14,965 research outputs found
Collocating Interface Objects: Zooming into Maps
May, Dean and Barnard [10] used a theoretically based model to argue that objects in a wide range of interfaces should be collocated following screen changes such as a zoom-in to detail. Many existing online maps do not follow this principle, but move a clicked point to the centre of the subsequent display, leaving the user looking at an unrelated location. This paper presents three experiments showing that collocating the point clicked on a map so that the detailed location appears in the place previously occupied by the overview location makes the map easier to use, reducing eye movements and interaction duration. We discuss the benefit of basing design principles on theoretical models so that they can be applied to novel situations, and so designers can infer when to use and not use them
Geometry and mechanics of microdomains in growing bacterial colonies
Bacterial colonies are abundant on living and nonliving surfaces and are
known to mediate a broad range of processes in ecology, medicine, and industry.
Although extensively researched, from single cells to demographic scales, a
comprehensive biomechanical picture, highlighting the cell-to-colony dynamics,
is still lacking. Here, using molecular dynamics simulations and continuous
modeling, we investigate the geometrical and mechanical properties of a
bacterial colony growing on a substrate with a free boundary and demonstrate
that such an expanding colony self-organizes into a "mosaic" of microdomains
consisting of highly aligned cells. The emergence of microdomains is mediated
by two competing forces: the steric forces between neighboring cells, which
favor cell alignment, and the extensile stresses due to cell growth that tend
to reduce the local orientational order and thereby distort the system. This
interplay results in an exponential distribution of the domain areas and sets a
characteristic length scale proportional to the square root of the ratio
between the system orientational stiffness and the magnitude of the extensile
active stress. Our theoretical predictions are finally compared with
experiments with freely growing E. coli microcolonies, finding quantitative
agreement.Comment: 10 pages, 7 figure
The information about the state of a charge qubit gained by a weakly coupled quantum point contact
We analyze the information that one can learn about the state of a quantum
two-level system, i.e. a qubit, when probed weakly by a nearby detector. We
consider the general case where the qubit Hamiltonian and the qubit's operator
probed by the detector do not commute. Because the qubit's state keeps evolving
while being probed and the measurement data is mixed with a detector-related
background noise, one might expect the detector to fail in this case. We show,
however, that under suitable conditions and by proper analysis of the
measurement data useful information about the initial state of the qubit can be
extracted. Our approach complements the usual master-equation and
quantum-trajectory approaches, which describe the evolution of the qubit's
quantum state during the measurement process but do not keep track of the
acquired measurement information.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figures; Published in the proceedings of the Nobel
Symposium 141: Qubits for Future Quantum Informatio
Weak and strong measurement of a qubit using a switching-based detector
We analyze the operation of a switching-based detector that probes a qubit's
observable that does not commute with the qubit's Hamiltonian, leading to a
nontrivial interplay between the measurement and free-qubit dynamics. In order
to obtain analytic results and develop intuitive understanding of the different
possible regimes of operation, we use a theoretical model where the detector is
a quantum two-level system that is constantly monitored by a macroscopic
system. We analyze how to interpret the outcome of the measurement and how the
state of the qubit evolves while it is being measured. We find that the answers
to the above questions depend on the relation between the different parameters
in the problem. In addition to the traditional strong-measurement regime, we
identify a number of regimes associated with weak qubit-detector coupling. An
incoherent detector whose switching time is measurable with high accuracy can
provide high-fidelity information, but the measurement basis is determined only
upon switching of the detector. An incoherent detector whose switching time can
be known only with low accuracy provides a measurement in the qubit's energy
eigenbasis with reduced measurement fidelity. A coherent detector measures the
qubit in its energy eigenbasis and, under certain conditions, can provide
high-fidelity information.Comment: 20 pages (two-column), 6 figure
Confidence and Backaction in the Quantum Filter Equation
We study the confidence and backaction of state reconstruction based on a
continuous weak measurement and the quantum filter equation. As a physical
example we use the traditional model of a double quantum dot being continuously
monitored by a quantum point contact. We examine the confidence of the estimate
of a state constructed from the measurement record, and the effect of
backaction of that measurement on that state. Finally, in the case of general
measurements we show that using the relative entropy as a measure of confidence
allows us to define the lower bound on the confidence as a type of quantum
discord.Comment: 9 pages, 6 figure
Diffusive transport of light in two-dimensional granular materials
We study photon diffusion in a two-dimensional random packing of monodisperse
disks as a simple model of granular material. We apply ray optics approximation
to set up a persistent random walk for the photons. We employ Fresnel's
intensity reflectance with its rich dependence on the incidence angle and
polarization state of the light. We present an analytic expression for the
transport-mean-free path in terms of the refractive indices of grains and host
medium, grain radius, and packing fraction. We perform numerical simulations to
examine our analytical result.Comment: 9 pages, 3 figure
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