177 research outputs found
Metastable phases and "metastable" phase diagrams
The work discusses specifics of phase transitions for metastable states of
substances. The objects of condensed media physics are primarily equilibrium
states of substances with metastable phases viewed as an exception, while the
overwhelming majority of organic substances investigated in chemistry are
metastable. It turns out that at normal pressure many of simple molecular
compounds based on light elements (these include: most hydrocarbons; nitrogen
oxides, hydrates, and carbides; carbon oxide (CO); alcohols, glycerin etc) are
metastable substances too, i.e. they do not match the Gibbs' free energy
minimum for a given chemical composition. At moderate temperatures and
pressures, the phase transitions for given metastable phases throughout the
entire experimentally accessible time range are reversible with the equilibrium
thermodynamics laws obeyed. At sufficiently high pressures (1-10 GPa), most of
molecular phases irreversibly transform to more energy efficient polymerized
phases, both stable and metastable. These transformations are not consistent
with the equality of the Gibbs' free energies between the phases before and
after the transition, i.e. they are not phase transitions in "classical"
meaning. The resulting polymeric phases at normal pressure can exist at
temperatures above the melting one for the initial metastable molecular phase.
Striking examples of such polymers are polyethylene and a polymerized
modification of CO. Many of energy-intermediate polymeric phases can apparently
be synthesized by the "classical" chemistry techniques at normal pressure.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure
Open Access Funds: Getting a Bigger Bang for Our Bucks
Many libraries offer open access publishing funds to support authors in paying article processing charges (APC) levied by some OA journals. However, there are few standard practices for managing or assessing these funds. The Open Access Working Group (OAWG) of the Canadian Association of Research Libraries (CARL) was asked to investigate and articulate best practices for successful open access fund management. In spring 2015, the OAWG surveyed Canadian academic libraries with OA funds to review their criteria and collect feedback on current practices. The survey proved timely because many OA funds are under review. Shrinking budgets, ending pilots, and questions around scale and sustainability of funds provide context for some institutions revisiting or reconfiguring these funds. At the same time, Canada’s principal funding agencies have issued the new Tri‐Agency Open Access Policy on Publications (effective May 2015) which mandates open access for funded research and which is increasing the demand from researchers for financial support from their institutions to pay APCs and other OA costs. This paper addresses findings of the survey, some best practices for open access publishing fund management, and counter arguments for OA funds, as well as other strategies developed by international agencies including the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition (SPARC)
Baryonic Regge trajectories with analyticity constraints
A model for baryonic Regge trajectories compatible with the threshold
behavior required by unitarity and asymptotic behavior in agreement with
analyticity constraints is given in explicit form. Widths and masses of the
baryonic resonances on the N and trajectories are reproduced. The
MacDowell symmetry is exploited and an application is given.Comment: 12 pages, 6 figure
Thermodynamic aspects of materials' hardness: prediction of novel superhard high-pressure phases
In the present work we have proposed the method that allows one to easily
estimate hardness and bulk modulus of known or hypothetical solid phases from
the data on Gibbs energy of atomization of the elements and corresponding
covalent radii. It has been shown that hardness and bulk moduli of compounds
strongly correlate with their thermodynamic and structural properties. The
proposed method may be used for a large number of compounds with various types
of chemical bonding and structures; moreover, the temperature dependence of
hardness may be calculated, that has been performed for diamond and cubic boron
nitride. The correctness of this approach has been shown for the recently
synthesized superhard diamond-like BC5. It has been predicted that the
hypothetical forms of B2O3, diamond-like boron, BCx and COx, which could be
synthesized at high pressures and temperatures, should have extreme hardness
Exploring the design space of metadata-focused file management systems
Operating systems both old and new are reliant on the venerable hierarchical file system. For some time now, however, attempts have been made to either define new file systems or to bolt on applications that offer much improved functionality to attach and use metadata. This is because researchers have shown that traditional file systems are not able to meet users' needs in terms of organising large numbers of files effectively, and to support expeditious retrieval of those files when they are needed at a later time.
Numerous proposals for post-hierarchical file management systems have been described in the literature; researchers focus on different dimensions of such systems in order to solve or reduce identified limitations. In some cases this leads to significantly different file system architectures, while in other cases new functionality is added on top of a traditional system through special purpose user-space applications. Orthogonally, some proposals focus on tags while others favour named attribute-value pairs. Still other choices are, seemingly, made in an ad hoc and often implicit manner.
This paper investigates the different dimensions and associated choices that participate in the proposal of new approaches and that affect their ability to improve on current systems. The Cartesian product of those dimensions and options forms a large design space; we map some of the existing literature onto that design space and discuss approaches to evaluate new proposals
Multi-factor service design: identification and consideration of multiple factors of the service in its design process
Service design is a multidisciplinary area that helps innovate services by bringing new ideas to customers through a design-thinking approach. Services are affected by multiple factors, which should be considered in designing services. In this paper, we propose the multi-factor service design (MFSD) method, which helps consider the multi-factor nature of service in the service design process. The MFSD method has been developed through and used in five service design studies with industry and government. The method addresses the multi-factor nature of service for systematic service design by providing the following guidelines: (1) identify key factors that affect the customer value creation of the service in question (in short, value creation factors), (2) define the design space of the service based on the value creation factors, and (3) design services and represent them based on the factors. We provide real stories and examples from the five service design studies to illustrate the MFSD method and demonstrate its utility. This study will contribute to the design of modern complex services that are affected by varied factors
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