938 research outputs found
Furrow irrigation erosion and its control
Furrow erosion was recognized as a serious problem damaging cropland 40
years ago (Israelson et al., 1946), and attempts to quantify soil loss in
relation to furrow stream size and slope were made then and in the following
few years (Gardner and Lauritzen, 1946; Mech, 1959). However, little attention
was given to these studies, and the furrow erosion problem continued without
much effort to correct it for another 25 years. In the early 1970's water
quality legislation was directed towards reducing sediment, nutrients and
biocides in irrigation return flows. As scientists began to develop methods
to improve the quality of irrigation return flows in response to this legislation,
some questions were raised about the sources of these pollutants. Brown et el.,
(1974), and Carter at al., (1974) reported sediment and phosphorus inflows,
outflows, and balances for two large irrigation tracts in south central Idaho.
They found large quantities of sediment and associated phosphorus were being
lost from many irrigated fields. Research has progressed during the life of
the STEEP project, and much new information about erosion and sediment loss
has been reported both at Kimberly, Idaho, and Prosser, Washington. This paper
is a summary of the progress made towards understanding and controlling irrigation
erosion and sediment loss
Furrow Irrigation Erosion and Its Control
Furrow erosion was recognized as a serious problem damaging cropland 40
years ago (Israelson et al., 1946), and attempts to quantify soil loss in
relation to furrow stream size and slope were made then and in the following
few years (Gardner and Lauritzen, 1946; Mach, 1959). However, little attention
was given to these studies, and the furrow erosion problem continued without
much effort to correct it for another 25 years. In the early 1970's water
quality legislation was directed towards reducing sediment, nutrients and
biocides in irrigation return flows. As scientists began to develop methods
to improve the quality of irrigation return flows in response to this legislation,
some questions were raised about the sources of these pollutants. Brown et al.,
(1974), and Carter et al., (1974) reported sediment and phosphorus inflows,
outflows, and balances for two large irrigation tracts in south central Idaho.
They found large quantities of sediment and associated phosphorus were being
lost from many irrigated fields. Research has progressed during the life of
the STEEP project, and much new information about erosion and sediment loss
has been reported both at Kimberly, Idaho, and Prosser, Washington. This paper
is a summary of the progress made towards understanding and controlling irrigation
erosion and sediment loss
Instabilities in the two-dimensional cubic nonlinear Schrodinger equation
The two-dimensional cubic nonlinear Schrodinger equation (NLS) can be used as
a model of phenomena in physical systems ranging from waves on deep water to
pulses in optical fibers. In this paper, we establish that every
one-dimensional traveling wave solution of NLS with trivial phase is unstable
with respect to some infinitesimal perturbation with two-dimensional structure.
If the coefficients of the linear dispersion terms have the same sign then the
only unstable perturbations have transverse wavelength longer than a
well-defined cut-off. If the coefficients of the linear dispersion terms have
opposite signs, then there is no such cut-off and as the wavelength decreases,
the maximum growth rate approaches a well-defined limit.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure
Stochastic Model for Surface Erosion Via Ion-Sputtering: Dynamical Evolution from Ripple Morphology to Rough Morphology
Surfaces eroded by ion-sputtering are sometimes observed to develop
morphologies which are either ripple (periodic), or rough (non-periodic). We
introduce a discrete stochastic model that allows us to interpret these
experimental observations within a unified framework. We find that a periodic
ripple morphology characterizes the initial stages of the evolution, whereas
the surface displays self-affine scaling in the later time regime. Further, we
argue that the stochastic continuum equation describing the surface height is a
noisy version of the Kuramoto-Sivashinsky equation.Comment: 4 pages, 7 postscript figs., Revtex, to appear in Phys. Rev. Let
Ratios of Elastic Scattering of Pions from 3H and 3He
We have measured the elastic-scattering ratios of normalized yields for
charged pions from 3H and 3He in the backward hemisphere. At 180 MeV, we
completed the angular distribution begun with our earlier measurements, adding
six data points in the angular range of 119 deg to 169 deg in the pi-nucleus
center of mass. We also measured an excitation function with data points at
142, 180, 220, and 256 MeV incident pion energy at the largest achievable angle
for each energy between 160 deg and 170 deg in the pi-nucleus center of mass.
This excitation function corresponds to the energies of our forward-hemisphere
studies. The data, taken as a whole, show an apparent role reversal of the two
charge-symmetric ratios r1 and r2 in the backward hemisphere. Also, for data >
100 deg we observe a strong dependence on the four-momentum transfer squared
(-t) for all of the ratios regardless of pion energy or scattering angle, and
we find that the superratio R data match very well with calculations based on
the forward-hemisphere data that predicts the value of the difference between
the even-nucleon radii of 3H and 3He. Comparisons are also made with recent
calculations incorporating different wave functions and double scattering
models.Comment: RevTex 8pages, 12 figure file
An Equation of State of a Carbon-Fibre Epoxy Composite under Shock Loading
An anisotropic equation of state (EOS) is proposed for the accurate
extrapolation of high-pressure shock Hugoniot (anisotropic and isotropic)
states to other thermodynamic (anisotropic and isotropic) states for a shocked
carbon-fibre epoxy composite (CFC) of any symmetry. The proposed EOS, using a
generalised decomposition of a stress tensor [Int. J. Plasticity \textbf{24},
140 (2008)], represents a mathematical and physical generalisation of the
Mie-Gr\"{u}neisen EOS for isotropic material and reduces to this equation in
the limit of isotropy. Although a linear relation between the generalised
anisotropic bulk shock velocity and particle velocity was
adequate in the through-thickness orientation, damage softening process
produces discontinuities both in value and slope in the -
relation. Therefore, the two-wave structure (non-linear anisotropic and
isotropic elastic waves) that accompanies damage softening process was proposed
for describing CFC behaviour under shock loading. The linear relationship
- over the range of measurements corresponding to non-linear
anisotropic elastic wave shows a value of (the intercept of the
- curve) that is in the range between first and second
generalised anisotropic bulk speed of sound [Eur. Phys. J. B \textbf{64}, 159
(2008)]. An analytical calculation showed that Hugoniot Stress Levels (HELs) in
different directions for a CFC composite subject to the two-wave structure
(non-linear anisotropic elastic and isotropic elastic waves) agree with
experimental measurements at low and at high shock intensities. The results are
presented, discussed and future studies are outlined.Comment: 12 pages, 9 figure
Estimating the parameters of the Sgr A* black hole
The measurement of relativistic effects around the galactic center may allow
in the near future to strongly constrain the parameters of the supermassive
black hole likely present at the galactic center (Sgr A*). As a by-product of
these measurements it would be possible to severely constrain, in addition,
also the parameters of the mass-density distributions of both the innermost
star cluster and the dark matter clump around the galactic center.Comment: Accepted for publication on General Relativity and Gravitation, 2010.
11 Pages, 1 Figur
Rotating metrics admitting non-perfect fluids in General Relativity
In this paper, by applying Newman-Janis algorithm in spherical symmetric
metrics, a class of embedded rotating solutions of field equations is
presented. These solutions admit non-perfect fluidsComment: LaTex, 39 page
Tensor-scalar gravity and binary-pulsar experiments
Some recently discovered nonperturbative strong-field effects in
tensor-scalar theories of gravitation are interpreted as a scalar analog of
ferromagnetism: "spontaneous scalarization". This phenomenon leads to very
significant deviations from general relativity in conditions involving strong
gravitational fields, notably binary-pulsar experiments. Contrary to
solar-system experiments, these deviations do not necessarily vanish when the
weak-field scalar coupling tends to zero. We compute the scalar "form factors"
measuring these deviations, and notably a parameter entering the pulsar timing
observable gamma through scalar-field-induced variations of the inertia moment
of the pulsar. An exploratory investigation of the confrontation between
tensor-scalar theories and binary-pulsar experiments shows that nonperturbative
scalar field effects are already very tightly constrained by published data on
three binary-pulsar systems. We contrast the probing power of pulsar
experiments with that of solar-system ones by plotting the regions they exclude
in a generic two-dimensional plane of tensor-scalar theories.Comment: 35 pages, REVTeX 3.0, uses epsf.tex to include 9 Postscript figure
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