13,833 research outputs found
Social attitudes modulate automatic imitation
In naturalistic interpersonal settings, mimicry or ‘automatic imitation’ generates liking, affiliation, cooperation and other positive social attitudes. The purpose of this study was to find out whether the relationship between social attitudes and mimicry is bidirectional: Do social attitudes have a direct and specific effect on mimicry? Participants were primed with pro-social, neutral or anti-social words in a scrambled sentence task. They were then tested for mimicry using a stimulus-response compatibility procedure. In this procedure, participants were required to perform a pre-specified movement (e.g. opening their hand) on presentation of a compatible (open) or incompatible (close) hand movement. Reaction time data were collected using electromyography (EMG) and the magnitude of the mimicry / automatic imitation effect was calculated by subtracting reaction times on compatible trials from those on incompatible trials. Pro-social priming produced a larger automatic imitation effect than anti-social priming, indicating that the relationship between mimicry and social attitudes is bidirectional, and that social attitudes have a direct and specific effect on the tendency to imitate behavior without intention or conscious awareness
Ultrasonic wave propagation in heterogenous media
The non-destructive testing of austenitic steel welds using ultrasound is of vital importance for assessing safety critical structures such as those found in the nuclear industry. The internal geometry of these welds is heterogeneous and highly scattering and this makes it dicult to detect and characterise any defects within them. To help overcome these diculties the use of ultrasound transducer arrays and the associated Full Matrix Capture is becoming more widespread. There is a need therefore to develop post-processing algorithms that best utilise the data from such devices. This paper considers the use of a time-frequency domain method known as the Decomposition of the Time Reversal Operator (DORT) method. To develop this method and to demonstrate its ecacy in tackling this problem a series of simulated data sets are used. The simulated data is generated using a finite element method (PZFLEX) with the heterogeneous internal microstructure of the weld being given by previous Electron Backscatter Diraction measurements. A range of artificial flaws are then inserted into this geometry. By varying the flaw size and type a comparison is conducted between the DORT method and the Total Focusing Method (TFM) and their relative ability to perform flaw detection assessed. Importantly, however, the DORT method relies on a Singular Value Decomposition in time and frequency space and this spectral information contains information about the flaw size and shape
Direct simulation for a homogenous gas
A probabilistic analysis of the direct simulation of a homogeneous gas is
given. A hierarchy of equations similar to the BBGKY hierarchy for the reduced
probability densities is derived. By invoking the molecular chaos assumption,
an equation similar to the Boltzmann equation for the single particle
probability density and the corresponding H-theorem is derived
Auroral thermosphere temperatures from observations of 6300 A emissions
Doppler temperatures determined from observations of the atomic oxygen OI 6300 A line during March 1984 at the University of Alaska/Fairbanks are presented. Temperatures are obtained from Fabry-Perot Interferometer pressure scans using a Fourier transform smoothing and fitting technique; this technique is presented in detail. The temperatures and the spread in the temperatures are consistent from day to day. On the clear nights of March 10 to 13, the temperatures were 800, 750, 750 and 800 K, respectively, with a spread of + or - 100 K. These temperatures are compared to the MSIS (84) model atmosphere for similar geomagnetic conditions and found to be in general agreement; they are also consistent with results obtained by other investigators
Mechanism of margination in confined flows of blood and other multicomponent suspensions
Flowing blood displays a phenomenon called margination, in which leukocytes
and platelets are preferentially found near blood vessel walls, while
erythrocytes are depleted from these regions. Here margination is investigated
using direct hydrodynamic simulations of a binary suspension of stiff (s) and
floppy (f) capsules, as well as a stochastic model that incorporates the key
particle transport mechanisms in suspensions -- wall-induced hydrodynamic
migration and shear-induced pair collisions. The stochastic model allows the
relative importance of these two mechanisms to be directly evaluated and
thereby indicates that margination, at least in the dilute case, is largely due
to the differential dynamics of homogeneous (e.g. s-s) and heterogeneous (s-f)
collisionsComment: 5 Pages, 4 figure
Structural Relaxation and Mode Coupling in a Simple Liquid: Depolarized Light Scattering in Benzene
We have measured depolarized light scattering in liquid benzene over the
whole accessible temperature range and over four decades in frequency. Between
40 and 180 GHz we find a susceptibility peak due to structural relaxation. This
peak shows stretching and time-temperature scaling as known from
relaxation in glass-forming materials. A simple mode-coupling model provides
consistent fits of the entire data set. We conclude that structural relaxation
in simple liquids and relaxation in glass-forming materials are
physically the same. A deeper understanding of simple liquids is reached by
applying concepts that were originally developed in the context of
glass-transition research.Comment: submitted to New J. Phy
Cosmology with velocity dispersion counts: an alternative to measuring cluster halo masses
The evolution of galaxy cluster counts is a powerful probe of several
fundamental cosmological parameters. A number of recent studies using this
probe have claimed tension with the cosmology preferred by the analysis of the
Planck primary CMB data, in the sense that there are fewer clusters observed
than predicted based on the primary CMB cosmology. One possible resolution to
this problem is systematic errors in the absolute halo mass calibration in
cluster studies, which is required to convert the standard theoretical
prediction (the halo mass function) into counts as a function of the observable
(e.g., X-ray luminosity, Sunyaev-Zel'dovich flux, optical richness). Here we
propose an alternative strategy, which is to directly compare predicted and
observed cluster counts as a function of the one-dimensional velocity
dispersion of the cluster galaxies. We argue that the velocity dispersion of
groups/clusters can be theoretically predicted as robustly as mass but, unlike
mass, it can also be directly observed, thus circumventing the main systematic
bias in traditional cluster counts studies. With the aid of the BAHAMAS suite
of cosmological hydrodynamical simulations, we demonstrate the potential of the
velocity dispersion counts for discriminating even similar CDM models.
These predictions can be compared with the results from existing redshift
surveys such as the highly-complete Galaxy And Mass Assembly (GAMA) survey, and
upcoming wide-field spectroscopic surveys such as the Wide Area Vista
Extragalactic Survey (WAVES) and the Dark Energy Survey Instrument (DESI).Comment: 15 pages, 13 figures. Accepted for publication in MNRAS. New section
on cosmological forecasts adde
IN-SYNC. VII. Evidence for a decreasing spectroscopic binary fraction from 1 to 100 Myr within the IN-SYNC sample
We study the occurrence of spectroscopic binaries in young star-forming
regions using the INfrared Spectroscopy of Young Nebulous Clusters(IN-SYNC)
survey, carried out in SDSS-III with the APOGEE spectrograph. Multi-epoch
observations of thousands of low-mass stars in Orion A, NGC 2264, NGC 1333, IC
348, and the Pleiades have been carried out, yielding H-band spectra with a
nominal resolution of R=22,500 for sources with H 12 mag. Radial velocity
precisions of 0.3 were achieved, which we use to identify
radial velocity variations indicative of undetected companions. We use Monte
Carlo simulations to assess the types of spectroscopic binaries to which we are
sensitive, finding sensitivity to binaries with orbital periods d,
for stars with and 100 . Using Bayesian inference, we find evidence
for a decline in the spectroscopic binary fraction, by a factor of 3-4 from the
age of our pre-main-sequence sample to the Pleiades age . The significance of
this decline is weakened if spot-induced radial-velocity jitter is strong in
the sample, and is only marginally significant when comparing any one of the
pre-main-sequence clusters against the Pleiades. However, the same decline in
both sense and magnitude is found for each of the five pre-main-sequence
clusters, and the decline reaches statistical significance of greater than 95%
confidence when considering the pre-main-sequence clusters jointly. Our results
suggest that dynamical processes disrupt the widest spectroscopic binaries
( d) as clusters age, indicating that this
occurs early in the stars' evolution, while they still reside within their
nascent clusters.Comment: 21 pages, 9 Figure
Continuum description of finite-size particles advected by external flows. The effect of collisions
The equation of the density field of an assembly of macroscopic particles
advected by a hydrodynamic flow is derived from the microscopic description of
the system. This equation allows to recognize the role and the relative
importance of the different microscopic processes implicit in the model: the
driving of the external flow, the inertia of the particles, and the collisions
among them.
The validity of the density description is confirmed by comparisons of
numerical studies of the continuum equation with Direct Simulation Monte Carlo
(DSMC) simulations of hard disks advected by a chaotic flow. We show that the
collisions have two competing roles: a dispersing-like effect and a clustering
effect (even for elastic collisions). An unexpected feature is also observed in
the system: the presence of collisions can reverse the effect of inertia, so
that grains with lower inertia are more clusterized.Comment: Final (strongly modified) version accepted in PRE; 6 pages, 3 figure
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