33,963 research outputs found
Thermally activated exchange narrowing of the Gd3+ ESR fine structure in a single crystal of Ce1-xGdxFe4P12 (x = 0.001) skutterudite
We report electron spin resonance (ESR) measurements in the Gd3+ doped
semiconducting filled skutterudite compound Ce1-xGdxFe4P12 (x = 0.001). As the
temperature T varies from T = 150 K to T = 165 K, the Gd3+ ESR fine and
hyperfine structures coalesce into a broad inhomogeneous single resonance. At T
= 200 K the line narrows and as T increases further, the resonance becomes
homogeneous with a thermal broadening of 1.1(2) Oe/K. These results suggest
that the origin of these features may be associated to a subtle interdependence
of thermally activated mechanisms that combine: i) an increase with T of the
density of activated conduction-carriers across the T-dependent semiconducting
pseudogap; ii) the Gd3+ Korringa relaxation process due to an exchange
interaction, J_{fd}S.s, between the Gd3+ localized magnetic moments and the
thermally activated conduction-carriers and; iii) a relatively weak confining
potential of the rare-earth ions inside the oversized (Fe2P3)4 cage, which
allows the rare-earths to become rattler Einstein oscillators above T = 148 K.
We argue that the rattling of the Gd3+ ions, via a motional narrowing
mechanism, also contributes to the coalescence of the ESR fine and hyperfine
structure.Comment: 7 pages, 9 figures, accepted for publication in Phys Rev
Measurement of the Probability Distribution of Total Transmission in Random Waveguides
Measurements have been made of the probability distribution of total
transmission of microwave radiation in waveguides filled with randomly
positioned scatterers which would have values of the dimensionless conductance
g near unity. The distributions are markedly non-Gaussian and have exponential
tails. The measured distributions are accurately described by diagrammatic and
random matrix calculations carried out for nonabsorbing samples in the limit g
>> 1 when g is expressed in terms of the variance of the distribution, which
equals the degree of long-range intensity correlation across the output face of
the sample.Comment: 5 pages, 5 post script figures, RevTe
Spatial field correlation, the building block of mesoscopic fluctuations
The absence of self averaging in mesoscopic systems is a consequence of
long-range intensity correlation. Microwave measurements suggest and
diagrammatic calculations confirm that the correlation function of the
normalized intensity with displacement of the source and detector,
and , respectively, can be expressed as the sum of three terms, with
distinctive spatial dependences. Each term involves only the sum or the product
of the square of the field correlation function, . The
leading-order term is the product, the next term is proportional to the sum.
The third term is proportional to .Comment: Submitted to PR
Field and intensity correlations in random media
Measurements of the microwave field transmitted through a random medium
allows direct access to the field correlation function, whose complex square is
the short range or C1 contribution to the intensity correlation function C. The
frequency and spatial correlation function are compared to their Fourier pairs,
the time of flight distribution and the specific intensity, respectively. The
longer range contribution to intensity correlation is obtained directly by
subtracting C1 from C and is in good agreement with theory.Comment: 9 pages, 5 figures, submitted to Phys.Rev.
Rotationally invariant family of L\'evy like random matrix ensembles
We introduce a family of rotationally invariant random matrix ensembles
characterized by a parameter . While corresponds to
well-known critical ensembles, we show that describes "L\'evy
like" ensembles, characterized by power law eigenvalue densities. For the density is bounded, as in Gaussian ensembles, but
describes ensembles characterized by densities with long tails. In particular,
the model allows us to evaluate, in terms of a novel family of orthogonal
polynomials, the eigenvalue correlations for L\'evy like ensembles. These
correlations differ qualitatively from those in either the Gaussian or the
critical ensembles.Comment: 9 pages, 5 figure
Order N photonic band structures for metals and other dispersive materials
We show, for the first time, how to calculate photonic band structures for
metals and other dispersive systems using an efficient Order N scheme. The
method is applied to two simple periodic metallic systems where it gives
results in close agreement with calculations made with other techniques.
Further, the approach demonstrates excellent numerical stablity within the
limits we give. Our new method opens the way for efficient calculations on
complex structures containing a whole new class of material.Comment: Four pages, plus seven postscript figures. Submitted to Physical
Review Letter
Lepton-flavor violating decays as probes of quantum gravity?
Lepton flavor violating decays and are considered. It is shown that these decays can reach sizeable
magnitudes if some specific lepton-flavor violating 4-fermion operators are
generated by low scale quantum gravity effects, or by some other new physics at
a TeV scale.Comment: 18 pages, 1 figures, LaTeX, uses FEYNMAN package. New references
adde
Autotrophic growth of bacterial and archaeal ammonia oxidizers in freshwater sediment microcosms incubated at different temperatures
Both bacteria and archaea potentially contribute to ammonia oxidation, but their roles in freshwater sediments are still poorly understood. Seasonal differences in the relative activities of these groups might exist, since cultivated archaeal ammonia oxidizers have higher temperature optima than their bacterial counterparts. In this study, sediment collected from eutrophic freshwater Lake Taihu (China) was incubated at different temperatures (4°C, 15°C, 25°C, and 37°C) for up to 8 weeks. We examined the active bacterial and archaeal ammonia oxidizers in these sediment microcosms by using combined stable isotope probing (SIP) and molecular community analysis. The results showed that accumulation of nitrate in microcosms correlated negatively with temperature, although ammonium depletion was the same, which might have been related to enhanced activity of other nitrogen transformation processes. Incubation at different temperatures significantly changed the microbial community composition, as revealed by 454 pyrosequencing targeting bacterial 16S rRNA genes. After 8 weeks of incubation, [(13)C]bicarbonate labeling of bacterial amoA genes, which encode the ammonia monooxygenase subunit A, and an observed increase in copy numbers indicated the activity of ammonia-oxidizing bacteria in all microcosms. Nitrosomonas sp. strain Is79A3 and Nitrosomonas communis lineages dominated the heavy fraction of CsCl gradients at low and high temperatures, respectively, indicating a niche differentiation of active bacterial ammonia oxidizers along the temperature gradient. The (13)C labeling of ammonia-oxidizing archaea in microcosms incubated at 4 to 25°C was minor. In contrast, significant (13)C labeling of Nitrososphaera-like archaea and changes in the abundance and composition of archaeal amoA genes were observed at 37°C, implicating autotrophic growth of ammonia-oxidizing archaea under warmer condition
- …