Abradable compressor and turbine seals, volume 1

The application and advantages of abradable coatings as gas-path seals in a general aviation turbine engine were evaluated for use on the high-pressure compressor, the high-pressure turbine, and the low-pressure turbine shrouds. Topics covered include: (1) the initial selection of candidate materials for interim full-scale engine testing; (2) interim engine testing of the initially selected materials and additional candidate materials; (3) the design of the component required to adapt the hardware to permit full-scale engine testing of the most promising materials; (4) finalization of the fabrication methods used in the manufacture of engine test hardware; and (5) the manufacture of the hardware necessary to support the final full-scale engine tests

Abradable compressor and turbine seals, volume 2

The applications and advantages of abradable coatings as gas path seals in a general aviation turbofan engine were investigated. Abradable materials were evaluated for the high pressure radial compressor and the axial high and low pressure turbine shrouds

Glueball Spin

The spin of a glueball is usually taken as coming from the spin (and possibly the orbital angular momentum) of its constituent gluons. In light of the difficulties in accounting for the spin of the proton from its constituent quarks, the spin of glueballs is reexamined. The starting point is the fundamental QCD field angular momentum operator written in terms of the chromoelectric and chromomagnetic fields. First, we look at the restrictions placed on the structure of glueballs from the requirement that the QCD field angular momentum operator should satisfy the standard commutation relationships. This can be compared to the electromagnetic charge/monopole system, where the quantization of the field angular momentum places restrictions (i.e. the Dirac condition) on the system. Second, we look at the expectation value of this operator under some simplifying assumptions.Comment: 11 pages, 0 figures; added references and some discussio

Brownian motion of solitons in a Bose-Einstein Condensate

For the first time, we observed and controlled the Brownian motion of solitons. We launched solitonic excitations in highly elongated $^{87}\rm{Rb}$ BECs and showed that a dilute background of impurity atoms in a different internal state dramatically affects the soliton. With no impurities and in one-dimension (1-D), these solitons would have an infinite lifetime, a consequence of integrability. In our experiment, the added impurities scatter off the much larger soliton, contributing to its Brownian motion and decreasing its lifetime. We describe the soliton's diffusive behavior using a quasi-1-D scattering theory of impurity atoms interacting with a soliton, giving diffusion coefficients consistent with experiment.Comment: 4 figure

Close contacts of xenograft recipients: Ethical considerations due to risk of xenozoonosis

With decades of pre-clinical studies culminating in the recent clinical application of xenotransplantation, it would appear timely to provide recommendations for operationalizing oversight of xenotransplantation clinical trials. Ethical issues with clinical xenotransplantation have been described for decades, largely centering on animal welfare, the risks posed to the recipient, and public health risks posed by potential spread of xenozoonosis. Much less attention has been given to considerations relating to potentially elevated risks faced by those who may care for or otherwise have close contact with xenograft recipients. This paper examines the ethical and logistical issues raised by the potential exposure to xenozoonotic disease faced by close contacts of xenotransplant recipients—defined herein as including but not limited to caregivers, household contacts, and sexual partners— which warrants special attention given their increased risk of exposure to infection compared to the general public. We discuss implications of assent or consent by these close contacts to potentially undergo, along with the recipient, procedures for infection screening and possible quarantine. We then propose several options and recommendations for operationalizing oversight of xenotransplantation clinical trials that could account for and address close contacts’ education on and agency regarding the risk of xenozoonosis

Finding exonic islands in a sea of non-coding sequence: splicing related constraints on protein composition and evolution are common in intron-rich genomes

Biased usage of amino acids near exon-intron boundaries is phylogenetically widespread and characteristic of species for which there are expected to be problems defining exons

Exploring the Use of Offshore Intermediary Jurisdictions by Chinese MNEs for the Purposes of ‘Onward-Journey’ Transit FDI: Implications for Measuring and Understanding Chinese MNE Activity

This paper explores (i) the extent to which Chinese multinational enterprises (CMNEs) undertake FDI via intermediary jurisdictions (also termed capital in transit (CIT)) and (ii) identifies the specific offshore locations are used by CMNEs to conduct CIT. We use newly available OECD/IMF bilateral FDI stock data reporting both immediate and ultimate FDI between nations, which allows us to construct a CIT index and empirically test whether Chinese MNEs have a higher propensity for CIT than other countries. We demonstrate that CMNEs are indeed outliers with regards to CIT and identify the specific hubs they use drawing from the Orbis database. Our findings imply, among other things, that nationally aggregated Chinese FDI data is systematically biased when used for the purposes of measuring CMNE activity. We then discuss the problems this has created for many studies analyzing CMNE activity that have used data collected at the firm-level. In conjunction, our empirical findings provide further insights into the extent, reasons and ways in which CMNEs exploit the offshore world and how this potentially confounds our understanding of their activities

Improving measurements of SF6 for the study of atmospheric transport and emissions

Sulfur hexafluoride (SF6) is a potent greenhouse gas and useful atmospheric tracer. Measurements of SF6 on global and regional scales are necessary to estimate emissions and to verify or examine the performance of atmospheric transport models. Typical precision for common gas chromatographic methods with electron capture detection (GC-ECD) is 1–2%. We have modified a common GC-ECD method to achieve measurement precision of 0.5% or better. Global mean SF6 measurements were used to examine changes in the growth rate of SF6 and corresponding SF6 emissions. Global emissions and mixing ratios from 2000–2008 are consistent with recently published work. More recent observations show a 10% decline in SF6 emissions in 2008–2009, which seems to coincide with a decrease in world economic output. This decline was short-lived, as the global SF6 growth rate has recently increased to near its 2007–2008 maximum value of 0.30±0.03 pmol mol−1 (ppt) yr−1 (95% C.L.)

Scaling Analysis and Evolution Equation of the North Atlantic Oscillation Index Fluctuations

The North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) monthly index is studied from 1825 till 2002 in order to identify the scaling ranges of its fluctuations upon different delay times and to find out whether or not it can be regarded as a Markov process. A Hurst rescaled range analysis and a detrended fluctuation analysis both indicate the existence of weakly persistent long range time correlations for the whole scaling range and time span hereby studied. Such correlations are similar to Brownian fluctuations. The Fokker-Planck equation is derived and Kramers-Moyal coefficients estimated from the data. They are interpreted in terms of a drift and a diffusion coefficient as in fluid mechanics. All partial distribution functions of the NAO monthly index fluctuations have a form close to a Gaussian, for all time lags, in agreement with the findings of the scaling analyses. This indicates the lack of predictive power of the present NAO monthly index. Yet there are some deviations for large (and thus rare) events. Whence suggestions for other measurements are made if some improved predictability of the weather/climate in the North Atlantic is of interest. The subsequent Langevin equation of the NAO signal fluctuations is explicitly written in terms of the diffusion and drift parameters, and a characteristic time scale for these is given in appendix.Comment: 6 figures, 54 refs., 16 pages; submitted to Int. J. Mod. Phys. C: Comput. Phy

Mineralogical evidence for multiple dust sources in an early Triassic loessite.

Loessite present in a borehole into the Smith Bank Formation (early Triassic age, Central North Sea) differentiates five coeval source terranes for aerosol dust, three long distance sources and two local sources. All were active immediately following the end Permian mass extinction. Long distance sources are sedimentary, basic magmatic and acid–intermediate volcanic. Although predominantly silt‐sized and dominated by quartz with subordinate feldspars, muscovite and illite, evidence of basic and acid–intermediate magmatic/volcanic sources are pervasive. Baddeleyite is diagnostic of basic magmatism, an origin supported by enrichment of plagioclase relative to potassium feldspar. Deduction of acid–intermediate volcanism comes from the collective occurrence of irregular geometry quartz, volcanic shards, Ti‐mineralization, euhedral biotite, sanidine, the co‐occurrence of apatite and zircon, and the common occurrence of a tosuditic clay mineral. The tosuditic phase occurs as an unusual diagenetic dioctahedral chlorite/smectite formed at low temperature (<45°C), during very shallow burial by the decomposition of unstable rhyo‐dacitic and andesitic grains in alkaline pore water from an adjacent lake that yielded pore fluids with a high Al:Si ratio. The Siberian Traps large igneous province is the likely source terrane for the magmatic and volcanic silt. Locally sourced clay pellets and kaolinite booklets formed from aeolian erosion of an adjacent, periodically desiccated lake‐floor and a kaolinitic regolith, respectively. Inference of a prolonged harsh, arid climate leaves no evidence of any periods of sustained humidity or climatic fluctuation, such as pedogenesis. The association between the end Permian mass extinction, emplacement and aeolian erosion of the Siberian Traps large igneous province, and location of the Smith Bank Formation in a large lacustrine endorheic basin, combine to preserve a record of prolonged harsh climate in the early Triassic