Crack path instabilities in DCDC experiments in the low speed regime

We studied the low speed fracture regime (10⁻⁴-10⁻⁹ m s⁻¹) in different glassy materials (soda-lime glass, glass ceramics) with variable but controlled length scale of heterogeneity. The chosen mechanical system enabled us to work in pure mode I (tensile) and at a fixed load on double cleavage drilled compression specimen. The internal residual stresses of studied samples were carefully relaxed by appropriate thermal treatment. By means of optical and atomic force microscopy techniques fracture surfaces have been examined. We have shown for the first time that the crack front line underwent an out-of-plane oscillating behavior as a result of a reproducible sequence of instabilities. The wavelength of such a phenomenon is in the micrometer range and its amplitude in the nanometer range. These features were observed for different glassy materials providing that a typical length scale characterizing internal heterogeneities was lower than a threshold limit estimated to few nanometers. This effect is the first clear experimental evidence of crack path instabilities in the low speed regime in a uniaxial loading experiment. This phenomenon has been interpreted by referring to the stability criterion for a straight crack propagation as presented by Adda-Bedia et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 76 (1996) 1497].     

Relaxor type perovskites: Primary candidates of nano-polar regions

Relaxor properties of 0.7Pb(Mg_1/3Nb_2/3)O₃-0.3PbTiO₃ (PMN-PT) and non-lead perovskite thin films have been analysed in terms of large frequency dispersion of dielectric response at low temperatures. A wide spectrum of dielectric relaxation was observed in the frequency-dependent response of the imaginary part of the dielectric permittivity. Transformation from normal ferroelectric to relaxor behaviour has been observed in the case of the Ca substituting the BaTiO₃ thin films. A number of techniques were exploited to investigate the wide spectrum of relaxation times in pulsed laser ablated thin films.ac anddc electric field induced complex dielectric properties of 0.7Pb(Mg_1/3Nb_2/3)O₃-0.3PbTiO₃ (PMN-PT) thin films were studied as function of frequencies at different temperatures. Nonlinear behaviour of dielectric susceptibility with respect to the amplitude of theac drive was observed at lower temperatures. The frequency dependence of transition temperatureT _m (temperature of the maximum of dielectric constant) was studied using the Vogel-Fulcher relation. Dedicated to Professor C N R Rao on his 70th birthday     

Recyclization of Products Formed by Addition of 5-Hydrazino-2-phenyl-1,3-oxazoles Functionally Substituted in 4-Position to Aryl Isothiocyanates

Russian Journal of General Chemistry -     

Time discretizations for Maxwell‐Bloch equations

In this article we derive new time discretizations for the numerical simulation of Maxwell‐Bloch equations. These discretizations decouple the equations, thus leading to improved efficiency. This approach may be combined with the fulfilment of physical properties, such as positiveness properties, which are not accounted for by classical schemes. Our time discretizations are moreover proved to be nonlinearly stable. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Numer Methods Partial Differential Eq 19: 284–300, 2003.     

A modified method of characteristics incorporating streamline diffusion

A hybrid finite-element method, combining ideas from a modified method of characteristics and the streamline diffusion method, delivers accurate solutions to the advection–diffusion equation. An error analysis for the case of tensorial diffusion shows that the lowest-order version of the scheme, which allows one to use a symmetric linear solvers at each time step, possesses first-order accuracy in time and space. Numerical experiments demonstrate the scheme's ability to model advection-dominated transport of solute plumes without distorting sharp fronts. © 1995 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

20-relative neighborhood graphs are hamiltonian

For any two points p and q in the Euclidean plane, define LUN_pq = { v | v ∈ R², d_pv < d_pq and d_qv < d_pq}, where d_uv is the Euclidean distance between two points u and v . Given a set of points V in the plane, let LUN_pq(V) = V ∩ LUN_pq. Toussaint defined the relative neighborhood graph of V, denoted by RNG(V) or simply RNG, to be the undirected graph with vertices V such that for each pair p,q ∈ V, (p,q) is an edge of RNG(V) if and only if LUN_pq (V) = ?. The relative neighborhood graph has several applications in pattern recognition that have been studied by Toussaint. We shall generalize the idea of RNG to define the k-relative neighborhood graph of V, denoted by kRNG(V) or simply kRNG, to be the undirected graph with vertices V such that for each pair p,q ∈ V, (p,q) is an edge of kRNG(V) if and only if | LUN_pq(V) | < k, for some fixed positive number k. It can be shown that the number of edges of a kRNG is less than O(kn). Also, a kRNG can be constructed in O(kn₂) time. Let E_c = {e_pq| p ∈ V and q ∈ V}. Then G_c = (V,E_c) is a complete graph. For any subset F of E_c, define the maximum distance of F as max_epq∈Fd_pq. A Euclidean bottleneck Hamiltonian cycle is a Hamiltonian cycle in graph G_c whose maximum distance is the minimum among all Hamiltonian cycles in graph G_c. We shall prove that there exists a Euclidean bottleneck Hamiltonian cycle which is a subgraph of 20RNG(V). Hence, 20RNGs are Hamiltonian.     

Asymptotics of Dirichlet Spectrum on Some Class of Noncompact Domains

We investigate the asymptotic behaviour of the counting function of Dirichlet eigenvalues on some class of noncompact manifolds. We prove that in cases when the volume or the perimeter (the volume of the boundary) of the manifold is infinite, some additional (nonclassical) terms appear in the precise asymptotics. The coefficients at the classical terms in those are regularized in some special way volume (resp. perimeter) of the manifold.