Working group report: Quantum chromodynamics

This is the report of the subgroup QCD of Working Group-4 at WHEPP-9. We present the activities that had taken place in the subgroup and report some of the partial results arrived at following the discussion at the working group meetings.     

Cyclic networks with general blocking and starvation

We introducegeneral starvation and consider cyclic networks withgeneral blocking and starvation (GBS). The mechanism of general blocking allows the server to process a limited number of jobs when the buffer downstream is full, and that of general starvation allows the server to perform a limited number of services in anticipation of jobs that are yet to arrive. The two main goals of this paper are to investigate how the throughput of cyclic GBS networks is affected by varying (1) the total number of jobsJ, and (2) the buffer allocationk=(k₁..., k_m) subject to a fixed total buffer capacityK=k ₁ +... + k_m. In particular, we obtain sufficient conditions for the throughput to be symmetric inJ and to be maximized whenJ=K/2. We also show that the equal buffer allocation is optimal under the two regimes of light or heavy usage. In order to establish these results, we obtain several intermediate structural properties of the throughput, using duality, reversibility, and concavity, which are of independent interest.Research supported in part by NSF Grant No. ECS-8919818.     

Discrete facility location with nonlinear diseconomies in fixed costs

A discrete facility location problem is formulated where the total fixed cost for establishing the facilities includes a component that is a nonlinear function of the number of facilities being established. Some theoretical properties of the solution are derived when this fixed cost is a convex nondecreasing function of the number of facilities. Based on these properties an efficient bisection heuristic is developed where at each iteration, the classical uncapacitated facility location and/or m-median subproblems are solved using available efficient heuristics.     

Polarographic reduction of some guanylpyrazoline nitrates and the effect of double layer structure on E1/2 values

Polarographic reduction of 4-arylhydrazono-1-guanylnitrate-3-methyl-2-pyrazoline-5-ones takes place in a single 4-electron transfer, giving a diffusion controlled irreversible wave in B.R. buffers of pH range 2.0–10.0. The reduction in these compounds takes place at the ?NH?N=C-bond. Effect of various cations, anions and solvent percentage on the reduction has been discussed. The effect of substituents and its correlation with the Hammett substituent constant (δ) have also been studied.     

Maximization of atomic information-entropy sum in configuration and momentum spaces

The maximum entropy procedure (MEP ) of Jaynes has been extended to the case involving constraints in complementary spaces. It has been rigorously shown that the sum of information entropies in position and momentum spaces is invariant to uniform scaling of the electron coordinates. A new MEP procedure requires that this sum of entropies must be maximized subject to the known constraints in both spaces. A specific application of this maximization procedure for synthesizing atomic-electron densities in coordinate and momentum spaces has been outlined.     

Topography of the potential energy hypersurface and criteria for fast-ion conduction in perovskite-related A2B2O5 oxides

We discuss the importance of the topography of the potential energy hypersurface for the ionic conductivity of perovskite-related A(2)B(2)O(5) oxides. A correlation between the energetic preference of the cations for different coordination geometries and the ionic conductivity is proposed based on a first principles periodic density functional theory study of selected possible structures for Ba(2)In(2)O(5), Sr(2)Fe(2)O(5), Sr(2)Mn(2)O(5), and La(2)Ni(2)O(5). There are a large number of low-energy local minima on the potential energy hypersurfaces of the two first compounds due to an energetic preference for BO(4) tetrahedra. Tetrahedral environments are energetically unfavorable for Mn(III) in Sr(2)Mn(2)O(5) and for Ni(II) in La(2)Ni(2)O(5), and the number of low-energy configurations is relatively low in these two cases. Consistent with our findings, in contrast to Sr(2)Fe(2)O(5) and Ba(2)In(2)O(5), Sr(2)Mn(2)O(5) and La(2)Ni(2)O(5) do not exhibit transitions to disordered phases on heating, and there appear to be no reports of enhanced ionic conductivity for these compounds. Thus we suggest that the possibility of many different oxygen orderings associated with a variety of low-energy connectivity schemes within tetrahedral layers such as in the brownmillerite-based structures of Sr(2)Fe(2)O(5) and Ba(2)In(2)O(5) is a prerequisite for high ionic conductivity in perovskite-related A(2)B(2)O(5) oxides.     

Formulation–composition map of a lecithin-based emulsion

Formulation–composition map is an interesting tool to predict the nature of an emulsion, stability, viscosity and nevertheless to decide the mixing protocol of its ingredients. Information based on optimum formulation (environmental conditions at which the affinity of an emulsifier for oil and for aqueous phase is same), which is depicted through hydrophilic–lipophilic deviation (HLD) concept, is necessary to make a formulation–composition map of an emulsion. In order to apply this concept in food emulsions, it is necessary to determine characteristic constants of each component of the system, i.e. the aqueous phase, the oil phase and the emulsifier at equilibrium. In this work formulation–composition map of a sunflower oil–water–lecithin system, based on the knowledge of phase behavior of lecithin at equilibrium and emulsification, was made. The shape of inversion line on formulation–composition map was not the classical stair type rather an almost vertical inversion line at water-fraction (f_w) near 0.20 was observed. It was supposed to be linked to the viscosity of oil phase which was 50 times the viscosity of aqueous phase. Additionally, emulsions were of oil-in-water (O/W) type for f_w higher than 0.20, but their viscosity and the drop size behavior with respect to salt concentration as formulation variable did not show the existence of transitional inversion line on formulation–composition map. Such map in advance can certainly facilitate the guidelines for dynamic emulsification.     

Influence of crystallite size on acetone hydrogenation over copper catalysts

Acetone hydrogenation was studied over a family of Cu/SiO2 catalysts as well as UHP Cu powder and a Cu chromite catalyst. Oxygen chemisorption via dissociative N2O adsorption was used to count surface Cu atoms and calculate crystallite sizes, and a microwave absorption technique was used to measure the electrical conductivity of these Cu particles. Under differential reaction conditions at 423 K and 1 atm, all catalysts exhibited deactivation on stream and activities were typically 10-20% of their initial values after 3-4 h on stream. However, initial turnover frequencies (TOFs) varied from 0.056 s(-1) on the most highly dispersed Cu catalyst to 0.50 s(-1) on Cu powder, with the highest TOF of 2.4 s(-1) occurring on 110 nm crystallites. A similar trend with a broader (80-fold) variation was observed in the "steady-state" TOF values. Apparent activation energies varied between 11 and 14 kcal/mol. These initial TOF values are in good agreement with previous results, and a correlation exists between TOF and Cu crystallite size in this reaction, which appears to be structure sensitive. In addition, the electrical conductivity of these dispersed Cu nanoparticles, which was always less than that of bulk Cu, also increased with increasing Cu crystallite size; consequently, the change in this parameter may offer a possible explanation for the increase in TOF.