Theoretical study of space plasmas Final report, 16 Feb. 1964 - 15 Mar. 1965

Interchange stability of Van Allen belt - Effect of resonant magnetic moment violation on trapped particles - Exact solution of universal instabilit

Theoretical studies of space plasmas Summary report, 3 May 1965 - 1 May 1966

Synchrotron radiation, ionospheric currents, auroral bombardment, and plasma instabilitie

Differential Form of the Collision Integral for a Relativistic Plasma

The differential formulation of the Landau-Fokker-Planck collision integral is developed for the case of relativistic electromagnetic interactions.Comment: Plain TeX, 5 page

Comparison between resistive and collisionless double tearing modes for nearby resonant surfaces

The linear instability and nonlinear dynamics of collisional (resistive) and collisionless (due to electron inertia) double tearing modes (DTMs) are compared with the use of a reduced cylindrical model of a tokamak plasma. We focus on cases where two q = 2 resonant surfaces are located a small distance apart. It is found that regardless of the magnetic reconnection mechanism, resistivity or electron inertia, the fastest growing linear eigenmodes may have high poloidal mode numbers m ~ 10. The spectrum of unstable modes tends to be broader in the collisionless case. In the nonlinear regime, it is shown that in both cases fast growing high-m DTMs lead to an annular collapse involving small magnetic island structures. In addition, collisionless DTMs exhibit multiple reconnection cycles due to reversibility of collisionless reconnection and strong ExB flows. Collisionless reconnection leads to a saturated stable state, while in the collisional case resistive decay keeps the system weakly dynamic by driving it back towards the unstable equilibrium maintained by a source term.Comment: 15 pages, 9 figure

Gender differences in outcomes of patients with cystic fibrosis

Background: Cystic fibrosis (CF) is a common life-shortening genetic disease in which women have been described to have worse outcomes than males, particularly in response to respiratory infections with Pseudomonas aeruginosa. However, as advancements in therapies have improved life expectancy, this gender disparity has been challenged. The objective of this study is to examine whether a gender-based survival difference still exists in this population and determine the impact of common CF respiratory infections on outcomes in males versus females with CF. Methods: We conducted a retrospective cohort analysis of 32,766 patients from the United States Cystic Fibrosis Foundation Patient Registry over a 13-year period. Kaplan-Meier and Cox proportional hazards models were used to compare overall mortality and pathogen based survival rates in males and females. Results: Females demonstrated a decreased median life expectancy (36.0 years; 95% confidence interval [CI] 35.0–37.3) compared with men (38.7 years; 95% CI 37.8–39.6; p<0.001). Female gender proved to be a significant risk factor for death (hazard ratio 2.22, 95% CI 1.79–2.77), despite accounting for variables known to influence CF mortality. Women were also found to become colonized earlier with several bacteria and to have worse outcomes with common CF pathogens. Conclusions: CF women continue to have a shortened life expectancy relative to men despite accounting for key CF-related comorbidities. Women also become colonized with certain common CF pathogens earlier than men and show a decreased life expectancy in the setting of respiratory infections. Explanations for this gender disparity are only beginning to be unraveled and further investigation into mechanisms is needed to help develop therapies that may narrow this gender gap

Transport control by coherent zonal flows in the core/edge transitional regime

3D Braginskii turbulence simulations show that the energy flux in the core/edge transition region of a tokamak is strongly modulated - locally and on average - by radially propagating, nearly coherent sinusoidal or solitary zonal flows. The flows are geodesic acoustic modes (GAM), which are primarily driven by the Stringer-Winsor term. The flow amplitude together with the average anomalous transport sensitively depend on the GAM frequency and on the magnetic curvature acting on the flows, which could be influenced in a real tokamak, e.g., by shaping the plasma cross section. The local modulation of the turbulence by the flows and the excitation of the flows are due to wave-kinetic effects, which have been studied for the first time in a turbulence simulation.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figures, submitted to PR

Limitations on Sub-Diffraction Imaging with a Negative Refractive Index Slab

Recently it has been proposed that a planar slab of material, for which both the permittivity and permeability have the values of -1, could bring not only the propagating fields associated with a source to a focus, but could also refocus the nonpropagating near-fields, thereby achieving a subdiffraction image. In this work we discuss the sensitivity of the subwavelength focus to various slab parameters, pointing out the connection to slab plasmon modes. We also note and resolve a paradox associated with the perfect imaging of a point source. We conclude that subwavelength resolution is achievable with available technology, but only by implementation of a critical set of design parameters.Comment: pdf fil

Connectivity-dependent properties of diluted sytems in a transfer-matrix description

We introduce a new approach to connectivity-dependent properties of diluted systems, which is based on the transfer-matrix formulation of the percolation problem. It simultaneously incorporates the connective properties reflected in non-zero matrix elements and allows one to use standard random-matrix multiplication techniques. Thus it is possible to investigate physical processes on the percolation structure with the high efficiency and precision characteristic of transfer-matrix methods, while avoiding disconnections. The method is illustrated for two-dimensional site percolation by calculating (i) the critical correlation length along the strip, and the finite-size longitudinal DC conductivity: (ii) at the percolation threshold, and (iii) very near the pure-system limit.Comment: 4 pages, no figures, RevTeX, Phys. Rev. E Rapid Communications (to be published

Possible Method for Measuring the Proton Form Factors in Processes with and without Proton Spin Flip

The ratio of the squares of the electric and magnetic proton form factors is shown to be proportional to the ratio of the cross sections for the elastic scattering of an unpolarized electron on a partially polarized proton with and without proton spin flip. The initial proton at rest should be polarized along the direction of the motion of the final proton. Similar results are valid for both radiative $ep$ scattering and the photoproduction of pairs on a proton in the Bethe--Heitler kinematics. When the initial proton is fully polarized in the direction of the motion of the final proton, the cross section for the $ep \to ep$ process, as well as for the $ep \to ep \gamma$ and $\gamma p \to e \bar e p$ processes, without (with) proton spin flip is expressed only in terms of the square of the electric (magnetic) proton form factor. Such an experiment on the measurement of the cross sections without and with proton spin flip would make it possible to acquire new independent data on the behavior of $G_E^2(Q^2)$ and $G_M^2(Q^2)$, which are necessary for resolving the contradictions appearing after the experiment of the JLab collaboration on the measurement of the proton form factors with the method of polarization transfer from the initial electron to the final proton.Comment: 7 pages, revtex