Spatially Resolved Nonlinearity Measurements of YBa2_2Cu3_3O7−d_{7-d} Bi-crystal Grain Boundaries

We have developed a near-field microwave microscope to locally excite a superconducting film and measure second and third harmonic responses at microwave frequencies. We study the local nonlinear response of a YBa$_2$Cu$_3$O$_{7-d}$ thin film grown on a bi-crystal SrTiO$_3$ substrate. The location of the bi-crystal grain boundary is clearly identified by the microscope through higher harmonic response, and the spatial resolution is on the order of the magnetic loop probe size, about 500$\mu m$. The harmonic power and spatial resolution are successfully modeled with a one-dimensional extended Josephson junction simulation. From the model, the 2nd order harmonic response is dominated by Josephson vortex generation and flow. A geometry-free nonlinear scaling current density $J_{NL}\simeq 10^4\sim 10^5 A/cm^2$ is also exstracted from the data, indicating that the grain boundary weak link is the dominant nonlinear source in this case.Comment: 4pages, 4figure

Viscous dissipative effects in isotropic brane cosmology

We consider the dynamics of a viscous cosmological fluid in the generalized Randall-Sundrum model for an isotropic brane. To describe the dissipative effects we use the Israel-Hiscock-Stewart full causal thermodynamic theory. In the limiting case of a stiff cosmological fluid with pressure equal to the energy density, the general solution of the field equations can be obtained in an exact parametric form for a cosmological fluid with constant bulk viscosity and with a bulk viscosity coefficient proportional to the square root of the energy density, respectively. The obtained solutions describe generally non-inflationary brane worlds, starting from a singular state. During this phase of evolution the comoving entropy of the Universe is an increasing function of time, and thus a large amount of entropy is created in the brane world due to viscous dissipative processes.Comment: 15 pages, 11 figure