547 research outputs found
Assessing the number of users who are excluded by domestic heating controls
This is the pre-print version of the Article. This Article is also referred to as: "Assessing the 'Design Exclusion' of Heating Controls at a Low-Cost, Low-Carbon Housing Development". - Copyright @ 2011 Taylor & FrancisSpace heating accounts for almost 60% of the energy delivered to housing which in turn accounts for nearly 27% of the total UK's carbon emissions. This study was conducted to investigate the influence of heating control design on the degree of ‘user exclusion’. This was calculated using the Design Exclusion Calculator, developed by the Engineering Design Centre at the University of Cambridge. To elucidate the capability requirements of the system, a detailed hierarchical task analysis was produced, due to the complexity of the overall task. The Exclusion Calculation found that the current design placed excessive demands upon the capabilities of at least 9.5% of the UK population over 16 years old, particularly in terms of ‘vision’, ‘thinking’ and ‘dexterity’ requirements. This increased to 20.7% for users over 60 years old. The method does not account for the level of numeracy and literacy and so the true exclusion may be higher. Usability testing was conducted to help validate the results which indicated that 66% of users at a low-carbon housing development could not programme their controls as desired. Therefore, more detailed analysis of the cognitive demands placed upon the users is required to understand where problems within the programming process occur. Further research focusing on this cognitive interaction will work towards a solution that may allow users to behave easily in a more sustainable manner
Rapid and predictable evolution of admixed populations between two Drosophila species pairs
The consequences of hybridization are varied, ranging from the origin of new lineages, introgression of some genes between species, to the extinction of one of the hybridizing species. We generated replicate admixed populations between two pairs of sister species of Drosophila: D. simulans and D. mauritiana; and D. yakuba and D. santomea. Each pair consisted of a continental species and an island endemic. The admixed populations were maintained by random mating in discrete generations for over 20 generations. We assessed morphological, behavioral, and fitness-related traits from each replicate population periodically, and sequenced genomic DNA from the populations at generation 20. For both pairs of species, species-specific traits and their genomes regressed to those of the continental species. A few alleles from the island species persisted, but they tended to be proportionally rare among all sites in the genome and were rarely fixed within the populations. This paucity of alleles from the island species was particularly pronounced on the X-chromosome. These results indicate that nearly all foreign genes were quickly eliminated after hybridization and that selection against the minor species genome might be similar across experimental replicates
Thin-Film Metamaterials called Sculptured Thin Films
Morphology and performance are conjointed attributes of metamaterials, of
which sculptured thin films (STFs) are examples. STFs are assemblies of
nanowires that can be fabricated from many different materials, typically via
physical vapor deposition onto rotating substrates. The curvilinear--nanowire
morphology of STFs is determined by the substrate motions during fabrication.
The optical properties, especially, can be tailored by varying the morphology
of STFs. In many cases prototype devices have been fabricated for various
optical, thermal, chemical, and biological applications.Comment: to be published in Proc. ICTP School on Metamaterials (Augsut 2009,
Sibiu, Romania
Fractal Properties of Robust Strange Nonchaotic Attractors in Maps of Two or More Dimensions
We consider the existence of robust strange nonchaotic attractors (SNA's) in
a simple class of quasiperiodically forced systems. Rigorous results are
presented demonstrating that the resulting attractors are strange in the sense
that their box-counting dimension is N+1 while their information dimension is
N. We also show how these properties are manifested in numerical experiments.Comment: 9 pages, 14 figure
Cold Plasma Dispersion Relations in the Vicinity of a Schwarzschild Black Hole Horizon
We apply the ADM 3+1 formalism to derive the general relativistic
magnetohydrodynamic equations for cold plasma in spatially flat Schwarzschild
metric. Respective perturbed equations are linearized for non-magnetized and
magnetized plasmas both in non-rotating and rotating backgrounds. These are
then Fourier analyzed and the corresponding dispersion relations are obtained.
These relations are discussed for the existence of waves with positive angular
frequency in the region near the horizon. Our results support the fact that no
information can be extracted from the Schwarzschild black hole. It is concluded
that negative phase velocity propagates in the rotating background whether the
black hole is rotating or non-rotating.Comment: 27 pages, 11 figures accepted for publication in Gen. Relat. & Gravi
Non-local charges on AdS_5 x S^5 and PP-waves
We show the existence of an infinite set of non-local classically conserved
charges on the Green-Schwarz closed superstring in a pp-wave background. We
find that these charges agree with the Penrose limit of non-local classically
conserved charges recently found for the Green-Schwarz
superstring. The charges constructed in this paper could help to understand the
role played by these on the full background.Comment: 20 pages. JHEP. v2:references adde
Plasma Wave Properties of the Schwarzschild Magnetosphere in a Veselago Medium
We re-formulate the 3+1 GRMHD equations for the Schwarzschild black hole in a
Veselago medium. Linear perturbation in rotating (non-magnetized and
magnetized) plasma is introduced and their Fourier analysis is considered. We
discuss wave properties with the help of wave vector, refractive index and
change in refractive index in the form of graphs. It is concluded that some
waves move away from the event horizon in this unusual medium. We conclude that
for the rotating non-magnetized plasma, our results confirm the presence of
Veselago medium while the rotating magnetized plasma does not provide any
evidence for this medium.Comment: 20 pages, 15 figures, accepted for publication in Astrophys. Space
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