Exploring background variability of a low-level (quartz) gas proportional counter using pulse shape and distribution analysis

The NIST low-level beta counting system is designed to capture digitally and timestamp each event for retrospective analysis. As a result, low and stable backgrounds are achieved and lead to extremely low detection and quantification limits for measuring, e.g., ¹⁴C of atmospheric gases and aerosol. The objective here is to explore the variability of the background count rate (counts per day) of several small (1 mL) freshly-assembled gas proportional counters (GPCs). The mean is 14.0 day^?1 with 95 % confidence limits 11.2–16.8 day^?1. The raw count per day data was non-normal and so a Log transformation was applied to achieve normality and to rigorously compute normal tolerance limits. Back in the original space such (95 % confidence, 95 % coverage) tolerance limits were 2.5–47.8 day^?1. These limits are taken as acceptance criteria for any GPCs assembled in the future.     

Fibrous twists and turns: early ceramic technology revealed through computed tomography

While the emergence of pottery manufacturing is a wide-spread historical occurrence, and one that has garnered the attention of archaeologists for decades, we know very little about how these ancient vessels were created. Through the application of radiographic scanning and computed tomography this paper provides insights into the manufacturing techniques used by the earliest potters in North America. While x-rays have been used to investigate ceramic manufacturing techniques for decades, this paper provides a reassessment of radiography in light of advances in both computed tomography and reconstructive software.     

APPLICATIONS OF MULTICOMPONENT ASSEMBLY PROCESSES TO THE FACILE SYNTHESES OF DIVERSELY FUNCTIONALIZED NITROGEN HETEROCYCLES

Several multicomponent assembly processes have been developed for the synthesis of intermediates that may be elaborated by a variety of cyclizations to generate a diverse array of highly functionalized heterocycles from readily-available starting materials. The overall approach enables the efficient preparation of libraries of small molecules derived from fused, privileged scaffolds.     

How often do simple dynamical processes have infinitely many coexisting sinks?

This work concerns the nature of chaotic dynamical processes. Sheldon Newhouse wrote on dynamical processes (depending on a parameter )x _x+1=T(x _n ; ), wherex is in the plane, such as might arise when studying Poincaré return maps for autonomous differential equations in IR³. He proved that if the system is chaotic there will very often be existing parameter values for which there are infinitely many periodic attractors coexisting in a bounded region of the plane, and that such parameter values would be dense in some interval. The fact that infinitely many coexisting sinks can occur brings into question the very nature of the foundations of chaotic dynamical processes. We prove, for an apparently typical situation, that Newhouse's construction yields only a set of parameter values of measure zero.This research was supported in part by grants from the Air Force Office of Scientific Research AFOSR 81-0217, the Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche-Comitato per le Matematiche, and the National Science Foundation DMS 84-19110On leave from: Dipartimento di Matematica G. Castel nuovo Universita di Roma La Sapienza P. le Aldo Moro 5, I-00185 Rome, Italy     

Improved limits on the mass of the tau neutrino

Several methods to determine (or set an upper bound on) the mass of the tau neutrino are described. The decay spectrum of \(\tau \to e\bar \nu _e \nu _\tau \) near the high center-of-mass electron-energy end is particularly sensitive to the tau-neutrino mass. It is shown that an upper bound of 20 MeV or lower may be feasible. In addition, improved limits on the mass and mixing angle of a heavy component of the tau-neutrino may be readily obtained. We also discuss the purely leptonic decays of theD andF mesons, and show how measurements of the ratiosB(D→τν_τ/B(D→μν_μ,B(F→τν_τ/B(D→μν_μ can be sensitive to tau-neutrino masses of 30 MeV or greater.     

Interactive effects of local smoothing window size and fundamental frequency on shimmer calculation

Slow amplitude modulation of human voice was approximated by a sinusoidal wave. The theoretical effects of smoothing window size, F₀, and modulation frequency on window amplitude average as well as calculated shimmer were mathematically derived. Subsequently, the theoretical predictions were tested using idealized and real voice signals from normal speakers. The theoretical and experimental results suggest that shimmer (when calculated using a smoothing window) is a function of window duration and modulation frequency. Window duration when defined as a constant number of pitch periods varies from speaker to speaker depending on their F₀. It may not be desirable to use local smoothing windows with a constant number of cycles for shimmer computation, especially if voices with known low-frequency amplitude modulations but notably different fundamental frequencies are compared.