47 research outputs found
NASA/LaRC jet plume research
The following provides a summary for research being conducted by NASA/LaRC and its contractors and grantees to develop jet engine noise suppression technology under the NASA High Speed Research (HSR) program for the High Speed Civil Transport (HSCT). The objective of this effort is to explore new innovative concepts for reducing noise to Federally mandated guidelines with minimum compromise on engine performance both in take-off and cruise. The research program is divided into four major technical areas: (1) jet noise research on advanced nozzles; (2) plume prediction and validation; (3) passive and active control; and (4) methodology for noise prediction
Building a house of C.A.R.D.S.: The practice structures of coaches in a professional rugby union academy
This chapter provides insights into the practice structures used by coaches of the Newcastle Falcons Rugby Union academy. It shows how training session activities are organised and adapted to purposefully develop creativity, awareness, resilience, decision-making and self-organisation (C.A.R.D.S.) among players aspiring to compete professionally. The chapter set out to create opportunities for every player in the Newcastle Falcons academy to explore the boundaries of their capabilities and adapt to the changing nature of the game of rugby union by developing C.A.R.D.S. skills. It draws on a range of concepts from dynamical systems theory, representative design, non-linear pedagogy, constraints-led coaching and games-based approaches. Making frequent amendments to the constraints of training activities is itself a form of adversity, as players need to remain aware and quickly adapt to respond to the new challenges posed. Self-organised players will have ‘the skill to use information to effectively coordinate themselves’
Dynamical Stability of Six-Dimensional Warped Brane-Worlds
We study a generalization of the Randall-Sundrum mechanism for generating the
weak/Planck hierarchy, which uses two rather than one warped extra dimension,
and which requires no negative tension branes. A 4-brane with one exponentially
large compact dimension plays the role of the Planck brane. We investigate the
dynamical stability with respect to graviton, graviphoton and radion modes. The
radion is shown to have a tachyonic instability for certain models of the
4-brane stress-energy, while it is stable in others, and massless in a special
case. If stable, its mass is in the milli-eV range, for parameters of the model
which solve the hierarchy problem. The radion is shown to couple to matter with
gravitational strength, so that it is potentially detectable by
submillimeter-range gravity experiments. The radion mass can be increased using
a bulk scalar field in the manner of Goldberger and Wise, but only to order
MeV, due to the effect of the large extra dimension. The model predicts a
natural scale of 10^{13} GeV on the 4-brane, making it a natural setting for
inflation from the ultraviolet brane.Comment: 28 pages, 7 figure
Can codimension-two branes solve the cosmological constant problem?
It has been suggested that codimension-two braneworlds might naturally
explain the vanishing of the 4D effective cosmological constant, due to the
automatic relation between the deficit angle and the brane tension. To
investigate whether this cancellation happens dynamically, and within the
context of a realistic cosmology, we study a codimension-two braneworld with
spherical extra dimensions compactified by magnetic flux. Assuming Einstein
gravity, we show that when the brane contains matter with an arbitrary equation
of state, the 4D metric components are not regular at the brane, unless the
brane has nonzero thickness. We construct explicit 6D solutions with thick
branes, treating the brane matter as a perturbation, and find that the universe
expands consistently with standard Friedmann-Robertson-Walker (FRW) cosmology.
The relation between the brane tension and the bulk deficit angle becomes
for a general equation of state. However, this
relation does not imply a self-tuning of the effective 4D cosmological constant
to zero; perturbations of the brane tension in a static solution lead to
deSitter or anti-deSitter braneworlds. Our results thus confirm other recent
work showing that codimension-two braneworlds in nonsupersymmetric Einstein
gravity do not lead to a dynamical relaxation of the cosmological constant, but
they leave open the possibility that supersymmetric versions can be compatible
with self-tuning.Comment: Revtex4, 17 pages, references added, typos corrected, minor points
clarified. Matches published versio
Emergent Electroweak Symmetry Breaking with Composite W, Z Bosons
We present a model of electroweak symmetry breaking in a warped extra
dimension where electroweak symmetry is broken at the UV (or Planck) scale. An
underlying conformal symmetry is broken at the IR (or TeV) scale generating
masses for the electroweak gauge bosons without invoking a Higgs mechanism. By
the AdS/CFT correspondence the W,Z bosons are identified as composite states of
a strongly-coupled gauge theory, suggesting that electroweak symmetry breaking
is an emergent phenomenon at the IR scale. The model satisfies electroweak
precision tests with reasonable fits to the S and T parameter. In particular
the T parameter is sufficiently suppressed since the model naturally admits a
custodial SU(2) symmetry. The composite nature of the W,Z-bosons provide a
novel possibility of unitarizing WW scattering via form factor suppression.
Constraints from LEP and the Tevatron as well as discovery opportunities at the
LHC are discussed for these composite electroweak gauge bosons.Comment: 39 pages, 4 figure
Cosmology of codimension-two braneworlds
We present a comprehensive study of the cosmological solutions of 6D
braneworld models with azimuthal symmetry in the extra dimensions, moduli
stabilization by flux or a bulk scalar field, and which contain at least one
3-brane that could be identified with our world. We emphasize an unusual
property of these models: their expansion rate depends on the 3-brane tension
either not at all, or in a nonstandard way, at odds with the naive expected
dimensional reduction of these systems to 4D general relativity at low
energies. Unlike other braneworld attempts to find a self-tuning solution to
the cosmological constant problem, the apparent failure of decoupling in these
models is not associated with the presence of unstabilized moduli; rather it is
due to automatic cancellation of the brane tension by the curvature induced by
the brane. This provides some corroboration for the hope that these models
provide a distinctive step toward understanding the smallness of the observed
cosmological constant. However, we point out some challenges for obtaining
realistic cosmology within this framework.Comment: 30 pages, 4 figures; generalized result for nonconventional Friedmann
equation, added referenc
Fermion Masses in Emergent Electroweak Symmetry Breaking
We consider the generation of fermion masses in an emergent model of
electroweak symmetry breaking with composite gauge bosons. A universal
bulk fermion profile in a warped extra dimension is used for all fermion
flavors. Electroweak symmetry is broken at the UV (or Planck) scale where
boundary mass terms are added to generate the fermion flavor structure. This
leads to flavor-dependent nonuniversality in the gauge couplings. The effects
are suppressed for the light fermion generations but are enhanced for the top
quark where the and couplings can deviate at the
level in the minimal setup. By the AdS/CFT correspondence our model
implies that electroweak symmetry is not a fundamental gauge symmetry. Instead
the Standard Model with massive fermions and gauge bosons is an effective
chiral Lagrangian for some underlying confining strong dynamics at the TeV
scale, where mass is generated without a Higgs mechanism.Comment: modified discussion in Sec 3.1, version published in JHE
A collaboratively derived environmental research agenda for Galapagos
Galápagos is one of the most pristine archipelagos in the world and its conservation relies upon research and sensible management. In recent decades both the interest in, and the needs of, the islands have increased, yet the funds and capacity for necessary research have remained limited. It has become, therefore, increasingly important to identify areas of priority research to assist decision-making in Galápagos conservation.
This study identified 50 questions considered priorities for future research and management. The exercise involved the collaboration of policy makers, practitioners and researchers from more than 30 different organisations. Initially, 360 people were consulted to generate 781 questions. An established process of preworkshop voting and three rounds to reduce and reword the questions, followed by a two-day workshop, was used to produce the final 50 questions. The most common issues raised by this list of questions were human population growth, climate change and the impact of invasive alien species. These results have already been used by a range of organisations and politicians and are expected to provide the basis for future research on the islands so that its sustainability may be enhanced.
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Alpha shapes: Determining 3D shape complexity across morphologically diverse structures
Background. Following recent advances in bioimaging, high-resolution 3D models of biological structures are now generated rapidly and at low-cost. To utilise this data to address evolutionary and ecological questions, an array of tools has been developed to conduct 3D shape analysis and quantify topographic complexity. Here we focus particularly on shape techniques applied to irregular-shaped objects lacking clear homologous landmarks, and propose the new ‘alpha-shapes’ method for quantifying 3D shape complexity. Methods. We apply alpha-shapes to quantify shape complexity in the mammalian baculum as an example of a morphologically disparate structure. Micro- computed-tomography (μCT) scans of bacula were conducted. Bacula were binarised and converted into point clouds. Following application of a scaling factor to account for absolute differences in size, a suite of alpha-shapes was fitted to each specimen. An alpha shape is a formed from a subcomplex of the Delaunay triangulation of a given set of points, and ranges in refinement from a very coarse mesh (approximating convex hulls) to a very fine fit. ‘Optimal’ alpha was defined as the degree of refinement necessary in order for alpha-shape volume to equal CT voxel volume, and was taken as a metric of overall shape ‘complexity’. Results Our results show that alpha-shapes can be used to quantify interspecific variation in shape ‘complexity’ within biological structures of disparate geometry. The ‘stepped’ nature of alpha curves is informative with regards to the contribution of specific morphological features to overall shape ‘complexity’. Alpha-shapes agrees with other measures of topographic complexity (dissection index, Dirichlet normal energy) in identifying ursid bacula as having low shape complexity. However, alpha-shapes estimates mustelid bacula as possessing the highest topographic complexity, contrasting with other shape metrics. 3D fractal dimension is found to be an inappropriate metric of complexity when applied to bacula. Conclusions. The alpha-shapes methodology can be used to calculate ‘optimal’ alpha refinement as a proxy for shape ‘complexity’ without identifying landmarks. The implementation of alpha-shapes is straightforward, and is automated to process large datasets quickly. Beyond genital shape, we consider the alpha-shapes technique to hold considerable promise for new applications across evolutionary, ecological and palaeoecological disciplines
Structural analysis of the Little Water syncline, Beaverhead County, Montana
Due to the character of the original source materials and the nature of batch digitization, quality control issues may be present in this document. Please report any quality issues you encounter to [email protected], referencing the URI of the item.Bibliography: leaves 154-164.Not availabl