4,352 research outputs found
Performance Evaluation of Sparse Matrix Multiplication Kernels on Intel Xeon Phi
Intel Xeon Phi is a recently released high-performance coprocessor which
features 61 cores each supporting 4 hardware threads with 512-bit wide SIMD
registers achieving a peak theoretical performance of 1Tflop/s in double
precision. Many scientific applications involve operations on large sparse
matrices such as linear solvers, eigensolver, and graph mining algorithms. The
core of most of these applications involves the multiplication of a large,
sparse matrix with a dense vector (SpMV). In this paper, we investigate the
performance of the Xeon Phi coprocessor for SpMV. We first provide a
comprehensive introduction to this new architecture and analyze its peak
performance with a number of micro benchmarks. Although the design of a Xeon
Phi core is not much different than those of the cores in modern processors,
its large number of cores and hyperthreading capability allow many application
to saturate the available memory bandwidth, which is not the case for many
cutting-edge processors. Yet, our performance studies show that it is the
memory latency not the bandwidth which creates a bottleneck for SpMV on this
architecture. Finally, our experiments show that Xeon Phi's sparse kernel
performance is very promising and even better than that of cutting-edge general
purpose processors and GPUs
An experimental investigation of the hypergolic ignition of some polymeric fuels with oxygen
Hypergolic ignition of polymeric fuels with oxyge
Increased surface flashover voltage in microfabricated devices
With the demand for improved performance in microfabricated devices, the
necessity to apply greater electric fields and voltages becomes evident. When
operating in vacuum, the voltage is typically limited by surface flashover
forming along the surface of a dielectric. By modifying the fabrication process
we have discovered it is possible to more than double the flashover voltage.
Our finding has significant impact on the realization of next-generation micro-
and nano-fabricated devices and for the fabrication of on-chip ion trap arrays
for the realization of scalable ion quantum technology
Dissipation due to tunneling two-level systems in gold nanomechanical resonators
We present measurements of the dissipation and frequency shift in
nanomechanical gold resonators at temperatures down to 10 mK. The resonators
were fabricated as doubly-clamped beams above a GaAs substrate and actuated
magnetomotively. Measurements on beams with frequencies 7.95 MHz and 3.87 MHz
revealed that from 30 mK to 500 mK the dissipation increases with temperature
as , with saturation occurring at higher temperatures. The relative
frequency shift of the resonators increases logarithmically with temperature up
to at least 400 mK. Similarities with the behavior of bulk amorphous solids
suggest that the dissipation in our resonators is dominated by two-level
systems
Brain natriuretic peptide and NT-proBNP levels reflect pulmonary artery systolic pressure in trekkers at high altitude.
Our objective was to evaluate the utility of the natriuretic peptides BNP (brain natriuretic peptide) and NT-proBNP as markers of pulmonary artery systolic pressure (PASP) in trekkers ascending to high altitude (HA). 20 participants had BNP and NT-proBNP assayed and simultaneous echocardiographic assessment of PASP performed during a trek to 5150 m. PASP increased significantly (p=0.006) with ascent from 24+/-4 to 39+/-11 mm Hg at 5150 m. At 5150 m those with a PASP>/=40 mm Hg (n=8) (versus those with PASP/=400 pg/ml) rise in NT-proBNP at 5150 m (n=4) PASP was significantly higher: 45.9+/-7.5 vs. 32.2+/-6.2 mm Hg (p=0.015). BNP and NT-proBNP may reflect elevated PASP, a central feature of high altitude pulmonary oedema, at HA
Nonlinear modal coupling in a high-stress doubly-clamped nanomechanical resonator
We present results from a study of the nonlinear intermodal coupling between
different flexural vibrational modes of a single high-stress, doubly-clamped
silicon nitride nanomechanical beam. The measurements were carried out at 100
mK and the beam was actuated using the magnetomotive technique. We observed the
nonlinear behavior of the modes individually and also measured the coupling
between them by driving the beam at multiple frequencies. We demonstrate that
the different modes of the resonator are coupled to each other by the
displacement induced tension in the beam, which also leads to the well known
Duffing nonlinearity in doubly-clamped beams.Comment: 15 pages, 7 figure
The Effects Of Medicare Payment Changes On Nursing Home Staffing
In light of persistent shortcomings in nursing home care quality and evidence that lower nurse staffing levels could be harmful to residents, we examine whether staffing levels are affected by changes in Medicare reimbursement rates. We exploit a 2006 change in Medicare’s methodology for adjusting provider payments for geographic differences in costs, a change that generated plausibly exogenous variation in nursing facility reimbursement rates. Our method compares facilities with higher and lower shares of Medicare resident days, which were differentially exposed to the payment changes we examine. Using panel data on US nursing homes from 2003 through 2009, we find that higher Medicare payments increased nurse staffing hours per resident day. Additional results suggest that changes in Medicare payments did not affect other measures of quality
Resistance Noise Scaling in a Dilute Two-Dimensional Hole System in GaAs
We have measured the resistance noise of a two-dimensional (2D)hole system in
a high mobility GaAs quantum well, around the 2D metal-insulator transition
(MIT) at zero magnetic field. The normalized noise power increases
strongly when the hole density p_s is decreased, increases slightly with
temperature (T) at the largest densities, and decreases strongly with T at low
p_s. The noise scales with the resistance, , as for a
second order phase transition such as a percolation transition. The p_s
dependence of the conductivity is consistent with a critical behavior for such
a transition, near a density p* which is lower than the observed MIT critical
density p_c.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures, to be published in Phys. Rev. Let
Real-space imaging of quantum Hall effect edge strips
We use dynamic scanning capacitance microscopy (DSCM) to image compressible
and incompressible strips at the edge of a Hall bar in a two-dimensional
electron gas (2DEG) in the quantum Hall effect (QHE) regime. This method gives
access to the complex local conductance, Gts, between a sharp metallic tip
scanned across the sample surface and ground, comprising the complex sample
conductance. Near integer filling factors we observe a bright stripe along the
sample edge in the imaginary part of Gts. The simultaneously recorded real part
exhibits a sharp peak at the boundary between the sample interior and the
stripe observed in the imaginary part. The features are periodic in the inverse
magnetic field and consistent with compressible and incompressible strips
forming at the sample edge. For currents larger than the critical current of
the QHE break-down the stripes vanish sharply and a homogeneous signal is
recovered, similar to zero magnetic field. Our experiments directly illustrate
the formation and a variety of properties of the conceptually important QHE
edge states at the physical edge of a 2DEG.Comment: 7 page
Pressure Dependence of Fragile-to-Strong Transition and a Possible Second Critical Point in Supercooled Confined Water
By confining water in nano-pores of silica glass, we can bypass the
crystallization and study the pressure effect on the dynamical behavior in
deeply supercooled state using neutron scattering. We observe a clear evidence
of a cusp-like fragile-to-strong (F-S) dynamic transition. Here we show that
the transition temperature decreases steadily with an increasing pressure,
until it intersects the homogenous nucleation temperature line of bulk water at
a pressure of 1600 bar. Above this pressure, it is no longer possible to
discern the characteristic feature of the F-S transition. Identification of
this end point with the possible second critical point is discussed.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure
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