Measuring H0 from the 6dF Galaxy Survey and future low-redshift surveys

Baryon acoustic oscillations (BAO) at low redshift provide a precise and largely model-independent way to measure the Hubble constant, H0. The 6dF Galaxy Survey measurement of the BAO scale gives a value of H0 = 67 +/- 3.2 km/s/Mpc, achieving a 1-sigma precision of 5%. With improved analysis techniques, the planned WALLABY (HI) and TAIPAN (optical) redshift surveys are predicted to measure H0 to 1-3% precision.Comment: Proceedings of IAU Symposium 289, "Advancing the Physics of Cosmic Distances", Richard de Grijs & Giuseppe Bono (eds), 2012, 4p

Topological Symmetry Groups of Complete Bipartite Graphs

The symmetries of complex molecular structures can be modeled by the {\em topological symmetry group} of the underlying embedded graph. It is therefore important to understand which topological symmetry groups can be realized by particular abstract graphs. This question has been answered for complete graphs; it is natural next to consider complete bipartite graphs. In previous work we classified the complete bipartite graphs that can realize topological symmetry groups isomorphic to $A_4$, $S_4$ or $A_5$; in this paper we determine which complete bipartite graphs have an embedding in $S^3$ whose topological symmetry group is isomorphic to $\mathbb{Z}_m$, $D_m$, $\mathbb{Z}_r \times \mathbb{Z}_s$ or $(\mathbb{Z}_r \times \mathbb{Z}_s) \ltimes \mathbb{Z}_2$.Comment: 26 pages, minor revisions; this is the final version accepted by Tokyo Journal of Mathematic

Development of an Optimized Delivery Method of Surface Irradiation Using an Electron Beam

Food safety has long been a nationwide concern. In 2011 alone, 731 outbreaks of foodborne illness were documented in the United States. These outbreaks resulted in over 13,000 illnesses, almost 900 people hospitalized and 45 deaths. The FDA has approved food irradiation as one method to combat foodborne illness. This research aims to develop a method, using electron scattering, to reduce the maximum to minimum dose ratio over the surface of a cantaloupe while also maintaining the electron penetration depth sufficient to provide an adequate dose throughout the rind. This research utilized a set of Monte Carlo N-Particle eXtended (MCNPX) decks to calculate the dose received by a cantaloupe passing under a 10 MeV electron beam. The decks also included metallic reflectors, to scatter the electron beam, to achieve a more uniform surface dose distribution. Dose distributions as a function of surface position and depth were obtained, and a surface dose map and dose depth curves were generated for each reflector plate model. It was shown that the surface dose ratio can be reduced from 83505 to 2.176 with the use of metallic reflectors. Additionally, the scattered electrons have sufficient energy to provide adequate dose throughout the rind to combat bacteria internalization without delivering a dose that might damage the texture of the interior of the cantaloupe. This technique could be easily extended to irradiate the surface of other medium-sized objects

The NASA-IGES geometry data visualizer

NIGESview, an interactive software tool for reading, viewing, and translating geometry data available in the Initial Graphics Exchange Specification (IGES) format, is described. NIGESview is designed to read a variety of IGES entities, translate some of the entities, graphically view the data, and output a file in a specific IGES format. The software provides a modern graphical user interface and is designed in a modular fashion so developers can utilize all or part of the code in their grid generation software for computational fluid dynamics

What\u27s so private about private property?

This work attempts to determine what kinds of institutions—if any—the state should implement to protect private property, and investigates how individuals and communities operating within those institutions ought to behave. Because the laws produced by such institutions may conflict with community rights, social welfare, and justice, the political authorities—including judges and legislators—who operate the institutions must determine whether, and under what conditions, individual property rights ought to prevail over conflicting rights. I argue that considerations of privacy are necessary for making these determinations. Privacy—the condition that requires limitations upon the ability of others to access one’s physical spaces—has normative significance for moral behavior as well as for constitutional law and politics. Privacy’s value is promoted through private property rights, which are themselves shaped by the normative aspects of privacy. Because private property is valuable due to its intricate relationship to the promotion of privacy, states and communities ought to be able to infringe upon private property only to the extent they may infringe upon other privacy-oriented rights and interests. This infringement is encapsulated in the political act of eminent domain (or expropriation), which permits states to take private property for public use. Moral theory clarifies the role of law as political authorities use eminent domain to negotiate between private and community interests. In this work, I describe several such theories and then provide a contemporary property theory that claims the theory as an ancestor. I then ask the following questions: does this property theory facilitate eminent domain—the transfer of property from private to public—or does it make eminent domain more difficult by protecting private property against expropriation? I argue for a private property right that enjoys the same constitutional protection, known as strict scrutiny, as the privacy right, and conclude that the privacy aspects of property are best protected by a takings jurisprudence that v restructures the definition of takings based upon a reappraisal of the role of just compensation, a more narrow conception of public use, and a better understanding of how privacy interests can be objectified in physical spaces

NASA data exchange standards for computational fluid dynamics

This paper covers the following topics in viewgraph format: purpose of data exchange standards; data exchange in engineering analysis/CFD; geometry data exchange through existing product data exchange standards, NASA Data Exchange Committee, and NASA-IGES (Initial Graphics Exchange Specification); CFD grid and solution data exchange; and data exchange for multi-disciplinary engineering

Development of an Optimized Delivery Method of Surface Irradiation Using an Electron Beam

Food safety has long been a nationwide concern. In 2011 alone, 731 outbreaks of foodborne illness were documented in the United States. These outbreaks resulted in over 13,000 illnesses, almost 900 people hospitalized and 45 deaths. The FDA has approved food irradiation as one method to combat foodborne illness. This research aims to develop a method, using electron scattering, to reduce the maximum to minimum dose ratio over the surface of a cantaloupe while also maintaining the electron penetration depth sufficient to provide an adequate dose throughout the rind. This research utilized a set of Monte Carlo N-Particle eXtended (MCNPX) decks to calculate the dose received by a cantaloupe passing under a 10 MeV electron beam. The decks also included metallic reflectors, to scatter the electron beam, to achieve a more uniform surface dose distribution. Dose distributions as a function of surface position and depth were obtained, and a surface dose map and dose depth curves were generated for each reflector plate model. It was shown that the surface dose ratio can be reduced from 83505 to 2.176 with the use of metallic reflectors. Additionally, the scattered electrons have sufficient energy to provide adequate dose throughout the rind to combat bacteria internalization without delivering a dose that might damage the texture of the interior of the cantaloupe. This technique could be easily extended to irradiate the surface of other medium-sized objects

Measurement of Star-Formation Rate from H-alpha in field galaxies at z=1

We report the results of J-band infrared spectroscopy of a sample of 13 z=1 field galaxies drawn from the Canada-France Redshift Survey, targeting galaxies whose redshifts place the rest frame H-alpha line emission from HII regions in between the bright night sky OH lines. As a result we detect emission down to a flux limit of ~10^{-16} ergs cm^{-2} s^{-1} corresponding to a luminosity limit of ~10^{41} ergs at this redshift for a H_0=50 km s^{-1} Mpc,^{-1} q_0=0.5 cosmology. From these luminosities we derive estimates of the star-formation rates in these galaxies which are independent of previous estimates based upon their rest-frame ultraviolet (2800A) luminosity. The mean star-formation rate at z=1, from this sample, is found to be at least three times as high as the ultraviolet estimates. The standard dust extinction in these galaxies is inferred to be A_V=0.5-1.0 mags, comparable to local field galaxies, suggesting that the bulk of star-formation is not heavily obscured unless one uses greyer extinction laws. Star-forming galaxies have the bluest colours and a preponderance of disturbed/interacting morphologies. We also investigate the effects of particular star-formation histories, in particular the role of bursts vs continuous star-formation in changing the detailed distribution of UV to H-alpha emission. Generally we find that models dominated by short, overlapping, bursts at typically 0.2 Gyr intervals provide a better model for the data than a constant rate of star-formation. The star-formation history of the Universe from Balmer lines is compiled and found to be typically 2--3\times higher than that inferred from the UV {\em at all redshifts}. It can not yet be clearly established whether the star-formation rate falls off or remains constant at high-redshift.Comment: 15 pages including 8 figures. MNRAS in pres

Geographic Distribution and Harvest Dynamics of the Eastern Spotted Skunk in Arkansas

The eastern spotted skunk (Spilogale putorius) is a small carnivore found across much of the central and southeastern United States, and while once common, this species has become rare in most obits range. We used harvest records collected by the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission from 1941-2004 to examine historic and current distribution and long-term harvest dynamics of this species in Arkansas. Eastern spotted skunks have historically been most common in the Ozarks and the Ouachitas though the species appears to have been present, but uncommon, in the Gulf Coastal Plain and in some counties in southeastern Arkansas near the Mississippi River. Annual harvests declined precipitously during the 1940s and 1950s, from \u3e1,800 animals in 1942 t

The NASA-IGES geometry data exchange standard

Described here are the data exchange efforts and plans supported by the NASA Steering Committee for Surface Modeling and Grid Generation. Current methods for geometry data exchange between computer aided design (CAD) systems and NASA computational fluid dynamics (CFD) analysis systems are tedious and induce errors. A Geometry Data Exchange Standard is proposed, utilizing a subset of an existing national standard titled Initial Graphic Exchange Standard (IGES). Future plans for data exchange standardization include all aspects of CFD data. Software systems to utilize this NASA-IGES Geometry Data Exchange Specification are under development