California Institute of Technology

About: California Institute of Technology is a education organization based out in Pasadena, California, United States. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Galaxy & Redshift. The organization has 57649 authors who have published 146691 publications receiving 8620287 citations. The organization is also known as: Caltech & Cal Tech.

Gaia Data Release 1 Summary of the astrometric, photometric, and survey properties

Abstract: Context. At about 1000 days after the launch of Gaia we present the first Gaia data release, Gaia DR1, consisting of astrometry and photometry for over 1 billion sources brighter than magnitude 20.7. Aims: A summary of Gaia DR1 is presented along with illustrations of the scientific quality of the data, followed by a discussion of the limitations due to the preliminary nature of this release. Methods: The raw data collected by Gaia during the first 14 months of the mission have been processed by the Gaia Data Processing and Analysis Consortium (DPAC) and turned into an astrometric and photometric catalogue. Results: Gaia DR1 consists of three components: a primary astrometric data set which contains the positions, parallaxes, and mean proper motions for about 2 million of the brightest stars in common with the Hipparcos and Tycho-2 catalogues - a realisation of the Tycho-Gaia Astrometric Solution (TGAS) - and a secondary astrometric data set containing the positions for an additional 1.1 billion sources. The second component is the photometric data set, consisting of mean G-band magnitudes for all sources. The G-band light curves and the characteristics of 3000 Cepheid and RR Lyrae stars, observed at high cadence around the south ecliptic pole, form the third component. For the primary astrometric data set the typical uncertainty is about 0.3 mas for the positions and parallaxes, and about 1 mas yr-1 for the proper motions. A systematic component of 0.3 mas should be added to the parallax uncertainties. For the subset of 94 000 Hipparcos stars in the primary data set, the proper motions are much more precise at about 0.06 mas yr-1. For the secondary astrometric data set, the typical uncertainty of the positions is 10 mas. The median uncertainties on the mean G-band magnitudes range from the mmag level to0.03 mag over the magnitude range 5 to 20.7. Conclusions: Gaia DR1 is an important milestone ahead of the next Gaia data release, which will feature five-parameter astrometry for all sources. Extensive validation shows that Gaia DR1 represents a major advance in the mapping of the heavens and the availability of basic stellar data that underpin observational astrophysics. Nevertheless, the very preliminary nature of this first Gaia data release does lead to a number of important limitations to the data quality which should be carefully considered before drawing conclusions from the data.

Decorrelation in interferometric radar echoes

Abstract: A radar interferometric technique for topographic mapping of surfaces, implemented utilizing a single synthetic aperture radar (SAR) system in a nearly repeating orbit, is discussed. The authors characterize the various sources contributing to the echo correlation statistics, and isolate the term which most closely describes surficial change. They then examine the application of this approach to topographic mapping of vegetated surfaces which may be expected to possess varying backscatter over time. It is found that there is decorrelation increasing with time but that digital terrain model generation remains feasible. The authors present such a map of a forested area in Oregon which also includes some nearly unvegetated lava flows. Such a technique could provide a global digital terrain map. >

Stress Singularities Resulting From Various Boundary Conditions in Angular Corners of Plates in Extension

Abstract: As an analog to the bending case published in an earlier paper, the stress singularities in plates subjected to extension in their plane are discussed. Three sets of boundary conditions on the radial edges are investigated: free-free, clamped-clamped, and clamped-free. Providing the vertex angle is less than 180 degrees, it is found that unbounded stresses occur at the vertex only in the case of the mixed boundary condition with the strength of the singularity being somewhat stronger than for the similar bending case. For vertex angles between 180 and 360 degrees, all the cases considered may have stress singularities. In amplification of some work of Southwell, it is shown that there are certain analogies between the characteristic equations governing the stresses in extension and bending, respectively, if ν, Poisson's ratio, is replaced by -ν. Finally, the free-free extensional plate behaves locally at the origin exactly the same as a clamped-clamped plate in bending, independent of Poisson's ratio. In conclusion, it is noted that the free-free case analysis may be applied to stress concentrations in V-shaped notches.

Capacity of fading channels with channel side information

Abstract: We obtain the Shannon capacity of a fading channel with channel side information at the transmitter and receiver, and at the receiver alone. The optimal power adaptation in the former case is "water-pouring" in time, analogous to water-pouring in frequency for time-invariant frequency-selective fading channels. Inverting the channel results in a large capacity penalty in severe fading.

Observation of Electron-Antineutrino Disappearance at Daya Bay

Abstract: The Daya Bay Reactor Neutrino Experiment has measured a nonzero value for the neutrino mixing angle θ13 with a significance of 5.2 standard deviations. Antineutrinos from six 2.9 GW_(th) reactors were detected in six antineutrino detectors deployed in two near (flux-weighted baseline 470 m and 576 m) and one far (1648 m) underground experimental halls. With a 43 000 ton–GW_(th)–day live-time exposure in 55 days, 10 416 (80 376) electron-antineutrino candidates were detected at the far hall (near halls). The ratio of the observed to expected number of antineutrinos at the far hall is R=0.940± 0.011(stat.)±0.004(syst.). A rate-only analysis finds sin^22θ_(13)=0.092±0.016(stat.)±0.005(syst.) in a three-neutrino framework.