27,894 research outputs found
Natural and laser-induced cavitation in corn stems: On the mechanisms of acoustic emissions
Water in plant xylem is often superheated, and therefore in a meta-stable
state. Under certain conditions, it may suddenly turn from the liquid to the
vapor state. This cavitation process produces acoustic emissions. We report the
measurement of ultrasonic acoustic emissions (UAE) produced by natural and
induced cavitation in corn stems. We induced cavitation and UAE in vivo, in
well controlled and reproducible experiments, by irradiating the bare stem of
the plants with a continuous-wave laser beam. By tracing the source of UAE, we
were able to detect absorption and frequency filtering of the UAE propagating
through the stem. This technique allows the unique possibility of studying
localized embolism of plant conduits, and thus to test hypotheses on the
hydraulic architecture of plants. Based on our results, we postulate that the
source of UAE is a transient "cavity oscillation" triggered by the disruptive
effect of cavitation inception.Comment: 8 pages, 5 figure
A family of complex potentials with real spectrum
We consider a two-parameter non hermitean quantum-mechanical hamiltonian that
is invariant under the combined effects of parity and time reversal
transformation. Numerical investigation shows that for some values of the
potential parameters the hamiltonian operator supports real eigenvalues and
localized eigenfunctions. In contrast with other PT symmetric models, which
require special integration paths in the complex plane, our model is integrable
along a line parallel to the real axis.Comment: Six figures and four table
A mathematically assisted reconstruction of the initial focus of the yellow fever outbreak in Buenos Aires (1871)
We discuss the historic mortality record corresponding to the initial focus
of the yellow fever epidemic outbreak registered in Buenos Aires during the
year 1871 as compared to simulations of a stochastic population dynamics model.
This model incorporates the biology of the urban vector of yellow fever, the
mosquito Aedes aegypti, the stages of the disease in the human being as well as
the spatial extension of the epidemic outbreak. After introducing the
historical context and the restrictions it puts on initial conditions and
ecological parameters, we discuss the general features of the simulation and
the dependence on initial conditions and available sites for breeding the
vector. We discuss the sensitivity, to the free parameters, of statistical
estimators such as: final death toll, day of the year when the outbreak reached
half the total mortality and the normalized daily mortality, showing some
striking regularities. The model is precise and accurate enough to discuss the
truthfulness of the presently accepted historic discussions of the epidemic
causes, showing that there are more likely scenarios for the historic facts.Comment: 25 pages, 12 figure
Pt-impregnated catalysts on powdery SiC and other commercial supports for the combustion of hydrogen under oxidant conditions
We report the study of the catalytic hydrogen combustion over Pt-impregnated powdery silicon carbide (SiC) using H2PtCl6 as precursor. The reaction was conducted in excess of oxygen. β-SiC was selected for the study because of its thermal conductivity, mechanical properties, chemical inertness and surface area. The obtained Pt particles over SiC were medium size (average particle diameter of 5 nm for 0.5 wt% Pt). The activity of the Pt-impregnated catalyst over SiC was compared to those obtained in oxidized form over TiO2 and Al2O3 commercial supports (Pt particles very small in size, average particle diameter of 1 nm for 0.5 wt% Pt in both cases). The case of a SiO2 support was also discussed. Those Pt/SiC particles were the most active because of their higher contribution of surface Pt0, indicating that partially oxidized surfaces have better activity than those totally oxidized in these conditions. SiC was modified with an acid treatment and thus bigger (average particle diameter of 7 nm for 0.5 wt% Pt) and more active Pt particles were obtained. Durability of the SiC and TiO2 supported catalysts was tested upon 5 cycles and both have shown to be durable and even more active than initially. Exposure to the oxidative reaction mixture activates the catalysts and the effect is more pronounced for the completely oxidized particles. This is due to the surface oxygen chemisorption which activates catalystĹ› surface.Junta de AndalucĂa PE2012-TEP862Ministerio de EconomĂa y Competitividad CTQ2012-32519, CTQ2015-65918-RConsejo Superior de Investigaciones CientĂficas PIE-201460E01
Broadening of HO rotational lines by collision with He atoms at low temperature
We report pressure broadening coefficients for the 21 electric-dipole
transitions between the eight lowest rotational levels of ortho-HO and
para-HO molecules by collisions with He at temperatures from 20 to 120 K.
These coefficients are derived from recently published experimental
state-to-state rate coefficients for HO:He inelastic collisions, plus an
elastic contribution from close coupling calculations. The resulting
coefficients are compared to the available experimental data. Mostly due to the
elastic contribution, the pressure broadening coefficients differ much from
line to line, and increase markedly at low temperature. The present results are
meant as a guide for future experiments and astrophysical observations.Comment: 2 figures, 2 table
Variational collocation on finite intervals
In this paper we study a new family of sinc--like functions, defined on an
interval of finite width. These functions, which we call ``little sinc'', are
orthogonal and share many of the properties of the sinc functions. We show that
the little sinc functions supplemented with a variational approach enable one
to obtain accurate results for a variety of problems. We apply them to the
interpolation of functions on finite domain and to the solution of the
Schr\"odinger equation, and compare the performance of present approach with
others.Comment: 12 pages, 8 figures, 1 tabl
Density, structure and dynamics of water: the effect of Van der Waals interactions
It is known that ab initio molecular dynamics (AIMD) simulations of liquid
water, based on the generalized gradient approximation (GGA) to density
functional theory (DFT), yield structural and diffusive properties in
reasonable agreement with experiment only if artificially high temperatures are
used in the simulations. The equilibrium density, at normal conditions, of DFT
water has been recently shown by Schmidt et al. [J. Phys. chem. B, 113, 11959
(2009)] to be underestimated by different GGA functionals for exchange and
correlation, and corrected by the addition of interatomic pair potentials to
describe van derWaals (vdW) interactions. In this contribution we present a
DFTAIMD study of liquid water using several GGA functionals as well as the van
der Waals density functional (vdW-DF) of Dion et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 92,
246401(2004)]. As expected, we find that the density of water is grossly
underestimated by GGA functionals. When a vdW-DF is used, the density improves
drastically and the experimental diffusivity is reproduced without the need of
thermal corrections. We analyze the origin of the density differences between
all the functionals. We show that the vdW-DF increases the population of
non-H-bonded interstitial sites, at distances between the first and second
coordination shells. However, it excessively weakens the H-bond network,
collapsing the second coordination shell. This structural problem is partially
associated to the choice of GGA exchange in the vdW-DF. We show that a
different choice for the exchange functional is enough to achieve an overall
improvement both in structure and diffusivity.Comment: 11 pages, 9 figures, submitted. Revised versio
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