5,711 research outputs found
Constitutional Law - Jury Selection - Peremptory Challenges
The United States Supreme Court held that intentional gender discrimination by state actors when exercising peremptory challenges in the jury selection process violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
J.E.B. v. Alabama ex rel. T.B., 114 S. Ct. 1419 (1994)
Efficient numerical approaches for predicting supersonic flows with viscous-inviscid interaction
Three different approaches for efficiently computing supersonic flow fields with strong viscous/inviscid interaction are critically examined. First, the single-pass philosophy employed for the solution of the parabolized Navier-Stokes (PNS) equations is considered. Through study of a model problem, the divergent space-marching solution that occurs when the streamwise pressure gradient is approximated using a backward difference is shown to be the response of the numerical algorithm to an ill-posed problem. In addition, it is shown that the so-called minimum marching step size is related to the longest wavelength that the finite-difference mesh is capable of resolving, not the thickness of the subsonic layer. Based on comparisons with other computed results, the single-pass philosophy is inadequate purely from the standpoint that it suppresses the streamwise elliptic behavior present in the solution;A second-order global pressure iteration (GPI) algorithm is developed using the Vigneron splitting to determine the portion of the streamwise pressure gradient that is responsible for streamwise elliptic behavior. A second-order finite-difference scheme is developed from a heuristic stability analysis of a model problem. A GPI algorithm is discussed in terms of upwind relaxation schemes that appear in the literature. For flows with streamwise separation, the FLARE approximation is employed to stabilize the iteration. Results predicted using the GPI algorithm show good agreement with results presented in the literature;In addition to the GPI algorithm, a new second-order algorithm is developed using a hybrid approach. The standard conservative PNS algorithm is employed in the outer supersonic flow, while in the subsonic region near the wall a split coefficient matrix (SCM) scheme is used to determine the direction of differencing for the streamwise convective flux vector. The second-order streamwise differencing scheme developed for the GPI algorithm is used in the SCM scheme while central differencing is employed for the transverse derivatives. Results predicted using the hybrid algorithm are very similar to results predicted using the GPI scheme except in the regions of reversed flow. The hybrid algorithm is less efficient than the GPI algorithm but more robust
Measuring dark matter ellipticity of Abell 901/902 using Particle Based Lensing
We present a non-parametric measure of the ellipticity and the alignment of
the dark matter halos in Abell 901/902 supercluster. This super-cluster is a
system of four separate peaks in a field of
view. We map the mass distribution of each individual peak using an improved
version of Particle Based Lensing (PBL) and measure the ellipticity of the dark
matter halos associated with two of the peaks directly from the mass map and by
fitting them to a singular isothermal ellipse. The parametric and
non-parametric measurements are consistent for A901b while the position angle
for the Southwest Group is different for the two techniques. We account for
this discrepancy to substructure present in the Southwest Peak. We estimate an
axis ratio of for A901b and for the
Southwest Group.Comment: submitted to APJ, 25 pages, 13 figure
A Comparison of Simple Mass Estimators for Galaxy Clusters
High-resolution N-body simulations are used to investigate systematic trends
in the mass profiles and total masses of clusters as derived from 3 simple
estimators: (1) the weak gravitational lensing shear field under the assumption
of an isothermal cluster potential, (2) the dynamical mass obtained from the
measured velocity dispersion under the assumption of an isothermal cluster
potential, and (3) the classical virial estimator. The clusters consist of
order 2.5e+05 particles of mass m_p \simeq 10^{10} \Msun, have triaxial mass
distributions, and significant substructure exists within their virial radii.
Not surprisingly, the level of agreement between the mass profiles obtained
from the various estimators and the actual mass profiles is found to be
scale-dependent.
The virial estimator yields a good measurement of the total cluster mass,
though it is systematically underestimated by of order 10%. This result
suggests that, at least in the limit of ideal data, the virial estimator is
quite robust to deviations from pure spherical symmetry and the presence of
substructure. The dynamical mass estimate based upon a measurement of the
cluster velocity dispersion and an assumption of an isothermal potential yields
a poor measurement of the total mass. The weak lensing estimate yields a very
good measurement of the total mass, provided the mean shear used to determine
the equivalent cluster velocity dispersion is computed from an average of the
lensing signal over the entire cluster (i.e. the mean shear is computed
interior to the virial radius). [abridged]Comment: Accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal. Complete
paper, including 3 large colour figures can also be obtained from
http://bu-ast.bu.edu/~brainerd/preprints
MC: Subaru and Hubble Space Telescope Weak-Lensing Analysis of the Double Radio Relic Galaxy Cluster PLCK G287.0+32.9
The second most significant detection of the Planck Sunyaev Zel'dovich
survey, PLCK~G287.0+32.9 () boasts two similarly bright radio relics
and a radio halo. One radio relic is located kpc northwest of the
X-ray peak and the other Mpc to the southeast. This large difference
suggests that a complex merging scenario is required. A key missing puzzle for
the merging scenario reconstruction is the underlying dark matter distribution
in high resolution. We present a joint Subaru Telescope and {\it Hubble Space
Telescope} weak-lensing analysis of the cluster. Our analysis shows that the
mass distribution features four significant substructures. Of the
substructures, a primary cluster of mass
$M_{200\text{c}}=1.59^{+0.25}_{-0.22}\times 10^{15} \ h^{-1}_{70} \
\text{M}_{\odot}M_{200\text{c}}=1.16^{+0.15}_{-0.13}\times 10^{14} \ h^{-1}_{70} \
\text{M}_{\odot}\sim 400\sim 2M_{200\text{c}}=1.68^{+0.22}_{-0.20}\times
10^{14} \ h^{-1}_{70} \ \text{M}_{\odot}M_{200\text{c}}=1.87^{+0.24}_{-0.22}\times 10^{14} \ h^{-1}_{70} \
\text{M}_{\odot}$, is northwest of the X-ray peak and beyond the NW radio
relic.Comment: 19 pages, 14 figures; Accepted to Ap
Grave Negotiations: The Rhetorical Foundations of American World War I Cemeteries in Europe
This dissertation uncovers the processes of negotiation between private citizens, President Woodrow Wilson's administration, the War Department, and the Commission of Fine Arts that led to the establishment and final visual presentation of the United States permanent World War I cemeteries in Europe (sites that are still frequented by tens of thousands of international visitors each year). It employs archival research and the analysis of newspapers and photographs to recover the voices of the many stakeholders involved in the cemeteries' foundation. Whereas previous studies have attempted to understand American World War I commemoration practices by focusing on postwar rituals of remembrance alone, my study contextualizes and explains postwar commemoration by analyzing the political ideologies, public rhetoric, and material realities of the war years (1914-1918)—ideologies, rhetoric, and material realities that shaped official and vernacular projects of memory after the Armistice. Providing what I believe is the first complete history of American World War I cemeteries in Europe, my dissertation situates these rhetorically charged sites within contemporary political debates about what it meant for U.S. soldiers to die on foreign soil; what would constitute the "proper" treatment and commemoration of the nation's war dead; how much control the U.S. government should have over the lives and bodies of American citizens; and, how best to communicate the nation's image to international populations
C3NN: Cosmological Correlator Convolutional Neural Network -- an interpretable machine learning tool for cosmological analyses
Modern cosmological research in large scale structure has witnessed an
increasing number of applications of machine learning methods. Among them,
Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs) have received substantial attention due to
their outstanding performance in image classification, cosmological parameter
inference and various other tasks. However, many models which make use of CNNs
are criticized as "black boxes" due to the difficulties in relating their
outputs intuitively and quantitatively to the cosmological fields under
investigation. To overcome this challenge, we present the Cosmological
Correlator Convolutional Neural Network (C3NN) -- a fusion of CNN architecture
with the framework of cosmological N-point correlation functions (NPCFs). We
demonstrate that the output of this model can be expressed explicitly in terms
of the analytically tractable NPCFs. Together with other auxiliary algorithms,
we are able to open the "black box" by quantitatively ranking different orders
of the interpretable convolution outputs based on their contribution to
classification tasks. As a proof of concept, we demonstrate this by applying
our framework to a series of binary classification tasks using Gaussian and
Log-normal random fields and relating its outputs to the analytical NPCFs
describing the two fields. Furthermore, we exhibit the model's ability to
distinguish different dark energy scenarios ( and ) using
N-body simulated weak lensing convergence maps and discuss the physical
implications coming from their interpretability. With these tests, we show that
C3NN combines advanced aspects of machine learning architectures with the
framework of cosmological NPCFs, thereby making it an exciting tool with the
potential to extract physical insights in a robust and explainable way from
observational data.Comment: 19 pages, 8 figures, 5 tables; Comments are welcome
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