222 research outputs found
Hyperfine quenching of the metastable states in divalent atoms
Hyperfine quenching rates of the lowest-energy metastable and
states of Mg, Ca, Sr, and Yb atoms are computed. The calculations are carried
out using ab initio relativistic many-body methods. The computed lifetimes may
be useful for designing novel ultra-precise optical clocks and trapping
experiments with the fermionic isotopes. The resulting natural widths of
the clock transition are 0.44 mHz for Mg, 2.2 mHz for
Ca, 7.6 mHz for Sr, 43.5 mHz for Yb, and 38.5 mHz for
Yb. Compared to the bosonic isotopes, the lifetime of the states
in fermionic isotopes is noticeably shortened by the hyperfine quenching but
still remains long enough for trapping experiments.Comment: 10 pages, 1 figure, submitted to Phys. Rev.
Forces between clustered stereocilia minimize friction in the ear on a subnanometre scale
The detection of sound begins when energy derived from acoustic stimuli
deflects the hair bundles atop hair cells. As hair bundles move, the viscous
friction between stereocilia and the surrounding liquid poses a fundamental
challenge to the ear's high sensitivity and sharp frequency selectivity. Part
of the solution to this problem lies in the active process that uses energy for
frequency-selective sound amplification. Here we demonstrate that a
complementary part involves the fluid-structure interaction between the liquid
within the hair bundle and the stereocilia. Using force measurement on a
dynamically scaled model, finite-element analysis, analytical estimation of
hydrodynamic forces, stochastic simulation and high-resolution interferometric
measurement of hair bundles, we characterize the origin and magnitude of the
forces between individual stereocilia during small hair-bundle deflections. We
find that the close apposition of stereocilia effectively immobilizes the
liquid between them, which reduces the drag and suppresses the relative
squeezing but not the sliding mode of stereociliary motion. The obliquely
oriented tip links couple the mechanotransduction channels to this least
dissipative coherent mode, whereas the elastic horizontal top connectors
stabilize the structure, further reducing the drag. As measured from the
distortion products associated with channel gating at physiological stimulation
amplitudes of tens of nanometres, the balance of forces in a hair bundle
permits a relative mode of motion between adjacent stereocilia that encompasses
only a fraction of a nanometre. A combination of high-resolution experiments
and detailed numerical modelling of fluid-structure interactions reveals the
physical principles behind the basic structural features of hair bundles and
shows quantitatively how these organelles are adapted to the needs of sensitive
mechanotransduction.Comment: 21 pages, including 3 figures. For supplementary information, please
see the online version of the article at http://www.nature.com/natur
Relative stereociliary motion in a hair bundle opposes amplification at distortion frequencies
Direct gating of mechanoelectrical-transduction channels by mechanical force
is a basic feature of hair cells that assures fast transduction and underpins
the mechanical amplification of acoustic inputs. But the associated
nonlinearity - the gating compliance - inevitably distorts signals. Because
reducing distortion would make the ear a better detector, we sought mechanisms
with that effect. Mimicking in vivo stimulation, we used stiff probes to
displace individual hair bundles at physiological amplitudes and measured the
coherence and phase of the relative stereociliary motions with a dual-beam
differential interferometer. Although stereocilia moved coherently and in phase
at the stimulus frequencies, large phase lags at the frequencies of the
internally generated distortion products indicated dissipative relative
motions. Tip links engaged these relative modes and decreased the coherence in
both stimulated and free hair bundles. These results show that a hair bundle
breaks into a highly dissipative serial arrangement of stereocilia at
distortion frequencies, precluding their amplification.Comment: 33 pages in total, including the main article with one table and
three figures, as well as the supplemental information that itself contains
two figure
Coherent motion of stereocilia assures the concerted gating of hair-cell transduction channels
The hair cell's mechanoreceptive organelle, the hair bundle, is highly
sensitive because its transduction channels open over a very narrow range of
displacements. The synchronous gating of transduction channels also underlies
the active hair-bundle motility that amplifies and tunes responsiveness. The
extent to which the gating of independent transduction channels is coordinated
depends on how tightly individual stereocilia are constrained to move as a
unit. Using dual-beam interferometry in the bullfrog's sacculus, we found that
thermal movements of stereocilia located as far apart as a bundle's opposite
edges display high coherence and negligible phase lag. Because the mechanical
degrees of freedom of stereocilia are strongly constrained, a force applied
anywhere in the hair bundle deflects the structure as a unit. This feature
assures the concerted gating of transduction channels that maximizes the
sensitivity of mechanoelectrical transduction and enhances the hair bundle's
capacity to amplify its inputs.Comment: 24 pages, including 6 figures, published in 200
High-accuracy relativistic many-body calculations of van der Waals coefficients C_6 for alkaline-earth atoms
Relativistic many-body calculations of van der Waals coefficients C_6 for
dimers correlating to two ground state alkaline-earth atoms at large
internuclear separations are reported. The following values and uncertainties
were determined : C_6 = 214(3) for Be, 627(12) for Mg, 2221(15) for Ca,
3170(196) for Sr, and 5160(74) for Ba in atomic units.Comment: 5 pages, submitted to Phys. Rev.
Correlated many-body treatment of Breit interaction with application to cesium atomic properties and parity violation
Corrections from Breit interaction to basic properties of atomic 133Cs are
determined in the framework of third-order relativistic many-body perturbation
theory. The corrections to energies, hyperfine-structure constants,
off-diagonal hyperfine 6S-7S amplitude, and electric-dipole matrix elements are
tabulated. It is demonstrated that the Breit corrections to correlations are
comparable to the Breit corrections at the Dirac-Hartree-Fock level.
Modification of the parity-nonconserving (PNC) 6S-7S amplitude due to Breit
interaction is also evaluated; the resulting weak charge of Cs shows no
significant deviation from the prediction of the standard model of elementary
particles. The neutron skin correction to the PNC amplitude is also estimated
to be -0.2% with an error bound of 30% based on the analysis of recent
experiments with antiprotonic atoms. The present work supplements publication
[A. Derevianko, Phys. Rev. Lett. 85, 1618 (2000)] with a discussion of the
formalism and provides additional numerical results and updated discussion of
parity violation.Comment: 16 pages; 5 figs; submitted to Phys. Rev.
Statistics of low-energy levels of a one-dimensional weakly localized Frenkel exciton: A numerical study
Numerical study of the one-dimensional Frenkel Hamiltonian with on-site
randomness is carried out. We focus on the statistics of the energy levels near
the lower exciton band edge, i. e. those determining optical response. We found
that the distribution of the energy spacing between the states that are well
localized at the same segment is characterized by non-zero mean, i.e. these
states undergo repulsion. This repulsion results in a local discrete energy
structure of a localized Frenkel exciton. On the contrary, the energy spacing
distribution for weakly overlapping local ground states (the states with no
nodes within their localization segments) that are localized at different
segments has zero mean and shows almost no repulsion. The typical width of the
latter distribution is of the same order as the typical spacing in the local
discrete energy structure, so that this local structure is hidden; it does not
reveal itself neither in the density of states nor in the linear absorption
spectra. However, this structure affects the two-exciton transitions involving
the states of the same segment and can be observed by the pump-probe
spectroscopy. We analyze also the disorder degree scaling of the first and
second momenta of the distributions.Comment: 10 pages, 6 figure
Challenges in QCD matter physics - The Compressed Baryonic Matter experiment at FAIR
Substantial experimental and theoretical efforts worldwide are devoted to
explore the phase diagram of strongly interacting matter. At LHC and top RHIC
energies, QCD matter is studied at very high temperatures and nearly vanishing
net-baryon densities. There is evidence that a Quark-Gluon-Plasma (QGP) was
created at experiments at RHIC and LHC. The transition from the QGP back to the
hadron gas is found to be a smooth cross over. For larger net-baryon densities
and lower temperatures, it is expected that the QCD phase diagram exhibits a
rich structure, such as a first-order phase transition between hadronic and
partonic matter which terminates in a critical point, or exotic phases like
quarkyonic matter. The discovery of these landmarks would be a breakthrough in
our understanding of the strong interaction and is therefore in the focus of
various high-energy heavy-ion research programs. The Compressed Baryonic Matter
(CBM) experiment at FAIR will play a unique role in the exploration of the QCD
phase diagram in the region of high net-baryon densities, because it is
designed to run at unprecedented interaction rates. High-rate operation is the
key prerequisite for high-precision measurements of multi-differential
observables and of rare diagnostic probes which are sensitive to the dense
phase of the nuclear fireball. The goal of the CBM experiment at SIS100
(sqrt(s_NN) = 2.7 - 4.9 GeV) is to discover fundamental properties of QCD
matter: the phase structure at large baryon-chemical potentials (mu_B > 500
MeV), effects of chiral symmetry, and the equation-of-state at high density as
it is expected to occur in the core of neutron stars. In this article, we
review the motivation for and the physics programme of CBM, including
activities before the start of data taking in 2022, in the context of the
worldwide efforts to explore high-density QCD matter.Comment: 15 pages, 11 figures. Published in European Physical Journal
Elliptic flow of charged particles in Pb-Pb collisions at 2.76 TeV
We report the first measurement of charged particle elliptic flow in Pb-Pb
collisions at 2.76 TeV with the ALICE detector at the CERN Large Hadron
Collider. The measurement is performed in the central pseudorapidity region
(||<0.8) and transverse momentum range 0.2< < 5.0 GeV/. The
elliptic flow signal v, measured using the 4-particle correlation method,
averaged over transverse momentum and pseudorapidity is 0.087 0.002
(stat) 0.004 (syst) in the 40-50% centrality class. The differential
elliptic flow v reaches a maximum of 0.2 near = 3
GeV/. Compared to RHIC Au-Au collisions at 200 GeV, the elliptic flow
increases by about 30%. Some hydrodynamic model predictions which include
viscous corrections are in agreement with the observed increase.Comment: 10 pages, 4 captioned figures, published version, figures at
http://aliceinfo.cern.ch/ArtSubmission/node/389
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