Space environmentSpace environment is a branch of astronautics, aerospace engineering and space physics that seeks to understand and address conditions existing in space that affect the design and operation of spacecraft. A related subject, space weather, deals with dynamic processes in the solar-terrestrial system that can give rise to effects on spacecraft, but that can also affect the atmosphere, ionosphere and geomagnetic field, giving rise to several other kinds of effects on human technologies.
Degenerate distributionIn mathematics, a degenerate distribution is, according to some, a probability distribution in a space with support only on a manifold of lower dimension, and according to others a distribution with support only at a single point. By the latter definition, it is a deterministic distribution and takes only a single value. Examples include a two-headed coin and rolling a die whose sides all show the same number. This distribution satisfies the definition of "random variable" even though it does not appear random in the everyday sense of the word; hence it is considered degenerate.
RandomnessIn common usage, randomness is the apparent or actual lack of definite pattern or predictability in information. A random sequence of events, symbols or steps often has no order and does not follow an intelligible pattern or combination. Individual random events are, by definition, unpredictable, but if the probability distribution is known, the frequency of different outcomes over repeated events (or "trials") is predictable. For example, when throwing two dice, the outcome of any particular roll is unpredictable, but a sum of 7 will tend to occur twice as often as 4.
Random matrixIn probability theory and mathematical physics, a random matrix is a matrix-valued random variable—that is, a matrix in which some or all elements are random variables. Many important properties of physical systems can be represented mathematically as matrix problems. For example, the thermal conductivity of a lattice can be computed from the dynamical matrix of the particle-particle interactions within the lattice. In nuclear physics, random matrices were introduced by Eugene Wigner to model the nuclei of heavy atoms.
