6,070 research outputs found
Light spin-1/2 or spin-0 Dark Matter particles
We recall and precise how light spin-0 particles could be acceptable Dark
Matter candidates, and extend this analysis to spin-1/2 particles. We evaluate
the (rather large) annihilation cross sections required, and show how they may
be induced by a new light neutral spin-1 boson U. If this one is vectorially
coupled to matter particles, the (spin-1/2 or spin-0) Dark Matter annihilation
cross section into e+e- automatically includes a v_dm^2 suppression factor at
threshold, as desirable to avoid an excessive production of gamma rays from
residual Dark Matter annihilations. We also relate Dark Matter annihilations
with production cross sections in e+e- scatterings. Annihilation cross sections
of spin-1/2 and spin-0 Dark Matter particles are given by exactly the same
expressions. Just as for spin-0, light spin-1/2 Dark Matter particles
annihilating into e+e- could be responsible for the bright 511 keV gamma ray
line observed by INTEGRAL from the galactic bulge.Comment: 10 page
Sideloading - Ingestion Of large point clouds into the apache spark big data engine
In the geospatial domain we have now reached the point where data volumes we handle have clearly grown beyond the capacity of most desktop computers. This is particularly true in the area of point cloud processing. It is therefore naturally lucrative to explore established big data frameworks for big geospatial data. The very first hurdle is the import of geospatial data into big data frameworks, commonly referred to as data ingestion. Geospatial data is typically encoded in specialised binary file formats, which are not naturally supported by the existing big data frameworks. Instead such file formats are supported by software libraries that are restricted to single CPU execution. We present an approach that allows the use of existing point cloud file format libraries on the Apache Spark big data framework. We demonstrate the ingestion of large volumes of point cloud data into a compute cluster. The approach uses a map function to distribute the data ingestion across the nodes of a cluster. We test the capabilities of the proposed method to load billions of points into a commodity hardware compute cluster and we discuss the implications on scalability and performance. The performance is benchmarked against an existing native Apache Spark data import implementation
Magnetism in pre-MS intermediate-mass stars and the fossil field hypothesis
Today, one of the greatest challenges concerning the Ap/Bp stars is to
understand the origin of their slow rotation and their magnetic fields. The
favoured hypothesis for the latter is the fossil field, which implies that the
magnetic fields subsist throughout the different evolutionary phases, and in
particular during the pre-main sequence phase. The existence of magnetic fields
at the pre-main sequence phase is also required to explain the slow rotation of
Ap/Bp stars. However, until recently, essentially no information was available
about the magnetic properties of intermediate-mass pre-main sequence stars, the
so-called Herbig Ae/Be stars. The new high-resolution spectropolarimeter
ESPaDOnS, installed in 2005 at the Canada-France-Hawaii telescope, provided the
capability necessary to perform surveys of the Herbig Ae/Be stars in order to
investigate their magnetism and rotation. These investigations have resulted in
the detection and/or confirmation of magnetic fields in 8 Herbig Ae/Be stars,
ranging in mass from 2 to nearly 15 solar masses. In this contribution I will
present the results of our survey, as well as their implications for the origin
and evolution of the magnetic fields and rotation.Comment: Proceedings of the CP#AP Workshop held in Vienna in September 200
Determination of Strong-Interaction Widths and Shifts of Pionic X-Rays with a Crystal Spectrometer
Pionic 3d-2p atomic transitions in F, Na, and Mg have been studied using a bent crystal spectrometer. The pionic atoms were formed in the production target placed in the external proton beam of the Space Radiation Effects Laboratory synchrocyclotron. The observed energies and widths of the transitions are E=41679(3) eV and Γ=21(8) eV, E=62434(18) eV and Γ=22(80) eV, E=74389(9) eV and Γ=67(35) eV, in F, Na, and Mg, respectively. The results are compared with calculations based on a pion-nucleus optical potential
Investigating the pre-main sequence magnetic chemically peculiar system HD 72106
The origin of the strong magnetic fields observed in chemically peculiar Ap
and Bp stars stars has long been debated. The recent discovery of magnetic
fields in the intermediate mass pre-main sequence Herbig Ae and Be stars links
them to Ap and Bp stars, providing vital clues about Ap and Bp stars and the
origin and evolution of magnetic fields in intermediate and high mass stars. A
detailed study of one young magnetic B star, HD 72106A, is presented. This star
appears to be in a binary system with an apparently normal Herbig Ae star. A
maximum longitudinal magnetic field strength of +391 +/- 65 G is found in HD
72106A, as are strong chemical peculiarities, with photospheric abundances of
some elements ranging up to 100x above solar.Comment: 8 pages, 6 figures. Proceeding of the 2006 conference of the Special
Astrophysical Observatory of the Russian Academy of Science
- …