4,719 research outputs found
Non-destructive testing of composite plates by holographic vibrometry
We report on a wide-field optical monitoring method for revealing local
delaminations in sandwich-type composite plates at video-rate by holographic
vibrometry. Non-contact measurements of low frequency flexural waves is
performed with time-averaged heterodyne holography. It enables narrowband
imaging of local out-of-plane nanometric vibration amplitudes under sinusoidal
excitation, and reveals delamination defects, which cause local resonances of
flexural waves. The size of the defect can be estimated from the first
resonance frequency of the flexural wave and the mechanical parameters of the
observed layer of the composite plate
Fast algorithms for computing isogenies between elliptic curves
We survey algorithms for computing isogenies between elliptic curves defined
over a field of characteristic either 0 or a large prime. We introduce a new
algorithm that computes an isogeny of degree ( different from the
characteristic) in time quasi-linear with respect to . This is based in
particular on fast algorithms for power series expansion of the Weierstrass
-function and related functions
Aspects of fine-tuning of the Higgs mass within finite field theories
We reanalyze the perturbative radiative corrections to the Higgs mass within
the Standard Model in the light of the Taylor-Lagrange renormalization scheme.
This scheme naturally leads to completely finite corrections, depending on an
arbitrary scale. The formulation avoids very large individual corrections to
the Higgs mass. This illustrates the fact that the so-called fine-tuning
problem in the Standard Model is just an artifact of the regularization scheme.
It should therefore not lead to any physical interpretation in terms of the
energy scale at which new physics should show up, nor in terms of a new
symmetry. We analyze the intrinsic physical scales relevant for the description
of these radiative corrections.Comment: 9 pages. arXiv admin note: substantial text overlap with
arXiv:1011.174
Searching for Mergers in Early-Type QSO Host Galaxies and a Control Sample of Inactive Ellipticals
We present very deep HST/ACS images of five QSO host galaxies, classified as
undisturbed ellipticals in earlier studies. For four of the five objects, our
images reveal strong signs of interaction such as tidal tails, shells, and
other fine structure, suggesting that a large fraction of QSO host galaxies may
have experienced a relatively recent merger event. Our preliminary results for
a control sample of inactive elliptical galaxies do not reveal comparable fine
structure.Comment: 2 pages, 1 figure; To appear in the proceedings of IAU Symposium 245,
"Formation and Evolution of Galaxy Bulges," M. Bureau, E. Athanassoula, and
B. Barbuy, ed
Evidence for Merger Remnants in Early-Type Host Galaxies of Low-Redshift QSOs
We present results from a pilot HST ACS deep imaging study in broad-band V of
five low-redshift QSO host galaxies classified in the literature as
ellipticals. The aim of our study is to determine whether these early-type
hosts formed at high redshift and have since evolved passively, or whether they
have undergone relatively recent mergers that may be related to the triggering
of the nuclear activity. We perform two-dimensional modeling of the light
distributions to analyze the host galaxies' morphology. We find that, while
each host galaxy is reasonably well fitted by a de Vaucouleurs profile, the
majority of them (4/5) reveal significant fine structure such as shells and
tidal tails. These structures contribute between ~5% and 10% to the total
V-band luminosity of each host galaxy within a region of r ~ 3 r_eff and are
indicative of merger events that occurred between a few hundred Myr and a Gyr
ago. These timescales are comparable to starburst ages in the QSO hosts
previously inferred from Keck spectroscopy. Our results thus support a
consistent scenario in which most of the QSO host galaxies suffered mergers
with accompanying starbursts that likely also triggered the QSO activity in
some way, but we are also left with considerable uncertainty on physical
mechanisms that might have delayed this triggering for several hundred Myr
after the merger.Comment: 22 pages, 4 figures. Accepted for publication in the Astrophysical
Journa
Linearizing nonlinear optics
In the framework of linear optics, light fields do not interact with each
other in a medium. Yet, when their field amplitude becomes comparable to the
electron binding energies of matter, the nonlinear motion of these electrons
emits new dipole radiation whose amplitude, frequency and phase differ from the
incoming fields. Such high fields are typically achieved with ultra-short,
femtosecond (1fs = 10-15 sec.) laser pulses containing very broad frequency
spectra. Here, the matter not only couples incoming and outgoing fields but
also causes different spectral components to interact and mix through a
convolution process. In this contribution, we describe how frequency domain
nonlinear optics overcomes the shortcomings arising from this convolution in
conventional time domain nonlinear optics1. We generate light fields with
previously inaccessible properties because the uncontrolled coupling of
amplitudes and phases is turned off. For example, arbitrary phase functions are
transferred linearly to the second harmonic frequency while maintaining the
exact shape of the input power spectrum squared.
This nonlinear control over output amplitudes and phases opens up new avenues
for applications based on manipulation of coherent light fields. One could
investigate c.f. the effect of tailored nonlinear perturbations on the
evolution of discrete eigenmodes in Anderson localization2. Our approach might
also open a new chapter for controlling electronic and vibrational couplings in
2D-spectroscopy3 by the geometrical optical arrangement
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