The Effect of Radiation on the Stochastic Web

A charged particle circling in a uniform magnetic field and kicked by an electric field is considered. Under the assumption of small magnetic field, an iterative map is developed. Comparison between the (relativistic) non-radiative case and the (relativistic) radiative case shows that in both cases one can observe a stochastic web structure, and that both cases are qualitatively similar.Comment: 8 Revtex pages including 4 figure

The effectiveness of origami on overall hand function after injury: A pilot controlled trial

This pilot study measured the effectiveness of using origami to improve the overall hand function of outpatients attending an NHS hand injury unit. The initiative came from one of the authors who had used origami informally in the clinical setting and observed beneficial effects. These observed effects were tested experimentally. The design was a pilot non-randomised controlled trial with 13 participants. Allocation of the seven control group members was based on patient preference. The experimental group members attended a weekly hour of origami for six weeks, in addition to their conventional rehabilitation. Hand function of all participants was measured using the Jebsen-Taylor Hand Function Test before and after the six-week period, and additional qualitative data were gathered in the form of written evaluations from patients. The quantitative data were analysed using the Mann Whitney U test or Fisher’s exact test. Themes were highlighted from the qualitative data. The results show that there was a greater difference in the total score of the experimental group using the impaired hand between pre- and post-intervention of 11.8 seconds, compared with 4.3 seconds in the control group, but this was not statistically significant at the 5% level (p=0.06). Additionally, differences in the sub-test scores show a markedly larger improvement in the experimental group. Qualitative data indicate that the experimental group experienced the origami sessions as being enjoyable and beneficial. Further research with a larger sample and randomised group allocation is recommended to verify and expand these preliminary findings

Super-Arrhenius dynamics for sub-critical crack growth in disordered brittle media

Taking into account stress fluctuations due to thermal noise, we study thermally activated irreversible crack growth in disordered media. The influence of material disorder on sub-critical growth of a single crack in two-dimensional brittle elastic material is described through the introduction of a rupture threshold distribution. We derive analytical predictions for crack growth velocity and material lifetime in agreement with direct numerical calculations. It is claimed that crack growth process is inhibited by disorder: velocity decreases and lifetime increases with disorder. More precisely, lifetime is shown to follow a super-Arrhenius law, with an effective temperature theta - theta_d, where theta is related to the thermodynamical temperature and theta_d to the disorder variance.Comment: Submitted to Europhysics Letter

Study on the spectrum of the injected relativistic protons

About 10TeV gamma-ray emission within 10 pc region from the Galactic Center had been reported by 4 independent groups. Considering that this TeV gamma-ray emission is produced via a hadronic model, and the relativistic protons came from the tidal disruption of stars by massive black holes, we investigate the spectral nature of the injected relativistic protons required by the hadronic model. The calculation was carried on the tidal disruption of the different types of stars and the different propagation mechanisms of protons in the interstellar medium. Compared with the observation data from HESS, we find for the best fitting that the power-law index of the spectrum of the injected protons is about -1.9, when a red giant star is tidally disrupted, and the effective confinement of protons diffusion mechanism is adopted.Comment: 2 pages, IAU Symposium 25