3,570 research outputs found
Distinguishing impurity concentrations in GaAs and AlGaAs, using very shallow undoped heterostructures
We demonstrate a method of making a very shallow, gateable, undoped
2-dimensional electron gas. We have developed a method of making very low
resistivity contacts to these structures and systematically studied the
evolution of the mobility as a function of the depth of the 2DEG (from 300nm to
30nm). We demonstrate a way of extracting quantitative information about the
background impurity concentration in GaAs and AlGaAs, the interface roughness
and the charge in the surface states from the data. This information is very
useful from the perspective of molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) growth. It is
difficult to fabricate such shallow high-mobility 2DEGs using modulation doping
due to the need to have a large enough spacer layer to reduce scattering and
switching noise from remote ionsied dopants.Comment: 4 pages, 5 eps figure
The Ultraluminous X-ray Sources near the Center of M82
We report the identification of a recurrent ultraluminous X-ray source (ULX),
a highly absorbed X-ray source (possibly a background AGN), and a young
supernova remnant near the center of the starburst galaxy M82. From a series of
Chandra observations taken from 1999 to 2005, we found that the transient ULX
first appeared in 1999 October. The source turned off in 2000 January, but
later reappeared and has been active since then. The X-ray luminosity of this
source varies from below the detection level (~2.5e38 erg/s) to its active
state in between ~7e39 erg/s and 1.3e40 erg/s (in the 0.5-10 keV energy band)
and shows unusual spectral changes. The X-ray spectra of some Chandra
observations are best fitted with an absorbed power-law model with photon index
ranging from 1.3 to 1.7. These spectra are similar to those of Galactic black
hole binary candidates seen in the low/hard state except that a very hard
spectrum was seen in one of the observations. By comparing with near infrared
images taken with the Hubble Space Telescope, the ULX is found to be located
within a young star cluster. Radio imaging indicates that it is associated with
a H II region. We suggest that the ULX is likely to be a > 100 solar mass
intermediate-mass black hole in the low/hard state. In addition to the
transient ULX, we also found a highly absorbed hard X-ray source which is
likely to be an AGN and an ultraluminous X-ray emitting young supernova remnant
which may be related to a 100-year old gamma-ray burst event, within 2 arcsec
of the transient ULX.Comment: 9 pages, 8 figures. Accepted for publication in Ap
Multilevel blocking approach to the fermion sign problem in path-integral Monte Carlo simulations
A general algorithm toward the solution of the fermion sign problem in
finite-temperature quantum Monte Carlo simulations has been formulated for
discretized fermion path integrals with nearest-neighbor interactions in the
Trotter direction. This multilevel approach systematically implements a simple
blocking strategy in a recursive manner to synthesize the sign cancellations
among different fermionic paths throughout the whole configuration space. The
practical usefulness of the method is demonstrated for interacting electrons in
a quantum dot.Comment: 4 pages RevTeX, incl. two figure
High Resolution X-Ray Imaging of the Center of IC342
We presented the result of a high resolution (FWHM~0.5'') 12 ks Chandra HRC-I
observation of the starburst galaxy IC342 taken on 2 April 2006. We identified
23 X-ray sources within the central 30' x 30' region of IC342. Our HRC-I
observation resolved the historical Ultraluminous X-ray sources (ULX), X3, near
the nucleus into 2 sources, namely C12 and C13, for the first time. The
brighter source C12, with L(0.08-10keV)=(6.66\pm0.45)\times10^{38}ergs^-1, was
spatially extended (~82 pc x 127 pc). From the astrometric registration of the
X-ray image, C12 was at R.A.=03h:46m:48.43s, decl.=+68d05m47.45s, and was
closer to the nucleus than C13. Thus we concluded that source was not an ULX
and must instead be associated with the nucleus. The fainter source C13, with
L(0.08-10keV)=(5.1\pm1.4) x 10^{37}ergs^-1 was consistent with a point source
and located $6.51'' at P.A. 240 degree of C12.
We also analyzed astrometrically corrected optical Hubble Space Telescope and
radio Very Large Array images, a comparison with the X-ray image showed
similarities in their morphologies. Regions of star formation within the
central region of IC342 were clearly visible in HST H alpha image and this was
the region where 3 optical star clusters and correspondingly our detected X-ray
source C12 were observed. We found that a predicted X-ray emission from
starburst was very close to the observed X-ray luminosity of C12, suggesting
that nuclear X-ray emission in IC342 was dominated by starburst. Furthermore,
we discussed the possibility of AGN in the nucleus of IC342. Although our data
was not enough to give a firm existence of an AGN, it could not be discarded.Comment: 29 page, 8 figures, accepted by Ap
Slow-light optical bullets in arrays of nonlinear Bragg-grating waveguides
We demonstrate how to control independently both spatial and temporal
dynamics of slow light. We reveal that specially designed nonlinear waveguide
arrays with phase-shifted Bragg gratings demonstrate the frequency-independent
spatial diffraction near the edge of the photonic bandgap, where the group
velocity of light can be strongly reduced. We show in numerical simulations
that such structures allow a great flexibility in designing and controlling
dispersion characteristics, and open a way for efficient spatiotemporal
self-trapping and the formation of slow-light optical bullets.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures; available from
http://link.aps.org/abstract/PRL/v97/e23390
Electric Field Effects on Graphene Materials
Understanding the effect of electric fields on the physical and chemical
properties of two-dimensional (2D) nanostructures is instrumental in the design
of novel electronic and optoelectronic devices. Several of those properties are
characterized in terms of the dielectric constant which play an important role
on capacitance, conductivity, screening, dielectric losses and refractive
index. Here we review our recent theoretical studies using density functional
calculations including van der Waals interactions on two types of layered
materials of similar two-dimensional molecular geometry but remarkably
different electronic structures, that is, graphene and molybdenum disulphide
(MoS). We focus on such two-dimensional crystals because of they
complementary physical and chemical properties, and the appealing interest to
incorporate them in the next generation of electronic and optoelectronic
devices. We predict that the effective dielectric constant () of
few-layer graphene and MoS is tunable by external electric fields (). We show that at low fields ( V/\AA)
assumes a nearly constant value 4 for both materials, but increases at
higher fields to values that depend on the layer thickness. The thicker the
structure the stronger is the modulation of with the electric
field. Increasing of the external field perpendicular to the layer surface
above a critical value can drive the systems to an unstable state where the
layers are weakly coupled and can be easily separated. The observed dependence
of on the external field is due to charge polarization driven by
the bias, which show several similar characteristics despite of the layer
considered.Comment: Invited book chapter on Exotic Properties of Carbon Nanomatter:
Advances in Physics and Chemistry, Springer Series on Carbon Materials.
Editors: Mihai V. Putz and Ottorino Ori (11 pages, 4 figures, 30 references
Graphene field-effect-transistors with high on/off current ratio and large transport band gap at room temperature
Graphene is considered to be a promising candidate for future
nano-electronics due to its exceptional electronic properties. Unfortunately,
the graphene field-effect-transistors (FETs) cannot be turned off effectively
due to the absence of a bandgap, leading to an on/off current ratio typically
around 5 in top-gated graphene FETs. On the other hand, theoretical
investigations and optical measurements suggest that a bandgap up to a few
hundred meV can be created by the perpendicular E-field in bi-layer graphenes.
Although previous carrier transport measurements in bi-layer graphene
transistors did indicate a gate-induced insulating state at temperature below 1
Kelvin, the electrical (or transport) bandgap was estimated to be a few meV,
and the room temperature on/off current ratio in bi-layer graphene FETs remains
similar to those in single-layer graphene FETs. Here, for the first time, we
report an on/off current ratio of around 100 and 2000 at room temperature and
20 K, respectively in our dual-gate bi-layer graphene FETs. We also measured an
electrical bandgap of >130 and 80 meV at average electric displacements of 2.2
and 1.3 V/nm, respectively. This demonstration reveals the great potential of
bi-layer graphene in applications such as digital electronics,
pseudospintronics, terahertz technology, and infrared nanophotonics.Comment: 3 Figure
Thermodynamic phase diagram and phase competition in BaFe2(As1-xPx)2 studied by thermal expansion
High-resolution thermal-expansion and specific-heat measurements were
performed on single crystalline BaFe2(As1-xPx)2 (0 < x < 0.33, x = 1). The
observation of clear anomalies allows to establish the thermodynamic phase
diagram which features a small coexistence region of SDW and superconductivity
with a steep rise of Tc on the underdoped side. Samples that undergo the
tetragonal-orthorhombic structural transition are detwinned in situ, and the
response of the sample length to the magneto-structural and superconducting
transitions is studied for all three crystallographic directions. It is shown
that a reduction of the magnetic order by superconductivity is reflected in all
lattice parameters. On the overdoped side, superconductivity affects the
lattice parameters in much the same way as the SDW on the underdoped side,
suggesting an intimate relation between the two types of order. Moreover, the
uniaxial pressure derivatives of Tc are calculated using the Ehrenfest relation
and are found to be large and anisotropic. A correspondence between
substitution and uniaxial pressure is established, i.e., uniaxial pressure
along the b-axis (c-axis) corresponds to a decrease (increase) of the P
content. By studying the electronic contribution to the thermal expansion we
find evidence for a maximum of the electronic density of states at optimal
doping
Quintessential Phenomena in Higher Dimensional Space Time
The higher dimensional cosmology provides a natural setting to treat, at a
classical level, the cosmological effects of vacuum energy. Here we discuss two
situations where starting with an ordinary matter field without any equation of
state we end up with a Chaplygin type of gas apparently as a consequence of
extra dimensions. In the second case we study the quintessential phenomena in
higher dimensional spacetime with the help of a Chaplygin type of matter field.
The first case suffers from the disqualification that no dimensional reduction
occurs, which is, however, rectified in the second case. Both the models show
the sought after feature of occurrence of \emph{flip} in the rate of expansion.
It is observed that with the increase of dimensions the occurrence of
\emph{flip} is delayed for both the models, more in line with current
observational demands. Interestingly we see that depending on some initial
conditions our model admits QCDM, CDM and also Phantom like evolution
within a unified framework. Our solutions are general in nature in the sense
that when the extra dimensions are switched off the known 4D model is
recovered.Comment: 17 Pages, 7 figure
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