Analytical and numerical investigation of the brightness of high power X- and gamma rays as a result of intense laser interacting with plasma mirrors in radiation pressure regime

At laser intensity in the range ~ 1022 –1023 W/cm2, the radiation pressure starts to play a key role in the interaction of an intense electromagnetic wave with a dense plasma foil. In this radiation pressure dominant regime (RPD regime) we present our numerical results for the frequency and brightness of the reflected radiation from a uniformly moving plasma mirror. The interaction of the electromagnetic wave with an approaching plasma mirror results in the Doppler-shifted reflected radiation. The reflected photon frequency lies in the hard X-ray or gamma-ray range. For the source pulse energy s= 12 J, λs = λ = 0.8µ m, ne = 480 ncr = 5.4×1023cm-3´ (1µ m / λ)2, there are approximately 9.6×1042 hard X-ray photons/ (mm2-mrad2 -s.-0.1% bandwidth) in the energy range ~ 10 keV. In the case when for the same parameters of source laser pulse and driver pulse normalized vector potential ad=300 , λd = 0.8 mm the brightness is found to be 3.9×1034 photons / (mm2 - mrad2 - s. - 0.1% bandwidth) in the energy range ~100 keV. These radiations have broad range of applications in many areas of research e.g. medicine and material science

Effective and Efficient Algorithms for Concise Range Queries

With the advance of wireless communication technology, it is quite common for people to view maps or get related services from the handheld devices, such as mobile phones and PDAs. Range queries, as one of the most commonly used tools, are often posed by the users to retrieve needful information from a spatial database. However, due to the limits of communication bandwidth and hardware power of handheld devices, displaying all the results of a range query on a handheld device is neither communication efficient nor informative to the users. This is simply because that there are often too many results returned from a range query. In view of this problem, we present a novel idea that a concise representation of a specified size for the range query results, while incurring minimal information loss, shall be computed and returned to the user. Such a concise range query not only reduces communication costs, but also offers better usability to the users, providing an opportunity for interactive exploration. The usefulness of the concise range queries is confirmed by comparing it with other possible alternatives, such as sampling and clustering. Unfortunately, we prove that finding the optimal representation with minimum information loss is an NP-hard problem. Therefore, we propose several effective and nontrivial algorithms to find a good approximate result. Extensive experiments on real-world data have demonstrated the effectiveness and efficiency of the proposed techniques

B-factory Signals for a Warped Extra Dimension

We study predictions for B-physics in a class of models, recently introduced, with a non-supersymmetric warped extra dimension. In these models few ($\sim 3$) TeV Kaluza-Klein masses are consistent with electroweak data due to bulk custodial symmetry. Furthermore, there is an analog of GIM mechanism which is violated by the heavy top quark (just as in SM) leading to striking signals at $B$-factories:(i) New Physics (NP) contributions to $\Delta F= 2$ transitions are comparable to SM. This implies that, within this NP framework, the success of SM unitarity triangle fit is a ``coincidence'' Thus, clean extractions of unitarity angles via e.g. $B \to \pi \pi,\rho \pi, \rho \rho, DK$ are likely to be affected, in addition to O(1) deviation from SM prediction in $B_s$ mixing. (ii) O(1) deviation from SM predictions for $B \to X_s l^+ l^-$ in rate as well as in forward-backward and direct CP asymmetry. (iii) Large mixing-induced CP asymmetry in radiative B decays, wherein the SM unamibgously predicts very small asymmetries. Also with KK masses 3 TeV or less, and with anarchic Yukawa masses, contributions to electric dipole moments of the neutron are roughly 20 times larger than the current experimental bound so that this framework has a "CP problem".Comment: On further consideration, we found that our framework does have a "CP problem" in that though contributions to neutron's electric dipole moment from CKM-like phases vanish at the one-loop level, sizeable contributions are induced by Majorana-like phases. Last sentence of abstract is changed along with para #3 and 4 on page

Naphtha Reduction of Iron Ores to Sponge Iron in Continuous Vertical Reactor

The development of a process of sponge iron production by naphtha, a petroleum by-product, in a continuous 90mm I.D. vertical reactor is discussed. The process, the equipment and the operational parameters, the results of the campaigns with various iron ores pellets are described. Sized iron ore fines from two deposits were directly reduced by petroleum naphtha to sponge iron at a temperature of about 1000 deg. C. maintaining naphtha injection at different controlled flow rates. The movement of solids in the reactor column was also controlled to obtain predetermined residence times.producing 70-100 kgs of sponge iron per day. Under optium conditions 98 percent metallization was obtained. The results are discussed in the light of efficiency of the reductant and the economics of the process

Responsible fisheries and sustainable aquaculture - A pledge for 21st century

The beginning of the new millennium century the next millennium looks not only to secure enough food for the existing population but also to provide a guarantee to sustained food availability for future generation. Though scientific aquaculture has substituted the traditional practices in a big way, it cannot be fully relied upon to meet the demands of future generation. This is due to the fact that continued over fishing, heavy intensification of farms in localized areas, degradation of aquatic environment etc will put insurmountable strain on the fishery sector which is capable enough for a sustainable food supply

Importance of Dietary Carotenoid Pigment (Astaxanthin) in aquaculture

India is bestowed with rich aquatic resources, both marine and freshwater. These provide an increasing scope for stepping up fish production. So much so, Indian seafood industry achieved a remarkable place in the world seafood trade (Rs.6300 crores, MPEDA, 2001)