The ALTO project at IPN-Orsay

The availability of both a tandem deuteron beam and a linac electron beam, the latter converted into Bremsstrahlung, at the new ALTO facility at IPN-Orsay offers a unique opportunity to compare the performance of a laser ion guide under different regimes. The ALTO accelerator has delivered its first electron beam at the end of 2005 and a design for a gas-cell prototype is being studied.     

Maximal Lyapunov exponent and rotation numbers for two coupled oscillators driven by real noise

Asymptotic expansions for the exponential growth rate, known as the Lyapunov exponent, and rotation numbers for two coupled oscillators driven by real noise are constructed. Such systems arise naturally in the investigation of the stability of steady-state motions of nonlinear dynamical systems and in parametrically excited linear mechanical systems. Almost-sure stability or instability of dynamical systems depends on the sign of the maximal Lyapunov exponent. Stability conditions are obtained under various assumptions on the infinitesimal generator associated with real noise provided that the natural frequencies are noncommensurable. The results presented here for the case of the infinitesimal generator having a simple zero eigenvalue agree with recent results obtained by stochastic averaging, where approximate ItÔ equations in amplitudes and phases are obtained in the sense of weak convergence.Dedicated to Thomas K. Caughey on the occasion of his 65th birthday.     

High-performance InP/InGaAs heterojunction bipolar transistors with highly carbon-doped base grown by chemical beam epitaxy

InP/In/sub 0.53/Ga/sub 0.47/As heterojunction bipolar transistors (HBTs) using a highly carbon-doped base are reported. High carbon doping has been achieved by chemical beam epitaxy (CBE). The resulting hole concentration in the carbon-doped base is as high as 7*10/sup 19//cm/sup 3/. To the authors' knowledge, this is the highest doping level reported using carbon. HBTs with a 20 AA spacer layer exhibited nearly ideal I-V characteristics with collector and base current ideality factor of 1.018 and 1.037, respectively. Current gain and breakdown voltage BV/sub CEO/ were 7 and 6 V, respectively.<>     

Hybrid cam mechanisms

This paper investigates the problem of driving a machine with several reciprocating heavy inertias. The drive should also realize some programmable flexibility of the motion, so that the operation of the machine, e,g., synchronization between different motions and duration of standstills, can easily be modified. The use of a single servomotor for every motion is not the best solution, since it does not allow for energy recuperation. This means that the installed servomotor power will be much higher than the required net peak power for the machine as a whole. The presented solution, however, reduces the servomotor peak torque and power by one order of magnitude, and makes energy transfer between the motions possible. The hybrid cam mechanism consists of a hybrid drive, which is a combination of a servomotor, a constant velocity motor and a cam follower mechanism. The operation principle exploits the nonlinear characteristics of the cam to add flexibility at low cost of energy. The hybrid solution is particularly successful for motions involving high peak acceleration. In addition, the concept can be used to reject disturbances. Simulations show the performance of the hybrid cam mechanism.     

Vibrotactile temporal gap detection as a function of age

The ability of subjects to detect temporal gaps between bursts of sinusoids or bursts of bandlimited noise was measured to evaluate the phenomenon of tactile "sensory persistence" in older persons. Vibratory stimuli were delivered to the right thenar eminence of 27 subjects ranging in age from 8-75 years. The subjects' task was to detect the presence of a silent interval or "gap" between flanking 350-ms vibrotactile stimuli. The gap-detection threshold, expressed as the amplitude of vibration relative to the absolute detection threshold, decreased as the gap duration increased and was higher for gaps in noise than for gaps in sinusoids. The threshold for detecting short gaps increased with age for noise stimuli, but not for sinusoidal stimuli. Furthermore, the gap-detection threshold recovered more rapidly in older subjects for noise stimuli, but less rapidly in older subjects for sinusoidal stimuli. Because of these differences, it appears that the effects of age on gap detection cannot be due to a simple increase in sensory persistence, but may be due to multiple processes.     

An algorithm for the linear complementarity problem with upper and lower bounds

In this paper, we adapt the octahedral simplicial algorithm for solving systems of nonlinear equations to solve the linear complementarity problem with upper and lower bounds. The proposed algorithm generates a piecewise linear path from an arbitrarily chosen pointz ⁰ to a solution point. This path is followed by linear programming pivot steps in a system ofn linear equations, wheren is the size of the problem. The starting pointz ⁰ is left in the direction of one of the 2 ⁿ vertices of the feasible region. The ray along whichz ⁰ is left depends on the sign pattern of the function value atz ⁰. The sign pattern of the linear function and the location of the points in comparison withz ⁰ completely govern the path of the algorithm.This research is part of the VF-Program Equilibrium and Disequilibrium in Demand and Supply, approved by the Netherlands Ministry of Education, Den Haag, The Netherlands.