The silicate absorption profile in the ISM towards the heavily obscured nucleus of NGC 4418

The 9.7-micron silicate absorption profile in the interstellar medium provides important information on the physical and chemical composition of interstellar dust grains. Measurements in the Milky Way have shown that the profile in the diffuse interstellar medium is very similar to the amorphous silicate profiles found in circumstellar dust shells around late M stars, and narrower than the silicate profile in denser star-forming regions. Here, we investigate the silicate absorption profile towards the very heavily obscured nucleus of NGC 4418, the galaxy with the deepest known silicate absorption feature, and compare it to the profiles seen in the Milky Way. Comparison between the 8-13 micron spectrum obtained with TReCS on Gemini and the larger aperture spectrum obtained from the Spitzer archive indicates that the former isolates the nuclear emission, while Spitzer detects low surface brightness circumnuclear diffuse emission in addition. The silicate absorption profile towards the nucleus is very similar to that in the diffuse ISM in the Milky Way with no evidence of spectral structure from crystalline silicates or silicon carbide grains.Comment: 7 Pages, 3 figures. MNRAS in pres

Optimization of photon correlations by frequency filtering

Photon correlations are a cornerstone of Quantum Optics. Recent works [NJP 15 025019, 033036 (2013), PRA 90 052111 (2014)] have shown that by keeping track of the frequency of the photons, rich landscapes of correlations are revealed. Stronger correlations are usually found where the system emission is weak. Here, we characterize both the strength and signal of such correlations, through the introduction of the 'frequency resolved Mandel parameter'. We study a plethora of nonlinear quantum systems, showing how one can substantially optimize correlations by combining parameters such as pumping, filtering windows and time delay.Comment: Small updates to take into account the recent experimental observation of the physics here analyze

N electrons in a quantum dot: Two-point Pade approximants

We present analytic estimates for the energy levels of N electrons (N = 2 - 5) in a two-dimensional parabolic quantum dot. A magnetic field is applied perpendicularly to the confinement plane. The relevant scaled energy is shown to be a smooth function of the parameter \beta=(effective Rydberg/effective dot energy)^{1/6}. Two-point Pade approximants are obtained from the series expansions of the energy near the oscillator ($\beta\to 0$) and Wigner ($\beta\to\infty$) limits. The approximants are expected to work with an error not greater than 2.5% in the entire interval $0\le\beta < \infty$.Comment: 27 pages. LaTeX. 6 figures not include