Application of Raman diagnostics to combustion

The use of laser Raman diagnostic techniques to measure the specie concentrations and their temperatures in combustion flow fields is discussed. The system designed to measure the specie concentrations, which included a ruby laser and a photodiode to trip the laser at the maximum light and heat output of the combustion process, is described and problems encountered in developing the system are reported. Photographs of the combustion process are presented and analyzed detailing the evolution of the combustion in terms of the photodiode and the lack of a noticeable Raman-Stokes signal. The absence of the Raman-Stokes signal is discussed

Information Matters in Tax Enforcement

Most scholars recognize both that the government needs information about taxpayers’ transactions to determine whether their reporting is honest, and that third third-party reporting helps the government obtain that information. Given governments’ reliance on tax collections, it would be risky to think that information or third third-party reporting is not needed by tax agencies. However, a recent article by Professor Wei Cui asserts that “modern governments can practice ‘taxation without information.’” Professor Cui’s argument rests on two claims: (1) “giving governments effective access to taxpayer information through third parties does not explain the success of modern tax administration” because, he argues, some important taxes taxes—such as the value added tax (VAT) VAT)—do not involve information reporting; and (2) modern tax administration succeeds because “business firms” are “sites of social cooperation under the rule of law,” fostering compliance. Both arguments are mistaken. As this Article demonstrates, third third-party information reporting is highly effective, third third-party reporting is used to enforce VATs, and firms are not inherently compliant. In fact, where individuals report on firms, firms’ compliance increases. This supports the intuitive notion that third third-party reporting increases tax compliance and that information matters in tax enforcement

King v. Burwell: What Does It Portend for Chevron\u27s Domain?

In King v. Burwell, the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed the Fourth Circuit’s decision, upholding regulations that extend the Premium Tax Credit (the Credit) to qualifying taxpayers who purchase health insurance on the Internet-based “Marketplace” operated by the federal Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), despite statutory language extending the subsidy to individuals who purchase through “an Exchange established by the State.” This was the second time in just three years that the Roberts Court engaged in what one critic called “linguistic acrobatics” that rescued President Obama’s signature healthcare law, the Affordable Care Act (ACA)—or, as Justice Scalia derisively called it, “SCOTUScare”—from attacks that would have gutted its core provisions. While the King Court could have achieved the same result by deferring to Treasury’s interpretation in the regulation the plaintiffs were challenging, it elected not to defer. Instead, the Court rejected the application of Chevron and, declaring King an “extraordinary case[],” conducted its own interpretation of the ACA. Thus, the Court reached a pro-government result without deferring to an agency rule. After King, scholars and lower courts may find themselves struggling with the contrast between decisions that seem to expand agency power and those that find Chevron inapplicable. Accordingly, this Essay analyzes what King suggests about the future of Chevron deference. Part I considers the King majority’s treatment of Chevron. Part II examines the effect of the Court’s lack of deference in King. The Essay concludes that although King was an “extraordinary case” for the Court, Chevron’s heyday may be on the wane

King v. Burwell: What Does It Portend for Chevron’s Domain?

This short Essay considers what the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in King v. Burwell, 135 S. Ct. 2480 (2015), suggests about the future of Chevron deference. It first compares the Court’s approach in King with its approach in two other “extraordinary” nondeference cases, FDA v. Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp. and Gonzales v. Oregon. It next situates King in a broader context of developments in the Court’s Chevron jurisprudence. The Essay concludes that, while King may simply be a sui generis case involving an important social program, it may also signal a fading appetite for deference among the Justices. - See more at: http://pepperdinelawreview.com/the-impact-of-king-v-burwell/#sthash.EaFb9gwN.dpu

Recent Results on Nonlinear Elliptic Free Boundary Problems

In this paper we give an overview of some recent and older results concerning free boundary problems governed by elliptic operators

Effect of carrier recombination on ultrafast carrier dynamics in thin films of the topological insulator Bi2Se3

Transient reflectivity (TR) from thin films (6 - 40 nm thick) of the topological insulator Bi2Se3 reveal ultrafast carrier dynamics, which suggest the existence of both radiative and non-radiative recombination between electrons residing in the upper cone of initially unoccupied high energy Dirac surface states (SS) and holes residing in the lower cone of occupied low energy Dirac SS. The modeling of measured TR traces allowed us to conclude that recombination is induced by the depletion of bulk electrons in films below ~20 nm thick due to the charge captured on the surface defects. We predict that such recombination processes can be observed using time-resolved photoluminescence techniques

Effects of hydrogen/deuterium absorption on the magnetic properties of Co/Pd multilayers

The effects of hydrogen (H2) and deuterium (D2) absorption were studied in two Co/Pd multilayers with perpendicular magnetic anisotropy (PMA) using polarized neutron reflectivity (PNR). PNR was measured in an external magnetic field H applied in the plane of the sample with the magnetization M confined in the plane for {\mu}_o H= 6.0 T and partially out of plane at 0.65 T. Nominal thicknesses of the Co and Pd layers were 2.5 {\AA} and 21 {\AA}, respectively. Because of these small values, the actual layer chemical composition, thickness, and interface roughness parameters were determined from the nuclear scattering length density profile ({\rho}_n) and its derivative obtained from both x-ray reflectivity and PNR, and uncertainties were determined using Monte Carlo analysis. The PNR {\rho}_n showed that although D2 absorption occurred throughout the samples, absorption in the multilayer stack was modest (0.02 D per Pd atom) and thus did not expand. Direct magnetometry showed that H2 absorption decreased the total M at saturation and increased the component of M in the plane of the sample when not at saturation. The PNR magnetic scattering length density ({\rho}_m) revealed that the Pd layers in the multilayer stack were magnetized and that their magnetization was preferentially modified upon D2 absorption. In one sample, a modulation of M with twice the multilayer period was observed at {\mu}_o H= 0.65 T, which increased upon D2 absorption. These results indicate that H2 or D2 absorption decreases both the PMA and total magnetization of the samples. The lack of measurable expansion during absorption indicates that these changes are primarily governed by modification of the electronic structure of the material.Comment: to appear in Physics review B, 201

The Symmetries of Nature

The study of the symmetries of nature has fascinated scientists for eons. The application of the formal mathematical description of symmetries during the last century has produced many breakthroughs in our understanding of the substructure of matter. In this talk, a number of these advances are discussed, and the important role that George Sudarshan played in their development is emphasize

Ferrimagnetism of dilute Ising antiferromagnets

It is shown that nearest-neighbor antiferromagnetic interactions of identical Ising spins on imbalanced bipartite lattice and imbalanced bipartite hierarchical fractal result in ferrimagnetic order instead of antiferromagnetic one. On some crystal lattices dilute Ising antiferromagnets may also become ferrimagnets due to the imbalanced nature of the magnetic percolation cluster when it coexists with the percolation cluster of vacancies. As evidenced by the existing experiments on $Fe_pZn_{1-p}F_2$, such ferrimagnetism is inherent property of bcc lattice so thermodynamics of these compounds at low $p$ can be similar to that of antiferromagnet on imbalanced hierarchical fractal.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figure