Theoretical description of two ultracold atoms in finite 3D optical lattices using realistic interatomic interaction potentials

A theoretical approach is described for an exact numerical treatment of a pair of ultracold atoms interacting via a central potential that are trapped in a finite three-dimensional optical lattice. The coupling of center-of-mass and relative-motion coordinates is treated using an exact diagonalization (configuration-interaction) approach. The orthorhombic symmetry of an optical lattice with three different but orthogonal lattice vectors is explicitly considered as is the Fermionic or Bosonic symmetry in the case of indistinguishable particles.Comment: 19 pages, 5 figure

Adaptive grid methods for Q-tensor theory of liquid crystals : a one-dimensional feasibility study

This paper illustrates the use of moving mesh methods for solving partial differential equation (PDE) problems in Q-tensor theory of liquid crystals. We present the results of an initial study using a simple one-dimensional test problem which illustrates the feasibility of applying adaptive grid techniques in such situations. We describe how the grids are computed using an equidistribution principle, and investigate the comparative accuracy of adaptive and uniform grid strategies, both theoretically and via numerical examples

Increasing the Reliability of Adaptive Quadrature Using Explicit Interpolants

We present two new adaptive quadrature routines. Both routines differ from previously published algorithms in many aspects, most significantly in how they represent the integrand, how they treat non-numerical values of the integrand, how they deal with improper divergent integrals and how they estimate the integration error. The main focus of these improvements is to increase the reliability of the algorithms without significantly impacting their efficiency. Both algorithms are implemented in Matlab and tested using both the "families" suggested by Lyness and Kaganove and the battery test used by Gander and Gautschi and Kahaner. They are shown to be more reliable, albeit in some cases less efficient, than other commonly-used adaptive integrators.Comment: 32 pages, submitted to ACM Transactions on Mathematical Softwar

Wave Mechanics of a Two Wire Atomic Beamsplitter

We consider the problem of an atomic beam propagating quantum mechanically through an atom beam splitter. Casting the problem in an adiabatic representation (in the spirit of the Born-Oppenheimer approximation in molecular physics) sheds light on explicit effects due to non-adiabatic passage of the atoms through the splitter region. We are thus able to probe the fully three dimensional structure of the beam splitter, gathering quantitative information about mode-mixing, splitting ratios,and reflection and transmission probabilities

Three-neutron resonance trajectories for realistic interaction models

Three-neutron resonances are investigated using realistic nucleon-nucleon interaction models. The resonance pole trajectories are explored by first adding an additional interaction to artificially bind the three-neutron system and then gradually removing it. The pole positions for the three-neutron states up to J=5/2 are localized in the third energy quadrant-Im (E)<=0, Re (E)<=0-well before the additional interaction is removed. Our study shows that realistic nucleon-nucleon interaction models exclude any possible experimental signature of three-neutron resonances.Comment: 13 pages ; 8 figs ; 5 table

Lattice QCD study of a five-quark hadronic molecule

We compute the ground-state energies of a heavy-light K-Lambda like system as a function of the relative distance r of the hadrons. The heavy quarks, one in each hadron, are treated as static. Then, the energies give rise to an adiabatic potential Va(r) which we use to study the structure of the five-quark system. The simulation is based on an anisotropic and asymmetric lattice with Wilson fermions. Energies are extracted from spectral density functions obtained with the maximum entropy method. Our results are meant to give qualitative insight: Using the resulting adiabatic potential in a Schroedinger equation produces bound state wave functions which indicate that the ground state of the five-quark system resembles a hadronic molecule, whereas the first excited state, having a very small rms radius, is probably better described as a five-quark cluster, or a pentaquark. We hypothesize that an all light-quark pentaquark may not exist, but in the heavy-quark sector it might, albeit only as an excited state.Comment: 11 pages, 15 figures, 4 table

Imaging Three Dimensional Two-particle Correlations for Heavy-Ion Reaction Studies

We report an extension of the source imaging method for analyzing three-dimensional sources from three-dimensional correlations. Our technique consists of expanding the correlation data and the underlying source function in spherical harmonics and inverting the resulting system of one-dimensional integral equations. With this strategy, we can image the source function quickly, even with the finely binned data sets common in three-dimensional analyses.Comment: 13 pages, 11 figures, submitted to Physical Review

An ADI extrapolated Crank-Nicolson orthogonal spline collocation method for nonlinear reaction-diffusion systems: a computational study

An alternating direction implicit (ADI) orthogonal spline collocation (OSC) method is described for the approximate solution of a class of nonlinear reaction-diffusion systems. Its efficacy is demonstrated on the solution of well-known examples of such systems, specifically the Brusselator, Gray-Scott, Gierer-Meinhardt and Schnakenberg models, and comparisons are made with other numerical techniques considered in the literature. The new ADI method is based on an extrapolated Crank-Nicolson OSC method and is algebraically linear. It is efficient, requiring at each time level only $O({\cal N})$ operations where ${\cal N}$ is the number of unknowns. Moreover,it is shown to produce approximations which are of optimal global accuracy in various norms, and to possess superconvergence properties

Calculation of the two-photon decay rates of hydrogen-like ions by using B-polynomials

A new approach is laid out to investigate the two photon atomic transitions. It is based on application of the finite basis solutions constructed from the Bernstein Polynomial (B-Polynomial) sets. We show that such an approach provides a very promising route for the relativistic second- (and even higher-order) calculations since it allows for analytical evaluation of the involved matrices elements. In order to illustrate possible applications of the method and to verify its accuracy, detailed calculations are performed for the 2s_{1/2}-1s_{1/2} transition in neutral hydrogen and hydrogen-like ions, and are compared with the theoretical predictions based on the well-established B-spline-basis-set approach

Giochi da senatori

Megalencephalic leucoencephalopathy with subcortical cysts is a genetic brain disorder with onset in early childhood. Affected infants develop macrocephaly within the first year of life, after several years followed by slowly progressive, incapacitating cerebellar ataxia and spasticity. From early on, magnetic resonance imaging shows diffuse signal abnormality and swelling of the cerebral white matter, with evidence of highly increased white matter water content. In most patients, the disease is caused by mutations in the gene MLC1, which encodes a plasma membrane protein almost exclusively expressed in brain and at lower levels in leucocytes. Within the brain, MLC1 is mainly located in astrocyte-astrocyte junctions adjacent to the blood-brain and cereborspinal fluid-brain barriers. Thus far, the function of MLC1 has remained unknown. We tested the hypothesis that MLC1 mutations cause a defect in ion currents involved in water and ion homeostasis, resulting in cerebral white matter oedema. Using whole-cell patch clamp studies we demonstrated an association between MLC1 expression and anion channel activity in different cell types, most importantly astrocytes. The currents were absent in chloride-free medium and in cells with disease-causing MLC1 mutations. MLC1-dependent currents were greatly enhanced by hypotonic pretreatment causing cell swelling, while ion channel blockers, including Tamoxifen, abolished the currents. Down regulation of endogenous MLC1 expression in astrocytes by small interfering RNA greatly reduced the activity of this channel, which was rescued by overexpression of normal MLC1. The current-voltage relationship and the pharmacological profiles of the currents indicated that the channel activated by MLC1 expression is a volume-regulated anion channel. Such channels are involved in regulatory volume decrease. We showed that regulatory volume decrease was hampered in lymphoblasts from patients with megalencephalic leucoencephalopathy. A similar trend was observed in astrocytes with decreased MLC1 expression; this effect was rescued by overexpression of normal MLC1. In the present study, we show that absence or mutations of the MLC1 protein negatively impact both volume-regulated anion channel activity and regulatory volume decrease, indicating that megalencephalic leucoencephalopathy is caused by a disturbance of cell volume regulation mediated by chloride transport. © 2011 The Author