A minimalist approach to receiver architecture

New signal processing techniques are described for Deep Space Network radios and a proposed receiver architecture is presented, as well as experimental results on this new receiver's analog front end. The receiver's design employs direct downconversion rather than high speed digitization, and it is just as suitable for use as a space based probe relay receiver as it is for installation at a ground antenna. The advantages of having an inexpensive, shoe box size receiver, which could be carried around to antennas of opportunity, used for spacecraft testing or installed in the base of every antenna in a large array are the force behind this project

Memory management in traceback Viterbi decoders

The new Viterbi decoder for long constraint length codes, under development for the Deep Space Network, stores path information according to an algorithm called traceback. The details of a particular implementation of this algorithm, based on three memory buffers, are described. The penalties in increased storage requirement and longer decoding delay are offset by the reduced amount of data that needs to be exchanged between processors, in a parallel architecture decoder

Determinate-state convolutional codes

A determinate state convolutional code is formed from a conventional convolutional code by pruning away some of the possible state transitions in the decoding trellis. The type of staged power transfer used in determinate state convolutional codes proves to be an extremely efficient way of enhancing the performance of a concatenated coding system. The decoder complexity is analyzed along with free distances of these new codes and extensive simulation results is provided of their performance at the low signal to noise ratios where a real communication system would operate. Concise, practical examples are provided

Triangular Antiferromagnets

In this article we review the effects of magnetic frustation in the stacked triangular lattice. Frustration increases the degeneracy of the ground state, giving rise to different physics. In particular it leads to unique phase diagrams with multicritical points and novel critical phenomena. We describe the confrontation of theory and experiment for a number of systems with differing magnetic Hamiltonians; Heisenberg, Heisenberg with easy-axis anisotropy, Heisenberg with easy-plane anisotropy, Ising and singlet ground state. Interestingly each leads to different magnetic properties and phase diagrams. We also describe the effects of ferromagnetic, rather than antiferromagnetic, stacking and of small distortions of the triangular lattice.Comment: Review article, 36 pages, revtex, 19 figures in PS format, to appear in Can. J. Phy

Renormalization-group anatomy of transverse-momentum dependent parton distribution functions in QCD

The ultraviolet and rapidity divergences of transverse-momentum dependent parton distribution functions with lightlike and transverse gauge links is studied, also incorporating a soft eikonal factor. We find that in the light-cone gauge with $q^-$-independent pole prescriptions extra divergences appear which amount, at one-loop, to a cusp-like anomalous dimension. We show that such contributions are absent when the Mandelstam-Leibbrandt prescription is used. In the first case, the soft factor cancels the anomalous-dimension defect, while in the second case its ultraviolet-divergent part reduces to unity.Comment: 10 pages, 3 figures; needs ws-mpla-hep.cls (supplied). Talk presented by the first author at Workshop on "Recent Advances in Perturbative QCD and Hadronic Physics", 20--25 July 2009, ECT*, Trento, Italy, in Honor of Prof. Anatoly Efremov's 75th birthda

Opacification of high temperature fibrous insulation

A study was conducted to determine the merits of adding particulate materials to silica fiber felts to increase their resistance to the passage of thermal radiation. Laboratory samples containing 5, 10, and 15 percent of chromium oxide, silicon carbide, and titanium dioxide were prepared and evaluated in accordance with ASTM C-518 thermal conductivity test method at 425 C (800 F) mean temperature. The titania particles averaging 3-4 micrometers in diameter were found to be the most effective. This was followed by a short plant run, in order to confirm the initial results on the laboratory samples. These samples were tested according to ASTM C-201 High Temperature Calorimeter from 93 C to 760 C (200 F to 1400 F) mean temperature. The ten percent by weight of titania resulted in an optimum effectiveness, and reduced the conductivity over 20% at 760 C (1400 F)

Real-time extraction of growth rates from rotating substrates during molecular-beam epitaxy

We present a method for measuring molecular‐beam epitaxy growth rates in near real‐time on rotating substrates. This is done by digitizing a video image of the reflection high‐energy electron diffraction screen, automatically tracking and measuring the specular spot width, and using numerical techniques to filter the resulting signal. The digitization and image and signal processing take approximately 0.4 s to accomplish, so this technique offers the molecular‐beam epitaxy grower the ability to actively adjust growth times in order to deposit a desired layer thickness. The measurement has a demonstrated precision of approximately 2%, which is sufficient to allow active control of epilayer thickness by counting monolayers as they are deposited. When postgrowth techniques, such as frequency domain analysis, are also used, the reflection high‐energy electron diffraction measurement of layer thickness on rotating substrates improves to a precision of better than 1%. Since all of the components in the system described are commercially available, duplication is straightforward

Dark matter cores all the way down

We use high resolution simulations of isolated dwarf galaxies to study the physics of dark matter cusp-core transformations at the edge of galaxy formation: M200 = 10^7 - 10^9 Msun. We work at a resolution (~4 pc minimum cell size; ~250 Msun per particle) at which the impact from individual supernovae explosions can be resolved, becoming insensitive to even large changes in our numerical 'sub-grid' parameters. We find that our dwarf galaxies give a remarkable match to the stellar light profile; star formation history; metallicity distribution function; and star/gas kinematics of isolated dwarf irregular galaxies. Our key result is that dark matter cores of size comparable to the stellar half mass radius (r_1/2) always form if star formation proceeds for long enough. Cores fully form in less than 4 Gyrs for the M200 = 10^8 Msun and 14 Gyrs for the 10^9 Msun dwarf. We provide a convenient two parameter 'coreNFW' fitting function that captures this dark matter core growth as a function of star formation time and the projected stellar half mass radius. Our results have several implications: (i) we make a strong prediction that if LCDM is correct, then 'pristine' dark matter cusps will be found either in systems that have truncated star formation and/or at radii r > r_1/2; (ii) complete core formation lowers the projected velocity dispersion at r_1/2 by a factor ~2, which is sufficient to fully explain the 'too big to fail problem'; and (iii) cored dwarfs will be much more susceptible to tides, leading to a dramatic scouring of the subhalo mass function inside galaxies and groups.Comment: 20 pages; 9 figures; final version to appear in MNRAS including typos corrected in proo

Quantization effects in Viterbi decoding rate 1/n convolutional codes

A Viterbi decoder's performance loss due to quantizing data from the additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN) channel is studied. An optimal quantization scheme and branch metric calculation method are presented. The uniformly quantized channel capacity C(sub u)(q) is used to determine the smallest number of quantization bits q that does not cause a significant loss. The quantizer stepsize which maximizes C(sub u)(q) almost minimizes the decoder bit error rate (BER). However, a slightly larger stepsize is better, like the value that minimizes the Bhattacharyya bound. The range and renormalization of state metrics is analyzed, in particular for K = 15 decoders such as the Big Viterbi Decoder (BVD) for the Galileo mission. These results are required to design reduced hardware complexity Viterbi decoders with a negligible quantization loss