Integrated Educational Project of Theoretical, Experimental, and Computational Analyses

This research demonstrates how to design an integrated capstone project by including theoretical, experimental and computational analyses of a truss bridge. The project mainly focused on leading students to approach engineering problems with various methods and to understand the advantages and disadvantages of each method. The students applied three methods to acquire the values of stresses and deflections of members in the given truss bridge. First, they calculated the stresses and deformations theoretically. Second, they actually conducted an experiment of the truss bridge with electronic measuring equipment. Lastly, they built two simulation models with Autodesk Inventor and Dassault Systèmes SolidWorks. From the comparisons of above three methods, students were guided to the validation of assumptions of theories.Cockrell School of Engineerin

Invasion of winter moth in New England: Effects of defoliation and site quality on tree mortality.

Abstract Widespread and prolonged defoliation by the European winter moth, Operophtera brumata L., has occurred in forests of eastern Massachusetts for more than a decade and populations of winter moth continue to invade new areas of New England. This study characterized the forests of eastern Massachusetts invaded by winter moth and related the duration of winter moth defoliation estimated using dendrochronology to observed levels of tree mortality and understory woody plant density. Quercus basal area mortality in mixed Quercus and mixed Quercus-Pinus strobus forests in eastern Massachusetts ranged from 0-30%; mortality of Quercus in these forests was related to site quality and the number of winter moth defoliation events. In addition, winter moth defoliation events lead to a subsequent increase in understory woody plant density. Our results indicate that winter moth defoliation has been an important disturbance in New England forests that may have lasting impacts

The triton and three-nucleon force in nuclear lattice simulations

We study the triton and three-nucleon force at lowest chiral order in pionless effective field theory both in the Hamiltonian and Euclidean nuclear lattice formalism. In the case of the Euclidean lattice formalism, we derive the exact few-body worldline amplitudes corresponding to the standard many-body lattice action. This will be useful for setting low-energy coefficients in future nuclear lattice simulations. We work in the Wigner SU(4)-symmetric limit where the S-wave scattering lengths {1}S{0} and {3}S{1} are equal. By comparing with continuum results, we demonstrate for the first time that the nuclear lattice formalism can be used to study few-body nucleon systems.Comment: 16 pages, 4 figure

Finite-volume Hamiltonian method for coupled channel interactions in lattice QCD

Within a multi-channel formulation of $\pi\pi$ scattering, we investigate the use of the finite-volume Hamiltonian approach to resolve scattering observables from lattice QCD spectra. The asymptotic matching of the well-known L\"uscher formalism encodes a unique finite-volume spectrum. Nevertheless, in many practical situations, such as coupled-channel systems, it is advantageous to interpolate isolated lattice spectra in order to extract physical scattering parameters. Here we study the use of the Hamiltonian framework as a parameterisation that can be fit directly to lattice spectra. We find that with a modest amount of lattice data, the scattering parameters can be reproduced rather well, with only a minor degree of model dependence.Comment: 25 pages, 16 figure

Absorbing-state phase transitions on percolating lattices

We study nonequilibrium phase transitions of reaction-diffusion systems defined on randomly diluted lattices, focusing on the transition across the lattice percolation threshold. To develop a theory for this transition, we combine classical percolation theory with the properties of the supercritical nonequilibrium system on a finite-size cluster. In the case of the contact process, the interplay between geometric criticality due to percolation and dynamical fluctuations of the nonequilibrium system leads to a new universality class. The critical point is characterized by ultraslow activated dynamical scaling and accompanied by strong Griffiths singularities. To confirm the universality of this exotic scaling scenario we also study the generalized contact process with several (symmetric) absorbing states, and we support our theory by extensive Monte-Carlo simulations.Comment: 11 pages, 10 eps figures included, final version as publishe

Uniqueness of Lagrangian Self-Expanders

We show that zero-Maslov class Lagrangian self-expanders in C^n which are asymptotic to a pair of planes intersecting transversely are locally unique if n>2 and unique if n=2.Comment: 32 page

Phenomenology of the Baryon Resonance 70-plet at Large N_c

We examine the multiplet structure and decay channels of baryon resonances in the large N_c QCD generalization of the N_c = 3 SU(6) spin-flavor 70. We show that this ``70'', while a construct of large N_c quark models, actually consists of five model-independent irreducible spin-flavor multiplets in the large N_c limit. The preferred decay modes for these resonances fundamentally depend upon which of the five multiplets to which the resonance belongs. For example, there exists an SU(3) ``8'' of resonances that is eta-philic and pi-phobic, and an ``8'' that is the reverse. Moreover, resonances with a strong SU(3) ``1'' component prefer to decay via a K-bar rather than via a pi. Remarkably, available data appears to bear out these conclusions.Comment: 26 pages, ReVTe

Statistical analysis of direct-strike lightning data (1980 to 1982)

Electromagnetic measurements are being made during direct lightning strikes by NASA Langley Center using a specially instrumented F-106B aircraft. The research is to aid refinement, characterization, and understanding of the lightning-aircraft interaction process and the lightning hazards to aircraft. Statistical methods are applied to characterize some aspects of the lightning data obtained from 176 strikes to the aircraft. Specific attention is given to the problem of estimating the upper extreme quantiles of the distributions of peak-to-peak values for currents and rates of change in the magnetic and flux densities. A formal treatment via a general location-scale family of models allows the estimation method to be adapted to the realized shapes the distributions. The shapes are examined by probability plotting methods