2,927 research outputs found
The effect of ionization on the populations of excited levels of C IV and C V in tokamak edge plasmas
The main populating and depopulating mechanisms of the excited energy levels
of ions in plasmas with densities <1023-1024 m-3 are electron collisional
excitation from the ion's ground state and radiative decay, respectively, with
the majority of the electron population being in the ground state of the
ionization stage. Electron collisional ionization is predominately expected to
take place from one ground state to that of the next higher ionization stage.
However, the question arises as to whether, in some cases, ionization can also
affect the excited level populations. This would apply particularly to those
cases involving transient events such as impurity influxes in a laboratory
plasma. An analysis of the importance of ionization in populating the excited
levels of ions in plasmas typical of those found in the edge of tokamaks is
undertaken for the C IV and C V ionization stages. The emphasis is on those
energy levels giving rise to transitions of most use for diagnostic purposes.
Carbon is chosen since it is an important contaminant of JET plasmas; it was
the dominant low Z impurity before the installation of the ITER-like wall and
is still present in the plasma after its installation. Direct electron
collisional ionization both from and to excited levels is considered.
Distorted-wave Flexible Atomic Code calculations are performed to generate the
required ionization cross sections, due to a lack of atomic data in the
literature.Comment: 29 pages, 5 figures. This is an author-created, un-copyedited version
of an article accepted for publication in Journal of Physics B. IOP
Publishing Ltd is not responsible for any errors or omissions in this version
of the manuscript or any version derived from i
Magnetic susceptibility of a CuO2 plane in the La2CuO4 system: I. RPA treatment of the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya Interactions
Motivated by recent experiments on undoped La2CuO4, which found pronounced
temperature-dependent anisotropies in the low-field magnetic susceptibility, we
have investigated a two-dimensional square lattice of S=1/2 spins that interact
via Heisenberg exchange plus the symmetric and anti-symmetric
Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya anisotropies. We describe the transition to a state with
long-ranged order, and find the spin-wave excitations, with a mean-field
theory, linear spin-wave analysis, and using Tyablikov's RPA decoupling scheme.
We find the different components of the susceptibility within all of these
approximations, both below and above the N'eel temperature, and obtain evidence
of strong quantum fluctuations and spin-wave interactions in a broad
temperature region near the transition.Comment: 20 pages, 2 column format, 22 figure
Thermally activated escape rates of uniaxial spin systems with transverse field
Classical escape rates of uniaxial spin systems are characterized by a
prefactor differing from and much smaller than that of the particle problem,
since the maximum of the spin energy is attained everywhere on the line of
constant latitude: theta=const, 0 =< phi =< 2*pi. If a transverse field is
applied, a saddle point of the energy is formed, and high, moderate, and low
damping regimes (similar to those for particles) appear. Here we present the
first analytical and numerical study of crossovers between the uniaxial and
other regimes for spin systems. It is shown that there is one HD-Uniaxial
crossover, whereas at low damping the uniaxial and LD regimes are separated by
two crossovers.Comment: 4 PR pages, 3 figures, final published versio
Evaluation of a ln tan integral arising in quantum field theory
We analytically evaluate a dilogarithmic integral that is prototypical of
volumes of ideal tetrahedra in hyperbolic geometry. We additionally obtain new
representations of the Clausen function Cl_2 and the Catalan constant
G=Cl_2(\pi/2), as well as new relations between sine and Clausen function
values.Comment: 24 pages, no figure
Monte Carlo simulation with time step quantification in terms of Langevin dynamics
For the description of thermally activated dynamics in systems of classical
magnetic moments numerical methods are desirable. We consider a simple model
for isolated magnetic particles in a uniform field with an oblique angle to the
easy axis of the particles. For this model, a comparison of the Monte Carlo
method with Langevin dynamics yields new insight in the interpretation of the
Monte Carlo process, leading to the implementation of a new algorithm where the
Monte Carlo step is time-quantified. The numeric results for the characteristic
time of the magnetisation reversal are in excellent agreement with asymptotic
solutions which itself are in agreement with the exact numerical results
obtained from the Fokker-Planck equation for the Neel-Brown model.Comment: 5 pages, Revtex, 4 Figures include
On the Radial Distribution of White Dwarfs in the Globular Cluster NGC 6397
We have examined the radial distribution of white dwarfs over a single
HST/ACS field in the nearby globular cluster NGC 6397. In relaxed populations,
such as in a globular cluster, stellar velocity dispersion, and hence radial
distribution, is directly dependent on stellar masses. The progenitors of very
young cluster white dwarfs had a mass of ~0.8 solar masses, while the white
dwarfs themselves have a mass of ~0.5 solar masses. We thus expect young white
dwarfs to have a concentrated radial distribution (like that of their
progenitors) that becomes more extended over several relaxation times to mimic
that of ~0.5 solar mass main-sequence stars. However, we observe young white
dwarfs to have a significantly extended radial distribution compared to both
the most massive main sequence stars in the cluster and also to old white
dwarfs.Comment: 13 pages including 1 table and 3 figures. Accepted for publication in
the MNRAS Letter
Bulk Charging of Dielectrics in Cryogenic Space Environments
We use a 1-D bulk charging model to evaluate dielectric charging at cryogenic temperatures relevant to space systems using passive cooling to <100K or extended operations in permanently dark lunar craters and the lunar night
In-situ Observations of the Ionospheric F2-Region from the International Space Station
The International Space Station orbit provides an ideal platform for in-situ studies of space weather effects on the mid and low latitude F-2 region ionosphere. The Floating Potential Measurement Unit (FPMU) operating on the ISS since Aug 2006, is a suite of plasma instruments: a Floating Potential Probe (FPP), a Plasma Impedance Probe (PIP), a Wide-sweep Langmuir Probe (WLP), and a Narrow-sweep Langmuir Probe (NLP). This instrument package provides a new opportunity for collaborative multi-instrument studies of the F-region ionosphere during both quiet and disturbed periods. This presentation first describes the operational parameters for each of the FPMU probes and shows examples of an intra-instrument validation. We then show comparisons with the plasma density and temperature measurements derived from the TIMED GUVI ultraviolet imager, the Millstone Hill ground based incoherent scatter radar, and DIAS digisondes, Finally we show one of several observations of night-time equatorial density holes demonstrating the capabilities of the probes for monitoring mid and low latitude plasma processes
Steady-State L\'evy Flights in a Confined Domain
We derive the generalized Fokker-Planck equation associated with a Langevin
equation driven by arbitrary additive white noise. We apply our result to study
the distribution of symmetric and asymmetric L\'{e}vy flights in an infinitely
deep potential well. The fractional Fokker-Planck equation for L\'{e}vy flights
is derived and solved analytically in the steady state. It is shown that
L\'{e}vy flights are distributed according to the beta distribution, whose
probability density becomes singular at the boundaries of the well. The origin
of the preferred concentration of flying objects near the boundaries in
nonequilibrium systems is clarified.Comment: 10 pages, 1 figur
Electrodynamics of a Clean Vortex Lattice
We report on a microscopic evaluation of electrodynamic response for the
vortex lattice state of a model s-wave superconductor. Our calculation accounts
self-consistently for both quasiparticle and order parameter response and
establishes the collective nature of linear response in the clean limit. We
discuss the effects of homogeneous and inhomogeneous pinning on the optical
conductivity and the penetration depth, and comment on the relationship between
macroscopic and local penetration depths. We find unexpected relationships
between pinning arrangements and conductivity due to the strongly non-local
response.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figure
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