585 research outputs found
Thermodynamics of Multi-Component Fermi Vapors
We study the thermodynamical properties of Fermi vapors confined in a
harmonic external potential. In the case of the ideal Fermi gas, we compare
exact density profiles with their semiclassical approximation in the conditions
of recent experiments. Then, we consider the phase-separation of a
multi-component Fermi vapor. In particular, we analyze the phase-separation as
a function of temperature, number of particles and scattering length. Finally,
we discuss the effect of rotation on the stability and thermodynamics of the
trapped vapors.Comment: 15 pages, 5 figures, to be published in J. Phys. B (Atom. Mol.) as a
Special Issue Articl
Kinetic energy of a trapped Fermi gas interacting with a Bose-Einstein condensate
We study a confined mixture of bosons and fermions in the regime of quantal
degeneracy, with particular attention to the effects of the interactions on the
kinetic energy of the fermionic component. We are able to explore a wide region
of system parameters by identifying two scaling variables which completely
determine its state at low temperature. These are the ratio of the
boson-fermion and boson-boson interaction strengths and the ratio of the radii
of the two clouds. We find that the effect of the interactions can be sizeable
for reasonable choices of the parameters and that its experimental study can be
used to infer the sign of the boson-fermion scattering length. The interplay
between interactions and thermal effects in the fermionic kinetic energy is
also discussed.Comment: REVTEX, 8 pages, 6 figures included. Small corrections to text and
figures, accepted for publication in EPJ
Temperature-dependent density profiles of trapped boson-fermion mixtures
We present a semiclassical three-fluid model for a Bose-condensed mixture of
interacting Bose and Fermi gases confined in harmonic traps at finite
temperature. The model is used to characterize the experimentally relevant
behaviour of the equilibrium density profile of the fermions with varying
composition and temperature across the onset of degeneracy, for coupling
strengths relevant to a mixture of
K and K atoms.Comment: 9 pages, 2 postscript figures, accepted for publication in Eur. Phys.
Jour.
Space-weighted seismic attenuation mapping of the aseismic source of Campi Flegrei 1983-84 unrest
Peer reviewedPublisher PD
Inversion of synthetic geodetic data for the 1997 Colfiorito events: clues on the effects of layering, assessment of model parameter PDFs, and model selection criteria
The 1997 September-October Umbria-Marche sequence has been extensively studied in the past by analyzing
coseismic displacement data (GPS, leveling, SAR). Here we focus on synthetic data representative of the main
event of the 1997 Umbria-Marche sequence and investigate the effects of a crustal layering proper to the Colfiorito
area on surface displacements and inferred source features when inverting coseismic geodetic data without
taking into account layering. We compare bootstrapping and NA-Bayes as tools for parameter uncertainty assessment
and show how the Akaike Information Criterion can be used to select the model which is most likely
to be correct. Since SAR images offer the most complete coverage of the study area, we use synthetic line-ofsight
displacement data
“Left and right prefrontal routes to action comprehension”
Successful action comprehension requires the integration of motor information and semantic cues about objects in context. Previous evidence suggests that while motor features are dorsally encoded in the fronto-parietal action observation network (AON); semantic features are ventrally processed in temporal structures. Importantly, these dorsal and ventral routes seem to be preferentially tuned to low (LSF) and high (HSF) spatial frequencies, respectively. Recently, we proposed a model of action comprehension where we hypothesized an additional route to action understanding whereby coarse LSF information about objects in context is projected to the dorsal AON via the prefrontal cortex (PFC), providing a prediction signal of the most likely intention afforded by them. Yet, this model awaits for experimental testing. To this end, we used a perturb-and-measure continuous theta burst stimulation (cTBS) approach, selectively disrupting neural activity in the left and right PFC and then evaluating the participant's ability to recognize filtered action stimuli containing only HSF or LSF. We find that stimulation over PFC triggered different spatial-frequency modulations depending on lateralization: left-cTBS and right-cTBS led to poorer performance on HSF and LSF action stimuli, respectively. Our findings suggest that left and right PFC exploit distinct spatial frequencies to support action comprehension, providing evidence for multiple routes to social perception in humans
Symmetric and asymmetric solitons in linearly coupled Bose-Einstein condensates trapped in optical lattices
We study spontaneous symmetry breaking in a system of two parallel
quasi-one-dimensional traps, equipped with optical lattices (OLs) and filled
with a Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC). The cores are linearly coupled by
tunneling. Analysis of the corresponding system of linearly coupled
Gross-Pitaevskii equations (GPEs) reveals that spectral bandgaps of the single
GPE split into subgaps. Symmetry breaking in two-component BEC solitons is
studied in cases of the attractive (AA) and repulsive (RR) nonlinearity in both
traps; the mixed situation, with repulsion in one trap and attraction in the
other (RA), is considered too. In all the cases, stable asymmetric solitons are
found, bifurcating from symmetric or antisymmetric ones (and destabilizing
them), in the AA and RR systems, respectively. In either case, bi-stability is
predicted, with a nonbifurcating stable branch, either antisymmetric or
symmetric, coexisting with asymmetric ones. Solitons destabilized by the
bifurcation tend to rearrange themselves into their stable asymmetric
counterparts. The impact of a phase mismatch, between the OLs in the two cores
is also studied. Also considered is a related model, for a binary BEC in a
single-core trap with the OL, assuming that the two species (representing
different spin states of the same atom) are coupled by linear interconversion.
In that case, the symmetry-breaking bifurcations in the AA and RR models switch
their character, if the inter-species nonlinear interaction becomes stronger
than the intra-species nonlinearity.Comment: 21 pages + 24 figs, accepted to Phys. Rev.
effect of intrathecal baclofen botulinum toxin type a and a rehabilitation programme on locomotor function after spinal cord injury a case report
Objective: a few studies have reported the use of botulinum toxin injections after spinal cord injury, as this is the gold standard to treat focal spasticity. We report such a case here. Case report: a 38-year-old woman who had become paraplegic and care-dependent secondary to cervico-thoracic intramedullary ependymoma, presented 8 months later with painful lower limb spasticity, which was being treated with oral anti-spastic and benzodiazepine drugs with no therapeutic effect. We treated the patient with intrathecal baclofen to reduce her spasticity and in order to avoid the major side-effects of high dosages of oral baclofen. after motor rehabilitation programmes, which included functional ele
Prevalence, Characteristics, and Patterns of Health Care Use for Chronic Headache in Two Areas of Italy. Results of A Questionnaire Interview in General Practice
We set out to define the prevalence, clinical features and severity of chronic headache among the affiliates of two groups of general practitioners (GPs) and to illustrate the diagnostic and therapeutic modalities employed. A semistructured questionnaire was completed for 2291 children and adults, seen at office or home consultations over a 6-month period by 44 GPs in two areas of Northern Italy (Varese and Sondrio) and Southern Italy (San Giovanni Rotondo), to assess the presence and the clinical features of chronic headache, the severity of the disease (i.e. the degree of interference with work and daily living activities), the diagnostic work-up, and the main treatment modalities. GPs attempted the classification of headache according to the International Headache Society (IHS) criteria. The sample comprised 910 men and 1381 women aged 2-92 years; 39% of cases reported chronic headache (Varese/Sondrio 40%; San Giovanni Rotondo 38%; men 28%; women 47%). Headache was mostly present for >10 years, with one to three attacks/month lasting 4-24 h. Headache was mild in 18% of cases, moderate in 29%, severe in 24%, and very severe in 29%. Diagnostic assessment and treatment varied in the study areas. Diagnostic work-up, hospital admissions, referral to headache centres, and treatment modalities tended to be correlated with headache severity. The GPs could not classify headache using the IHS categories in 27% of cases (Varese/Sondrio 11%; San Giovanni Rotondo 78%). An inverse correlation was found between case classification and use of subsidiary diagnostic and therapeutic aids. Chronic headache is common among individuals seen in general practice. The patterns of health care use tend to be correlated to its severity. A better knowledge of the IHS criteria may be directly related to lower management costs
Collisionless collective modes of fermions in magnetic traps
We present a Random-Phase-Approximation formalism for the collective spectrum
of two hyperfine species of dilute 40K atoms, magnetically trapped at zero
temperature and subjected to a repulsive s-wave interaction between atoms with
different spin projections. We examine the density-like and the spin-like
oscillation spectra, as well as the transition density profiles created by
external multipolar fields. The zero sound spectrum is always fragmented and
the density and spin channels become clearly distinguishable if the trapping
potentials acting on the species are identical. Although this distinction is
lost when these confining fields are different, at selected excitation
frequencies the transition densities may display the signature of the channel.Comment: 10 pages, 9 figure
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