13,350 research outputs found
Expansions of the solutions of the biconfluent Heun equation in terms of incomplete Beta and Gamma functions
Starting from equations obeyed by functions involving the first or the second
derivatives of the biconfluent Heun function, we construct two expansions of
the solutions of the biconfluent Heun equation in terms of incomplete Beta
functions. The first series applies single Beta functions as expansion
functions, while the second one involves a combination of two Beta functions.
The coefficients of expansions obey four- and five-term recurrence relations,
respectively. It is shown that the proposed technique is potent to produce
series solutions in terms of other special functions. Two examples of such
expansions in terms of the incomplete Gamma functions are presente
Adiabatic tracking for photo- and magneto-association of Bose-Einstein condensates with Kerr nonlinearities
We develop the method of adiabatic tracking for photo- and
magneto-association of Bose-Einstein atomic condensates with models that
include Kerr type nonlinearities. We show that the inclusion of these terms can
produce qualitatively important modifications in the adiabatic dynamics, like
the appearance of bifurcations, in which the trajectory that is being tracked
loses its stability. As a consequence the adiabatic theorem does not apply and
the adiabatic transfer can be strongly degraded. This degradation can be
compensated by using fields that are strong enough compared with the values of
the Kerr terms. The main result is that, despite these potentially detrimental
features, there is always a choice of the detuning that leads to an efficient
adiabatic tracking, even for relatively weak fields
Search for magnetic fields in particle-accelerating colliding-wind binaries
Some colliding-wind massive binaries, called particle-accelerating
colliding-wind binaries (PACWB), exhibit synchrotron radio emission, which is
assumed to be generated by a stellar magnetic field. However, no measurement of
magnetic fields in these stars has ever been performed. We aim at quantifying
the possible stellar magnetic fields present in PACWB to provide constraints
for models. We gathered 21 high-resolution spectropolarimetric observations of
9 PACWB available in the ESPaDOnS, Narval and HarpsPol archives. We analysed
these observations with the Least Squares Deconvolution method. We separated
the binary spectral components when possible. No magnetic signature is detected
in any of the 9 PACWB stars and all longitudinal field measurements are
compatible with 0 G. We derived the upper field strength of a possible field
that could have remained hidden in the noise of the data. While the data are
not very constraining for some stars, for several stars we could derive an
upper limit of the polar field strength of the order of 200 G. We can therefore
exclude the presence of strong or moderate stellar magnetic fields in PACWB,
typical of the ones present in magnetic massive stars. Weak magnetic fields
could however be present in these objects. These observational results provide
the first quantitative constraints for future models of PACWB.Comment: Accepted in A&
Infrared-temperature variability in a large agricultural field
The combined effect of water carved gullies, varying soil color, moisture state of the soil and crop, nonuniform phenology, and bare spots was measured for commercially grown barley planted on varying terrain. For all but the most rugged terrain, over 80% of the area within 4, 16, 65, and 259 ha cells was at temperatures within 3 C of the mean cell temperature. The result of using relatively small, 4 ha instantaneous field of views for remote sensing applications is that either the worst or the best of conditions is often observed. There appears to be no great advantage in utilizing a small instantaneous field of view instead of a large one for remote sensing of crop canopy temperatures. The two alternatives for design purposes are then either a very high spatial resolution, of the order of a meter or so, where the field is very accurately temperature mapped, or a low resolution, where the actual size seems to make little difference
Airborne observed solar elevation and row direction effects on the near-IR/red ratio of cotton
An airborne multispectral scanner was used to obtain data over two adjacent cotton fields having rows perpendicular to one another, at three times of day (different solar elevations), and on two dates (different plant size). The near IR/red ratios were displayed in image form, so that within-field variations and differences between fields could be easily assessed. The ratio varied with changing Sun elevation for north-south oriented rows, but no variation was detected for east-west oriented rows
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