1,533 research outputs found
How to Commission, Operate and Maintain a Large Future Accelerator Complex from Far Remote
A study on future large accelerators [1] has considered a facility, which is
designed, built and operated by a worldwide collaboration of equal partner
institutions, and which is remote from most of these institutions. The full
range of operation was considered including commi-ssioning, machine
development, maintenance, trouble shooting and repair. Experience from existing
accele-rators confirms that most of these activities are already performed
'remotely'. The large high-energy physics ex-periments and astronomy projects,
already involve inter-national collaborations of distant institutions. Based on
this experience, the prospects for a machine operated remotely from far sites
are encouraging. Experts from each laboratory would remain at their home
institution but continue to participate in the operation of the machine after
construction. Experts are required to be on site only during initial
commissioning and for par-ticularly difficult problems. Repairs require an
on-site non-expert maintenance crew. Most of the interventions can be made
without an expert and many of the rest resolved with remote assistance. There
appears to be no technical obstacle to controlling an accelerator from a
distance. The major challenge is to solve the complex management and
communication problems.Comment: ICALEPCS 2001 abstract ID No. FRBI001 invited talk submitting author
F. Willeke 5 pages, 1 figur
Relativistic Winds from Compact Gamma-Ray Sources: II. Pair Loading and Radiative Acceleration in Gamma-ray Bursts
We consider the effects of rapid pair creation by an intense pulse of
gamma-rays propagating ahead of a relativistic shock. Side-scattered photons
colliding with the main gamma-ray beam amplify the density of scattering
charges. The acceleration rate of the pair-loaded medium is calculated, and its
limiting bulk Lorentz factor related to the spectrum and compactness of the
photon source. One obtains, as a result, a definite prediction for the relative
inertia in baryons and pairs. The deceleration of a relativistic shock in the
moving medium, and the resulting synchrotron emissivity, are compared with
existing calculations for a static medium. The radiative efficiency is
increased dramatically by pair loading. When the initial ambient density
exceeds a critical value, the scattering depth traversed by the main gamma-ray
pulse rises above unity, and the pulse is broadened. These considerations place
significant constraints on burst progenitors: a pre-burst mass loss rate
exceeding 10^{-5} M_\odot per year is difficult to reconcile with individual
pulses narrower than 10 s, unless the radiative efficiency is low. An
anisotropic gamma-ray flux (on an angular scale \Gamma^{-1} or larger) drives a
large velocity shear that greatly increases the energy in the seed magnetic
field forward of the propagating shock.Comment: 19 pp., LaTeX (aaspp4.sty), revised 12/23/99, Ap. J. in press;
summary section added and several minor improvements in presentatio
Tidal coupling of a Schwarzschild black hole and circularly orbiting moon
We describe the possibility of using LISA's gravitational-wave observations
to study, with high precision, the response of a massive central body to the
tidal gravitational pull of an orbiting, compact, small-mass object. Motivated
by this application, we use first-order perturbation theory to study tidal
coupling for an idealized case: a massive Schwarzschild black hole, tidally
perturbed by a much less massive moon in a distant, circular orbit. We
investigate the details of how the tidal deformation of the hole gives rise to
an induced quadrupole moment in the hole's external gravitational field at
large radii. In the limit that the moon is static, we find, in Schwarzschild
coordinates and Regge-Wheeler gauge, the surprising result that there is no
induced quadrupole moment. We show that this conclusion is gauge dependent and
that the static, induced quadrupole moment for a black hole is inherently
ambiguous. For the orbiting moon and the central Schwarzschild hole, we find
(in agreement with a recent result of Poisson) a time-varying induced
quadrupole moment that is proportional to the time derivative of the moon's
tidal field. As a partial analog of a result derived long ago by Hartle for a
spinning hole and a stationary distant companion, we show that the orbiting
moon's tidal field induces a tidal bulge on the hole's horizon, and that the
rate of change of the horizon shape leads the perturbing tidal field at the
horizon by a small angle.Comment: 14 pages, 0 figures, submitted to Phys. Rev.
Jet Acceleration by Tangled Magnetic Fields
We explore the possibility that extragalactic radio jets might be accelerated
by highly disorganized magnetic fields that are strong enough to dominate the
dynamics until the terminal Lorentz factor is reached. Following the
twin-exhaust model by Blandford & Rees (1974), the collimation under this
scenario is provided by the stratified thermal pressure from an external
medium. The acceleration efficiency then depends on the pressure gradient of
that medium. In order for this mechanism to work there must be continuous
tangling of the magnetic field, changing the magnetic equation of state away
from pure flux freezing (otherwise conversion of Poynting flux to kinetic
energy flux is suppressed). This is a complementary approach to models in which
the plasma is accelerated by large scale ordered fields. We include a simple
prescription for magnetic dissipation, which leads to tradeoffs among
conversion of magnetic energy into bulk kinetic energy, random particle energy,
and radiation. We present analytic dynamical solutions of such jets, assess the
effects of radiation drag, and comment on observational issues, such as the
predicted polarization and synchrotron brightness. Finally, we try to make the
connection to observed radio galaxies and gamma-ray bursts.Comment: 15 pages, 10 figures, accepted for publication in Ap
The Arecibo 430-MHz Intermediate Galactic Latitude Survey: Discovery of Nine Radio Pulsars
We have used the Arecibo Radio Telescope to search for millisecond pulsars in
two intermediate Galactic latitude regions (7 deg < | b | < 20 deg) accessible
to this telescope. For these latitudes the useful millisecond pulsar search
volume achieved by Arecibo's 430-MHz beam is predicted to be maximal. Searching
a total of 130 square degrees, we have discovered nine new pulsars and detected
four previously known objects. We compare the results of this survey with those
of other 430-MHz surveys carried out at Arecibo and of an intermediate latitude
survey made at Parkes that included part of our search area; the latter
independently found two of the nine pulsars we have discovered.
At least six of our discoveries are isolated pulsars with ages between 5 and
300 Myr; one of these, PSR J1819+1305, exhibits very marked and periodic
nulling. We have also found a recycled pulsar, PSR J2016+1948. With a
rotational period of 65 ms, this is a member of a binary system with a 635-day
orbital period. We discuss some of the the properties of this system in detail,
and indicate its potential to provide a test of the Strong Equivalence
Principle. This pulsar and PSR J0407+16, a similar system now being timed at
Arecibo, are by far the best systems known for such a test.Comment: Accepted for publication in ApJ Referee format: 22 pages, 7 figure
Cosmological test of gravity with polarizations of stochastic gravitational waves around 0.1-1 Hz
In general relativity, a gravitational wave has two polarization modes
(tensor mode), but it could have additional polarizations (scalar and vector
modes) in the early stage of the universe, where the general relativity may not
strictly hold and/or the effect of higher-dimensional gravity may become
significant. In this paper, we discuss how to detect extra-polarization modes
of stochastic gravitational wave background (GWB), and study the separability
of each polarization using future space-based detectors such as BBO and DECIGO.
We specifically consider two plausible setups of the spacecraft constellations
consisting of two and four clusters, and estimate the sensitivity to each
polarization mode of GWBs. We find that a separate detection of each
polarization mode is rather sensitive to the geometric configuration and
distance between clusters and that the clusters should be, in general,
separated by an appropriate distance. This seriously degrades the signal
sensitivity, however, for suitable conditions, space-based detector can
separately detect scalar, vector and tensor modes of GWBs with energy density
as low as ~10^-15.Comment: 16 pages, 11 figure
Reconstructing the massive black hole cosmic history through gravitational waves
The massive black holes we observe in galaxies today are the natural
end-product of a complex evolutionary path, in which black holes seeded in
proto-galaxies at high redshift grow through cosmic history via a sequence of
mergers and accretion episodes. Electromagnetic observations probe a small
subset of the population of massive black holes (namely, those that are active
or those that are very close to us), but planned space-based gravitational-wave
observatories such as the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA) can measure
the parameters of ``electromagnetically invisible'' massive black holes out to
high redshift. In this paper we introduce a Bayesian framework to analyze the
information that can be gathered from a set of such measurements. Our goal is
to connect a set of massive black hole binary merger observations to the
underlying model of massive black hole formation. In other words, given a set
of observed massive black hole coalescences, we assess what information can be
extracted about the underlying massive black hole population model. For
concreteness we consider ten specific models of massive black hole formation,
chosen to probe four important (and largely unconstrained) aspects of the input
physics used in structure formation simulations: seed formation, metallicity
``feedback'', accretion efficiency and accretion geometry. For the first time
we allow for the possibility of ``model mixing'', by drawing the observed
population from some combination of the ``pure'' models that have been
simulated. A Bayesian analysis allows us to recover a posterior probability
distribution for the ``mixing parameters'' that characterize the fractions of
each model represented in the observed distribution. Our work shows that LISA
has enormous potential to probe the underlying physics of structure formation.Comment: 24 pages, 16 figures, submitted to Phys. Rev.
Detecting the Cosmic Gravitational Wave Background with the Big Bang Observer
The detection of the Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation (CMB) was one of
the most important cosmological discoveries of the last century. With the
development of interferometric gravitational wave detectors, we may be in a
position to detect the gravitational equivalent of the CMB in this century. The
Cosmic Gravitational Background (CGB) is likely to be isotropic and stochastic,
making it difficult to distinguish from instrument noise. The contribution from
the CGB can be isolated by cross-correlating the signals from two or more
independent detectors. Here we extend previous studies that considered the
cross-correlation of two Michelson channels by calculating the optimal signal
to noise ratio that can be achieved by combining the full set of interferometry
variables that are available with a six link triangular interferometer. In
contrast to the two channel case, we find that the relative orientation of a
pair of coplanar detectors does not affect the signal to noise ratio. We apply
our results to the detector design described in the Big Bang Observer (BBO)
mission concept study and find that BBO could detect a background with
.Comment: 15 pages, 12 Figure
Shared reading of children's interactive picture books
We report on a study of children and parents shared reading of interactive printed books. We investigated the differences between books with interactive features and books with expressive typography in order to evaluate which features within a book encouraged interaction between the reading participants and the book. 11 parent and child groups took part in the study that involved three observed reading sessions. From our observations we offer suggestions for the development of books and eBooks to encourage shared reading practices
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