Effects of Nacelle configuration/position on performance of subsonic transport

An experimental study was conducted to explore possible reductions in installed propulsion system drag due to underwing aft nacelle locations. Both circular (C) and D inlet cross section nacelles were tested. The primary objectives were: to determine the relative installed drag of the C and D nacelle installations; and, to compare the drag of each aft nacelle installation with that of a conventional underwing forward, drag of each aft nacelle installation with that of a conventional underwing forward, pylon mounted (UTW) nacelle installation. The tests were performed in the NASA-Langley Research Center 16-Foot Transonic Wind Tunnel at Mach numbers from 0.70 to 0.85, airplane angles of attack from -2.5 to 4.1 degrees, and Reynolds numbers per foot from 3.4 to 4.0 million. The nacelles were installed on the NASA USB full span transonic transport model with horizontal tail on. The D nacelle installation had the smallest drag of those tested. The UTW nacelle installation had the largest drag, at 6.8 percent larger than the D at Mach number 0.80 and lift coefficient (C sub L) 0.45. Each tested configuration still had some interference drag, however. The effect of the aft nacelles on airplane lift was to increase C sub L at a fixed angle of attack relative to the wing body. There was higher lift on the inboard wing sections because of higher pressures on the wing lower surface. The effects of the UTW installation on lift were opposite to those of the aft nacelles

Breather decay into a vortex/anti-vortex pair in a Josephson Ladder

We present experimental evidence for a new behavior which involves discrete breathers and vortices in a Josephson Ladder. Breathers can be visualized as the creation and subsequent annihilation of vortex/anti-vortex pairs. An externally applied magnetic field breaks the vortex/anti-vortex symmetry and causes the breather to split apart. The motion of the vortex or anti-vortex creates multi-site breathers, which are always to one side or the other of the original breather depending on the sign of the applied field. This asymmetry in applied field is experimentally observed.Comment: 10 pages, 5 figure

Spin-dependent resonant tunneling through semimetallic ErAs quantum wells

Resonant tunneling through semimetallic ErAs quantum wells embedded in GaAs structures with AlAs barriers was recently found to exhibit an intriguing behavior in magnetic fields which is explained in terms of tunneling selection rules and the spin-polarized band structure including spin-orbit coupling.Comment: 4 pages, figures supplied as self-unpacking figures.uu, uses epsfig.sty to incorporate figures in preprin

Egalitarian justice and expected value

According to all-luck egalitarianism, the differential distributive effects of both brute luck, which defines the outcome of risks which are not deliberately taken, and option luck, which defines the outcome of deliberate gambles, are unjust. Exactly how to correct the effects of option luck is, however, a complex issue. This article argues that (a) option luck should be neutralized not just by correcting luck among gamblers, but among the community as a whole, because it would be unfair for gamblers as a group to be disadvantaged relative to non-gamblers by bad option luck; (b) individuals should receive the warranted expected results of their gambles, except insofar as individuals blamelessly lacked the ability to ascertain which expectations were warranted; and (c) where societal resources are insufficient to deliver expected results to gamblers, gamblers should receive a lesser distributive share which is in proportion to the expected results. Where all-luck egalitarianism is understood in this way, it allows risk-takers to impose externalities on non-risk-takers, which seems counterintuitive. This may, however, be an advantage as it provides a luck egalitarian rationale for assisting ‘negligent victims’

Oxide nanotemplates for self-assembling "solid" building blocks

It is widely accepted that self-assembling building blocks is one of the promising ways for engineering new materials. Recent years reveal substantial progress in fabricating colloidal particles, polymer blocks and supramolecular aggregates of organic molecules. Despite of substantial progress in molecular self-assembly there is still a lack of simple blocks made of "solid matter" (e.g. metals, oxides etc.) with well-defined crystal structure and spatial order. Here we demonstrate that ordered arrays of metal nanoclusters can be fabricated by self-assembly on a wide range of oxide templates. These nano-templates are produced either by depositing an alien oxide film or by oxidizing a metal/metal oxide substrate.Comment: 11 pages, 2 figures added DFT calculations and Fig.

Diffraction in low-energy electron scattering from DNA: bridging gas phase and solid state theory

Using high-quality gas phase electron scattering calculations and multiple scattering theory, we attempt to gain insights on the radiation damage to DNA induced by secondary low-energy electrons in the condensed phase, and to bridge the existing gap with the gas phase theory and experiments. The origin of different resonant features (arising from single molecules or diffraction) is discussed and the calculations are compared to existing experiments in thin films.Comment: 40 pages preprint, 12 figures, submitted to J. Chem. Phy

Chemotaxis When Bacteria Remember: Drift versus Diffusion

{\sl Escherichia coli} ({\sl E. coli}) bacteria govern their trajectories by switching between running and tumbling modes as a function of the nutrient concentration they experienced in the past. At short time one observes a drift of the bacterial population, while at long time one observes accumulation in high-nutrient regions. Recent work has viewed chemotaxis as a compromise between drift toward favorable regions and accumulation in favorable regions. A number of earlier studies assume that a bacterium resets its memory at tumbles -- a fact not borne out by experiment -- and make use of approximate coarse-grained descriptions. Here, we revisit the problem of chemotaxis without resorting to any memory resets. We find that when bacteria respond to the environment in a non-adaptive manner, chemotaxis is generally dominated by diffusion, whereas when bacteria respond in an adaptive manner, chemotaxis is dominated by a bias in the motion. In the adaptive case, favorable drift occurs together with favorable accumulation. We derive our results from detailed simulations and a variety of analytical arguments. In particular, we introduce a new coarse-grained description of chemotaxis as biased diffusion, and we discuss the way it departs from older coarse-grained descriptions.Comment: Revised version, journal reference adde