User's Guide for ERB 7 Matrix. Volume 1: Experiment Description and Quality Control Report for Year 1

The Nimbus 7 ERB MATRIX Tape is a computer program in which radiances and irradiances are converted into fluxes which are used to compute the basic scientific output parameters, emitted flux, albedo, and net radiation. They are spatially averaged and presented as time averages over one-day, six-day, and monthly periods. MATRIX data for the period November 16, 1978 through October 31, 1979 are presented. Described are the Earth Radiation Budget experiment, the Science Quality Control Report, Items checked by the MATRIX Science Quality Control Program, and Science Quality Control Data Analysis Report. Additional material from the detailed scientific quality control of the tapes which may be very useful to a user of the MATRIX tapes is included. Known errors and data problems and some suggestions on how to use the data for further climatologic and atmospheric physics studies are also discussed

Force balance in canonical ensembles of static granular packings

We investigate the role of local force balance in the transition from a microcanonical ensemble of static granular packings, characterized by an invariant stress, to a canonical ensemble. Packings in two dimensions admit a reciprocal tiling, and a collective effect of force balance is that the area of this tiling is also invariant in a microcanonical ensemble. We present analytical relations between stress, tiling area and tiling area fluctuations, and show that a canonical ensemble can be characterized by an intensive thermodynamic parameter conjugate to one or the other. We test the equivalence of different ensembles through the first canonical simulations of the force network ensemble, a model system.Comment: 9 pages, 9 figures, submitted to JSTA

Function of B cells expressing a human immunoglobulin M rheumatoid factor autoantibody in transgenic mice.

We have generated transgenic mice that express the immunoglobulin (Ig)M heavy chain and kappa light chain genes coding for a human IgM rheumatoid factor (RF), Les. Transgenic B cells expressing human IgM RF show striking similarities to their counterparts in normal humans. They comprise a significant proportion of the adult B cell population, but secrete only low levels of RF into the serum. The RF transgene-expressing B cells localize to primary B cell follicles and the mantle zone regions of secondary follicles in the spleen. Using these mice we have been able to show that one of the central functions of normal RF-expressing B cells may be to act as highly efficient antigen-presenting cells for low concentrations of immune-complexed antigen. High levels of secretion of IgM RF can not be induced under normal circumstances, although RF-expressing B cells proliferate well in vitro to both aggregated human IgG and anti-human IgM antibodies. However, these mice are not intrinsically secretion deficient. By crossing the RF transgenic mice with the autoimmune MRL/lpr background, we find a dramatic increase, > 200-fold, in levels of serum RF. The results strongly suggest that a major function of normal resting RF B cells is unrelated to antibody secretion. Rather, the RF B cells in the follicles may play a role in antigen presentation and regulation of immune responses to antibody-bound nonself-, and possibly self-antigens. This physiologic role of RF B cells may be disrupted in RF-associated autoimmune disease

Relaxations and rheology near jamming

We determine the form of the complex shear modulus $G^*$ in soft sphere packings near jamming. Viscoelastic response at finite frequency is closely tied to a packing's intrinsic relaxational modes, which are distinct from the vibrational modes of undamped packings. We demonstrate and explain the appearance of an anomalous excess of slowly relaxing modes near jamming, reflected in a diverging relaxational density of states. From the density of states, we derive the dependence of $G^*$ on frequency and distance to the jamming transition, which is confirmed by numerics.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure

High-resolution imaging at the SOAR telescope

Bright single and binary stars were observed at the 4.1-m telescope with a fast electron-multiplication camera in the regime of partial turbulence correction by the visible-light adaptive optics system. We compare the angular resolution achieved by simple averaging of AO-corrected images (long-exposure), selection and re-centering (shift-and-add or "lucky" imaging) and speckle interferometry. The effect of partial AO correction, vibrations, and image post-processing on the attained resolution is shown. Potential usefulness of these techniques is evaluated for reaching the diffraction limit in ground-based optical imaging. Measurements of 75 binary stars obtained during these tests are given and objects of special interest are discussed. We report tentative resolution of the astrometric companion to Zeta Aqr B. A concept of advanced high-resolution camera is outlined.Comment: Accepted for publication in PASP. 14 pages, 9 figures, 2 tabl

Angoricity and compactivity describe the jamming transition in soft particulate matter

The application of concepts from equilibrium statistical mechanics to out-of-equilibrium systems has a long history of describing diverse systems ranging from glasses to granular materials. For dissipative jammed systems-- particulate grains or droplets-- a key concept is to replace the energy ensemble describing conservative systems by the volume-stress ensemble. Here, we test the applicability of the volume-stress ensemble to describe the jamming transition by comparing the jammed configurations obtained by dynamics with those averaged over the ensemble as a probe of ergodicity. Agreement between both methods suggests the idea of "thermalization" at a given angoricity and compactivity. We elucidate the thermodynamic order of the jamming transition by showing the absence of critical fluctuations in static observables like pressure and volume. The approach allows to calculate observables such as the entropy, volume, pressure, coordination number and distribution of forces to characterize the scaling laws near the jamming transition from a statistical mechanics viewpoint.Comment: 27 pages, 13 figure

Force distributions in a triangular lattice of rigid bars

We study the uniformly weighted ensemble of force balanced configurations on a triangular network of nontensile contact forces. For periodic boundary conditions corresponding to isotropic compressive stress, we find that the probability distribution for single-contact forces decays faster than exponentially. This super-exponential decay persists in lattices diluted to the rigidity percolation threshold. On the other hand, for anisotropic imposed stresses, a broader tail emerges in the force distribution, becoming a pure exponential in the limit of infinite lattice size and infinitely strong anisotropy.Comment: 11 pages, 17 figures Minor text revisions; added references and acknowledgmen

Parity Effect and Charge Binding Transition in Submicron Josephson Junction Arrays

We reconsider the issue of Berezinskii-Kosterlitz-Thouless (BKT) transition into an insulating state in the Coulomb-dominated Josephson junction arrays. We show that previously predicted picture of the Cooper-pair BKT transtion at T = T_2 is valid only under the condition that T_2 is considerably below the parity-effect temperature (which is usually almost 10 times below the value of superconductive transition temperature), and even in this case it is not a rigorous phase transition but only a crossover, whereas the real phase transition takes place at T_1 = T_2/4. Our theory is in agreement with available experimental data on Coulomb-dominated Josephson arrays and also sheds some light on the origin of unusual reentrant temperature dependence of resistivity in the array with nearly-criticial ratio of Coulomb to Josephson energies.Comment: 4 pages, Revtex, to be published in JETP Letters, April 9