Control of atomic transition rates via laser light shaping

A modular systematic analysis of the feasibility of modifying atomic transition rates by tailoring the electromagnetic field of an external coherent light source is presented. The formalism considers both the center of mass and internal degrees of freedom of the atom, and all properties of the field: frequency, angular spectrum, and polarization. General features of recoil effects for internal forbidden transitions are discussed. A comparative analysis of different structured light sources is explicitly worked out. It includes spherical waves, Gaussian beams, Laguerre-Gaussian beams, and propagation invariant beams with closed analytical expressions. It is shown that increments in the order of magnitude of the transition rates for Gaussian and Laguerre-Gaussian beams, with respect to those obtained in the paraxial limit, requires waists of the order of the wavelength, while propagation invariant modes may considerably enhance transition rates under more favorable conditions. For transitions that can be naturally described as modifications of the atomic angular momentum, this enhancement is maximal (within propagation invariant beams) for Bessel modes, Mathieu modes can be used to entangle the internal and center of mass involved states, and Weber beams suppress this kind of transitions unless they have a significant component of odd modes. However, if a recoil effect of the transition with an adequate symmetry is allowed, the global transition rate (center of mass and internal motion) can also be enhanced using Weber modes. The global analysis presented reinforces the idea that a better control of the transitions between internal atomic states requires both a proper control of the available states of the atomic center of mass, and shaping of the background electromagnetic field.Comment: 23 pages, 3 figure

Spin effects on the semiclassical trajectories of Dirac electrons

The relativistic semiclassical evolution of the position of an electron in the presence of an external electromagnetic field is studied in terms of a Newton equation that incorporates spin effects directly. This equation emerges from the Dirac equation and allows the identification of scenarios where spin effects are necessary to understand the main characteristics of the electron trajectories. It involves the eigenvalues of the non-Hermitian operator $\Sigma_{\mu\nu}F^{\mu\nu}$ with $\Sigma_{\mu\nu}$ and $F^{\mu\nu}$ as the spin and electromagnetic tensors. The formalism allows a deeper understanding on the physics behind known analytical solutions of the Dirac equation when translational dynamics decouples from spin evolution. As an illustrative example, it is applied to an electron immersed in an electromagnetic field which exhibits chiral symmetry and optical vortices. It is shown that the polarization of intense structured light beams can be used to suppress or enhance spin effects on the electron semiclassical trajectory; the latter case yields a realization of a Stern-Gerlach apparatus for an electronComment: 18 pages, 3 figure

Smoothing the Bartnik boundary conditions and other results on Bartnik's quasi-local mass

Quite a number of distinct versions of Bartnik's definition of quasi-local mass appear in the literature, and it is not a priori clear that any of them produce the same value in general. In this paper we make progress on reconciling these definitions. The source of discrepancies is two-fold: the choice of boundary conditions (of which there are three variants) and the non-degeneracy or "no-horizon" condition (at least six variants). To address the boundary conditions, we show that given a 3-dimensional region $\Omega$ of nonnegative scalar curvature ($R \geq 0$) extended in a Lipschitz fashion across $\partial \Omega$ to an asymptotically flat 3-manifold with $R \geq 0$ (also holding distributionally along $\partial \Omega$), there exists a smoothing, arbitrarily small in $C^0$ norm, such that $R \geq 0$ and the geometry of $\Omega$ are preserved, and the ADM mass changes only by a small amount. With this we are able to show that the three boundary conditions yield equivalent Bartnik masses for two reasonable non-degeneracy conditions. We also discuss subtleties pertaining to the various non-degeneracy conditions and produce a nontrivial inequality between a no-horizon version of the Bartnik mass and Bray's replacement of this with the outward-minimizing condition.Comment: 25 pages, 3 figure

Lower semicontinuity of the ADM mass in dimensions two through seven

The semicontinuity phenomenon of the ADM mass under pointed (i.e., local) convergence of asymptotically flat metrics is of interest because of its connections to nonnegative scalar curvature, the positive mass theorem, and Bartnik's mass-minimization problem in general relativity. In this paper, we extend a previously known semicontinuity result in dimension three for $C^2$ pointed convergence to higher dimensions, up through seven, using recent work of S. McCormick and P. Miao (which itself builds on the Riemannian Penrose inequality of H. Bray and D. Lee). For a technical reason, we restrict to the case in which the limit space is asymptotically Schwarzschild. In a separate result, we show that semicontinuity holds under weighted, rather than pointed, $C^2$ convergence, in all dimensions $n \geq 3$, with a simpler proof independent of the positive mass theorem. Finally, we also address the two-dimensional case for pointed convergence, in which the asymptotic cone angle assumes the role of the ADM mass.Comment: 23 pages. Comments welcome

On the lower semicontinuity of the ADM mass

The ADM mass, viewed as a functional on the space of asymptotically flat Riemannian metrics of nonnegative scalar curvature, fails to be continuous for many natural topologies. In this paper we prove that lower semicontinuity holds in natural settings: first, for pointed Cheeger--Gromov convergence (without any symmetry assumptions) for $n=3$, and second, assuming rotational symmetry, for weak convergence of the associated canonical embeddings into Euclidean space, for $n \geq 3$. We also apply recent results of LeFloch and Sormani to deal with the rotationally symmetric case, with respect to a pointed type of intrinsic flat convergence. We provide several examples, one of which demonstrates that the positive mass theorem is implied by a statement of the lower semicontinuity of the ADM mass.Comment: 18 pages, 4 figure

Paradoxical probabilistic behavior for strongly correlated many-body classical systems

Using a simple probabilistic model, we illustrate that a small part of a strongly correlated many-body classical system can show a paradoxical behavior, namely asymptotic stochastic independence. We consider a triangular array such that each row is a list of $n$ strongly correlated random variables. The correlations are preserved even when $n\to\infty$, since the standard central limit theorem does not hold for this array. We show that, if we choose a fixed number $m<n$ of random variables of the $n$th row and trace over the other $n-m$ variables, and then consider $n\to\infty$, the $m$ chosen ones can, paradoxically, turn out to be independent. However, the scenario can be different if $m$ increases with $n$. Finally, we suggest a possible experimental verification of our results near criticality of a second-order phase transition.Comment: 5 pages, 7 figure

Nonlinear optics determination of the symmetry group of a crystal using structured light

We put forward a technique to unveil to which symmetry group a nonlinear crystal belongs, making use of nonlinear optics with structured light. We consider as example the process of spontaneous parametric down-conversion. The crystal, which is illuminated with a special type of Bessel beam, is characterized by a nonlinear susceptibility tensor whose structure is dictated by the symmetry group of the crystal. The observation of the spatial angular dependence of the lower-frequency generated light provides direct information about the symmetry group of the crystal.Comment: 6pages, 2 figure

Non linear magnetotransport theory and Hall induced resistance oscillations in graphene

The quantum oscillations of nonlinear magnetoresistance in graphene that occurs in response to a dc current bias are investigated. We present a theoretical model for the nonlinear magnetotransport of graphene carriers. The model is based on the exact solution of the effective Dirac equation in crossed electric and magnetic fields, while the effects of randomly distributed impurities are perturbatively added. To compute the nonlinear current we develop a covariant formulation of the migration center theory. The analysis of the differential resistivity in the large magnetic field region, shows that the extrema of the Shubnikov de Hass oscillations invert when the dc currents exceeds a threshold value. This results are in good agreement with the experimental observations. At small magnetic field, the existence of Hall induced resistance oscillations are predicted for ultra clean graphene samples. These oscillations originate from Landau-Zener transitions between Landau levels, that are tilted by the strong electric Hall field.Comment: 5 figure

Lower semicontinuity of mass under C0C^0 convergence and Huisken's isoperimetric mass

Given a sequence of asymptotically flat 3-manifolds of nonnegative scalar curvature with outermost minimal boundary, converging in the pointed $C^0$ Cheeger--Gromov sense to an asymptotically flat limit space, we show that the total mass of the limit is bounded above by the liminf of the total masses of the sequence. In other words, total mass is lower semicontinuous under such convergence. In order to prove this, we use Huisken's isoperimetric mass concept, together with a modified weak mean curvature flow argument. We include a brief discussion of Huisken's work before explaining our extension of that work. The results are all specific to three dimensions.Comment: 30 pages, 5 figure

Non-Hermitian degeneracy of two unbound states

We solved numerically the implicit, trascendental equation that defines the eigenenergy surface of a degenerating isolated doublet of unbound states in the simple but illustrative case of the scattering of a beam of particles by a double barrier potential. Unfolding the degeneracy point with the help of a contact equivalent approximant, crossings and anticrossings of energies and widths, as well as the changes of identity of the poles of the S-matrix are explained in terms of sections of the eigenenergy surfaces.Comment: 23 pages, 9 figures. To be published in J. of Physics A: Math. and Gen. Special issue: Pseudo-Hermitian Hamiltonians in Quantum Physics, August 200