3,335 research outputs found
Shallow optically active structural defect in wurtzite GaN epilayers grown on stepped 4H-SiC substrates
Shallow optically active structural defect in wurtzite GaN epilayers grown on stepped 4H-SiC substrates was investigated. The GaN epilayers grown with plasma-assisted molecular-beam epitaxy were optically characterized by photoluminescence and excitation spectra. Results showed that the localized states which were induced by the structural defect located about 100 meV above the maximum valence band of GaN.published_or_final_versio
The connection between superconducting phase correlations and spin excitations in YBaCuO: A magnetic field study
One of the most striking universal properties of the
high-transition-temperature (high-) superconductors is that they are all
derived from the hole-doping of their insulating antiferromagnetic (AF) parent
compounds. From the outset, the intimate relationship between magnetism and
superconductivity in these copper-oxides has intrigued researchers. Evidence
for this link comes from neutron scattering experiments that show the
unambiguous presence of short-range AF correlations (excitations) in cuprate
superconductors. Even so, the role of such excitations in the pairing mechanism
and superconductivity is still a subject of controversy. For
YBaCuO, where controls the hole-doping level, the most
prominent feature in the magnetic excitations spectra is the ``resonance''.
Here we show that for underdoped YBaCuO, where and
are below the optimal values, modest magnetic fields suppress the resonance
significantly, much more so for fields approximately perpendicular rather than
parallel to the CuO planes. Our results indicate that the resonance
measures pairing and phase coherence, suggesting that magnetism plays an
important role in the superconductivity of cuprates. The persistence of a field
effect above favors mechanisms with preformed pairs in the normal state
of underdoped cuprates.Comment: 12 pages, 4 figures, Nature (in press
Electronic Liquid Crystal Phases of a Doped Mott Insulator
The character of the ground state of an antiferromagnetic insulator is
fundamentally altered upon addition of even a small amount of charge. The added
charges agglomerate along domain walls at which the spin correlations, which
may or may not remain long-ranged, suffer a phase shift. In two
dimensions, these domain walls are ``stripes'' which are either insulating, or
conducting, i.e. metallic rivers with their own low energy degrees of freedom.
However, quasi one-dimensional metals typically undergo a transition to an
insulating ordered charge density wave (CDW) state at low temperatures. Here it
is shown that such a transition is eliminated if the zero-point energy of
transverse stripe fluctuations is sufficiently large in comparison to the CDW
coupling between stripes. As a consequence, there exist novel,
liquid-crystalline low-temperature phases -- an electron smectic, with
crystalline order in one direction, but liquid-like correlations in the other,
and an electron nematic with orientational order but no long-range positional
order. These phases, which constitute new states of matter, can be either high
temperature supeconductors or two-dimensional anisotropic ``metallic''
non-Fermi liquids. Evidence for the new phases may already have been obtained
by neutron scattering experiments in the cuprate superconductor,
La_{1.6-x}Nd_{0.4}Sr_xCuO_{4}.Comment: 5 pages in RevTex with two figures in ep
Natural language analysis of online health forums
Despite advances in concept extraction from free text, finding
meaningful health related information from online patient forums
still poses a significant challenge. Here we demonstrate how structured
information can be extracted from posts found in such online health related
forums by forming relationships between a drug/treatment and a
symptom or side effect, including the polarity/sentiment of the patient.
In particular, a rule-based natural language processing (NLP) system
is deployed, where information in sentences is linked together though
anaphora resolution. Our NLP relationship extraction system provides
a strong baseline, achieving an F1 score of over 80% in discovering the
said relationships that are present in the posts we analysed
Electron-Spin Excitation Coupling in an Electron Doped Copper Oxide Superconductor
High-temperature (high-Tc) superconductivity in the copper oxides arises from
electron or hole doping of their antiferromagnetic (AF) insulating parent
compounds. The evolution of the AF phase with doping and its spatial
coexistence with superconductivity are governed by the nature of charge and
spin correlations and provide clues to the mechanism of high-Tc
superconductivity. Here we use a combined neutron scattering and scanning
tunneling spectroscopy (STS) to study the Tc evolution of electron-doped
superconducting Pr0.88LaCe0.12CuO4-delta obtained through the oxygen annealing
process. We find that spin excitations detected by neutron scattering have two
distinct modes that evolve with Tc in a remarkably similar fashion to the
electron tunneling modes in STS. These results demonstrate that
antiferromagnetism and superconductivity compete locally and coexist spatially
on nanometer length scales, and the dominant electron-boson coupling at low
energies originates from the electron-spin excitations.Comment: 30 pages, 12 figures, supplementary information include
Electronic Structures of S-Doped Capped C-SWNT from First Principles Study
The semiconducting single-walled carbon nanotube (C-SWNT) has been synthesized by S-doping, and they have extensive potential application in electronic devices. We investigated the electronic structures of S-doped capped (5, 5) C-SWNT with different doping position using first principles calculations. It is found that the electronic structures influence strongly on the workfunction without and with external electric field. It is considered that the extended wave functions at the sidewall of the tube favor for the emission properties. With the S-doping into the C-SWNT, the HOMO and LUMO charges distribution is mainly more localized at the sidewall of the tube and the presence of the unsaturated dangling bond, which are believed to enhance workfunction. When external electric field is applied, the coupled states with mixture of localized and extended states are presented at the cap, which provide the lower workfunction. In addition, the wave functions close to the cap have flowed to the cap as coupled states and to the sidewall of the tube mainly as extended states, which results in the larger workfunction. It is concluded that the S-doped C-SWNT is not incentive to be applied in field emitter fabrication. The results are also helpful to understand and interpret the application in other electronic devices
Resonance in the electron-doped high-Tc superconductor Pr0.88LaCe0.12CuO(4-delta)
In conventional superconductors, the interaction that pairs the electrons to
form the superconducting state is mediated by lattice vibrations (phonons). In
high-transition temperature (high-Tc) copper oxides, it is generally believed
that magnetic excitations play a fundamental role in the superconducting
mechanism because superconductivity occurs when mobile 'electrons' or 'holes'
are doped into the antiferromagnetic parent compounds. Indeed, a sharp magnetic
excitation termed "resonance" has been observed by neutron scattering in a
number of hole-doped materials. The resonance is intimately related to
superconductivity, and its interaction with charged quasi-particles observed by
photoemission, optical conductivity, and tunneling suggests that it plays a
similar role as phonons in conventional superconductors. However, the relevance
of the resonance to high-Tc superconductivity has been in doubt because so far
it has been found only in hole-doped materials. Here we report the discovery of
the resonance in electron-doped superconducting Pr0.88LaCe0.12CuO(4-delta) (Tc
= 24 K). We find that the resonance energy (Er) is proportional to Tc via Er =
5.8kBTc (kB is the Boltzmann's constant) for all high-Tc superconductors
irrespective of electron- or hole-doping (Fig. 1e). Our results demonstrate
that the resonance is a fundamental property of the superconducting copper
oxides and therefore must play an essential role in the mechanism of
superconductivity.Comment: PDF file with 4 Figure
Genetic contributions to visuospatial cognition in Williams syndrome: insights from two contrasting partial deletion patients
Background
Williams syndrome (WS) is a rare neurodevelopmental disorder arising from a hemizygotic deletion of approximately 27 genes on chromosome 7, at locus 7q11.23. WS is characterised by an uneven cognitive profile, with serious deficits in visuospatial tasks in comparison to relatively proficient performance in some other cognitive domains such as language and face processing. Individuals with partial genetic deletions within the WS critical region (WSCR) have provided insights into the contribution of specific genes to this complex phenotype. However, the combinatorial effects of different genes remain elusive.
Methods
We report on visuospatial cognition in two individuals with contrasting partial deletions in the WSCR: one female (HR), aged 11 years 9 months, with haploinsufficiency for 24 of the WS genes (up to GTF2IRD1), and one male (JB), aged 14 years 2 months, with the three most telomeric genes within the WSCR deleted, or partially deleted.
Results
Our in-depth phenotyping of the visuospatial domain from table-top psychometric, and small- and large-scale experimental tasks reveal a profile in HR in line with typically developing controls, albeit with some atypical features. These data are contrasted with patient JB’s atypical profile of strengths and weaknesses across the visuospatial domain, as well as with more substantial visuospatial deficits in individuals with the full WS deletion.
Conclusions
Our findings point to the contribution of specific genes to spatial processing difficulties associated with WS, highlighting the multifaceted nature of spatial cognition and the divergent effects of genetic deletions within the WSCR on different components of visuospatial ability. The importance of general transcription factors at the telomeric end of the WSCR, and their combinatorial effects on the WS visuospatial phenotype are also discussed
One-dimensional nature of the magnetic fluctuations in YBaCuO
There is increasing evidence that inhomogeneous distributions of charge and
spin--so-called "striped phases"--play an important role in determining the
properties of the high-temperature superconductors. For example, recent
neutron-scattering measurements on the YBaCuO family of
materials show both spin and charge fluctuations that are consistent with the
striped-phase picture. But the fluctuations associated with a striped phase are
expected to be one-dimensional, whereas the magnetic fluctuations observed to
date appear to display two-dimensional symmetry. We show here that this
apparent two-dimensionality results from measurements on twinned crystals, and
that similar measurements on substantially detwinned crystals of
YBaCuO reveal the one-dimensional character of the magnetic
fluctuations, thus greatly strengthening the striped-phase interpretation.
Moreover, our results also suggest that superconductivity originates in charge
stripes that extend along the b crystal axis, where the superfluid density is
found to be substantially larger than for the a direction.Comment: 3 pages, PDF onl
A strategy for emergency treatment of Schistosoma japonicum-infested water
<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Schistosomiasis japonica, caused by contact with <it>Schistosoma japonicum </it>cercaria-infested water when washing, bathing or production, remains a major public-health concern in China. The purpose of the present study was to investigate the effect of a suspension concentrate of niclosamide (SCN) on killing cercaria of <it>S. japonicum </it>that float on the water surface, and its toxicity to fish, so as to establish an emergency-treatment intervention for rapidly killing cercaria and eliminating water infectivity.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>At 30 min after spraying 100 mg/L SCN, with niclosamide dosages of 0.01, 0.02, 0.03, 0.04 g/m<sup>2</sup>, the water infectivity reduced significantly and no infectivity was found at 60 min after spraying SCN. The surface of static water was sprayed with 100 mg/L SCN, the peak concentration was found at 0 min, and the solution diffused to site with a water depth of 10 cm after 10 min. 30 min later, SCN diffused to the whole water body, and distributed evenly. After spraying 100 mg/L SCN onto the surface of the water with a volume of(3.14 × 20<sup>2</sup>×50)cm<sup>3</sup>, with niclosamide dosages of 0.02 g/m<sup>2</sup>, 96 h later, no death of zebra fish was observed.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>By spraying 100 mg/L SCN, with a niclosamide dosage of 0.02 g/m<sup>2 </sup>onto the surface of <it>S. japonicum</it>-infested water, infectivity of the water can be eliminated after 30-60 min, and there is no evident toxicity to fish. This cercaria-killing method, as an emergency-treatment intervention for infested water, can be applied in those forecasting and early warning systems for schistosomiasis.</p
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