Operations of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis - 1978

Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis

Phase transitions and change of type in low-temperature heat

Classical heat pulse experiments have shown heat to propagate in waves through crystalline materials at temperatures close to absolute zero. With increasing temperature, these waves slow down and finally disappear, to be replaced by diffusive heat propagation. Several features surrounding this phenomenon are examined in this work. The model used switches between an internal parameter (or extended thermodynamics) description and a classical (linear or nonlinear) Fourier law setting. This leads to a hyperbolic-parabolic change of type, which allows wavelike features to appear beneath the transition temperature and diffusion above. We examine the region around and immediately below the transition temperature, where dissipative effects are insignificant

The XMM-Newton slew survey in the 2-10 keV band

The XMM-Newton Slew Survey (XSS) covers a significant fraction of the sky in a broad X-ray bandpass. Although shallow by contemporary standards, in the `classical' 2-10 keV band of X-ray astronomy, the XSS provides significantly better sensitivity than any currently available all-sky survey. We investigate the source content of the XSS, focussing on detections in the 2-10 keV band down to a very low threshold (> 4 counts net of background). At the faint end, the survey reaches a flux sensitivity of roughly 3e-12 erg/cm2/s (2-10 keV). Our starting point was a sample of 487 sources detected in the XMMSL1d2 XSS at high galactic latitude in the hard band. Through cross-correlation with published source catalogues from surveys spanning the electromagnetic spectrum from radio to gamma-rays, we find that 45% of the sources have likely identifications with normal/active galaxies, 18% are associated with other classes of X-ray object (nearby coronally active stars, accreting binaries, clusters of galaxies), leaving 37% of the XSS sources with no current identification. We go on to define an XSS extragalactic hard band sample comprised of 219 galaxies and active galaxies. We investigate the properties of this extragalactic sample including its X-ray logN-logS distribution. We find that in the low-count limit, the XSS is strongly affected by Eddington bias. There is also a very strong bias in the XSS against the detection of extended sources, most notably clusters of galaxies. A significant fraction of the detections at and around the low-count limit may be spurious. Nevertheless, it is possible to use the XSS to extract a reasonably robust sample of extragalactic sources, excluding galaxy clusters. The differential logN-logS relation of these extragalactic sources matches very well to the HEAO-1 A2 all-sky survey measurements at bright fluxes and to the 2XMM source counts at the faint end.Comment: 16 pages, 13 figures, FITS table of XSS extragalactic sample available from http://www.star.le.ac.uk/~amr30/Slew

The white is right? : the challenge with defining social work in Fiji

This study explores social work in Fiji and considers how cultural identity, practice context, and participant worldviews interact to form understandings of practice. These understandings, metaphors and beliefs contribute to a construction of social work that reflects lived experiences of social workers in Fiji. Sixty-one social workers from the East, West, Central, and Northern divisions of Fiji participated in individual and group talanoa discussions to examine the values, knowledge and skills considered foundational for practice. This was also accompanied by a consideration of what enables purposeful social work within the Fijian practice context. These narratives contribute to a growing literature base that seeks to articulate non-Western frameworks within social work. Fiji’s colonial history, a heavy dependence on foreign aid and the influence of globalisation contribute to an environment where Western models of research may supersede or drown out efforts to integrate and bring together models of Western and non-Western practice. This is problematic given the divergent epistemological and ideological basis of individualised Western models to that of more collectivist social ideals espoused within Fiji. In response, this thesis contributes to the development of a culturally informed framework of Fijian social work practice, while recognising the need to be wary of any indigenous research process that seek to promote Fiji as a singular homogenous group. Ultimately, in the context of increasing globalisation, I argue that the social work profession should foster a rich and diverse understanding of social work practice by embracing indigenous and localised understandings of research and practice

The XMM-Newton Slew Survey: Towards The Whole X-ray Sky and the Rarest X-ray Events

The data collected by XMM-Newton as it slews between pointings currently cover almost half the entire sky, and many familiar features and new sources are visible. The soft-band sensitivity limit of the Slew is close to that of the RASS, and a large-area Slew-RASS comparison now provides the best opportunity for discovering extremely rare high-variability objects.Comment: To appear in Proceedings of "X-ray Astronomy 2009: Present Status, Multi-Wavelength Approach and Future Perspectives", Bologna, Italy, September 7-11, 2009, AIP, eds. A. Comastri, M. Cappi, and L. Angelin

Statistical evaluation of the flux cross-calibration of the XMM-Newton EPIC cameras

The second XMM-Newton serendipitous source catalogue, 2XMM, provides the ideal data base for performing a statistical evaluation of the flux cross-calibration of the XMM-Newton European Photon Imaging Cameras (EPIC). We aim to evaluate the status of the relative flux calibration of the EPIC cameras on board XMM-Newton (MOS1, MOS2, and pn) and investigate the dependence of the calibration on energy, position in the field of view of the X-ray detectors, and lifetime of the mission. We compiled the distribution of flux percentage differences for large samples of 'good quality' objects detected with at least two of the EPIC cameras. The mean offset of the fluxes and dispersion of the distributions was then found by Gaussian fitting. Count rate to flux conversion was performed with a fixed spectral model. The impact on the results of varying this model was investigated. Excellent agreement was found between the two EPIC MOS cameras to better than 4% from 0.2 keV to 12.0 keV. MOS cameras register 7-9% higher flux than pn below 4.5 keV and 10-13% flux excess above 4.5 keV. No evolution of the flux ratios is seen with time, except at energies below 0.5 keV, where we found a strong decrease in the MOS to pn flux ratio with time. This effect is known to be due to a gradually degrading MOS redistribution function. The flux ratios show some dependence on distance from the optical axis in the sense that the MOS to pn flux excess increases with off-axis angle. Furthermore, in the 4.5-12.0 keV band there is a strong dependence of the MOS to pn excess flux on the azimuthal-angle. These results strongly suggest that the calibration of the Reflection Grating Array (RGA) blocking factors is incorrect at high energies. Finally, we recommend ways to improve the calculation of fluxes in future versions of XMM-Newton source catalogues.Comment: 11 pages, 10 figures, 3 tables. Abridged Abstract. Accepted for publication in Astronomy and Astrophysic

Online containers for hypergraphs, with applications to linear equations

A set of containers for a hypergraph G is a collection CC of vertex subsets, such that for every independent (or, indeed, merely sparse) set I of G there is some C∈CC∈C with I⊂CI⊂C, no member of CC is large, and the collection CC is relatively small. Containers with useful properties have been exhibited by Balogh, Morris and Samotij [6] and by the authors [39]; [40] ; [41], along with several applications. Our purpose here is to give a simpler algorithm than the one used in [40], which nevertheless yields containers with all the properties needed for the main container theorem of [40] and its consequences. Moreover this algorithm produces containers having the so-called online property, allowing the colouring results of [40] to be extended to all, not just simple, hypergraphs. Most of the proof of the container theorem remains the same if this new algorithm is used, and we do not repeat all the details here, but describe only the changes that need to be made. However, for illustrative purposes, we do include a complete proof of a slightly weaker but simpler version of the theorem, which for many (perhaps most) applications is plenty. We also present applications to the number of solution-free sets of linear equations, including the number of Sidon sets, that were announced in [40]

Two fluid model for thermal stratification in the Apollo cryogenic oxygen tanks

It is observed on Apollo flights that for oxygen densities greater than 42 lb/cu ft the heater operation time to achieve a desired pressure rise is half that which would be required if the energy were uniformly dispersed. A two fluid model was developed to describe this effect of stratification on the tank's pressurization behavior. The increase in pressure rise rate is attributed to compression of the bulk fluid in response to expansion of the heated fluid adjacent to the heater. It is assumed that during the heating operation the adjacent fluid retains nearly all the heater energy and has no mass interaction with the bulk fluid. The hot fluid temperatures predicted by the model are in reasonable correspondence with the observed heater temperatures. The model indicates that the fraction of the fluid interacting with the heater increases with decreasing density, from less than 0.1% at full tank to roughly 1% at 50% quantity, the lowest quantity at which stratification effects on pressure are observed

Scaling law in target-hunting processes

We study the hunting process for a target, in which the hunter tracks the goal by smelling odors it emits. The odor intensity is supposed to decrease with the distance it diffuses. The Monte Carlo experiment is carried out on a 2-dimensional square lattice. Having no idea of the location of the target, the hunter determines its moves only by random attempts in each direction. By sorting the searching time in each simulation and introducing a variable $x$ to reflect the sequence of searching time, we obtain a curve with a wide plateau, indicating a most probable time of successfully finding out the target. The simulations reveal a scaling law for the searching time versus the distance to the position of the target. The scaling exponent depends on the sensitivity of the hunter. Our model may be a prototype in studying such the searching processes as various foods-foraging behavior of the wild animals.Comment: 7 figure