Orientation dependence of the elastic instability on strained SiGe films

At low strain, SiGe films on Si substrates undergo a continuous nucleationless morphological evolution known as the Asaro-Tiller-Grinfeld instability. We demonstrate experimentally that this instability develops on Si(001) but not on Si(111) even after long annealing. Using a continuum description of this instability, we determine the origin of this difference. When modeling surface diffusion in presence of wetting, elasticity and surface energy anisotropy, we find a retardation of the instability on Si(111) due to a strong dependence of the instability onset as function of the surface stiffness. This retardation is at the origin of the inhibition of the instability on experimental time scales even after long annealing.Comment: 3 pages, 4 figure

Short to long-range charge-transfer excitations in the zincbacteriochlorin-bacteriochlorin complex: a Bethe-Salpeter study

We study using the Bethe-Salpeter formalism the excitation energies of the zincbacteriochlorinbacteriochlorin dyad, a paradigmatic photosynthetic complex. In great contrast with standard timedependent density functional theory calculations with (semi)local kernels, charge transfer excitations are correctly located above the intramolecular Q-bands transitions found to be in excellent agreement with experiment. Further, the asymptotic Coulomb behavior towards the true quasiparticle gap for charge transfer excitations at long distance is correctly reproduced, showing that the present scheme allows to study with the same accuracy intramolecular and charge transfer excitations at various spatial range and screening environment without any adjustable parameter.Comment: 5 pages, 2 figures, 1 tabl

Universal decay of scalar turbulence

The asymptotic decay of passive scalar fields is solved analytically for the Kraichnan model, where the velocity has a short correlation time. At long times, two universality classes are found, both characterized by a distribution of the scalar -- generally non-Gaussian -- with global self-similar evolution in time. Analogous behavior is found numerically with a more realistic flow resulting from an inverse energy cascade.Comment: 4 pages, 3 Postscript figures, submitted to PR

A practical guide to density matrix embedding theory in quantum chemistry

Density matrix embedding theory (DMET) provides a theoretical framework to treat finite fragments in the presence of a surrounding molecular or bulk environment, even when there is significant correlation or entanglement between the two. In this work, we give a practically oriented and explicit description of the numerical and theoretical formulation of DMET. We also describe in detail how to perform self-consistent DMET optimizations. We explore different embedding strategies with and without a self-consistency condition in hydrogen rings, beryllium rings, and a sample S$_{\text{N}}$2 reaction. The source code for the calculations in this work can be obtained from \url{https://github.com/sebwouters/qc-dmet}.Comment: 41 pages, 10 figure

On The Complexity and Completeness of Static Constraints for Breaking Row and Column Symmetry

We consider a common type of symmetry where we have a matrix of decision variables with interchangeable rows and columns. A simple and efficient method to deal with such row and column symmetry is to post symmetry breaking constraints like DOUBLELEX and SNAKELEX. We provide a number of positive and negative results on posting such symmetry breaking constraints. On the positive side, we prove that we can compute in polynomial time a unique representative of an equivalence class in a matrix model with row and column symmetry if the number of rows (or of columns) is bounded and in a number of other special cases. On the negative side, we show that whilst DOUBLELEX and SNAKELEX are often effective in practice, they can leave a large number of symmetric solutions in the worst case. In addition, we prove that propagating DOUBLELEX completely is NP-hard. Finally we consider how to break row, column and value symmetry, correcting a result in the literature about the safeness of combining different symmetry breaking constraints. We end with the first experimental study on how much symmetry is left by DOUBLELEX and SNAKELEX on some benchmark problems.Comment: To appear in the Proceedings of the 16th International Conference on Principles and Practice of Constraint Programming (CP 2010

Statistical conservation laws in turbulent transport

We address the statistical theory of fields that are transported by a turbulent velocity field, both in forced and in unforced (decaying) experiments. We propose that with very few provisos on the transporting velocity field, correlation functions of the transported field in the forced case are dominated by statistically preserved structures. In decaying experiments (without forcing the transported fields) we identify infinitely many statistical constants of the motion, which are obtained by projecting the decaying correlation functions on the statistically preserved functions. We exemplify these ideas and provide numerical evidence using a simple model of turbulent transport. This example is chosen for its lack of Lagrangian structure, to stress the generality of the ideas

The Velocity Distribution of the Nearest Interstellar Gas

The bulk flow velocity for the cluster of interstellar cloudlets within about 30 pc of the Sun is determined from optical and ultraviolet absorption line data, after omitting from the sample stars with circumstellar disks or variable emission lines and the active variable HR 1099. Ninety-six velocity components towards the remaining 60 stars yield a streaming velocity through the local standard of rest of -17.0+/-4.6 km/s, with an upstream direction of l=2.3 deg, b=-5.2 deg (using Hipparcos values for the solar apex motion). The velocity dispersion of the interstellar matter (ISM) within 30 pc is consistent with that of nearby diffuse clouds, but present statistics are inadequate to distinguish between a Gaussian or exponential distribution about the bulk flow velocity. The upstream direction of the bulk flow vector suggests an origin associated with the Loop I supernova remnant. Groupings of component velocities by region are seen, indicating regional departures from the bulk flow velocity or possibly separate clouds. The absorption components from the cloudlet feeding ISM into the solar system form one of the regional features. The nominal gradient between the velocities of upstream and downstream gas may be an artifact of the Sun's location near the edge of the local cloud complex. The Sun may emerge from the surrounding gas-patch within several thousand years.Comment: Typographical errors corrected; Five tables, seven figures; Astrophysical Journal, in pres

Emergence of chaotic scattering in ultracold Er and Dy

We show that for ultracold magnetic lanthanide atoms chaotic scattering emerges due to a combination of anisotropic interaction potentials and Zeeman coupling under an external magnetic field. This scattering is studied in a collaborative experimental and theoretical effort for both dysprosium and erbium. We present extensive atom-loss measurements of their dense magnetic Feshbach resonance spectra, analyze their statistical properties, and compare to predictions from a random-matrix-theory inspired model. Furthermore, theoretical coupled-channels simulations of the anisotropic molecular Hamiltonian at zero magnetic field show that weakly-bound, near threshold diatomic levels form overlapping, uncoupled chaotic series that when combined are randomly distributed. The Zeeman interaction shifts and couples these levels, leading to a Feshbach spectrum of zero-energy bound states with nearest-neighbor spacings that changes from randomly to chaotically distributed for increasing magnetic field. Finally, we show that the extreme temperature sensitivity of a small, but sizeable fraction of the resonances in the Dy and Er atom-loss spectra is due to resonant non-zero partial-wave collisions. Our threshold analysis for these resonances indicates a large collision-energy dependence of the three-body recombination rate

Multiscaling in passive scalar advection as stochastic shape dynamics

The Kraichnan rapid advection model is recast as the stochastic dynamics of tracer trajectories. This framework replaces the random fields with a small set of stochastic ordinary differential equations. Multiscaling of correlation functions arises naturally as a consequence of the geometry described by the evolution of N trajectories. Scaling exponents and scaling structures are interpreted as excited states of the evolution operator. The trajectories become nearly deterministic in high dimensions allowing for perturbation theory in this limit. We calculate perturbatively the anomalous exponent of the third and fourth order correlation functions. The fourth order result agrees with previous calculations.Comment: 14 pages, LaTe