Jet Propulsion Laboratory

About: Jet Propulsion Laboratory is a facility organization based out in La Cañada Flintridge, California, United States. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Mars Exploration Program & Telescope. The organization has 8801 authors who have published 14333 publications receiving 548163 citations. The organization is also known as: JPL & NASA JPL.

Coded Communication over Fading Channels

Abstract: In studying the performance of coded communications over memoryless channels (with or without fading), the results are given as upper bounds on the average bit error probability (BEP). In principle, there are three different approaches to arriving at these bounds, all of which employ obtaining the so-called pairwise error probability , or the probability of choosing one symbol sequence over another for a given pair of possible transmitted symbol sequences, followed by a weighted summation over all pairwise events. In this chapter, we will focus on the results obtained from the third approach since these provide the tightest upper bounds on the true performance. The first emphasis will be placed on evaluating the pairwise error probability with and without CSI, following which we shall discuss how the results of these evaluations can be used via the transfer bound approach to evaluate average BEP of coded modulation transmitted over the fading channel.

Mineralogy and petrology of comet 81P/wild 2 nucleus samples

Abstract: The bulk of the comet 81P/Wild 2 (hereafter Wild 2) samples returned to Earth by the Stardust spacecraft appear to be weakly constructed mixtures of nanometer-scale grains, with occasional much larger (over 1 micrometer) ferromagnesian silicates, Fe-Ni sulfides, Fe-Ni metal, and accessory phases. The very wide range of olivine and low-Ca pyroxene compositions in comet Wild 2 requires a wide range of formation conditions, probably reflecting very different formation locations in the protoplanetary disk. The restricted compositional ranges of Fe-Ni sulfides, the wide range for silicates, and the absence of hydrous phases indicate that comet Wild 2 experienced little or no aqueous alteration. Less abundant Wild 2 materials include a refractory particle, whose presence appears to require radial transport in the early protoplanetary disk.

A Circumstellar Disk Around β Pictoris

Abstract: A circumstellar disk has been observed optically around the fourth-magnitude star Beta Pictoris. First detected in the infrared by the Infrared Astronomy Satellite last year, the disk is seen to extend to more than 400 astronomical units from the star, or more than twice the distance measured in the infrared by the Infrared Astronomy Satellite. The disk is presented to earth almost edge-on and is composed of solid particles in nearly coplanar orbits. The observed change in surface brightness with distance from the star implies that the mass density of the disk falls off with approximately the third power of the radius. Because the circumstellar material is in the form of a highly flattened disk rather than a spherical shell, it is presumed to be associated with planet formation. It seems likely that the system is relatively young and that planet formation either is occurring now around Beta Pictoris or has recently been completed.

DASI First Results: A Measurement of the Cosmic Microwave Background Angular Power Spectrum

Abstract: We present measurements of anisotropy in the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) from the first season of observations with the Degree Angular Scale Interferometer (DASI) The instrument was deployed at the South Pole in the austral summer 1999--2000, and made observations throughout the following austral winter We have measured the angular power spectrum of the CMB in the range 100

A dust-obscured massive maximum-starburst galaxy at a redshift of 6.34

Abstract: Massive present-day early-type (elliptical and lenticular) galaxies probably gained the bulk of their stellar mass and heavy elements through intense, dust-enshrouded starbursts--that is, increased rates of star formation--in the most massive dark-matter haloes at early epochs. However, it remains unknown how soon after the Big Bang massive starburst progenitors exist. The measured redshift (z) distribution of dusty, massive starbursts has long been suspected to be biased low in z owing to selection effects, as confirmed by recent findings of systems with redshifts as high as ~5 (refs 2-4). Here we report the identification of a massive starburst galaxy at z = 6.34 through a submillimetre colour-selection technique. We unambiguously determined the redshift from a suite of molecular and atomic fine-structure cooling lines. These measurements reveal a hundred billion solar masses of highly excited, chemically evolved interstellar medium in this galaxy, which constitutes at least 40 per cent of the baryonic mass. A `maximum starburst' converts the gas into stars at a rate more than 2,000 times that of the Milky Way, a rate among the highest observed at any epoch. Despite the overall downturn in cosmic star formation towards the highest redshifts, it seems that environments mature enough to form the most massive, intense starbursts existed at least as early as 880 million years after the Big Bang.