Neutrino–nucleus reactions and nuclear structure

The methods used in the evaluation of the neutrino–nucleus cross section are reviewed. Results are shown for a variety of targets of practical importance. Many of the described reactions are accessible in future experiments with neutrino sources from the pion and muon decays at rest, which might be available at the neutron spallation facilities. Detailed comparison between the experimental and theoretical results would establish benchmarks needed for verification and/or parameter adjustment of the nuclear models. Having a reliable tool for such calculation is of great importance in a variety of applications, e.g. the neutrino oscillation studies, detection of supernova neutrinos, description of the neutrino transport in supernovae and description of the r-process nucleosynthesis

Imaging of fuel mixture fraction oscillations in a driven system using acetone PLIF

Measurements of fuel mixture fraction are made for a jet flame in an acoustic chamber. Acoustic forcing creates a spatially-uniform, temporally-varying pressure field which results in oscillatory behavior in the flame . Forcing is at 22,27, 32, 37, and 55 Hz. To asses the oscillatory behavior, previous work included chemiluminescence, OH PUF, nitric oxide PUF imaging, and fuel mixture fraction measurements by infrared laser absorption. While these results illuminated what was happening to the flame chemistry, they did not provide a complete explanation as to why these things were happening. In this work, the fuel mixture fraction is measured through PUF of acetone, which is introduced into the fuel stream as a marker. This technique enables a high degree of spatial resolution of fuel/air mixture value. Both non-reacting and reacting cases were measured and comparisons are drawn with the results from the previous work. It is found that structure in the mixture fraction oscillations is a major contributor to the magnitude of the flame oscillations

Shell-model half-lives for r-process waiting point nuclei including first-forbidden contributions

We have performed large-scale shell-model calculations of the half-lives and neutron-branching probabilities of the r-process waiting point nuclei at the magic neutron numbers N=50, 82, and 126. The calculations include contributions from allowed Gamow-Teller and first-forbidden transitions. We find good agreement with the measured half-lives for the N=50 nuclei with charge numbers Z=28-32 and for the N=82 nuclei 129Ag and 130Cd. The contribution of forbidden transitions reduce the half-lives of the N=126 waiting point nuclei significantly, while they have only a small effect on the half-lives of the N=50 and 82 r-process nuclei.Comment: 14 pages, 17 figures, submitted to Phys. Rev.

Backbending in 50Cr

The collective yrast band and the high spin states of the nucleus 50Cr are studied using the spherical shell model and the HFB method. The two descriptions lead to nearly the same values for the relevant observables. A first backbending is predicted at I=10\hbar corresponding to a collective to non-collective transition. At I=16\hbar a second backbending occurs, associated to a configuration change that can also be interpreted as an spherical to triaxial transition.Comment: ReVTeX v 3.0 epsf.sty, 5 pages, 5 figures included. Full Postscript version available at http://www.ft.uam.es/~gabriel/Cr50art.ps.g

Influence of light nuclei on neutrino-driven supernova outflows

We study the composition of the outer layers of a protoneutron star and show that light nuclei are present in substantial amounts. The composition is dominated by nucleons, deuterons, tritons and alpha particles; 3He is present in smaller amounts. This composition can be studied in laboratory experiments with new neutron-rich radioactive beams that can reproduce similar densities and temperatures. After including the corresponding neutrino interactions, we demonstrate that light nuclei have a small impact on the average energy of the emitted electron neutrinos, but are significant for the average energy of antineutrinos. During the early post-explosion phase, the average energy of electron antineutrinos is slightly increased, while at later times during the protoneutron star cooling it is reduced by about 1 MeV. The consequences of these changes for nucleosynthesis in neutrino-driven supernova outflows are discussed

First report of caprine abortions due to Chlamydia abortus in Argentina.

Infectious abortions of goats in Argentina are mainly associated with brucellosis and toxoplasmosis. In this paper, we describe an abortion outbreak in goats caused by Chlamydia abortus. Seventy out of 400 goats aborted. Placental smears stained with modified Ziehl-Neelsen stain showed many chlamydia-like bodies within trophoblasts. One stillborn fetus was necropsied and the placenta was examined. No gross lesions were seen in the fetus, but the inter-cotyledonary areas of the placenta were thickened and covered by fibrino-suppurative exudate. The most consistent microscopic finding was found in the placenta and consisted of fibrinoid necrotic vasculitis, with mixed inflammatory infiltration in the tunica media. Immunohistochemistry of the placenta was positive for Chlamydia spp. The results of polymerase chain reaction targeting 23S rRNA gene performed on placenta were positive for Chlamydia spp. An analysis of 417 amplified nucleotide sequences revealed 99% identity to those of C. abortus pm225 (GenBank AJ005617) and pm112 (GenBank AJ005613) isolates. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report of abortion associated with C. abortus in Argentina