220 research outputs found
Effects of long-range disorder and electronic interactions on the optical properties of graphene quantum dots
We theoretically investigate the effects of long-range disorder and
electron-electron interactions on the optical properties of hexagonal armchair
graphene quantum dots consisting of up to 10806 atoms. The numerical
calculations are performed using a combination of tight-binding, mean-field
Hubbard and configuration interaction methods. Imperfections in the graphene
quantum dots are modelled as a long-range random potential landscape, giving
rise to electron-hole puddles. We show that, when the electron-hole puddles are
present, tight-binding method gives a poor description of the low-energy
absorption spectra compared to meanfield and configuration interaction
calculation results. As the size of the graphene quantum dot is increased, the
universal optical conductivity limit can be observed in the absorption
spectrum. When disorder is present, calculated absorption spectrum approaches
the experimental results for isolated monolayer of graphene sheet
Effects of random atomic disorder on the magnetic stability of graphene nanoribbons with zigzag edges
We investigate the effects of randomly distributed atomic defects on the
magnetic properties of graphene nanoribbons with zigzag edges using an extended
mean-field Hubbard model. For a balanced defect distribution among the
sublattices of the honeycomb lattice in the bulk region of the ribbon, the
ground state antiferromagnetism of the edge states remains unaffected. By
analyzing the excitation spectrum, we show that while the antiferromagnetic
ground state is susceptible to single spin flip excitations from edge states to
magnetic defect states at low defect concentrations, it's overall stability is
enhanced with respect to the ferromagnetic phase.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure
Quantum Monte Carlo Study of Semiconductor Artificial Graphene Nanostructures
Semiconductor artificial graphene nanostructures where Hubbard model
parameter can be of the order of 100, provide a highly controllable
platform to study strongly correlated quantum many-particle phases. We use
accurate variational and diffusion Monte Carlo methods to demonstrate a
transition from antiferromagnetic to metallic phases for experimentally
accessible lattice constant nm in terms of lattice site radius ,
for finite sized artificial honeycomb structures nanopatterned on GaAs quantum
wells containing up to 114 electrons. By analysing spin-spin correlation
functions for hexagonal flakes with armchair edges and triangular flakes with
zigzag edges, we show that edge type, geometry and charge nonuniformity affect
the steepness and the crossover value of the phase transition. For
triangular structures, the metal-insulator transition is accompanied with a
smoother edge polarization transition.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figures; references added, several system sizes added,
typos corrected; abstract update
Effect of Er:YAG laser enamel conditioning and moisture on the microleakage of a hydrophilic sealant
For a given sealant, successful pit and fissure sealing is principally governed by the enamel conditioning technique and the presence of moisture contamination. A new generation of hydrophilic resin sealants is reported to tolerate moisture. This study investigates the impact of Er:YAG laser pre-conditioning and moisture contamination on the microleakage of a recent hydrophilic sealant. Occlusal surfaces of extracted human molars were either acid etched (n = 30), or successively lased and acid etched (n = 30). Ten teeth from each group were either air-dried, water-contaminated, or saliva-contaminated prior to sealing with UltraSeal XT® hydro™. Samples were inspected for penetration of fuchsin dye following 3000 thermocycles between 5 and 50 °C, and the enamel–sealant interfaces were observed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). Significant differences in microleakage were evaluated using the Mann–Whitney U test with Bonferroni adjustment (p = 0.05). Laser pre-conditioning significantly reduced dye penetration irrespective of whether the enamel surface was moist or dry. Microleakageof water-contaminated acid etched teeth was significantly greater than that of their air-dried or saliva-contaminated counterparts. SEM analysis demonstrated good adaptation in all groups with the exception of water-contaminated acid etched teeth which exhibited relatively wide gaps. In conclusion, this hydrophilic sealant tolerates the presence of saliva, although water was found to impair its sealing ability. Laser pre-conditioning significantly decreases microleakage in all cases
Correlation Induced Inhomogeneity in Circular Quantum Dots
Properties of the "electron gas" - in which conduction electrons interact by
means of Coulomb forces but ionic potentials are neglected - change
dramatically depending on the balance between kinetic energy and Coulomb
repulsion. The limits are well understood. For very weak interactions (high
density), the system behaves as a Fermi liquid, with delocalized electrons. In
contrast, in the strongly interacting limit (low density), the electrons
localize and order into a Wigner crystal phase. The physics at intermediate
densities, however, remains a subject of fundamental research. Here, we study
the intermediate-density electron gas confined to a circular disc, where the
degree of confinement can be tuned to control the density. Using accurate
quantum Monte Carlo techniques, we show that the electron-electron correlation
induced by an increase of the interaction first smoothly causes rings, and then
angular modulation, without any signature of a sharp transition in this density
range. This suggests that inhomogeneities in a confined system, which exist
even without interactions, are significantly enhanced by correlations.Comment: final version, modified introduction and clarifications, 4 page
Strong suppression of Coulomb corrections to the cross section of e+e- pair production in ultrarelativistic nuclear collisions
The Coulomb corrections to the cross section of pair production in
ultrarelativistic nuclear collisions are calculated in the next-to-leading
approximation with respect to the parameter
( are the Lorentz factors of colliding nuclei). We found
considerable reduction of the Coulomb corrections even for large
due to the suppression of the production of pair
with the total energy of the order of a few electron masses in the rest frame
of one of the nuclei. Our result explains why the deviation from the Born
result were not observed in the experiment at SPS.Comment: 4 pages, RevTe
Coulomb Effects on Electromagnetic Pair Production in Ultrarelativistic Heavy-Ion Collisions
We discuss the implications of the eikonal amplitude on the pair production
probability in ultrarelativistic heavy-ion transits. In this context the
Weizs\"acker-Williams method is shown to be exact in the ultrarelativistic
limit, irrespective of the produced particles' mass. A new equivalent
single-photon distribution is derived which correctly accounts for the Coulomb
distortions. As an immediate application, consequences for unitarity violation
in photo-dissociation processes in peripheral heavy-ion encounters are
discussed.Comment: 13 pages, 4 .eps figure
Investigation of pilot scale manufacturing of polysulfone (PSf) membranes by wet phase inversion method
Membranes are used as a support layer for the fabrication of thin film composite membranes. Sup- port layer properties can affect many performance parameters of TFC membranes such as flux, rejection, morphology and stability against pressure. Although studies in lab scale fabrication exist, investigation the pilot scale polysulfone membrane fabrication has not been done. In this study, opti- mization of polysulfone support membranes fabrication was conducted in pilot scale. Coagulation bath temperature; casting speed and solution content were selected as main parameters for the opti- mization. Membrane surface properties were investigated in details with SEM and pore size dis- tribution. Membrane performance were determined with permeability experiments. Differences in pilot scale and lab scale membrane manufacturing were observed and compared with literature. On the contrary to literature it was found that, coagulation bath temperature has exact opposite effect in pilot scale membrane formation compared to lab scale studies. 10°C drop (from 25°C to 15°C) in coagulation bath temperature decreased mean pore size of membranes from 27 nm to 8 nm and per- meability from 464 l/m2h to 100 l/m2h while everything else was kept constant
Symmetry breaking and quantum correlations in finite systems: Studies of quantum dots and ultracold Bose gases and related nuclear and chemical methods
Investigations of emergent symmetry breaking phenomena occurring in small
finite-size systems are reviewed, with a focus on the strongly correlated
regime of electrons in two-dimensional semicoductor quantum dots and trapped
ultracold bosonic atoms in harmonic traps. Throughout the review we emphasize
universal aspects and similarities of symmetry breaking found in these systems,
as well as in more traditional fields like nuclear physics and quantum
chemistry, which are characterized by very different interparticle forces. A
unified description of strongly correlated phenomena in finite systems of
repelling particles (whether fermions or bosons) is presented through the
development of a two-step method of symmetry breaking at the unrestricted
Hartree-Fock level and of subsequent symmetry restoration via post Hartree-Fock
projection techniques. Quantitative and qualitative aspects of the two-step
method are treated and validated by exact diagonalization calculations.
Strongly-correlated phenomena emerging from symmetry breaking include: (I)
Chemical bonding, dissociation, and entanglement (at zero and finite magnetic
fields) in quantum dot molecules and in pinned electron molecular dimers formed
within a single anisotropic quantum dot. (II) Electron crystallization, with
particle localization on the vertices of concentric polygonal rings, and
formation of rotating electron molecules (REMs) in circular quantum dots. (III)
At high magnetic fields, the REMs are described by parameter-free analytic wave
functions, which are an alternative to the Laughlin and composite-fermion
approaches. (IV) Crystalline phases of strongly repelling bosons. In rotating
traps and in analogy with the REMs, such repelling bosons form rotating boson
molecules (RBMs).Comment: Review article published in Reports on Progress in Physics. REVTEX4.
95 pages with 37 color figures. To download a copy with high-quality figures,
go to publication #82 in http://www.prism.gatech.edu/~ph274cy
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