A Comparision of the Number of Rational Places of Certain Function Fields to the Hasse-Weil Bounds

We give explicitly the number of rational places of certain function fields in terms of the reciprocals of the zeros of the function fields in question. The results are then compared with the Hasse-Weil bounds by using the approximation theorems of Dirichlet and Kronecker and it turns out that in many of these function fields the number of rational places is near the upper Hasse-Weil bound. Keywords:Function fields, Diophantine approximation, Exponential sums.     

Numerical Study on Effects of Fuel Mixture Fraction and Li-6 Enrichment on Neutronic Parameters of a Fusion–Fission Hybrid Reactor

This study presents the effects of mixture fractions of nuclear fuels (mixture of fissile–fertile fuels and mixture of two different fertile fuels) and ⁶Li enrichment on the neutronic parameters (the tritium breeding ratio, TBR, the fission rate, FR, the energy multiplication ratio, M, the fissile breeding rate, FBR, the neutron leakage out of blanket, L, and the peak-to-average fission power density ratio, Γ) of a deuterium–tritium (D–T) fusion neutron-driven hybrid blanket. Three different fertile fuels (²³²Th, ²³⁸U and ²⁴⁴Cm), and one fissile fuel (²³⁵U) were selected as the nuclear fuel. Two different coolants (pressurized helium and natural lithium) were used for the nuclear heat transfer out of the fuel zone (FZ). The Boltzmann transport equation was solved numerically for obtaining the neutronic parameters with the help of the neutron transport code XSDRNPM/SCALE4.4a. In addition, these calculations were performed by also using the MCNP4B code. The sub-limits of the mixture fractions and ⁶Li enrichment were determined for the tritium self-sufficiency. The considered hybrid reactor can be operated in a self-sufficiency mode in the cases with the fuel mixtures mixed with a fraction of equal to or greater than these sub-limits. Furthermore, the numerical results show that the fissile fuel breeding and fission potentials of the blankets with the helium coolant are higher than with the lithium coolant.     

Aurora: a new model and architecture for data stream management

This paper describes the basic processing model and architecture of Aurora, a new system to manage data streams for monitoring applications. Monitoring applications differ substantially from conventional business data processing. The fact that a software system must process and react to continual inputs from many sources (e.g., sensors) rather than from human operators requires one to rethink the fundamental architecture of a DBMS for this application area. In this paper, we present Aurora, a new DBMS currently under construction at Brandeis University, Brown University, and M.I.T. We first provide an overview of the basic Aurora model and architecture and then describe in detail a stream-oriented set of operators.Received: 12 September 2002, Accepted: 26 March 2003, Published online: 21 July 2003Edited by Y. Ioannidis     

Agent-based simulation of electricity markets: a survey of tools

Agent-based simulation has been a popular technique in modeling and analyzing electricity markets in recent years. The main objective of this paper is to study existing agent-based simulation packages for electricity markets. We first provide an overview of electricity markets and briefly introduce the agent-based simulation technique. We then investigate several general-purpose agent-based simulation tools. Next, we review four popular agent-based simulation packages developed for electricity markets and several agent-based simulation models reported in the literature. We compare all the reviewed packages and models and identify their common features and design issues. Based on the study, we describe an agent-based simulation framework for electricity markets to facilitate the development of future models for electricity markets.     

换流站直流刀闸发热改造

就两起换流站直流刀闸发热的问题进行技术分析,从技术、经济及工程施工难易程度方面进行方案比较,在回路电阻计算的基础上提出了增加旁路导电带的改造方案.实施改造后在实际运行中测量结果表明改造结果良好.     

我国缺水风险分布状况及其对策

在对风险理论及水资源风险研究进展回顾与展望的基础上，探讨了水资源短缺风险主导因子的辨识方法，提出了采用缺水率、人均缺水量和缺水边际损失3个指标的缺水风险评价指标体系，采用模糊层次分析评价方法对全国二级水资源分区的缺水风险进行了综合评价。评价结果表明，全国现状情况下有33个二级水资源分区面临着不同程度的水资源短缺风险，必须采取工程和非工程等防范措施和有效调控，方可减轻缺水风险对我国经济社会发展的危害程度。     

Critical Flow Velocity in Slurry Transporting Horizontal Pipelines

A new empirical equation is proposed for predicting critical flow velocity in slurry-transporting horizontal pipelines. An analysis of the settling velocity of solid particles, including the effect of solid particle concentration, is undertaken because of this parameter's importance. This study builds on a previous study carried out to consider the settling velocity of a single solid particle in clear-water condition, which is actually different from the real physics of the hydrotransport phenomenon of the solid particles. Two earlier proposed methods are applied to the calculation of the settling velocity of a solid particle, including the effect of solid particle concentration within the suspending fluid. The most appropriate method for slurry transportation among these two methods is discussed and used in the analysis of critical flow velocity. The new proposed equation is based on analysis of data from the experiments as well as data from the earlier studies. A unique feature of the proposed equation is that it can be applied to noncohesive, uniform, and nonuniform coarse solid particles. In a comparison of prediction accuracy with four existing relationships, the proposed equation was found to give significantly better agreements with the observed data. Therefore, it can be stated that the new equation can safely be used by designers in the problems of slurry transportation.     

Still Image Processing on Coarse-Grained Reconfigurable Array Architectures

Due to the increasing demands on efficiency, performance and flexibility reconfigurable computational architectures are very promising candidates in embedded systems design. Recently coarse-grained reconfigurable array architectures (CGRAs), such as the ADRES CGRA and its corresponding DRESC compiler are gaining more popularity due to several technological breakthroughs in this area. We investigate the mapping of two image processing algorithms, Wavelet encoding and decoding, and TIFF compression on this novel type of array architectures in a systematic way. The results of our experiments show that CGRAs based on ADRES and its DRESC compiler technology deliver improved performance levels for these two benchmark applications when compared to results obtained on a state-of-the-art commercial DSP platform, the c64x DSP from Texas Instruments. ADRES/DRESC can beat its performance by at least 50% in cycle count and the power consumption even drops to 10% of the published numbers of the c64x DSP.     

Lactic acid bacteria profiles and tyramine and tryptamine contents of Turkish tulum cheeses

Tulum cheese, commonly produced in Turkey, is a traditional Turkish dairy product made from raw milk. In this research, 20 samples of tulum cheese were purchased from different markets in Isparta and Ankara (Turkey) and the populations of lactic acid bacteria (LAB) and contents of biogenic amines of Turkish tulum cheeses were investigated. The mean counts of LAB (as log10 cfu/g) were 7.22±0.67 on MRS agar, 6.93±1.77 on M17 agar, 7.28±0.72 on APT agar and 5.98±2.20 on ADA agar. Isolates of LAB obtained from 20 tulum cheeses were characterised as lactobacilli (48.5%), enterococci (32.7%), lactococci (15.8%) and streptococci (3.0%). Lactobacillus paracasei ssp. paracasei, Lactobacillus bifermentans and Enterococcus faecium predominated among the LAB in the samples of tulum cheeses; these organisms represented 30.2% of the isolates. As amino acids, tyrosine and tryptophan were determined in tulum cheeses. Tyramine and tryptamine, biogenic amines, were found at 0.00–329.00 and 0.32–40.44 mg/kg, respectively.