795 research outputs found
A note from the editors: the state of the political constitution
The revival of the political constitution has come about in parallel with two developments, one in constitutional practice and the other in political theory. With regard to the former, the political constitution has been seen as something of a bulwark against the rise of legal (or judicial, or common law) constitutionalism. The seeming hegemony of this latter model of constitutionalism among contemporary lawyers and political scientists has produced from (so-called) political constitutionalists a reaction against the delegation of important decisions to non-political institutions and an obsessively court-centered scholarship. Perceiving this shift in focus from political to legal institutions to be the very antithesis of the traditional Commonwealth (more particularly, of the United Kingdom’s parliamentary) model of constitutionalism, and, more broadly, to be an affront to democratic sensibilities, the notion of the political constitution was retrieved and defended in a seminal article in the 1979 edition of the Modern Law Review, written (though first delivered in his Chorley Lecture the previous year) by the late John Griffith. More recently, in the work of Adam Tomkins, Richard Bellamy, and Grégoire Webber and Graham Gee, a normative interpretation has been lent to Griffith’s thesis so as to provide a full-fledged constitutional theory capable of standing as an alternative to the liberal-legal paradigm—a turn, one might say, from the political constitution to political constitutionalism
Raman signatures of classical and quantum phases in coupled dots: A theoretical prediction
We study electron molecules in realistic vertically coupled quantum dots in a
strong magnetic field. Computing the energy spectrum, pair correlation
functions, and dynamical form factor as a function of inter-dot coupling via
diagonalization of the many-body Hamiltonian, we identify structural
transitions between different phases, some of which do not have a classical
counterpart. The calculated Raman cross section shows how such phases can be
experimentally singled out.Comment: 9 pages, 2 postscript figures, 1 colour postscript figure, Latex 2e,
Europhysics Letters style and epsfig macros. Submitted to Europhysics Letter
Optical-NIR spectroscopy of the puzzling gamma-ray source 3FGL 1603.9-4903/PMN J1603-4904 with X-shooter
The Fermi/LAT instrument has detected about two thousands Extragalactic High
Energy (E > 100 MeV) gamma-ray sources. One of the brightest is 3FGL
1603.9-4903, associated to the radio source PMN J1603-4904. Its nature is not
yet clear, it could be either a very peculiar BL Lac or a CSO (Compact
Symmetric Object) radio source, considered as the early stage of a radio
galaxy. The latter, if confirmed, would be the first detection in gamma-rays
for this class of objects. Recently a redshift z=0.18 +/- 0.01 has been claimed
on the basis of the detection of a single X-ray line at 5.44 +/- 0.05 keV
interpreted as a 6.4 keV (rest frame) fluorescent line. We aim to investigate
the nature of 3FGL 1603.9-4903/PMN J1603-4904 using optical to NIR
spectroscopy. We observed PMN J1603-4904 with the UV-NIR VLT/X-shooter
spectrograph for two hours. We extracted spectra in the VIS and NIR range that
we calibrated in flux and corrected for telluric absorption and we
systematically searched for absorption and emission features. The source was
detected starting from ~6300 Ang down to 24000 Ang with an intensity comparable
to the one of its 2MASS counterpart and a mostly featureless spectrum. The
continuum lacks absorption features and thus is non-stellar in origin and
likely non-thermal. On top of this spectrum we detected three emission lines
that we interpret as the Halpha-[NII] complex, the [SII] 6716,6731 doublet and
the [SIII] 9530 line, obtaining a redshift estimate of z= 0.2321 +/- 0.0004.
The equivalent width of the Halpha-[NII] complex implies that PMN J1603-4904
does not follow the observational definition of BL Lac, the line ratios suggest
that a LINER/Seyfert nucleus is powering the emission. This new redshift
measurement implies that the X-ray line previously detected should be
interpreted as a 6.7 keV line which is very peculiar.Comment: Published in Astronomy and Astrophysic
1RXS J180408.9-342058: an ultra compact X-ray binary candidate with a transient jet
We present a detailed NIR/optical/UV study of the transient low mass X-ray
binary 1RXS J180408.9-342058 performed during its 2015 outburst, aimed at
determining the nature of its companion star. We obtained three optical spectra
at the 2.1 m San Pedro Martir Observatory telescope (Mexico). We performed
optical and NIR photometric observations with both the REM telescope and the
New Technology Telescope (NTT) in La Silla. We obtained optical and UV
observations from the Swift archive. Finally, we performed optical polarimetry
of the source by using the EFOSC2 instrument mounted on the NTT. The optical
spectrum of the source is almost featureless since the hydrogen and He I
emissions lines, typically observed in LMXBs, are not detected. Similarly,
carbon and oxygen lines are neither observed. We marginally detect the He II
4686 AA emission line, suggesting the presence of helium in the accretion disc.
No significant optical polarisation level was observed. The lack of hydrogen
and He I emission lines in the spectrum implies that the companion is likely
not a main sequence star. Driven by the tentative detection of the He II 4686
AA emission line, we suggest that the system could harbour a helium white
dwarf. If this is the case, 1RXS J180408.9-342058 would be an ultra-compact
X-ray binary. By combining an estimate of the mass accretion rate together with
evolutionary tracks for a He white dwarf, we obtain a tentative orbital period
of ~ 40 min. On the other hand, we also built the NIR-optical-UV spectral
energy distribution (SED) of the source at two different epochs. One SED was
gathered when the source was in the soft X-ray state, and it is consistent with
the presence of a single thermal component. The second SED, obtained when the
source was in the hard X-ray state, shows a thermal component together with a
tail in the NIR, likely indicating the presence of a (transient) jet.Comment: 8 pages, 5 figures, 4 tables. Accepted for publication in Astronomy &
Astrophysics (Section 7
Shape-independent scaling of excitonic confinement in realistic quantum wires
The scaling of exciton binding energy in semiconductor quantum wires is
investigated theoretically through a non-variational, fully three-dimensional
approach for a wide set of realistic state-of-the-art structures. We find that
in the strong confinement limit the same potential-to-kinetic energy ratio
holds for quite different wire cross-sections and compositions. As a
consequence, a universal (shape- and composition-independent) parameter can be
identified that governs the scaling of the binding energy with size. Previous
indications that the shape of the wire cross-section may have important effects
on exciton binding are discussed in the light of the present results.Comment: To appear in Phys. Rev. Lett. (12 pages + 2 figures in postscript
Full configuration interaction approach to the few-electron problem in artificial atoms
We present a new high-performance configuration interaction code optimally
designed for the calculation of the lowest energy eigenstates of a few
electrons in semiconductor quantum dots (also called artificial atoms) in the
strong interaction regime. The implementation relies on a single-particle
representation, but it is independent of the choice of the single-particle
basis and, therefore, of the details of the device and configuration of
external fields. Assuming no truncation of the Fock space of Slater
determinants generated from the chosen single-particle basis, the code may
tackle regimes where Coulomb interaction very effectively mixes many
determinants. Typical strongly correlated systems lead to very large
diagonalization problems; in our implementation, the secular equation is
reduced to its minimal rank by exploiting the symmetry of the effective-mass
interacting Hamiltonian, including square total spin. The resulting Hamiltonian
is diagonalized via parallel implementation of the Lanczos algorithm. The code
gives access to both wave functions and energies of first excited states.
Excellent code scalability in a parallel environment is demonstrated; accuracy
is tested for the case of up to eight electrons confined in a two-dimensional
harmonic trap as the density is progressively diluted and correlation becomes
dominant. Comparison with previous Quantum Monte Carlo simulations in the
Wigner regime demonstrates power and flexibility of the method.Comment: RevTeX 4.0, 18 pages, 6 tables, 9 postscript b/w figures. Final
version with new material. Section 6 on the excitation spectrum has been
added. Some material has been moved to two appendices, which appear in the
EPAPS web depository in the published versio
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