5,808 research outputs found
Novel substrates for Helium adsorption: Graphane and Graphene-Fluoride
The discovery of fullerenes has stimulated extensive exploration of the
resulting behavior of adsorbed films. Our study addresses the planar substrates
graphene-fluoride (GF) and graphane (GH) in comparison to graphene. We present
initial results concerning the potential energy, energy bands and low density
behavior of 4He and 3He films on such different surfaces. For example, while
graphene presents an adsorption potential that is qualitatively similar to that
on graphite, GF and GH yield potentials with different symmetry, a number of
adsorption sites double that on graphene/graphite and a larger corrugation for
the adatom. In the case of GF, the lowest energy band width is similar to that
on graphite but the He atom has a significantly larger effective mass and the
adsorption energy is about three time that on graphite. Implications concerning
the monolayer phase diagram of 4He are explored with the exact path integral
ground state method. A commensurate ordered state similar to the sqrt{3} x
sqrt{3} R30^o state on graphite is found the be unstable both on GF and on GH.
The ground states of submonolayer 4He on both GF and GH are superfluids with a
Bose Einstein condensate fraction of about 10%.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figures, LT26 proceedings, accepted for publication in
Journal of Physics: Conference Serie
Surface charging of thick porous water ice layers relevant for ion sputtering experiments
We use a laboratory facility to study the sputtering properties of
centimeter-thick porous water ice subjected to the bombardment of ions and
electrons to better understand the formation of exospheres of the icy moons of
Jupiter. Our ice samples are as similar as possible to the expected moon
surfaces but surface charging of the samples during ion irradiation may distort
the experimental results. We therefore monitor the time scales for charging and
dis- charging of the samples when subjected to a beam of ions. These
experiments allow us to derive an electric conductivity of deep porous ice
layers. The results imply that electron irradiation and sputtering play a
non-negligible role for certain plasma conditions at the icy moons of Jupiter.
The observed ion sputtering yields from our ice samples are similar to previous
experiments where compact ice films were sputtered off a micro-balance.Comment: arXiv admin note: text overlap with arXiv:1509.0400
Study of solid 4He in two dimensions. The issue of zero-point defects and study of confined crystal
Defects are believed to play a fundamental role in the supersolid state of
4He. We report on studies by exact Quantum Monte Carlo (QMC) simulations at
zero temperature of the properties of solid 4He in presence of many vacancies,
up to 30 in two dimensions (2D). In all studied cases the crystalline order is
stable at least as long as the concentration of vacancies is below 2.5%. In the
2D system for a small number, n_v, of vacancies such defects can be identified
in the crystalline lattice and are strongly correlated with an attractive
interaction. On the contrary when n_v~10 vacancies in the relaxed system
disappear and in their place one finds dislocations and a revival of the
Bose-Einstein condensation. Thus, should zero-point motion defects be present
in solid 4He, such defects would be dislocations and not vacancies, at least in
2D. In order to avoid using periodic boundary conditions we have studied the
exact ground state of solid 4He confined in a circular region by an external
potential. We find that defects tend to be localized in an interfacial region
of width of about 15 A. Our computation allows to put as upper bound limit to
zero--point defects the concentration 0.003 in the 2D system close to melting
density.Comment: 17 pages, accepted for publication in J. Low Temp. Phys., Special
Issue on Supersolid
Climate change over the high-mountain versus plain areas: Effects on the land surface hydrologic budget in the Alpine area and northern Italy
Climate change may intensify during the second half of the current century. Changes in temperature and precipitation can exert a significant impact on the regional hydrologic cycle. Because the land surface serves as the hub of interactions among the variables constituting the energy and water cycles, evaluating the land surface processes is essential to detail the future climate. In this study, we employ a trusted soil–vegetation–atmosphere transfer scheme, called the University of Torino model of land Processes Interaction with Atmosphere (UTOPIA), in offline simulations to quantify the changes in hydrologic components in the Alpine area and northern Italy, between the period of 1961–1990 and 2071–2100. The regional climate projections are obtained by the Regional Climate Model version 3 (RegCM3) via two emission scenarios – A2 and B2 from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Special Report on Emissions Scenarios. The hydroclimate projections, especially from A2, indicate that evapotranspiration generally increases, especially over the plain areas, and consequently the surface soil moisture decreases during summer, falling below the wilting point threshold for an extra month. In the high-mountain areas, due to the earlier snowmelt, the land surface becomes snowless for an additional month. The annual mean number of dry (wet) days increases remarkably (slightly), thus increasing the risk of severe droughts, and slightly increasing the risk of floods coincidently. Our results have serious implications for human life, including agricultural production, water sustainability, and general infrastructures, over the Alpine and adjacent plain areas and can be used to plan the managements of water resources, floods, irrigation, forestry, hydropower, and many other relevant activities
Magnetic field in a young circumbinary disk
We use polarization observations of a circumbinary disk to investigate how
the polarization properties change at distinct frequency bands. Our goal is to
discern the main mechanism responsible for the polarization through comparison
between our observations and model predictions. We used ALMA to perform full
polarization observations at 97.5 GHz, 233 GHz and 343.5 GHz. The target is the
Class I object BHB07-11, which is the youngest object in the Barnard 59
protocluster. Complementary VLA observations at 34.5 GHz revealed a binary
system within the disk. We detect an extended and structured polarization
pattern remarkably consistent among all three bands. The distribution of
polarized intensity resembles a horseshoe shape with polarization angles
following this morphology. From the spectral index between bands 3 and 7, we
derive a dust opacity index consistent with maximum grain sizes
larger than expected to produce self-scattering polarization in each band. The
polarization morphology do not match predictions from self-scattering. On the
other hand, marginal correspondence is seen between our maps and predictions
from radiation field assuming the brightest binary component as main radiation
source. Molecular line data from BHB07-11 indicates disk rotation. We produced
synthetic polarization maps from a rotating magnetized disk model assuming
combined poloidal and toroidal magnetic field components. The magnetic field
vectors (i. e., the polarization vectors rotated by 90\degr) are better
represented by a model with poloidal magnetic field strength about 3 times the
toroidal one. The similarity of our polarization patterns among the three bands
provides a strong evidence against self-scattering and radiation fields. On the
other hand, our data are reasonably well reproduced by a model of disk with
toroidal magnetic field components slightly smaller than poloidal ones.Comment: 8 pages, 8 figures, accepted for publication in Astronomy &
Astrophysic
Analysis of the IBEX-Lo interstellar hydrogen fluxes collected in 2009–2018 as a tool for sensing of the solar radiation pressure and the hydrogen ionization rate
The Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX) has been measuring interstellar hydrogen fluxes at 1 au since 2009. In this paper,we analysed all available data obtained with the IBEX-Lo instrument at energies 11–41 eV using our numerical kinetic modelof the interstellar hydrogen distribution in the heliosphere. We performed a fitting of the data to find independently the modelparameters: the ratio of the solar radiation pressure to the solar gravitation (μ0), ionization rate of hydrogen atoms at 1 au(β0), parameters of the secondary interstellar atoms at 70 au from the Sun, which provide the best agreement with the data byminimization of metricχ2. We also analysed temporal variations of the ratio of the fluxes measured in a fixed direction at energybin 1 and energy bin 2. It is found that in 2009–2011 and 2017–2016 the ratio provided by the model is smaller than in the IBEX-Lo data, while in 2012–2015, oppositely, the model ratio is larger compared to the data. This might be caused by the incorrectseparation of the measured fluxes between energy channels in the data, or by some additional physical factors that are omitted inthe model. Understanding this issue may be important for the preparation of future Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probemission. At this stage, we relied on the sum of the fluxes measured in energy bins 1 and 2 for comparison to model predictions
The downwind hemisphere of the heliosphere: Eight years of IBEX-Lo observations
We present a comprehensive study of energetic neutral atoms (ENAs) of 10 eV
to 2.5 keV from the downwind hemisphere of the heliosphere. These ENAs are
believed to originate mostly from pickup protons and solar wind protons in the
inner heliosheath. This study includes all low-energy observations made with
the Interstellar Boundary Explorer over the first 8 years. Since the protons
around 0.1 keV dominate the plasma pressure in the inner heliosheath in
downwind direction, these ENA observations offer the unique opportunity to
constrain the plasma properties and dimensions of the heliosheath where no
in-situ observations are available.
We first derive energy spectra of ENA intensities averaged over time for 49
macropixels covering the entire downwind hemisphere. The results confirm
previous studies regarding integral intensities and the roll-over around 0.1
keV energy. With the expanded dataset we now find that ENA intensities at 0.2
and 0.1 keV seem to anti-correlate with solar activity. We then derive the
product of total plasma pressure and emission thickness of protons in the
heliosheath to estimate lower limits on the thickness of the inner heliosheath.
The temporally averaged ENA intensities support a rather spherical shape of the
termination shock and a heliosheath thickness between 150 and 210 au for most
regions of the downwind hemisphere. Around the nominal downwind direction of
76{\deg} ecliptic longitude, the heliosheath is at least 280 au thick. There,
the neutral hydrogen density seems to be depleted compared to upwind directions
by roughly a factor of 2.Comment: Preprint of article in The Astrophysical Journa
Protostellar Collapse with Various Metallicities
The thermal and chemical evolution of gravitationally collapsing protostellar
clouds is investigated, focusing attention on their dependence on metallicity.
Calculations are carried out for a range of metallicities spanning the local
interstellar value to zero. During the time when clouds are transparent to
continuous radiation, the temperatures are higher for those with lower
metallicity, reflecting lower radiative ability. However, once the clouds
become opaque, in the course of the adiabatic contraction of the transient
cores, their evolutionary trajectories in the density-temperature plane
converge to a unique curve that is determined by only physical constants. The
trajectories coincide with each other thereafter. Consequently, the size of the
stellar core at the formation is the same regardless of the gas composition of
the parent cloud.Comment: 30 pages. The Astrophysical Journal, 533, in pres
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