Simulating demand for electrical vehicles using revealed preference data. ESRI working paper no. 437, May 2012

We have modelled the market for new cars in Ireland with the aim of quantifying the values placed on a range of observable car characteristics. Mid-sized petrol cars with a manual transmission sell best. Price and perhaps fuel cost are negatively associated with sales, and acceleration and perhaps range are positively associated. Hybrid cars are popular. The values of car characteristics are then used to simulate the likely market shares of three new electrical vehicles. Electrical vehicles tend to be more expensive even after tax breaks and subsidies are applied, but we assume their market shares would benefit from an “environmental” premium similar to those of hybrid cars. The “environmental” premium and the level of subsidies would need to be raised to incredible levels to reach the government target of 10% market penetration of all-electric vehicles

Simulating Demand for Electrical Vehicles using Revealed Preference Data. ESRI WP437. May 2012

We have modelled the market for new cars in Ireland with the aim of quantifying the values placed on a range of observable car characteristics. Mid-sized petrol cars with a manual transmission sell best. Price and perhaps fuel cost are negatively associated with sales, and acceleration and perhaps range are positively associated. Hybrid cars are popular. The values of car characteristics are then used to simulate the likely market shares of three new electrical vehicles. Electrical vehicles tend to be more expensive even after tax breaks and subsidies are applied, but we assume their market shares would benefit from an “environmental” premium similar to those of hybrid cars. The “environmental” premium and the level of subsidies would need to be raised to incredible levels to reach the government target of 10% market penetration of all-electric vehicles

η\eta Production in Peripheral Heavy-Ion Collisions

We estimate the impact parameter dependence of the production cross section for $\eta_c$ and $\eta_b$ mesons in peripheral heavy-ion collisions collisions. Total and elastic $\gamma\gamma$ cross sections are calculated in an equivalent photon approximation.Comment: 9 pages, uuencoded postscrip

Spin-orbit final state interaction in the framework of Glauber theory for (e,e'p) reactions

We investigate the reactions D(e,e'p)n and D(\vec e,e'p)n at GeV energies and discuss the opportunities to distinguish between different models for the nuclear ground state by measuring the response functions. In calculating the final-state interaction (FSI) we employ Glauber theory, and we also include relativistic effects in the electromagnetic current. We include not only the central FSI, but also the spin-orbit FSI which is usually neglected in (e,e'p) calculations within the Glauber framework and we show that this contribution plays a crucial role for the fifth response function. All of the methods developed here can be applied to any target nucleus.Comment: 20 pages, 12 figures, minor change in figures 3 and 4 (changed beam energy), correction of error in figure 4 in the previous replacemen

The Glauber model and the heavy ion reaction cross section

We reexamine the Glauber model and calculate the total reaction cross section as a function of energy in the low and intermediate energy range, where many of the corrections in the model, are effective. The most significant effect in this energy range is by the modification of the trajectory due to the Coulomb field. The modification in the trajectory due to nuclear field is also taken into account in a self consistent way. The energy ranges in which particular corrections are effective, are quantified and it is found that when the center of mass energy of the system becomes 30 times the Coulomb barrier, none of the trajectory modification to the Glauber model is really required. The reaction cross sections for light and heavy systems, right from near coulomb barrier to intermediate energies have been calculated. The exact nuclear densities and free nucleon-nucleon (NN) cross sections have been used in the calculations. The center of mass correction which is important for light systems, has also been taken into account. There is an excellent agreement between the calculations with the modified Glauber model and the experimental data. This suggests that the heavy ion reactions in this energy range can be explained by the Glauber model in terms of free NN cross sections without incorporating any medium modification.Comment: RevTeX, 21 pages including 9 Postscript figures, submitted to Phys. Rev.

A controlled aquarium system and approach to study the role of sponge-bacteria interactions using Aplysilla rosea and Vibrio natriegens

Sponge-bacteria interactions are very important due to their ecological and biological significance. To understand the impact of interactions between sponges and bacteria (both associated with and external to sponges) on sponge-associated microbial diversity, sponge metabolite profiles and bioactivity, we used a controlled aquarium system and designed an experimental approach that allows the study of sponge-bacteria interactions in a well-defined manner. To test the feasibility of this approach, this system was used to study the interaction between a sponge Aplysilla rosea and a marine bacterium commonly found in seawater, Vibrio natriegens. Sponge explants were exposed to V. natriegens, at 5 × 106 cfu/ml, and changes were monitored for 48 hours. Pyro-sequencing revealed significant shifts in microbial communities associated with the sponges after 24 to 48 hours. Both the control (sponge only without added bacteria) and Vibrio-exposed sponges showed a distinct shift in bacterial diversity and abundance with time. Vibrio exposure significantly increased bacterial diversity, the abundance of a number of taxa compared to control sponges. The result experimentally supports the notion of dynamic and concerted responses by the sponge when interacting with a bacterium, and demonstrates the feasibility of using this controlled aquarium system for the study of sponge-bacteria interactions.Mohammad F. Mehbub, Jason E. Tanner, Stephen J. Barnett, Jan Bekker, Christopher M. M. Franco and Wei Zhan

Energy Loss versus Shadowing in the Drell-Yan Reaction on Nuclei

We present a new analysis of the E772 and E866 experiments on the nuclear dependence of Drell-Yan (DY) lepton pair production resulting from the bombardment of $^2H$, Be, C, Ca, Fe, and W targets by 800 GeV/c protons at Fermilab. We employ a light-cone formulation of the DY reaction in the rest frame of the nucleus, where the dimuons detected at small values of Bjorken x_2 << 1 may be considered to originate from the decay of a heavy photon radiated from an incident quark in a bremsstrahlung process. We infer the energy loss of the quark by examining the suppression of the nuclear-dependent DY ratios seen as a function of projectile momentum fraction x_1 and dimuon mass M. Shadowing, which also leads to nuclear suppression of dimuons, is calculated within the same approach employing the results of phenomenological fits to deep inelastic scattering data from HERA. The analysis yields -dE/dz =2.73 +/- 0.37 +/- 0.5 GeV/fm for the rate of quark energy loss per unit path length, a value consistent with theoretical expectations including the effects of the inelastic interaction of the incident proton at the surface of the nucleus. This is the first observation of a nonzero energy loss effect in such experiments.Comment: 43 pages including 17 figure

Analytical results on quantum interference and magnetoconductance for strongly localized electrons in a magnetic field: Exact summation of forward-scattering paths

We study quantum interference effects on the transition strength for strongly localized electrons hopping on 2D square and 3D cubic lattices in the presence of a magnetic field B. These effects arise from the interference between phase factors associated with different electron paths connecting two distinct sites. For electrons confined on a square lattice, with and without disorder, we obtain closed-form expressions for the tunneling probability, which determines the conductivity, between two arbitrary sites by exactly summing the corresponding phase factors of all forward-scattering paths connecting them. An analytic field-dependent expression, valid in any dimension, for the magnetoconductance (MC) is derived. A positive MC is clearly observed when turning on the magnetic field. In 2D, when the strength of B reaches a certain value, which is inversely proportional to twice the hopping length, the MC is increased by a factor of two compared to that at zero field. We also investigate transport on the much less-studied and experimentally important 3D cubic lattice case, where it is shown how the interference patterns and the small-field behavior of the MC vary according to the orientation of B. The effect on the low-flux MC due to the randomness of the angles between the hopping direction and the orientation of B is also examined analytically.Comment: 24 pages, RevTeX, 8 figures include

Soil microstructure alterations induced by land use change for sugarcane expansion in Brazil

© 2019 British Society of Soil Science Land use change (LUC) alters soil structure and, consequently, the functions and services provided by these soils. Conversion from extensive pasture to sugarcane is one of the largest land transitions in Brazil as a result of the growth of the domestic and global demands of bioenergy. However, the impacts of sugarcane expansion on the soil structure under extensive pasture remains unclear, especially when considering changes at the microscale. We investigated whether LUC for sugarcane cultivation impacted soil microstructure quality. Undisturbed soil samples were taken from two soil layers (0–10 and 10–20cm) under three contrasting land uses (native vegetation—NV, pasture—PA and sugarcane—SC) in three different locations in the central-southern Brazil. Oriented thin sections (30μm) were used for micromorphological analysis. The total area of pores decreased following the LUC in the following order: NV > PA > SC in both soil layers. The area of large complex packing pores (>0.01mm²) also decreased with the LUC sequence: NV>PA>SC. Qualitative and semi-quantitative micromorphological analysis confirmed porosity reduction was driven by the decrease in complex packing pores and that biological features decreased in the same LUC sequence as the quantitative parameters. Therefore, LUC for sugarcane expansion reduced microscale soil porosity, irrespectively of soil type and site-specific conditions, indicating that the adoption of more sustainable management practices is imperative to preserve soil structure and sustain soil functions in Brazilian sugarcane fields

Reactive inkjet printing and propulsion analysis of silk-based self-propelled micro-stirrers

In this study, a protocol for using reactive inkjet printing to fabricate enzymatically propelled silk swimmers with well-defined shapes is reported. The resulting devices are an example of self-propelled objects capable of generating motion without external actuation and have potential applications in medicine and environmental sciences for a variety of purposes ranging from micro-stirring, targeted therapeutic delivery, to water remediation (e.g., cleaning oil spills). This method employs reactive inkjet printing to generate well-defined small-scale solid silk structures by converting water soluble regenerated silk fibroin (silk I) to insoluble silk fibroin (silk II). These structures are also selectively doped in specific regions with the enzyme catalase in order to produce motion via bubble generation and detachment. The number of layers printed determines the three-dimensional (3D) structure of the device, and so here the effect of this parameter on the propulsive trajectories is reported. The results demonstrate the ability to tune the motion by varying the dimensions of the printed structures