Physics Commons^™

2p Or Not 2p:The 14o(Α,2p) 16o Reaction Rate And Its Implications On Nova And X-Ray Burst Nucleosynthesis, Luc L. Dessieux, Jr.

Masters Theses

During explosive hydrogen burning, the catalytic CNO cycle suffers depletion by additional thermonuclear capture reactions on the members of the cycle. This "break out" from the β-limited CNO cycle has been suggested to occur in novae and X-ray bursts for temperatures greater than 0.4 GK [3,26,28]. At these temperatures α captures can occur on the CNO waiting point isotopes through the nuclear reactions

¹⁴O(α,p) ¹⁷F, ¹⁵O(α,γ) ¹⁹Ne, and ¹⁸Ne(α,γ) ²¹Na [3]. An additional reaction, ¹⁴O(α,2p)¹⁶O has been suggested as a possible break out path from the CNO cycle [49]. To investigate …

Implementationof Monte Carlo And Numerical Integration Techniques Within An Online Physics Laboratory Environment, Malachi Schram

Masters Theses

A robust and sophisticated online physics laboratory environment has been developed. This environment can handle large data sets and generate realistic experimental results by applying Monte Carlo and numerical integration techniques. The advantages and limitations of both the Flash 5 and Java development environments were explored. Java was chosen for it’s ability to handle large data sets and consequently used to create the Java Laboratory (JLab) environment. Within the online environment two JLabs were created, the ”Online Virtual Nuclear Decay Laboratory” and the ”Online Virtual Stern-Gerlach Laboratory”. These laboratories teach students how to manipulate experimental parameters, take data, and use …

Reaclibalive! (Reaclib Rate Library Interactive Viewer): A Software Package For Graphical Analysis Of Nuclear Reaction Rates For Astrophysics, Eric J. Lingerfelt

Masters Theses

Nucleosynthesis occurs in such diverse astrophysical phenomena as ordinary stars, like our own Sun, supernovae, novae, X-ray bursts, and the Big Bang. Large sets of nuclear reaction rates for hundreds of seed isotopes are utilized in simulations of these nucleosynthesis processes. A cross-platform, Java software package called REACLIB aLIVe! has been developed with intuitive graphical interfaces and interactive controls to produce custom one-dimensional plots of reaction rates. The points used for these plots are calculated from exponential fits whose parameters, along with other quantities, make up the REACLIB Nuclear Reaction Rate Library. The software offers nuclear astrophysicists the capability to …

Single-Molecule Imaging With A Custom-Built Fluorescence Microscope, David Allan Ball

Masters Theses

An apparatus for single-molecule imaging was constructed and used to examine nanomolar solutions of Bodipy Texas Red in water. The illumination source for this microscope is a synchronously pumped dye laser operating at a wavelength of 585 nm. The beam can easily be switched to give total internal reflection or wide field epi-illumination excitation of the sample. The instrument also has the capability of being used for single-molecule detection by confocal epiillumination and for fluorescence correlation spectroscopy. Movies of single molecules were analyzed using custom software written in Matlab. Molecules stuck to the surface revealed fluctuations in intensity, or blinking, …

Single-Molecule Detection, Wesley Carlton Parker

Masters Theses

Single-molecule detection (SMD) provides a practical method of examining the behavior of individual molecules. This has application both for fundamental studies of particle dynamics such as diffusion in solutions, and for bio-technology applications such as DNA sequencing.

In this thesis I discuss two confocal epi-illumination microscopes constructed at UTSI and used for single-molecule detection and fluorescence correlation spectroscopy. Examples of data collected from experiments using each instrument is presented in which solutions of the fluorescent dye sulforhodamine 101 are analyzed. An example of the use of the instrument to detect fluorescence quenching is also presented.