8,519 research outputs found
Coordinate noncommutativity in strong non-uniform magnetic fields
Noncommuting spatial coordinates are studied in the context of a charged
particle moving in a strong non-uniform magnetic field. We derive a relation
involving the commutators of the coordinates, which generalizes the one
realized in a strong constant magnetic field. As an application, we discuss the
noncommutativity in the magnetic field present in a magnetic mirror.Comment: 4 page
Geometrical foundations of fractional supersymmetry
A deformed -calculus is developed on the basis of an algebraic structure
involving graded brackets. A number operator and left and right shift operators
are constructed for this algebra, and the whole structure is related to the
algebra of a -deformed boson. The limit of this algebra when is a -th
root of unity is also studied in detail. By means of a chain rule expansion,
the left and right derivatives are identified with the charge and covariant
derivative encountered in ordinary/fractional supersymmetry and this leads
to new results for these operators. A generalized Berezin integral and
fractional superspace measure arise as a natural part of our formalism. When
is a root of unity the algebra is found to have a non-trivial Hopf
structure, extending that associated with the anyonic line. One-dimensional
ordinary/fractional superspace is identified with the braided line when is
a root of unity, so that one-dimensional ordinary/fractional supersymmetry can
be viewed as invariance under translation along this line. In our construction
of fractional supersymmetry the -deformed bosons play a role exactly
analogous to that of the fermions in the familiar supersymmetric case.Comment: 42 pages, LaTeX. To appear in Int. J. Mod. Phys.
Exotic galilean symmetry and the Hall effect
The ``Laughlin'' picture of the Fractional Quantum Hall effect can be derived
using the ``exotic'' model based on the two-fold centrally-extended planar
Galilei group. When coupled to a planar magnetic field of critical strength
determined by the extension parameters, the system becomes singular, and
``Faddeev-Jackiw'' reduction yields the ``Chern-Simons'' mechanics of Dunne,
Jackiw, and Trugenberger. The reduced system moves according to the Hall law.Comment: Talk given by P. A. Horvathy at the Joint APCTP- Nankai Symposium.
Tianjin (China), Oct.2001. To appear in the Proceedings, to be published by
Int. Journ. Mod. Phys. B. 7 pages, LaTex, IJMPB format. no figure
Simplified Vacuum Energy Expressions for Radial Backgrounds and Domain Walls
We extend our previous results of simplified expressions for functional
determinants for radial Schr\"odinger operators to the computation of vacuum
energy, or mass corrections, for static but spatially radial backgrounds, and
for domain wall configurations. Our method is based on the zeta function
approach to the Gel'fand-Yaglom theorem, suitably extended to higher
dimensional systems on separable manifolds. We find new expressions that are
easy to implement numerically, for both zero and nonzero temperature.Comment: 30 page
Gravitational non-commutativity and G\"odel-like spacetimes
We derive general conditions under which geodesics of stationary spacetimes
resemble trajectories of charged particles in an electromagnetic field. For
large curvatures (analogous to strong magnetic fields), the quantum
mechanicical states of these particles are confined to gravitational analogs of
{\it lowest Landau levels}. Furthermore, there is an effective
non-commutativity between their spatial coordinates. We point out that the
Som-Raychaudhuri and G\"odel spacetime and its generalisations are precisely of
the above type and compute the effective non-commutativities that they induce.
We show that the non-commutativity for G\"odel spacetime is identical to that
on the fuzzy sphere. Finally, we show how the star product naturally emerges in
Som-Raychaudhuri spacetimes.Comment: Two sections added (Relation to the fuzzy sphere, Emergence of the
star product). 10 pages, Revtex. To appear in General Relativity and
Gravitatio
Motivations and experiences of UK students studying abroad
This report summarises the findings of research aimed at improving understanding of the motivations behind the international diploma mobility of UK student
Functional Determinants in Quantum Field Theory
Functional determinants of differential operators play a prominent role in
theoretical and mathematical physics, and in particular in quantum field
theory. They are, however, difficult to compute in non-trivial cases. For one
dimensional problems, a classical result of Gel'fand and Yaglom dramatically
simplifies the problem so that the functional determinant can be computed
without computing the spectrum of eigenvalues. Here I report recent progress in
extending this approach to higher dimensions (i.e., functional determinants of
partial differential operators), with applications in quantum field theory.Comment: Plenary talk at QTS5 (Quantum Theory and Symmetries); 16 pp, 2 fig
The SCUBA Local Universe Galaxy Survey I: First Measurements of the Submillimetre Luminosity and Dust Mass Functions
We have used SCUBA to observe a complete sample of 104 galaxies selected at
60 microns from the IRAS BGS and we present here the 850 micron measurements.
Fitting the 60,100 and 850 micron fluxes with a single temperature dust model
gives the sample mean temperature T=36 K and beta = 1.3. We do not rule out the
possibility of dust which is colder than this, if a 20 K component was present
then our dust masses would increase by factor 1.5-3. We present the first
measurements of the luminosity and dust mass functions, which were well fitted
by Schechter functions (unlike those 60 microns). We have correlated many
global galaxy properties with the submillimetre and find that there is a
tendancy for less optically luminous galaxies to contain warmer dust and have
greater star formation efficiencies (cf. Young 1999). The average gas-to-dust
ratio for the sample is 581 +/- 43 (using both atomic and molecular hydrogen),
significantly higher than the Galactic value of 160. We believe this
discrepancy is due to a cold dust component at T < 20 K. There is a suprisingly
tight correlation between dust mass and the mass of molecular hydrogen as
estimated from CO measurements, with an intrinsic scatter of ~50%.Comment: 24 pages, 15 figures, 8 tables, accepted for publication in MNRA
- âŠ