at lower gravities is predicted by model atmosphere calculations, an effect
partially corroborated by existing observational data. Larger samples
containing L dwarfs of well determined ages are needed to further test this
empirically. If verified, this result would reinforce the caveat first cited in
Kirkpatrick et al. (2006) that the lithium test should be used with caution
when attempting to confirm the substellar nature of the youngest brown dwarfs.Comment: 73 pages with 22 figures; to appear in ApJ (Dec 20, 2008, v689n2
issue
The thermal emission of the young and massive planet CoRoT-2b at 4.5 and 8 microns
We report measurements of the thermal emission of the young and massive
planet CoRoT-2b at 4.5 and 8 microns with the Spitzer Infrared Array Camera
(IRAC). Our measured occultation depths are 0.510 +- 0.042 % and 0.41 +- 0.11 %
at 4.5 and 8 microns, respectively. In addition to the CoRoT optical
measurements, these planet/star flux ratios indicate a poor heat distribution
to the night side of the planet and are in better agreement with an atmosphere
free of temperature inversion layer. Still, the presence of such an inversion
is not definitely ruled out by the observations and a larger wavelength
coverage is required to remove the current ambiguity. Our global analysis of
CoRoT, Spitzer and ground-based data confirms the large mass and size of the
planet with slightly revised values (Mp = 3.47 +- 0.22 Mjup, Rp = 1.466 +-
0.044 Rjup). We find a small but significant offset in the timing of the
occultation when compared to a purely circular orbital solution, leading to e
cos(omega) = -0.00291 +- 0.00063 where e is the orbital eccentricity and omega
is the argument of periastron. Constraining the age of the system to be at most
of a few hundreds of Myr and assuming that the non-zero orbital eccentricity is
not due to a third undetected body, we model the coupled orbital-tidal
evolution of the system with various tidal Q values, core sizes and initial
orbital parameters. For log(Q_s') = 5 - 6, our modelling is able to explain the
large radius of CoRoT-2b if log(Q_p') <= 5.5 through a transient tidal
circularization and corresponding planet tidal heating event. Under this model,
the planet will reach its Roche limit within 20 Myr at most.Comment: 13 pages, 2 tables, 11 figures. Accepted for publication in Astronomy
and Astrophysic
LBT observations of the HR 8799 planetary system: First detection of HR8799e in H band
We have performed H and Ks band observations of the planetary system around
HR 8799 using the new AO system at the Large Binocular Telescope and the PISCES
Camera. The excellent instrument performance (Strehl ratios up to 80% in H
band) enabled detection the inner planet HR8799e in the H band for the first
time. The H and Ks magnitudes of HR8799e are similar to those of planets c and
d, with planet e slightly brighter. Therefore, HR8799e is likely slightly more
massive than c and d. We also explored possible orbital configurations and
their orbital stability. We confirm that the orbits of planets b, c and e are
consistent with being circular and coplanar; planet d should have either an
orbital eccentricity of about 0.1 or be non-coplanar with respect to b and c.
Planet e can not be in circular and coplanar orbit in a 4:2:1 mean motion
resonances with c and d, while coplanar and circular orbits are allowed for a
5:2 resonance. The analysis of dynamical stability shows that the system is
highly unstable or chaotic when planetary masses of about 5 MJup for b and 7
MJup for the other planets are adopted. Significant regions of dynamical
stability for timescales of tens of Myr are found when adopting planetary
masses of about 3.5, 5, 5, and 5 Mjup for HR 8799 b, c, d, and e respectively.
These masses are below the current estimates based on the stellar age (30 Myr)
and theoretical models of substellar objects.Comment: 13 pages, 10 figures, A&A, accepte
H-band thermal emission from the 19-h period planet WASP-19b
peer reviewedWe present the first ground-based detection of thermal emission from an exoplanet in the H-band. Using HAWK-I on the VLT, we observed an occultation of WASP-19b by its G8V-type host star. WASP-19b is a Jupiter-mass planet with an orbital period of only 19 h, and thus, being highly irradiated, is expected to be hot. We measure an H-band occultation depth of 0.259[SUP]+0.046[/SUP][SUB]-0.044[/SUB]%, which corresponds to an H-band brightness temperature of T[SUB]H[/SUB] = 2580 ± 125 K. A cloud-free model of the planet's atmosphere, with no redistribution of energy from day-side to night-side, under predicts the planet/star flux density ratio by a factor of two. As the stellar parameters, and thus the level of planetary irradiation, are well-constrained by measurement, it is likely that our model of the planet's atmosphere is too simple. Based on data collected with the VLT/HAWKI instrument at ESO Paranal Observatory, Chile (programs 083.C-0377(A)).The photometric time-series used in this work are only available in electronic form at the CDS via anonymous ftp to cdsarc.u-strasbg.fr (130.79.128.5) or via http://cdsweb.u-strasbg.fr/cgi-bin/qcat?J/A+A/513/L3</A
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