2,694 research outputs found
Variation of the X-ray non-thermal emission in the Arches cloud
The origin of the iron fluorescent line at 6.4 keV from an extended region
surrounding the Arches cluster is debated and the non-variability of this
emission up to 2009 has favored the low-energy cosmic-ray origin over a
possible irradiation by hard X-rays. By probing the variability of the Arches
cloud non-thermal emission in the most recent years, including a deep
observation in 2012, we intend to discriminate between the two competing
scenarios. We perform a spectral fit of XMM-Newton observations collected from
2000 to 2013 in order to build the Arches cloud lightcurve corresponding to
both the neutral Fe Kalpha line and the X-ray continuum emissions. We reveal a
30% flux drop in 2012, detected with more than 4 sigma significance for both
components. This implies that a large fraction of the studied non-thermal
emission is due to the reflection of an X-ray transient source.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figures, accepted for publication in MNRAS Letter
The effect of rotation and tidal heating on the thermal lightcurves of Super Mercuries
Short period (<50 days) low-mass (<10Mearth) exoplanets are abundant and the
few of them whose radius and mass have been measured already reveal a diversity
in composition. Some of these exoplanets are found on eccentric orbits and are
subjected to strong tides affecting their rotation and resulting in significant
tidal heating. Within this population, some planets are likely to be depleted
in volatiles and have no atmosphere. We model the thermal emission of these
"Super Mercuries" to study the signatures of rotation and tidal dissipation on
their infrared light curve. We compute the time-dependent temperature map at
the surface and in the subsurface of the planet and the resulting
disk-integrated emission spectrum received by a distant observer for any
observation geometry. We calculate the illumination of the planetary surface
for any Keplerian orbit and rotation. We include the internal tidal heat flow,
vertical heat diffusion in the subsurface and generate synthetic light curves.
We show that the different rotation periods predicted by tidal models
(spin-orbit resonances, pseudo-synchronization) produce different photometric
signatures, which are observable provided that the thermal inertia of the
surface is high, like that of solid or melted rocks (but not regolith). Tidal
dissipation can also directly affect the light curves and make the inference of
the rotation more difficult or easier depending on the existence of hot spots
on the surface. Infrared light curve measurement with the James Webb Space
Telescope and EChO can be used to infer exoplanets' rotation periods and
dissipation rates and thus to test tidal models. This data will also constrain
the nature of the (sub)surface by constraining the thermal inertia.Comment: 15 pages, 13 figures, accepted for publication in Astronomy &
Astrophysic
Antimatter cosmic rays from dark matter annihilation: First results from an N-body experiment
[Abridged]. We take advantage of the galaxy-like 3D dark matter map extracted
from the HORIZON Project results to calculate the positron and antiproton
fluxes from dark matter annihilation, in a model-independent approach as well
as for dark matter particle benchmarks relevant at the LHC scale (from
supersymmetric and extra-dimensional theories). Such a study is dedicated to a
better estimate of the theoretical uncertainties affecting predictions, while
the PAMELA and GLAST satellites are currently taking data which will soon
provide better observational constraints. We discuss the predictions of the
antiproton and positron fluxes, and of the positron fraction as well, as
compared to the current data. We finally discuss the limits of the Nbody
framework in describing the dark matter halo of our Galaxy.Comment: 19 pages, 9 figures. Backgrounds included and additional comments and
figures on the positron fraction. Accepted for publication in PR
Dark matter annihilation and decay in dwarf spheroidal galaxies: The classical and ultrafaint dSphs
Dwarf spheroidal (dSph) galaxies are prime targets for present and future
gamma-ray telescopes hunting for indirect signals of particle dark matter. The
interpretation of the data requires careful assessment of their dark matter
content in order to derive robust constraints on candidate relic particles.
Here, we use an optimised spherical Jeans analysis to reconstruct the
`astrophysical factor' for both annihilating and decaying dark matter in 21
known dSphs. Improvements with respect to previous works are: (i) the use of
more flexible luminosity and anisotropy profiles to minimise biases, (ii) the
use of weak priors tailored on extensive sets of contamination-free mock data
to improve the confidence intervals, (iii) systematic cross-checks of binned
and unbinned analyses on mock and real data, and (iv) the use of mock data
including stellar contamination to test the impact on reconstructed signals.
Our analysis provides updated values for the dark matter content of 8
`classical' and 13 `ultrafaint' dSphs, with the quoted uncertainties directly
linked to the sample size; the more flexible parametrisation we use results in
changes compared to previous calculations. This translates into our ranking of
potentially-brightest and most robust targets---viz., Ursa Minor, Draco,
Sculptor---, and of the more promising, but uncertain targets---viz., Ursa
Major 2, Coma---for annihilating dark matter. Our analysis of Segue 1 is
extremely sensitive to whether we include or exclude a few marginal member
stars, making this target one of the most uncertain. Our analysis illustrates
challenges that will need to be addressed when inferring the dark matter
content of new `ultrafaint' satellites that are beginning to be discovered in
southern sky surveys.Comment: 19 pages, 14 figures, submitted to MNRAS. Supplementary material
available on reques
Dark matter annihilation and decay profiles for the Reticulum II dwarf spheroidal galaxy
The dwarf spheroidal galaxies (dSph) of the Milky Way are among the most
attractive targets for indirect searches of dark matter. In this work, we
reconstruct the dark matter annihilation (J-factor) and decay profiles for the
newly discovered dSph Reticulum II. Using an optimized spherical Jeans analysis
of kinematic data obtained from the Michigan/Magellan Fiber System (M2FS), we
find Reticulum II's J-factor to be among the largest of any Milky Way dSph. We
have checked the robustness of this result against several ingredients of the
analysis. Unless it suffers from tidal disruption or significant inflation of
its velocity dispersion from binary stars, Reticulum II may provide a unique
window on dark matter particle properties.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures. Match the ApJL accepted versio
Improved sensitivity of H.E.S.S.-II through the fifth telescope focus system
The Imaging Atmospheric Cherenkov Telescope (IACT) works by imaging the very
short flash of Cherenkov radiation generated by the cascade of relativistic
charged particles produced when a TeV gamma ray strikes the atmosphere. This
energetic air shower is initiated at an altitude of 10-30 km depending on the
energy and the arrival direction of the primary gamma ray. Whether the best
image of the shower is obtained by focusing the telescope at infinity and
measuring the Cherenkov photon angles or focusing on the central region of the
shower is a not obvious question. This is particularly true for large size IACT
for which the depth of the field is much smaller. We address this issue in
particular with the fifth telescope (CT5) of the High Energy Stereoscopic
System (H.E.S.S.); a 28 m dish large size telescope recently entered in
operation and sensitive to an energy threshold of tens of GeVs. CT5 is equipped
with a focus system, its working principle and the expected effect of focusing
depth on the telescope sensitivity at low energies (50-200 GeV) is discussed.Comment: In Proceedings of the 33rd International Cosmic Ray Conference
(ICRC2013), Rio de Janeiro (Brazil
Saturation effects in the sub-Doppler spectroscopy of Cesium vapor confined in an Extremely Thin Cell
Saturation effects affecting absorption and fluorescence spectra of an atomic
vapor confined in an Extremely Thin Cell (cell thickness ) are
investigated experimentally and theoretically. The study is performed on the
line ( of and concentrates on the two
situations and , the most contrasted ones with
respect to the length dependence of the coherent Dicke narrowing. For , the Dicke-narrowed absorption profile simply broadens and
saturates in amplitude when increasing the light intensity, while for , sub-Doppler dips of reduced absorption at line-center appear on the
broad absorption profile. For a fluorescence detection at ,
saturation induces narrow dips, but only for hyperfine components undergoing a
population loss through optical pumping. These experimental results are
interpreted with the help of the various existing models, and are compared with
numerical calculations based upon a two-level modelling that considers both a
closed and an open system.Comment: 11 pages, 12 figure
The effects of discreteness of galactic cosmic rays sources
Most studies of GeV Galactic Cosmic Rays (GCR) nuclei assume a steady
state/continuous distribution for the sources of cosmic rays, but this
distribution is actually discrete in time and in space. The current progress in
our understanding of cosmic ray physics (acceleration, propagation), the
required consistency in explaining several GCRs manifestation (nuclei,
,...) as well as the precision of present and future space missions
(e.g. INTEGRAL, AMS, AGILE, GLAST) point towards the necessity to go beyond
this approximation. A steady state semi-analytical model that describes well
many nuclei data has been developed in the past years based on this
approximation, as well as others. We wish to extend it to a time dependent
version, including discrete sources. As a first step, the validity of several
approximations of the model we use are checked to validate the approach: i) the
effect of the radial variation of the interstellar gas density is inspected and
ii) the effect of a specific modeling for the galactic wind (linear vs
constant) is discussed. In a second step, the approximation of using continuous
sources in space is considered. This is completed by a study of time
discreteness through the time-dependent version of the propagation equation. A
new analytical solution of this equation for instantaneous point-like sources,
including the effect of escape, galactic wind and spallation, is presented.
Application of time and space discretness to definite propagation conditions
and realistic distributions of sources will be presented in a future paper.Comment: final version, 8 figures, accepted in ApJ. A misprint in fig 8 labels
has been correcte
Translation Representations and Scattering By Two Intervals
Studying unitary one-parameter groups in Hilbert space (U(t),H), we show that
a model for obstacle scattering can be built, up to unitary equivalence, with
the use of translation representations for L2-functions in the complement of
two finite and disjoint intervals.
The model encompasses a family of systems (U (t), H). For each, we obtain a
detailed spectral representation, and we compute the scattering operator, and
scattering matrix. We illustrate our results in the Lax-Phillips model where (U
(t), H) represents an acoustic wave equation in an exterior domain; and in
quantum tunneling for dynamics of quantum states
Theoretical and experimental investigation of thiourea derivatives: synthesis, crystal structure, in-silico and in-vitro biological evaluation
ABSTRACT. In this study, five different thiourea derivatives were synthesized from aryl amines according to the reported method. 1-Benzoyl-3-(4-methoxyphenyl)thiourea (2) was confirmed with single crystal XRD analysis while 1-benzoyl-3-phenylthiourea (1), 1-benzoyl-3-(4-hydroxyphenyl)thiourea (3), 1-benzoyl-3-(2-nitrophenyl) thiourea (4) and 1-benzoyl-3-p-tolylthiourea (5) were elucidated with FTIR and NMR techniques. The geometry optimization of the targeted molecules was accomplished with density functional theory applying B3LYP function. The experimental (XRD) and calculated (DFT) bond angles and bond lengths were compared. The frontier molecular orbitals and molecular electrostatic potential were computed to determine the charge density distribution and possible sites for electrophilic and nucleophilic reactions of the crystalline compound. The synthesized compounds were evaluated as an anti-radical scavenger and enzyme (esterases and protease) inhibitor using in-vitro models. The results confirmed that the synthesized molecules have good anti-oxidant property while a moderate enzyme inhibiting activity. Docking study was conducted with acetylcholine and butyrylcholine esterase which suggested that molecules under study have a potential to inhibit these esterases and protease enzymes. On the basis of in-vitro studies, it is concluded that compound 2 is most active against all tested assays.
KEY WORDS: Thiourea, 2,2-Diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl, Enzyme inhibition, Density functional theory, Docking studies
Bull. Chem. Soc. Ethiop. 2021, 35(3), 587-600.
DOI: https://dx.doi.org/10.4314/bcse.v35i3.1
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