64 research outputs found
COVID-19 : symptoms and spread
What symptoms does one
experience if they have
COVID-19? How long
does it take to recover
from infection? When
is hospitalization likely
to be necessary? Can
asymptomatic people
spread the infection?
What precautions help
minimize the risks
of transmitting the
infection
Parity Violating Gravitational Coupling Of Electromagnetic Fields
A manifestly gauge invariant formulation of the coupling of the Maxwell
theory with an Einstein Cartan geometry is given, where the space time torsion
originates from a massless Kalb-Ramond field augmented by suitable U(1) Chern
Simons terms.We focus on the situation where the torsion violates parity, and
relate it to earlier proposals for gravitational parity violation.Comment: 7 Pages, Latex . no figures, Replaced with Revtex version, many
references added and typos correcte
Global Topology and Local Violation of Discrete Symmetries
Cosmological models that are locally consistent with general relativity and
the standard model in which an object transported around the universe undergoes
P, C and CP transformations, are constructed. This leads to generalization of
the gauge fields that describe electro-weak and strong interactions by
enlarging the gauge groups to include anti-unitary transformations. Gedanken
experiments show that if all interactions obey Einstein causality then P, C and
CP cannot be violated in these models. But another model, which would violate
charge superselection rule even for an isolated system, is allowed. It is
suggested that the fundamental physical laws must have these discrete
symmetries which are broken spontaneously, or they must be non causal.Comment: 12 pages, 1 figure, latex, Revtex. Charge conjugation which is
physically implemented in a cosmology with the appropriate topology is
described in more detail. Some minor errors are corrected. Shortened to meet
the page limit of Physical Review Letters to which this paper was submitte
Further Evidence for Collimated Particle Beams from Pulsars, and Precession
We follow up on our (Radhakrishnan & Deshpande, 2001: RD01) radically
different interpretation of the observed structures and morphologies in the
x-ray observations of the nebulae around young pulsars (PWNe). In our general
model for PWNe (RD01), originally motivated by the Chandra observations of the
Vela X-ray nebula, the bright arcs, the jet-like feature and the diffuse
components in such nebulae can be explained together in detail, wherein the
arcs are understood as traces of the particle beams from the two magnetic poles
at the shock front. We consider this as important evidence for collimated
particle beams from pulsars' magnetic poles. In this paper, we discuss the
variability in the features in the Vela X-ray nebula observed by Pavlov et al.
(2003), and assess the relevance and implication of our model to the
observations on the Crab and other remnants. Our basic picture after
incorporating the signatures of free precession of the central compact object
can readily account for the variability and significant asymmetries, including
the bent jet-like features, in the observed morphologies. The implications of
these findings are discussed.Comment: Minor revision; 12 (9+3) pages, 3 figures; To appear in Ap
On the Emergence of the Microcanonical Description from a Pure State
We study, in general terms, the process by which a pure state can
``self-thermalize'' and {\em appear} to be described by a microcanonical
density matrix. This requires a quantum mechanical version of the Gibbsian
coarse graining that conceptually underlies classical statistical mechanics. We
introduce some extra degrees of freedom that are necessary for this.
Interaction between these degrees and the system can be understood as a process
of resonant absorption and emission of ``soft quanta''. This intuitive picture
allows one to state a criterion for when self thermalization occurs. This
paradigm also provides a method for calculating the thermalization rate using
the usual formalism of atomic physics for calculating decay rates. We contrast
our prescription for coarse graining, which is somewhat dynamical, with the
earlier approaches that are intrinsically kinematical. An important motivation
for this study is the black hole information paradox.Comment: 58 pages, 2 figures. A reference adde
Dual Computations of Non-abelian Yang-Mills on the Lattice
In the past several decades there have been a number of proposals for
computing with dual forms of non-abelian Yang-Mills theories on the lattice.
Motivated by the gauge-invariant, geometric picture offered by dual models and
successful applications of duality in the U(1) case, we revisit the question of
whether it is practical to perform numerical computation using non-abelian dual
models. Specifically, we consider three-dimensional SU(2) pure Yang-Mills as an
accessible yet non-trivial case in which the gauge group is non-abelian. Using
methods developed recently in the context of spin foam quantum gravity, we
derive an algorithm for efficiently computing the dual amplitude and describe
Metropolis moves for sampling the dual ensemble. We relate our algorithms to
prior work in non-abelian dual computations of Hari Dass and his collaborators,
addressing several problems that have been left open. We report results of spin
expectation value computations over a range of lattice sizes and couplings that
are in agreement with our conventional lattice computations. We conclude with
an outlook on further development of dual methods and their application to
problems of current interest.Comment: v1: 18 pages, 7 figures, v2: Many changes to appendix, minor changes
throughout, references and figures added, v3: minor corrections, 22 page
Quantum Tests of the Foundations of General Relativity
The role of the equivalence principle in the context of non-relativistic
quantum mechanics and matter wave interferometry, especially atom beam
interferometry, will be discussed. A generalised form of the weak equivalence
principle which is capable of covering quantum phenomena too, will be proposed.
It is shown that this generalised equivalence principle is valid for matter
wave interferometry and for the dynamics of expectation values. In addition,
the use of this equivalence principle makes it possible to determine the
structure of the interaction of quantum systems with gravitational and inertial
fields. It is also shown that the path of the mean value of the position
operator in the case of gravitational interaction does fulfill this generalised
equivalence principle.Comment: Classical and Quantum Gravity 15, 13 (1998
Infrared Behaviour of Systems With Goldstone Bosons
We develop various complementary concepts and techniques for handling quantum
fluctuations of Goldstone bosons.We emphasise that one of the consequences of
the masslessness of Goldstone bosons is that the longitudinal fluctuations also
have a diverging susceptibility characterised by an anomalous dimension
in space-time dimensions .In these fluctuations diverge
logarithmically in the infrared region.We show the generality of this
phenomenon by providing three arguments based on i). Renormalization group
flows, ii). Ward identities, and iii). Schwinger-Dyson equations.We obtain an
explicit form for the generating functional of one-particle irreducible
vertices of the O(N) (non)--linear --models in the leading 1/N
approximation.We show that this incorporates all infrared behaviour correctly
both in linear and non-linear -- models. Our techniques provide an
alternative to chiral perturbation theory.Some consequences are discussed
briefly.Comment: 28 pages,2 Figs, a new section on some universal features of
multipion processes has been adde
Spin, gravity, and inertia
The gravitational effects in the relativistic quantum mechanics are
investigated. The exact Foldy-Wouthuysen transformation is constructed for the
Dirac particle coupled to the static spacetime metric. As a direct application,
we analyze the non-relativistic limit of the theory. The new term describing
the specific spin (gravitational moment) interaction effect is recovered in the
Hamiltonian. The comparison of the true gravitational coupling with the purely
inertial case demonstrates that the spin relativistic effects do not violate
the equivalence principle for the Dirac fermions.Comment: Revtex, 12 pages, no figures, accepted in Phys. Rev. Let
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