Pullout behavior of biocement–geosynthetic reinforcement system: a parametric study

Acta Geotechnica - In the biocement–geosynthetic system, biocement is combined with geosynthetic to increase the pullout resistance of the geosynthetic and thereby the stability of reinforced...     

Intelligent ship traffic monitoring for oil spill prevention: risk based decision support building on AIS

The paper describes a model, which estimates the risk levels of individual crude oil tankers. The intended use of the model, which is ready for trial implementation at The Norwegian Coastal Administrations new Vard? VTS (Vessel Traffic Service) centre, is to facilitate the comparison of ships and to support a risk based decision on which ships to focus attention on. For a VTS operator, tasked with monitoring hundreds of ships, this is a valuable decision support tool. The model answers the question, "Which ships are likely to produce an oil spill accident, and how much is it likely to spill?".     

Jet phenomena above null points of the coronal magnetic field

Short-lived plasma jets of various scales, from giant X-ray jets more than 300 Mm in extent to numerous small jets with sizes typical of macrospicules, are the phenomena observed in the solar corona in extreme ultraviolet and X-ray emission. Small jets are particularly prominent in polar coronal holes. They are close neighbors of tiny bright loops and coincide in time with their sudden brightening and increase in size. The geometric shape of the jets and their location suggest that they arise near singular null points of the coronal magnetic field. These points appear in coronal holes due to the emergence of small bipolar or unipolar magnetic structures within large-scale unipolar cells. Polar jets show a distinct vertical plasma motion in a coronal hole that introduces significant momentum and mass into the solar wind flow. Investigating the dynamics of polar jets can elucidate certain details in the problem of fast solar wind acceleration.     

On shear-wave triplication in transversely isotropic media

The exact solution to the problem of qSV triplication in homogenous transversely isotropic media has been long known, but the result is algebraically complex and is seldom applied in practice. We present an appropriate approximation (not assuming weak qSV-anisotropy) that simplifies the conditions for the onset of off-axis triplication as anisotropy is increased, identifying the anisotropy parameter σ as the controlling parameter. It follows that commonly reported surface-seismic P-wave move-out measurements imply that many formations in the earth's sedimentary crust support off-axis qSV triplications. For typical Vp/Vs velocity ratios and a horizontally stratified earth, however, off-axis qSV triplications appear to only occur for shear-wave incidence angles too far from the vertical to be sampled by surface-seismic converted-wave survey geometries.     

A procedure to develop scalable models for the transient response of sleepers in conventional and high-speed railway lines and implementation to the vertical vibration mode

This paper presents a procedure to develop scalable reduced models for the through-the soil interaction and traveling wave effects of distant sleepers in a long railway track. For development purposes, and, without loss of generality, the geometry of the sleepers is consistent with the UIC-60 track system commonly used in European high speed rail and the vertical vibration mode is considered. The ballast and the effects of soil layering are not considered in the present paper; however, it is the subject of ongoing research. The proposed reduced models are based on B-Spline impulse response functions (BIRF) of the sleepers only as computed through boundary element method (BEM) solutions of the full model, preserve the frequency content of the full models, and they are highly accurate within the assumptions of linear isotropic and homogeneous soil media. They are expressed in a scalable form with respect to soil properties and sleeper spacing. In particular, the BIRFs of distant sleepers can be accurately approximated by appropriate scaling operations of time and amplitude of a reference sleeper BIRF while retaining all dynamic characteristics of the full model. Three main scaling parameters are proposed: (i) the apparent propagation velocity, (ii) the geometric damping coefficient, and (iii) the soil properties of a reference soil (i.e., the shear modulus and shear wave velocity). The models are validated through comparisons with other BEM solutions, and the accuracy and efficiency are established. The proposed models are developed as part of an NSF funded research on vibrations induced by high-speed rail traffic and are consistent with the associated train and rail models and a multi-system interface coupling (MSIC) technique that were developed as a part of the project and presented in companion papers. The proposed procedure forms the framework for developing scaled reduced models for other vibration modes and different sleeper geometries and can be generalized to include any foundation type or layered soil profiles.     

Race,Space, and Struggles for Mobility: Transportation Impacts on African Americans in Oakland and the East Bay

Abstract

A long history of overt discrimination left an enduring racialized imprint upon the geography of the East Bay. While the benefits of a metropolitan decentralization of jobs, housing, and public investment fell to Whites, discrimination in employment and housing trapped African Americans in urban neighborhoods burdened by infrastructure encroachment and divestment. By circa 1970, overt discrimination succumbed to new, racially neutral, legal, and administrative forms, including regional planning processes. Using an environmental racism framework, we show that these new forms reproduced the existing racialized geography by means of new inequalities in representation and transportation service provision. These new regional transportation policies, like those challenged by a 2005 civil rights lawsuit, favored the mobility needs of more affluent suburbanites over those of African American East Bay bus riders. These policies, layered onto an existing racialized geography, reinforced existing inequalities by failing to address racial barriers to opportunity in the built environment. [Key words: transportation, race, segregation, Oakland]     

Analysis of Magnetic Shear in An X17 Solar Flare on October 28, 2003

An X17 class (GOES soft X-ray) two-ribbon solar flare on October 28, 2003 is analyzed in order to determine the relationship between the timing of the impulsive phase of the flare and the magnetic shear change in the flaring region. EUV observations made by the Transition Region and Coronal Explorer (TRACE) show a clear decrease in the shear of the flare footpoints during the flare. The shear change stopped in the middle of the impulsive phase. The observations are interpreted in terms of the splitting of the sheared envelope field of the greatly sheared core rope during the early phase of the flare. We have also investigated the temporal correlation between the EUV emission from the brightenings observed by TRACE and the hard X-ray (HXR) emission (E > 150 keV) observed by the anticoincidence system (ACS) of the spectrometer SPI on board the ESA INTEGRAL satellite. The correlation between these two emissions is very good, and the HXR sources (RHESSI) late in the flare are located within the two EUV ribbons. These observations are favorable to the explanation that the EUV brightenings mainly result from direct bombardment of the atmosphere by the energetic particles accelerated at the reconnection site, as does the HXR emission. However, if there is a high temperature (T > 20 MK) HXR source close to the loop top, a contribution of thermal conduction to the EUV brightenings cannot be ruled out.     

Farside explorer: unique science from a mission to the farside of the moon

Farside Explorer is a proposed Cosmic Vision medium-size mission to the farside of the Moon consisting of two landers and an instrumented relay satellite. The farside of the Moon is a unique scientific platform in that it is shielded from terrestrial radio-frequency interference, it recorded the primary differentiation and evolution of the Moon, it can be continuously monitored from the Earth–Moon L2 Lagrange point, and there is a complete lack of reflected solar illumination from the Earth. Farside Explorer will exploit these properties and make the first radio-astronomy measurements from the most radio-quiet region of near-Earth space, determine the internal structure and thermal evolution of the Moon, from crust to core, and quantify impact hazards in near-Earth space by the measurement of flashes generated by impact events. The Farside Explorer flight system includes two identical solar-powered landers and a science/telecommunications relay satellite to be placed in a halo orbit about the Earth–Moon L2 Lagrange point. One lander would explore the largest and oldest recognized impact basin in the Solar System— the South Pole–Aitken basin—and the other would investigate the primordial highlands crust. Radio astronomy, geophysical, and geochemical instruments would be deployed on the surface, and the relay satellite would continuously monitor the surface for impact events.