An effective quiescent medium for sound propagating through an inhomogeneous,moving fluid

The idea of similarity between acoustic fields in a moving fluid and in a certain "effective" quiescent medium, first put forward by Lord Rayleigh, proved very helpful in understanding and modeling sound propagation in an atmosphere with winds and in an ocean with currents, as well as in other applications involving flows with small velocity compared to sound speed. Known as effective sound speed approximation, the idea is routinely utilized in the contexts of the ray theory, normal mode representation of the sound field, and the parabolic approximation. Despite the wide use of the concept of effective sound speed in acoustics of moving media, no theoretical justification of Rayleigh's idea was published that would be independent of the chosen representation of the sound field and uniformly apply to distinct propagation regimes. In this paper, we present such a justification by reducing boundary conditions and a wave equation governing sound fields in the inhomogeneous moving fluid with a slow flow to boundary conditions and a wave equation in a quiescent fluid with effective sound speed and density. The derivation provides insight into validity conditions of the concept of effective quiescent fluid. Introduction of effective density in conjunction with effective sound speed is essential to ensure accurate reproduction of acoustic pressure amplitude in the effective medium. Effective parameters depend on sound speed, flow velocity, and density of the moving fluid as well as on sound propagation direction. Conditions are discussed under which the dependence on the propagation direction can be avoided or relaxed.     

Scars of the Wigner Function

We propose a picture of Wigner function scars as a sequence of concentric rings along a two-dimensional surface inside a periodic orbit. This is verified for a two-dimensional plane that contains a classical hyperbolic orbit of a Hamiltonian system with 2 degrees of freedom. The stationary wave functions are the familiar mixture of scarred and random waves, but the spectral average of the Wigner functions in part of the plane is nearly that of a harmonic oscillator and individual states are also remarkably regular. These results are interpreted in terms of the semiclassical picture of chords and centers.     

Balance of mass, momentum, and energy in splintering central collisions for 40Ar up to 115 MeV /Nucleon

For central collisions of (17-115)A MeV 40Ar+Cu, Ag, Au, an overall balance is determined for the average mass, energy, and longitudinal momentum. Light charged particles and fragments are separated into forward-focused and isotropic components in the frame of the heaviest fragment. Energy removal by the isotropic component reaches 1-2 GeV. For such high deposition energies, statistical multifragmentation models predict much more extensive nuclear disassembly than is observed.     

Gamow-teller strengths of the inverse beta transition 176Yb-->176Lu for spectroscopy of proton-proton and other sub-MeV solar neutrinos

Discrete Gamow-Teller (GT) transitions 176Yb-->176Lu at low excitation energies have been measured via the ( 3He,t) reaction at 450 MeV and at 0 degrees. For 176Yb, two low-lying states are observed, setting low thresholds Q(nu) = 301 and 445 keV for neutrino ( nu) capture. Capture rates estimated from the measured GT strengths, the simple two-state excitation structure, and the low Q(nu) in Yb-Lu indicate that Yb-based nu detectors are well suited for a direct measurement of the sub-MeV solar electron-neutrino ( nu(e)) spectrum including pp neutrinos.     

The blow-up curve of solutions of mixed problems for semilinear wave equations with exponential nonlinearities in one space dimension, I

In this paper, we consider mixed problems with a spacelike boundary derivative condition for semilinear wave equations with exponential nonlinearities in a quarter plane. Results similar to those obtained earlier by Caffarelli-Friedman for Cauchy problems and power nonlinearities are proved in the present situation, namely we show that solutions either are global or blow up on a spacelike curve. Weaker results are also obtained if the boundary vector field is tangent to the characteristic which leaves the domain in the future. Received January 7, 2000 / Accepted July 17, 2000 /Published online December 8, 2000     

Acoustic emission potentialities for characterization of Mullins effect in natural rubber materials filled with carbon black

Acoustic Emission (AE) was investigated in order to monitor in real time the Mullins effect. Cyclic uniaxial tensile tests were carried out on two different natural rubbers. Different behaviour is revealed depending on whether or not the material undergoes the Mullins effect. The acoustic emission activity is very important during the first cycle, but decreases gradually with increasing number of cycles, when the Mullins effect is observed. On the contrary, when there is no Mullins effect no significant AE activity is recorded.