Synthesis of tungsten carbide nanopowder via submerged discharge method

Tungsten carbide nanopowder was prepared via pulsed discharge of bulk tungsten and graphite rods immersed in pure ethanol. The effect of discharge parameters on the characteristics of final products was investigated. Structural and morphological characterization of nanopowder was performed by means of X-ray diffraction analysis and transmission electron microscopy. In order to determine the feasibility of using synthesized material as an electrocatalyst, tungsten carbide nanopowder was tested for hydrogen evolution. A correlation was found between morphology of nanoparticles, their phase composition and electrocatalytic activity.     

Scaling properties of ℤ k- 1 actions on the circle

We derive universal scaling properties for ^k–1 actions on the circle whose generators have rotation numbers algebraic of degreek. As fork=2 these properties can be explained for arbitraryk in terms of a renormalization group transformation. It has at least one trivial fixed point corresponding to an action whose generators are pure rotations. The spectrum of the linearized transformation in this fixed point is analyzed completely. The fixed point is hyperbolic with a (k–1)-dimensional unstable manifold. In the casek=2 the known results are therefore recovered.     

Efficient unbiased variance reduction techniques for Monte Carlo simulations of radiative transfer in cloudy atmospheres: The solution

We present five new variance reduction techniques applicable to Monte Carlo simulations of radiative transfer in the atmosphere: detector directional importance sampling, n-tuple local estimate, prediction-based splitting and Russian roulette, and circum-solar virtual importance sampling. With this set of methods it is possible to simulate remote sensing instruments accurately and quickly. In contrast to all other known techniques used to accelerate Monte Carlo simulations in cloudy atmospheres - except for two methods limited to narrow angle lidars - the presented methods do not make any approximations, and hence do not bias the result. Nevertheless, these methods converge as quickly as any of the biasing acceleration techniques, and the probability distribution of the simulation results is almost perfectly normal. The presented variance reduction techniques have been implemented into the Monte Carlo code MYSTIC (“Monte Carlo code for the physically correct tracing of photons in cloudy atmospheres”) in order to validate the techniques.     

Etude d'impulsions lumineuses breves par interferometrie a deux ondes

We have studied the evolution of the light transmitted through matter in which an optical breakdown is taking place. With a two-waves interferometer made a birefringent plate between polarizers we get informations about the time correlation function of the fields. With an interferometer made of two identical harmonic generating plates separated by a dispersion medium, we learn about the correlation function of the square of the fields. Both systems act as spectral filters with a notch cosine-shaped centered at the incident frequency. We have also observed a transient angular spreading of the beam not previously emphasized which brings a further complication in the picture.     

Possible evidence for a narrow isovectorB=2 resonance below pion production threshold

Some evidence is presented for a narrow peak at 1969±2 MeV (FWHM=9±2 MeV) in the missing mass spectrum of the³He(p, d) reaction, with 3 standard deviations. The nature of this state, the mass of which is below the NN threshold, is discussed in connection with structures found in other experiments.     

A class of stationary charged dust solutions of Einstein's field equations

We consider a special class of stationary rotating charged dust solutions of Einstein's field equations without cosmological constant. In these space-times, the motion of freely falling particles and of light rays can be visualized by the motion of charged particles in an appropriate model magnetic field. Any curl-free magnetostatic field, given on an open subset of Euclidean 3-space, can serve as a model magnetic field for a charged dust solution in this sense. The simplest example, corresponding to a homogeneous model magnetic field, is given by Som-Raychaudhuri space-time. Some other examples are worked out.     

Local solution for the Kadomtsev-Petviashvili equation with periodic conditions

In this article we prove a local existence and uniqueness theorem for the Kadomtsev-Petviashvili Equation (u _t +u _xxx +uu _x ) _x −u _yy =0) in the Sobolev spaces of orders≥3, with initial values in the same spaces, and periodic boundary conditions. This theorem improves previous results based upon the application of singular perturbation techniques.     

Poincaré duality in P.A. Smith theory

Let , or more generally be a finite -group, where is an odd prime. If acts on a space whose cohomology ring fulfills Poincaré duality (with appropriate coefficients ), we prove a mod congruence between the total Betti number of and a number which depends only on the -module structure of . This improves the well known mod congruences that hold for actions on general spaces.