Scattering by small defects in the neighbourhood of a fluid-solid interface

The scattering of incident plane elastic waves by a varietyof different defects that lie upon a fluid-solid interface isconsidered here using matched asymptotic expansions. The expansionscheme is developed in terms of a parameter , the ratio of typicaldefect length scale to a typical wavelength of the incidentfield, taken to be small. Three different canonical situations occur and these are illustratedvia three specific examples treated here: a rigid strut, anedge crack, and a rigid strip. In each case the leading-ordermatching is performed to identify the leading-order contributionof the defect to the acoustic field in the far field. In particular,each defect is identified with a source of dipole response ininterfacial stress of displacement. It is shown in the limit as s<<s1 that in the inner problemsthe fluid and solid pieces uncouple in a particularly convenientmanner allowing analytical solutions to be deduced. These arethen matched with appropriate outer solutions.     

Working group report: Heavy-ion physics and quark-gluon plasma

This is the report of Heavy Ion Physics and Quark-Gluon Plasma at WHEPP-09 which was part of Working Group-4. Discussion and work on some aspects of quark-gluon plasma believed to have created in heavy-ion collisions and in early Universe are reported.     

Meson production in p + d reactions

Total and differential cross sections for the reactions p + d → ³He + m ⁰ with m=π, η and p + d → ³H+π⁺ were measured with the GEM detector at COSY for beam momenta between threshold and the maximum of the corresponding baryon resonance. For both reactions a strong forward-backward asymmetry was found. The data were compared with model calculations. The aspect of isospin symmetry breaking is studied. Representing the GEM Collaboration     

Interaction between explosive and analyte layers in explosive matrix-assisted plasma desorption mass spectrometry

An HMX/insulin two-layer system was chosen as a model for further investigation of the matrix properties of explosive materials for protein analytes in plasma desorption mass spectrometry. The dependencies of the molecular ion yield and average charge state as a function of the analyte thickness were studied. An increase in the charge state of multiply protonated molecular species was confirmed as the major matrix effect, with the average charge state z at the smallest thickness studied being higher than in matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization and closer to the value obtained in electrospray ionization under standard acidic conditions. Observed charge state distributions are significantly narrower than the corresponding Poisson distributions, which suggests that the protonation of insulin is limited in plasma desorption by the number of basic sites in the molecule, similar to electrospray ionization. Both the curve displaying total molecular ion yield and the one showing the total charge (proton) yield as a function of the insulin thickness have maxima at a thickness different from an insulin monolayer. These observations diminish the significance of a matrix/analyte interface mechanism for the explosive matrix assistance. Instead, a mechanism related to the chemical energy release during conversion of the explosive after the ion impact is proposed. As additional mechanisms, enhanced protonation of the analyte through collisions with products of the explosive decay is considered, as well as electron scavenging by other products, which leads to a higher survival probability of positively charged protein molecular ions. Copyright 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Projection functions for particle-grid methods

Random walk particle methods (RWPM) can be used in operator splitting schemes to simulate reactive solute transport in porous media. Projection functions are used to transfer particle location and mass information to concentrations at selected spatial points. Because of the stochastic nature of RWPM, concentration estimates made from particle distributions include a “noisy” error component. In some cases of reactive or density-dependent flows, this type of error may be propagated forward in time. It can be reduced by using larger numbers of particles or by using different projection functions. The effects of using different projection functions or numbers of particles in different flow regimes or dimensions are explored using concentration solutions for a set of one-, two-, and three-dimensional nonreactive test problems. Resulting solutions are compared with analytic results and classical random walk error estimates. A piecewise linear projection function provides a reasonable improvement in accuracy over the more convenient box methods at a modest increase in cost. The support of the projection functions should be O(Δx) to avoid excessive smearing. Multidimensional projection functions may be advantageously formed by products of different one-dimensional projection functions.     

Chapman–Enskog solutions to arbitrary order in Sonine polynomials I: Simple,rigid-sphere gas

The Chapman–Enskog solutions of the Boltzmann equations provide a basis for the computation of important transport coefficients for both simple gases and gas mixtures. These coefficients include the viscosities, the thermal conductivities, and diffusion coefficients. The Chapman–Enskog solutions are also useful for computation of the associated slip and jump coefficients near surfaces. Generally, these solutions are expressed in terms of Sonine polynomial expansions. While it has been found that relatively, low-order expansions (of order 4) can provide reasonable precision in the computation of the transport coefficients (to about 1 part in 1000), the adequacy of the low-order expansions for computation of the slip and jump coefficients still needs to be explored. Also of importance is the fact that such low-order expansions do not provide good convergence (in velocity space) for the actual Chapman–Enskog solutions even though the transport coefficients derived from these solutions appear to be reasonable. Thus, it is of some interest to explore Sonine polynomial expansions to higher orders. It is our purpose in this paper to report the results of our investigation of high-order, standard, Sonine polynomial expansions for the viscosity and the thermal conductivity related Chapman–Enskog solutions for a simple, rigid-sphere gas where we have carried out our calculations using expansions to order 150 and where our reported values for the transport coefficients have been demonstrated to converge to at least 25 significant digits. We note that, for a rigid-sphere gas, all of the relevant integrals needed for these solutions are evaluated analytically as pure fractions and, thus, results to any desired precision may be obtained. This work also indicates how results may be obtained in a similar fashion for realistic intermolecular potential models, and how gas-mixture problems may also be addressed with some additional effort.     

On a Simple Nonisothermal Adsorption Experiment with Organic Vapors and an Inertial Microbalance To Study the Surface Properties of Hybrid (Organic/Inorganic) Porous Materials

A nonisothermal adsorption experiment using a controlled flow of cyclopentane in the 333-313 K range is used to simultaneously estimate the specific surface area and micropore volume of a hybrid (organic/inorganic) alcogel. For reference, the method is also applied to an all-inorganic material with a more rigid structure, namely, a high surface area SiO(2)-Al(2)O(3). The proposed data analysis provides guidelines to determine whether adsorption data on a certain adsorbate/adsorbent system can be modeled effectively as a convolution of BET (meso- and macropore) and Dubinin-Radushkevitch (DR, micropore) contributions. Copyright 2000 Academic Press.