Convergence of Probability Measures. By P. Billingsley. Chichester, Sussex, Wiley, 1968. xii, 253 p. 9 1/4“. 117s.

Convergence of Probability Measures

QUANTUM gravitational effects are usually ignored in calculations of the formation and evolution of black holes. The justification for this is that the radius of curvature of space-time outside the event horizon is very large compared to the Planck length (Għ/c3)1/2 ≈ 10−33 cm, the length scale on which quantum fluctuations of the metric are expected to be of order unity. This means that the energy density of particles created by the gravitational field is small compared to the space-time curvature. Even though quantum effects may be small locally, they may still, however, add up to produce a significant effect over the lifetime of the Universe ≈ 1017 s which is very long compared to the Planck time ≈ 10−43 s. The purpose of this letter is to show that this indeed may be the case: it seems that any black hole will create and emit particles such as neutrinos or photons at just the rate that one would expect if the black hole was a body with a temperature of (κ/2π) (ħ/2k) ≈ 10−6 (M/M)K where κ is the surface gravity of the black hole1. As a black hole emits this thermal radiation one would expect it to lose mass. This in turn would increase the surface gravity and so increase the rate of emission. The black hole would therefore have a finite life of the order of 1071 (M/M)−3 s. For a black hole of solar mass this is much longer than the age of the Universe. There might, however, be much smaller black holes which were formed by fluctuations in the early Universe2. Any such black hole of mass less than 1015 g would have evaporated by now. Near the end of its life the rate of emission would be very high and about 1030 erg would be released in the last 0.1 s. This is a fairly small explosion by astronomical standards but it is equivalent to about 1 million 1 Mton hydrogen bombs. It is often said that nothing can escape from a black hole. But in 1974, Stephen Hawking realized that, owing to quantum effects, black holes should emit particles with a thermal distribution of energies — as if the black hole had a temperature inversely proportional to its mass. In addition to putting black-hole thermodynamics on a firmer footing, this discovery led Hawking to postulate 'black hole explosions', as primordial black holes end their lives in an accelerating release of energy.

Black Hole Explosions

I. the origin of species by means of natural selection

The Theory of Matrices. By F R. Gantmacher. Two volumes, pp. 374 and 276. 1959. (Translated from the Russian by K. A. Hirsch; Chelsea Publishing Company, New York)

The task of quantizing general relativity raises serious questions about the meaning of the present formulation and interpretation of quantum mechanics when applied to so fundamental a structure as the space-time geometry itself. This paper seeks to clarify the foundations of quantum mechanics. It presents a reformulation of quantum theory in a form believed suitable for application to general relativity. The aim is not to deny or contradict the conventional formulation of quantum theory, which has demonstrated its usefulness in an overwhelming variety of problems, but rather to supply a new, more general and complete formulation, from which the conventional interpretation can be deduced. The relationship of this new formulation to the older formulation is therefore that of a metatheory to a theory, that is, it is an underlying theory in which the nature and consistency, as well as the realm of applicability, of the older theory can be investigated and clarified.

"relative State" Formulation of Quantum Mechanics

http://staff.mechmining.uq.edu.au/klimenko/pub/pdf/Prog_Energy_Combust_Sci_1999_p.pdf

Conditional moment closure for turbulent combustion

A new modeling approach—multiple mapping conditioning (MMC)—is introduced to treat mixing and reaction in turbulent flows. The model combines the advantages of the probability density function and the conditional moment closure methods and is based on a certain generalization of the mapping closure concept. An equivalent stochastic formulation of the MMC model is given. The validity of the closuring hypothesis of the model is demonstrated by a comparison with direct numerical simulation results for the three-stream mixing problem.

The modeling of turbulent reactive flows based on multiple mapping conditioning

The CO2 with superior thermo-physical properties has numerous applications in nuclear reactor, power plant, refrigeration and air conditioning systems as well as in many engineering and industrial applications. The complex phenomenon of thermal and hydrodynamic behaviour associated with supercritical CO2 is a continuing research topic for many researchers. The conventional correlations of turbulent forced convection heat transfer failed to predict the heat transfer and flow behaviour especially in the vicinity of the critical condition. The present paper presents a comprehensive review of heat transfer characteristics and correlations with supercritical CO2 employed under heating and cooling condition in horizontal channel or tube. An exhaustive review of implementation of supercritical CO2 used with horizontal and vertical orientation of tubes under turbulent flow condition and other operating parameters (inlet sCO2 pressure, mass flux, temperature, and heat flux) is also reported. In the present work, possible reasons for heat transfer deterioration under heating of supercritical CO2 are discussed. The characteristics of pressure drop, convective heat transfer behaviour, effect of buoyancy, the wall temperature distribution and finally the comparison among different correlations are reviewed extensively for supercritical CO2. The study of these correlations with their range of applicability provides a good insight for efficient thermal design and optimization of heat exchanger especially in thermal power plants.

A comprehensive review on heat transfer and pressure drop characteristics and correlations with supercritical CO2 under heating and cooling applications

This article follows the development of early UCG (underground coal gasification) ideas. Historical facts are discussed mainly from the technological perspective and early experiments in UCG are analyzed. Our search for the first successful UCG experiment brings to light a new finding, which was commonly overlooked in previous reviews. We also outline the key role that engineer and inventor A. G. Betts played in introducing technologies utilizing unmined coal; his original ideas are visible in the first successful UCG experiments and in modern UCG technology.

/pdf/early-ideas-in-underground-coal-gasification-and-their-v9bywds7hw.pdf

Early ideas in underground coal gasification and their evolution

This paper follows the evolution in understanding of the multiple mapping conditioning (MMC) approach for turbulent combustion and reviews different implementations of MMC models. As the MMC name suggests, the original version represents a consistent combination of CMC-type conditional equations (conditional moment closure) and generalised mapping closure. It seems that the strength of the MMC model, and especially that of its stochastic version, lies in a more general (and much more transparent) interpretation. In this new generalised interpretation, we can replace complicated derivations by physical reasoning and the model appears to be a natural extension of modelling approaches developed in recent decades. MMC can be seen as a methodology for enforcing certain known characteristics of turbulence on a conventional mixing model. This is achieved by localising the mixing operation in a reference space. The reference space variables are selected to emulate the properties of a turbulent flow which have a strong effect on reactive quantities. The best and simplest example is an MMC model which has a single reference variable emulating the mixture fraction. In diffusion flames turbulent fluctuations of reacting quantities are strongly correlated with fluctuations of the mixture fraction. By making mixing local in the reference mixture fraction space a CMC-type mixing closure is enforced. In the original interpretation of MMC the reference variables are modelled as Markov processes. Since the reference variables should emulate properties of turbulent flows as realistically as possible the next step, and the basis of generalised MMC, is to remove the Markovian restriction and set reference variables equal to traced Lagrangian quantities within DNS or LES flow fields. Indeed, no Markov value can emulate the mixture fraction better than the mixture fraction itself. (Using a Markov vector process of dimension higher than the number of conditioning variables represents a more economical alternative for producing reference variables in generalised MMC.) The generalised MMC approach effectively incorporates the mixture fraction-based models, the PDF methods and LES/DNS techniques into a single methodology with possibility of blending useful features developed previously for conventional models. The generalised approach to MMC stimulates a more flexible understanding of simulations using sparsely placed Lagrangian particles as tools that may provide accurate joint distributions of reactive scalars at relatively low computational cost. The physical reasoning behind the new interpretation of MMC is supported by example computations for a partially premixed methane/air diffusion flame (Sandia Flame D). The scheme utilises LES for the dynamic field and a sparse-Lagrangian filtered density function method with MMC mixing for the scalar field. Two different particle mixing schemes are tested. Simulations are performed using only 35,000 Lagrangian particles (of these only 10,000 are chemically active) on a single workstation. The relatively low computational cost allows the use of realistic chemical kinetics containing 34 reactive species and 219 reactions.

http://staff.mechmining.uq.edu.au/klimenko/pub/pdf/Flow_Turbul_Combust_2009_p.pdf

Alexander Y. Klimenko

Papers

Conditional moment closure for turbulent combustion

The modeling of turbulent reactive flows based on multiple mapping conditioning

A comprehensive review on heat transfer and pressure drop characteristics and correlations with supercritical CO2 under heating and cooling applications

Early ideas in underground coal gasification and their evolution

A Generalised Multiple Mapping Conditioning Approach for Turbulent Combustion