3,536 research outputs found
Wind conditions and ventilation in high-rise long street models
We regarded high-rise cities as obstacles and channels to wind. We first studied wind conditions and ventilations in idealized high-rise long street models experimentally and numerically with a constant street width (W = 30 mm), variable street heights (H = 2 W, 2.5W, 3W, 4W), variable street lengths (L = 47.4W, 79W, 333W, 667W) and a parallel approaching wind. The flow rates penetrating into windward entries are a little larger than the reference flow rate in the far upstream free flow through the same area with windward entries in all models. The stream-wise velocity decreases along the street as some air leaves upwardly across street roofs. Near the leeward entry, there is a downward flow which brings some air into the street and results in an accelerating process. In the neighborhood scale long streets (L = 47.4W and 79W), wind in taller streets is stronger and the ventilation is better than a lower one. For the city scale long streets (L = 333W and 667W), a constant flow region exists where the vertical velocity is zero and the stream-wise velocity remains constant. In such regions, turbulent fluctuations across the street roof are more important to air exchange than vertical mean flows. In a taller street, the process to establish the constant flow conditions is longer and the normalized balanced horizontal flow rate is smaller than those in a lower street. In the city scale long streets, the turbulence exchange rate can be 5-10 times greater than the mean flow rate. Crown Copyright © 2009.postprin
Orientability and energy minimization in liquid crystal models
Uniaxial nematic liquid crystals are modelled in the Oseen-Frank theory
through a unit vector field . This theory has the apparent drawback that it
does not respect the head-to-tail symmetry in which should be equivalent to
-. This symmetry is preserved in the constrained Landau-de Gennes theory
that works with the tensor .We study
the differences and the overlaps between the two theories. These depend on the
regularity class used as well as on the topology of the underlying domain. We
show that for simply-connected domains and in the natural energy class
the two theories coincide, but otherwise there can be differences
between the two theories, which we identify. In the case of planar domains we
completely characterise the instances in which the predictions of the
constrained Landau-de Gennes theory differ from those of the Oseen-Frank
theory
Quantum anti-Zeno effect without rotating wave approximation
In this paper, we systematically study the spontaneous decay phenomenon of a
two-level system under the influences of both its environment and continuous
measurements. In order to clarify some well-established conclusions about the
quantum Zeno effect (QZE) and the quantum anti-Zeno effect (QAZE), we do not
use the rotating wave approximation (RWA) in obtaining an effective
Hamiltonian. We examine various spectral distributions by making use of our
present approach in comparison with other approaches. It is found that with
respect to a bare excited state even without the RWA, the QAZE can still happen
for some cases, e.g., the interacting spectra of hydrogen. But for a physical
excited state, which is a renormalized dressed state of the atomic state, the
QAZE disappears and only the QZE remains. These discoveries inevitably show a
transition from the QZE to the QAZE as the measurement interval changes.Comment: 14 pages, 8 figure
Pipe network model for scaling of dynamic interfaces in porous media
We present a numerical study on the dynamics of imbibition fronts in porous
media using a pipe network model. This model quantitatively reproduces the
anomalous scaling behavior found in imbibition experiments [Phys. Rev. E {\bf
52}, 5166 (1995)]. Using simple scaling arguments, we derive a new identity
among the scaling exponents in agreement with the experimental results.Comment: 13 pages, 3 figures, REVTeX, to appear in Phys. Rev. Let
Deformations of the hemisphere that increase scalar curvature
Consider a compact Riemannian manifold M of dimension n whose boundary
\partial M is totally geodesic and is isometric to the standard sphere S^{n-1}.
A natural conjecture of Min-Oo asserts that if the scalar curvature of M is at
least n(n-1), then M is isometric to the hemisphere S_+^n equipped with its
standard metric. This conjecture is inspired by the positive mass theorem in
general relativity, and has been verified in many special cases. In this paper,
we construct counterexamples to Min-Oo's conjecture in dimension n \geq 3.Comment: Revised version, to appear in Invent. Mat
Inflation and Gauge Hierarchy in Randall-Sundrum Compactification
We obtain the general inflationary solutions for the slab of five-dimensional
AdS spacetime where the fifth dimension is an orbifold and two
three-branes reside at its boundaries, of which the Randall-Sundrum model
corresponds to the static limit. The investigation of the general solutions and
their static limit reveals that the RS model recasts both the cosmological
constant problem and the gauge hierarchy problem into the balancing problem of
the bulk and the brane cosmological constants.Comment: 9 pages, revtex, minor changes and more references adde
Fabrication of hydrophobic structures by nanosecond pulse laser
In this paper, a feasibility study of manufacturing anti-bacteria surface on stainless steel 7C27Mo2 used for surgical tools by using nanosecond pulse laser is presented. The effect of laser power on the depth of groove was studied through laser cutting experiment. Micro-pillar arrays of different dimensions and spacing were generated by laser cutting. The wetting characteristics of micro-structured surfaces were assessed by using the static contact angle measurement approach. The measurement results show that the original hydrophilic stainless steel surface can be converted into a hydrophobic surface by using laser structuring as the contact angle can be doubled. This research shows that it is feasible to manufacture hydrophobic microstructures with a laser cutting process
Circadian pattern and burstiness in mobile phone communication
The temporal communication patterns of human individuals are known to be
inhomogeneous or bursty, which is reflected as the heavy tail behavior in the
inter-event time distribution. As the cause of such bursty behavior two main
mechanisms have been suggested: a) Inhomogeneities due to the circadian and
weekly activity patterns and b) inhomogeneities rooted in human task execution
behavior. Here we investigate the roles of these mechanisms by developing and
then applying systematic de-seasoning methods to remove the circadian and
weekly patterns from the time-series of mobile phone communication events of
individuals. We find that the heavy tails in the inter-event time distributions
remain robustly with respect to this procedure, which clearly indicates that
the human task execution based mechanism is a possible cause for the remaining
burstiness in temporal mobile phone communication patterns.Comment: 17 pages, 12 figure
Principals of the theory of light reflection and absorption by low-dimensional semiconductor objects in quantizing magnetic fields at monochromatic and pulse excitations
The bases of the theory of light reflection and absorption by low-dimensional
semiconductor objects (quantum wells, wires and dots) at both monochromatic and
pulse irradiations and at any form of light pulses are developed. The
semiconductor object may be placed in a stationary quantizing magnetic field.
As an example the case of normal light incidence on a quantum well surface is
considered. The width of the quantum well may be comparable to the light wave
length and number of energy levels of electronic excitations is arbitrary. For
Fourier-components of electric fields the integral equation (similar to the
Dyson-equation) and solutions of this equation for some individual cases are
obtained.Comment: 14 page
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