18 research outputs found
Software development practices in academia: a case study comparison
Academic software development practices often differ from those of commercial development settings, yet only limited research has been conducted on assessing software development practises in academia. Here we present a case study of software development practices in four open-source scientific codes over a period of nine years, characterizing the evolution of their respective development teams, their scientific productivity, and the adoption (or discontinuation) of specific software engineering practises as the team size changes. We show that the transient nature of the development team results in the adoption of different development strategies. We relate measures of publication output to accumulated numbers of developers and find that for the projects considered the time-scale for returns on expended development effort is approximately three years. We discuss the implications of our findings for evaluating the performance of research software development, and in general any computationally oriented scientific project.Computational Horizons in Cancer (CHIC) project under EU FP7 grant agreement number 600841 (JG); CRESTA project under EU FP7 grant agreement number 287703 (DG,US); UK Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council under grant numbers EP/I017909/1 (www.2020science.net, DG,JG,JMO) and EP/I034602/1 (US)
Mixing of CNO-cycled matter in massive stars
Aims: We test predictions of evolution models on mixing of CNO-cycled
products in massive stars from a fundamental perspective. Relative changes
within the theoretical C:N:O abundance ratios and the buildup of helium are
compared with observational results. Methods: A sample of well-studied Galactic
massive stars is presented. High-quality optical spectra are carefully analysed
using improved NLTE line-formation and comprehensive analysis strategies. The
results are put in the context of the existing literature data. Results: A
tight trend in the observed N/C vs. N/O ratios and the buildup of helium is
found from the self-consistent analysis of main-sequence to supergiant stars
for the first time. The catalytic nature of the CNO-cycles is confirmed
quantitatively, though further investigations are required to derive a fully
consistent picture. Our observational results support the case of strong
mixing, as predicted e.g. by evolution models that consider magnetic fields or
by models that have gone through the first dredge-up in the case of many
supergiants.Comment: 6 pages, 6 figures. A&A, in pres
Quantum Spacetime Phenomenology
I review the current status of phenomenological programs inspired by
quantum-spacetime research. I stress in particular the significance of results
establishing that certain data analyses provide sensitivity to effects
introduced genuinely at the Planck scale. And my main focus is on
phenomenological programs that managed to affect the directions taken by
studies of quantum-spacetime theories.Comment: 125 pages, LaTex. This V2 is updated and more detailed than the V1,
particularly for quantum-spacetime phenomenology. The main text of this V2 is
about 25% more than the main text of the V1. Reference list roughly double