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Fundamental Physics and Chemistry Space Science in the Twenty-First Century -- Imperatives for the Decades 1995 to 2015 (1988) / Chapter Skim
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2. Gravity-Sensitive Systems at Equilibrium
Pages 66-70

The Chapter Skim interface presents what we've algorithmically identified as the most significant single chunk of text within every page in the chapter.
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From page 66...
... The same long-range order exhibited in many-body systems near their critical points also exists in systems that have "secondorder" or cooperative phase transitions. A transition especially suitable for experimental study is the so-called lambda (~)
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From page 67...
... Even though Wilson's work produced specific values of the coefficients and exponents that characterize the critical anomalies, the experunents have not yet been able to test the finer details of the theory. Accurate experimental values of the predicted quantities require extremely precise measurements under tightly controlled conditions (temperature, pressure, density, and so on)
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From page 68...
... In a microgravity environment the correlation length could approach the size where a weak link could be constructed in a machine shop. It would be fascinating to see what effect the various forms of dissipation near the lambda transition would have on the tunneling rate in such a junction.
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From page 69...
... Postfailure behavior ~ important in a variety of scientific and engineering applications, including chemical process ing of catalytic powders, earthquake engineering, and geophysical catastrophes such as eruptions and landslides. The presence of gravity represents a nearly insurmountable obstacle to the meat surement of failure criteria, failure mode, and microscopic failure mechanisms on the one hand, and postfailure behavior on the other.
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From page 70...
... furthermore, local microscopic pho" tographic measurements of the motion of individual particles and grains wail give insight into the grain-level mechanisms of failure. These results wiB be useful for formulating and testing nonlinear constitutive equations for such materials.
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Key Terms

  • liquid helium
  • weak link
  • lambda transition
  • density gradient
  • postfailure behavior

  • transport properties
  • critical phenomena
  • phase transitions
  • experiment measures
  • simple fluid

  • cooperative phase
  • greatly reduced
  • theoretical understanding
  • quantities require
  • transition especially

  • experimental study
  • projects involves
  • microscopic failure
  • meat surement
  • controlled conditions

  • space experiments
  • josephson effects
  • wave function
  • work produced
  • experimental values

  • produced specific
  • remain relateci
  • require extremely
  • flight centers
  • superfluid helium


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