543 research outputs found
Inflation and Nonsingular Spacetimes of Cosmic Strings
Inflation of cosmic gauge and global strings is investigated by numerically
solving the combined Einstein and field equations. Above some critical
symmetry-breaking scales, the strings undergo inflation along the radial
direction as well as the axial direction at the core. The nonsingular nature of
the spacetimes around supercritical gauge and global strings is discussed and
contrasted to the singular static solutions that have been discussed in the
literature.Comment: 22 pages, REVTeX, 7 PostScript figure
Investigating the effects of lightning on cultural heritage: Characterization of the resulting fulgurite
On average, about 100 lightning discharges occur every second on the Earth. When lightning strikes soil, sand or rock, the high temperatures reached (about 30.000 ÂșK) promote the formation of melted glass tubular structures known as fulgurites. In the case referred here, lightning stroked a soil (granitic sand plus angular stones of thick-grained two-mica granite) and allochthonous materials supporting the platform of an electric tower. The intense melting produced a cylindrical rod, from which, as if they were roots of a tree, several bifurcating horizontal and subhorizontal branches of decreasing thickness were attached (see figure below).Peer reviewe
Description of the idealized bed roughness effects on tracer transport in water flumes by applying the strange attractor multifractal analysis
River hydrodynamicsTurbulent open channel flow and transport phenomen
Molecular impact of launch related dynamic vibrations and static hypergravity in planarians
Although many examples of simulated and real microgravity demonstrating their profound effect on biological systems are described in literature, few reports deal with hypergravity and vibration effects, the levels of which are severely increased during the launch preceding the desired microgravity period. Here, we used planarians, flatworms that can regenerate any body part in a few days. Planarians are an ideal model to study the impact of launch-related hypergravity and vibration during a regenerative process in a âwhole animalâ context. Therefore, planarians were subjected to 8.5 minutes of 4 g hypergravity (i.e. a human-rated launch level) in the Large Diameter Centrifuge (LDC) and/or to vibrations (20â2000 Hz, 11.3 Grms) simulating the conditions of a standard rocket launch. The transcriptional levels of genes (erg-1, runt-1, fos, jnk, and yki) related with the early stress response were quantified through qPCR. The results show that early response genes are severely deregulated after static and dynamic loads but more so after a combined exposure of dynamic (vibration) and static (hypergravity) loads, more closely simulating real launch exposure profiles. Importantly, at least four days after the exposure, the transcriptional levels of those genes are still deregulated. Our results highlight the deep impact that short exposures to hypergravity and vibration have in organisms, and thus the implications that space flight launch could have. These phenomena should be taken into account when planning for well-controlled microgravity studies
Oral processing of hydrogels: Influence of food material properties versus individuals' eating capability
Food material properties play an important role in sensory perception and consumer acceptance of foods. However, the actual oral processing behavior may depend on both the material properties of the food that is being consumed and individuals' oral capabilities. This study aimed to examine the relationships between intrinsic (oral capabilities of healthy participants) and extrinsic (food material properties of a set of hydrogels) variables to the real oral processing behavior. Three Îșâcarrageenan hydrogels (ÎșC), differing in fracture mechanics and oral tribology properties, were prepared: native ÎșC, ÎșC with added Naâalginate, and a ÎșC matrix with added Caâalginate beads of 300âÎŒm. A composite score of eating capability (EC) was measured with nonâinvasive techniques (maximum bite force and tongue pressure) using a panel of 28 untrained consumers. The oral processing behaviors (number of chews, oral residence time, and chewing rate) were analyzed with the same participants using frameâbyâframe video analysis. It was found that the EC scores did not correlate with any of the oral processing behaviors. The number of chews and oral residence time showed a strong correlation with the fracture force and friction force at orally relevant speeds (10â100âmm/s), whereas chewing rate did not vary with these properties. The results from this study indicate that oral processing in healthy adults seems mainly motivated by food material properties, and the chewing rate seems to relate more to individual differences and EC than to food properties. Insights from this study, using model hydrogels, have helped to promote knowledge on oral processing behavior in healthy individuals; could bridge the gap between consumer science, psychology, and food science; and may be of interest to product developers in designing foods with pleasant texture properties
Interactions between Cosmic Strings: An Analytical Study
We derive analytic expressions for the interaction energy between two general
cosmic strings as the function of their relative orientation and the
ratio of the coupling constants in the model. The results are relevant to the
statistic description of strings away from critical coupling and shed some
light on the mechanisms involved in string formation and the evolution of
string networks.Comment: 31 pages,REVTEX, Imperial/TP/93-94/3
Vorton Formation
In this paper we present the first analytic model for vorton formation. We
start by deriving the microscopic string equations of motion in Witten's
superconducting model, and show that in the relevant chiral limit these
coincide with the ones obtained from the supersonic elastic models of Carter
and Peter. We then numerically study a number of solutions of these equations
of motion and thereby suggest criteria for deciding whether a given
superconducting loop configuration can form a vorton. Finally, using a recently
developed model for the evolution of currents in superconducting strings we
conjecture, by comparison with these criteria, that string networks formed at
the GUT phase transition should produce no vortons. On the other hand, a
network formed at the electroweak scale can produce vortons accounting for up
to 6% of the critical density. Some consequences of our results are discussed.Comment: 41 pages; color figures 3-6 not included, but available from authors.
To appear in Phys. Rev.
Geodesic motion in the space-time of a cosmic string
We study the geodesic equation in the space-time of an Abelian-Higgs string
and discuss the motion of massless and massive test particles. The geodesics
can be classified according to the particles energy, angular momentum and
linear momentum along the string axis. We observe that bound orbits of massive
particles are only possible if the Higgs boson mass is smaller than the gauge
boson mass, while massless particles always move on escape orbits. Moreover,
neither massive nor massless particles can ever reach the string axis for
non-vanishing angular momentum. We also discuss the dependence of light
deflection by a cosmic string as well as the perihelion shift of bound orbits
of massive particles on the ratio between Higgs and gauge boson mass and the
ratio between symmetry breaking scale and Planck mass, respectively.Comment: 20 pages including 14 figures; v2: references added, discussion on
null geodesics extended, numerical results adde
Renormalized spin coefficients in the accumulated orbital phase for unequal mass black hole binaries
We analyze galactic black hole mergers and their emitted gravitational waves.
Such mergers have typically unequal masses with mass ratio of the order 1/10.
The emitted gravitational waves carry the inprint of spins and mass quadrupoles
of the binary components. Among these contributions, we consider here the
quasi-precessional evolution of the spins. A method of taking into account
these third post-Newtonian (3PN) effects by renormalizing (redefining) the 1.5
PN and 2PN accurate spin contributions to the accumulated orbital phase is
developed.Comment: 10 pages, to appear in Class. Quantum Grav. GWDAW13 Proceedings
Special Issue, v2: no typos conjectur
Entanglement hamiltonian and entanglement contour in inhomogeneous 1D critical systems
Inhomogeneous quantum critical systems in one spatial dimension have been studied by using conformal field theory in static curved backgrounds. Two interesting examples are the free fermion gas in the harmonic trap and the inhomogeneous XX spin chain called rainbow chain. For conformal field theories defined on static curved spacetimes characterised by a metric which is Weyl equivalent to the flat metric, with the Weyl factor depending only on the spatial coordinate, we study the entanglement hamiltonian and the entanglement spectrum of an interval adjacent to the boundary of a segment where the same boundary condition is imposed at the endpoints. A contour function for the entanglement entropies corresponding to this configuration is also considered, being closely related to the entanglement hamiltonian. The analytic expressions obtained by considering the curved spacetime which characterises the rainbow model have been checked against numerical data for the rainbow chain, finding an excellent agreement
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