220 research outputs found
Collisional decoherence reexamined
We re-derive the quantum master equation for the decoherence of a massive
Brownian particle due to collisions with the lighter particles from a thermal
environment. Our careful treatment avoids the occurrence of squares of Dirac
delta functions. It leads to a decoherence rate which is smaller by a factor of
2 pi compared to previous findings. This result, which is in agreement with
recent experiments, is confirmed by both a physical analysis of the problem and
by a perturbative calculation in the weak coupling limit.Comment: 33 pages, 4 figure
Absorption-free optical control of spin systems:the quantum Zeno effect in optical pumping
We show that atomic spin motion can be controlled by circularly polarized
light without light absorption in the strong pumping limit. In this limit, the
pumping light, which drives the empty spin state, destroys the Zeeman coherence
effectively and freezes the coherent transition via the quantum Zeno effect. It
is verified experimentally that the amount of light absorption decreases
asymptotically to zero as the incident light intensity is increased.Comment: 4 pages with 4 figure
Real-time detection of solar neutrinos with Borexino
Solar neutrinos have been fundamental in the discovery of neutrino flavor oscillations and are a unique tool to probe the nuclear reactions that fuel the Sun. The Borexino experiment, located in the Gran Sasso National Laboratory, is an ultra-pure liquid scintillator detector conceived for the real time spectroscopy of low energy solar neutrinos. Thanks to its unprecedented background levels, Borexino could measure in real time the fluxes of different components of the solar neutrino spectrum, thus probing both solar neutrino oscillations and the Standard Solar Model. We review these fundamental results and also discuss the prospects for the Phase-II of Borexino, which is entering the precision era of solar neutrino measurements
Projection Postulate and Atomic Quantum Zeno Effect
The projection postulate has been used to predict a slow-down of the time
evolution of the state of a system under rapidly repeated measurements, and
ultimately a freezing of the state. To test this so-called quantum Zeno effect
an experiment was performed by Itano et al. (Phys. Rev. A 41, 2295 (1990)) in
which an atomic-level measurement was realized by means of a short laser pulse.
The relevance of the results has given rise to controversies in the literature.
In particular the projection postulate and its applicability in this experiment
have been cast into doubt. In this paper we show analytically that for a wide
range of parameters such a short laser pulse acts as an effective level
measurement to which the usual projection postulate applies with high accuracy.
The corrections to the ideal reductions and their accumulation over n pulses
are calculated. Our conclusion is that the projection postulate is an excellent
pragmatic tool for a quick and simple understanding of the slow-down of time
evolution in experiments of this type. However, corrections have to be
included, and an actual freezing does not seem possible because of the finite
duration of measurements.Comment: 25 pages, LaTeX, no figures; to appear in Phys. Rev.
Intact finger representation within primary sensorimotor cortex of musician's dystonia.
Musician's dystonia presents with a persistent deterioration of motor control during musical performance. A predominant hypothesis has been that this is underpinned by maladaptive neural changes to the somatotopic organisation of finger representations within primary somatosensory cortex. Here, we tested this hypothesis by investigating the finger-specific activity patterns in the primary somatosensory and motor cortex using functional MRI and multivariate pattern analysis in nine musicians with dystonia and nine healthy musicians. A purpose-built keyboard device allowed characterisation of activity patterns elicited during passive extension and active finger presses of individual fingers. We analysed the data using both traditional spatial analysis and state-of-the art multivariate analyses. Our analysis reveals that digit representations in musicians were poorly captured by spatial analyses. An optimised spatial metric found clear somatotopy but no difference in the spatial geometry between fingers with dystonia. Representational similarity analysis was confirmed as a more reliable technique than all spatial metrics evaluated. Significantly, the dissimilarity architecture was equivalent for musicians with and without dystonia. No expansion or spatial shift of digit representation maps were found in the symptomatic group. Our results therefore suggest that the neural representation of generic finger maps in primary sensorimotor cortex is intact in musician's dystonia. These results speak against the idea that task-specific dystonia is associated with a distorted hand somatotopy and lend weight to an alternative hypothesis that task-specific dystonia is due to a higher order disruption of skill encoding. Such a formulation can better explain the task-specific deficit and offers alternative inroads for therapeutic interventions
Cavity-induced coherence effects in spontaneous emission from pre-Selection of polarization
Spontaneous emission can create coherences in a multilevel atom having close
lying levels, subject to the condition that the atomic dipole matrix elements
are non-orthogonal. This condition is rarely met in atomic systems. We report
the possibility of bypassing this condition and thereby creating coherences by
letting the atom with orthogonal dipoles to interact with the vacuum of a
pre-selected polarized cavity mode rather than the free space vacuum. We derive
a master equation for the reduced density operator of a model four level atomic
system, and obtain its analytical solution to describe the interference
effects. We report the quantum beat structure in the populations.Comment: 6 pages in REVTEX multicolumn format, 5 figures, new references
added, journal reference adde
Quantum jumps in hydrogen-like systems
In this paper it is shown that the Lyman- transition of a single
hydrogen-like system driven by a laser exhibits macroscopic dark periods,
provided there exists an additional constant electric field. We describe the
photon-counting process under the condition that the polarization of the laser
coincides with the direction of the constant electric field. The theoretical
results are given for the example of . We show that the emission
behavior depends sensitively on the Lamb shift (W.E. Lamb, R.C. Retherford,
Phys. Rev. 72, 241 (1947)) between the and energy levels.
A possibly realizable measurement of the mean duration of the dark periods
should give quantitative information about the above energy difference by using
the proposed photon-counting process.Comment: 7 pages RevTeX + 2 figures Phys. Rev A accepte
Zeno dynamics yields ordinary constraints
The dynamics of a quantum system undergoing frequent measurements (quantum
Zeno effect) is investigated. Using asymptotic analysis, the system is found to
evolve unitarily in a proper subspace of the total Hilbert space. For spatial
projections, the generator of the "Zeno dynamics" is the Hamiltonian with
Dirichlet boundary conditions.Comment: 6 page
The PERMA well-being model and music facilitation practice: Preliminary documentation for well-being through music provision in Australian schools
The aim of this study was to consider how we can invest in music-making to promote well-being in school contexts. Web-based data collection was conducted where researchers identified 17 case studies that describe successful music programs in schools in Australia. The researchers aligned content from these case studies into the five categories of the PERMA well-being model: Positive emotions, Engagement, Relationships, Meaning, and Accomplishment, in order to understand how each well-being element was realised through the music programs. The results indicate that the element of the PERMA well-being model that relates to relationships was described most often. Collaboration and partnership between students, teachers, and staff in schools, and local people in the community such as parents, local entrepreneurs, and musicians were repeatedly identified as a highly significant contributing factor in the success of the music program. The school leaders? roles in providing opportunities for students to experience musical participation and related activities (engagement) and valuing these experiences (meaning) were also crucial in the facilitation of the music programs. The findings of this study indicate that tailored music and relationship-centred music programs in schools not only increase skills and abilities of the students, but also improve the psychosocial well-being of the students and the community
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Improved Upper Limit on the Neutrino Mass from a Direct Kinematic Method by KATRIN.
We report on the neutrino mass measurement result from the first four-week science run of the Karlsruhe Tritium Neutrino experiment KATRIN in spring 2019. Beta-decay electrons from a high-purity gaseous molecular tritium source are energy analyzed by a high-resolution MAC-E filter. A fit of the integrated electron spectrum over a narrow interval around the kinematic end point at 18.57 keV gives an effective neutrino mass square value of (-1.0_{-1.1}^{+0.9}) eV^{2}. From this, we derive an upper limit of 1.1 eV (90% confidence level) on the absolute mass scale of neutrinos. This value coincides with the KATRIN sensitivity. It improves upon previous mass limits from kinematic measurements by almost a factor of 2 and provides model-independent input to cosmological studies of structure formation
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