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Jones, C

Publications and source records attributed to Jones, C.

17 records
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2021

Development, characterisation, and deployment of the SNO+ liquid scintillator

A liquid scintillator consisting of linear alkylbenzene as the solvent and 2,5-diphenyloxazole as the fluor was developed for the SNO+ experiment. This mixture was chosen as it is compatible with acrylic and has a competitive light yield to pre-existing liquid scintillators while conferring other advantages including longer attenuation lengths, superior safety characteristics, chemical simplicity, ease of handling, and logistical availability. Its properties have been extensively characterized and are presented here. This liquid scintillator is now used in several neutrino physics experiments in addition to SNO+.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2012

Biogeochemistry of manganese in ferruginous Lake Matano, Indonesia

This study explores Mn biogeochemistry in a stratified, ferruginous lake, a modern analogue to ferruginous oceans. Intense Mn cycling occurs in the chemocline where Mn is recycled at least 15 times before sedimentation. The product of biologically catalyzed Mn oxidation in Lake Matano is birnessite. Although there is evidence for abiotic Mn reduction with Fe(II), Mn reduction likely occurs through a variety of pathways. The flux of Fe(II) is insufficient to balance the reduction of Mn at 125m depth in the water column, and Mn reduction could be a significant contributor to CH{sub 4} oxidation. By combining results from synchrotron-based X-ray fluorescence and X-ray spectroscopy, extractions of sinking particles, and reaction transport modeling, we find the kinetics of Mn reduction in the lake's reducing waters are sufficiently rapid to preclude the deposition of Mn oxides from the water column to the sediments underlying ferruginous water. This has strong implications for the interpretation of the sedimentary Mn record.

58 GEOSCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2012

A framework for benchmarking land models

Land models, which have been developed by the modeling community in the past few decades to predict future states of ecosystems and climate, have to be critically evaluated for their performance skills of simulating ecosystem responses and feedback to climate change. Benchmarking is an emerging procedure to measure performance of models against a set of defined standards. This paper proposes a benchmarking framework for evaluation of land model performances and, meanwhile, highlights major challenges at this infant stage of benchmark analysis. The framework includes (1) targeted aspects of model performance to be evaluated, (2) a set of benchmarks as defined references to test model performance, (3) metrics to measure and compare performance skills among models so as to identify model strengths and deficiencies, and (4) model improvement. Land models are required to simulate exchange of water, energy, carbon and sometimes other trace gases between the atmosphere and land surface, and should be evaluated for their simulations of biophysical processes, biogeochemical cycles, and vegetation dynamics in response to climate change across broad temporal and spatial scales. Thus, one major challenge is to select and define a limited number of benchmarks to effectively evaluate land model performance. The second challenge is to develop metrics of measuring mismatches between models and benchmarks. The metrics may include (1) a priori thresholds of acceptable model performance and (2) a scoring system to combine data–model mismatches for various processes at different temporal and spatial scales. The benchmark analyses should identify clues of weak model performance to guide future development, thus enabling improved predictions of future states of ecosystems and climate. The near-future research effort should be on development of a set of widely acceptable benchmarks that can be used to objectively, effectively, and reliably evaluate fundamental properties of land models to improve their prediction performance skills.

Biophysical Processes↗
DOE OSTI2012

DEEP SILICATE ABSORPTION FEATURES IN COMPTON-THICK ACTIVE GALACTIC NUCLEI PREDOMINANTLY ARISE DUE TO DUST IN THE HOST GALAXY

We explore the origin of mid-infrared (mid-IR) dust extinction in all 20 nearby (z < 0.05) bona fide Compton-thick (N{sub H} > 1.5 Multiplication-Sign 10{sup 24} cm{sup -2}) active galactic nuclei (AGNs) with hard energy (E > 10 keV) X-ray spectral measurements. We accurately measure the silicate absorption features at {lambda} {approx} 9.7 {mu}m in archival low-resolution (R {approx} 57-127) Spitzer Infrared Spectrograph spectroscopy, and show that only a minority ( Almost-Equal-To 45%) of nearby Compton-thick AGNs have strong Si-absorption features (S{sub 9.7} = ln (f{sub int}/f{sub obs}) {approx}> 0.5) which would indicate significant dust attenuation. The majority ( Almost-Equal-To 60%) are star formation dominated (AGN:SB < 0.5) at mid-IR wavelengths and lack the spectral signatures of AGN activity at optical wavelengths, most likely because the AGN emission lines are optically extinguished. Those Compton-thick AGNs hosted in low-inclination-angle galaxies exhibit a narrow range in Si-absorption (S{sub 9.7} {approx} 0-0.3), which is consistent with that predicted by clumpy-torus models. However, on the basis of the IR spectra and additional lines of evidence, we conclude that the dominant contribution to the observed mid-IR dust extinction is dust located in the host galaxy (i.e., due to disturbed morphologies, dust lanes, galaxy inclination angles) and not necessarily a compact obscuring torus surrounding the central engine.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2012

IRREGULAR SLOSHING COLD FRONTS IN THE NEARBY MERGING GROUPS NGC 7618 AND UGC 12491: EVIDENCE FOR KELVIN-HELMHOLTZ INSTABILITIES

We present results from two {approx}30 ks Chandra observations of the hot atmospheres of the merging galaxy groups centered around NGC 7618 and UGC 12491. Our images show the presence of arc-like sloshing cold fronts (CFs) wrapped around each group center and {approx}100 kpc long spiral tails in both groups. Most interestingly, the CFs are highly distorted in both groups, exhibiting 'wings' along the fronts. These features resemble the structures predicted from non-viscous hydrodynamic simulations of gas sloshing, where Kelvin-Helmholtz instabilities (KHIs) distort the CFs. This is in contrast to the structure seen in many other sloshing and merger CFs, which are smooth and featureless at the current observational resolution. Both magnetic fields and viscosity have been invoked to explain the absence of KHIs in these smooth CFs, but the NGC 7618/UGC 12491 pair are two in a growing number of both sloshing and merger CFs that appear distorted. Magnetic fields and/or viscosity may be able to suppress the growth of KHIs at the CFs in some clusters and groups, but clearly not in all. We propose that the presence or absence of KHI distortions in CFs can be used as a measure of the effective viscosity and/or magnetic field strengths in the intracluster medium.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2012

AGES: THE AGN AND GALAXY EVOLUTION SURVEY

The AGN and Galaxy Evolution Survey (AGES) is a redshift survey covering, in its standard fields, 7.7 deg{sup 2} of the Booetes field of the NOAO Deep Wide-Field Survey. The final sample consists of 23,745 redshifts. There are well-defined galaxy samples in 10 bands (the B{sub W} , R, I, J, K, IRAC 3.6, 4.5, 5.8, and 8.0 {mu}m, and MIPS 24 {mu}m bands) to a limiting magnitude of I < 20 mag for spectroscopy. For these galaxies, we obtained 18,163 redshifts from a sample of 35,200 galaxies, where random sparse sampling was used to define statistically complete sub-samples in all 10 photometric bands. The median galaxy redshift is 0.31, and 90% of the redshifts are in the range 0.085 < z < 0.66. Active galactic nuclei (AGNs) were selected as radio, X-ray, IRAC mid-IR, and MIPS 24 {mu}m sources to fainter limiting magnitudes (I < 22.5 mag for point sources). Redshifts were obtained for 4764 quasars and galaxies with AGN signatures, with 2926, 1718, 605, 119, and 13 above redshifts of 0.5, 1, 2, 3, and 4, respectively. We detail all the AGES selection procedures and present the complete spectroscopic redshift catalogs and spectral energy distribution decompositions. Photometric redshift estimates are provided for all sources in the AGES samples.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2012

AN ACTIVE GALACTIC NUCLEUS DRIVEN SHOCK IN THE INTRACLUSTER MEDIUM AROUND THE RADIO GALAXY 3C 310

We present results from a 57.6 ks Chandra observation of the cluster gas associated with the fat-double radio galaxy 3C 310. We find a surface brightness discontinuity in the gas outside the southern radio lobe that we attribute to a shock driven by the supersonic inflation of this lobe {approx}180 kpc from the nucleus. Modeling the surface brightness/density jump, the shock has Mach number 1.5-1.9, depending on the assumptions one makes about the density profile and the nature of the energy input. There are not sufficient counts in the image to detect conclusively the temperature jump associated with the shock. The total mechanical energy of the outburst is 5 Multiplication-Sign 10{sup 60} erg. Assuming a Mach 1.9 shock, the age of the outburst is {approx}100 million yrs, and the time-averaged power of the outburst is {approx}1.3 Multiplication-Sign 10{sup 45} erg s{sup -1}. The power input is 100 times greater than the radiative losses of the gas within the radius of the shock. Most importantly, the equivalent heat input due to the entropy increase is roughly 10% of the thermal energy of the gas to the radius of the shock. 3C 310 is another example where regular outbursts of the observed strength with a duty cycle of 0.1 could offset the radiative losses of the gas near the Bondi radius and regulate feedback. We also detect a cool filamentary X-ray arm along the eastern periphery of the southern radio lobe. This arm is probably composed of low-entropy gas dredged up in the inflation of the radio plasma, similar to features seen in M87.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2011

Chiral Isotropic Liquids from Achiral Molecules

A variety of simple bent-core molecules exhibit smectic liquid crystal phases of planar fluid layers that are spontaneously both polar and chiral in the absence of crystalline order. We found that because of intralayer structural mismatch, such layers are also only marginally stable against spontaneous saddle splay deformation, which is incompatible with long-range order. This results in macroscopically isotropic fluids that possess only short-range orientational and positional order, in which the only macroscopically broken symmetry is chirality - even though the phases are formed from achiral molecules. Their conglomerate domains exhibit optical rotatory powers comparable to the highest ever found for isotropic fluids of chiral molecules.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2011

Helical Nanofilament Phases

In the formation of chiral crystals, the tendency for twist in the orientation of neighboring molecules is incompatible with ordering into a lattice: Twist is expelled from planar layers at the expense of local strain. We report the ordered state of a neat material in which a local chiral structure is expressed as twisted layers, a state made possible by spatial limitation of layering to a periodic array of nanoscale filaments. Although made of achiral molecules, the layers in these filaments are twisted and rigorously homochiral - a broken symmetry. The precise structural definition achieved in filament self-assembly enables collective organization into arrays in which an additional broken symmetry - the appearance of macroscopic coherence of the filament twist-produces a liquid crystal phase of helically precessing layers.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2011

CONSTRAINING HALO OCCUPATION PROPERTIES OF X-RAY ACTIVE GALACTIC NUCLEI USING CLUSTERING OF CHANDRA SOURCES IN THE BOOeTES SURVEY REGION

We present one of the most precise measurements to date of the spatial clustering of X-ray-selected active galactic nuclei (AGNs) using a sample derived from the Chandra X-ray Observatory survey in the Booetes field. The real-space two-point correlation function over a redshift interval from z = 0.17 to z {approx} 3 is well described by the power law, {xi}(r) = (r/r{sub 0}){sup -}{gamma}, for comoving separations r {approx}< 20 h{sup -1} Mpc. We find {gamma} = 1.84 {+-} 0.12 and r{sub 0} consistent with no redshift trend within the sample (varying between r{sub 0} = 5.5 {+-} 0.6 h{sup -1} Mpc for (z) = 0.37 and r{sub 0} = 6.9 {+-} 1.0 h{sup -1} Mpc for (z) = 1.28). Furthermore, we are able to measure the projections of the two-point correlation function both on the sky plane and in the line of sight. We use these measurements to show that the Chandra/Booetes AGNs are predominantly located at the centers of dark matter halos with circular velocity v{sub max} > 320 km s{sup -1} or M{sub 180} > 4.1 x 10{sup 12} h{sup -1} M{sub sun}, and tend to avoid satellite galaxies in halos of this or higher mass. The halo occupation properties inferred from the clustering properties of Chandra/Booetes AGNs-the mass scale of the parent dark matter halos, the lack of significant redshift evolution of the clustering length, and the low satellite fraction-are broadly consistent with the Hopkins et al. scenario of quasar activity triggered by mergers of similarly sized galaxies.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗