499 research outputs found
Laser Doppler technology applied to atmospheric environmental operating problems
Carbon dioxide laser Doppler ground wind data were very favorably compared with data from standard anemometers. As a result of these measurements, two breadboard systems were developed for taking research data: a continuous wave velocimeter and a pulsed Doppler system. The scanning continuous wave laser Doppler velocimeter developed for detecting, tracking and measuring aircraft wake vortices was successfully tested at an airport where it located vortices to an accuracy of 3 meters at a range of 150 meters. The airborne pulsed laser Doppler system was developed to detect and measure clear air turbulence (CAT). This system was tested aboard an aircraft, but jet stream CAT was not encountered. However, low altitude turbulence in cumulus clouds near a mountain range was detected by the system and encountered by the aircraft at the predicted time
Parameters of Herbig Ae/Be and Vega-type stars
This work presents the determination of the effective temperature, gravity,
metallicity, mass, luminosity and age of 27 young early-type stars, most of
them in the age range 1-10 Myr, and three -suspected- hot companions of post-T
Tauri stars belonging to the Lindroos binary sample. Most of these objects show
IR excesses in their spectral energy distributions, which are indicative of the
presence of disks. The work is relevant in the fields of stellar physics,
physics of disks and formation of planetary systems.
Spectral energy distributions and mid-resolution spectra were used to
estimate the effective temperature. The comparison of the profiles of the
Balmer lines with synthetic profiles provides the value of the stellar gravity.
High-resolution optical observations and synthetic spectra are used to estimate
the metallicity, [M/H]. Once these three parameters are known for each star,
evolutionary tracks and isochrones provide estimations of the mass, luminosity,
age and distance (or upper limits in some cases). The method is original in the
sense that it is distance-independent, i.e. the estimation of the stellar
parameters does not require, as it happens in other works, the knowledge of the
distance to the object. A detailed discussion on some individual objects, in
particular VV Ser, RR Tau, 49 Cet and the three suspected hot companions of
post-T Tauris, is presented. The paper also shows the difficulty posed by the
morphology and behaviour of the system star+disk in the computation of the
stellar parameters.Comment: 18 pages, 11 figure
Commercial-off-the-shelf simulation package interoperability: Issues and futures
Commercial-Off-The-Shelf Simulation Packages (CSPs) are widely used in industry to simulate discrete-event models. Interoperability of CSPs requires the use of distributed simulation techniques. Literature presents us with many examples of achieving CSP interoperability using bespoke solutions. However, for the wider adoption of CSP-based distributed simulation it is essential that, first and foremost, a standard for CSP interoperability be created, and secondly, these standards are adhered to by the CSP vendors. This advanced tutorial is on an emerging standard relating to CSP interoperability. It gives an overview of this standard and presents case studies that implement some of the proposed standards. Furthermore, interoperability is discussed in relation to large and complex models developed using CSPs that require large amount of computing resources. It is hoped that this tutorial will inform the simulation community of the issues associated with CSP interoperability, the importance of these standards and its future
Could the Ultra Metal-poor Stars be Chemically Peculiar and Not Related to the First Stars?
Chemically peculiar stars define a class of stars that show unusual elemental
abundances due to stellar photospheric effects and not due to natal variations.
In this paper, we compare the elemental abundance patterns of the ultra
metal-poor stars with metallicities [Fe/H] to those of a subclass of
chemically peculiar stars. These include post-AGB stars, RV Tauri variable
stars, and the Lambda Bootis stars, which range in mass, age, binarity, and
evolutionary status, yet can have iron abundance determinations as low as
[Fe/H] . These chemical peculiarities are interpreted as due to the
separation of gas and dust beyond the stellar surface, followed by the
accretion of dust depleted-gas. Contrary to this, the elemental abundances in
the ultra metal-poor stars are thought to represent yields of the most
metal-poor supernova and, therefore, observationally constrain the earliest
stages of chemical evolution in the Universe. The abundance of the elements in
the photospheres of the ultra metal-poor stars appear to be related to the
condensation temperature of that element; if so, then their CNO abundances
suggest true metallicities of [X/H]~ -2 to -4, rather than their present
metallicities of [Fe/H] < -5.Comment: Accepted for ApJ. 17 pages, 10 figure
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Lunar elemental composition and ivestigations with D-CIXS x-ray mapping spectrometer on SMART-1
The D-CIXS Compact X-ray Spectrometer on ESA SMART-1 successfully launched in Sept 2003 can derive 45 km resolution images of the Moon with a spectral resolution of 185 eV, providing the first high-resolution global map of rock forming element abundances
A new misfit function for multimodal inversion of surface waves
Higher-mode contribution is important in surface-wave inversion because it allows more information to be exploited, increases investigation depth, and improves model resolution. A new misfit function for multimodal inversion of surface waves, based on the Haskell-Thomson matrix method, allows higher modes to be taken into account without the need to associate experimental data points to a specific mode, thus avoiding mode-misidentification errors in the retrieved velocity profiles. Computing cost is reduced by avoiding the need for calculating synthetic apparent or modal dispersion curves. Based on several synthetic and real examples with inversion results from the classical and the proposed methods, we find that correct velocity models can be retrieved through the multimodal inversion when higher modes are superimposed in the apparent dispersion-curve or when it is not trivial to determine a priori to which mode each data point of the experimental dispersion curve belongs. The main drawback of the method is related to the presence of several local minima in the misfit function. This feature makes the choice of a consistent initial model very importan
Discovery of Reflection Nebulosity Around Five Vega-like Stars
Coronagraphic optical observations of six Vega-like stars reveal reflection
nebulosities, five of which were previously unknown. The nebulosities
illuminated by HD 4881, HD 23362, HD 23680, HD 26676, and HD 49662 resemble
that of the Pleiades, indicating an interstellar origin for dust grains. The
reflection nebulosity around HD 123160 has a double-arm morphology, but no
disk-like feature is seen as close as 2.5 arcsec from the star in K-band
adaptive optics data. We demonstrate that uniform density dust clouds
surrounding HD 23362, HD 23680 and HD 123160 can account for the observed
12-100 micron spectral energy distributions. For HD 4881, HD 26676, and HD
49662 an additional emission source, such as from a circumstellar disk or
non-equilibrium grain heating, is required to fit the 12-25 micron data. These
results indicate that in some cases, particularly for Vega-like stars located
beyond the Local Bubble (>100 pc), the dust responsible for excess thermal
emission may originate from the interstellar medium rather than from a
planetary debris system.Comment: The Astrophysical Journal, in press for March, 2002 (32 pages, 13
figures
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Observations of Past Lunar Landing Sites by the D-CIXS X-Ray Spectrometer on SMART-1
D-CIXS initial observations show a first unambiguous remote sensing of calcium in the lunar regolith. Data obtained are broadly consistent with current understanding of mare and highland composition. Ground truth is provided by the returned Apollo and Luna sample sets
Atomic and molecular interstellar absorption lines toward the high galactic latitude stars HD~141569 and HD~157841 at ultra-high resolution
We present ultra-high resolution (0.32 km/s) spectra obtained with the 3.9m
Anglo-Australian Telescope (AAT) and Ultra-High-Resolution Facility (UHRF), of
interstellar NaI D1, D2, Ca II K, K I and CH absorption toward two high
galactic latitude stars HD141569 and HD157841. We have compared our data with
21-cm observations obtained from the Leiden/Dwingeloo HI survey. We derive the
velocity structure, column densities of the clouds represented by the various
components and identify the clouds with ISM structures seen in the region at
other wavelengths. We further derive abundances, linear depletions and H2
fractional abundances for these clouds, wherever possible. Toward HD141569, we
detect two components in our UHRF spectra : a weak, broad component at - 15
km/s, seen only in CaII K absorption and another component at 0 km/s, seen in
NaI D1, D2, Ca II K, KI and CH absorption. In the case of the HD157841
sightline, a total of 6 components are seen on our UHRF spectra in NaI D1, D2
Ca II K, K I and CH absorption. 2 of these 6 components are seen only in a
single species.Comment: 16 pages, Latex, 4 figures, ps files Astrophysical Journal (in press
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