7,752 research outputs found
Control of gradient-driven instabilities using shear Alfv\'en beat waves
A new technique for manipulation and control of gradient-driven instabilities
through nonlinear interaction with Alfv\'en waves in a laboratory plasma is
presented. A narrow field-aligned density depletion is created in the Large
Plasma Device (LAPD), resulting in coherent unstable fluctuations on the
periphery of the depletion. Two independent kinetic Alfv\'en waves are launched
along the depletion at separate frequencies, creating a nonlinear beat-wave
response at or near the frequency of the original instability. When the
beat-wave has sufficient amplitude, the original unstable mode is suppressed,
leaving only the beat-wave response at a different frequency, generally at
lower amplitude.Comment: Submitted for Publication in Physical Review Letters. Revision 2
reflects changes suggested by referees for PRL submission. One figure
removed, several major changes to another figure, and a number of major and
minor changes to the tex
Bifurcations and Chaos in Time Delayed Piecewise Linear Dynamical Systems
We reinvestigate the dynamical behavior of a first order scalar nonlinear
delay differential equation with piecewise linearity and identify several
interesting features in the nature of bifurcations and chaos associated with it
as a function of the delay time and external forcing parameters. In particular,
we point out that the fixed point solution exhibits a stability island in the
two parameter space of time delay and strength of nonlinearity. Significant
role played by transients in attaining steady state solutions is pointed out.
Various routes to chaos and existence of hyperchaos even for low values of time
delay which is evidenced by multiple positive Lyapunov exponents are brought
out. The study is extended to the case of two coupled systems, one with delay
and the other one without delay.Comment: 34 Pages, 14 Figure
Chaos driven fusion enhancement factor at astrophysical energies
We perform molecular dynamics simulations to assess the screening effects by
bound target electrons in low energy nuclear reactions in laboratories. Quantum
effects corresponding to the Pauli and Heisenberg principle are enforced by
constraints. We show that the enhancement of the average cross section and of
its variance is due to the perturbations induced by the electrons.This gives a
correlation between the maximum amplitudes of the inter-nuclear oscillational
motion and the enhancement factor. It suggests that the chaotic behavior of the
electronic motion affects the magnitude of the enhancement factor.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure
Abundances and Kinematics of Field Halo and Disk Stars I: Observational Data and Abundance Analysis
We describe observations and abundance analysis of a high-resolution,
high-S/N survey of 168 stars, most of which are metal-poor dwarfs. We follow a
self-consistent LTE analysis technique to determine the stellar parameters and
abundances, and estimate the effects of random and systematic uncertainties on
the resulting abundances. Element-to-iron ratios are derived for key alpha,
odd, Fe-peak, r- and s-process elements. Effects of Non-LTE on the analysis of
Fe I lines are shown to be very small on the average. Spectroscopically
determined surface gravities are derived that are generally close to those
obtained from Hipparcos parallaxes.Comment: 41 pages, 7 Postscript figures. Accepted for publication in the A
Preliminary design and cost of a 1-megawatt solar-pumped iodide laser space-to-space transmission station
A preliminary conceptual design of a space-based solar pumped iodide laser emitting 1 megawatt of laser power for space-to-space power transmission is described. A near parabolic solar collector focuses sunlight onto the t-C4F9I (perfluoro-t butyl iodide) lasant within a transverse flow optical cavity. Using waste heat, a thermal system was designed to supply compressor and auxiliary power. System components were designed with weight and cost estimates assigned. Although cost is very approximate, the cost comparison of individual system components leads to valuable insights for future research. In particular, it was found that laser efficiency was not a dominant cost or weight factor, the dominant factor being the laser cavity and laser transmission optics. The manufacturing cost was approx. two thirds of the total cost with transportation to orbit the remainder. The flowing nonrenewable lasant comprised 20% of the total life cycle cost of the system and thus was not a major cost factor. The station mass was 92,000 kg without lasant, requiring approx. four shuttle flights to low Earth orbit where an orbital transfer vehicle will transport it to the final altitude of 6378 km
Semi-Automated SVG Programming via Direct Manipulation
Direct manipulation interfaces provide intuitive and interactive features to
a broad range of users, but they often exhibit two limitations: the built-in
features cannot possibly cover all use cases, and the internal representation
of the content is not readily exposed. We believe that if direct manipulation
interfaces were to (a) use general-purpose programs as the representation
format, and (b) expose those programs to the user, then experts could customize
these systems in powerful new ways and non-experts could enjoy some of the
benefits of programmable systems.
In recent work, we presented a prototype SVG editor called Sketch-n-Sketch
that offered a step towards this vision. In that system, the user wrote a
program in a general-purpose lambda-calculus to generate a graphic design and
could then directly manipulate the output to indirectly change design
parameters (i.e. constant literals) in the program in real-time during the
manipulation. Unfortunately, the burden of programming the desired
relationships rested entirely on the user.
In this paper, we design and implement new features for Sketch-n-Sketch that
assist in the programming process itself. Like typical direct manipulation
systems, our extended Sketch-n-Sketch now provides GUI-based tools for drawing
shapes, relating shapes to each other, and grouping shapes together. Unlike
typical systems, however, each tool carries out the user's intention by
transforming their general-purpose program. This novel, semi-automated
programming workflow allows the user to rapidly create high-level, reusable
abstractions in the program while at the same time retaining direct
manipulation capabilities. In future work, our approach may be extended with
more graphic design features or realized for other application domains.Comment: In 29th ACM User Interface Software and Technology Symposium (UIST
2016
Comparison of electrically driven lasers for space power transmission
High-power lasers in space could provide power for a variety of future missions such as spacecraft electric power requirements and laser propulsion. This study investigates four electrically pumped laser systems, all scaled to 1-MW laser output, that could provide power to spacecraft. The four laser systems are krypton fluoride, copper vapor, laser diode array, and carbon dioxide. Each system was powered by a large solar photovoltaic array which, in turn, provided power for the appropriate laser power conditioning subsystem. Each system was block-diagrammed, and the power and efficiency were found for each subsystem block component. The copper vapor system had the lowest system efficiency (6 percent). The CO2 laser was found to be the most readily scalable but has the disadvantage of long laser wavelength
Solid state television camera system Patent
Solid state television camera system consisting of monolithic semiconductor mosaic sensor and molecular digital readout system
- …