ALBERT

Description: Inflation provides very strong motivation for a flat Universe, Harrison-Zel'dovich (constant-curvature) perturbations, and cold dark matter. However, there are a number of cosmological observations that conflict with the predictions of the simplest such model: one with zero cosmological constant. They include the age of the Universe, dynamical determinations of Omega, galaxy-number counts, and the apparent abundance of large-scale structure in the Universe. While the discrepancies are not yet serious enough to rule out the simplest and most well motivated model, the current data point to a best-fit model with the following parameters: Omega(sub B) approximately equal to 0.03, Omega(sub CDM) approximately equal to 0.17, Omega(sub Lambda) approximately equal to 0.8, and H(sub 0) approximately equal to 70 km/(sec x Mpc) which improves significantly the concordance with observations. While there is no good reason to expect such a value for the cosmological constant, there is no physical principle that would rule out such.

Description: The present approach to the prediction of instability generation that is due to the interaction of freestream disturbances with regions of subscale variations in surface boundary conditions can account for the finite Reynolds number effects, while furnishing a framework for the study of receptivity in compressible flow and in 3D boundary layers. The approach is illustrated for the case of Tollmien-Schlichting wave generation in a Blasius boundary layer, due to the interaction of a freestream acoustic wave with a localized wall inhomogeneity. Results are presented for the generation of viscous and inviscid instabilities in adverse pressure-gradient boundary layers, supersonic boundary layer instabilities, and cross-flow vortex instabilities.

Description: Reacting free shear layers are of fundamental importance in many industrial systems including gas turbine combustors and rockets. Efficient propulsion systems are essential for air breathing supersonic ramjets in the high Mach number range. A limiting factor in these engines is the time for fuel and oxidizer to mix in the combustion chamber; for fast mixing, the flow must be vigorously turbulent which requires the laminar flow to be unstable. Understanding the stability characteristics of compressible reacting free shear layers is, therefore, very important and may allow one to control the flow. Low speed shear layers are highly unstable but, as chemical reaction and compressibility effects tend to stabilize them, it is important to investigate the stability of high speed reacting mixing layers. The latter consists of two fluid streams containing fuel and oxidizer respectively, and the conclusions are expected to apply, with quantitative modifications, to other shear flows, e.g., jets. Since low speed reacting cases have been studied earlier, we concentrate on the effects of Mach number and heat release. We are primarily interested in solving the stability problem over a large range of Mach number and heat release. In order to understand the effect of the heat release on the stability of this flow, one must first study the characteristics of the non-reacting flow. Inviscid theory is a reliable guide for understanding stability of compressible shear flows at moderate and large Reynolds numbers and is the basis for this work.

Description: Several direct numerical simulations of high-speed turbulent Couette flow were performed with a new spectral code. Mach numbers up to three and a Reynolds number of 3000 were used. A new time-integration scheme was developed to handle Mach numbers above 1.5, which require greater accuracy and stability than lower Mach numbers. At low Mach number, the large streamwise eddies found by M. J. Lee in high incompressible Couette flow simulations were reproduced. At higher Mach numbers these structures still exist, but they become considerably less organized (although the disorganization may be a function of the spanwise box size). While the same types of vortical structures seen in the incompressible flow are observed at higher Mach numbers, a new structure involving the divergence of the velocity is also observed. This structure is generally associated with low shear areas next to the walls, but it has not been determined whether it is a cause or an effect of the low shear. A 'nonphysical' simulation was performed to determine by what mechanism the Mach number affects the flow. It appears that pressure gradient (acoustic) effects are more important than variable viscosity effects in determining the wall shear, but the size of vortical structures is determined more by the local kinematic viscosity. Low-order mean statistics are provided to help quantify these effects.

Description: Many of the turbulent layers encountered in practical flows develop in adverse pressure gradients; hence, the dynamics of the thickening and possible separation of the boundary layer has important implications for design practices. What are the key physical processes that govern how a turbulent boundary layer responds to an adverse pressure gradient, and how should these processes be modeled? Despite the ubiquity of such flows in engineering and nature, these equations remain largely unanswered. The turbulence closure models presently used to describe these flows commonly use 'wall functions' that have ad hoc corrections for the effects of pressure gradients. There is, therefore, a practical and theoretical need to examine the effects of adverse pressure gradients on wall bounded turbulent flows in order to develop models based on sound physical principle. The evolution of a turbulent boundary layer on a flat wall with an externally imposed pressure gradient is studied.

Description: Advancing the knowledge and understanding of turbulence theory is addressed. Specific problems to be addressed will include studies of subgrid models to understand the effects of unresolved small scale dynamics on the large scale motion which, if successful, might substantially reduce the number of degrees of freedom that need to be computed in turbulence simulation.

Description: The increase in the range of length scales with increasing Reynolds number limits the direct simulation of turbulent flows to relatively simple geometries and low Reynolds numbers. However, since most flows of engineering interest occur at much higher Reynolds number than is currently within the capabilities of full simulation, prediction of these flow fields can only be obtained by solving some suitably-averaged set of governing equations. In the traditional Reynolds-averaged approach, the Navier-Stokes equations are averaged over time. This in turn yields correlations between various turbulence fluctuations. It is these terms, e.g. the Reynolds stresses, for which a turbulence model must be derived. Turbulence modeling of incompressible flows has received a great amount of attention in the literature. An area of research that has received comparatively less attention is the modeling of compressible turbulent flows. An approach to simulating compressible turbulence at high Reynolds numbers is through the use of Large-Eddy Simulation (LES). In LES the dependent variables are decomposed into a large-scale (resolved) component and a sub-grid scale component. It is the small-scale components of the velocity field which are presumably more homogeneous than the large scales and, therefore, more easily modeled. Thus, it seems plausible that simpler models, which should be more universal in character than those employed in second-order closure schemes, may be developed for LES of compressible turbulence. The objective of the present research, therefore, is to explore models for the Large-Eddy Simulation of compressible turbulent flows. Given the recent successes of Zeman in second order closure modeling of compressible turbulence, model development was guided by principals employed in second-order closures.

Description: With the recent revitalization of high speed flow research, compressibility presents a new set of challenging problems to turbulence researchers. Questions arise as to what extent compressibility affects turbulence dynamics, structures, the Reynolds stress-mean velocity (constitutive) relation, and the accompanying processes of heat transfer and mixing. In astrophysical applications, compressible turbulence is believed to play an important role in intergalactic gas cloud dynamics and in accretion disk convection. Understanding and modeling of the compressibility effects in free shear flows, boundary layers, and boundary layer/shock interactions is discussed.

Description: Because of the breakdown of the Einstein equivalence principle in the nonsymmetric gravitational theory (NGT) of Moffat, orthogonally polarized electromagnetic waves can propagate at different velocities in a gravitational field. Moffat has proposed that galactic dark matter, in the form of cosmions, may act as a significant source of gravity in the NGT. We discuss how observations of the highly polarized radiation from distant pulsars could provide significant limits on the strength of the coupling of cosmions in the NGT.

Description: We discuss the results of a survey of Quasar radio structures over redshifts from 0.6 to 3.7. There are clear evolutionary trends in size and luminosity, which suggest that the duty cycle of individual Quasars has increased over cosmic time. This affects source count statistics and gives clues on the evolution of Quasar environments.

Description: The objective of this work is to develop a space-time accurate numerical method for the solution of incompressible Navier-Stokes equations in generalized coordinates. The resulting code is to be used for direct and large-eddy simulation of turbulence in complex geometries. In a previous paper, the system of Navier-Stokes equations in general curvilinear coordinates was solved by a second-order accurate finite-difference scheme. Satisfactory results were obtained for several flows in two and three dimensions. The system of Navier-Stokes for the fluxes are given in Orlandi (1989). The main deficiency of the numerical scheme was the large CPU time required for the solution of the Poisson equation for the 'pressure' field. The point SOR relaxation, in conjunction with a multigrid scheme, was used for the Poisson equation. In some cases, particularly with very fine grids, it was impossible to obtain a divergent-free flow. A preliminary attempt is made to compute the spatially evolving flow of Swearingen & Blackwelder. To reduce the streamwise distance, the inflow was at a distance x = 60 cm from the leading edge.

Description: Vortex filaments in superfluids such as helium 2 may provide new insights into very high Reynolds number flows. The behavior of a superfluid vortex ring interacting with a normal fluid shear flow, specifically channel flow, is simulated. The vortex ring evolves into a stable horseshoe configuration which propagates without further change of form. In this simulation, a boundary layer behavior in a superfluid through the coupling of the superfluid and the normal fluid is demonstrated.

Description: Explicit solutions of the stationary Hopf equation are discussed and their computational possibilities are explored. The motivation is to circumvent the infinite hierarchy of coupled equations for the velocity moments and obtain an exact closure of the steady-state 3D Navier-Stokes equations, without modeling assumptions or truncation. The Hopf formulation of the Navier-Stokes equation is reviewed. A stationary homogeneous solution for 2D flow is displayed and discussed. It is shown how depletion of nonlinearity may arise for 3D forced homogeneous flow. The general 3D forced case is considered and a method for closing the 3D unforced equations with arbitrary boundary conditions is derived.

Description: The solar nebula, from which the planets in our solar system formed, featured a disk of gas and dust grains in rapid, differential rotation, and at some stage was likely to have been unstable to thermal convection. This situation is suspected by many to lead to significant turbulent Reynolds stress production and angular momentum transport in such systems, and estimates of transport rates have been attempted from unsubstantiated phenomenological models. In order to determine the circumstances and physical conditions under which our own planetary system formed and to explain recent observations of young stellar systems, it is necessary to develop realistic models of heat and angular momentum transport for such flows. Developing an understanding of complicated flows featuring thermal convection, rotation, and shear is also of wide interest in stellar astrophysics and in planetary and terrestrial atmospheric studies. The ultimate objective is to develop workable models based on the numerical simulations for constructing global solar nebula models; viz., relatively simple prescriptions for heat and angular momentum fluxes from given system parameters (e.g., ratios of rotation, shear, and convective lapse rates) are characterized, quantified, and developed. Toward this end, our program has been to attempt to understand the behavior of the direct numerical simulations of Boussinesq convection, which, despite the complexity of the results, is still an overly simplified approximation to the real system and should be more amenable to analysis. These results are also intended to be tested against turbulence models, especially those designed for atmospheric boundary layers, and may provide a basis for subgrid-scale models. In order to make the numerical simulations more realistic with regard to the solar nebula problem, a fully compressible code that will allow incorporation of large density stratifications and realistic thermodynamic and radiative properties is developed. In order to explore the properties of these flows at the very high values of Re found in natural systems and the very low values of Pr found in most astrophysical contexts, we will need to employ large-eddy simulations for which we want to determine the most appropriate subgrid-scale model to incorporate.

Description: Turbulent plane Couette flow was numerically simulated at a Reynolds number (U(sub w)h/nu) of 6000, where U(sub w) is the relative wall speed and h is half the channel-height. Unlike in Poiseuille flow, where the mean shear rate changes its sign at the centerline, the sign of mean shear rate in plane Couette flow remains the same across the whole channel. This difference is expected to yield several differences between the two flows, especially in the core region. The most significant and dramatic difference observed was the existence of large-scale structures in the core region of the plane Couette flow. The large eddies are extremely long in the flow direction and fill the entire channel (i.e., their vertical extent is 2h). The large-scale structures have the largest contribution from the wavenumber (k(sub x)h,k(sub z)h) = (0, plus or minus 1.5), corresponding to a wavelength lambda(sub z)/h is approximately equal to 4. The secondary motion associated with the k(sub x)h = 0 mode consists of the large-scale vortices. The large eddies contribute about 30 percent of turbulent kinetic energy.

Description: The National Aerospace Plane (NASP) will require thermal insulation systems which are consistent with cryogenic fluids, high thermal loads, and design restrictions such as weight and volume. Test sections of the proposed system have been constructed and evaluated. In this paper we discuss the components of the insulation system, the application of the insulation system to the NASP liquid hydrogen fuel tank system, and thermal conductivity measurements performed on test sections of the system. Both steady-state and transient thermal measurements are presented.

Description: The surface distribution of star clusters in the LMC has revealed the existence of two elliptical systems superimposed. A small surface density outer ellipse outlining the large system and a higher density elliptical inner system. The major axis of the two subsystems form an angle of 60 deg. The central subsystem contains all youngest populous globular star clusters from both the stellar and dynamical point of view. The large outer system seems to contain all old globular clusters, showing a dumpy distribution and outlining two arms at the northeast and southwest. The small LMC clusters were found to have masses less than 1000 solar masses and are distributed all over the large elliptical system.

Description: On the basis of optical and IUE observations we have investigated the possibility that some of the very young stellar systems of the LMC, such as SL360, may be regarded as globular clusters at the very early phases of their dynamical evolution after the gas cloud expulsion.

Description: A model is developed for describing the interaction of vortex-drop clusters in a flowing gaseous jet, convecting downstream from an injection location. Results are presented for a stationary case representing the situation when identical clusters are continuously injected and the injection rate is constant. The results indicate that, in a rich mixture high-drop-number density regime, the mass evaporated from the drops controls the velocity of the cluster-in-vortex as it propagates downstream.

Description: An algorithm is presented for unsteady two-dimensional incompressible Navier-Stokes calculations. This algorithm is based on the fourth order partial differential equation for incompressible fluid flow which uses the streamfunction as the only dependent variable. The algorithm is second order accurate in both time and space. It uses a multigrid solver at each time step. It is extremely efficient with respect to the use of both CPU time and physical memory. It is extremely robust with respect to Reynolds number.

Description: A Navier-Stokes equations solver based on a pressure correction method with a pressure-staggered mesh and calculations of separated three-dimensional flows are presented. It is shown that the velocity pressure decoupling, which occurs when various pressure correction algorithms are used for pressure-staggered meshes, is caused by the ill-conditioned discrete pressure correction equation. The use of a partial differential equation for the incremental pressure eliminates the velocity pressure decoupling mechanism by itself and yields accurate numerical results. Example flows considered are a three-dimensional lid driven cavity flow and a laminar flow through a 90 degree bend square duct. For the lid driven cavity flow, the present numerical results compare more favorably with the measured data than those obtained using a formally third order accurate quadratic upwind interpolation scheme. For the curved duct flow, the present numerical method yields a grid independent solution with a very small number of grid points. The calculated velocity profiles are in good agreement with the measured data.

Description: The least squares (L sub 2) finite element method is introduced for 2-D steady state pure convection problems with smooth solutions. It is proven that the L sub 2 method has the same stability estimate as the original equation, i.e., the L sub 2 method has better control of the streamline derivative. Numerical convergence rates are given to show that the L sub 2 method is almost optimal. This L sub 2 method was then used as a framework to develop an iteratively reweighted L sub 2 finite element method to obtain a least absolute residual (L sub 1) solution for problems with discontinuous solutions. This L sub 1 finite element method produces a nonoscillatory, nondiffusive and highly accurate numerical solution that has a sharp discontinuity in one element on both coarse and fine meshes. A robust reweighting strategy was also devised to obtain the L sub 1 solution in a few iterations. A number of examples solved by using triangle and bilinear elements are presented.

Description: The use of satellite-derived imagery for measuring subresolution horizontal terrain displacments associated with present-day earthquakes is discussed with reference to data from the French SPOT satellite whose sensor array provides 10-m panchromatic imagery. The measured terrain displacements can be up to several meters, but usually no more than 6-8 m even for major earthquakes. The general approach is to spatially match the after image to the before image at each point on a half-kilometer grid by iteratively interpolating one and testing its correlation with the other. The discussion covers the basic algorithm, results of initial tests, error types and limitations, and future work.

Description: A new approach to stratigraphic analysis is described which uses photogeologic and spectral interpretation of multispectral remote sensing data combined with topographic information to determine the attitude, thickness, and lithology of strata exposed at the surface. The new stratigraphic procedure is illustrated by examples in the literature. The published results demonstrate the potential of spectral stratigraphy for mapping strata, determining dip and strike, measuring and correlating stratigraphic sequences, defining lithofacies, mapping biofacies, and interpreting geological structures.

Description: An implicit numerical algorithm for the time accurate solution of the compressible Navier-Stokes equations is described. Results for steady flow past a finite flat plate are presented, together with preliminary results for the temporal simulation of second mode instability in a flat plate boundary layer at Mach 4.5.

Description: The main objective of this research is to address two important but unresolved problems: (1) the measurement of vertical and transverse length scales via space correlations for all Reynolds stress components and velocity-temperature correlations, both in the free stream and within the boundary layer using the existing triple and quad-wire probes; and (2) to relate the character of the free stream turbulence to the character of the turbulence within the boundary layer in order to determine the effect on surface heat transfer.

Description: An experimental research project aimed at obtaining quantitative data on the behavior of the secondary vortex structure in a turbulent mixing layer at moderate Reynolds numbers (Re(sub delta) = 2.9 x 10(exp 4)) is discussed. This project was terminated before all the contemplated measurements could be made, and data were obtained only on the spatially stationary part of the secondary structure. Nonetheless, these data reveal some interesting facets of mixing layer behavior which are discussed.

Description: The wavelet-transformed Navier-Stokes equations are used to define quantities such as the transfer of kinetic energy and the flux of kinetic energy through scale r at position x. Direct numerical simulations of turbulent shear flow reveal that although their mean spatial values agree with their traditional counterparts in Fourier space, their spatial variability at every scale is very large, exhibiting non-Gaussian statistics. The local flux of energy involving scales smaller than some r also exhibits large spatial intermittency, and it is negative quite often, indicative of local inverse cascades.

Description: Large-scale structures in turbulent and transitional wall-bounded flows make a significant contribution to the Reynolds stress and turbulent energy. The behavior of these structures is examined. Small perturbations are introduced into a laminar and a turbulent boundary layer to trigger the formation of large-scale features. Both flows use the same inlet unit Reynolds number, and they experience the same pressure gradient history, i.e. a favorable pressure gradient (FPG) followed by an adverse pressure gradient (APG). The perturbation consists of a small short duration flow repetitively introduced through a hole in the wall located at the C(sub p) minimum. Hot-wire data are averaged on the basis of the phase of the disturbance, and automation of the experiment was used to obtain measurements on large spatially dense grids. In the turbulent boundary, the perturbation evolves into a vortex loop which retains its identity for a considerable streamwise distance. In the laminar layer, the perturbation decays to a very small magnitude before growing rapidly and triggering the transition process in the APG. The 'time-like' animations of the phase-averaged data are used to gain insight into the naturally occurring physical mechanisms in each flow.

Description: The dependence of product generation on Peclet and Reynolds numbers in a numerically simulated, reacting, two dimensional, temporally growing mixing layer is related theoretically to the fractal dimension of the passive scalar interfaces. This relation is verified using product generation measurements and dimensions derived from a standard box counting technique. A transition from a low initial dimension to a higher one of approximately 5/3 is identified and shown to be associated to the kinematic distortion on the flow field during the first pairing interaction. It is suggested that the structures responsible for this transition are non-deterministic, non-random, inhomogeneous fractals. Only the large scales are involved. No further transitions, either in the spectra of the vorticity field or in the mixing behavior, are found for Reynolds numbers up to 90,000.

Description: Studies of supersonic mixing which were accomplished over the last year with Center for Turbulence Research (CTR) support are described. During this period, a Nd:YAG laser, optical components, and data acquisition computer were obtained. This allowed detailed visualizations of the flow structure to be performed at a rapid rate, representing a significant improvement over our previous attempts. Aspects of the flow structure are described below. In addition, preliminary findings on a possible mixing enhancement strategy are also shown using the flow visualization technique.

Description: A formulation has been developed to describe the evaporation of dense or dilute clusters of binary-fuel drops. The binary fuel is assumed to be made of a solute and a solvent whose volatility is much lower than that of the solute. Convective flow effects, inducing a circulatory motion inside the drops, are taken into account, as well as turbulence external to the cluster volume. Results obtained with this model show that, similar to the conclusions for single isolated drops, the evaporation of the volatile is controlled by liquid mass diffusion when the cluster is dilute. In contrast, when the cluster is dense, the evaporation of the volatile is controlled by surface layer stripping, that is, by the regression rate of the drop, which is in fact controlled by the evaporation rate of the solvent. These conclusions are in agreement with existing experimental observations. Parametric studies show that these conclusions remain valid with changes in ambient temperature, initial slip velocity between drops and gas, initial drop size, initial cluster size, initial liquid mass fraction of the solute, and various combinations of solvent and solute. The implications of these results for computationally intensive combustor calculations are discussed.

Description: It is found through two-dimensional temporal simulations of high-speed free shear layers that mean flow distortion is significantly increased when supersonic disturbances are introduced as initial conditions. The shear layer exhibits no subharmonic growth or roll-up, but rather a spectral broadening as energy is distributed into higher harmonics. Increasing the velocity of one side of the mixing layer (u2) to roughly 1/5 the speed of the high speed side (u1), allows a slight subharmonic growth at a very slow rate for two-dimensional modes. A first look at three-dimensional free shear flows is also presented for M = 2. No effect is seen for incompressible flow; however, stabilization is seen with respect to maximum temporal growth rates as the transverse velocity is increased. A much stronger, but similar effect is seen if u2 is increased. The wave direction of maximum growth for u2 is greater than 0.4 is found to be the direction of the faster stream (u1) over a broad range of transverse velocities.

Description: Column ozone measurements obtained from a Spin-scan Ozone Imager (SOI) aboard the Dynamics Explorer I (DE-I) satellite are discussed. The orbital geometry has many features similar to the Molniya satellite orbits. The ozone imagery obtained from DE-I are unique in being synoptic views of a region of continental scale for a period of a few hours. A brief description of the instrument, data, and orbit is followed by a discussion of some applications of DE-I data and the potential usefulness of an ozone imager aboard a satellite in a Molniya-type orbit.

Description: The Colima Volcanic Complex at the western end of the Mexican Volcanic Belt is the most active andesitic volcano in Mexico. Short-wavelength infrared data from the Landsat Thematic Mapper satellite were used to determine the temperature and fractional area of radiant picture elements for two January data acquisitions in 1985 and 1986. The 1986 data showed four 28.5 m by 28.5 m pixels (picture elements) whose hot subpixel components had temperatures ranging from 511-774 C and areas of 1.8-13 sq m. The 1985 data had no radiating areas above background temperatures. Ground observations and measurements in November 1985 and February 1986 reported the presence of hot fumaroles at the summit with temperatures of 135-895 C. This study demonstrates the utility of satellite data for monitoring volcanic activity.

Description: The outburst of Halley comet that occurred in February 1991 when the comet was over 14 AU from the sun, between the orbits of Saturn and Uranus, is described. This region of the solar system was known to be so cold that a comet nucleus would be totally inert there. On February 12th, 1991 Halley brightened by a factor of about 300, and a dust coma was observed around the nucleus. Different explanations of the comet's strange behavior are suggested.

Description: The effects of rotation on grid turbulence were studied in a low speed tunnel. Results are presented for both axisymmetric and non-axisymmetric flows. As observed by previous workers, the cascade process was seen to be effectively blocked by rotation leading to reduced dissipation. In the non-axisymmetric case, rotation caused the flow to tend rapidly towards axisymmetry; however, for the length studied, the flow tended to move away from isotropy. Based on the results, some recommendations are made on the design of a larger facility for studying similar flows.

Description: It is shown that the ideas of selective amplification and direct resonance, based on linear theory, can not provide an explanation for the well-defined streak spacing of about 100 wall units (referred to as 100(+) hereafter) in wall-bounded turbulent shear flows. In addition, for the direct resonance theory, the streaks are created by the non-linear self-interaction of the vertical velocity rather than of the directly forced vertical vorticity. In view of the failure of these approaches, it is then proposed that the selection mechanism must be inherently non-linear and correspond to a self-sustaining mechanism. The 100(+) value should thus be considered as a critical Reynolds number for that mechanism. Indeed, in the case of Poiseuille flow, this 100(+) criterion for transition to turbulence corresponds to the usually quoted value of 1000 based on the half-width and the centerline velocity. In Couette flow, it corresponds to a critical Reynolds number of about 400 based on the half width and half velocity difference.

Description: The development of an automated technique for the eduction of 3-D spatial patterns in vector or scalar diagnostics was completed. The method is based on an iterative convolution between a trial pattern and the data field. It was applied to the analysis of low Reynolds number turbulent channel flow and homogeneous shear flow. The results yielded new information on the dominant flow structures in these flows, particularly with respect to the spatial relationships between various forms of organized motion. A particular application of the pattern eduction method, which is tentatively referred to as an 'adaptive wavelet transformation', is proposed with the objective of investigating the way turbulence structure changes with scale. Preliminary results using data from homogeneous turbulent shear flow simulations are presented. At the low Reynolds numbers of the simulations, there is no evidence of scale similarity. The small scales appear to be associated with the edges of the larger scale vortical structures.

Description: The existence and importance of large-scale spanwise vortical structures for 2-D straight mixing layers has been well documented in the last decade. Computer models and simulations have sought to reproduce these vortical structures associated with the Kelvin-Helmholtz (K-H) instability mode which is due to the shear per se. Secondary streamwise vortical structures for the same flows were also seen experimentally and have recently been given importance in computational efforts. Curved mixing layers can be characterized as stable (the high-speed stream is placed on the outside of the longitudinal bend), leading to a suppression of the Taylor-Gortler (T-G) instability, and unstable (high-speed stream on the inside of the bend), leading to an enhancement of the T-G instability. The T-G instability is associated with the centripetal acceleration that the curvature imparts. Thus, curvature superimposed on 2-D shear layer flows provides a way for studying the importance of streamwise vorticity, its competition with spanwise vorticity, and changes to entrainment and mixing. Furthermore, the outcome of the competition of a relatively enhanced or suppressed T-G instability with the K-H instability offers the possibility of achieving passive mixing enhancement. As a first step in understanding the competition between the K-H and the T-G instabilities and the resulting changes to the structure of the flow, highly resolved visualizations of the flow structure for the stable and the unstable configurations are provided. The straight layer is also visualized for comparison with earlier works.

Description: Computer flow simulation aided by dynamical systems analysis is used to investigate the kinematics of time-periodic vortex shedding past a two-dimensional circular cylinder in the context of the following general questions: (1) Is a dynamical systems viewpoint useful in the understanding of this and similar problems involving time-periodic shedding behind bluff bodies; and (2) Is it indeed possible, by adopting such a point of view, to complement previous analyses or to understand kinematical aspects of the vortex shedding process that somehow remained hidden in previous approaches. We argue that the answers to these questions are positive. Results are described.

Description: An ongoing research effort designed to apply the best possible second-moment-closure model to simulate complex hypersonic flows is presented. The baseline model under consideration is the Launder-Reece-Rodi Reynolds stress transport turbulence model. Two add-ons accounting for wall effects, namely, the Launder-Shima low-Reynolds-number model and the compressible wall-function technique, are tested. Results are reported for flow over a flat plate, both adiabatic-wall and cooled-wall cases. It has been found that further improvements of the existing models are necessary to achieve accurate prediction in high Mach number flow range.

Description: Scalar fields undergoing random advection have attracted much attention from researchers in both the theoretical and practical sectors. Research interest spans from the study of the small scale structures of turbulent scalar fields to the modeling and simulations of turbulent reacting flows. The probability density function (PDF) method is an effective tool in the study of turbulent scalar fields, especially for those which involve chemical reactions. It has been argued that a one-point, joint PDF approach is the one to choose from among many simulation and closure methods for turbulent combustion and chemically reacting flows based on its practical feasibility in the foreseeable future for multiple reactants. Instead of the multi-point PDF, the joint PDF of a scalar and its gradient which represents the roles of both scalar and scalar diffusion is introduced. A proper closure model for the molecular diffusion term in the PDF equation is investigated. Another direction in this research is to study the mapping closure method that has been recently proposed to deal with the PDF's in turbulent fields. This method seems to have captured the physics correctly when applied to diffusion problems. However, if the turbulent stretching is included, the amplitude mapping has to be supplemented by either adjusting the parameters representing turbulent stretching at each time step or by introducing the coordinate mapping. This technique is still under development and seems to be quite promising. The final objective of this project is to understand some fundamental properties of the turbulent scalar fields and to develop practical numerical schemes that are capable of handling turbulent reacting flows.

Description: The immediate goal is to understand and validate the Yakhot-Orszag model of the velocity-derivative skewness and model equation for the rate of energy dissipation epsilon. A summary of a more detailed manuscript in preparation is presented. The purpose is to clarify some limitations of the theory by careful examination of key assumptions and approximations, and thereby to encourage its improvement.

Description: Investigations carried out for revisiting homogeneous turbulent flows in the presence of mean shear, rotation, or external compression are summarized. The simplest and most concise RDT (Rapid Distortion Theory) formulation, which includes a comprehensive linear stability analysis, is used for this purpose. Such a linear approach could be extended by a generalized EDQNM (Eddy Damped Quasi-Normal Markovian) to two point closure in order to model non-linear interactions, especially when pure Coriolis effects are present. The results are discussed in connection with databases obtained by DNS (Direct Numerical Simulations), including previous Center for Turbulence Research (CTR) results and new calculations in progress. The main goal is to contribute to and significantly improve on the rational one-point closure models in progress at the CTR and at Ecole Centrale de Lyon (ECL).

Description: The near-wall region plays an essential role in turbulent boundary layers: it is a region of high shear; the peak rate of production and peak intensity of turbulence occurs there; and the peak rate of dissipation occurs right at the wall. Nevertheless, this region has received less attention from modelers than have more nearly homogeneous flows. One reason for this is that when the boundary layer is near equilibrium, experimental data can be used to prescribe the flow in the wall layer. Another reason is that most turbulence models are developed under assumptions of near homogeneity. This is a poor approximation in the wall region. A single-point moment closure model for the strongly non-homogeneous A turbulent flow near a rigid boundary is developed.

Description: Horizontal-branch (HB) sequences have been computed for different rates of convective overshooting at the edge of the convective core. We find that the convective core undergoes a series of 'breathing pulses' during most of the HB phase. The average behavior of these sequences closely mimics the behavior of sequences computed with canonical semiconvection.

Description: A prototype ceramic fabric/titanium water heat pipe has been constructed and tested; it transported 25 to 80 W of power at 423 K. Component development and testing is continuing with the aim of providing an improved prototype, with a 38 micron stainless steel liner covered by a biaxially-braided Nextel (trademark) sleeve that is approximately 300 microns thick. This fabric has been tested to 800 K, and its emittance is about 0.5 at that temperature. Advanced versions of the water heat pipe will probably require a coating over the ceramic fabric in order to increase this emittance to the 0.8 to 0.9 range.

Description: Present understanding of the earth's atmosphere is briefly reviewed. The structure and composition of the atmosphere are described. The origin of the atmosphere and the factors involved in global atmospheric change are addressed.

Description: Ground-based and airborne measurements of biomass-burning smoke particle optical properties, obtained with a view to aerosol-absorption properties, are presented as a function of time and atmospheric height. The wavelength dependence of the optical thickness can be explained by a log-normal size distribution, with particles' effective radius varying between 0.1 and 0.2 microns. The strong correlation noted between aerosol particle profile and CO profile indicates that smoke particulates constitute a good tracer for emission trace gases from tropical biomass burning.

Description: Results are presented from airborne measurements of aerosol mass loading, size distribution, and elemental composition obtained in a smoke plume from a fire at a Florida wildlife refuge. It is found that there was a high concentration of carbon-containing aerosols and salt crystals in the 0.1-0.2 micron size range; the composition and morphology of the aerosols differed with size. Aerosol mass concentrations are used in conjunction with those obtained for CO2 in order to calculate ratios of aerosol and CO2. The ratios are noted to be higher for the smoldering phase of the fire than for its flaming phase.

Description: Recent advances in the methodology for direct numerical simulation of turbulent flows and some of the current applications are reviewed. It is argued that high-order finite difference schemes yield solutions with comparable accuracy to the spectral methods with the same number of degrees of freedom. The effects of random inflow conditions on the downstream evolution of turbulence are discussed.

Description: A variable explicit time integration algorithm is developed for unsteady diffusion problems. The algorithm uses nodal partitioning and allows the nodal groups to be updated with different time steps. The stability of the algorithm is analyzed using energy methods and critical time steps are found in terms of element eigenvalues with no restrictions on element types. Several numerical examples are given to illustrate the accuracy of the method.

Description: Results derived from a spectroscopic analysis of the nu5 band R19 transition of C2H2 observed in solar spectra recorded at the Jungfraujoch station, Switzerland, between June 1986 and April 1991 are reported. A least-squares sine fit to the data reveals a seasonal variability with an amplitude of about +/-40 percent of the mean; the maximum occurs during mid-winter and the minimum in summer. In general, the observed seasonal observations are comparable with those derived from airborne in-situ measurements and those reported from ground-based stations.

Description: A methodology for correcting raw pressure-drop data on the influence of acceleration on the instrumentation in two-phase flow thermal management systems is described. Such systems are now being considered as an alternative to conventional single-phase systems in future space missions because of the potential to reduce overall system mass, size, and pumping power requirements. Corrected pressure-drop measurements are presented and compared with predictions of two-phase flow pressure-drop models. A set of flow and acceleration conditions is defined for which the frictional pressure drop does not increase upon entry into 0-'g' pressure drop.

Description: This article describes the results of numerical simulations of oscillating wall-bounded developing flows. The full phase-averaged Navier-Stokes equations are solved. The application of quasi-steady turbulence modeling to unsteady flows is demonstrated using an unsteady version of the k-epsilon model. The effects of unsteadiness on the mean flow and turbulence are studied. Critical evaluation of the applicability of the quasi-steady approach to turbulence modeling is presented. Suggestions are given for the future efforts in turbulence modeling of unsteady flows.

Description: Propulsion systems planned for use late in this century and beyond will require appropriate physical models for describing supersonic combustion and numerical techniques for solving the model governing equations. A computer program to study these flows is reported which considers the multicomponent diffusion and convection of important chemical species, the finite-rate reaction of these species, and the resulting interaction of the field mechanics and the chemistry. The application of the program to a spatially developing and reacting mixing layer, which serves an an excellent physical model for the mixing and reaction processes that take place in a scramjet combustor, is reported. Several techniques to enhance the fuel-air mixing and growth of that layer and improve its overall combustion efficiency are considered.

Description: A near-infrared camera was used to search for jets around low-luminosity embedded infrared sources in nearby molecular clouds. The near-infrared offers the advantage that the extinction is very low compared with the optical. A jet is detected in molecular hydrogen at 2.12 microns toward a source in L1448. Given the sample size this indicates a detection rate of no more than a couple percent. The average visual extinction in L1448 is roughly 5 mag. The properties of the molecular hydrogen emission are similar to those measured for known Herbig-Haro objects, suggesting the jet is a buried Herbig-Haro object/jet that would be visible in the optical if the extinction were lower. The L1448 jet coincides with the unusual CO outflow that is highly collimated and contains high-velocity CO 'bullets'. The properties of the L1448 source suggest it defines a transition case between molecular outflows and Herbig-Haro jets, combining the characteristics of both.

Description: Properties and parameters of UV flares have been observed from RS CVn systems approximately once per few days observing time. The peak flare luminosities are five or six orders of magnitude more intense than the most energetic solar flares. The nonradiative energy losses, e.g., turbulence and flows, are likely to be at least comparable to the radiative loss.

Description: A three-component laser velocimeter is used to investigate the flow over a backward-facing step. The backward-facing step had an expansion ratio of 2, a boundary layer height to step height ratio of 0.34 and a Reynolds number based on step height of 19,000. Results from three-component velocimeter surveys of the flow over the backward-facing step are presented with comparisons of the current experiment with previous experiments and computational results. The present results compared well with previous experiments with the exception of the reattachment length. The short reattachment length was due to the short length of the channel downstream. The measurement of the lateral velocity component showed that there is a mean flow in and out of the centerline plane as high as 7 percent of the freestream velocity. However, the shear stresses show no correlation between the lateral fluctuations and the longitudinal and vertical fluctuations, indicating that the flow is 2D in terms of the turbulence quantities.

Description: The cosmic neutrino background is expected to consist of relic neutrinos from the big bang, of neutrinos produced during nuclear burning in stars, of neutrinos released by gravitational stellar collapse, and of neutrinos produced by cosmic ray interactions with matter and radiation in the interstellar and intergalactic medium. Formation of baryonic dark matter in the early universe, matter-antimatter annihilation in a baryonic symmetric universe, and dark matter annihilation could have also contributed significantly to the cosmic neutrino background. The purpose of this paper is to review the properties of these cosmic neutrino backgrounds, the indirect evidence for their existence, and the prospects for their detection.

Description: We have investigated the dipole anisotropy of the sky X-ray flux from nearby AGNs to compare with the peculiar motion of the Local Group (LG) using a more extensive sample than that of Miyaji and Boldt (1990). We have sampled 56 low redshift emission-line AGNs (z less than 0.06) from the HEAO 1 A-2 experiment with a flux limit lower than that of Piccinotti et al. (1982) and with a lower galactic latitude cutoff. Our sample shows a significant dipole anisotropy whose apex is only about 30 deg away from the direction of the Local Group's peculiar motion for the objects with z less than 0.015. The dipole growth vs. redshift shows a sharp rise between z = 0.006 and z = 0.015; the amplitude of the dipole is 40 +/- 10 percent of the corresponding monopole at z = 0.015. The outer redshift cutoff is consistent with the results obtained from analyses using optical and IRAS galaxies. The present sample strengthens our previous conclusion that X-ray emission from AGNs traces the underlying mass distribution as strongly as optical and IR emission from galaxies.

Description: We review the available data for the existence of dark matter in clusters of galaxies and elliptical galaxies. While the amount of dark matter in clusters is not well determined, both the X-ray and optical data show that more than 50 percent of the total mass must be dark. There is in general fair agreement in the binding mass estimates between the X-ray and optical techniques, but there is not detailed agreement on the form of the potential or the distribution of dark matter. The X-ray spectral and spatial observations of elliptical galaxies demonstrate that dark matter is also required in these objects and that it must be considerably more extended than the stellar distribution.

Description: From an all sky, X-ray flux limited sample of clusters of galaxies evidence for a significant deficit in the number of high luminosity clusters is found in the redshift range z approximately 0.1 to 0.2 compared with numbers of nearby clusters. This indicates that the X-ray luminous clusters are undergoing strong evolution. The strength of the effect is consistent with hierarchical merging models. The implications of such strong evolution for clusters are discussed.

Description: Black hole accretion disk dynamo processes are generally regarded as the central power source for AGN (Rees, 1984). If the precursor active galaxies for such AGN are formed at redshift z greater than about 4 and contain initial central seed black holes about 10 exp 6 solar masses, then the Eddington limited X-ray radiation emitted during their lifetime will undergo the phenomenon of 'spectral-luminosity evolution'. When accretion disks are first formed at the onset of galaxy formation, the accretion rate occurs at high values of luminosity/size compactness parameter L/R greater than 10 exp 30 erg/cm-sec. Such high values of L/R generate dynamic constraints which suppress nonthermal black hole accretion disk dynamo processes in favor of thermal processes. This causes the spectrum of X-radiation emitted by early AGN to be predominantly thermal. A superposition of such thermal, comptonized PAG sources can account for the residual cosmic X-ray background and can act as a source of X-ray heating of the intergalactic medium for z greater than about 4.

Description: The regular variations of the shape of the primary minimum of the orbital 13.082-day light curve of SS 433 with the phase of the 162.5-day processional period were discovered by analysis of the photometrical databank. The regular variability of the shape of the primary minimum of the discovered light curve of SS 433 reflects displacement with the 26-day double orbital period of at least two hot bright spots on the surface of the processional accretional disk and their eclipse by a normal star. Other aspects of the investigation are further discussed.

Description: The objectives of this study are the following: (1) to assess the quality of the sea level observed by altimetry on a global scale, especially in tropical regions where the atmospheric effects are the most critical, and to prepare the altimeter data for their assimilation into tropical Oceanic General Circulation Models; and (2) to validate and calibrate the altimeter-derived sea state parameters, to assimilate these parameters into numerical models, and to estimate the altimeter's sea state and electromagnetic biases.

Description: In the proposed research, TOPEX/POSEIDON altimeter data will be used with Geosat and European Remote Sensing satellite (ERS-1) data to compute global, region, and local oceanic geoid surfaces. These observations will then be analyzed to conduct geophysical studies relative to the structure of the oceanic lithosphere and mantle.

Description: The dependence of the bolometric light curve and of the effective temperature on the density distribution in a progenitor, its chemical composition, mass, radius, and explosion energy is studied. It is shown that, just before the supernova 1987 A outburst, the outside layers of the blue supergiant Sk-69.202 deg had a density distribution similar to that of the polytropic model with an index of n equals 3, a chemical composition with a mass fraction of hydrogen of the order of 0.1, and a relative helium abundance of about 0.9.

Description: Radio pulsars provide unparalleled opportunities for making measurements of astrophysically interesting phenomena. The author concentrates on two particular applications of high precision timing observations of pulsars: tests of relativistic gravitation theory using the binary pulsar 1913+16, and tests of cosmological models using timing data from millisecond pulsars. New upper limits are presented for the energy density of a cosmic background of low frequency gravitational radiation.

Description: The supersonic flow of the ionized gas in WR+OB binaries and X-ray generation are considered. X-ray emission is caused by gas heating up to temperatures of 10(exp 7) to 10(exp 8) K behind the front of shock waves. These are found in the collision of gas flowing out from the WR star with either the OB star's surface or the gas of the OB star's wind. The distribution of temperature and concentration behind the shock front are obtained. Using these distributions, the spectral power of bremsstrahlung X-ray emission of hot gas is calculated. Possible reasons that lead to a considerable difference between the observed parameters of X-ray emission of the WR binary of V 444 Cygni and the theoretically expected are discussed.

Description: The results of two years of SN1987A hard X-ray observations by the HEXE instrument aboard the Kvant module are summarized. By May to June 1989, the hard x-ray flux had declined more than 8.5 times in comparison with the maximum of the x-ray light curve. The upper limit of the ratio of Co-57/Co-56 abundances at the level of ratio of Fe-57/Fe-56 abundances at the Earth is a factor of 1.5.

Description: It is noted, in the wake of the recent completion of a redshift survey of about 2300 IRAS galaxies with a characteristic depth of about 4000 km/sec, that the redshift distribution obtained is entirely consistent with that of the observed optical galaxies in the direction of the Great Attractor. The IRAS velocity field also qualitatively reproduces recent observations of the spiral and elliptical galaxies. Although it is not possible to rule out the existence of excess mass in the galactic plane in the direction of the Great Attractor, this is not needed to explain the observed peculiar velocities.

Description: Extragalactic x-ray source counts carry information about the luminosity function and cosmic evolution of galaxies, BL Lac objects, Seyfort galaxies, and quasars. We discuss two available x-ray source samples with complete optical identifications and redshifts. We find evidence for instrumental bias in the detection of clusters for cosmic evolution of quasars, and of absorption effects in low luminosity Seyfert galaxies. Modest spectral and density evolution of Seyfort galaxies would allow the soft x-ray background to be made up entirely of discrete sources. We present a source count prognosis for the Advanced X-ray Astrophysics Facility (AXAF) energy range 0.5 to 10 keV.

Description: One of the major discoveries of the the IRAS all-sky survey was a population of sources having the bolometric luminosities of quasars, but where more than 90 percent of the luminosity emerges in the infrared. These objects, more numerous than quasars, are found exclusivly in interacting/merging galaxies that are extremely rich in interstellar gas. We have accumulated evidence that suggests that these systems are indeed quasars, obscured by many tens of magnitudes of extinction. We suggest that these Ultraluminous Infrared Galaxies are the formation stage of quasars, and that colliding galaxies, ultraluminous infrared galaxies, and quasars might be linked through an evolutionary sequence where the infrared bright phase is one in which the quasar is formed in the nucleus of a merger system, and is enshrouded in gas and dust, while the UV excess quasars are at the end state of quasar evolution where most of the enveloping dust cloud has been dissipated, and the quasar is visible directly.

Description: The 110-millisecond pulsar PSR 2127+12 in the core of the globular cluster M15 is distinguished by having a negative period derivative P approximately equals -2 x 10(exp -17). This value cannot be provided by acceleration in the mean gravitational potential of the core. A flyby of a star approximately equal to 300 AU away could explain the P observed, but the probability of such an event is small, approximately equal to 10(exp -13). We suggest that the pulsar motion is governed by the presence of a moderately massive (approximately equals 2 divided by 3 x 10(exp 4) solar mass) black hole in the clusters center. The idea is further supported by an observed post-collapse morphology of the M15 core.

Description: Evidence for neutron star free precession is discussed, which is often presumed to be responsible for the observed 35-day cycle in Hercules X-1. The precise formula for the period derivative due to free precession is obtained under assumption that the precession period is much longer than that of the neutron star rotation. The optical light curves to be seen from the binary, with freely precessing accretion neutron star are simulated numerically. This simulation takes into account the reflection effect on the surface of the secondary component and on the accretion disk itself for different diagrams of x-ray emission.

Description: The x-ray background (XRB) and the microwave background are the dominant isotropic radiation fields available for measurement. There was extensive work on trying to determine the physical origin of the background. That is, whether it is due to a superposition of numerous faint well-known sources, such as active galaxies, an early unidentified population of AGN at high redshift, a new population of objects, or to truly diffuse processes or to a superposition of these. However, while of great intrinsic interest, these studies were not aimed at using the XRB to provide the cosmological information that was gleaned from the microwave background. An alternate approach is presented, which uses the available information on the large, greater than 5 deg, scale distribution of the sky flux to see if the XRB can provide such constraints.

Description: The evolution is discussed of gravitational waves spectra produced by binary stars, supernova explosions, and coalescences of binary compact stars in outer galaxies. These spectra are integrated over a simple model of the universe to give an estimate of the stochastic gravitational wave background due to astrophysical sources.

Description: Variability on short time scales in the x-ray flux is a very general property of binary x-ray sources. Not until after the discovery of intensity-dependent quasi-periodic oscillations (QPO) and associated red noise form luminous low-mass x-ray binaries were systematic studies of the shape of the power-spectral components made. A brief account is given of the main developments since this discovery which have led to a new picture of the properties of low-mass x-ray binaries.

Description: Gravitational lensing is one of the topics in astrophysics that was quite extensively discussed over time before it was actually discovered. Ten years after the discovery of the first one, it is interesting to note how the field has developed. After an initial slow rate of discovery, the last few years have seen an explosion in the number of reported cases. Attention was drawn to the first few cases because quasars at the same red shift, with similar optical spectra, were observed with angular separations of only a few arc seconds. Most observational effort has been devoted to searching for new candidate lens systems and carefully measuring their properties, both to test whether they are indeed lensed and to provide constraints for modeling. A classification of the lenses is into rings, arcs, multiples, and doubles, where the progression is from sources close to the optical axis to far from the optical axis. The known candidate systems are listed. The searches for gravitational lenses are proving to be successful, and more lenses continue to be discovered serendipitously. Many searches are under way, along with instruments that will routinely increase the resolution of astronomical imaging.

Description: Stellar wind is of great interest, because many of the astrophysical systems possess wind like structures. For a long time only nonrelativistic winds have been studied. However, recently it was proposed by Kennel et al. that the relativistic pulsar wind with the plasma, consisting of electrons and positrons, can be responsible for the observed features of the Crab nebula. The study of Kennel et al. revealed the inconsistency of the assumption of the wind zero temperature with the observational data. It has been shown that only for high relativistic temperatures can high Mach numbers be reached, which allows the possibility of a shock formation. The analysis of Kennel et al. was extended into the 2-D case by using conventional magnetohydrodynamic equations for a relativistic plasma with an isotropic relativistic temperature. The state equation is assumed polytropic.

Description: Observations of the eclipsing binary X ray pulsar, 4U 1538-52 have revealed a cyclotron absorption feature at 20 keV in the x ray spectrum. The pulse phase dependence of the intensity and spectrum can be mimicked by a model of x ray emission from thin accretion heated slabs at the magnetic poles of a rotating neutron star with its magnetic dipole axis inclined at 45 deg from the rotation axis. The observations also yielded data on the eclipse transitions which show that the radial density function at the base of the supersonic wind of the O-type supergiant primary has the form of an exponential like that which characterizes the density run in the similar region of the O-type supergiant primary of Cen X-3. As in the Cen X-3 system, the scale height of the exponential implies a temperature in the base region much greater than that of the supersonic wind.

Description: It has been realized that the inflationary universe is in fact chaotic, that globally it is strongly inhomogeneous, and that the inflation in the universe as a whole is eternal. In such a picture the region available to modern observations is just a tiny part of the universe, in which inflation finished about 10(exp 10) years ago. In spite of the great popularity of the chaotic inflationary universe models, it is usually taken for granted that their specific features (such as strong global inhomogeneity of the universe) can hardly lead to any observable consequences. The argument is that all that is seen is just a tiny part of the universe, a region about 10(exp 28) cm, and the typical scales of considerable inhomogeneities are much greater than this size. In contrast to this opinion, an attempt is made to show that such observable consequences can really exist. The phenomenon closely connected with the origin of structure (galaxies, clusters, etc.) in the observable region is discussed. The main idea considered is the vacuum fluctuations evolution on the inhomogeneous background.

Description: The problem of instability in shear flows is treated in a number of works which present a global analysis of irrotational (potential) modes in a 2-D compressible shear flow, implying that, in the presence of reflecting boundaries, those modes can increase and that the characteristic time of the increase is several orders as high as the dynamic time in the medium. Due to the slowness of the increase of irrotational modes and to the problematic character of the theory's applicability for thin accretion disks, an attempt was made to develop an alternative theory of turbulization shear flows. It is quite contrary to the above theory. Instead of the global analysis, a local one is made far from the flow boundaries. Instead of irrotational perturbations, vortical ones are examined. Lastly, the medium is considered to be incompressible. The flow in the accretion disk can be modeled by a plane Couette flow, without regard for boundary conditions: it can be modeled by a plane shear flow in infinite incompressible fluid. According to this scenario, there is a critical perturbation level in the free shear flow. If the level of initial perturbations exceeds the critical one, the flow is turbulized.

Description: A turbulent dynamo nonlinear theory of turbulence was developed that shows that in the compact objects of accretion disks, the generated large-scale magnetic field (when the generation takes place) has a practically toroidal configuration. Its energy density can be much higher than turbulent pulsations energy density, and it becomes comparable with the thermal energy density of the medium. On this basis, the manifestations to which the large-scale magnetic field can lead at the accretion onto black holes and gravimagnetic rotators, respectively, are presented.

Description: A fully implicit high-order scheme was developed for the independent multi-group radiative transfer coupled with implicit hydrodynamics. The application of this scheme to the SN1987A explosion shows that shortly after the shock breakout a dense shell forms. A gasdynamic code describing the time dependent radiation transport in the multi-group approximation with variable Eddington factors was developed. Results and other aspects of the project are presented.

Description: The origin of cylindrically symmetric supernova remnants (SNR's) is discussed. The results of numerical simulations of two most distinguished barrel-like SNR's SN1006 and G296.5+10.0 are presented.

Description: Data from a previous investigation on the angle chi between the axis of rotation and the magnetic dipole axis, determined from polarization observations, provides a complete catalog which makes it possible to carry out a detailed comparison of the theoretical results of this present investigation with the observed distribution of radio pulsars over the angel chi. Before such a comparison is made, the main features of a theory for pulsar evolution is described.

Description: While giving a remarkably good description of many aspects of SN1987A, calculations assuming spherical symmetry have a number of flaws. Many of these problems naturally disappear in the development of a 2-D calculation, as nonspherical instabilities grow. This nonspherical behavior, made evident in SN1987A, has implications for other types of supernovae.

Description: Presently, the value of the retardation dP/dt is well known for most radio pulsars. It is negative for all cases except one and is of the order of 10(exp -15). That single case is when the pulsar, which is located in the star globular system, can have a considerable acceleration leading to the opposite sign of P'= dP/dt due to the Doppler effect. Careful measurements of the period, P, also allow one to determine the variation of this retardation with the course of time- P'' = d(exp 2)P/dt(exp 2). The results of these measurements are usually represented in the form of the dimensionless retardation index n = omega'' omega/omega(exp 2)= 2 - P''P/P(exp 2) (omega is the angular velocity). The data for 21 pulsars are given. The parameter, n, is strongly undetermined both in value and sign in all cases except for four pulsars. Changes of the rotation period, P, and the inclination angle, chi, the angle between the axes of rotation and the magnetic moment are caused by two processes: the regular retardation and nutation due to deviation from the strict spherical shape of the neutron star. Losses which are caused by the currents flowing in the magnetosphere of the neutron star and by being closed on the star surface are considered. Such losses are critical for the neutron star magnetosphere which is full of dense plasma. Since the radio emission is generated in the dense plasma of the polar magnetosphere, then practically all radio pulsars are retarded by the current mechanism. The formula for the braking index is presented along with other aspects of the investigation.

Description: The primary objective of our research program is the application of TOPEX/POSEIDON oceanic data to the study of various geophysical observations, thereby improving our knowledge of the Earth's interior. Observations of the Earth's solid tides, rotation, time-dependent gravity, and crustal deformation provide potentially useful constraints on properties of the solid Earth and its liquid core, but all these parameters are also sensitive to oceanic effects. Depending on the type of observation, those effects are usually either removed by modeling (often using particularly simple assumptions about the dynamics of the ocean) or ignored entirely. Useful oceanic data are rarely available. In many cases, the uncertainty in the oceanic correction is the main source of error in the geophysical interpretation of the results. We describe, below several of these geophysical observations, how their interpretation in terms of the Earth's interior is affected by the oceans, and how data from the TOPEX/POSEIDON mission can be used to improve this situation.

Description: The goal of the proposal is to determine the present motion of the main tectonic plates from the Doppler data of the Doppler Orbitography and Radiopositioning Integrated by Satellite (DORIS) orbitography system, which includes in its final configuration about 50 tracking stations with a world-wide distribution.

Description: The disconnection event (DE) in the plasma tail of Comet Halley on January 9-12, 1986 is examined. The distances between the comet head and the disconnected tail are measured for a series of images for that time period and then extrapolated to the nucleus to determine the disconnection time: January 9.60 +/- 0.2 days. The approximate solar-wind conditions at the time of the DE were obtained by corotation of IMP-8 satellite data in earth orbit to Comet Halley. At the time of the DE, Comet Halley is inferred to have been close to a magnetic-sector boundary and a high-speed stream-compression region. However, a heliographic latitude separation of 22 degrees (between the comet and IMP-8) and gaps in the IMP-8 data render a more definitive statement about the linkage of the DE to external conditions quite difficult. It is not possible to resolve the effects of magnetic changes associated with the sector boundary and plasma pressure in the compression region.

Description: Advances in the acquisition and analysis of cometary data are reviewed with attention given to current research and projects under development. The need for supplementing the present cometary data is underscored by discussing observational missions from the ground and earth orbit such as the Giotto Extended Mission and the Comet Rendezvous Asteroid Flyby. The interpretation of Comet Halley data is characterized as advanced with respect to both complete observational data and sophisticated modeling.

Description: A method presented by Schlosser et al. (1989) for analyzing the pressure dependence of experimental melting-temperature data is applied to rare-gas solids. The plots of the logarithm of the reduced melting temperature vs that of the reduced pressure are straight lines in the absence of phase transitions. The plots of the reduced melting temperatures for Ar, Kr, and Xe are shown to be approximately straight lines.

Description: The physical mechanism driving the weakly chaotic Taylor-Couette flow is investigated using the short-time Liapunov exponent analysis. In this procedure, the transition from quasi-periodicity to chaos is studied using direct numerical 3D simulations of axially periodic Taylor-Couette flow, and a partial Liapunov exponent spectrum for the flow is computed by simultaneously advancing the full solution and a set of perturbations. It is shown that the short-time Liapunov exponent analysis yields more information on the exponents and dimension than that obtained from the common Liapunov exponent calculations. Results show that the chaotic state studied here is caused by a Kelvin-Helmholtz-type instability of the outflow boundary jet of Taylor vortices.

Description: The recently reprocessed Nimbus-7 TOMS total ozone data from 1979 to 1989 are analyzed to assess the global impact of the El Chichon volcanic eruption on stratospheric total ozone. An apparent decrease in total ozone of 5 to 6 percent is present during the winter of 1982-1983 following the eruption of El Chichon. A regression analysis of total ozone with the equatorial zonal wind at 30 mb indicates that response to the quasi-biennial oscillation can explain much of the observed ozone anomaly, and that the total ozone decrease which can be attributed to El Chichon is at most 2 to 4 percent. This study also suggests that the interannual variability caused by the quasi-biennial oscillation and planetary wave activity may introduce apparent seasonal trends in total ozone and temperature in the lower stratosphere, particularly if the length of the data record is not very long. Such trends may affect the assessment of total ozone changes caused by chemical perturbations.

Description: The present study compares the diurnal variation of NO2 measured near 30 km by the BLISS in situ laser spectrometer with calculations from a photochemical model that includes a detailed description of multiple scattering. Even better agreement is found between the data and the model, both at sunset and during the day. The conclusions of an earlier study that the high-resolution in situ measurements of NO2 facilitated validation of the understanding of the diurnal chemistry of NO2 are confirmed.

Description: A sectorial nonradial pulsation model is used to construct theoretical line profiles which mimic the variations for Kappa(2) Boo. Synthetic spectra generated with the appropriate Teff and log g are used as input. It is found that the data can be reproduced by the combination of a high-degree l is approximately equal to 12 mode with P(osc) aproximately equal to 0.071 d, and a low-degree mode, l is approximately equal to 0-2 with P(osc) approximately equal to 0.071-0.079 d. The projected rotational velocity (v sin i - 115 +/-5 km/s) was determined by fitting synthetic line profiles to the observed spectra. The velocity amplitude of the high-degree oscillations is estimated to be about 3.5 km/s. It is found that the ratio of the horizontal and radial pulsation amplitudes is small (about 0.02) and consistent with p-mode oscillations. Comparisons are made with models invoking starspots, and it is impossible to fit the observations of Kappa(2) Boo by a starspot model without assuming unrealistic values of radius or equatorial velocity.