Final Merger Research Articles

Effect of water maldistribution in multi-circuit evaporator on superheat control dynamics of thermostatic-expansion-valve refrigeration system

Air/water mal-distribution widely occurs in multi-circuit evaporators, and may deteriorate the stability of thermostatic-expansion-valve (TEV) controlled systems. In this article, effect of water maldistribution on superheat control dynamics of a TEV system was studied experimentally. The evaporator had two circuits, with the overall outlet superheat controlled by TEV. By regulating the smaller water percentage of Circuit 2 (F2) from 36.9% to 9.1%, the system underwent the stable period (F2 from 36.9% to 27.0%) and the hunting period (F2 from 21.2% to 9.1%) sequentially. In the latter period, temperature and pressure parameters of the evaporator oscillated over time. Moreover, the lag of evaporator outlet temperature responses behind TEV actions was found and considered to be a reason of hunting. The resultant superheat oscillation dynamics were also analyzed at both circuit outlets and the overall outlet, and we found that evaporator overall outlet superheat was highly influenced by the non-uniform water distribution and the final merging of the paralleled circuits.

A NEW POPULATION OF COMPTON-THICK AGNs IDENTIFIED USING THE SPECTRAL CURVATURE ABOVE 10 keV

ABSTRACT We present a new metric that uses the spectral curvature (SC) above 10 keV to identify Compton-thick active galactic nuclei (AGNs) in low-quality Swift/Burst Alert Telescope (BAT) X-ray data. Using NuSTAR, we observe nine high SC-selected AGNs. We find that high-sensitivity spectra show that the majority are Compton-thick (78% or 7/9) and the remaining two are nearly Compton-thick (N H ≃ (5–8) × 1023 cm−2 ). We find that the SC BAT and SC NuSTAR measurements are consistent, suggesting that this technique can be applied to future telescopes. We tested the SC method on well-known Compton-thick AGNs and found that it is much more effective than broadband ratios (e.g., 100% using SC versus 20% using 8–24 keV/3–8 keV). Our results suggest that using the >10 keV emission may be the only way to identify this population since only two sources show Compton-thick levels of excess in the Balmer decrement corrected [O iii] to observed X-ray emission ratio ( ) and WISE colors do not identify most of them as AGNs. Based on this small sample, we find that a higher fraction of these AGNs are in the final merger stage (<10 kpc) than typical BAT AGNs. Additionally, these nine obscured AGNs have, on average, ≈4× higher accretion rates than other BAT-detected AGNs ( compared to ). The robustness of SC at identifying Compton-thick AGNs implies that a higher fraction of nearby AGNs may be Compton-thick (≈22%) and the sum of black hole growth in Compton-thick AGNs (Eddington ratio times population percentage) is nearly as large as mildly obscured and unobscured AGNs.

Black Hole Kicks as New Gravitational Wave Observables.

Generic black hole binaries radiate gravitational waves anisotropically, imparting a recoil, or kick, velocity to the merger remnant. If a component of the kick along the line of sight is present, gravitational waves emitted during the final orbits and merger will be gradually Doppler shifted as the kick builds up. We develop a simple prescription to capture this effect in existing waveform models, showing that future gravitational wave experiments will be able to perform direct measurements, not only of the black hole kick velocity, but also of its accumulation profile. In particular, the eLISA space mission will measure supermassive black hole kick velocities as low as ∼500 km s^{-1}, which are expected to be a common outcome of black hole binary coalescence following galaxy mergers. Black hole kicks thus constitute a promising new observable in the growing field of gravitational wave astronomy.

Wavelet-Based Visible and Infrared Image Fusion: A Comparative Study.

This paper evaluates different wavelet-based cross-spectral image fusion strategies adopted to merge visible and infrared images. The objective is to find the best setup independently of the evaluation metric used to measure the performance. Quantitative performance results are obtained with state of the art approaches together with adaptations proposed in the current work. The options evaluated in the current work result from the combination of different setups in the wavelet image decomposition stage together with different fusion strategies for the final merging stage that generates the resulting representation. Most of the approaches evaluate results according to the application for which they are intended for. Sometimes a human observer is selected to judge the quality of the obtained results. In the current work, quantitative values are considered in order to find correlations between setups and performance of obtained results; these correlations can be used to define a criteria for selecting the best fusion strategy for a given pair of cross-spectral images. The whole procedure is evaluated with a large set of correctly registered visible and infrared image pairs, including both Near InfraRed (NIR) and Long Wave InfraRed (LWIR).

Tests of General Relativity with GW150914.

The LIGO detection of GW150914 provides an unprecedented opportunity to study the two-body motion of a compact-object binary in the large-velocity, highly nonlinear regime, and to witness the final merger of the binary and the excitation of uniquely relativistic modes of the gravitational field. We carry out several investigations to determine whether GW150914 is consistent with a binary black-hole merger in general relativity. We find that the final remnant's mass and spin, as determined from the low-frequency (inspiral) and high-frequency (postinspiral) phases of the signal, are mutually consistent with the binary black-hole solution in general relativity. Furthermore, the data following the peak of GW150914 are consistent with the least-damped quasinormal mode inferred from the mass and spin of the remnant black hole. By using waveform models that allow for parametrized general-relativity violations during the inspiral and merger phases, we perform quantitative tests on the gravitational-wave phase in the dynamical regime and we determine the first empirical bounds on several high-order post-Newtonian coefficients. We constrain the graviton Compton wavelength, assuming that gravitons are dispersed in vacuum in the same way as particles with mass, obtaining a 90%-confidence lower bound of 10^{13} km. In conclusion, within our statistical uncertainties, we find no evidence for violations of general relativity in the genuinely strong-field regime of gravity.

Massive black hole binaries from runaway collisions: the impact of metallicity

The runaway collision scenario is one of the most promising mechanisms to explain the formation of intermediate-mass black holes (IMBHs) in young dense star clusters. On the other hand, the massive stars that participate in the runaway collisions lose mass by stellar winds. In this paper, we discuss new N-body simulations of massive (6.5x10^4 Msun) star clusters, in which we added upgraded recipes for stellar winds and supernova explosion at different metallicity. We follow the evolution of the principal collision product (PCP), through dynamics and stellar evolution, till it forms a stellar remnant. At solar metallicity, the mass of the final merger product spans from few solar masses up to ~30 Msun. At low metallicity (0.01-0.1 Zsun) the maximum remnant mass is ~250 Msun, in the range of IMBHs. A large fraction (~0.6) of the PCPs are not ejected from the parent star cluster and acquire stellar or black hole (BH) companions. Most of the long-lived binaries hosting a PCP are BH-BH binaries. We discuss the importance of this result for gravitational wave detection.

Co-rotating vortex interaction

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to study the structure and dynamic development of a pair of co-rotating trailing vortices, during their formation, interaction and merging, using detailed experimental measurements of the velocity and vorticity fields. Design/methodology/approach The vortices were generated using two half wings (NACA0030) positioned at equal and opposite angles of attack at the entrance of the test section of an open-circuit, subsonic, wind tunnel. Velocity vector measurements were obtained at Rec = 133,000, on cross-plane grids at several distances from the trailing edges of the wings, using an in-house developed four-sensor hot wire anemometer probe. Findings The results include cross-plane contour plots of the mean and fluctuating velocity as well as mean vorticity fields. Each of these variables is affected in a different way, providing complementary information on the development of the flow field. After shedding, the two vortices are swept along the stream-wise direction and spiral around each other, thereby developing a braid of two vortices, which then deforms the external flow field. Gradually, the interaction with the external flow field links both vortices together until the final merging and the formation of a new stable linear vortex emerges. Practical implications Trailing vortices have been rendered particularly important during the past decades, because of increasing traffic density of very heavy aircrafts and several plane “incidents”, which were attributed to the action of the vortex wake. Originality/value The presented results provide information on the evolution and merging of a pair of vortices formed by a closely spaced differential wing configuration. The vortices interact almost immediately after shedding as expected in flap–flap or flap–wing vortices interaction.

Possible confirmation of the existence of the ergoregion by the Kerr quasinormal mode in gravitational waves from a Population III massive black hole binary

The existence of the ergoregion of the Kerr space-time has not been confirmed observationally yet. We show that the confirmation would be possible by observing the quasinormal mode in gravitational waves. As an example, using the recent population synthesis results of Pop III binary black holes, we find that the peak of the final merger mass ($M_f$) is about $50~\rm M_{\odot}$, while the fraction of the final spin $q_f = a_f/M_f > 0.7$ needed for the confirmation of a part of ergoregion is $\sim 77\%$. To confirm the frequency of the quasinormal mode, ${\rm SNR} > 35$ is needed. The standard model of Pop III population synthesis tells us that the event rate for the confirmation of more than $50\%$ of the ergoregion by the second generation gravitational wave detectors is $\sim 2.3$ ${\rm events\ yr^{-1}\ (SFR_p/(10^{-2.5}\ M_\odot yr^{-1}\ Mpc^{-3}))} \cdot (\rm [f_b/(1+f_b)]/0.33)$ where ${\rm SFR_p}$ and ${\rm f_b}$ are the peak value of the Pop III star formation rate and the fraction of binaries, respectively.

Phantom based point by point photon counting and imaging of human skin tissue

Time-correlated single photon counting (TCSPC) is popular in the resolved techniques due to its prominent performance such as ultra-high time resolution and ultra-high sensitivity. This paper presents advance signal processing techniques on the optical TCSPC signals obtained from the series of experiments on fabricated tissue like phantom. A pulsed laser sources at a wavelength of 830 rim transmits the light through the surface of phantom and finally at receiver side, photon counting device generates the histogram of the receiving signal. The noisy data obtained from the photon counter is processed with the splitting based denoising method. The method divide the signal into different subsets based on the transitions. Each subset is then processed individually and final merging of all subsets gives noise free signal. The main objective of this work is to analyze the signal obtained from photon counter in context of skin blood absorption. We had examined the signal obtained by varying the distance between transmitter and receiver to extract the features. Experimental results with our prototype shows more scattering with the increase in the distance at 3dB level and hence less absorption with increase in the distance.

Binary neutron stars with generic spin, eccentricity, mass ratio, and compactness: Quasi-equilibrium sequences and first evolutions

Information about the last stages of a binary neutron star inspiral and the final merger can be extracted from quasi-equilibrium configurations and dynamical evolutions. In this article, we construct quasi-equilibrium configurations for different spins, eccentricities, mass ratios, compactnesses, and equations of state. For this purpose we employ the SGRID code, which allows us to construct such data in previously inaccessible regions of the parameter space. In particular, we consider spinning neutron stars in isolation and in binary systems; we incorporate new methods to produce highly eccentric and eccentricity reduced data; we present the possibility of computing data for significantly unequal-mass binaries; and we create equal-mass binaries with individual compactness up to 0.23. As a proof of principle, we explore the dynamical evolution of three new configurations. First, we simulate a $q=2.06$ mass ratio which is the highest mass ratio for a binary neutron star evolved in numerical relativity to date. We find that mass transfer from the companion star sets in a few revolutions before merger and a rest mass of $\sim10^{-2}M_\odot$ is transferred between the two stars. This configuration also ejects a large amount of material during merger, imparting a substantial kick to the remnant. Second, we simulate the first merger of a precessing binary neutron star. We present the dominant modes of the gravitational waves for the precessing simulation, where a clear imprint of the precession is visible in the (2,1) mode. Finally, we quantify the effect of an eccentricity reduction procedure on the gravitational waveform. The procedure improves the waveform quality and should be employed in future precision studies, but also other errors, notably truncation errors, need to be reduced in order for the improvement due to eccentricity reduction to be effective. [abridged]

Large-Scale Merging of Histograms using Distributed In-Memory Computing

Most high-energy physics analysis jobs are embarrassingly parallel except for the final merging of the output objects, which are typically histograms. Currently, the merging of output histograms scales badly. The running time for distributed merging depends not only on the overall number of bins but also on the number partial histogram output files. That means, while the time to analyze data decreases linearly with the number of worker nodes, the time to merge the histograms in fact increases with the number of worker nodes. On the grid, merging jobs that take a few hours are not unusual. In order to improve the situation, we present a distributed and decentral merging algorithm whose running time is independent of the number of worker nodes. We exploit full bisection bandwidth of local networks and we keep all intermediate results in memory. We present benchmarks from an implementation using the parallel ROOT facility (PROOF) and RAMCloud, a distributed key-value store that keeps all data in DRAM.

An Analysis of When the Merger Price is the Best Representaion of Fair Value in an Appaisal Action

Delaware’s statutorily afforded right of appraisal is once again a hot topic. In an appraisal action, the Delaware Court of Chancery is charged with the task of determining the fair value of recently acquired Delaware corporations. However, the appraisal process is not an easy one due, in no small part, to the inflexible statute guiding the appraisal procedure. The process is further complicated by the Delaware Supreme Court’s mandate that the Court of Chancery not to employ a bright line test in determining the fair value even for those transactions that were the result of a free and open market process. As a result, the courts are often left second guessing a merger value that was the product of a fair merger process.I propose that in an arms-length third-party cash-out merger, the entire fairness standard of review is the appropriate standard to determine fair value within an appraisal action. A statutory safe harbor allowing the judiciary the opportunity to examine the process by which the target company and acquiring company arrived at the final merger value versus questioning the substance of the merger would serve the M&A and shareholder community well.In the absence of a legislative fix, the Court of Chancery has, at the least, provided buyers, sellers, and arbitrageurs alike, with scenarios that will likely result in the court determining that the merger price is in fact the best representation of fair value. Essentially, when the inputs typically used by the court for determining fair value are in some way flawed, the court will likely conclude that the merger price is the best representation of fair value.

From discs to bulges: effect of mergers on the morphology of galaxies

We study the effect of mergers on the morphology of galaxies by means of the simulated merger tree approach first proposed by Moster et al. This method combines N-body cosmological simulations and semi-analytic techniques to extract realistic initial conditions for galaxy mergers. These are then evolved using high resolution hydrodynamical simulations, which include dark matter, stars, cold gas in the disc and hot gas in the halo. We show that the satellite mass accretion is not as effective as previously thought, as there is substantial stellar stripping before the final merger. The fraction of stellar disc mass transferred to the bulge is quite low, even in the case of a major merger, mainly due to the dispersion of part of the stellar disc mass into the halo. We confirm the findings of Hopkins et al., that a gas rich disc is able to survive major mergers more efficiently. The enhanced star formation associated with the merger is not localised to the bulge of galaxy, but a substantial fraction takes place in the disc too. The inclusion of the hot gas reservoir in the galaxy model contributes to reducing the efficiency of bulge formation. Overall, our findings suggest that mergers are not as efficient as previously thought in transforming discs into bulges. This possibly alleviates some of the tensions between observations of bulgeless galaxies and the hierarchical scenario for structure formation.

THE CHESHIRE CAT GRAVITATIONAL LENS: THE FORMATION OF A MASSIVE FOSSIL GROUP

The Cheshire Cat is a relatively poor group of galaxies dominated by two luminous elliptical galaxies surrounded by at least four arcs from gravitationally lensed background galaxies that give the system a humorous appearance. Our combined optical/X-ray study of this system reveals that it is experiencing a line of sight merger between two groups with a roughly equal mass ratio with a relative velocity of ?1350 km s?1. One group was most likely a low-mass fossil group, while the other group would have almost fit the classical definition of a fossil group. The collision manifests itself in a bimodal galaxy velocity distribution, an elevated central X-ray temperature and luminosity indicative of a shock, and gravitational arc centers that do not coincide with either large elliptical galaxy. One of the luminous elliptical galaxies has a double nucleus embedded off-center in the stellar halo. The luminous ellipticals should merge in less than a Gyr, after which observers will see a massive 1.2?1.5 ? 1014 fossil group with an brightest group galaxy at its center. Thus, the Cheshire Cat offers us the first opportunity to study a fossil group progenitor. We discuss the limitations of the classical definition of a fossil group in terms of magnitude gaps between the member galaxies. We also suggest that if the merging of fossil (or near-fossil) groups is a common avenue for creating present-day fossil groups, the time lag between the final galactic merging of the system and the onset of cooling in the shock-heated core could account for the observed lack of well-developed cool cores in some fossil groups.

EU Competition Law Developments in the Aviation Sector: July to December 2014

The second half of 2014 has seen a dramatic increase in competition law activity in all areas, from mergers, to State aid as well as private enforcement. The European Commission ('Commission'), in particular, wrapped up no less than eighteen aviation related State aid investigations, perhaps reflecting the desire of the outgoing Commissioner's desire to clear the backlog of cases, but also probably relating to the Commission's adoption of the new Aviation Guidelines published in February this year and supplemented with new guidelines for rescue and restructuring aid to non-financial undertakings. Only four of the eighteen cases related solely to State aid granted to airlines and fourteen cases related to aid granted to airports with some cases also considering the potential State aid grated to one or more carriers operating at the airport. With an increase in the number of follow-on damages actions (taken by those affected by allegedly anti-competitive activity) there has also been an increase in the number of judgments handed down and still awaited clarifying specific points of law, particularly at the moment surrounding the complainant's access to the Commission's decision and documents on its file. The Commission's airfreight decision is notable insofar as there are now follow-on damages actions being taken in Germany, The Netherlands, Norway and the UK, as well as in the US. In the context of mergers, the Commission was notified of at least nine aviation related mergers, of which two related to airlines (Alitalia and CSA Czech Airways), two related to airports (in Croatia and the UK), four related to ancillary services (fuel, IT, pilot training and aircraft leasing) and final merger related to space launchers, satellite subsystems and missile propulsion.

A NEW CHANNEL FOR THE FORMATION OF KINEMATICALLY DECOUPLED CORES IN EARLY-TYPE GALAXIES

We present the formation of a Kinematically Decoupled Core (KDC) in an elliptical galaxy, resulting from a major merger simulation of two disk galaxies. We show that although the two progenitor galaxies are initially following a prograde orbit, strong reactive forces during the merger can cause a short-lived change of their orbital spin; the two progenitors follow a retrograde orbit right before their final coalescence. This results in a central kinematic decoupling and the formation of a large-scale (~2 kpc radius) counter-rotating core (CRC) at the center of the final elliptical-like merger remnant (M*=1.3x10^11 Msun), while its outer parts keep the rotation direction of the initial orbital spin. The stellar velocity dispersion distribution of the merger remnant galaxy exhibits two symmetrical off-centered peaks, comparable to the observed "2-sigma galaxies". The KDC/CRC consists mainly of old, pre-merger population stars (older than 5 Gyr), remaining prominent in the center of the galaxy for more than 2 Gyr after the coalescence of its progenitors. Its properties are consistent with KDCs observed in massive elliptical galaxies. This new channel for the formation of KDCs from prograde mergers is in addition to previously known formation scenarios from retrograde mergers and can help towards explaining the substantial fraction of KDCs observed in early-type galaxies.

Approximate Merging of Two Adjacent B-Spline Surfaces Using Least Square Approximation

The approximate merging of two adjacent B-spline surfaces into a B-spline surface is the core problem in data communication. A novel algorithm is presented in this paper to solve this problem. In this algorithm, we compute the merging error using L2 norm instead of the Euclidean norm, the process of merging is minimizing the approximate error and we only need solve a system of linear equations to get the final merging surface. In order to reduce the merging error, we add a weighed function on objective function to start the next merger; this function adds greater weight on where error is larger. After the next merger, the merging error will be significantly reduced. Finally, some examples are given to demonstrate the effectiveness and validity of the proposed algorithm.

Resonantly enhanced kicks from equatorial small mass-ratio inspirals

We calculate the kick generated by an eccentric black hole binary inspiral as it evolves through a resonant orbital configuration where the precession of the system temporarily halts. As a result, the effects of the asymmetric emission of gravitational waves build up coherently over a large number of orbits. Our results are calculated using black hole perturbation theory in the limit where the ratio of the masses of the orbiting objects $\ensuremath{\epsilon}=m/M$ is small. The resulting kick velocity scales as ${\ensuremath{\epsilon}}^{3/2}$, much faster than the ${\ensuremath{\epsilon}}^{2}$ scaling of the kick generated by the final merger. For the most extreme case of a very eccentric ($e\ensuremath{\sim}1$) inspiral around a maximally spinning black hole, we find kicks close to $30\text{ }000\text{ }{\ensuremath{\epsilon}}^{3/2}\text{ }\text{ }\mathrm{km}/\mathrm{s}$, enough to dislodge an intermediate-mass black hole from its host globular cluster. In reality, such extreme inspirals should be very rare. Nonetheless, the astrophysical impact of kicks in less extreme inspirals could be astrophysically significant.

Evolution of star clusters in a cosmological tidal field

We present a method to couple N-body star cluster simulations to a cosmological tidal field, using the Astrophysical Multipurpose Software Environment. We apply this method to star clusters embedded in the CosmoGrid dark matter-only LambdaCDM simulation. Our star clusters are born at z = 10 (corresponding to an age of the Universe of about 500 Myr) by selecting a dark matter particle and initializing a star cluster with 32,000 stars on its location. We then follow the dynamical evolution of the star cluster within the cosmological environment. We compare the evolution of star clusters in two Milky-Way size haloes with a different accretion history. The mass loss of the star clusters is continuous irrespective of the tidal history of the host halo, but major merger events tend to increase the rate of mass loss. From the selected two dark matter haloes, the halo that experienced the larger number of mergers tends to drive a smaller mass loss rate from the embedded star clusters, even though the final masses of both haloes are similar. We identify two families of star clusters: native clusters, which become part of the main halo before its final major merger event, and the immigrant clusters, which are accreted upon or after this event; native clusters tend to evaporate more quickly than immigrant clusters. Accounting for the evolution of the dark matter halo causes immigrant star clusters to retain more mass than when the z=0 tidal field is taken as a static potential. The reason for this is the weaker tidal field experienced by immigrant star clusters before merging with the larger dark matter halo.

깊이정보를 이용한 케스케이드 방식의 실시간 손 영역 검출

본 논문에서는 깊이정보를 이용하여 케스케이드 방식에 기반한 실시간 손 영역 검출 방법을 제안한다. 실험 환경 조명 조건의 변화로부터 빠르고 안정적으로 손 영역을 검출하기 위해 깊이정보만을 이용한 특징을 제안하며, 부스팅과 케스케이드 방법을 이용한 분류기를 통해 손 영역 검출 방법을 제안한다. 먼저, 깊이정보만을 이용한 특징을 추출하기 위해 입력영상의 중심 깊이 값과 분할된 블록의 평균 깊이 값의 차이를 계산하고, 모든 크기의 손 영역 검출을 위해 중심 깊이 값과 2차 선형 모델을 이용하여 손 영역의 크기를 예측한다. 그리고 손 영역으로부터의 특징 추출을 통한 학습 및 인식을 위해 케스케이드 방식을 적용한다. 본 논문에서 제안한 분류기는 정확도를 유지하고 속도를 향상시키기 위하여 각 스테이지를 한 개의 약분류기로 구성하고 검출율을 만족하면서 오류율이 가장 낮은 임계값을 구하여 과적합 학습을 수행한다. 학습된 분류기를 이용하여 손 영역을 분류하고, 병합단계를 통해 최종 손 영역을 검출한다. 마지막으로 성능 검증을 위해 기존의 다양한 아다부스트와 정량적, 정성적 비교 분석을 통해 제안하는 손 영역 검출 알고리즘의 효율성을 입증한다. This paper proposes a method of using depth information to detect the hand region in real-time based on the cascade method. In order to ensure stable and speedy detection of the hand region even under conditions of lighting changes in the test environment, this study uses only features based on depth information, and proposes a method of detecting the hand region by means of a classifier that uses boosting and cascading methods. First, in order to extract features using only depth information, we calculate the difference between the depth value at the center of the input image and the average of depth value within the segmented block, and to ensure that hand regions of all sizes will be detected, we use the central depth value and the second order linear model to predict the size of the hand region. The cascade method is applied to implement training and recognition by extracting features from the hand region. The classifier proposed in this paper maintains accuracy and enhances speed by composing each stage into a single weak classifier and obtaining the threshold value that satisfies the detection rate while exhibiting the lowest error rate to perform over-fitting training. The trained classifier is used to classify the hand region, and detects the final hand region in the final merger stage. Lastly, to verify performance, we perform quantitative and qualitative comparative analyses with various conventional AdaBoost algorithms to confirm the efficiency of the hand region detection algorithm proposed in this paper.