Initial noise predictions for rudimentary landing gear

A four-wheel “rudimentary” landing gear (RLG) truck was designed for public-domain research, with a level of complexity which is manageable in current numerical simulations, and a weak Reynolds-number sensitivity. Experimental measurements of wall-pressure fluctuations are allowing a meaningful test of unsteady simulations with emphasis on noise generation. We present three Detached-Eddy Simulations (DES) using up to 18 million points in the high-order NTS code. The first is incompressible with the model placed in the wind tunnel, as requested for the 2010 workshop on Benchmark problems for Airframe Noise Computations (BANC-I), intended for force and surface-pressure studies. The second and third are at Mach 0.115 and Mach 0.23, with only one wall, a “ceiling” analogous to a wing (but infinite and inviscid), and are used to exercise far-field noise prediction by coupling the Detached-Eddy Simulations and a Ffowcs-Williams/Hawkings calculation. The results include wall-pressure, and far-field-noise intensities and spectra. The wall pressure signals in the three simulations are very similar and, in a comparison published separately, agree well with experiment and other simulations. In the absence of experimental noise data, the attention is focused on internal quality checks, by varying the permeable Ffowcs-Williams/Hawkings calculation surface and then by using only the solid surface. An unexpected finding at these Mach numbers is an apparent strong role for quadrupoles, revealed by a typical deficit of 3 dB in the solid-surface results, relative to the permeable-surface results. The solid-surface approach has variants, related to the presence of the ceiling (a plane of symmetry), which can increase this error further; there is little consensus on the exact configuration of the solid surfaces in the Ffowcs-Williams/Hawkings calculation procedure. Tentative theoretical arguments suggest that a balance somewhat in favor of quadrupoles over dipoles is plausible at Mach 0.115. However, the scaling of sound with Mach number does not follow the eighth power, as quadrupoles do in theory: it is closer to the sixth power. This trend gives a muddled theoretical picture, but agrees with the scaling observed in experiments. If it is confirmed, this finding will complicate airframe-noise calculations, and prevent the attribution of noise to a given component of the aircraft. Progress in airframe-noise simulations appears real, but systematic grid-refinement studies and noise comparisons with experiment or other simulations have yet to occur, and the theoretical uncertainty is high.     

The Sigmoidal Transfer Function and the Gain-Threshold Exponential Dependence for Neurons from Statistical Mechanics Treatment

Analogy is used to treat the system of non-interacting integrate-and-fire neurons as an ideal Fermi gas. It allows to obtain the nonlinear gain curve in the form of sigmoid in agreement with biological findings. As the by-product the gain-threshold mechanism in neurons is presented. Surprisingly enough, this is in agreement with new biological findings, too. Besides, the application of this mechanism to the dynamics of neurons leads to the non-monotone transfer function.     

Pseudotetrahedral polyhaloadamantanes as chirality probes: synthesis,separation, and absolute configuration

Pseudotetrahedral, conformationally as well as configurationally stable 1-bromo-3-chloro-5-fluoro- (4) and 1-bromo-3-chloro-5-fluoro-7-iodoadamantane (5) (and some related compounds) were prepared by our recently devised phase-transfer catalytic halogenation protocol; the optical antipodes of 4 were separated by HPLC on chiral phase in ee > 99%, and the absolute configurations were assigned by matching observed and computed circular dichroism spectra. Structure 5 is the first chiral aliphatic hydrocarbon containing all stable (nonradioactive) halogens; its structure was proven by NMR spectroscopy and by X-ray crystal data. We emphasize that the combination of experiment and theory is very powerful in assigning absolute configurations even for molecules without typical chromophors, with small values for the optical rotation, and without an atom at the stereogenic center.     

Development of a sequential enzymolysis approach for the evaluation of the bioaccessibility of Cd and Pb from cocoa

An in vitro model simulating enzymatic activity in the gastrointestinal tract was developed for the assessment of the potential bioaccessibility of Cd and Pb in cocoa powder and liquor. The model was based on the sequential extraction with simulated gastric and intestinal juices; the residue after the latter extraction was further investigated by using, in parallel, solutions of phytase and cellulase. The solubility of Cd and Pb in the corresponding enzymatic extracts was measured by ICP MS. The bioaccessibility of Cd in cocoa varied from 10 to 50% in gastrointestinal conditions. An additional 20 or 30% of Cd could be recovered by phytase and cellulase, respectively. The bioaccessibility of Pb in gastrointestinal conditions did not exceed 5-10%. Only a few percent more of this metal could be recovered by extraction with phytase and cellulase.     

Synthesis of photochromic 1,2-dihetarylethene using regioselective acylation of thienopyrroles

[formula: see text] The influence of catalysts, acid chlorides, and solvents in the acylation of methyl 2-methyl-4H-thieno[3,2-b]pyrrole-5-carboxylate was studied. Conditions for the regioselective acylation processes were found. Thienopyrrole-based photochrome was synthesized for the first time.     

Bending of DNA by asymmetric charge neutralization: all-atom energy simulations

DNA dodecamers of the alternating d(CG).d(CG) sequence with six phosphate groups either charge-neutralized or substituted by neutral methylphosphonates across the major or minor groove have been subjected to energy minimization to determine the conformational effect of the asymmetric elimination of phosphate charge. We report bending angles, directions of bending, and detailed structural characteristics such as groove widths and local base-pair parameters. Our principal results are that charge neutralization on one face of the DNA induces significant bending toward the neutralized face, in agreement with theoretical predictions on a simplified model and experimental data on a similar base-pair sequence, and that the DNA conformation averaged over all stereospecific methylphosphonate substitutions is nearly the same as the conformation produced by charge neutralization of the phosphates. Individual isomers, however, cover a wide range of structures, with the magnitude and direction of overall bending sensitive to the precise stereochemical pattern of neutralization. Our simulation does not explicitly contain counterions, and the results therefore suggest that counterions can influence DNA structure by neutralizing the phosphate charge. These data provide new hints into the molecular mechanisms which underlie the deformations of DNA structure induced by the binding of positively charged proteins and other tightly associated cationic species.     

Self-written waveguides in photopolymerizable resins

We study the optically induced growth and interaction of self-written waveguides in a photopolymerizable resin. We investigate experimentally how the interaction depends on the mutual coherence and the relative power of the input beams and suggest an improved analytical model that describes the growth of single waveguides and the main features of their interaction in photosensitive materials.     

Arnold's method for asymptotic stability of steady inviscid incompressible flow through a fixed domain with permeable boundary

The flow of an ideal fluid in a domain with a permeable boundary may be asymptotically stable. Here the permeability means that the fluid can flow into and out of the domain through some parts of the boundary. This permeability is a principal reason for the asymptotic stability. Indeed, the well-known conservation laws make the asymptotic stability of an inviscid flow impossible, if the usual no flux condition on a rigid wall (or on a free boundary) is employed. We study the stability problem using the direct Lyapunov method in the Arnold's form. We prove the linear and nonlinear Lyapunov stability of a two-dimensional flow through a domain with a permeable boundary under Arnold's conditions. Under certain additional conditions, we amplify the linear result and prove the exponential decay of small disturbances. Here we employ the plan of the proof of the Barbashin-Krasovskiy theorem, established originally only for systems with a finite number of degrees of freedom. (c) 2002 American Institute of Physics.