3,457 research outputs found
Universality of Load Balancing Schemes on Diffusion Scale
We consider a system of parallel queues with identical exponential
service rates and a single dispatcher where tasks arrive as a Poisson process.
When a task arrives, the dispatcher always assigns it to an idle server, if
there is any, and to a server with the shortest queue among randomly
selected servers otherwise . This load balancing scheme
subsumes the so-called Join-the-Idle Queue (JIQ) policy and the
celebrated Join-the-Shortest Queue (JSQ) policy as two crucial
special cases. We develop a stochastic coupling construction to obtain the
diffusion limit of the queue process in the Halfin-Whitt heavy-traffic regime,
and establish that it does not depend on the value of , implying that
assigning tasks to idle servers is sufficient for diffusion level optimality
Could Fire and Rescue Services identify older people at risk of falls?
Protecting or improving the efficiency and effectiveness of services while reducing costs in response to public sector funding reductions is a significant challenge for all public service organisations. Preventing falls in older people is a major public health objective. We propose here an innovative model of community partnership with Fire and Rescue Services assisting falls prevention services to enhance the safety and well-being of older people in local communities through early identification of those who are at risk of injury from a fall or accidental domestic fire
Finite Element Flow Simulations of the EUROLIFT DLR-F11 High Lift Configuration
This paper presents flow simulation results of the EUROLIFT DLR-F11
multi-element wing configuration, obtained with a highly scalable finite
element solver, PHASTA. This work was accomplished as a part of the 2nd high
lift prediction workshop. In-house meshes were constructed with increasing mesh
density for analysis. A solution adaptive approach was used as an alternative
and its effectiveness was studied by comparing its results with the ones
obtained with other meshes. Comparisons between the numerical solution obtained
with unsteady RANS turbulence model and available experimental results are
provided for verification and discussion. Based on the observations, future
direction for adaptive research and simulations with higher fidelity turbulence
models is outlined.Comment: 52nd Aerospace Sciences Meetin
Maser Source Finding Methods in HOPS
The {\bf H}{\bf O} Southern Galactic {\bf P}lane {\bf S}urvey (HOPS) has
observed 100 square degrees of the Galactic plane, using the Mopra radio
telescope to search for emission from multiple spectral lines in the 12\,mm
band (19.5\,--\,27.5\,GHz). Perhaps the most important of these spectral lines
is the 22.2\,GHz water maser transition. We describe the methods used to
identify water maser candidates and subsequent confirmation of the sources. Our
methods involve a simple determination of likely candidates by searching peak
emission maps, utilising the intrinsic nature of water maser emission -
spatially unresolved and spectrally narrow-lined. We estimate completeness
limits and compare our method with results from the {\sc Duchamp} source
finder. We find that the two methods perform similarly. We conclude that the
similarity in performance is due to the intrinsic limitation of the noise
characteristics of the data. The advantages of our method are that it is
slightly more efficient in eliminating spurious detections and is simple to
implement. The disadvantage is that it is a manual method of finding sources
and so is not practical on datasets much larger than HOPS, or for datasets with
extended emission that needs to be characterised. We outline a two-stage method
for the most efficient means of finding masers, using {\sc Duchamp}.Comment: 8 pages, 1 table, 4 figures. Accepted for publication in PASA special
issue on Source Finding & Visualisatio
Further Observational Evidence for a Critical Ionising Luminosity in Active Galaxies
We report the results of a survey for HI 21-cm absorption at redshifts of z >
2.6 in a new sample of radio sources with the Green Bank and Giant Metrewave
Radio Telescopes. From a total of 25 targets, we report zero detections in the
16 for which optical depth limits could be obtained. Based upon the detection
rate for z > 0.1 associated absorption, we would expect approximately four
detections. Of the 11 which have previously not been searched, there is
sufficient source-frame optical/ultra-violet photometry to determine the
ionising photon rate for four. Adding these to the literature, the hypothesis
that there is a critical rate of logQ = 56 ionising photons per second is now
significant at ~7 sigma. This reaffirms our assertion that searching z > 3
active galaxies for which optical redshifts are available selects sources in
which the ultra-violet luminosity is sufficient to ionise all of the neutral
gas in the host galaxy.Comment: Accepted by MNRA
Nanoelectromechanical Resonator Arrays for Ultrafast, Gas-Phase Chromatographic Chemical Analysis
Miniaturized gas chromatography (GC) systems can provide fast, quantitative analysis of chemical vapors in an ultrasmall package. We describe a chemical sensor technology based on resonant nanoelectromechanical systems (NEMS) mass detectors that provides the speed, sensitivity, specificity, and size required by the microscale GC paradigm. Such NEMS sensors have demonstrated detection of subparts per billion (ppb) concentrations of a phosphonate analyte. By combining two channels of NEMS detection with an ultrafast GC front-end, chromatographic analysis of 13 chemicals was performed within a 5 s time window
A search for 21 cm HI absorption in AT20G compact radio galaxies
We present results from a search for 21 cm associated HI absorption in a
sample of 29 radio sources selected from the Australia Telescope 20 GHz survey.
Observations were conducted using the Australia Telescope Compact Array
Broadband Backend, with which we can simultaneously look for 21 cm absorption
in a redshift range of 0.04 < z < 0.08, with a velocity resolution of 7 km/s .
In preparation for future large-scale H I absorption surveys we test a
spectral-line finding method based on Bayesian inference. We use this to assign
significance to our detections and to determine the best-fitting number of
spectral-line components. We find that the automated spectral-line search is
limited by residuals in the continuum, both from the band-pass calibration and
spectral-ripple subtraction, at spectral-line widths of \Deltav_FWHM > 103 km/s
. Using this technique we detect two new absorbers and a third, previously
known, yielding a 10 per cent detection rate. Of the detections, the
spectral-line profiles are consistent with the theory that we are seeing
different orientations of the absorbing gas, in both the host galaxy and
circumnuclear disc, with respect to our line-of-sight to the source. In order
to spatially resolve the spectral-line components in the two new detections,
and so verify this conclusion, we require further high-resolution 21 cm
observations (~0.01 arcsec) using very long baseline interferometry.Comment: 16 pages, 8 figures and 5 tables; accepted for publication in MNRAS
(version 2 based on proof corrections
Self-Learning Threshold-Based Load Balancing
We consider a large-scale service system where incoming tasks have to be
instantaneously dispatched to one out of many parallel server pools. The
user-perceived performance degrades with the number of concurrent tasks and the
dispatcher aims at maximizing the overall quality-of-service by balancing the
load through a simple threshold policy. We demonstrate that such a policy is
optimal on the fluid and diffusion scales, while only involving a small
communication overhead, which is crucial for large-scale deployments. In order
to set the threshold optimally, it is important, however, to learn the load of
the system, which may be unknown. For that purpose, we design a control rule
for tuning the threshold in an online manner. We derive conditions which
guarantee that this adaptive threshold settles at the optimal value, along with
estimates for the time until this happens. In addition, we provide numerical
experiments which support the theoretical results and further indicate that our
policy copes effectively with time-varying demand patterns.Comment: 51 pages, 6 figure
Evolution of In-Plane Magnetic Anisotropy In Sputtered FeTaN/TaN/FeTaN Sandwich Films
FeTaN/TaN/FeTaN sandwich films, FeTaN/TaN and TaN/FeTaN bilayers were
synthesized by using RF magnetron sputtering. The magnetic properties,
crystalline structures, microstructures and surface morphologies of the
as-deposited samples were characterized using angle-resolved M-H loop tracer,
VSM, XRD, TEM, AES and AFM. An evolution of the in-plane anisotropy was
observed with the changing thickness of the nonmagnetic TaN interlayer in the
FeTaN/TaN/FeTaN sandwiches, such as the easy-hard axis switching and the
appearing of biaxial anisotropy. It is ascribed to three possible mechanisms,
which are interlayer magnetic coupling, stress, and interface roughness,
respectively. Interlayer coupling and stress anisotropies may be the major
reasons to cause the easy-hard axis switching in the sandwiches. Whereas,
magnetostatic and interface anisotropies may be the major reasons to cause
biaxial anisotropy in the sandwiches, in which magnetostatic anisotropy is the
dominant one.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figure
Action and Hamiltonian for eternal black holes
We present the Hamiltonian, quasilocal energy, and angular momentum for a
spacetime region spatially bounded by two timelike surfaces. The results are
applied to the particular case of a spacetime representing an eternal black
hole. It is shown that in the case when the boundaries are located in two
different wedges of the Kruskal diagram, the Hamiltonian is of the form , where and are the Hamiltonian functions for the right
and left wedges respectively. The application of the obtained results to the
thermofield dynamics description of quantum effects in black holes is briefly
discussed.Comment: 24 pages, Revtex, 5 figures (available upon request
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