878 research outputs found
STOP - A computer program for supersonic transport trajectory optimization
IBM 7094 digital program using steepest ascent technique for optimizing flight path of supersonic transport aircraf
The Role of Starbursts in the Formation of Galaxies & Active Galactic Nuclei
Starbursts are episodes of intense star-formation in the central regions of
galaxies, and are the sites of roughly 25% of the high-mass star-formation in
the local universe. In this contribution I review the role starbursts play in
the formation and evolution of galaxies, the intergalactic medium, and active
galactic nuclei. Four major conclusions are drawn. 1) Starburst galaxies are
good analogues (in fact, the only plausible local analogues) to the known
population of star-forming galaxies at high-redshift. 2) Integrated over cosmic
time, supernova-driven galactic-winds (`superwinds') play an essential role in
the evolution of galaxies and the inter-galactic medium. 3) Circumnuclear
starbursts are an energetically-significant component of the Seyfert
phenomenon. 4) The evolution of the population of the host galaxies of
radio-quiet quasars is significantly different than that of powerful radio
galaxies, and is at least qualitatively consistent with the standard picture of
the hierarchical assembly of massive galaxies at relatively late times.Comment: 16 pages, 4 figures, Royal Society discussion meeting `The formation
of galaxies
Physical Bias of Galaxies From Large-Scale Hydrodynamic Simulations
We analyze a new large-scale (Mpc) numerical hydrodynamic
simulation of the popular CDM cosmological model, including in our
treatment dark matter, gas and star-formation, on the basis of standard
physical processes. The method, applied with a numerical resolution of
kpc (which is still quite coarse for following individual galaxies,
especially in dense regions), attempts to estimate where and when galaxies
form. We then compare the smoothed galaxy distribution with the smoothed mass
distribution to determine the "bias" defined as on scales large compared with the code
numerical resolution (on the basis of resolution tests given in the appendix of
this paper). We find that (holding all variables constant except the quoted
one) bias increases with decreasing scale, with increasing galactic age or
metallicity and with increasing redshift of observations. At the Mpc
fiducial comoving scale bias (for bright regions) is 1.35 at reaching to
3.6 at , both numbers being consistent with extant observations. We also
find that Mpc voids in the distribution of luminous objects are
as observed (i.e., observed voids are not an argument against CDM-like models)
and finally that the younger systems should show a colder Hubble flow than do
the early type galaxies (a testable proposition). Surprisingly, little
evolution is found in the amplitude of the smoothed galaxy-galaxy correlation
function (as a function of {\it comoving} separation). Testing this prediction
vs observations will allow a comparison between this work and that of Kauffmann
et al which is based on a different physical modelingmethod.Comment: in press, ApJ, 26 latex pages plus 7 fig
Peculiar Velocities of Galaxy Clusters
We investigate the peculiar velocities predicted for galaxy clusters by
theories in the cold dark matter family. A widely used hypothesis identifies
rich clusters with high peaks of a suitably smoothed version of the linear
density fluctuation field. Their peculiar velocities are then obtained by
extrapolating the similarly smoothed linear peculiar velocities at the
positions of these peaks. We test these ideas using large high resolution
N-body simulations carried out within the Virgo supercomputing consortium. We
find that at early times the barycentre of the material which ends up in a rich
cluster is generally very close to a high peak of the initial density field.
Furthermore the mean peculiar velocity of this material agrees well with the
linear value at the peak. The late-time growth of peculiar velocities is,
however, systematically underestimated by linear theory. At the time clusters
are identified we find their rms peculiar velocity to be about 40% larger than
predicted. Nonlinear effects are particularly important in superclusters. These
systematics must be borne in mind when using cluster peculiar velocities to
estimate the parameter combination .Comment: 8 pages, 4 figures; submitted to MNRA
The galaxy cluster X-ray luminosity--gravitational mass relation in the light of the WMAP 3rd year data
The 3rd year WMAP results mark a shift in best fit values of cosmological
parameters compared to the 1st year data and the concordance cosmological
model. We test the consistency of the new results with previous constraints on
cosmological parameters from the HIFLUGCS galaxy cluster sample and the impact
of this shift on the X-ray luminosity-gravitational mass relation. The measured
X-ray luminosity function combined with the observed luminosity-mass relation
are compared to mass functions predicted for given cosmological parameter
values. The luminosity function and luminosity-mass relation derived previously
from HIFLUGCS are in perfect agreement with mass functions predicted using the
best fit parameter values from the 3rd year WMAP data (OmegaM=0.238,
sigma8=0.74) and inconsistent with the concordance cosmological model
(OmegaM=0.3, sigma8=0.9), assuming a flat Universe. Trying to force consistency
with the concordance model requires artificially decreasing the normalization
of the luminosity-mass relation by a factor of 2. The shift in best fit values
for OmegaM and sigma8 has a significant impact on predictions of cluster
abundances. The new WMAP results are now in perfect agreement with previous
results on the OmegaM-sigma8 relation determined from the mass function of
HIFLUGCS clusters and other X-ray cluster samples (the ``low cluster
normalization''). We conclude that - unless the true values of OmegaM and
sigma8 differ significantly from the 3rd year WMAP results - the
luminosity-mass relation is well described by their previous determination from
X-ray observations of clusters, with a conservative upper limit on the bias
factor of 1.5. These conclusions are currently being tested in a complete
follow-up program of all HIFLUGCS clusters with Chandra and XMM-Newton.Comment: 4 pages; A&A Letters, in press; replaced to match accepted version;
also available at http://www.reiprich.ne
The Power Spectrum of the PSC Redshift Survey
We measure the redshift-space power spectrum P(k) for the recently completed
IRAS Point Source Catalogue (PSC) redshift survey, which contains 14500
galaxies over 84% of the sky with 60 micron flux >= 0.6 Jansky. Comparison with
simulations shows that our estimated errors on P(k) are realistic, and that
systematic errors due to the finite survey volume are small for wavenumbers k
>~ 0.03 h Mpc^-1. At large scales our power spectrum is intermediate between
those of the earlier QDOT and 1.2 Jansky surveys, but with considerably smaller
error bars; it falls slightly more steeply to smaller scales. We have fitted
families of CDM-like models using the Peacock-Dodds formula for non-linear
evolution; the results are somewhat sensitive to the assumed small-scale
velocity dispersion \sigma_V. Assuming a realistic \sigma_V \approx 300 km/s
yields a shape parameter \Gamma ~ 0.25 and normalisation b \sigma_8 ~ 0.75; if
\sigma_V is as high as 600 km/s then \Gamma = 0.5 is only marginally excluded.
There is little evidence for any `preferred scale' in the power spectrum or
non-Gaussian behaviour in the distribution of large-scale power.Comment: Latex, uses mn.sty, 14 pages including 11 Postscript figures.
Accepted by MNRA
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