Excitation of surface plasmons at a SiO2/Ag interface by silicon quantum dots: Experiment and theory

The excitation of surface plasmons (SPs) by optically excited silicon quantum dots (QDs) located near a Ag interface is studied both experimentally and theoretically for different QD-interface separations. The Si QDs are formed in the near-surface region of an SiO2 substrate by Si ion implantation and thermal annealing. Photoluminescence decay-rate distributions, as derived from an inverse Laplace transform of the measured decay trace, are determined for samples with and without a Ag cover layer. For the smallest, investigated Si-QDs-to-interface distance of 44 nm the average decay rate at lambda=750 nm is enhanced by 80% due to the proximity of the Ag-glass interface, with respect to an air-glass interface. Calculations based on a classical dipole oscillator model show that the observed decay rate enhancement is mainly due to the excitation of surface plasmons that are on the SiO2/Ag interface. By comparing the model calculations to the experimental data, it is determined that Si QDs have a very high internal emission quantum efficiency of (77±17)%. At this distance they can excite surface plasmons at a rate of (1.1±0.2)×104 s¿1. From the model it is also predicted that by using thin metal films the excitation of surface plasmons by Si QDs can be further enhanced. Si QDs are found to preferentially excite symmetric thin-film surface plasmons

Optical control of solar sails using distributed reflectivity

The dynamics of solar sails with a variable surface reflectivity distribution are investigated. When changing the reflectivity across the sail film, which can be achieved using electro-chromic coatings, the solar radiation pressure forces and torques across the sail film can be controlled without changing the attitude of the spacecraft relative to the Sun and without using mechanical systems. The paper presents two approaches. First, a continuous reflectivity distribution is presented to control the sail attitude under the influence of, for example, gravity gradient torques in Earth orbit. The second approach assumes discrete on/o reflectivity regions across the surface. Both concepts of `optical reconfiguration' of solar sails enable a more flexible steering of the spacecraft and minimize actuation effort

Direct numerical simulation of heat transport in dispersed gas-liquid two-phase flow using a front tracking approach

In this paper a simulation model is presented for the Direct Numerical Simulation (DNS) of heat transport in dispersed gas-liquid two-phase flow using the Front Tracking (FT) approach. Our model extends the FT model developed by van Sint Annaland et al. (2006) to non-isothermal conditions. In FT an unstructured dynamic mesh is used to represent and track the interface explicitly by a number of interconnected marker points. The Lagrangian representation of the interface avoids the necessity to reconstruct the interface from the local distribution of the fractions of the phases and, moreover, allows a direct and accurate calculation of the surface tension force circumventing the (problematic) computation of the interface curvature. The extended model is applied to predict the heat exchange rate between the liquid and a hot wall kept at a fixed temperature. It is found that the wall-to-liquid heat transfer coefficient exhibits a maximum in the vicinity of the bubble that can be attributed to the locally decreased thickness of the thermal boundary layer

The Discrete Frenet Frame, Inflection Point Solitons And Curve Visualization with Applications to Folded Proteins

We develop a transfer matrix formalism to visualize the framing of discrete piecewise linear curves in three dimensional space. Our approach is based on the concept of an intrinsically discrete curve, which enables us to more effectively describe curves that in the limit where the length of line segments vanishes approach fractal structures in lieu of continuous curves. We verify that in the case of differentiable curves the continuum limit of our discrete equation does reproduce the generalized Frenet equation. As an application we consider folded proteins, their Hausdorff dimension is known to be fractal. We explain how to employ the orientation of $C_\beta$ carbons of amino acids along a protein backbone to introduce a preferred framing along the backbone. By analyzing the experimentally resolved fold geometries in the Protein Data Bank we observe that this $C_\beta$ framing relates intimately to the discrete Frenet framing. We also explain how inflection points can be located in the loops, and clarify their distinctive r\^ole in determining the loop structure of foldel proteins.Comment: 14 pages 12 figure

MOTIFATOR: detection and characterization of regulatory motifs using prokaryote transcriptome data

Summary: Unraveling regulatory mechanisms (e.g. identification of motifs in cis-regulatory regions) remains a major challenge in the analysis of transcriptome experiments. Existing applications identify putative motifs from gene lists obtained at rather arbitrary cutoff and require additional manual processing steps. Our standalone application MOTIFATOR identifies the most optimal parameters for motif discovery and creates an interactive visualization of the results. Discovered putative motifs are functionally characterized, thereby providing valuable insight in the biological processes that could be controlled by the motif.