2,914 research outputs found
K-T impact(s): Continental, oceanic or both
Although geochemical and mineralogical evidence indicate that a major accretionary event occurred at the K-T boundary, no impact crater of suitable size and age was recognized. The 35 km Manson Structure, Iowa, was suggested recently as a possibility and Ar-40/Ar-39 determinations indicate that its formation age is indistinguishable from that of the K-T boundary. In order to test a possible association between Manson and the K-T boundary clay, the geochemistry and mineralogy of the K-T boundary clays at the Scollard Canyon section, Alberta and the Starkville South section, Colorado are compared with three dominant lithologies affected by the Manson impact: Proterozoic red clastics, underlying late-state granites, and gneisses. The chemical and mineralogical makeup of the Scollard Canyon boundary clay and its clastic constituents are presented, commenting on the implications for impact models. An impact into crystalline material of continental affinity appears to be required to explain the mineralogy and chemistry of the Scollard Canyon (and other Western N. American K-T sections). The low REE abundances of some K-T boundary layers are unusual but perhaps attempts should be made to understand the contributions of individual crustal components (e.g., carbonates, arkoses) as well as the potential for alteration involving these and other elements during and after impact-induced vaporization, before mantle excavation is invoked. If further studies confirm the results of published studies of marine boundary clays that indicate an oceanic target, attention must be paid to the possibility that multiple impacts occurred at the K-T boundary - one or more on the continents and one or more in the ocean
Generalized Grassmannian Coherent States For Pseudo-Hermitian Level Systems
The purpose of this paper is to generalize fermionic coherent states for
two-level systems described by pseudo-Hermitian Hamiltonian \cite{Trifonov}, to
n-level systems. Central to this task is the expression of the coherent states
in terms of generalized Grassmann variables. These kind of Grassmann coherent
states satisfy bi-overcompleteness condition instead of over-completeness one,
as it is reasonably expected because of the biorthonormality of the system.
Choosing an appropriate Grassmann weight function resolution of identity is
examined. Moreover Grassmannian coherent and squeezed states of deformed group
for three level pseudo-Hermitian system are presented.Comment: 17 page
Feather growth rate and mass in nearctic passerines with variablemigratory behavior and molt pattern
Bird species vary greatly in the duration of their annual complete feather molt. However, such variation is not well documented
in birds from many biogeographic areas, which restricts our understanding of the diversification of molt strategies. Recent research has revealed
that molt duration can be estimated in passerines from ptilochronology-based measurements of the growth rate of their tail feathers. We used
this approach to explore how molt duration varied in 98 Nearctic species that have different migratory strategies and molt patterns. As previously
documented for Palearctic species, migration was associated with a shortening of molt duration among species that molted during summer on
their breeding range. However, molts of winter-molting migratory species were as long as those of summer-molting sedentary species, which
suggests that winter molt also allows Nearctic migrants to avoid the temporal constraints experienced during summer. Our results also suggest
that migratory species that undergo a stopover molt within the Mexican monsoon region have the shortest molt duration among all Nearctic
passerines. Interestingly, and contrary to expectations from a potential tradeoff between molt duration and feather quality, observed variation
in feather growth rate was positively correlated with differences in tail feather mass, which may be caused by differences among groups in the
availability of resources for molting. We encourage the use of similar approaches to study the variation in molt duration in other geographic areas
where knowledge of the evolution of molt is limited.
Lattice Discretization in Quantum Scattering
The utility of lattice discretization technique is demonstrated for solving
nonrelativistic quantum scattering problems and specially for the treatment of
ultraviolet divergences in these problems with some potentials singular at the
origin in two and three space dimensions. This shows that lattice
discretization technique could be a useful tool for the numerical solution of
scattering problems in general. The approach is illustrated in the case of the
Dirac delta function potential.Comment: 9 page
Multiple electromagnetic electron positron pair production in relativistic heavy ion collisions
We calculate the cross sections for the production of one and more
electron-positron pairs due to the strong electromagnetic fields in
relativistic heavy ion collisions. Using the generating functional of fermions
in an external field we derive the N-pair amplitude. Neglecting the
antisymmetrisation in the final state we find that the total probability to
produce N pairs is a Poisson distribution. We calculate total cross sections
for the production of one pair in lowest order and also include higher-order
corrections from the Poisson distribution up to third order. Furthermore we
calculate cross sections for the production of up to five pairs including
corrections from the Poisson distribution.Comment: 13 pages REVTeX, 4 Postscript figures, This and related papers may
also be obtained from http://www.phys.washington.edu/~hencken
Near-Infrared and Star-forming properties of Local Luminous Infrared Galaxies
We use HST NICMOS continuum and Pa-alpha observations to study the
near-infrared and star-formation properties of a representative sample of 30
local (d ~ 35-75Mpc) luminous infrared galaxies (LIRGs, infrared 8-1000um
luminosities of L_IR=11-11.9[Lsun]). The data provide spatial resolutions of
25-50pc and cover the central ~3.3-7.1kpc regions of these galaxies. About half
of the LIRGs show compact (~1-2kpc) Pa-alpha emission with a high surface
brightness in the form of nuclear emission, rings, and mini-spirals. The rest
of the sample show Pa-alpha emission along the disk and the spiral arms
extending over scales of 3-7kpc and larger. About half of the sample contains
HII regions with H-alpha luminosities significantly higher than those observed
in normal galaxies. There is a linear empirical relationship between the mid-IR
24um and hydrogen recombination (extinction-corrected Pa-alpha) luminosity for
these LIRGs, and the HII regions in the central part of M51. This relation
holds over more than four decades in luminosity suggesting that the mid-IR
emission is a good tracer of the star formation rate (SFR). Analogous to the
widely used relation between the SFR and total IR luminosity of Kennicutt
(1998), we derive an empirical calibration of the SFR in terms of the
monochromatic 24um luminosity that can be used for luminous, dusty galaxies.Comment: Accepted for publication in ApJ. Contact first author for high
qualitity version of figure
Geometrical approach to the proton spin decomposition
We discuss in detail and from the geometrical point of view the issues of
gauge invariance and Lorentz covariance raised by the approach proposed
recently by Chen et al. to the proton spin decomposition. We show that the
gauge invariance of this approach follows from a mechanism similar to the one
used in the famous Stueckelberg trick. Stressing the fact that the Lorentz
symmetry does not force the gauge potential to transform as a Lorentz
four-vector, we show that the Chen et al. approach is Lorentz covariant
provided that one uses the suitable Lorentz transformation law. We also make an
attempt to summarize the present situation concerning the proton spin
decomposition. We argue that the ongoing debates concern essentially the
physical interpretation and are due to the plurality of the adopted pictures.
We discuss these different pictures and propose a pragmatic point of view.Comment: 39 pages, 1 figure, updated version to appear in PRD (2013
Corporal diagnostic work and diagnostic spaces: Clinicians' use of space and bodies during diagnosis
© 2015 The Authors. Sociology of Health & Illness © 2015 Foundation for the Sociology of Health & Illness/John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.An emerging body of literature in sociology has demonstrated that diagnosis is a useful focal point for understanding the social dimensions of health and illness. This article contributes to this work by drawing attention to the relationship between diagnostic spaces and the way in which clinicians use their own bodies during the diagnostic process. As a case study, we draw upon fieldwork conducted with a multidisciplinary clinical team providing deep brain stimulation (DBS) to treat children with a movement disorder called dystonia. Interviews were conducted with team members and diagnostic examinations were observed. We illustrate that clinicians use communicative body work and verbal communication to transform a material terrain into diagnostic space, and we illustrate how this diagnostic space configures forms of embodied 'sensing-and-acting' within. We argue that a 'diagnosis' can be conceptualised as emerging from an interaction in which space, the clinician-body, and the patient-body (or body-part) mutually configure one another. By conceptualising diagnosis in this way, this article draws attention to the corporal bases of diagnostic power and counters Cartesian-like accounts of clinical work in which the patient-body is objectified by a disembodied medical discourse.The Wellcome Trust (Wellcome Trust Biomedical Strategic Award 086034
Renormalization in Nonrelativistic Quantum Mechanics
The importance and usefulness of renormalization are emphasized in
nonrelativistic quantum mechanics. The momentum space treatment of both
two-body bound state and scattering problems involving some potentials singular
at the origin exhibits ultraviolet divergence. The use of renormalization
techniques in these problems leads to finite converged results for both the
exact and perturbative solutions. The renormalization procedure is carried out
for the quantum two-body problem in different partial waves for a minimal
potential possessing only the threshold behavior and no form factors. The
renormalized perturbative and exact solutions for this problem are found to be
consistent with each other. The useful role of the renormalization group
equations for this problem is also pointed out.Comment: 16 page
Finite temperature Casimir effect in the presence of nonlinear dielectrics
Starting from a Lagrangian, electromagnetic field in the presence of a
nonlinear dielectric medium is quantized using path-integral techniques and
correlation functions of different fields are calculated. The susceptibilities
of the nonlinear medium are obtained and their relation to coupling functions
are determined. Finally, the Casimir energy and force in the presence of a
nonlinear medium at finite temperature is calculated.Comment: 16 pages, 0 figure
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