The aim of the project is to use the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) to data mine the spectra of quasars and identify redshifted absorption troughs as outflows. SDSS collects data on a variety of objects in the universe, but our interest is in Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN) and outflows of quasars. The database search paves the way for follow-up analysis including determining the mass flux, kinetic luminosity, column density, and other physical parameters of the outflow. Of the thousands of SDSS objects, the ones deemed most interesting are analyzed using computer software that identies doublets in the spectra such as CIV, SiII, and NV. Each line of spectra is examined for excited ions that are used in the calculation of the hydrogen number density. This is the rst step in a long process to learn more about the outflows of quasars and AGN. Currently, we have dozens of objects ready to explore further with higher resolution telescopes such as the William Herschel Telescope, the Very Large Telescope at the European Southern Observatory in Chile and also the Hubble Space Telescope.

We study a stochastic system with N individuals, consisting of four species competing cyclically: A+B → A+A, B+C → B+B, C+D → C+C , D+A → D+D. Randomly choosing a pair and letting them react, N is conserved but the fractions of each species evolve non-trivially. At late times, the system ends in a static, absorbing state typically, coexisting species AC or BD. The master equation is shown and solved exactly for N=4, providing a little insight into the problem. For large N, we rely on simulations by Monte Carlo techniques (with a faster dynamics where a reaction occurs at every step). Generally, the results are in good agreement with predictions from mean field theory, after appropriate rescaling of Monte Carlo time. The theory fails, however, to describe extinction or predict their probabilities. Nevertheless, it can hint at many remarkable behavior associated with extinction, which we discover when studying systems with extremely disparate rates.