DXL: a sounding rocket mission for the study of solar wind charge exchange and local hot bubble X-ray emission

The Diffuse X-rays from the Local galaxy (DXL) mission is an approved sounding rocket project with a first launch scheduled around December 2012. Its goal is to identify and separate the X-ray emission generated by solar wind charge exchange from that of the local hot bubble to improve our understanding of both. With 1,000 cm² proportional counters and grasp of about 10 cm² sr both in the 1/4 and 3/4 keV bands, DXL will achieve in a 5-min flight what cannot be achieved by current and future X-ray satellites.     

Hazard assessment model for debris flow prediction

Debris flow disasters have plagued Taiwan in recent decades, and caused casualties and destruction of property. Several methods, including the numerical method, statistical method, and experimental method, have been adopted in recent years to predict debris flow, and more recently, the neural network (NN) and the genetic algorithm (GA) methods have been introduced to simulate the occurrence of debris flows. This study proposes using the GA to weigh seven important variables according to principles similar to natural selection. The study then simultaneously inputs these variables into a NN model to predict debris flow occurrences based on relevant factors. There were 154 potential cases of debris flow collected from eastern Taiwan and fed into the model for testing. The average ratio of successful prediction reached 94.94%, which demonstrates that the proposed model can provide stable and reliable results for predicting debris flow in hazard mitigation and guard systems.     

Iron oxides in comet 81P/Wild 2

Abstract– We have used synchrotron Fe‐XANES, XRS, microRaman, and SEM‐TEM analyses of Stardust track 41 slice and track 121 terminal area slices to identify Fe oxide (magnetite‐hematite and amorphous oxide), Fe‐Ti oxide, and V‐rich chromite (Fe‐Cr‐V‐Ti‐Mn oxide) grains ranging in size from 200 nm to ～10 μm. They co‐exist with relict FeNi metal. Both Fe‐XANES and microRaman analyses suggest that the FeNi metal and magnetite (Fe₂O₃FeO) also contain some hematite (Fe₂O₃). The FeNi has been partially oxidized (probably during capture), but on the basis of our experimental work with a light‐gas gun and microRaman analyses, we believe that some of the magnetite‐hematite mixtures may have originated on Wild 2. The terminal samples from track 121 also contain traces of sulfide and Mg‐rich silicate minerals. Our results show an unequilibrated mixture of reduced and oxidized Fe‐bearing minerals in the Wild 2 samples in an analogous way to mineral assemblages seen in carbonaceous chondrites and interplanetary dust particles. The samples contain some evidence for terrestrial contamination, for example, occasional Zn‐bearing grains and amorphous Fe oxide in track 121 for which evidence of a cometary origin is lacking.     

Analysis of climate policy targets under uncertainty

Although policymaking in response to the climate change threat is essentially a challenge of risk management, most studies of the relation of emissions targets to desired climate outcomes are either deterministic or subject to a limited representation of the underlying uncertainties. Monte Carlo simulation, applied to the MIT Integrated Global System Model (an integrated economic and earth system model of intermediate complexity), is used to analyze the uncertain outcomes that flow from a set of century-scale emissions paths developed originally for a study by the U.S. Climate Change Science Program. The resulting uncertainty in temperature change and other impacts under these targets is used to illustrate three insights not obtainable from deterministic analyses: that the reduction of extreme temperature changes under emissions constraints is greater than the reduction in the median reduction; that the incremental gain from tighter constraints is not linear and depends on the target to be avoided; and that comparing median results across models can greatly understate the uncertainty in any single model.     

A computational chemical study of penetration and displacement of water films near mineral surfaces

A series of molecular dynamics simulations have been performed on organic–water mixtures near mineral surfaces. These simulations show that, in contrast to apolar compounds, small polar organic compounds such as phenols can penetrate through thin water films to adsorb on these mineral surfaces. Furthermore, additional simulations involving demixing of an organic–water mixture near a surfactant-covered mineral surface demonstrate that even low concentrations of adsorbed polar compounds can induce major changes in mineral surface wettability, allowing sorption of apolar molecules. This strongly supports a two-stage adsorption mechanism for organic solutes, involving initial migration of small polar organic molecules to the mineral surface followed by water film displacement due to co-adsorption of the more apolar organic compounds, thus converting an initial water-wet mineral system to an organic-covered surface. This has profound implications for studies of petroleum reservoir diagenesis and wettability changes.