7,546 research outputs found
Theory of positron production in heavy-ion collisions
Collisions of very heavy ions at energies close to the Coulomb barrier are discussed as a unique tool to study the behavior of the electron-positron field in the presence of strong external electromagnetic fields. To calculate the excitation processes induced by the collision dynamics, a semiclassical model is employed and adapted to describe the field-theoretical many-particle system. An expansion in the adiabatic molecular basis is chosen. Energies and matrix elements are calculated using the monopole approximation. In a supercritical (Z1+Z2≳173) quasiatomic system the 1s level joins the antiparticle continuum and becomes a resonance, rendering the neutral vacuum state unstable. Several methods of treating the corresponding time-dependent problem are discussed. A projection-operator technique is introduced for a fully dynamical treatment of the resonance. Positron excitation rates in s1/2 and p1/2 states are obtained by numerical solution of the coupled-channel equations and are compared with results from first- plus second-order perturbation theory. Calculations are performed for subcritical and supercritical collisions of Pb-Pb, Pb-U, U-U, and U-Cf. Strong relativistic deformations of the wave functions and the growing contributions from inner-shell bound states lead to a very steep Z dependence of positron production. The results are compared with available data from experiments done at GSI. Correlations between electrons and positrons are briefly discussed
Energy Spectra of Superfluid Turbulence in He
In superfluid He turbulence is carried predominantly by the superfluid
component. To explore the statistical properties of this quantum turbulence and
its differences from the classical counterpart we adopt the time-honored
approach of shell models. Using this approach we provide numerical simulations
of a Sabra-shell model that allows us to uncover the nature of the energy
spectrum in the relevant hydrodynamic regimes. These results are in qualitative
agreement with analytical expressions for the superfluid turbulent energy
spectra that were found using a differential approximation for the energy flux
Inertial modes in stratified rotating neutron stars : An evolutionary description
With (non-barotropic) equations of state valid even when the neutron, proton
and electron content of neutron star cores is not in beta equilibrium, we study
inertial and composition gravity modes of relativistic rotating neutron stars.
We solve the relativistic Euler equations in the time domain with a three
dimensional numerical code based on spectral methods, in the slow rotation,
relativistic Cowling and anelastic approximations. Principally, after a short
description of the gravity modes due to smooth composition gradients, we focus
our analysis on the question of how the inertial modes are affected by
non-barotropicity of the nuclear matter. In our study, the deviation with
respect to barotropicity results from the frozen composition of non-superfluid
matter composed of neutrons, protons and electrons, when beta equilibrium is
broken by millisecond oscillations. We show that already for moderatly fast
rotating stars the increasing coupling between polar and axial modes makes
those two cases less different than for very slowly rotating stars. In
addition, as we directly solve the Euler equations, without coupling only a few
number of spherical harmonics, we always found, for the models that we use, a
discrete spectrum for the inertial mode. Finally, we find that, for
non-barotropic stars, the frequency of this mode, which is our main focus,
decreases in a non-negligible way, whereas the time dependence of the energy
transfer between polar and axial modes is substantially different due to the
existence of low-frequencies gravity modes.Comment: 34 pages, 24 figures, published versio
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