7,168 research outputs found
Lensing Properties of Cored Galaxy Models
A method is developed to evaluate the magnifications of the images of
galaxies with lensing potentials stratified on similar concentric ellipses. A
simple contour integral is provided which enables the sums of the
magnifications of even parity or odd parity or the central image to be easily
calculated. The sums for pairs of images vary considerably with source
position, while the signed sums can be remarkably uniform inside the tangential
caustic in the absence of naked cusps. For a family of models in which the
potential is a power-law of the elliptic radius, the number of visible images
is found as a function of flattening, external shear and core radius. The
magnification of the central image depends on the core radius and the slope of
the potential. For typical source and lens redshifts, the missing central image
leads to strong constraints; the mass distribution in the lensing galaxy must
be nearly cusped, and the cusp must be isothermal or stronger. This is in
accord with the cuspy cores seen in high resolution photometry of nearby,
massive, early-type galaxies, which typically have the surface density falling
like distance^{-1.3} outside a break radius of a few hundred parsecs. Cuspy
cores by themselves can provide an explanation of the missing central images.
Dark matter at large radii may alter the slope of the projected density;
provided the slope remains isothermal or steeper and the break radius remains
small, then the central image remains unobservable. The sensitivity of the
radio maps must be increased fifty-fold to find the central images in
abundance.Comment: 42 pages, 11 figures, ApJ in pres
Technical guidelines for economic valuation of inland small-scale fisheries in developing countries
These ôTechnical Guidelines for Economic Valuation of Inland Small-scale Fisheries in Developing Countriesö are one of the outputs of the project on ôFood security and poverty alleviation through improved valuation and governance of river fisheries in Africaö. The guidelines draw upon research results and experience gained during the course of the project. The project was coordinated and implemented by the WorldFish Center and was carried out in cooperation with the National Agricultural Research Institutes (NARs) from the participating countries: the Nigeria Institute for Freshwater Fisheries Research, the Departments of Fishery of Niger, Malawi and Zambia, and the Cameroonian MinistΦre de lÆElevage, des PΩches et de lÆIndustrie Animale; and three advanced research institutes (ARIs): the Leibniz University of Hannover in Germany, the Institute for Sustainable Development and Aquatic Resources in UK, and the University of Cape Town in South Africa.Rural development, Sustainable development, Livelihoods, Economic analysis, Research, Artisanal fishing
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OAO1.01. Are complementary therapies and integrative care cost-effective? A comprehensive systematic review of economic evaluations
Exotic Statistics for Ordinary Particles in Quantum Gravity
Objects exhibiting statistics other than the familiar Bose and Fermi ones are
natural in theories with topologically nontrivial objects including geons,
strings, and black holes. It is argued here from several viewpoints that the
statistics of ordinary particles with which we are already familiar are likely
to be modified due to quantum gravity effects. In particular, such
modifications are argued to be present in loop quantum gravity and in any
theory which represents spacetime in a fundamentally piecewise-linear fashion.
The appearance of unusual statistics may be a generic feature (such as the
deformed position-momentum uncertainty relations and the appearance of a
fundamental length scale) which are to be expected in any theory of quantum
gravity, and which could be testable.Comment: Awarded an honourable mention in the 2008 Gravity Research Foundation
Essay Competitio
Hadronization Approach for a Quark-Gluon Plasma Formed in Relativistic Heavy Ion Collisions
A transport model is developed to describe hadron emission from a strongly
coupled quark-gluon plasma formed in relativistic heavy ion collisions. The
quark-gluon plasma is controlled by ideal hydrodynamics, and the hadron motion
is characterized by a transport equation with loss and gain terms. The two sets
of equations are coupled to each other, and the hadronization hypersurface is
determined by both the hydrodynamic evolution and the hadron emission. The
model is applied to calculate the transverse momentum distributions of mesons
and baryons, and most of the results agree well with the experimental data at
RHIC.Comment: 16 pages, 24 figures. Version accepted by PR
Improved Detection Rates for Close Binaries Via Astrometric Observations of Gravitational Microlensing Events
In addition to constructing a Galactic matter mass function free from the
bias induced by the hydrogen-burning limit, gravitational microlensing allows
one to construct a mass function which is less affected by the problem of
unresolved binaries (Gaudi & Gould). However, even with the method of
microlensing, the photometric detection of binaries is limited to binary
systems with relatively large separations of of their combined
Einstein ring radius, and thus the mass function is still not totally free from
the problem of unresolved binaries. In this paper, we show that by detecting
distortions of the astrometric ellipse of a microlensing event with high
precision instruments such as the {\it Space Interferometry Mission}, one can
detect close binaries at a much higher rate than by the photometric method. We
find that by astrometrically observing microlensing events, of
binaries with separations of can be detected with the detection
threshold of 3%. The proposed astrometric method is especially efficient at
detecting very close binaries. With a detection threshold of 3% and a rate of
10%, one can astrometrically detect binaries with separations down to .Comment: total 14 pages, including 5 Figures and no Table (For figure 1,
please send a request mail to [email protected]), accepted to
ApJ (Vol 525, 000), updated versio
The Energy-Momentum Tensor in Fulling-Rindler Vacuum
The energy density in Fulling-Rindler vacuum, which is known to be negative
"everywhere" is shown to be positive and singular on the horizons in such a
fashion as to guarantee the positivity of the total energy. The mechanism of
compensation is displayed in detail.Comment: 9 pages, ULB-TH-15/9
Interpreting the M22 Spike Events
Recently Sahu et al., using the Hubble Space Telescope to monitor stars in
the direction of the old globular cluster M22, detected six events in which
otherwise constant stars brightened by ~50% during a time of <1 day. They
tentatively interpret these unresolved events as due to microlensing of
background bulge stars by free-floating planets in M22. I show that if these
spike events are due to microlensing, the lensing objects are unlikely to be
associated with M22, and unlikely to be part of a smoothly distributed Galactic
population. Thus either there happens to be a massive, dark cluster of planets
along our line-of-sight to M22, or the spike events are not due to
microlensing. The lensing planets cannot be bound to stars in the core of M22:
if they were closer than 8 AU, the lensing influence of the parent star would
have been detectable. Moreover, in the core of M22, all planets with
separations > 1 AU would have been ionized by random stellar encounters. Most
unbound planets would have escaped the core via evaporation which
preferentially affects such low-mass objects. Bound or free-floating planets
can exist in the outer halo of M22; however, for reasonable assumptions, the
maximum optical depth to such a population falls short of the observed optical
depth, tau ~ 3x10^{-6}, by a factor of 5-10. Therefore, if real, these events
represent the detection of a significant free-floating Galactic planet
population. The optical depth to these planets is comparable to and mutually
exclusive from the optical depth to resolved events measured by microlensing
survey collaborations toward the bulge, and thus implies a similar additional
mass of lensing objects. Such a population is difficult to reconcile with both
theory and observations.Comment: Minor changes. 12 pages, 4 figures, 2 tables. Accepted to ApJ. To
appear in Feb 10, 2002 issue (v566
Supersymmetric D-branes and calibrations on general N=1 backgrounds
We study the conditions to have supersymmetric D-branes on general {\cal N}=1
backgrounds with Ramond-Ramond fluxes. These conditions can be written in terms
of the two pure spinors associated to the SU(3)\times SU(3) structure on
T_M\oplus T^\star_M, and can be split into two parts each involving a different
pure spinor. The first involves the integrable pure spinor and requires the
D-brane to wrap a generalised complex submanifold with respect to the
generalised complex structure associated to it. The second contains the
non-integrable pure spinor and is related to the stability of the brane. The
two conditions can be rephrased as a generalised calibration condition for the
brane. The results preserve the generalised mirror symmetry relating the type
IIA and IIB backgrounds considered, giving further evidence for this duality.Comment: 23 pages. Some improvements and clarifications, typos corrected and
references added. v3: Version published in JHE
Podolsky Electromagnetism at Finite Temperature: Implications on Stefan-Boltzmann Law
In this work we study Podolsky electromagnetism in thermodynamic equilibrium.
We show that a Podolsky mass-dependent modification to the Stefan-Boltzmann law
is induced and we use experimental data to limit the possible values for this
free parameter.Comment: 13 pages, submitted to Physical Review
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