Fire extinguishment in oxygen enriched atmospheres

Current state-of-the-art of fire suppression and extinguishment techniques in oxygen enriched atmosphere is reviewed. Four classes of extinguishment action are considered: cooling, separation of reactants, dilution or removal of fuel, and use of chemically reactive agents. Current practice seems to show preference for very fast acting water spray applications to all interior surfaces of earth-based chambers. In space, reliance has been placed on fire prevention methods through the removal of ignition sources and use of nonflammable materials. Recommendations are made for further work related to fire suppression and extinguishment in oxygen enriched atmospheres, and an extensive bibliography is appended

Big Bang Nucleosynthesis Constraints on the Self-Gravity of Pressure

Using big bang nucleosynthesis and present, high-precision measurements of light element abundances, we constrain the self-gravity of radiation pressure in the early universe. The self-gravity of pressure is strictly non-Newtonian, and thus the constraints we set provide a direct test of this prediction of general relativity and of the standard, Robertson-Walker-Friedmann cosmology.Comment: 5 pages, 1 figure. This paper was developed from an earlier version which was posted as arXiv:0707.358

Precise location of Sagittarius X ray sources with a rocket-borne rotating modulation collimator

Precise location of Sagittarius X ray sources with rocket-borne rotating modulation collimato

Detecting Exomoons Via Doppler Monitoring of Directly Imaged Exoplanets

Recently, Teachey, Kipping, and Schmitt (2018) reported the detection of a candidate exomoon, tentatively designated Kepler-1625b I, around a giant planet in the Kepler field. The candidate exomoon would be about the size and mass of Neptune, considerably larger than any moon in our Solar System, and if confirmed, would be the first in a new class of giant moons or binary planets. Motivated by the large mass ratio in the Kepler-1625b planet and satellite system, we investigate the detectability of similarly massive exomoons around directly imaged exoplanets via Doppler spectroscopy. The candidate moon around Kepler-1625b would induce a radial velocity signal of about 200 m/s on its host planet, large enough that similar moons around directly imaged planets orbiting bright, nearby stars might be detected with current or next generation instrumentation. In addition to searching for exomoons, a radial velocity survey of directly imaged planets could reveal the orientations of the planets' spin axes, making it possible to identify Uranus analogs.Comment: 15 pages, 8 figures, 2 tables. Accepted for publication in A

Within-Home versus Between-Home Variability of House Dust Endotoxin in a Birth Cohort

Endotoxin exposure has been proposed as an environmental determinant of allergen responses in children. To better understand the implications of using a single measurement of house dust endotoxin to characterize exposure in the first year of life, we evaluated room-specific within-home and between-home variability in dust endotoxin obtained from 470 households in Boston, Massachusetts. Homes were sampled up to two times over 5–11 months. We analyzed 1,287 dust samples from the kitchen, family room, and baby’s bedroom for endotoxin. We fit a mixed-effects model to estimate mean levels and the variation of endotoxin between homes, between rooms, and between sampling times. Endotoxin ranged from 2 to 1,945 units per milligram of dust. Levels were highest during summer and lowest in the winter. Mean endotoxin levels varied significantly from room to room. Cross-sectionally, endotoxin was moderately correlated between family room and bedroom floor (r = 0.30), between family room and kitchen (r = 0.32), and between kitchen and bedroom (r = 0.42). Adjusting for season, the correlation of endotoxin levels within homes over time was 0.65 for both the bedroom and kitchen and 0.54 for the family room. The temporal within-home variance of endotoxin was lowest for bedroom floor samples and highest for kitchen samples. Between-home variance was lowest in the family room and highest for kitchen samples. Adjusting for season, within-home variation was less than between-home variation for all three rooms. These results suggest that room-to-room and home-to-home differences in endotoxin influence the total variability more than factors affecting endotoxin levels within a room over time

Transits and Occultations of an Earth-Sized Planet in an 8.5-Hour Orbit

We report the discovery of an Earth-sized planet ($1.16\pm 0.19 R_\oplus$) in an 8.5-hour orbit around a late G-type star (KIC 8435766, Kepler-78). The object was identified in a search for short-period planets in the {\it Kepler} database and confirmed to be a transiting planet (as opposed to an eclipsing stellar system) through the absence of ellipsoidal light variations or substantial radial-velocity variations. The unusually short orbital period and the relative brightness of the host star ($m_{\rm Kep}$ = 11.5) enable robust detections of the changing illumination of the visible hemisphere of the planet, as well as the occultations of the planet by the star. We interpret these signals as representing a combination of reflected and reprocessed light, with the highest planet dayside temperature in the range of 2300 K to 3100 K. Follow-up spectroscopy combined with finer sampling photometric observations will further pin down the system parameters and may even yield the mass of the planet.Comment: Accepted for publication, ApJ, 10 pages and 6 figure

Multiwavelength transit observations of the candidate disintegrating planetesimals orbiting WD 1145+017

We present multiwavelength, ground-based follow-up photometry of the white dwarf WD 1145+017, which has recently been suggested to be orbited by up to six or more short-period, low-mass, disintegrating planetesimals. We detect nine significant dips in flux of between 10% and 30% of the stellar flux in our ~32 hr of photometry, suggesting that WD 1145+017 is indeed being orbited by multiple, short-period objects. Through fits to the asymmetric transits that we observe, we confirm that the transit egress is usually longer than the ingress, and that the transit duration is longer than expected for a solid body at these short periods, all suggesting that these objects have cometary tails streaming behind them. The precise orbital periods of the planetesimals are unclear, but at least one object, and likely more, have orbital periods of ~4.5 hr. We are otherwise unable to confirm the specific periods that have been reported, bringing into question the long-term stability of these periods. Our high-precision photometry also displays low-amplitude variations, suggesting that dusty material is consistently passing in front of the white dwarf, either from discarded material from these disintegrating planetesimals or from the detected dusty debris disk. We compare the transit depths in the V- and R-bands of our multiwavelength photometry, and find no significant difference; therefore, for likely compositions, the radius of single-size particles in the cometary tails streaming behind the planetesimals must be ~0.15 μm or larger, or ~0.06 μm or smaller, with 2σ confidence

Radiation-Resistant Solar Cells - A Panel Discussion

Radiation resistant silicon cells for solar energy conversio