7,573 research outputs found
Regenerating the strength of thermally recycled glass fibres using hot sodium hydroxide
Results are presented from the ReCoVeR project on the regeneration of the strength of thermally conditioned glass fibres. Thermal recycling of end-of-life glass fibre reinforced composites or composite manufacturing waste delivers fibres with virtually no residual strength or value. Composites produced from such fibres also have extremely poor mechanical performance. Data is presented showing that a short hot sodium hydroxide solution treatment of such recycled fibres can more than triple their strength and restore their ability to act as an effective reinforcement in second life composite materials. The implications of these results for real materials reuse of recycled glass fibres as replacement for pristine reinforcement fibres are discussed
Do wildflower strips enhance pest control in organic cabbage?
Within this project we assess whether wildflower strips and companion plants increase the control of cabbage pests Plutella xylostella L. (Lepidoptera: Plutellidae), Mamestra brassicae L. (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae) and Pieris rapae L. (Lepidoptera: Pieridae) by (1) naturally occurring parasitoids and predators and (2) mass‐releasedn Trichogramma brassciae (Bezdenko) (Hymenoptera: Trichogrammatidae) parasitoids. Two organic cabbage fields were used for this study: adjacent to each field a wildflower strip was sown and companion plants (Centaurea cyanus L. (Asteraceae)) intermixed within the crop. Within each field ~15,000 M. brassicae eggs were placed out to determine the parasitism rates by mass‐released T. brassicae and to assess the levels of egg predation. Over 1,000 lepidopteran larvae were collected and screened for hymenopteran and tachinid parasitoid DNA using a multiplex PCR assay. Invertebrate generalist predators (n=1,063) were collected for DNA‐based gut content analysis. The wildflower strip had a significant positive effect on M. brassicae egg parasitism rates as rates increased 5‐fold in the vicinity to the strip. Moreover, companion plants enhanced invertebrate predation on M. brassicae eggs. Both, the release of T. brassicae and the use of companion plants, however, did not significantly increase egg parasitism rates. The infestation of plants by caterpillars increased with distance to the wildflower strip and there was a trend of decreasing larval parasitism rates with distance to the strip. Currently the invertebrate predators are being molecularly analysed to assess predation on unparasitized and parasitized lepidopteran pests
Discrete stochastic models for traffic flow
We investigate a probabilistic cellular automaton model which has been
introduced recently. This model describes single-lane traffic flow on a ring
and generalizes the asymmetric exclusion process models. We study the
equilibrium properties and calculate the so-called fundamental diagrams (flow
vs.\ density) for parallel dynamics. This is done numerically by computer
simulations of the model and by means of an improved mean-field approximation
which takes into account short-range correlations. For cars with maximum
velocity 1 the simplest non-trivial approximation gives the exact result. For
higher velocities the analytical results, obtained by iterated application of
the approximation scheme, are in excellent agreement with the numerical
simulations.Comment: Revtex, 30 pages, full postscript version (including figures)
available by anonymous ftp from "fileserv1.mi.uni-koeln.de" in the directory
"pub/incoming/" paper accepted for publication in Phys.Rev.
The Effect of absorbing sites on the one-dimensional cellular automaton traffic flow with open boundaries
The effect of the absorbing sites with an absorbing rate , in both
one absorbing site (one way out) and two absorbing sites (two ways out) in a
road, on the traffic flow phase transition is investigated using numerical
simulations in the one-dimensional cellular automaton traffic flow model with
open boundaries using parallel dynamics.In the case of one way out, there exist
a critical position of the way out below which the current is
constant for and decreases when increasing
for . When the way out is located at a
position greater than , the current increases with for
and becomes constant for any value of
greater than . While, when the way out is located at any position
between and (), the current increases,
for , with and becomes constant for
and decreases with for
. In the later case the density undergoes two
successive first order transitions; from high density to maximal current phase
at and from intermediate density to the low one at
. In the case of two ways out located respectively
at the positions and , the two successive transitions occur
only when the distance - separating the two ways is smaller than
a critical distance . Phase diagrams in the (),
() and () planes are established. It is found
that the transitions between Free traffic, Congested traffic and maximal
current phase are first order
Metrological characterization of the pulsed Rb clock with optical detection
We report on the implementation and the metrological characterization of a
vapor-cell Rb frequency standard working in pulsed regime. The three main parts
that compose the clock, physics package, optics and electronics, are described
in detail in the paper. The prototype is designed and optimized to detect the
clock transition in the optical domain. Specifically, the reference atomic
transition, excited with a Ramsey scheme, is detected by observing the
interference pattern on a laser absorption signal.
\ The metrological analysis includes the observation and characterization of
the clock signal and the measurement of frequency stability and drift. In terms
of Allan deviation, the measured frequency stability results as low as
, being the averaging time, and
reaches the value of few units of for s, an
unprecedent achievement for a vapor cell clock. We discuss in the paper the
physical effects leading to this result with particular care to laser and
microwave noises transferred to the clock signal. The frequency drift, probably
related to the temperature, stays below per day, and no evidence of
flicker floor is observed.
\ We also mention some possible improvements that in principle would lead to
a clock stability below the level at 1 s and to a drift of few units
of per day
Geometric origin of excess low-frequency vibrational modes in amorphous solids
Glasses have a large excess of low-frequency vibrational modes in comparison
with crystalline solids. We show that such a feature is a necessary consequence
of the geometry generic to weakly connected solids. In particular, we analyze
the density of states of a recently simulated system, comprised of weakly
compressed spheres at zero temperature. We account for the observed a)
constancy of the density of modes with frequency, b) appearance of a
low-frequency cutoff, and c) power-law increase of this cutoff with
compression. We predict a length scale below which vibrations are very
different from those of a continuous elastic body.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures. Argument rewritten, identical result
Effects of prenatal exposure to xenobiotic estrogen and the development of endometriosis in adulthood
Abstract only availableEndometriosis is an estrogen-dependent disease that affects millions of women worldwide, causing pain and infertility. While it is known that retrograde menstruation places endometrial tissue in the peritoneal cavity, it is unclear why it invades and proliferates in women with endometriosis. Studies have shown that other hormone-dependent diseases have a fetal basis (e.g. breast cancer), suggesting that the presence of different hormones before birth may alter the incidence of endometriosis in adulthood. For example, women whose mothers took the synthetic estrogen diethylstilbestrol (DES) during pregnancy had an eighty percent increased incidence of endometriosis. Thus, our hypothesis is that prenatal exposure to xenobiotic estrogen will increase the severity of endometriosis in adulthood in a mouse model of surgically-induced endometriosis. To test this hypothesis, mice were time mated and dosed with vehicle control, 100 ng/kg DES or 10,000 ng/kg DES from days 11-17 of gestation. Surgical induction of endometriosis was performed in adulthood by autotransplantation of one uterine horm. The horn was removed, opened, divided into three pieces, and sutured to the arterial cascade of the intestinal mesentery. The implants became vascularized and formed endometriotic lesions. The mice were then collected at 2 or 4 weeks post-surgery, and the following endpoints were measured: 1) uterine weight; 2) implant size; and 3) implant weight. Additionally, implants were set aside for further analysis of 1) histology; 2) estrogen receptor indicator reporter gene activity; and 3) endometriosis-related gene expression. At the conclusion of this ongoing study, we expect to show whether there is an estrogen-mediated fetal component to endometriosis.Life Sciences Undergraduate Research Opportunity Progra
Traffic jams and ordering far from thermal equilibrium
The recently suggested correspondence between domain dynamics of traffic
models and the asymmetric chipping model is reviewed. It is observed that in
many cases traffic domains perform the two characteristic dynamical processes
of the chipping model, namely chipping and diffusion. This correspondence
indicates that jamming in traffic models in which all dynamical rates are
non-deterministic takes place as a broad crossover phenomenon, rather than a
sharp transition. Two traffic models are studied in detail and analyzed within
this picture.Comment: Contribution to the Niels Bohr Summer Institute on Complexity and
Criticality; to appear in a Per Bak Memorial Issue of PHYSICA
Self-guided wakefield experiments driven by petawatt class ultra-short laser pulses
We investigate the extension of self-injecting laser wakefield experiments to
the regime that will be accessible with the next generation of petawatt class
ultra-short pulse laser systems. Using linear scalings, current experimental
trends and numerical simulations we determine the optimal laser and target
parameters, i.e. focusing geometry, plasma density and target length, that are
required to increase the electron beam energy (to > 1 GeV) without the use of
external guiding structures.Comment: 15 pages, 8 figure
Drop Splashing on a Dry Smooth Surface
The corona splash due to the impact of a liquid drop on a smooth dry
substrate is investigated with high speed photography. A striking phenomenon is
observed: splashing can be completely suppressed by decreasing the pressure of
the surrounding gas. The threshold pressure where a splash first occurs is
measured as a function of the impact velocity and found to scale with the
molecular weight of the gas and the viscosity of the liquid. Both experimental
scaling relations support a model in which compressible effects in the gas are
responsible for splashing in liquid solid impacts.Comment: 11 pages, 4 figure
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