224 research outputs found

    Second harmonic generation: applications in phase diagram investigations

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    International audienceThe influence of water (in its gaseous state) on the stability of crystallized organic compounds was investigated. Through two examples of solid/vapour equilibria, several behaviours were highlighted (stoichiometric or non stoichiometric hydrates, hydration/dehydration mechanisms, stability domains of multi-hydrates as a function of relative humidity). Phase diagrams (as a function of partial water pressure) and stability diagrams have been proposed for each example. This study illustrates that solid/vapour equilibrium knowledge is a crucial step during the complete characterization of solid organic compounds

    Software countermeasures for control flow integrity of smart card C codes

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    International audienceFault attacks can target smart card programs in order to disrupt an execution and gain an advantage over the data or the embedded functionalities. Among all possible attacks, control flow attacks aim at disrupting the normal execution flow. Identifying harmful control flow attacks as well as designing countermeasures at software level are tedious and tricky for developers. In this paper, we propose a methodology to detect harmful intra-procedural jump attacks at source code level and to automatically inject formally-proven countermeasures. The proposed software countermeasures defeat 100% of attacks that jump over at least two C source code statements or beyond. Experiments show that the resulting code is also hardened against unexpected function calls and jump attacks at assembly level

    Electrical conductivity during incipient melting in the oceanic low-velocity zone

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    International audienceThe low-viscosity layer in the upper mantle, the asthenosphere, is a requirement for plate tectonics1. The seismic low velocities and the high electrical conductivities of the asthenosphere are attributed either to subsolidus, water-related defects in olivine minerals2, 3, 4 or to a few volume per cent of partial melt5, 6, 7, 8, but these two interpretations have two shortcomings. First, the amount of water stored in olivine is not expected to be higher than 50 parts per million owing to partitioning with other mantle phases9 (including pargasite amphibole at moderate temperatures10) and partial melting at high temperatures9. Second, elevated melt volume fractions are impeded by the temperatures prevailing in the asthenosphere, which are too low, and by the melt mobility, which is high and can lead to gravitational segregation11, 12. Here we determine the electrical conductivity of carbon-dioxide-rich and water-rich melts, typically produced at the onset of mantle melting. Electrical conductivity increases modestly with moderate amounts of water and carbon dioxide, but it increases drastically once the carbon dioxide content exceeds six weight per cent in the melt. Incipient melts, long-expected to prevail in the asthenosphere10, 13, 14, 15, can therefore produce high electrical conductivities there. Taking into account variable degrees of depletion of the mantle in water and carbon dioxide, and their effect on the petrology of incipient melting, we calculated conductivity profiles across the asthenosphere for various tectonic plate ages. Several electrical discontinuities are predicted and match geophysical observations in a consistent petrological and geochemical framework. In moderately aged plates (more than five million years old), incipient melts probably trigger both the seismic low velocities and the high electrical conductivities in the upper part of the asthenosphere, whereas in young plates4, where seamount volcanism occurs6, a higher degree of melting is expected

    Diamondites: evidence for a distinct tectono-thermal diamond-forming event beneath the Kaapvaal craton

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    The petrogenesis and relationship of diamondite to well-studied monocrystalline and fibrous diamonds are poorly understood yet would potentially reveal new aspects of how diamond-forming fluids are transported through the lithosphere and equilibrate with surrounding silicates. Of 22 silicate- and oxide-bearing diamondites investigated, most yielded garnet intergrowths (n = 15) with major element geochemistry (i.e. Ca–Cr) classifying these samples as low-Ca websteritic or eclogitic. The garnet REE patterns fit an equilibrium model suggesting the diamond-forming fluid shares an affinity with high-density fluids (HDF) observed in fibrous diamonds, specifically on the join between the saline–carbonate end-members. The δ13C values for the diamonds range from − 5.27 to − 22.48‰ (V-PDB) with δ18O values for websteritic garnets ranging from + 7.6 to + 5.9‰ (V-SMOW). The combined C–O stable isotope data support a model for a hydrothermally altered and organic carbon-bearing subducted crustal source(s) for the diamond- and garnet-forming media. The nitrogen aggregation states of the diamonds require that diamondite-formation event(s) pre-dates fibrous diamond-formation and post-dates most of the gem monocrystalline diamond-formation events at Orapa. The modelled fluid compositions responsible for the precipitation of diamondites match the fluid-poor and fluid-rich (fibrous) monocrystalline diamonds, where all grow from HDFs within the saline-silicic-carbonatitic ternary system. However, while the nature of the parental fluid(s) share a common lithophile element geochemical affinity, the origin(s) of the saline, silicic, and/or carbonatitic components of these HDFs do not always share a common origin. Therefore, it is wholly conceivable that the diamondites are evidence of a distinct and temporally unconstrained tectono-thermal diamond-forming event beneath the Kaapvaal craton
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