190 research outputs found
Spectroscopic analysis of Pu-bearing compounds in double-walled cells
Spectroscopic analysis of radiological materials has been historically limited to radiological labs with older or less advanced scientific instrumentation. The development of double-walled cells (DWCs) at the Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL) has enabled Pu-bearing compounds to be removed from radiological laboratories and studied in our radiologically clean spectroscopy laboratory with state-of-the-art instrumentation. In this manuscript, we discuss the contributions of DWCs that have allowed the application of Raman spectroscopy, diffuse reflectance infrared Fourier transform spectroscopy (DRIFTS), diffuse reflectance spectroscopy (DRS) in the shortwave infrared, and gamma spectroscopy at SRNL. Significant advances have been made in the understanding of the thermal decomposition of Pu(III) and Pu(IV) oxalates, alpha-induced damage to the PuO2 crystal lattice, and the effect of calcination temperatures on the quality of PuO2. These techniques have enabled methods to conduct PuO2 age dating since last calcination and estimate the calcination temperature with Raman spectroscopy and DRS. Additional spectroscopic information measured with DRIFTS has enabled the observation of the evolution of carbon species with calcination temperature, while gamma spectroscopy provides information on age dating since last purification
Strong Ultraviolet Pulse From a Newborn Type Ia Supernova
Type Ia supernovae are destructive explosions of carbon oxygen white dwarfs.
Although they are used empirically to measure cosmological distances, the
nature of their progenitors remains mysterious, One of the leading progenitor
models, called the single degenerate channel, hypothesizes that a white dwarf
accretes matter from a companion star and the resulting increase in its central
pressure and temperature ignites thermonuclear explosion. Here we report
observations of strong but declining ultraviolet emission from a Type Ia
supernova within four days of its explosion. This emission is consistent with
theoretical expectations of collision between material ejected by the supernova
and a companion star, and therefore provides evidence that some Type Ia
supernovae arise from the single degenerate channel.Comment: Accepted for publication on the 21 May 2015 issue of Natur
Spectroscopy of High-Redshift Supernovae from the ESSENCE Project: The First Two Years
We present the results of spectroscopic observations of targets discovered
during the first two years of the ESSENCE project. The goal of ESSENCE is to
use a sample of ~200 Type Ia supernovae (SNe Ia) at moderate redshifts (0.2 < z
< 0.8) to place constraints on the equation of state of the Universe.
Spectroscopy not only provides the redshifts of the objects, but also confirms
that some of the discoveries are indeed SNe Ia. This confirmation is critical
to the project, as techniques developed to determine luminosity distances to
SNe Ia depend upon the knowledge that the objects at high redshift are the same
as the ones at low redshift. We describe the methods of target selection and
prioritization, the telescopes and detectors, and the software used to identify
objects. The redshifts deduced from spectral matching of high-redshift SNe Ia
with low-redshift SNe Ia are consistent with those determined from host-galaxy
spectra. We show that the high-redshift SNe Ia match well with low-redshift
templates. We include all spectra obtained by the ESSENCE project, including 52
SNe Ia, 5 core-collapse SNe, 12 active galactic nuclei, 19 galaxies, 4 possibly
variable stars, and 16 objects with uncertain identifications.Comment: 38 pages, 9 figures (many with multiple parts), submitted to A
High Throughput Discovery of Lightweight Corrosion-Resistant Compositionally Complex Alloys
Compositionally complex alloys hold the promise of simultaneously attaining
superior combinations of properties such as corrosion resistance,
light-weighting, and strength. Achieving this goal is a challenge due in part
to a large number of possible compositions and structures in the vast alloy
design space. High throughput methods offer a path forward, but a strong
connection between the synthesis of a given composition and structure with its
properties has not been fully realized to date. Here we present the rapid
identification of light weight highly corrosion-resistant alloys based on
combinations of Al and Cr in a Cantor-like base alloy (Al-Co-Cr-Fe-Ni).
Previously unstudied alloy stoichiometries were identified using a combination
of high throughput experimental screening coupled with key metallurgical and
electrochemical corrosion tests, identifying alloys with excellent passivation
behavior. Importantly, the electrochemical impedance modulus of the
exposure-modified, air-formed film at the corrosion potential was found as an
accurate non-destructive predictor of corrosion and passivation
characteristics. Multi-element EXAFS analyses connected more ordered type
chemical short range order in the Ni-Al 1st nn shell to poorer corrosion. This
report underscores the utility of high throughput exploration of
compositionally complex alloys for the identification and rapid screening of
vast stoichiometric space
Using Line Profiles to Test the Fraternity of Type Ia Supernovae at High and Low Redshifts
Using archival data of low-redshift (z < 0.01) Type Ia supernovae (SN Ia) and
recent observations of high-redshift (0.16 < z <0.64; Matheson et al. 2005) SN
Ia, we study the "uniformity'' of the spectroscopic properties of nearby and
distant SN Ia. We find no difference in the measures we describe here. In this
paper, we base our analysis solely on line-profile morphology, focusing on
measurements of the velocity location of maximum absorption (vabs) and peak
emission (vpeak). We find that the evolution of vabs and vpeak for our sample
lines (Ca II 3945, Si II 6355, and S II 5454, 5640) is similar for both the
low- and high-redshift samples. We find that vabs for the weak S II 5454, 5640
lines, and vpeak for S II 5454, can be used to identify fast-declining [dm15 >
1.7] SN Ia, which are also subluminous. In addition, we give the first direct
evidence in two high-z SN Ia spectra of a double-absorption feature in Ca II
3945, an event also observed, though infrequently, in low-redshift SN Ia
spectra (6/22 SN Ia in our local sample). We report for the first time the
unambiguous and systematic intrinsic blueshift of peak emission of optical
P-Cygni line profiles in Type Ia spectra, by as much as 8000 km/s. All the
high-z SN Ia analyzed in this paper were discovered and followed up by the
ESSENCE collaboration, and are now publicly available.Comment: 28 pages (emulateapj), 15 figures; accepted for publication in A
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A Spectroscopic Study of Type Ibc Supernova Host Galaxies From Untargeted Surveys
We present the first spectroscopic study of the host environments of Type Ibc supernovae (SN Ibc) discovered exclusively by untargeted SN searches. Past studies of SN Ibc host environments have been biased towards high-mass, high-metallicity galaxies by focusing on SNe discovered in galaxytargeted SN searches. Our new observations more than double the total number of spectroscopic stellar population age and metallicity measurements published for untargeted SN Ibc host environments. For the 12 SNe Ib and 21 SNe Ic in our metallicity sample, we find median metallicities of 0.62 Z⊙ and 0.83 Z⊙, respectively, but determine that the discrepancy in the full distribution of metallicities is not statistically significant. This median difference would correspond to only a small difference in the mass loss via metal-line driven winds (. 30%), suggesting this does not play the dominant role in distinguishing SN Ib and Ic progenitors. However, the median metallicity of the 7 broad-lined SN Ic (SN Ic-BL) in our sample is significantly lower, 0.45 Z⊙. The age of the young stellar population of SN Ic-BL host environments also seems to be lower than for SN Ib and Ic, but our age sample is small. Combining all SN Ibc host environment spectroscopy from the literature to date does not reveal a significant difference in SN Ib and Ic metallicities, but reinforces the significance of the lower metallicities for SN Ic-BL. This combined sample demonstrates that galaxy-targeted SN searches introduce a significant bias for studies seeking to infer the metallicity distribution of SN progenitors, and we identify and discuss other systematic effects that play smaller roles. We discuss the path forward for making progress on SN Ibc progenitor studies in the LSST era. This paper includes data gathered with the 6.5 m Magellan Telescopes located at Las Campanas Observatory, Chile.Astronom
Berkeley Supernova Ia Program I: Observations, Data Reduction, and Spectroscopic Sample of 582 Low-Redshift Type Ia Supernovae
In this first paper in a series we present 1298 low-redshift (z\leq0.2)
optical spectra of 582 Type Ia supernovae (SNe Ia) observed from 1989 through
2008 as part of the Berkeley SN Ia Program (BSNIP). 584 spectra of 199 SNe Ia
have well-calibrated light curves with measured distance moduli, and many of
the spectra have been corrected for host-galaxy contamination. Most of the data
were obtained using the Kast double spectrograph mounted on the Shane 3 m
telescope at Lick Observatory and have a typical wavelength range of
3300-10,400 Ang., roughly twice as wide as spectra from most previously
published datasets. We present our observing and reduction procedures, and we
describe the resulting SN Database (SNDB), which will be an online, public,
searchable database containing all of our fully reduced spectra and companion
photometry. In addition, we discuss our spectral classification scheme (using
the SuperNova IDentification code, SNID; Blondin & Tonry 2007), utilising our
newly constructed set of SNID spectral templates. These templates allow us to
accurately classify our entire dataset, and by doing so we are able to
reclassify a handful of objects as bona fide SNe Ia and a few other objects as
members of some of the peculiar SN Ia subtypes. In fact, our dataset includes
spectra of nearly 90 spectroscopically peculiar SNe Ia. We also present
spectroscopic host-galaxy redshifts of some SNe Ia where these values were
previously unknown. [Abridged]Comment: 34 pages, 11 figures, 11 tables, revised version, re-submitted to
MNRAS. Spectra will be released in January 2013. The SN Database homepage
(http://hercules.berkeley.edu/database/index_public.html) contains the full
tables, plots of all spectra, and our new SNID template
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