Electron/Photon identification in ATLAS and CMS

Recent studies in ATLAS and CMS experiments for the reconstruction and identification of electrons and photons using full Monte Carlo and testbeam data are reportedComment: Talk given at the Hadron Collider Physic Symposium 2006 (HCP2006), Durham, NC on behalf of ATLAS and CMS collaboration

Higgs search in H→\toZZ/WW decay channels with the CMS detector

A prospective analysis for the search of the Standard Model Higgs boson decaying in vector boson pairs is presented with the CMS experiment in the context of the initial luminosity at the CERN LHC pp collider. Monte Carlo data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of up to 1 fb$^{-1}$ are analysed and the expected significance for a Standard Model-like Higgs boson in these channels is established.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures, proceedings of the Lake Louise Winter Institute 2009, 16th-21st February 2009, Alberta, Canad

Twelve Ways to Build CMS Crossings from ROOT Files

The simulation of CMS raw data requires the random selection of one hundred and fifty pileup events from a very large set of files, to be superimposed in memory to the signal event. The use of ROOT I/O for that purpose is quite unusual: the events are not read sequentially but pseudo-randomly, they are not processed one by one in memory but by bunches, and they do not contain orthodox ROOT objects but many foreign objects and templates. In this context, we have compared the performance of ROOT containers versus the STL vectors, and the use of trees versus a direct storage of containers. The strategy with best performances is by far the one using clones within trees, but it stays hard to tune and very dependant on the exact use-case. The use of STL vectors could bring more easily similar performances in a future ROOT release.Comment: Talk from the 2003 Computing in High Energy and Nuclear Physics (CHEP03), La Jolla, Ca, USA, March 2003, 8 pages, LaTeX, 1 eps figures. PSN TUKT00

OVAL: the CMS Testing Robot

Oval is a testing tool which help developers to detect unexpected changes in the behavior of their software. It is able to automatically compile some test programs, to prepare on the fly the needed configuration files, to run the tests within a specified Unix environment, and finally to analyze the output and check expectations. Oval does not provide utility code to help writing the tests, therefore it is quite independant of the programming/scripting language of the software to be tested. It can be seen as a kind of robot which apply the tests and warn about any unexpected change in the output. Oval was developed by the LLR laboratory for the needs of the CMS experiment, and it is now recommended by the CERN LCG project.Comment: Talk from the 2003 Computing in High Energy and Nuclear Physics (CHEP03), La Jolla, Ca, USA, March 2003, 5 pages, LaTeX, 0 eps figures. PSN MOJT00

Theoretical Predictions for Surface Brightness Fluctuations and Implications for Stellar Populations of Elliptical Galaxies

(Abridged) We present new theoretical predictions for surface brightness fluctuations (SBFs) using models optimized for this purpose. Our predictions agree well with SBF data for globular clusters and elliptical galaxies. We provide refined theoretical calibrations and k-corrections needed to use SBFs as standard candles. We suggest that SBF distance measurements can be improved by using a filter around 1 micron and calibrating I-band SBFs with the integrated V-K galaxy color. We also show that current SBF data provide useful constraints on population synthesis models, and we suggest SBF-based tests for future models. The data favor specific choices of evolutionary tracks and spectra in the models among the several choices allowed by comparisons based on only integrated light. In addition, the tightness of the empirical I-band SBF calibration suggests that model uncertainties in post-main sequence lifetimes are less than +/-50% and that the IMF in ellipticals is not much steeper than that in the solar neighborhood. Finally, we analyze the potential of SBFs for probing unresolved stellar populations. We find that optical/near-IR SBFs are much more sensitive to metallicity than to age. Therefore, SBF magnitudes and colors are a valuable tool to break the age/metallicity degeneracy. Our initial results suggest that the most luminous stellar populations of bright cluster galaxies have roughly solar metallicities and about a factor of three spread in age.Comment: Astrophysical Journal, in press (uses Apr 20, 2000 version of emulateapj5.sty). Reposted version has a minor cosmetic change to Table

The Celestial Reference Frame at 24 and 43 GHz. II. Imaging

We have measured the sub-milli-arcsecond structure of 274 extragalactic sources at 24 and 43 GHz in order to assess their astrometric suitability for use in a high frequency celestial reference frame (CRF). Ten sessions of observations with the Very Long Baseline Array have been conducted over the course of $\sim$5 years, with a total of 1339 images produced for the 274 sources. There are several quantities that can be used to characterize the impact of intrinsic source structure on astrometric observations including the source flux density, the flux density variability, the source structure index, the source compactness, and the compactness variability. A detailed analysis of these imaging quantities shows that (1) our selection of compact sources from 8.4 GHz catalogs yielded sources with flux densities, averaged over the sessions in which each source was observed, of about 1 Jy at both 24 and 43 GHz, (2) on average the source flux densities at 24 GHz varied by 20%-25% relative to their mean values, with variations in the session-to-session flux density scale being less than 10%, (3) sources were found to be more compact with less intrinsic structure at higher frequencies, and (4) variations of the core radio emission relative to the total flux density of the source are less than 8% on average at 24 GHz. We conclude that the reduction in the effects due to source structure gained by observing at higher frequencies will result in an improved CRF and a pool of high-quality fiducial reference points for use in spacecraft navigation over the next decade.Comment: 63 pages, 18 figures, 6 tables, accepted by the Astronomical Journa

Abundance patterns in early-type galaxies: is there a 'knee' in the [Fe/H] vs. [alpha/Fe] relation?

Early-type galaxies (ETGs) are known to be enhanced in alpha elements, in accordance with their old ages and short formation timescales. In this contribution we aim to resolve the enrichment histories of ETGs. This means we study the abundance of Fe ([Fe/H]) and the alpha-element groups ([alpha/Fe]) separately for stars older than 9.5 Gyr ([Fe/H]o, [alpha/Fe]o) and for stars between 1.5 and 9.5 Gyr ([Fe/H]i, [alpha/Fe]i). Through extensive simulation we show that we can indeed recover the enrichment history per galaxy. We then analyze a spectroscopic sample of 2286 early-type galaxies from the SDSS selected to be ETGs. We separate out those galaxies for which the abundance of iron in stars grows throughout the lifetime of the galaxy, i.e. in which [Fe/H]o < [Fe/H]i. We confirm earlier work where the [Fe/H] and [alpha/Fe] parameters are correlated with the mass and velocity dispersion of ETGs. We emphasize that the strongest relation is between [alpha/Fe] and age. This relation falls into two regimes, one with a steep slope for old galaxies and one with a shallow slope for younger ETGs. The vast majority of ETGs in our sample do not show the 'knee' in the plot of [Fe/H] vs. [alpha/Fe] commonly observed in local group galaxies. This implies that for the vast majority of ETGs, the stars younger than 9.5 Gyrs are likely to have been accreted or formed from accreted gas. The properties of the intermediate-age stars in accretion-dominated ETGs indicate that mass growth through late (minor) mergers in ETGs is dominated by galaxies with low [Fe/H] and low [alpha/Fe]. The method of reconstructing the stellar enrichment histories of ETGs introduced in this paper promises to constrain the star formation and mass assembly histories of large samples of galaxies in a unique way.Comment: 22 pages, 25 figures, accepted for publication by A&

Angular Sizes of Faint Field Disk Galaxies: Intrinsic Luminosity Evolution

In order to explain the small scale-lengths detected in the recent deep field observations performed from large ground-based telescopes and from the Hubble Space Telescope, we investigate the predictions at high redshifts for disk galaxies that formed by infall. Changes with redshift in the observed properties of field galaxies are directly related to the evolution of the disks and of the stellar populations. We see that changes in the rest frame luminosity of a galaxy induce smaller values of half-light radii than are predicted assuming no evolution. Comparisons are presented with two observed samples from Mutz et al. (1994) and Smail et al. (1995).Comment: plain tex file + 3 postscript figures. To be published in ApJ

Physical interpretation of the near-infrared colours of low-redshift galaxies

We use empirical techniques to interpret the near-infrared (near-IR) colours of a sample of 5800 galaxies drawn from Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) main spectroscopic sample with YJHK photometry from the United Kingdom Infrared Deep Sky Survey (UKIDSS) data release 1. Our study focuses on the inner 3 arcsec regions of the galaxies sampled by the SDSS fibre spectra. We study correlations between near-IR colours measured within this aperture and physical parameters derived from the spectra. These parameters include specific star formation rate (SFR), stellar age, metallicity and dust attenuation. All correlations are analysed for samples of galaxies that are closely matched in redshift, in stellar mass and in concentration index. Whereas more strongly star-forming galaxies have bluer optical colours, the opposite is true at near-IR wavelengths ¿ galaxies with higher specific SFR have redder near-IR colours. This result agrees qualitatively with the predictions of models in which thermally pulsing asymptotic giant branch (TP-AGB) stars dominate the H- and K-band light of a galaxy following a burst of star formation. We also find a surprisingly strong correlation between the near-IR colours of star-forming galaxies and their dust attenuation as measured from the Balmer decrement. Unlike optical colours, however, near-IR colours exhibit very little dependence on galaxy inclination. This suggests that the correlation of near-IR colours with dust attenuation arises because TP-AGB stars are the main source of dust in the galaxy. Finally, we compare the near-IR colours of the galaxies in our sample to the predictions of three different stellar population models: the Bruzual & Charlot model, a preliminary version of a new model under development which includes a new prescription for AGB star evolution, and the Maraston model

Un procedimiento y una herramienta de ayuda a la decisión para desarrollar estrategias de rehabilitación energética sostenibles para la Directiva Europea (EPBD) 2010

The 2010 EPBD asks for an economic and social analysis in order to preserve social equity and to promote innovation and building productivity. This is possible with a life cycle energy cost (LCEC) analysis, such as with the SEC (Sustainable Energy Cost) model whose bottom up approach begins with a building typology including inhabitants. Then the analysis of some representative buildings includes the identification of a technico-economical optimum and energy retrofitting scenarios for each retrofitting programme and the extrapolation for the whole building stock. An extrapolation for the whole building stock allows to set up the strategy and to identify the needed means for reaching the objectives. SEC is a decision aid tool for optimising sustainable energy retrofitting strategies for buildings at territorial and patrimonial scales inside a sustainable development approach towards the factor 4. Various versions of the SEC model are now available for housing and for tertiary buildings.La directiva europea de 2010 sobre eficiencia energética en los edificios exige un análisis económico y social con el objetivo de preservar la equidad social, promover la innovación y reforzar la productividad en la construcción. Esto es posible con el análisis del coste global ampliado y especialmente con el modelo SEC. El análisis “bottom up” realizado con la SEC se basa en una tipología de edificio/usuario y en el análisis de edificios representativos: la identificación del óptimo técnico-económico y elaboración de escenarios antes de hacer una extrapolación al conjunto del parque. SEC es una herramienta de ayuda a la decisión para desarrollar estrategias territoriales o patrimoniales de rehabilitación energética. Existen diversas versiones del modelo: para edificios residenciales (unifamiliares y plurifamiliares, públicos y privados) y para edificios terciarios