Topologically Protected Zero Modes in Twisted Bilayer Graphene

We show that the twisted graphene bilayer can reveal unusual topological properties at low energies, as a consequence of a Dirac-point splitting. These features rely on a symmetry analysis of the electron hopping between the two layers of graphene and we derive a simplified effective low-energy Hamiltonian which captures the essential topological properties of twisted bilayer graphene. The corresponding Landau levels peculiarly reveal a degenerate zero-energy mode which cannot be lifted by strong magnetic fields.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figures; published versio

As indicações geográficas como estratégia mercadológica para vinhos.

Este texto tem como objetivo principal analisar, em termos de estratégia mercadológica, as indicações geográficas (IGs) como instrumento de agregação de valor para o agronegócio brasileiro. Além de analisar a evolução do conceito de indicações geográficas no Brasil, na França e em outros países, este trabalho discute os aspectos mercadológicos desse mecanismo da propriedade intelectual. A fim de ilustrar e sustentar a discussão, apresentam-se os resultados de um estudo das IGs, levando-se em conta a percepção das vinícolas brasileiras e de um nicho do mercado consumidor de vinhos do Distrito Federal, Brasil. Neste estudo, foi observado que as IGs são um fator de diferenciação mercadológica nesse nicho de mercado e, também, uma característica relevante que agrega valor aos vinho s. No mínimo 57% dos consumidores pesquisados estariam dispostos a pagar mais por vinhos que possuíssem uma IG. Por sua vez, as vinícolas brasileiras estão cientes da importância mercadológica das IGs, já que 83% das empresas pesquisadas têm tomado iniciativa com esse propósito. Exceto em alguns casos, observou-se o quão distintas são as percepções dos atores da cadeia pesquisada em relação aos fatores mercadológicos estudados, principalmente sobre a IG. Por fim, são tecidas considerações a respeito das indicações geográficas como uma oportunidade de agregação de valor para o agronegócio brasileiro, sugerindo-se que a construção de uma estratégia mercadológica baseada nas indicações geográficas, tendo como público-alvo consumidores que buscam qualidade superior, pode ser comercialmente positiva para determinados produtores e regiões do agronegócio nacional

On the Interacting Chiral Gauge Field Theory in D=6 and the Off-Shell Equivalence of Dual Born-Infeld-Like Actions

A canonical action describing the interaction of chiral gauge fields in D=6 Minkowski space-time is constructed. In a particular partial gauge fixing it reduces to the action found by Perry and Schwarz. The additional gauge symmetries are used to show the off-shell equivalence of the dimensional reduction to D=5 Minkowski space-time of the chiral gauge field canonical action and the Born-Infeld canonical action describing an interacting D=5 Abelian vector field. Its extension to improve the on-shell equivalence arguments of dual D-brane actions to off-shell ones is discussed.Comment: 18 page

Design of an RSFQ Control Circuit to Observe MQC on an rf-SQUID

We believe that the best chance to observe macroscopic quantum coherence (MQC) in a rf-SQUID qubit is to use on-chip RSFQ digital circuits for preparing, evolving and reading out the qubit's quantum state. This approach allows experiments to be conducted on a very short time scale (sub-nanosecond) without the use of large bandwidth control lines that would couple environmental degrees of freedom to the qubit thus contributing to its decoherence. In this paper we present our design of a RSFQ digital control circuit for demonstrating MQC in a rf-SQUID. We assess some of the key practical issues in the circuit design including the achievement of the necessary flux bias stability. We present an "active" isolation structure to be used to increase coherence times. The structure decouples the SQUID from external degrees of freedom, and then couples it to the output measurement circuitry when required, all under the active control of RSFQ circuits. Research supported in part by ARO grant # DAAG55-98-1-0367.Comment: 4 pages. More information and publications at http://www.ece.rochester.edu:8080/users/sde/research/publications/index.htm

Sunflower yield: adjustement of data means by the combination of ANOVA and Regression models.

Sunflower is an important oilseed crop. Besides producing high quality edible oil for human consumption, it also produces meal for animal feeding, and is an alternative for biodiesel production as well. Sunflower is a crop well adapted to several environmental conditions and is tolerant to low temperatures and to relatively short periods of water stress. In Brazil, the sunflower cultivated area reaches 75,000 hectares and its yield averages 1,460 kg/ha (CONAB). Much effort has been spent on research work at management of sunflower and consequently higher yield. Research efforts are specifically directed to the control of diseases and pests, which can cause defoliation, damages to the roots, and yield losses. The need for macro- and micronutrient fertilizations is another research demanding aspect of the crop. Within this context, two extremely important aspects in solving these research demands are: the appropriate agronomical planning and the adequate experimental design. These procedures will allow decisions on selection of size and shape of plots, on experimental unit, on qualitative and quantitative factors, on experimental design, and on the choice of the variables that influence the response and the ways of choosing and distributing the treatments in the plots. The selection of the suitable statistical methods, which allow precise estimates of the treatments and the reduction of the residual variance, uncontrolled in the planning, is also essential. One of these methods is the Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA). This method combines the Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) and the Regression Analysis, and besides controlling the experimental error, it adjusts the treatment means, thus helping the interpretation of the experimental results as well as the comparison of regressions among several groups of treatments. The model representing this combination is :Yij = ? + ? i + ? j + ? (xij - x.. ) +? ij , where: Yij is the observed value of the response variable; ? is the mean value of the response variable; i ? is the effect of treatment I, with i = 1, 2,?, I; j ? is the effect of the block j, with j = 1,2,?, J; ? is the effect of the combined linear regression Yij as related to x; ij x is the observed value of the co-variable; and ij ? is the experimental error associated toYij, with ?ij ?N (0,?2 ) . The covariate should not be influenced by the treatments initially tested, maintaining the independence among them. Therefore, the treatments were: one control (0), and the P2O5 dosages of 40 kg ha-1, 80 kg ha-1, 120 kg ha-1, and 160 kg ha-1, applied to the sunflower hybrid Aguara 4. The experiment was carried out as a randomized block design, with six replications and the variables studied were: yield (kg ha-1) and the number of achenes per sunflower plant. The descriptive analysis indicated consistency in the tests concerning normality and independence of errors, additivity of the model, and homogeneity of treatments variances. The F statistics presented significant response for the treatments, for the response variable and covariate (5.48 and 4.93), respectively. The highest sunflower yield, obtained with the dosage of 120 kg ha-1 P2O5, statistically differed only from the control (Tukey p? 0, 05). The ANCOVA, adjusted by the number of achenes, reduced the error variance from 49,768.84 to 32,887.40. An interesting fact is that after ANCOVA, the effect of treatments became non-significant (F = 2.62), even with the reduction of the error variance. The mean values adjusted by the Tukey-Kramer test were reduced when compared to the original means. The interaction of treatment with the covariable was not significant, indicating that the angular coefficients for the treatments were similar. We concluded that the analysis of covariance reduces the error variance and indicates the real significance of the treatment effects and of the angular coefficients for the non-homogeneous treatments

Spatial fluctuations in an optical parametric oscillator below threshold with an intracavity photonic crystal

We show how to control spatial quantum correlations in a multimode degenerate optical parametric oscillator type I below threshold by introducing a spatially inhomogeneous medium, such as a photonic crystal, in the plane perpendicular to light propagation. We obtain the analytical expressions for all the correlations in terms of the relevant parameters of the problem and study the number of photons, entanglement, squeezing, and twin beams. Considering different regimes and configurations we show the possibility to tune the instability thresholds as well as the quantumness of correlations by breaking the translational invariance of the system through a photonic crystal modulation.Comment: 12 pages, 7 figure