The Modern FPGA as Discriminator, TDC and ADC

Recent generations of Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs) have become indispensible tools for complex state machine control and signal processing, and now routinely incorporate CPU cores to allow execution of user software code. At the same time, their exceptional performance permits low-power implementation of functionality previously the exclusive domain of dedicated analog electronics. Specific examples presented here use FPGAs as discriminator, time-to-digital (TDC) and analog-to-digital converter (ADC). All three cases are examples of instrumentation for current or future astroparticle experiments.Comment: 7 pages, v3 minor JINST editorial correction

Relation between CKM and MNS Matrices Induced by Bi-Maximal Rotations in the Seesaw Mechanism

It is found that the seesaw mechanism not only explains the smallness of neutrino masses but also accounts for the large mixing angles simultaneously, even if the unification of the neutrino Dirac mass matrix with that of up-type quark sector is realized. In this mechanism, we show that the mixing matrix of the Dirac-type mass matrix gets extra rotations from the diagonalization of Majorana mass matrix. Assuming that the mixing angles to diagonalize the Majorana mass matrix are extremely small, we find that the large mixing angles of leptonic sector found in atmospheric and long baseline reactor neutrino oscillation experiments can be explained by these extra rotations. We also find that provided the mixing angle around y-axis to diagonalize the Majorana mass matrix vanishes, we can derive the information about the absolute values of neutrino masses and Majorana mass responsible for the neutrinoless double beta decay experiment through the data set of neutrino experiments. In the simplified case that there is no CP phase, we find that the neutrino masses are decided as $m_1:m_2:m_3\approx 1:2:8$ and that there are no solution which satisfy $m_3<m_1<m_2$ (inverted mass spectrum). Then, including all CP phases, we reanalyze the absolute values of neutrino masses and Majorana mass responsible for the neutrinoless double beta decay experiment.Comment: 19 pages, 7 figures, revtex4, to appear in J.PHYS.SOC.JA

Remaining inconsistencies with solar neutrinos: can spin flavour precession provide a clue?

A few inconsistencies remain after it has been ascertained that LMA is the dominant solution to the solar neutrino problem: why is the SuperKamiokande spectrum flat and why is the Chlorine rate prediction over two standard deviations above the data. There also remains the ananswered and important question of whether the active neutrino flux is constant or time varying. We propose a scenario involving spin flavour precession to sterile neutrinos with three active flavours that predicts a flat SuperK spectrum and a Chlorine rate prediction more consistent with data. We also argue that running the Borexino experiment during the next few years may provide a very important clue as to the possible variability of the solar neutrino flux.Comment: 3 pages, 2 figures, contribution to TAUP 2009 (Rome

New Linear Codes from Matrix-Product Codes with Polynomial Units

A new construction of codes from old ones is considered, it is an extension of the matrix-product construction. Several linear codes that improve the parameters of the known ones are presented

The effect of massive neutrinos on the matter power spectrum

We investigate the impact of massive neutrinos on the distribution of matter in the semi-non-linear regime (0.1<k<0.6 h/Mpc). We present a suite of large-scale N-body simulations quantifying the scale dependent suppression of the total matter power spectrum, resulting from the free-streaming of massive neutrinos out of high-density regions. Our simulations show a power suppression of 3.5-90 per cent at k~0.6 h/Mpc for total neutrino mass, m_nu=0.05-1.9 eV respectively. We also discuss the precision levels that future cosmological datasets would have to achieve in order to distinguish the normal and inverted neutrino mass hierarchies.Comment: 10 pages, 10 figures, 1 table, changes made to address referee repor