Nuclear muon capture by 3He: meson exchange currents for the triton channel

Exchange current corrections are calculated using currents found from the hard-pion model and AV14+3BF wavefunctions. Results are given for the rate and spin observables. Their sensitivity to g_P, the nucleon pseudoscalar form factor, is reported.Comment: 35 pages, uuencoded gz-compressed tar file 42 Kbyte

Nuclear electron capture rate in stellar interiors and the case of 7Be

Nuclear electron capture rate from continuum in an astrophysical plasma environment (like solar core) is calculated using a modified Debye-Huckel screening potential and the related non-Gaussian q-distribution of electron momenta. For q=1 the well-known Debye-Huckel results are recovered. The value of q can be derived from the fluctuation of number of particles and temperature inside the Debye sphere. For 7Be continuum electron capture in solar core, we find an increase of 7 -- 10 percent over the rate calculated with standard Debye-Huckel potential. The consequence of this results is a reduction of the same percentage of the SSM 8B solar neutrino flux, leaving unchanged the SSM 7Be flux.Comment: 8 pages, 1 figure, IOP macro style, submitted to JP

On the pion electroproduction amplitude

We analyze amplitudes for the pion electroproduction on proton derived from Lagrangians based on the local chiral SU(2) x SU(2) symmetries. We show that such amplitudes do contain information on the nucleon axial form factor F_A in both soft and hard pion regimes. This result invalidates recent Haberzettl's claim that the pion electroproduction at threshold cannot be used to extract any information regarding F_A.Comment: 14 pages, 6 figures, revised version, accepted for publication in Phys. Rev.

Manifestation of solar activity in the global topside ion composition − a study based on satellite data

The solar cycle variation of the most important parameters characterizing the ion composition in the topside ionosphere is studied. For this purpose data from the ACTIVE mission (the IK-24 satellite) for the maximum of solar cycle 22 (aver F10.7~200), complemented by data available from the Atmosphere Explorer (AE) satellites, for the minimum of solar cycle 21 (average F10.7~85), were processed. OGO-6 data from the low maximum of solar cycle 20 (average F10.7~150) were used for medium solar activity conditions. The results for the equinox from the recently developed empirical model of ion composition are analyzed and presented, and typical vertical profiles from solar maxima and minima are shown. It was found that the logarithm of the O+, H+, He+, and N+ densities in the topside ionosphere at a fixed altitude, latitude, and local time is, in the first approximation, a linear function of solar activity characterized by the daily F10.7. On the other hand, the upper transition height is generally a non linear function of the daily F10.7, the deviation from linear dependence increases with latitude. Keywords. Ionosphere (Plasma temperature and density; Ion chemistry and composition; Modeling and forecasting

Solar flux variation of the electron temperature morning overshoot in the equatorial F

Using 8 years of CHAMP satellite observations of the equatorial electron temperature, T-e, we investigate its behavior during the morning overshoot and at ionospheric altitudes below 450 km including its variation with solar activity. The morning T-e has a maximum at the dip equator and decreases gradually with increasing latitude, which is due to the increasing importance of heat conduction as the dip angle becomes larger. The amplitude of the equatorial morning overshoot T-e decreases with increasing solar flux by about -10 degrees K/solar flux unit depending on season and longitude. Trends of similar magnitude are predicted by the FLIP model. The model calculations confirm that the electron cooling due to enhanced electron-ion collisions increases faster than the heating of thermal electrons through collision with photoelectrons for increasing solar EUV. Both data and model showed that elevated electron temperatures persist to later local times during low solar activity. Obviously, the decreased background plasma density, together with the slower rise of electron density after sunrise under such conditions are responsible for the longer persistence. First investigations of longitudinal aspects revealed that the strength of the anticorrelation between morning T-e and solar flux and the seasonal difference of the T-e amplitude varies with longitude. The positive correlation between the morning overshoot and solar flux at 600 km as was shown earlier in Hinotori data is consistent with FLIP predictions and radar observations. The solar flux variation of the morning T-e reverses sign between 400 and 600 km

Space weather effects on the MAGION-4 and MAGION-5 solar cells

Data on solar array efficiency measured on board two Czech MAGION micro-satellites between August 1995 and June 2002, during the period of increasing and high solar activity, were used to study the space weather effects on photo-voltaic solar cells. A stronger degradation of the solar array was observed on MAGION-5 in comparison with MAGION-4. This fact can be explained by the essential difference between the two orbits. The MAGION-5 s/c was in the radiation belts more than 40% of the time, whereas the MAGION-4 was only present about 4% of the time. The experimental data refer to periods of low as well as high solar activity, with an enhanced occurrence of strong solar events. The evaluation of the data set covering a period of more than 6 years has shown that solar proton flares can have an almost immediate effect on the solar array efficiency. However, in the case of MAGION-5, an important role in solar cell degradation is played by the long-term effect of energetic particles in the radiation belts. Periods with a distinctly steeper decrease in the solar array output power were observed and can be explained by an increase of particle flux density in the radiation belts. Periods in slower decline of the solar array output power correspond to periods in low radiation belt indices based on the NOAA POES s/c data