2,587 research outputs found
A mesh adaptation strategy for complex wall-modeled turbomachinery LES
A mesh adaptation methodology for wall-modeled turbomachinery Large Eddy Simulation (LES) is proposed, simultaneously taking into account two quantities of interest: the average kinetic energy dissipation rate and the normalized wall distance y+. This strategy is first tested on a highly loaded transonic blade with separated flow, and is compared to wall-resolved LES results, as well as experimental data. The adaptation methodology allows to predict fairly well the boundary layer transition on the suction side and the recirculation bubble of the pressure side. The method is then tested on a real turbofan stage for which it is shown that the general operating point of the computation converges toward the experimental one. Furthermore, comparison of turbulence predictions with hot-wire anemometry show good agreement as soon as a first adaptation is performed, which confirms the efficiency of the proposed adaptation method
Encerramento Percutâneo de Comunicação Interauricular Residual por Falência de Dispositivo
A 39-year-old woman underwent uneventful percutaneous occlusion of an ostium secundum atrial septal defect (ASD) with a 22 mm Ultrasept ASD Occluder®. Transesophageal echocardiography (TEE) performed two years after implantation revealed a de novo residual left-to-right shunt through the correctly implanted device. Three-dimensional transesophageal echocardiography (3D TEE) further clarified this finding by showing a perforation of the device membrane coating. The patient underwent transcatheter closure of the residual shunt with a 20 mm Ultrasept PFO®device. The procedure was guided by fluoroscopy and real-time 3D TEE. At the end of the procedure 3D TEE documented correct device deployment with complete defect coverage and absence of residual shunt.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio
Risk assessment and suicide by patients with schizophrenia in secondary mental healthcare: a case-control study
Objectives: To investigate the role of risk assessment in predicting suicide in patients with schizophrenia spectrum disorders (SSDs) receiving secondary mental healthcare. We postulated that risk assessment plays a limited role in predicting suicide in these patients. Design: Retrospective case–control study. Setting: Anonymised electronic mental health record data from the South London and Maudsley National Health Service (NHS) Foundation Trust (SLaM) (London, UK) linked with national mortality data. Participants: In 242 227 SLaM service users up to 31 December 2013, 635 suicides were identified. 96 (15.1%) had a SSD diagnosis. Those who died before 1 January 2007 (n=25) were removed from the analyses. Thus, 71 participants with SSD who died from suicide over the study period (cases) were compared with 355 controls. Main outcome measure: Risk of suicide in relation to risk assessment ratings. Results: Cases were younger at first contact with services (mean±SD 34.5±12.6 vs 39.2±15.2) and with a higher preponderance of males (OR=2.07, 95% CI 1.18 to 3.65, p=0.01) than controls. Also, suicide occurred within 10 days after last contact with services in half of cases, with the most common suicide methods being hanging (14) and jumping (13). Cases were more likely to have the following ‘risk assessment’ items previously recorded: suicidal history (OR=4.42, 95% CI 2.01 to 9.65, p<0.001), use of violent method (OR=3.37, 95% CI 1.47 to 7.74, p=0.01), suicidal ideation (OR=3.57, 95% CI 1.40 to 9.07, p=0.01) and recent hospital discharge (OR=2.71, 95% CI 1.17 to 6.28, p=0.04). Multiple regression models predicted only 21.5% of the suicide outcome variance. Conclusions: Predicting suicide in schizophrenia is highly challenging due to the high prevalence of risk factors within this diagnostic group irrespective of outcome, including suicide. Nevertheless, older age at first contact with mental health services and lack of suicidal history and suicidal ideation are useful protective markers indicative of those less likely to end their own lives
Laser cooling of a diatomic molecule
It has been roughly three decades since laser cooling techniques produced
ultracold atoms, leading to rapid advances in a vast array of fields.
Unfortunately laser cooling has not yet been extended to molecules because of
their complex internal structure. However, this complexity makes molecules
potentially useful for many applications. For example, heteronuclear molecules
possess permanent electric dipole moments which lead to long-range, tunable,
anisotropic dipole-dipole interactions. The combination of the dipole-dipole
interaction and the precise control over molecular degrees of freedom possible
at ultracold temperatures make ultracold molecules attractive candidates for
use in quantum simulation of condensed matter systems and quantum computation.
Also ultracold molecules may provide unique opportunities for studying chemical
dynamics and for tests of fundamental symmetries. Here we experimentally
demonstrate laser cooling of the molecule strontium monofluoride (SrF). Using
an optical cycling scheme requiring only three lasers, we have observed both
Sisyphus and Doppler cooling forces which have substantially reduced the
transverse temperature of a SrF molecular beam. Currently the only technique
for producing ultracold molecules is by binding together ultracold alkali atoms
through Feshbach resonance or photoassociation. By contrast, different proposed
applications for ultracold molecules require a variety of molecular
energy-level structures. Our method provides a new route to ultracold
temperatures for molecules. In particular it bridges the gap between ultracold
temperatures and the ~1 K temperatures attainable with directly cooled
molecules (e.g. cryogenic buffer gas cooling or decelerated supersonic beams).
Ultimately our technique should enable the production of large samples of
molecules at ultracold temperatures for species that are chemically distinct
from bialkalis.Comment: 10 pages, 7 figure
Migrations and habitat use of the smooth hammerhead shark (Sphyrna zygaena) in the Atlantic Ocean
The smooth hammerhead shark, Sphyrna zygaena, is a cosmopolitan semipelagic shark captured as bycatch in pelagic oceanic fisheries, especially pelagic longlines targeting swordfish and/or tunas. From 2012 to 2016, eight smooth hammerheads were tagged with Pop-up Satellite Archival Tags in the inter-tropical region of the Northeast Atlantic Ocean, with successful transmissions received from seven tags (total of 319 tracking days). Results confirmed the smooth hammerhead is a highly mobile species, as the longest migration ever documented for this species (> 6600 km) was recorded. An absence of a diel vertical movement behavior was noted, with the sharks spending most of their time at surface waters (0-50 m) above 23 degrees C. The operating depth of the pelagic long-line gear was measured with Minilog Temperature and Depth Recorders, and the overlap with the species vertical distribution was calculated. The overlap is taking place mainly during the night and is higher for juveniles (similar to 40% of overlap time). The novel information presented can now be used to contribute to the provision of sustainable management tools and serve as input for Ecological Risk Assessments for smooth hammerheads caught in Atlantic pelagic longline fisheries.Oceanario de Lisboa through Project "SHARK-TAG: Migrations and habitat use of the smooth hammerhead shark in the Atlantic Ocean"; Investigador-FCT from the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT, Fundacao para a Ciencia e Tecnologia) [Ref: IF/00253/2014]; EU European Social Fund; Programa Operacional Potencial Human
Sisyphus Cooling of Electrically Trapped Polyatomic Molecules
The rich internal structure and long-range dipole-dipole interactions
establish polar molecules as unique instruments for quantum-controlled
applications and fundamental investigations. Their potential fully unfolds at
ultracold temperatures, where a plethora of effects is predicted in many-body
physics, quantum information science, ultracold chemistry, and physics beyond
the standard model. These objectives have inspired the development of a wide
range of methods to produce cold molecular ensembles. However, cooling
polyatomic molecules to ultracold temperatures has until now seemed
intractable. Here we report on the experimental realization of opto-electrical
cooling, a paradigm-changing cooling and accumulation method for polar
molecules. Its key attribute is the removal of a large fraction of a molecule's
kinetic energy in each step of the cooling cycle via a Sisyphus effect,
allowing cooling with only few dissipative decay processes. We demonstrate its
potential by reducing the temperature of about 10^6 trapped CH_3F molecules by
a factor of 13.5, with the phase-space density increased by a factor of 29 or a
factor of 70 discounting trap losses. In contrast to other cooling mechanisms,
our scheme proceeds in a trap, cools in all three dimensions, and works for a
large variety of polar molecules. With no fundamental temperature limit
anticipated down to the photon-recoil temperature in the nanokelvin range, our
method eliminates the primary hurdle in producing ultracold polyatomic
molecules. The low temperatures, large molecule numbers and long trapping times
up to 27 s will allow an interaction-dominated regime to be attained, enabling
collision studies and investigation of evaporative cooling toward a BEC of
polyatomic molecules
An asymmetric explosion as the origin of spectral evolution diversity in type Ia supernovae
Type Ia Supernovae (SNe Ia) form an observationally uniform class of stellar
explosions, in that more luminous objects have smaller decline-rates. This
one-parameter behavior allows SNe Ia to be calibrated as cosmological `standard
candles', and led to the discovery of an accelerating Universe. Recent
investigations, however, have revealed that the true nature of SNe Ia is more
complicated. Theoretically, it has been suggested that the initial
thermonuclear sparks are ignited at an offset from the centre of the
white-dwarf (WD) progenitor, possibly as a result of convection before the
explosion. Observationally, the diversity seen in the spectral evolution of SNe
Ia beyond the luminosity decline-rate relation is an unresolved issue. Here we
report that the spectral diversity is a consequence of random directions from
which an asymmetric explosion is viewed. Our findings suggest that the spectral
evolution diversity is no longer a concern in using SNe Ia as cosmological
standard candles. Furthermore, this indicates that ignition at an offset from
the centre of is a generic feature of SNe Ia.Comment: To appear in Nature, 1st July 2010 issue. 36 pages including
supplementary materials. 4 figures, 3 supplementary figures, 1 supplementary
tabl
Laser Cooling of Optically Trapped Molecules
Calcium monofluoride (CaF) molecules are loaded into an optical dipole trap
(ODT) and subsequently laser cooled within the trap. Starting with
magneto-optical trapping, we sub-Doppler cool CaF and then load CaF
molecules into an ODT. Enhanced loading by a factor of five is obtained when
sub-Doppler cooling light and trapping light are on simultaneously. For trapped
molecules, we directly observe efficient sub-Doppler cooling to a temperature
of . The trapped molecular density of
cm is an order of magnitude greater than in the initial sub-Doppler
cooled sample. The trap lifetime of 750(40) ms is dominated by background gas
collisions.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figure
Variable strength of forest stand attributes and weather conditions on the questing activity of Ixodes ricinus ticks over years in managed forests
Given the ever-increasing human impact through land use and climate change on the environment, we crucially need to achieve a better understanding of those factors that influence the questing activity of ixodid ticks, a major disease-transmitting vector in temperate forests. We investigated variation in the relative questing nymph densities of Ixodes ricinus in differently managed forest types for three years (2008–2010) in SW Germany by drag sampling. We used a hierarchical Bayesian modeling approach to examine the relative effects of habitat and weather and to consider possible nested structures of habitat and climate forces. The questing activity of nymphs was considerably larger in young forest successional stages of thicket compared with pole wood and timber stages. Questing nymph density increased markedly with milder winter temperatures. Generally, the relative strength of the various environmental forces on questing nymph density differed across years. In particular, winter temperature had a negative effect on tick activity across sites in 2008 in contrast to the overall effect of temperature across years. Our results suggest that forest management practices have important impacts on questing nymph density. Variable weather conditions, however, might override the effects of forest management practices on the fluctuations and dynamics of tick populations and activity over years, in particular, the preceding winter temperatures. Therefore, robust predictions and the detection of possible interactions and nested structures of habitat and climate forces can only be quantified through the collection of long-term data. Such data are particularly important with regard to future scenarios of forest management and climate warming
- …