On the Evaluation of the Mechanical Behaviour of Structural Glass Elements

Glass can be considered to be a high-technology engineering material with a multifunctional potential for structural applications. However, the conventional approach to the use of glass is often based only on its properties of transparency and isolation. It is thus highly appropriate and necessary to study the mechanical behaviour of this material and to develop adequate methods and models leading to its characterisation. It is evident that the great potential of growth for structural glass applications is an important opportunity of development for the glass industry and the building/construction sectors. The work presented in this paper is a reflection of this conclusion. The authors shortly present the state-of-the-art on the application of glass as a structural element in building and construction, and refer to other potential fields of application and available glass materials. The experimental procedures and methods adopted in three-point bending tests performed on 500 × 100 [mm2] float, laminated and tempered glass specimens with thicknesses between 4 and 19 mm are thoroughly described. The authors evaluated the mechanical strength and stiffness of glass for structural applications. This work contributes to a deeper knowledge of the properties of this material

Melting of scalar mesons and black-hole quasinormal modes in a holographic QCD model

A holographic model for QCD is employed to investigate the effects of the gluon condensate on the spectrum and melting of scalar mesons. We find the evolution of the free energy density with the temperature, and the result shows that the temperature of the confinement/deconfinement transition is sensitive to the gluon-condensate parameter. The spectral functions (SPFs) are also obtained and show a series of peaks in the low-temperature regime, indicating the presence of quasiparticle states associated to the mesons, while the number of peaks decreases with the increment of the temperature, characterizing the quasiparticle melting. In the dual gravitational description, the scalar mesons are identified with the black-hole quasinormal modes (QNMs). We obtain the spectrum of QNMs and the dispersion relations corresponding to the scalar-field perturbations of the gravitational background, and find their dependence with the gluon-condensate parameter.Comment: 30 pages, 12 figures, 5 table

Massive Black Hole Binary Systems in Hierarchical Scenario of Structure Formation

The hierarchical scenario of structure formation describes how objects like galaxies and galaxy clusters are formed by mergers of small objects. In this scenario, mergers of galaxies can lead to the formation of massive black hole (MBH) binary systems. On the other hand, the merger of two MBH could produce a gravitational wave signal detectable, in principle, by the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA). In the present work, we use the Press-Schechter formalism, and its extension, to describe the merger rate of haloes which contain massive black holes. Here, we do not study the gravitational wave emission of these systems. However, we present an initial study to determine the number of systems formed via mergers that could permit, in a future extension of this work, the calculation of the signature in gravitational waves of these systems.Comment: to match the published version in International Journal of Modern Physics

Random Antiferromagnetic SU(N) Spin Chains

We analyze random isotropic antiferromagnetic SU(N) spin chains using the real space renormalization group. We find that they are governed at low energies by a universal infinite randomness fixed point different from the one of random spin-1/2 chains. We determine analytically the important exponents: the energy-length scale relation is $\Omega\sim\exp(-L^{\psi})$, where $\psi=1/N$, and the mean correlation function is given by $\bar{C_{ij}}\sim(-1)^{i-j}/|i-j|^{\phi}$, where $\phi=4/N$. Our analysis shows that the infinite-N limit is unable to capture the behavior obtained at any finite N.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure

Population Dynamics Of Megalobulimus Paranaguensis (gastropoda: Pulmonata) In The Southeast Coast Of Brazil

The population dynamics of Megalobulimus paranaguensis (Pilsbry & lhering, 1900), a large and long-lived land gastropod from Brazil's Southeast (Atlantic Forest) was studied between 2006 and 2009, at an urban park in the city of Santos, state of Sao Paulo. The study included biometry, weighing, and marking and recapture of adult individuals. The variables obtained from specimens were correlated with the environmental variables of the study period. The survival rate of the adult snail population was 96.7%. Recruitment showed several peaks during the year, and was concentrated between April and August, except in 2009, when there was only one peak in August. Specimen abundance progressively increased from 2006 on, with a trend towards relative stability during that period. The condition factor remained relatively stable as well, decreasing from December to February. The potential evapotranspiration and precipitation influenced the number of captures, and the mean temperature influenced the condition factor. Megalobulimus paranaguensis goes through a period of dormancy in the tropical summer, which is between November and February, but remains active in the winter. The survival rate of M. paranaguensis was high, and may be the result of having its annual cycle synchronized with the tropical climate of the Atlantic forest.32646346

Vector meson quasinormal modes in a finite-temperature AdS/QCD model

We study the spectrum of vector mesons in a finite temperature plasma. The plasma is holographically described by a black hole AdS/QCD model. We compute the boundary retarded Green's function using AdS/CFT prescriptions. The corresponding thermal spectral functions show quasiparticle peaks at low temperatures. Then we calculate the quasinormal modes of vector mesons in the soft-wall black hole geometry and analyse their temperature and momentum dependences.Comment: 27 pages, 9 figure

Scalar Spectrum from a Dynamical Gravity/Gauge model

We show that a Dynamical AdS/QCD model is able to reproduce the linear Regge trajectories for the light-flavor sector of mesons with high spin and also for the scalar and pseudoscalar ones. In addition the model has confinement by the Wilson loop criteria and a mass gap. We also calculate the decay amplitude of scalars into two pion in good agreement to the available experimental data.Comment: Presented in the 4th International Workshop on Astronomy and Relativistic Astrophysic