2,624 research outputs found
Investigation of the aerodynamic characteristics and wing-deployment transients of the NASA DL-4 body with a sailwing landing aid Final report
Aerodynamic characteristics and wing deployment transients of NASA DL-4 lifting body fitted with sailwing landing ai
A Simple Quantum Model of Ultracold Polar Molecule Collisions
We present a unified formalism for describing chemical reaction rates of
trapped, ultracold molecules. This formalism reduces the scattering to its
essential features, namely, a propagation of the reactant molecules through a
gauntlet of long-range forces before they ultimately encounter one another,
followed by a probability for the reaction to occur once they do. In this way,
the electric-field dependence should be readily parametrized in terms of a pair
of fitting parameters (along with a coefficient) for each asymptotic
value of partial wave quantum numbers . From this, the electric
field dependence of the collision rates follows automatically. We present
examples for reactive species such as KRb, and non-reactive species, such as
RbCs
p-wave Feshbach molecules
We have produced and detected molecules using a p-wave Feshbach resonance
between 40K atoms. We have measured the binding energy and lifetime for these
molecules and we find that the binding energy scales approximately linearly
with magnetic field near the resonance. The lifetime of bound p-wave molecules
is measured to be 1.0 +/- 0.1 ms and 2.3 +/- 0.2 ms for the m_l = +/- 1 and m_l
= 0 angular momentum projections, respectively. At magnetic fields above the
resonance, we detect quasi-bound molecules whose lifetime is set by the
tunneling rate through the centrifugal barrier
Methane emissions from western Siberian wetlands: heterogeneity and sensitivity to climate change
The prediction of methane emissions from high-latitude wetlands is important given concerns about their sensitivity to a warming climate. As a basis for the prediction of wetland methane emissions at regional scales, we coupled the variable infiltration capacity macroscale hydrological model (VIC) with the biosphere–energy-transfer–hydrology terrestrial ecosystem model (BETHY) and a wetland methane emissions model to make large-scale estimates of methane emissions as a function of soil temperature, water table depth, and net primary productivity (NPP), with a parameterization of the sub-grid heterogeneity of the water table depth based on TOPMODEL. We simulated the methane emissions from a 100 km × 100 km region of western Siberia surrounding the Bakchar Bog, for a retrospective baseline period of 1980–1999 and have evaluated their sensitivity to increases in temperature of 0–5 °C and increases in precipitation of 0–15%. The interactions of temperature and precipitation, through their effects on the water table depth, played an important role in determining methane emissions from these wetlands. The balance between these effects varied spatially, and their net effect depended in part on sub-grid topographic heterogeneity. Higher temperatures alone increased methane production in saturated areas, but caused those saturated areas to shrink in extent, resulting in a net reduction in methane emissions. Higher precipitation alone raised water tables and expanded the saturated area, resulting in a net increase in methane emissions. Combining a temperature increase of 3 °C and an increase of 10% in precipitation to represent climate conditions that may pertain in western Siberia at the end of this century resulted in roughly a doubling in annual emissions
Total angular momentum representation for atom-molecule collisions in electric fields
It is shown that the atom-molecule collision problem in the presence of an
external electric field can be solved using the total angular momentum
representation in the body-fixed coordinated frame, leading to a
computationally efficient method for ab initio modeling of low-temperature
scattering phenomena. Our calculations demonstrate rapid convergence of the
cross sections for vibrational and Stark relaxation in He-CaD collisions with
the number of total angular momentum states in the basis set, leading to a
5-100 fold increase in computational efficiency over the previously used
methods based on the fully uncoupled space-fixed representation. These results
open up the possibility of carrying out numerically converged quantum
scattering calculations on a wide array of atom-molecule collisions and
chemical reactions in the presence of electric fields.Comment: 19 pages, 3 figures, 1 tabl
A Dielectric Superfluid of Polar Molecules
We show that, under achievable experimental conditions, a Bose-Einstein
condensate (BEC) of polar molecules can exhibit dielectric character. In
particular, we derive a set of self-consistent mean-field equations that couple
the condensate density to its electric dipole field, leading to the emergence
of polarization modes that are coupled to the rich quasiparticle spectrum of
the condensate. While the usual roton instability is suppressed in this system,
the coupling can give rise to a phonon-like instability that is characteristic
of a dielectric material with a negative static dielectric function.Comment: Version published in New Journal of Physics, 11+ pages, 4 figure
Measurement and Modeling of Infrared Nonlinear Absorption Coefficients and Laser-induced Damage Thresholds in Ge and GaSb
Using a simultaneous fitting technique to extract nonlinear absorption coefficients from data at two pulse widths, we measure two-photon and free-carrier absorption coefficients for Ge and GaSb at 2.05 and 2.5 μm for the first time, to our knowledge. Results agreed well with published theory. Single-shot damage thresholds were also measured at 2.5 μm and agreed well with modeled thresholds using experimentally determined parameters including nonlinear absorption coefficients and temperature dependent linear absorption. The damage threshold for a single-layer Al2O3 anti-reflective coating on Ge was 55% or 35% lower than the uncoated threshold for picosecond or nanosecond pulses, respectively
Ultracold collisions of oxygen molecules
Collision cross sections and rate constants between two ground- state oxygen
molecules are investigated theoretically at translational energies below K and in zero magnetic field. We present calculations for elastic and spin-
changing inelastic collision rates for different isotopic combinations of
oxygen atoms as a prelude to understanding their collisional stability in
ultracold magnetic traps. A numerical analysis has been made in the framework
of a rigid- rotor model that accounts fully for the singlet, triplet, and
quintet potential energy surfaces in this system. The results offer insights
into the effectiveness of evaporative cooling and the properties of molecular
Bose- Einstein condensates, as well as estimates of collisional lifetimes in
magnetic traps. Specifically, looks like a good candidate for
ultracold studies, while is unlikely to survive evaporative
cooling. Since is representative of a wide class of molecules that
are paramagnetic in their ground state we conclude that many molecules can be
successfully magnetically trapped at ultralow temperatures.Comment: 15 pages, 9 figure
V/STOL lift fan commercial short haul transports: Continuing conceptual design study
A design study of commercial V/STOL transport airplanes for a 1985 operational time period has been made. The baseline mission considered was 400 nmi at a cruise speed of M = 0.75 and a 100-passenger payload with VTOL. Variations from the baseline included mission distance, payload, cruise speed, and propulsion system failure philosophy. All designs used propulsion systems consisting of multiple gas generators driving remote tip turbine lift and lift/cruise fans. By considering the fan to be designed for operational reliability, significant simplication of the airplane systems and reduction in airplane size and cost can be achieved
Fermionization of two distinguishable fermions
In this work we study a system of two distinguishable fermions in a 1D
harmonic potential. This system has the exceptional property that there is an
analytic solution for arbitrary values of the interparticle interaction. We
tune the interaction strength via a magnetic offset field and compare the
measured properties of the system to the theoretical prediction. At the point
where the interaction strength diverges, the energy and square of the wave
function for two distinguishable particles are the same as for a system of two
identical fermions. This is referred to as fermionization. We have observed
this phenomenon by directly comparing two distinguishable fermions with
diverging interaction strength with two identical fermions in the same
potential. We observe good agreement between experiment and theory. By adding
one or more particles our system can be used as a quantum simulator for more
complex few-body systems where no theoretical solution is available
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