8,387 research outputs found
Interband polarized absorption in InP polytypic superlattices
Recent advances in growth techniques have allowed the fabrication of
semiconductor nanostructures with mixed wurtzite/zinc-blende crystal phases.
Although the optical characterization of these polytypic structures is well
eported in the literature, a deeper theoretical understanding of how crystal
phase mixing and quantum confinement change the output linear light
polarization is still needed. In this paper, we theoretically investigate the
mixing effects of wurtzite and zinc-blende phases on the interband absorption
and in the degree of light polarization of an InP polytypic superlattice. We
use a single 88 kp Hamiltonian that describes both crystal
phases. Quantum confinement is investigated by changing the size of the
polytypic unit cell. We also include the optical confinement effect due to the
dielectric mismatch between the superlattice and the vaccum and we show it to
be necessary to match experimental results. Our calculations for large wurtzite
concentrations and small quantum confinement explain the optical trends of
recent photoluminescence excitation measurements. Furthermore, we find a high
sensitivity to zinc-blende concentrations in the degree of linear polarization.
This sensitivity can be reduced by increasing quantum confinement. In
conclusion, our theoretical analysis provides an explanation for optical trends
in InP polytypic superlattices, and shows that the interplay of crystal phase
mixing and quantum confinement is an area worth exploring for light
polarization engineering.Comment: 9 pages, 6 figures and 1 tabl
Spin Chains in an External Magnetic Field. Closure of the Haldane Gap and Effective Field Theories
We investigate both numerically and analytically the behaviour of a spin-1
antiferromagnetic (AFM) isotropic Heisenberg chain in an external magnetic
field. Extensive DMRG studies of chains up to N=80 sites extend previous
analyses and exhibit the well known phenomenon of the closure of the Haldane
gap at a lower critical field H_c1. We obtain an estimate of the gap below
H_c1. Above the lower critical field, when the correlation functions exhibit
algebraic decay, we obtain the critical exponent as a function of the net
magnetization as well as the magnetization curve up to the saturation (upper
critical) field H_c2. We argue that, despite the fact that the SO(3) symmetry
of the model is explicitly broken by the field, the Haldane phase of the model
is still well described by an SO(3) nonlinear sigma-model. A mean-field theory
is developed for the latter and its predictions are compared with those of the
numerical analysis and with the existing literature.Comment: 11 pages, 4 eps figure
On the use of scaling relations for the Tolman test
The use of relations between structural parameters of early type galaxies to
perform the Tolman test is reconsidered. Scaling relations such as the FP or
the Kormendy relation, require the transformation from angular to metric sizes,
to compare the relation at different z values. This transformation depends on
the assumed world model: galaxies of a given angular size, at a given z, are
larger (in kpc) in a non-expanding universe than in an expanding one.
Furthermore, the luminosities of galaxies are expected to evolve with z in an
expanding model. These effects are shown to conspire to reduce the difference
between the predicted SB change with redshift in the expanding and non
expanding cases. We find that the predictions for the visible photometric bands
of the expanding models with passive luminosity evolution are very similar to
those of the static model till z about 1, and therefore, the test cannot
distinguish between the two world models. Recent good quality data are
consistent with the predictions from both models. In the K-band, where the
expected (model) luminosity evolutionary corrections are smaller, the
differences between the xpanding and static models amount to about 0.4 (0.8)
magnitudes at z = 0.4 (1). It is shown that, due to that small difference
between the predictions in the covered z-range, and to the paucity and
uncertainties of the relevant SB photometry, the existing K-band data is not
adequate to distinguish between the different world metrics, and cannot be yet
used to discard the static case. It is pointed out that the scaling relations
could still be used to rule out the non-evolving case if it could be shown that
the coefficients change with the redshift.Comment: Latex, 15 pages with 2 figures. To be published in ApJ Letter
Determining R-parity violating parameters from neutrino and LHC data
In supersymmetric models neutrino data can be explained by R-parity violating
operators which violate lepton number by one unit. The so called bilinear model
can account for the observed neutrino data and predicts at the same time
several decay properties of the lightest supersymmetric particle. In this paper
we discuss the expected precision to determine these parameters by combining
neutrino and LHC data and discuss the most important observables. We show that
one can expect a rather accurate determination of the underlying R-parity
parameters assuming mSUGRA relations between the R-parity conserving ones and
discuss briefly also the general MSSM as well as the expected accuracies in
case of a prospective e+ e- linear collider. An important observation is that
several parameters can only be determined up to relative signs or more
generally relative phases.Comment: 13 pages, 13 figure
A comparative analysis of the observed white dwarf cooling sequence from globular clusters
We report our study of features at the observed red end of the white dwarf
cooling sequences for three Galactic globular clusters: NGC\,6397, 47\,Tucanae
and M\,4. We use deep colour-magnitude diagrams constructed from archival
Hubble Space Telescope (ACS) to systematically investigate the blue turn at
faint magnitudes and the age determinations for each cluster. We find that the
age difference between NGC\,6397 and 47\,Tuc is 1.98\,Gyr,
consistent with the picture that metal-rich halo clusters were formed later
than metal-poor halo clusters. We self-consistently include the effect of
metallicity on the progenitor age and the initial-to-final mass relation. In
contrast with previous investigations that invoked a single white dwarf mass
for each cluster, the data shows a spread of white dwarf masses that better
reproduce the shape and location of the blue turn. This effect alone, however,
does not completely reproduce the observational data - the blue turn retains
some mystery. In this context, we discuss several other potential problems in
the models. These include possible partial mixing of H and He in the atmosphere
of white dwarf stars, the lack of a good physical description of the
collision-induced absorption process and uncertainties in the opacities at low
temperatures. The latter are already known to be significant in the description
of the cool main sequence. Additionally, we find that the present day local
mass function of NGC\,6397 is consistent with a top-heavy type, while 47\,Tuc
presents a bottom-heavy profile.Comment: Accepted for publication in MNRAS (16 pages, 19 figures
Galaxy number counts- IV. surveying the Herschel deep field in the near-infrared
(abridged) We present results from two new near-infrared imaging surveys. One
covers 47.2 arcmin^2 to K(3\sigma)<20 whilst a second, deeper survey covers a
sub-area of 1.8 arcmin^2 to K(3\sigma)<22.75. Over the entire area we have
extremely deep UBRI photometry. Our K- counts are consistent with the
predictions of non-evolving models with 0 < q0 <0.5. The K-selected (B-K)
galaxy colour distributions move sharply bluewards fainter than K~20 and at at
brighter magnitudes (K<20) our observed colour distributions indicate a
deficiency of red, early-type galaxies at z~1 in comparison with passively
evolving models. This implies either a pure luminosity evolution (PLE) model
with a low level of continuing star-formation following an an initial burst, or
dynamical merging. At fainter magnitudes, the continuing bluewards trend
observed in (B-K) can be explained purely in terms of passively evolving PLE
models. Our observed numbers of (I-K)>4 galaxies at K<20 exhibit the same
deficiency, suggesting that at least part of the larger deficit observed in
(B-K) at K<20 may be due to star-formation rather than dynamical merging.
Finally, as we and others have noted, the number-redshift distribution at
18<K<19 of recent, deep K- selected redshift surveys is well fitted by
non-evolving models; passively evolving models with a Salpeter or Scalo initial
mass functions overpredict the numbers of galaxies with z>1. Dynamical merging
is one possible solution to reduce the numbers of these galaxies but a
dwarf-dominated IMF for early-type galaxies could offer an alternative
explanation; we show that this model reproduces both the optical-infrared
colour distributions and the K- band galaxy counts.Comment: 15 pages, 9 figures, revised version, requires astrobib.sty,
mn-abs.sty, submitted to MNRA
Emission-Line Galaxy Surveys as Probes of the Spatial Distribution of Dwarf Galaxies. I. The University of Michigan Survey
Objective-prism surveys which select galaxies on the basis of line-emission
are extremely effective at detecting low-luminosity galaxies and constitute
some of the deepest available samples of dwarfs. In this study, we confirm that
emission-line galaxies (ELGs) in the University of Michigan (UM)
objective-prism survey (MacAlpine et al. 1977-1981) are reliable tracers of
large-scale structure, and utilize the depth of the samples to examine the
spatial distribution of low-luminosity (M -18.0) dwarfs relative to
higher luminosity giant galaxies (M -18.0) in the Updated Zwicky
Catalogue (Falco et al. 1999). New spectroscopic data are presented for 26 UM
survey objects. We analyze the relative clustering properties of the overall
starbursting ELG and normal galaxy populations, using nearest neighbor and
correlation function statistics. This allows us to determine whether the
activity in ELGs is primarily caused by gravitational interactions. We conclude
that galaxy-galaxy encounters are not the sole cause of activity in ELGs since
ELGs tend to be more isolated and are more often found in the voids when
compared to their normal galaxy counterparts. Furthermore, statistical analyses
performed on low-luminosity dwarf ELGs show that the dwarfs are less clustered
when compared to their non-active giant neighbors. The UM dwarf samples have
greater percentages of nearest neighbor separations at large values and lower
correlation function amplitudes relative to the UZC giant galaxy samples. These
results are consistent with the expectations of galaxy biasing.Comment: 17 pages, 4 tables, 10 figures. Accepted for publication in the Ap
Noise Kernel in Stochastic Gravity and Stress Energy Bi-Tensor of Quantum Fields in Curved Spacetimes
The noise kernel is the vacuum expectation value of the (operator-valued)
stress-energy bi-tensor which describes the fluctuations of a quantum field in
curved spacetimes. It plays the role in stochastic semiclassical gravity based
on the Einstein-Langevin equation similar to the expectation value of the
stress-energy tensor in semiclassical gravity based on the semiclassical
Einstein equation. According to the stochastic gravity program, this two point
function (and by extension the higher order correlations in a hierarchy) of the
stress energy tensor possesses precious statistical mechanical information of
quantum fields in curved spacetime and, by the self-consistency required of
Einstein's equation, provides a probe into the coherence properties of the
gravity sector (as measured by the higher order correlation functions of
gravitons) and the quantum nature of spacetime. It reflects the low and medium
energy (referring to Planck energy as high energy) behavior of any viable
theory of quantum gravity, including string theory. It is also useful for
calculating quantum fluctuations of fields in modern theories of structure
formation and for backreaction problems in cosmological and black holes
spacetimes.
We discuss the properties of this bi-tensor with the method of
point-separation, and derive a regularized expression of the noise-kernel for a
scalar field in general curved spacetimes. One collorary of our finding is that
for a massless conformal field the trace of the noise kernel identically
vanishes. We outline how the general framework and results derived here can be
used for the calculation of noise kernels for Robertson-Walker and
Schwarzschild spacetimes.Comment: 22 Pages, RevTeX; version accepted for publication in PR
Completely monotone outer approximations of lower probabilities on finite possibility spaces
Drawing inferences from general lower probabilities on finite possibility spaces usually involves solving linear programming problems. For some applications this may be too computationally demanding. Some special classes of lower probabilities allow for using computationally less demanding techniques. One such class is formed by the completely monotone lower probabilities, for which inferences can be drawn efficiently once their Möbius transform has been calculated. One option is therefore to draw approximate inferences by using a completely monotone approximation to a general lower probability; this must be an outer approximation to avoid drawing inferences that are not implied by the approximated lower probability. In this paper, we discuss existing and new algorithms for performing this approximation, discuss their relative strengths and weaknesses, and illustrate how each one works and performs
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