The most energetic planetary collisions attain shock pressures that result in abundant melting and vaporization. Accurate predictions of the extent of melting and vaporization require knowledge of ...vast regions of the phase diagrams of the constituent materials. To reach the liquid‐vapor phase boundary of silica, we conducted uniaxial shock‐and‐release experiments, where quartz was shocked to a state sufficient to initiate vaporization upon isentropic decompression (hundreds of GPa). The apparent temperature of the decompressing fluid was measured with a streaked optical pyrometer, and the bulk density was inferred by stagnation onto a standard window. To interpret the observed post‐shock temperatures, we developed a model for the apparent temperature of a material isentropically decompressing through the liquid‐vapor coexistence region. Using published thermodynamic data, we revised the liquid‐vapor boundary for silica and calculated the entropy on the quartz Hugoniot. The silica post‐shock temperature measurements, up to entropies beyond the critical point, are in excellent qualitative agreement with the predictions from the decompressing two‐phase mixture model. Shock‐and‐release experiments provide an accurate measurement of the temperature on the phase boundary for entropies below the critical point, with increasing uncertainties near and above the critical point entropy. Our new criteria for shock‐induced vaporization of quartz are much lower than previous estimates, primarily because of the revised entropy on the Hugoniot. As the thermodynamics of other silicates are expected to be similar to quartz, vaporization is a significant process during high‐velocity planetary collisions.
Key Points
We measured the temperature on the liquid‐vapor curve of silica
We calculated the entropy on the quartz Hugoniot
We provide new criteria for shock‐induced vaporization of silica
Solid iron compressed up to 560 GPa Ping, Y; Coppari, F; Hicks, D G ...
Physical review letters,
08/2013, Letnik:
111, Številka:
6
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
Dynamic compression by multiple shocks is used to compress iron up to 560 GPa (5.6 Mbar), the highest solid-state pressure yet attained for iron in the laboratory. Extended x-ray absorption fine ...structure (EXAFS) spectroscopy offers simultaneous density, temperature, and local-structure measurements for the compressed iron. The data show that the close-packed structure of iron is stable up to 560 GPa, the temperature at peak compression is significantly higher than expected from pure compressive work, and the dynamic strength of iron is many times greater than the static strength based on lower pressure data. The results provide the first constraint on the melting line of iron above 400 GPa.
Since Ross proposed that there might be 'diamonds in the sky' in 1981 (ref. 1), the idea of significant quantities of pure carbon existing in giant planets such as Uranus and Neptune has gained both ...experimental and theoretical support. It is now accepted that the high-pressure, high-temperature behaviour of carbon is essential to predicting the evolution and structure of such planets. Still, one of the most defining of thermal properties for diamond, the melting temperature, has never been directly measured. This is perhaps understandable, given that diamond is thermodynamically unstable, converting to graphite before melting at ambient pressure, and tightly bonded, being the strongest bulk material known. Shock-compression experiments on diamond reported here reveal the melting temperature of carbon at pressures of 0.6-1.1 TPa (6-11 Mbar), and show that crystalline diamond can be stable deep inside giant planets such as Uranus and Neptune. The data indicate that diamond melts to a denser, metallic fluid-with the melting curve showing a negative Clapeyron slope-between 0.60 and 1.05 TPa, in good agreement with predictions of first-principles calculations. Temperature data at still higher pressures suggest diamond melts to a complex fluid state, which dissociates at shock pressures between 1.1 and 2.5 TPa (11-25 Mbar) as the temperatures increase above 50,000 K.
Mass-Radius Relationships for Exoplanets Swift, D. C; Eggert, J. H; Hicks, D. G ...
Astrophysical journal/The Astrophysical journal,
01/2012, Letnik:
744, Številka:
1
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
For planets other than Earth, particularly exoplanets, interpretation of the composition and structure depends largely on comparing the mass and radius with the composition expected given their ...distance from the parent star. The composition implies a mass-radius relation which relies heavily on equations of state calculated from electronic structure theory and measured experimentally on Earth. We lay out a method for deriving and testing equations of state, and deduce mass-radius and mass-pressure relations for key, relevant materials whose equation of state (EOS) is reasonably well established, and for differentiated Fe/rock. We find that variations in the EOS, such as may arise when extrapolating from low-pressure data, can have significant effects on predicted mass-radius relations and on planetary pressure profiles. The relations are compared with the observed masses and radii of planets and exoplanets, broadly supporting recent inferences about exoplanet structures. Kepler-10b is apparently 'Earth-like,' likely with a proportionately larger core than Earth's, nominally 2/3 of the mass of the planet. CoRoT-7b is consistent with a rocky mantle over an Fe-based core which is likely to be proportionately smaller than Earth's. GJ 1214b lies between the mass-radius curves for H2O and CH4, suggesting an 'icy' composition with a relatively large core or a relatively large proportion of H2O. CoRoT-2b is less dense than the hydrogen relation, which could be explained by an anomalously high degree of heating or by higher than assumed atmospheric opacity. HAT-P-2b is slightly denser than the mass-radius relation for hydrogen, suggesting the presence of a significant amount of matter of higher atomic number. CoRoT-3b lies close to the hydrogen relation. The pressure at the center of Kepler-10b is 1.5+1.2 -- 1.0 TPa. The central pressure in CoRoT-7b is probably close to 0.8 TPa, though may be up to 2 TPa. These pressures are accessible by planar shock and ramp-loading experiments at large laser facilities. The center of HAT-P-2b is probably around 210 TPa, in the range of planned National Ignition Facility experiments, and that of CoRoT-3b around 1900 TPa.
The atomic nucleus is one of the densest and most complex quantum-mechanical systems in nature. Nuclei account for nearly all the mass of the visible Universe. The properties of individual nucleons ...(protons and neutrons) in nuclei can be probed by scattering a high-energy particle from the nucleus and detecting this particle after it scatters, often also detecting an additional knocked-out proton. Analysis of electron- and proton-scattering experiments suggests that some nucleons in nuclei form close-proximity neutron-proton pairs
with high nucleon momentum, greater than the nuclear Fermi momentum. However, how excess neutrons in neutron-rich nuclei form such close-proximity pairs remains unclear. Here we measure protons and, for the first time, neutrons knocked out of medium-to-heavy nuclei by high-energy electrons and show that the fraction of high-momentum protons increases markedly with the neutron excess in the nucleus, whereas the fraction of high-momentum neutrons decreases slightly. This effect is surprising because in the classical nuclear shell model, protons and neutrons obey Fermi statistics, have little correlation and mostly fill independent energy shells. These high-momentum nucleons in neutron-rich nuclei are important for understanding nuclear parton distribution functions (the partial momentum distribution of the constituents of the nucleon) and changes in the quark distributions of nucleons bound in nuclei (the EMC effect)
. They are also relevant for the interpretation of neutrino-oscillation measurements
and understanding of neutron-rich systems such as neutron stars
.
Southern Africa is characterised by unusually elevated topography and abnormal heat flow. This can be explained by thermal perturbation of the mantle, but the origin of this is unclear. Geophysics ...has not detected a thermal anomaly in the upper mantle and there is no geochemical evidence of an asthenosphere mantle contribution to the Cenozoic volcanic record of the region. Here we show that natural CO
seeps along the Ntlakwe-Bongwan fault within KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, have C-He isotope systematics that support an origin from degassing mantle melts. Neon isotopes indicate that the melts originate from a deep mantle source that is similar to the mantle plume beneath Réunion, rather than the convecting upper mantle or sub-continental lithosphere. This confirms the existence of the Quathlamba mantle plume and importantly provides the first evidence in support of upwelling deep mantle beneath Southern Africa, helping to explain the regions elevation and abnormal heat flow.
The atomic nucleus is made of protons and neutrons (nucleons), which are themselves composed of quarks and gluons. Understanding how the quark-gluon structure of a nucleon bound in an atomic nucleus ...is modified by the surrounding nucleons is an outstanding challenge. Although evidence for such modification-known as the EMC effect-was first observed over 35 years ago, there is still no generally accepted explanation for its cause
. Recent observations suggest that the EMC effect is related to close-proximity short-range correlated (SRC) nucleon pairs in nuclei
. Here we report simultaneous, high-precision measurements of the EMC effect and SRC abundances. We show that EMC data can be explained by a universal modification of the structure of nucleons in neutron-proton SRC pairs and present a data-driven extraction of the corresponding universal modification function. This implies that in heavier nuclei with many more neutrons than protons, each proton is more likely than each neutron to belong to an SRC pair and hence to have distorted quark structure. This universal modification function will be useful for determining the structure of the free neutron and thereby testing quantum chromodynamics symmetry-breaking mechanisms and may help to discriminate between nuclear physics effects and beyond-the-standard-model effects in neutrino experiments.
Epidemiological and laboratory studies suggest that β-blockers may reduce cancer progression in various cancer sites. The aim of this study was to conduct the first epidemiological investigation of ...the effect of post-diagnostic β-blocker usage on colorectal cancer-specific mortality in a large population-based colorectal cancer patient cohort.
Patients and methods: A nested case–control analysis was conducted within a cohort of 4794 colorectal cancer patients diagnosed between 1998 and 2007. Patients were identified from the UK Clinical Practice Research Datalink and confirmed using cancer registry data. Patients with a colorectal cancer- specific death (data from the Office of National Statistics death registration system) were matched to five controls. Conditional logistic regression was applied to calculate odds ratios (OR) and 95% confidence intervals (95% CIs) according to β-blocker usage (data from GP-prescribing records).
Post-diagnostic β-blocker use was identified in 21.4% of 1559 colorectal cancer-specific deaths and 23.7% of their 7531 matched controls, with little evidence of an association (OR = 0.89 95% CI 0.78–1.02). Similar associations were found when analysing drug frequency, β-blocker type or specific drugs such as propranolol. There was some evidence of a weak reduction in all-cause mortality in β-blocker users (adjusted OR = 0.88; 95% CI 0.77–1.00; P = 0.04) which was in part due to the marked effect of atenolol on cardiovascular mortality (adjusted OR = 0.62; 95% CI 0.40–0.97; P = 0.04).
In this novel, large UK population-based cohort of colorectal cancer patients, there was no evidence of an association between post-diagnostic β-blocker use and colorectal cancer-specific mortality.
NCT00888797.
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