1,339 research outputs found
Optimal Moments for the Analysis of Peculiar Velocity Surveys II: Testing
Analyses of peculiar velocity surveys face several challenges, including low
signal--to--noise in individual velocity measurements and the presence of
small--scale, nonlinear flows. This is the second in a series of papers in
which we describe a new method of overcoming these problems by using data
compression as a filter with which to separate large--scale, linear flows from
small--scale noise that can bias results. We demonstrate the effectiveness of
our method using realistic catalogs of galaxy velocities drawn from N--body
simulations. Our tests show that a likelihood analysis of simulated catalogs
that uses all of the information contained in the peculiar velocities results
in a bias in the estimation of the power spectrum shape parameter and
amplitude , and that our method of analysis effectively removes this
bias. We expect that this new method will cause peculiar velocity surveys to
re--emerge as a useful tool to determine cosmological parameters.Comment: 28 pages, 9 figure
Optimal Moments for the Analysis of Peculiar Velocity Surveys
We present a new method for the analysis of peculiar velocity surveys which
removes contributions to velocities from small scale, nonlinear velocity modes
while retaining information about large scale motions. Our method utilizes
Karhunen--Lo\`eve methods of data compression to construct a set of moments out
of the velocities which are minimally sensitive to small scale power. The set
of moments are then used in a likelihood analysis. We develop criteria for the
selection of moments, as well as a statistic to quantify the overall
sensitivity of a set of moments to small scale power. Although we discuss our
method in the context of peculiar velocity surveys, it may also prove useful in
other situations where data filtering is required.Comment: 25 Pages, 3 figures. Submitted to Ap
Coronary heart disease in Indian Asians.
The Indian Asian population accounts for a fifth of all global deaths from coronary heart disease (CHD). CHD deaths on the Indian subcontinent have doubled since 1990, and are predicted to rise a further 50% by 2030. Reasons underlying the increased CHD mortality among Indian Asians remain unknown. Although conventional cardiovascular risk factors contribute to CHD in Indian Asians as in other populations, these do not account for their increased risk. Type-2 diabetes, insulin resistance and related metabolic disturbances are more prevalent amongst Indian Asians than Europeans, and have been proposed as major determinants of higher CHD risk among Indian Asians. However, this view is not supported by prospective data. Genome-wide association studies have not identified differences in allele frequencies or effect sizes in known loci to explain the increased CHD risk in Indian Asians. Limited knowledge of mechanisms underlying higher CHD risk amongst Indian Asians presents a major obstacle to reducing the burden of CHD in this population. Systems biology approaches such as genomics, epigenomics, metabolomics and transcriptomics, provide a non-biased approach for discovery of novel biomarkers and disease pathways underlying CHD. Incorporation of these omic approaches in prospective Indian Asian cohorts such as the London Life Sciences Population Study (LOLIPOP) provide an exciting opportunity for the identification of new risk factors underlying CHD in this high risk population
Einstein Cluster Alignments Revisited
We have examined whether the major axes of rich galaxy clusters tend to point
toward their nearest neighboring cluster. We have used the data of Ulmer,
McMillan, and Kowalski, who used position angles based on X-ray morphology. We
also studied a subset of this sample with updated positions and distances from
the MX Northern Abell Cluster Survey (for rich clusters () with well
known redshifts). A Kolmogorov-Smirnov (KS) test showed no significant signal
for nonrandom angles on any scale Mpc. However, refining the
null hypothesis with the Wilcoxon rank-sum test, we found a high confidence
signal for alignment. Confidence levels increase to a high of 99.997% as only
near neighbors which are very close are considered. We conclude there is a
strong alignment signal in the data, consistent with gravitational instability
acting on Gaussian perturbations.Comment: Minor revisions. To be published in Ap
Addendum to "Coherent radio pulses from GEANT generated electromagnetic showers in ice"
We reevaluate our published calculations of electromagnetic showers generated
by GEANT 3.21 and the radio frequency pulses they produce in ice. We are
prompted by a recent report showing that GEANT 3.21-modeled showers are
sensitive to internal settings in the electron tracking subroutine. We report
the shower and pulse characteristics obtained with different settings of GEANT
3.21 and with GEANT 4. The default setting of electron tracking in GEANT 3.21
we used in previous work speeds up the shower simulation at the cost of
information near the end of the tracks. We find that settings tracking electron
and positron to lower energy yield a more accurate calculation, a more intense
shower, and proportionately stronger radio pulses at low frequencies. At high
frequencies the relation between shower tracking algorithm and pulse spectrum
is more complex. We obtain radial distributions of shower particles and phase
distributions of pulses from 100 GeV showers that are consistent with our
published results.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure
An estimate of \Omega_m without priors
Using mean relative peculiar velocity measurements for pairs of galaxies, we
estimate the cosmological density parameter and the amplitude of
density fluctuations . Our results suggest that our statistic is a
robust and reproducible measure of the mean pairwise velocity and thereby the
parameter. We get and . These estimates do not depend on prior assumptions on
the adiabaticity of the initial density fluctuations, the ionization history,
or the values of other cosmological parameters.Comment: 12 pages, 4 figures, slight changes to reflect published versio
Monolithic Integration of Two-Dimensional Liquid ChromatographyâCapillary Electrophoresis and Electrospray Ionization on a Microfluidic Device
A microfluidic device capable of two-dimensional reversed-phase liquid chromatography-capillary electrophoresis with integrated electrospray ionization (LC-CE-ESI) for mass spectrometry (MS)-based proteomic applications is described. Traditional instrumentation was used for the LC sample injection and delivery of the LC mobile phase. The glass microfabricated device incorporated a sample-trapping region and an LC channel packed with reversed-phase particles. Rapid electrokinetic injections of the LC effluent into the CE dimension were performed at a cross channel intersection. The CE separation channel terminated at a corner of the square device, which functioned as an integrated electrospray tip. In addition to LC-CE-ESI, this device was used for LC-ESI without any instrumental modifications. To evaluate the system, LC-MS and LC-CE-MS analysis of protein digests were performed and compared
Region-Wide Ecological Responses of Arid Wyoming Big Sagebrush Communities to Fuel Treatments
If arid sagebrush ecosystems lack resilience to disturbances or resistance to annual invasives, then alternative successional states dominated by annual invasives, especially cheatgrass (Bromus tectorum L.), are likely after fuel treatments. We identified six Wyoming big sagebrush (Artemisia tridentata ssp. wyomingensis Beetle & Young) locations (152â381 mm precipitation) that we believed had sufficient resilience and resistance for recovery. We examined impacts of woody fuel reduction (fire, mowing, the herbicide tebuthiuron, and untreated controls, all with and without the herbicide imazapic) on short-term dominance of plant groups and on important land health parameters with the use of analysis of variance (ANOVA). Fire and mowing reduced woody biomass at least 85% for 3 yr, but herbaceous fuels were reduced only by fire (72%) and only in the first year. Herbaceous fuels produced at least 36% more biomass with mowing than untreated areas during posttreatment years. Imazapic only reduced herbaceous biomass after fires (34%). Tebuthiuron never affected herbaceous biomass. Perennial tall grass cover was reduced by 59% relative to untreated controls in the first year after fire, but it recovered by the second year. Cover of all remaining herbaceous groups was not changed by woody fuel treatments. Only imazapic reduced significantly herbaceous cover. Cheatgrass cover was reduced at least 63% with imazapic for 3 yr. Imazapic reduced annual forb cover by at least 45%, and unexpectedly, perennial grass cover by 49% (combination of tall grasses and Sandberg bluegrass [Poa secunda J. Presl.]). Fire reduced density of Sandberg bluegrass between 40% and 58%, decreased lichen and moss cover between 69% and 80%, and consequently increased bare ground between 21% and 34% and proportion of gaps among perennial plants &spigt;â2 m (at least 28% during the 3 yr). Fire, mowing, and imazapic may be effective in reducing fuels for 3 yr, but each has potentially undesirable consequences on plant communities
Visible light carrier generation in co-doped epitaxial titanate films
Perovskite titanates such as SrTiO (STO) exhibit a wide range of
important functional properties, including high electron mobility,
ferroelectricity, and excellent photocatalytic performance. The wide optical
band gap of titanates limits their use in these applications, however, making
them ill-suited for integration into solar energy harvesting technologies. Our
recent work has shown that by doping STO with equal concentrations of La and Cr
we can enhance visible light absorption in epitaxial thin films while avoiding
any compensating defects. In this work, we explore the optical properties of
photoexcited carriers in these films. Using spectroscopic ellipsometry, we show
that the Cr dopants, which produce electronic states immediately above
the top of the O 2p valence band in STO reduce the direct band gap of the
material from 3.75 eV to between 2.4 and 2.7 eV depending on doping levels.
Transient reflectance spectroscopy measurements are in agreement with the
observations from ellipsometry and confirm that optically generated carriers
are present for longer than 2 ns. Finally, through photoelectrochemical
methylene blue degradation measurements, we show that these co-doped films
exhibit enhanced visible light photocatalysis when compared to pure STO.Comment: 19 pages including supplement, 8 figures (3 main, 5 supplement
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