GRAPE - A Balloon-Borne Gamma-Ray Polarimeter Experiment

This paper reviews the development status of GRAPE (the Gamma-Ray Polarimeter Experiment), a hard X-ray Compton Polarimeter. The purpose of GRAPE is to measure the polarization of hard X-rays in the 50-300 keV energy range. We are particularly interested in X-rays that are emitted from solar flares and gamma-ray bursts (GRBs), although GRAPE could also be employed in the study of other astrophysical sources. Accurately measuring the polarization of the emitted radiation will lead to a better understating of both emission mechanisms and source geometries. The GRAPE design consists of an array of plastic scintillators surrounding a central high-Z crystal scintillator. The azimuthal distribution of photon scatters from the plastic array into the central calorimeter provides a measure of the polarization fraction and polarization angle of the incident radiation. The design of the detector provides sensitivity over a large field-of-view (>pi steradian). The design facilitates the fabrication of large area arrays with minimal deadspace. This paper presents the latest design concept and the most recent results from laboratory tests of a GRAPE science model.Comment: 6 pages; paper presented at the FRASCATI Workshop 2005 on Multifrequency Behaviour of High Energy Cosmic Sources; submitted to Chinese Journal of Astronomy and Astrophysic

Differential rotation enhanced dissipation of tides in the PSR J0045-7319 Binary

Recent observations of PSR J0045-7319, a radio pulsar in a close eccentric orbit with a massive B-star companion, indicate that the system's orbital period is decreasing on a timescale of $\approx 5 \times10^{5}$ years, which is much shorter than the timescale of $\approx$ 10^9 years given by the standard theory of tidal dissipation in radiative stars. Observations also provide strong evidence that the B-star is rotating rapidly, perhaps at nearly its break up speed. We show that the dissipation of the dynamical tide in a star rotating in the same direction as the orbital motion of its companion (prograde rotation) with a speed greater than the orbital angular speed of the star at periastron results in an increase in the orbital period of the binary system with time. Thus, since the observed time derivative of the orbital period is large and negative, the B-star in the PSR J0045-7319 binary must have retrograde rotation if tidal effects are to account for the orbital decay. We also show that the time scale for the synchronization of the B-star's spin with the orbital angular speed of the star at periastron is comparable to the orbital evolution time. From the work of Goldreich and Nicholson (1989) we therefore expect that the B-star should be rotating differentially, with the outer layers rotating more slowly than the interior. We show that the dissipation of the dynamical tide in such a differentially rotating B-star is enhanced by almost three orders of magnitude leading to an orbital evolution time for the PSR J0045-7319 Binary that is consistent with the observations.Comment: 8 pages, tex. Submitted to Ap

Soluble CD40 ligand can replace the normal T cell-derived CD40 ligand signal to B cells in T cell-dependent activation

We have constructed a soluble chimeric fusion protein between the mouse CD8 alpha chain and the mouse CD40 T cell ligand. This protein binds to both human and mouse B cells. By itself it induced a modest degree of B cell proliferation, but together with anti-immunoglobulin (anti-Ig) antibody it greatly stimulated B cell proliferation, as determined by both [3H]thymidine uptake and increase in cell numbers. These data are evidence that the CD40 ligand on T cells provides a signal that drives B cell proliferation. This signal is synergistic with that delivered by anti-Ig antibody

Using aircraft measurements to determine the refractive index of Saharan dust during the DODO Experiments

Much uncertainty in the value of the imaginary part of the refractive index of mineral dust contributes to uncertainty in the radiative effect of mineral dust in the atmosphere. A synthesis of optical, chemical and physical in-situ aircraft measurements from the DODO experiments during February and August 2006 are used to calculate the refractive index mineral dust encountered over West Africa. Radiative transfer modeling and measurements of broadband shortwave irradiance at a range of altitudes are used to test and validate these calculations for a specific dust event on 23 August 2006 over Mauritania. Two techniques are used to determine the refractive index: firstly a method combining measurements of scattering, absorption, size distributions and Mie code simulations, and secondly a method using composition measured on filter samples to apportion the content of internally mixed quartz, calcite and iron oxide-clay aggregates, where the iron oxide is represented by either hematite or goethite and clay by either illite or kaolinite. The imaginary part of the refractive index at 550 nm (ni550) is found to range between 0.0001 i to 0.0046 i, and where filter samples are available, agreement between methods is found depending on mineral combination assumed. The refractive indices are also found to agree well with AERONET data where comparisons are possible. ni550 is found to vary with dust source, which is investigated with the NAME model for each case. The relationship between both size distribution and ni550 on the accumulation mode single scattering albedo at 550 nm (ω0550) are examined and size distribution is found to have no correlation to ω0550, while ni550 shows a strong linear relationship with ω0550. Radiative transfer modeling was performed with different models (Mie-derived refractive indices, but also filter sampling composition assuming both internal and external mixing). Our calculations indicate that Mie-derived values of ni550 and the externally mixed dust where the iron oxide-clay aggregate corresponds to the goethite-kaolinite combination result in the best agreement with irradiance measurements. The radiative effect of the dust is found to be very sensitive to the mineral combination (and hence refractive index) assumed, and to whether the dust is assumed to be internally or externally mixed

Molecular ferroelectric contributions to anomalous hysteresis in hybrid perovskite solar cells

We report a model describing the molecular orientation disorder in CH3NH3PbI3, solving a classical Hamiltonian parametrised with electronic structure calculations, with the nature of the motions informed by ab-initio molecular dynamics. We investigate the temperature and static electric field dependence of the equilibrium ferroelectric (molecular) domain structure and resulting polarisability. A rich domain structure of twinned molecular dipoles is observed, strongly varying as a function of temperature and applied electric field. We propose that the internal electrical fields associated with microscopic polarisation domains contribute to hysteretic anomalies in the current--voltage response of hybrid organic-inorganic perovskite solar cells due to variations in electron-hole recombination in the bulk.Comment: 10 pages; 4 figures, 2 SI figure

The emission of Cygnus X-1: observations with INTEGRAL SPI from 20 keV to 2 MeV

We report on Cyg X-1 observations performed by the SPI telescope onboard the INTEGRAL mission and distributed over more than 6 years. We investigate the variability of the intensity and spectral shape of this peculiar source in the hard X-rays domain, and more particularly up to the MeV region. We first study the total averaged spectrum which presents the best signal to noise ratio (4 Ms of data). Then, we refine our results by building mean spectra by periods and gathering those of similar hardness. Several spectral shapes are observed with important changes in the curvature between 20 and 200 keV, even at the same luminosity level. In all cases, the emission decreases sharply above 700 keV, with flux values above 1 MeV (or upper limits) well below the recently reported polarised flux (Laurent et al. 2011), while compatible with the MeV emission detected some years ago by CGRO/COMPTEL (McConnell et al., 2002). Finally, we take advantage of the spectroscopic capability of the instrument to seek for spectral features in the 500 keV region with negative results for any significant annihilation emission on 2 ks and days timescales, as well as in the total dataset.Comment: 14 pages, 10 figures, accepted for publication in Ap

Environmental modeling and recognition for an autonomous land vehicle

An architecture for object modeling and recognition for an autonomous land vehicle is presented. Examples of objects of interest include terrain features, fields, roads, horizon features, trees, etc. The architecture is organized around a set of data bases for generic object models and perceptual structures, temporary memory for the instantiation of object and relational hypotheses, and a long term memory for storing stable hypotheses that are affixed to the terrain representation. Multiple inference processes operate over these databases. Researchers describe these particular components: the perceptual structure database, the grouping processes that operate over this, schemas, and the long term terrain database. A processing example that matches predictions from the long term terrain model to imagery, extracts significant perceptual structures for consideration as potential landmarks, and extracts a relational structure to update the long term terrain database is given