6,294 research outputs found
CFD computations of wind turbine blade loads during standstill operation KNOW-BLADE, Task 3.1 report
Dust sedimentation and self-sustained Kelvin-Helmholtz turbulence in protoplanetary disk mid-planes. I. Radially symmetric simulations
We perform numerical simulations of the Kelvin-Helmholtz instability in the
mid-plane of a protoplanetary disk. A two-dimensional corotating slice in the
azimuthal--vertical plane of the disk is considered where we include the
Coriolis force and the radial advection of the Keplerian rotation flow. Dust
grains, treated as individual particles, move under the influence of friction
with the gas, while the gas is treated as a compressible fluid. The friction
force from the dust grains on the gas leads to a vertical shear in the gas
rotation velocity. As the particles settle around the mid-plane due to gravity,
the shear increases, and eventually the flow becomes unstable to the
Kelvin-Helmholtz instability. The Kelvin-Helmholtz turbulence saturates when
the vertical settling of the dust is balanced by the turbulent diffusion away
from the mid-plane. The azimuthally averaged state of the self-sustained
Kelvin-Helmholtz turbulence is found to have a constant Richardson number in
the region around the mid-plane where the dust-to-gas ratio is significant.
Nevertheless the dust density has a strong non-axisymmetric component. We
identify a powerful clumping mechanism, caused by the dependence of the
rotation velocity of the dust grains on the dust-to-gas ratio, as the source of
the non-axisymmetry. Our simulations confirm recent findings that the critical
Richardson number for Kelvin-Helmholtz instability is around unity or larger,
rather than the classical value of 1/4Comment: Accepted for publication in ApJ. Some minor changes due to referee
report, most notably that the clumping mechanism has been identified as the
streaming instability of Youdin & Goodman (2005). Movies of the simulations
are still available at http://www.mpia.de/homes/johansen/research_en.ph
Dendritic flux patterns in MgB2 films
Magneto-opitcal studies of a c-oriented epitaxial MgB2 film with critical
current density 10^7 A/cm^2 demonstrate a breakdown of the critical state at
temperatures below 10 K [cond-mat/0104113]. Instead of conventional uniform and
gradual flux penetration in an applied magnetic field, we observe an abrupt
invasion of complex dendritic structures. When the applied field subsequently
decreases, similar dendritic structures of the return flux penetrate the film.
The static and dynamic properties of the dendrites are discussed.Comment: Accepted to Supercond. Sci. Techno
Classification of Possible Finite-Time Singularities by Functional Renormalization
Starting from a representation of the early time evolution of a dynamical
system in terms of the polynomial expression of some observable f (t) as a
function of the time variable in some interval 0 < t < T, we investigate how to
extrapolate/forecast in some optimal stability sense the future evolution of
f(t) for time t>T. Using the functional renormalization of Yukalov and Gluzman,
we offer a general classification of the possible regimes that can be defined
based on the sole knowledge of the coefficients of a second-order polynomial
representation of the dynamics. In particular, we investigate the conditions
for the occurence of finite-time singularities from the structure of the time
series, and quantify the critical time and the functional nature of the
singularity when present. We also describe the regimes when a smooth extremum
replaces the singularity and determine its position and amplitude. This extends
previous works by (1) quantifying the stability of the functional
renormalization method more accurately, (2) introducing new global constraints
in terms of moments and (3) going beyond the ``mean-field'' approximation.Comment: Latex document of 18 pages + 7 ps figure
Current-induced dendritic magnetic instability in superconducting MgB2 films
Magneto-optical imaging reveals that in superconducting films of MgB2 a
transport current creates avalanche-like flux dynamics where highly branching
dendritic penetration patterns are formed. The instability is triggered when
the current exceeds a threshold value, and the superconductor, shaped as a long
strip, is initially in the critical state. The instability exists up to 19 K,
which is a much wider temperature range than in previous experiments, where
dendrites were formed by applying a magnetic field. The instability is believed
to be of thermo-magnetic origin indicating that thermal stabilization may
become crucial in applications of MgB2.Comment: 3 pages, 3 figures, resubmitted to Appl.Phys.Let
Biocatalytic quantification of alpha-glucan in marine particulate organic matter
Marine algae drive the marine carbon cycle, converting carbon dioxide into organic material. A major component of this produced biomass is a variety of glycans. Marine alpha-glucans include a range of storage glycans from red and green algae, bacteria, fungi, and animals. Although these compounds are likely to account for a high amount of the carbon stored in the oceans they have not been quantified in marine samples so far. Here we present a method to extract and quantify alpha-glucans (and compare it with the beta-glucan laminarin) in particulate organic matter from algal cultures and environmental samples using sequential physicochemical extraction and enzymes as alpha-glucan-specific probes. This enzymatic assay is more specific and less susceptible to side reactions than chemical hydrolysis. Using HPAEC-PAD to detect the hydrolysis products allows for a glycan quantification in particulate marine samples down to a concentration of approximate to 2 mu g/L. We measured glucans in three cultured microalgae as well as in marine particulate organic matter from the North Sea and western North Atlantic Ocean. While the beta-glucan laminarin from diatoms and brown algae is an essential component of marine carbon turnover, our results further indicate the significant contribution of starch-like alpha-glucans to marine particulate organic matter. Henceforth, the combination of glycan-linkage-specific enzymes and chromatographic hydrolysis product detection can provide a powerful tool in the exploration of marine glycans and their role in the global carbon cycle
Following autophagy step by step
Autophagy is an evolutionarily conserved lysosomal degradation route for soluble components of the cytosol and organelles. There is great interest in identifying compounds that modulate autophagy because they may have applications in the treatment of major diseases including cancer and neurodegenerative disease. Hundeshagen and colleagues describe this month in BMC Biology a screening assay based on flow cytometry that makes it possible to track distinct steps in the autophagic process and thereby identify novel modulators of autophagy
Weighted Fixed Points in Self-Similar Analysis of Time Series
The self-similar analysis of time series is generalized by introducing the
notion of scenario probabilities. This makes it possible to give a complete
statistical description for the forecast spectrum by defining the average
forecast as a weighted fixed point and by calculating the corresponding a
priori standard deviation and variance coefficient. Several examples of
stock-market time series illustrate the method.Comment: two additional references are include
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