49,659 research outputs found
The principle of equivalence and projective structure in space-times
This paper discusses the extent to which one can determine the space-time
metric from a knowledge of a certain subset of the (unparametrised) geodesics
of its Levi-Civita connection, that is, from the experimental evidence of the
equivalence principle. It is shown that, if the space-time concerned is known
to be vacuum, then the Levi-Civita connection is uniquely determined and its
associated metric is uniquely determined up to a choice of units of
measurement, by the specification of these geodesics. It is further
demonstrated that if two space-times share the same unparametrised geodesics
and only one is assumed vacuum then their Levi-Civita connections are again
equal (and so the other metric is also a vacuum metric) and the first result
above is recovered.Comment: 23 pages, submitted to Classical and Quantum Gravit
Review of available synchronization and time distribution techniques
The methods of synchronizing precision clocks will be reviewed placing particular attention to the simpler techniques, their accuracies, and the approximate cost of equipment. The more exotic methods of synchronization are discussed in lesser detail. The synchronization techniques that will be covered will include satellite dissemination, communication and navigation transmissions via VLF, LF, HF, UHF and microwave as well as commercial and armed forces television. Portable clock trips will also be discussed
Quark-hadron duality constraints on \gamma Z box corrections to parity-violating elastic scattering
We examine the interference \gamma Z box corrections to parity-violating
elastic electron--proton scattering in the light of the recent observation of
quark-hadron duality in parity-violating deep-inelastic scattering from the
deuteron, and the approximate isospin independence of duality in the
electromagnetic nucleon structure functions down to Q^2 \approx 1 GeV^2.
Assuming that a similar behavior also holds for the \gamma Z proton structure
functions, we find that duality constrains the \gamma Z box correction to the
proton's weak charge to be \Re e\, \square_{\gamma Z}^V = (5.4 \pm 0.4) \times
10^{-3} at the kinematics of the Q_{\text{weak}} experiment. Within the same
model we also provide estimates of the \gamma Z corrections for future
parity-violating experiments, such as MOLLER at Jefferson Lab and MESA at
Mainz.Comment: 10 pages, 3 figures. Final version to be published in Phys. Lett.
Anomalous Hall effect in superconductors with spin-orbit interaction
We calculate the anomalous Hall conductance of superconductors with
spin-orbit interaction and with either uniform or local magnetization. In the
first case we consider a uniform ferromagnetic ordering in a spin triplet
superconductor, while in the second case we consider a conventional s-wave spin
singlet superconductor with a magnetic impurity (or a diluted set of magnetic
impurities). In the latter case we show that the anomalous Hall conductance can
be used to track the quantum phase transition, that occurs when the spin
coupling between the impurity and electronic spin density exceeds a certain
critical value. In both cases we find that for large spin-orbit coupling the
superconductivity is destroyed and the Hall conductance oscillates strongly.Comment: 10 pages, 6 figure
Cosmological Constraints on Dissipative Models of Inflation
(Abridged) We study dissipative inflation in the regime where the dissipative
term takes a specific form, \Gamma=\Gamma(\phi), analyzing two models in the
weak and strong dissipative regimes with a SUSY breaking potential. After
developing intuition about the predictions from these models through analytic
approximations, we compute the predicted cosmological observables through full
numerical evolution of the equations of motion, relating the mass scale and
scale of dissipation to the characteristic amplitude and shape of the
primordial power spectrum. We then use Markov Chain Monte Carlo techniques to
constrain a subset of the models with cosmological data from the cosmic
microwave background (WMAP three-year data) and large scale structure (SDSS
Luminous Red Galaxy power spectrum). We find that the posterior distributions
of the dissipative parameters are highly non-Gaussian and their allowed ranges
agree well with the expectations obtained using analytic approximations. In the
weak regime, only the mass scale is tightly constrained; conversely, in the
strong regime, only the dissipative coefficient is tightly constrained. A lower
limit is seen on the inflation scale: a sub-Planckian inflaton is disfavoured
by the data. In both weak and strong regimes, we reconstruct the limits on the
primordial power spectrum and show that these models prefer a {\it red}
spectrum, with no significant running of the index. We calculate the reheat
temperature and show that the gravitino problem can be overcome with large
dissipation, which in turn leads to large levels of non-Gaussianity: if
dissipative inflation is to evade the gravitino problem, the predicted level of
non-Gaussianity might be seen by the Planck satellite.Comment: 14 pages, 9 figures, Accepted by JCAP without text changes,
References adde
Operating characteristics of a prototype high energy gamma-ray telescope
The field of gamma-ray astronomy in the energy range from ten to several hundred MeV is severely limited by the angular resolution that can be achieved by present instruments. The identification of some of the point sources found by the COS-B mission and the resolution of detailed structure existing in those sources may depend on the development of a new class of instrument. The coded aperture mask telescope, used successfully at X-ray energies hold the promise of being such an instrument. A prototype coded aperture telescope was operated in a tagged photon beam ranging in energy from 23 to 123 MeV. The purpose of the experiment was to demonstrate the feasibility of operating a coded aperture mask telescope in this energy region. Some preliminary results and conclusions drawn from some of the data resulting from this experiment are presented
Asymptotic iteration method for eigenvalue problems
An asymptotic interation method for solving second-order homogeneous linear
differential equations of the form y'' = lambda(x) y' + s(x) y is introduced,
where lambda(x) \neq 0 and s(x) are C-infinity functions. Applications to
Schroedinger type problems, including some with highly singular potentials, are
presented.Comment: 14 page
A strong form of the Quantitative Isoperimetric inequality
We give a refinement of the quantitative isoperimetric inequality. We prove
that the isoperimetric gap controls not only the Fraenkel asymmetry but also
the oscillation of the boundary
Conservation of long-range synteny and microsynteny between the genomes of two distantly related nematodes
BACKGROUND: Comparisons between the genomes of the closely related nematodes Caenorhabditis elegans and Caenorhabditis briggsae reveal high rates of rearrangement, with a bias towards within-chromosome events. To assess whether this pattern is true of nematodes in general, we have used genome sequence to compare two nematode species that last shared a common ancestor approximately 300 million years ago: the model C. elegans and the filarial parasite Brugia malayi. RESULTS: An 83 kb region flanking the gene for Bm-mif-1 (macrophage migration inhibitory factor, a B. malayi homolog of a human cytokine) was sequenced. When compared to the complete genome of C. elegans, evidence for conservation of long-range synteny and microsynteny was found. Potential C. elegans orthologs for II of the 12 protein-coding genes predicted in the B. malayi sequence were identified. Ten of these orthologs were located on chromosome I, with eight clustered in a 2.3 Mb region. While several, relatively local, intrachromosomal rearrangements have occurred, the order, composition, and configuration of two gene clusters, each containing three genes, was conserved. Comparison of B. malayi BAC-end genome survey sequence to C. elegans also revealed a bias towards intrachromosome rearrangements. CONCLUSIONS: We suggest that intrachromosomal rearrangement is a major force driving chromosomal organization in nematodes, but is constrained by the interdigitation of functional elements of neighboring genes
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