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At least 73 records · Page 4

Fokker-Planck electron diffusion caused by an obliquely propagating electromagnetic wave packet of narrow bandwidth

The relativistic motion of electrons in an intense electromagnetic wave packet propagating obliquely to a uniform magnetic field is analytically studied on the basis of the Fokker-Planck-Kolmogorov (FPK) approach. The wavepacket consists of circularly polarized electron-cyclotron waves. The dynamical system in question is shown to be reducible to one with three degrees of freedom. Within the framework of the Hamiltonian analysis the nonlinear diffusion tensor is derived, and it is shown that this tensor can be separated into zeroth-, first-, and second-order parts with respect to the relative bandwidth. The zeroth-order part describes diffusive acceleration along lines of constant unperturbed Hamiltonian. The second-order part, which corresponds to the longest time scale, describes diffusion across those lines. A possible transport theory is outlined on the basis of this separation of the time scales.

Hizanidis, Kyriakos

On the local nature of the energy cascade

The local nature of the energy cascade in space and time is studied using direct numerical simulation of decaying and forced isotropic turbulence. To examine the concept that large scales evolve into smaller ones, we compute the Lagrangian correlation coefficient between local kinetic energy at different scales. This correlation is found to peak at a Lagrangian time-delay that increases with scale separation. The results show that, on average, the flow of energy to smaller scales is predominantly local in physical space and that the view of eddies decaying into smaller ones while transferring their kinetic energy appears to be, on average, quite realistic. To examine the spectral characteristics of the cascade under unsteady conditions, a pulse of large-scale energy is added to the large-eddy simulation of forced isotropic turbulence. As time progresses, the evolution of this pulse through bands of increasing wavenumbers is studied.

Meneveau, C.

Experiments on an unsteady, three-dimensional separation

Unsteady, three-dimensional flow separation occurs in a variety of technical situations including turbomachinery and low-speed aircraft. An experimental program at Stanford in unsteady, three-dimensional, pressure-driven laminar separation has investigated the structure and time-scaling of these flows; of particular interest is the development, washout, and control of flow separation. Results reveal that a two-dimensional, laminar boundary layer passes through several stages on its way to a quasi-steady three-dimensional separation. The quasi-steady state of the separation embodies a complex, unsteady, vortical structure.

Henk, R. W.

A catalogue of solar cosmic ray events: IMPS 4 and 5, May 1967 - December 1972

This catalogue of solar cosmic ray events has been prepared for the use of solar physicists and other interested scientists. It contains some 185 solar particle events detected by the Goddard Space Flight Center Cosmic Ray Experiments on IMP's IV and V (Explorer 34 and 41) for the period May 1967 - December 1972. The data is presented in the form of hourly averages for three proton energy intervals - 0.9 - 1.6 MeV; 6 - 20 MeV and 20 - 80 MeV. In addition the time histories of .5 - 1.1 MeV electrons are shown on a separate scale. To assist in the identification of related solar events, the onset time of the electron event is indicated. The details of the instrumentation and detector techniques are described. Further descriptions of data reduction procedure and on the time-history plots are given.

Vanhollebeke, M. A.

Understanding Geospace on a Grand Scale: The Global Ionoshphere/Thermosphere Constellation

We present the concept of a constellation of polar orbiting satellites equally spaced in longitude (local time) to systematically sample both the neutral and ionzed gas components of the Earth in circular orbits near 350 km, including their density, temperature, and velocities. The instrumentation would include techniques to measure the height of the ionospheric "F-peak" and its variations along the orbit. The number of satellites (l2? 24? 48?) and their configuration would be determined from modeling analysis and expected geophysical phenomena, including their drivers and characteristic time scales. Together with imaging data from separate satellites, the array of satellites with in situ probes would be expected to provide a new picture of (1) high latitude electrodynamics and atmospheric processes and associated coupling with magnetospheric mass and momentum input, (2) the response of the global ionosphere and thermosphere to magnetic storms, and (3) global neutral wind circulation patterns, neutral density structure, tides, planetary waves, and gravity waves. The comprehensive measurements gathered by the IT-Constellation envisioned here would provide a major leap forward in each of these areas, addressing global physical processes and providing fundamental, new knowledge of Geospace. In particular, by its very nature, the constellation addresses "system science", revealing how the ionosphere-thermosphere connects globally to the magnetosphere above and the troposphere below. We present this concept as the next logical step in observing the "whole" space environment using in situ probes in conjunction with imagers. We invite modelers to not only comment on this concept but also to become actively engaged in helping to define it.

Pfaff, Robert

Development of a global cloud model for simulating earth-viewing space missions.

Existing global cloud models are improved and expanded so that they might be more effectively used in planning and evaluating potential earth-viewing space missions. A relationship is developed between the ground and satellite-derived cloud-amount frequency distributions. This relationship is used to improve internal consistency between the ground-observed unconditional statistics and the satellite-derived conditional statistics as tabulated in previous models. A statistical technique is developed which permits the scaling of the conditional statistics to time and distance separations other than those for which the data base is tabulated. A new technique to increase or decrease the representative area size of the statistical data base is developed. Both the scaling and area adjustment techniques are shown to represent significant improvements over the techniques previously employed.

Greaves, J. R.

Measurements of the effect of horizontal variability of atmospheric backscatter on dial measurements

The horizontal variability of atmospheric backscatter may have a substantial effect on how Differential Absorption Lidar (DIAL) data must be taken and analyzed. To minimize errors, lidar pulse pairs are taken with time separations which are short compared to the time scales associated with variations in atmospheric backscatter. To assess the atmospheric variability for time scales which are long compared to the lidar pulse repetition rate, the variance of the lidar return signal in a given channel can be computed. The variances of the on-line, off-line, and ration of the on-line to off-line signals at given altitudes obtained with the dual solid-state Alexandrite laser system were calculated. These evaluations were made for both down-looking aircraft and up-looking ground-based lidar data. Data were taken with 200 microsecond separation between on-line and off-line laser pulses, 30 m altitude resolution, 5 Hz repetition rate, and the signal were normalized for outgoing laser energy.

Schwemmer, G. K.

Space Weather Modeling and Prediction for Intermediate Time-scales

Much of solar activity within a sunspot cycle occurs as bursts, or 'seasons' of strong activity over several months, separated by periods of much less activity. The most important space weather effects occur during these bursts. Previous modeling and forecasting efforts have focused on time-scales of hours-to-days and decades-to-centuries. The recent discovery of Rossby waves in the Sun, together with recently developed global models of solar MHD Rossby waves and their interactions with differential rotation and spot-producing magnetic fields, reveal the opportunity to simulate and predict the occurrence, strength and location of enhanced activity bursts a few weeks up to several months in advance. We now have a golden opportunity to fill in this gap in time-scales of forecasting space weather. This requires a) continuous observations of solar Rossby waves by various techniques; b) development of coupled nonlinear MHD models that simulate both global Rossby waves and the much smaller spatial scale emergence of new active regions; c) application of advanced data assimilation techniques to couple surface observations to update the model-system to integrate forward in time for creating forecasts months ahead. Then it will be possible to build operational prediction models to meet the needs of customers and stakeholders, including support of future NASA missions, regarding what kind and level of space weather to expect a few weeks to several months ahead.

SMD

Real-Space Constrained Density Functional Theory Investigation of Site-Specific, Interfacial Charge Recombination Dynamics Across the Au Nanoparticle/TiO 2 Heterojunction

Au nanoparticle (NP)/TiO 2 heterojunction is a representative system to study interfacial charge transfer in photocatalysis and photovoltaics, where suppressing recombination from TiO 2 to Au can enhance hot carrier extraction. We apply real-space constrained density functional theory (CDFT) with Marcus theory to quantify charge recombination time scales across Au/TiO 2 . This approach enables direct control and visualization of charge-separated states, aligning with site-specific probes like time-resolved X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (trXPS). We find that the charge-separated state features a bipolaron, with recombination dominated by TiO 2 LUMO to Au HOMO transitions, primarily at interfacial Au sites. Marcus rate predictions are benchmarked with surface hopping methods, quantifying differences in time scales and computational efficiency. Lastly, we examine how the Au cluster size affects the free energy change (ΔG) and reorganization energy (λ), explaining trends in closed-shell systems and highlighting challenges for open-shell extrapolations. Overall, CDFT + Marcus theory provides efficient, mechanistically transparent interfacial charge transfer modeling, and we clearly defined its applicability and limitation.

Glenna, Drew M. [Univ. of Idaho, Idaho Falls, ID (

Operating systems

A counter operating system creates a hierarchy of levels of abstraction, so that at a given level all details concerning lower levels can be ignored. This hierarchical structure separates functions according to their complexity, characteristic time scale, and level of abstraction. The lowest levels include the system's hardware; concepts associated explicitly with the coordination of multiple tasks appear at intermediate levels, which conduct 'primitive processes'. Software semaphore is the mechanism controlling primitive processes that must be synchronized. At higher levels lie, in rising order, the access to the secondary storage devices of a particular machine, a 'virtual memory' scheme for managing the main and secondary memories, communication between processes by way of a mechanism called a 'pipe', access to external input and output devices, and a hierarchy of directories cataloguing the hardware and software objects to which access must be controlled.

Denning, P. J.

Can we identify lensed gamma-ray bursts?

A gravitationally lensed gamma-ray burst (GRB) would appear as multiple bursts with identical light curves, separated in time and differing only by the scaling of their amplitudes. In reality, the detected bursts will be noisy, and therefore they may be difficult to identify as lensed images. Furthermore, faint, intrinsically similar, yet distinct light curves may be falsely identified as lensing events. In this paper we develop two statistical tests to distinguish noisy burst light curves. We use Fourier analysis techniques to analyze the signals for both intrinsic variability and variability due to noise. We are able to determine the noise level, and we compare the bursts only at frequency channels that are signal dominated. Utilizing these methods, we are able to make quantitative statements about whether two bursts are distinct. We apply these statistics to scaled versions of two subbursts of GRB 910503 -- subbursts previously investigated by Wambsganss using a different statistical test. We find that our methods are able to distinguish these bursts at slightly smaller amplitudes than those at which Wambsganss's method succeeds. We then apply our techniques to 'candidate' lensing events taken from the Burst and Transient Source Experiment (BATSE) catalog, and we find that nearly all of them, except for the very shortest ones (durations approx. less than 3 sec), are distinguishable. We therefore expect that a majority of bursts will be distinguishable from one another.

Nowak, Michael A.

A new approach to the design of time varying control systems with application to the space shuttle booster

A general approach toward the analysis and design of closed loop control for slowly time-varying linear systems was investigated. The approach is by the method of generalized multiple scales, in which slow and fast dynamics are systematically separated by employing different clocks which measure time at varying rates. The clocks, which are necessarily nonlinear functions of time, so that the system dynamics are asymptotically invariant with respect to the new time scale. A transfer function relating the output to the input for general linear slowly time-varying systems is developed and represents the actual system under certain conditions. The clock functions are shown to satisfy an algebraic characteristic equation and can be determined in general in terms of the coefficients.

Ramnath, R. V.

The effects of correlated noise in intra-complex DSN arrays for S-band Galileo telemetry reception

A number of the proposals for supporting a Galileo S-band (2.3-GHz) mission involve arraying several antennas to maximize the signal-to-noise ratio (and bit rate) obtainable from a given set of antennas. Arraying is no longer a new idea, having been used successfully during the Voyager encounters with Uranus and Neptune. However, arraying for Galileo's tour of Jupiter is complicated by Jupiter's strong radio emission, which produces correlated noise effects. This article discusses the general problem of correlated noise due to a planet, or other radio source, and applies the results to the specific case of an array of antennas at the DSN's Tidbinbilla, Australia, complex (DSS 42, DSS 43, DSS 45, and the yet-to-be-built DSS 34). The effects of correlated noise are highly dependent on the specific geometry of the array and on the spacecraft-planet configuration; in some cases, correlated noise effects produce an enhancement, rather than a degradation, of the signal-to-noise ratio. For the case considered here--an array of the DSN's Australian antennas observing Galileo and Jupiter--there are three regimes of interest. If the spacecraft-planet separation is approximately less than 75 arcsec, the average effect of correlated noise is a loss of signal to noise (approximately 0.2 dB as the spacecraft-planet separation approaches zero). For spacecraft-planet separations approximately greater than 75 arcsec, but approximately less than 400 arcsec, the effects of correlated noise cause signal-to-noise variations as large as several tenths of a decibel over time scales of hours or changes in spacecraft-planet separation of tens of arcseconds; however, on average its effects are small (less than 0.01 dB). When the spacecraft is more than 400 arcsec from Jupiter (as is the case for about half of Galileo's tour), correlated noise is a less than 0.05-dB effect.

Dewey, R. J.

A new approach to the design of time-varying control systems with application to the Space Shuttle Boost

A general approach to the analysis and design of closed-loop control for slowly time-varying linear systems is presented. The approach uses the method of generalized multiple scales in which slow and fast dynamics are systematically separated by employing different 'clocks' which measure time at varying rates. The clocks, which are necessarily nonlinear functions of time, are chosen in such a manner that the system dynamics are asymptotically invariant with respect to the new time scale. A transfer function relating the output to the input for general linear slowly time-varying systems is developed and represents the actual system under certain conditions. The clock function is shown to satisfy an algebraic characteristic equation and can be determined in terms of the coefficients. The approach can be viewed as an extension of time-invariant linear feedback control theory.

Ramanth, R. V.

Numerical solution of the geoelectrodynamic problem

The primary goal is to understand the sources of the near-Earth ambient magnetic field as observed by recent spacecraft surveys and surface variational magnetic observations so as to determine the electrical properties of the crust and upper mantle. Also included is the structure and changes on a short time scale of the core field which must be separated and identified. The Magsat data collection interval provides an opportunity to compare the vector field projections of ionospheric currents computed from surface data above the ionosphere as does the POGO data for scalar projections. The limitation of Magsat is its sun-synchronous orbit, which only sampled low latitudes at dawn and dusk, whereas POGO, though only making observations of the scalar field, sampled all local times. Magsat operated at a lower altitude than POGO (down to 350 km) whereas the orbits of the three POGO spacecraft ranged up to 1500 km and were never lower than about 400 km.

Cain, Joseph C.

Science requirements for a global change technology architecture trade study

Science requirements for a global change technology initiative (GCTI) Architecture Trade Study were established by reviewing and synthesizing results from recent studies. A scientific rationale was adopted and used to identify a comprehensive set of measureables and their priorities. Spatial and temporal requirements for a number of measurement parameters were evaluated based on results from several working group studies. Science requirements were defined using these study results in conjunction with the guidelines for investigating global changes over a time scale of decades to centuries. Requirements are given separately for global studies and regional process studies. For global studies, temporal requirements are for sampling every 1 to 12 hours for atmospheric and radiation parameters and 1 day or more for most earth surface measurements. Therefore, the atmospheric measureables provide the most critical drivers for temporal sampling. Spatial sampling requirements vary from 1 km for land and ocean surface characteristics to 50 km for some atmospheric parameters. Thus, the land and ocean surface parameters have the more significant spatial variations and provide the most challenging spatial sampling requirements.

Suttles, John T.

Science requirements for a global change technology initiative architecture trade study

Science requirements for a Global Change Technology Initiative (GCTI) Architecture Trade Study were established by reviewing and synthesizing results from recent studies. A scientific rationale was adopted and used to identify a comprehensive set of measurables and their priorities. Spatial and temporal requirements for a number of measurement parameters were evaluated based on results from several working group studies. Science requirements were defined using these study results in conjunction with guidelines for investigating global changes over a time scale of decades to centuries. Requirements are given separately for global studies and regional process studies. For global studies, temporal requirements are for sampling every 1 to 12 hours for atmospheric and radiation parameters and 1 day or more for most Earth surface measurements. Therefore, the atmospheric measurables provide the most critical drivers for temporal sampling. Spatial sampling requirements vary from 1 km for land and ocean surface characteristics to 50 km for some atmospheric parameters. Thus, the land and ocean surface parameters have the more significant spatial variations and provide the most challenging spatial sampling requirements.

Suttles, John T.

Calculating Conductance of Ion Channels

We have simulated two small ion channels in a water/membrane system, which consists of 71,000-72,000 atoms, and have estimated the conductance by way of counting ions crossing these channels in applied field. The calculated values of conductance have been compared with predictions of the electrodiffusion model. In a recently developed theoretical framework, all commonly used assumptions of the model can be tested. If they are satisfied, which is often the case, the approach provides a rigorous way to extrapolate conductance calculated at one voltage to other voltages. This, in turn, allows for efficient estimations of current-voltage dependence, examining rectifying behavior of channels and calculating the reversal potential. Furthermore, the consistency of the results can be precisely tested. Simulations at microsecond time scales are required to sufficiently reduce statistical errors and separate them from possible systematic errors. Only then the accuracy of the proposed approach can be properly tested. Linking simulations with electrophysiology provides a stringent, highly relevant test for the correctness of computer simulations of ion channels. Considering biological, medical and pharmaceutical importance of these proteins, results of the proposed study might motivate the development of improved hardware and software that would enable applying a similar strategy to more complex channels at longer times.

Ion