Numerical Study on Transient Heat Characteristics of a Rectangular Latent Heat Storage Vessel

Transient characteristics of the rectangular latent heat storage vessel packed with shape-stabilized phase change (solid-liquid) material (PCM) are investigated numerically by solving the governing equations of both the PCM and the heat transfer medium(water) simultaneously as a conjugate problem with the finite difference technique. It's found that the heat storage characteristics are greatly affected by the flow direction of the heat transfer medium since the natural and forced convection coexists in the heat storage vessel. That is, it is classified that the effectively thermal efficiency of the latent heat storage system is obtained by the downflow along vertical PCM for heat storage process and the upflow for heat release process. The effect of the inlet velocity of heat transfer medium(water) on transient heat characteristics of the latent heat storage system is also revealed in the present study

Twisted K-theory of differentiable stacks

In this paper, we develop twisted $K$-theory for stacks, where the twisted class is given by an $S^1$-gerbe over the stack. General properties, including the Mayer-Vietoris property, Bott periodicity, and the product structure $K^i_\alpha \otimes K^j_\beta \to K^{i+j}_{\alpha +\beta}$ are derived. Our approach provides a uniform framework for studying various twisted $K$-theories including the usual twisted $K$-theory of topological spaces, twisted equivariant $K$-theory, and the twisted $K$-theory of orbifolds. We also present a Fredholm picture, and discuss the conditions under which twisted $K$-groups can be expressed by so-called "twisted vector bundles". Our approach is to work on presentations of stacks, namely \emph{groupoids}, and relies heavily on the machinery of $K$-theory ($KK$-theory) of $C^*$-algebras.Comment: 74 page

The export competitiveness of the newly industrialised east Asian economies: How real is the Chinese threat in electronics?

This paper examines the export performance of China in electronics compared to the east Asian NIEs exporting to the USA, the European Union, and Japan between 1988 and 2001 using a dynamic version of shift-share analysis to overcome some of the inherent drawbacks of the widely-used static shift-share methodology. Our findings suggest that China has now emerged as a serious contender in the export market for electronic goods, but this position has not been a dominant one. For electronics as a whole, the principal gainers after 1995 appear to be newcomers China and Malaysia at the expense of the older Tigers, like Singapore and Hong Kong. To some extent this represents a natural process of ‘catch-up’. Moreover, no single NIE has dominated all categories of electronic exports. In the east Asian region, the less developed members of ASEAN would appear to be most at risk in the immediate future since they compete head on with China in lower-end manufacturing and are in danger of being ‘leapfrogged’ in the value-added chain. The more advanced NIEs are in a better position since they have time to increase value-added before China catches up and may benefit more from the opportunities China offers in terms of production and service complementarities

Hugoniot of shocked liquid deuterium up to 300 GPa: Quantum molecular dynamic simulations

Quantum molecular dynamic (QMD) simulations are introduced to study the thermophysical properties of liquid deuterium under shock compression. The principal Hugoniot is determined from the equation of states, where contributions from molecular dissociation and atomic ionization are also added onto the QMD data. At pressures below 100 GPa, our results show that the local maximum compression ratio of 4.5 can be achieved at 40 GPa, which is in good agreement with magnetically driven flyer and convergent-explosive experiments; At the pressure between 100 and 300 GPa, the compression ratio reaches a maximum of 4.95, which agrees well with recent high power laser-driven experiments. In addition, the nonmetal-metal transition and optical properties are also discussed.Comment: 4.1 pages, 4 figure

Link between K-absorption edges and thermodynamic properties of warm-dense plasmas established by improved first-principles method

A precise calculation that translates shifts of X-ray K-absorption edges to variations of thermodynamic properties allows quantitative characterization of interior thermodynamic properties of warm dense plasmas by X-ray absorption techniques, which provides essential information for inertial confinement fusion and other astrophysical applications. We show that this interpretation can be achieved through an improved first-principles method. Our calculation shows that the shift of K-edges exhibits selective sensitivity to thermal parameters and thus would be a suitable temperature index to warm dense plasmas. We also show with a simple model that the shift of K-edges can be used to detect inhomogeneity inside warm dense plasmas when combined with other experimental tools