10,568 research outputs found
Multiple Thresholds in a Model System of Noisy Ion Channels
Voltage-activated ion channels vary randomly between open and closed states,
influenced by the membrane potential and other factors. Signal transduction is
enhanced by noise in a simple ion channel model. The enhancement occurs in a
finite range of signals; the range can be extended using populations of
channels. The range increases more rapidly in multiple-threshold channel
populations than in single-threshold populations. The diversity of ion channels
may thus be present as a strategy to reduce the metabolic costs of handling a
broad class of electrochemical signals.Comment: REVTeX 4, 5 pages, 4 figures; added paragrap
The Sound of Sonoluminescence
We consider an air bubble in water under conditions of single bubble
sonoluminescence (SBSL) and evaluate the emitted sound field nonperturbatively
for subsonic gas-liquid interface motion. Sound emission being the dominant
damping mechanism, we also implement the nonperturbative sound damping in the
Rayleigh-Plesset equation for the interface motion. We evaluate numerically the
sound pulse emitted during bubble collapse and compare the nonperturbative and
perturbative results, showing that the usual perturbative description leads to
an overestimate of the maximal surface velocity and maximal sound pressure. The
radius vs. time relation for a full SBSL cycle remains deceptively unaffected.Comment: 25 pages; LaTex and 6 attached ps figure files. Accepted for
publication in Physical Review
Fault Slip and Exhumation History of the Willard Thrust Sheet, Sevier Fold‐Thrust Belt, Utah: Relations to Wedge Propagation, Hinterland Uplift, and Foreland Basin Sedimentation
Zircon (U‐Th)/He (ZHe) and zircon fission track thermochronometric data for 47 samples spanning the areally extensive Willard thrust sheet within the western part of the Sevier fold‐thrust belt record enhanced cooling and exhumation during major thrust slip spanning approximately 125–90 Ma. ZHe and zircon fission track age‐paleodepth patterns along structural transects and age‐distance relations along stratigraphic‐parallel traverses, combined with thermo‐kinematic modeling, constrain the fault slip history, with estimated slip rates of ~1 km/Myr from 125 to 105 Ma, increasing to ~3 km/Myr from 105 to 92 Ma, and then decreasing as major slip was transferred onto eastern thrusts. Exhumation was concentrated during motion up thrust ramps with estimated erosion rates of ~0.1 to 0.3 km/Myr. Local cooling ages of approximately 160–150 Ma may record a period of regional erosion, or alternatively an early phase of limited... (see full abstract in article)
Critical Exponent for the Density of Percolating Flux
This paper is a study of some of the critical properties of a simple model
for flux. The model is motivated by gauge theory and is equivalent to the Ising
model in three dimensions. The phase with condensed flux is studied. This is
the ordered phase of the Ising model and the high temperature, deconfined phase
of the gauge theory. The flux picture will be used in this phase. Near the
transition, the density is low enough so that flux variables remain useful.
There is a finite density of finite flux clusters on both sides of the phase
transition. In the deconfined phase, there is also an infinite, percolating
network of flux with a density that vanishes as . On
both sides of the critical point, the nonanalyticity in the total flux density
is characterized by the exponent . The main result of this paper is
a calculation of the critical exponent for the percolating network. The
exponent for the density of the percolating cluster is . The specific heat exponent and the crossover exponent
can be computed in the -expansion. Since , the variation in the separate densities is much more rapid than
that of the total. Flux is moving from the infinite cluster to the finite
clusters much more rapidly than the total density is decreasing.Comment: 20 pages, no figures, Latex/Revtex 3, UCD-93-2
Mechanisms for Stable Sonoluminescence
A gas bubble trapped in water by an oscillating acoustic field is expected to
either shrink or grow on a diffusive timescale, depending on the forcing
strength and the bubble size. At high ambient gas concentration this has long
been observed in experiments. However, recent sonoluminescence experiments show
that in certain circumstances when the ambient gas concentration is low the
bubble can be stable for days. This paper presents mechanisms leading to
stability which predict parameter dependences in agreement with the
sonoluminescence experiments.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures on request (2 as .ps files
Modelling thermal flow in a transition regime using a lattice Boltzmann approach
Lattice Boltzmann models are already able to capture important rarefied flow phenomena, such as velocity-slip and temperature jump, provided the effects of the Knudsen layer are minimal. However, both conventional hydrodynamics, as exemplified by the Navier-Stokes-Fourier equations, and the lattice Boltzmann method fail to predict the nonlinear velocity and temperature variations in the Knudsen layer that have been observed in kinetic theory. In the present paper, we propose an extension to the lattice Boltzmann method that will enable the simulation of thermal flows in the transition regime where Knudsen layer effects are significant. A correction function is introduced that accounts for the reduction in the mean free path near a wall. This new approach is compared with direct simulation Monte Carlo data for Fourier flow and good qualitative agreement is obtained for Knudsen numbers up to 1.58
Bubble Shape Oscillations and the Onset of Sonoluminescence
An air bubble trapped in water by an oscillating acoustic field undergoes
either radial or nonspherical pulsations depending on the strength of the
forcing pressure. Two different instability mechanisms (the Rayleigh--Taylor
instability and parametric instability) cause deviations from sphericity.
Distinguishing these mechanisms allows explanation of many features of recent
experiments on sonoluminescence, and suggests methods for finding
sonoluminescence in different parameter regimes.Comment: Phys. Rev. Lett., in pres
Photoinduced time-resolved electrodynamics of superconducting metals and alloys
The photoexcited state in superconducting metals and alloys was studied via
pump-probe spectroscopy. A pulsed Ti:sapphire laser was used to create the
non-equilibrium state and the far-infrared pulses of a synchrotron storage
ring, to which the laser is synchronized, measured the changes in the material
optical properties. Both the time- and frequency- dependent photoinduced
spectra of Pb, Nb, NbN, Nb{0.5}Ti{0.5}N, and Pb{0.75}Bi{0.25} superconducting
thin films were measured in the low-fluence regime. The time dependent data
establish the regions where the relaxation rate is dominated either by the
phonon escape time (phonon bottleneck effect) or by the intrinsic quasiparticle
recombination time. The photoinduced spectra measure directly the reduction of
the superconducting gap due to an excess number of quasiparticles created by
the short laser pulses. This gap shift allows us to establish the temperature
range over which the low fluence approximation is valid.Comment: 12 pages with 10 figure
Finite size effects in nonequilibrium wetting
Models with a nonequilibrium wetting transition display a transition also in
finite systems. This is different from nonequilibrium phase transitions into an
absorbing state, where the stationary state is the absorbing one for any value
of the control parameter in a finite system. In this paper, we study what kind
of transition takes place in finite systems of nonequilibrium wetting models.
By solving exactly a microscopic model with three and four sites and performing
numerical simulations we show that the phase transition taking place in a
finite system is characterized by the average interface height performing a
random walk at criticality and does not discriminate between the bounded-KPZ
classes and the bounded-EW class. We also study the finite size scaling of the
bKPZ universality classes, showing that it presents peculiar features in
comparison with other universality classes of nonequilibrium phase transitions.Comment: 14 pages, 6figures, major change
On the finite-size behavior of systems with asymptotically large critical shift
Exact results of the finite-size behavior of the susceptibility in
three-dimensional mean spherical model films under Dirichlet-Dirichlet,
Dirichlet-Neumann and Neumann-Neumann boundary conditions are presented. The
corresponding scaling functions are explicitly derived and their asymptotics
close to, above and below the bulk critical temperature are obtained. The
results can be incorporated in the framework of the finite-size scaling theory
where the exponent characterizing the shift of the finite-size
critical temperature with respect to is smaller than , with
being the critical exponent of the bulk correlation length.Comment: 24 pages, late
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