Balmer Discontinuity Temperatures in the Orion Nebula

We have mapped the Balmer discontinuity temperature Te (BJ) along two long-slit positions in the Orion Nebula, using high-quality spectra obtained with the ESO 1.52 m telescope and with the 3.9 m AAT. One slit was oriented north-south and positioned 40” west of Ö1 C Ori. The second slit was oriented east-west, with its eastern end 10" west of Ö1 C Ori, identical to the slit position previously studied by Walter & Dufour (1994). For the NS slit, both the 1.52 m and the AAT data yield a constant temperature of about 9000 K, with variations of only a few hundred K over a total slit length of about 3#5. For the EW-slit, our data reveal two distinct regions of nearly constant temperatures of 8900 and 7200 K, respectively, possibly resulting from two separate H II regions. No evidence is found for the anomalously low temperatures reported by Walter and Dufour for the same region. © 1995, IOP Publishing Ltd

Neutral carbon far-red forbidden line emission from planetary nubulae

The temperature-sensitive neutral carbon forbidden lines at 8727, 9824 and 9850 Å have been measured simultaneously for the first time from a planetary nebula. The nebulae NGC 2346, NGC 2440, NGC 3132 and IC 4406 were observed. Accurate rest wavelengths of these lines are obtained. The observed line ratios I(λ9824+λ9850)/I(λ8727) are consistent with collisional excitation by electron impacts. It is demonstrated that radiative recombination and stellar continuum fluorescence are unimportant in exciting the observed [CI] lines, with the possible exception of NGC 2440 where a contribution from the former process cannot be ruled out. For NGC 2346, NGC 3132 and IC 4406, the observed [C I]line ratios yield electron temperatures between 7400 and 8000 K, about 1800 to 2800 K lower than those deduced from the [N II], [S III] and [O III] line ratios that we also measured. Electron densities are derived from the observed [N I], [S II] and [Cl III] doublet ratios

Simultaneous Bayesian Sparse Approximation with Structured Sparse Models

Sparse approximation is key to many signal processing, image processing and machine learning applications. If multiple signals maintain some degree of dependency, for example the support sets are statistically related, then it will generally be advantageous to jointly estimate the sparse representation vectors from the measurements vectors as opposed to solving for each signal individually. In this paper, we propose simultaneous sparse Bayesian learning (SBL) for joint sparse approximation with two structured sparse models (SSMs), where one is row-sparse with embedded element-sparse, and the other one is row-sparse plus element-sparse. While SBL has attracted much attention as a means to deal with a single sparse approximation problem, it is not obvious how to extend SBL to SSMs. By capitalizing on a dual-space view of existing convex methods for SMs, we showcase the precision component model and covariance component model for SSMs, where both models involve a common hyperparameter and an innovation hyperparameter that together control the prior variance for each coefficient. The statistical perspective of precision component vs. covariance component models unfolds the intrinsic mechanism in SSMs, and also leads to our development of SBL-inspired cost functions for SSMs. Centralized algorithms, that include ℓ1 and ℓ2 reweighting algorithms, and consensus based decentralized algorithms are developed for simultaneous sparse approximation with SSMs. In addition, theoretical analysis is conducted to provide valuable insights into the proposed approach, which includes global minima analysis of the SBLinspired nonconvex cost functions and convergence analysis of the proposed ℓ1 reweighting algorithms for SSMs. Superior performance of the proposed algorithms is demonstrated by numerical experiments.This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from IEEE at http://dx.doi.org/10.1109/TSP.2016.2605067

Graphene–Metamaterial Photodetectors for Integrated Infrared Sensing

PublishedIn this work we study metamaterial-enhanced graphene photodetectors operating in the mid-IR to THz. The detector element consists of a graphene ribbon embedded within a dual-metal split ring resonator, which acts like a cavity to enhance the absorption of electromagnetic radiation by the graphene ribbon, while the asymmetric metal contacts enable photothermoelectric detection. Detectors designed for the mid-IR demonstrate peak responsivity (referenced to total power) of ∼120 mV/W at 1500 cm–1 and are employed in the spectroscopic evaluation of vibrational resonances, thus demonstrating a key step toward a platform for integrated surface-enhanced sensing.The authors thank Johanna Wolf for providing the QCL used for the detector characterization. This research was supported by the European Union under the FET-open grant GOSFEL and the Swiss National Science Foundation through NCCR QSIT. G.R.N. also gratefully acknowledges the support of the UK Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council through a fellowship in Frontier Manufacturing (Grant No. EP/J018651/1)

Chemical abundances of planetary nebulae from optical recombination lines - III. The Galactic bulge PN M 1-42 and M 2-36

We present deep, high-resolution optical spectra of two Galactic bulge planetary nebulae (PN), M 1-42 and M 2-36. The spectra show very prominent and rich optical recombination lines (ORLs) from C, N, O and Ne ions. Infrared spectra from graphic were also obtained using the Short and Long Wavelength Spectrometer (SWS and LWS) on board ISO. The optical and infrared spectra, together with archival IUE spectra, are used to study their density and thermal characteristics and to determine elemental abundances. We determine the optical and UV extinction curve towards these two bulge PN using observed H I and He II recombination line fluxes and the radio free–free continuum flux density. In the optical, the reddening curve is found to be consistent with the standard Galactic extinction law, with a total to selective extinction ratio graphic. However, the extinction in the UV is found to be much steeper, consistent with the earlier finding of Walton, Barlow & Clegg. The rich ORL spectra from C, N, O and Ne ions detected from the two nebulae have been used to determine the abundances of these elements relative to hydrogen. In all cases, the resultant ORL abundances are found to be significantly higher than the corresponding values deduced from collisionally excited lines (CELs). In M 2-36, the discrepancies are about a factor of 5 for all four elements studied. In M 1-42, the discrepancies reach a factor of about 20, the largest ever observed in a PN. M 1-42 also has the lowest Balmer jump temperature ever determined for a PN, graphic, 5660 K lower than its [O III] forbidden line temperature. We compare the observed intensities of the strongest O II ORLs from different electronic configurations, including λ4649 from graphic, λ4072 from graphic, λ4089 from graphic, and λ4590 and λ4190 from the doubly excited graphic and graphic configurations, respectively. In all cases, in spite of the fact that the ratios of the ORL to CEL ionic abundances span a wide range from ∼graphic, the intensity ratios of λ4649, λ4072, λ4590 and λ4190 relative to λ4089 are found to be nearly constant, apart from some small monotonic increase of these ratios as a function of electron temperature. Over a range of Balmer jump temperature from graphic, the variations amount to about 20 per cent for the graphic and graphic transitions and a factor of 2 for the primed transitions, and are consistent with the predictions of the current recombination theory. Our results do not support the claim by Dinerstein, Lafon & Garnett that the relative intensities of O II ORLs vary from nebula to nebula and that the scatter is largest in objects where the discrepancies between ORL and CEL abundances are also the largest. We find that the ORL to CEL abundance ratio is highly correlated with the difference between the temperatures yielded by the [O III] forbidden line ratio and by the H I Balmer jump, providing the strongest evidence so far that the two phenomena, i.e. the disparity between ORL and CEL temperature and abundance determinations, are closely related. However, temperature fluctuations of the type envisaged by Peimbert are unable to explain the low ionic abundances yielded by IR fine-structure lines. The very low Balmer jump temperature of M 1-42, coupled with its very low Balmer decrement density, may also be difficult to explain with a chemically inhomogeneous composite model of the type proposed by Liu et al. for NGC 6153

NGC 6153: a super-metal-rich planetary nebula?

We have obtained deep optical spectra of the planetary nebula NGC 6153, both along its minor axis and by uniformly scanning a long slit across the whole nebula. The scanned spectra, when combined with the nebular total Hβ flux, yield integrated fluxes for all the lines (∼400) in our spectra, which are rich in strong recombination lines from C, N, O and Ne ions A weak O VI λ 3811 emission line from the central star has been detected, suggesting that the nucleus of NGC 6153 has a hydrogen-deficient surface. The optical data, together with the ISO LWS 43-197 μm spectrum and the archival IUE and IRAS LRS spectra, are used to study the thermal and density structure and to derive the heavy-element abundances from lines produced by different excitation mechanisms. In all cases, the C2+/H+ N2+/H+, O2+/H+ and Ne2+/H+ abundances derived from multiple optical recombination lines (ORLs) are consistently higher, by about a factor of 10, than the corresponding values deduced from optical, UV or infrared (IR) collisionally excited lines (CELs). regardless of the excitation energies or critical densities of the latter. The agreement between the temperature-sensitive optical forbidden lines and the temperature-insensitive IR fine-structure lines rules out temperature fluctuations as the cause of the large difference between the ORL and CEL abundances. We present the results of a new calculation of recombination coefficients for [O II] which lead to good agreement between the observed and predicted [O II] λλ7320,7330 forbidden line intensities if these lines are solely excited by recombination at the Balmer jump temperature. Recombination excitation is also found to be important in exciting the [N II] λ5754 line, which, if unaccounted for, would lead to an overestimated [N II] temperature from the observed (λ6548 +λ6584)/λ5754 ratio. Analysis of a number of C II lines arising from levels as high as 7g in the recombination ladder reveals excellent agreement between their reddening-corrected relative intensities and those predicted by recombination theory. Spatial analysis of the long-slit spectra taken along the nebular minor axis yields a varying [O III] temperature, whereas the hydrogen Balmer jump temperature of 6000 K is approximately constant across the nebula, and is 2000-3000 K lower than the [O III] temperature The observed high-n Balmer line decrement indicates that the hydrogen lines arise from material having an electron density of 2000+2000-1000cm-3, consistent with the optical and IR forbidden-line density diagnostics, which yield average line-of-sight electron densities along the minor axis varying between 2000 and 4000 cm-3. While the He/H ratio mapped by He I and He II recombination lines is constant within 5 per cent across the nebula, the C2+/H+ and O2+/H+ recombination-line abundances decrease by a factor of 2-3 over a radius of 15 arcsec from the centre, pointing to the presence of abundance gradients. We consider a variety of hypotheses to account for the observed behaviour of the various thermal, density and abundance diagnostics. Empirical nebular models containing two components with differing densities and temperatures are able to account for many of the observed patterns, but only if one of the components is significantly hydrogen-deficient. One such model, which gives a good fit to the observed line intensities and patterns, has 500-K H-depleted material, presumed to be evaporating from dense neutral inclusions, embedded in 9500-K material with 'normal' abundances. An alternative model, which appears more physically plausible on a number of grounds, has high-density (2 × 106 cm-3), fully ionized, H-deficient knots embedded in the 'normal' component, although this model fails to account adequately for the observed low (6000 K) hydrogen Balmer jump temperature. However, the observed fact that the ORLs and CELs yield heavy-element abundance ratios that are identical within the uncertainties finds no obvious explanation in the context of H-deficient knot models

Detecting the orientation of magnetic fields in galaxy clusters

Clusters of galaxies, filled with hot magnetized plasma, are the largest bound objects in existence and an important touchstone in understanding the formation of structures in our Universe. In such clusters, thermal conduction follows field lines, so magnetic fields strongly shape the cluster's thermal history; that some have not since cooled and collapsed is a mystery. In a seemingly unrelated puzzle, recent observations of Virgo cluster spiral galaxies imply ridges of strong, coherent magnetic fields offset from their centre. Here we demonstrate, using three-dimensional magnetohydrodynamical simulations, that such ridges are easily explained by galaxies sweeping up field lines as they orbit inside the cluster. This magnetic drape is then lit up with cosmic rays from the galaxies' stars, generating coherent polarized emission at the galaxies' leading edges. This immediately presents a technique for probing local orientations and characteristic length scales of cluster magnetic fields. The first application of this technique, mapping the field of the Virgo cluster, gives a startling result: outside a central region, the magnetic field is preferentially oriented radially as predicted by the magnetothermal instability. Our results strongly suggest a mechanism for maintaining some clusters in a 'non-cooling-core' state.Comment: 48 pages, 21 figures, revised version to match published article in Nature Physics, high-resolution version available at http://www.cita.utoronto.ca/~pfrommer/Publications/pfrommer-dursi.pd

Strong coupling in the far-infrared between graphene plasmons and the surface optical phonons of silicon dioxide

This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from American Chemical Society via the DOI in this record.We study plasmonic resonances in electrostatically gated graphene nanoribbons on silicon dioxide substrates. Absorption spectra are measured in the mid-far infrared and reveal multiple peaks, with width-dependent resonant frequencies. We calculate the dielectric function within the random phase approximation and show that the observed spectra can be explained by surface-plasmon-phonon-polariton modes, which arise from coupling of the graphene plasmon to three surface optical phonon modes in the silicon dioxide.This research was supported by the UK Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, via the award of a Fellowship in Frontier Manufacturing (EP/J018651/1) to G.N., and the European Union under the FET-open grant GOSFEL

Novel semiconducting iron–quinizarin metal–organic framework for application in supercapacitors^*

We present conductivity data for a newly synthesised metal organic framework FeQ, Fe(C14H6O4).H2O demonstrating significant electronic transport. The electrical conductivity of the material is expected to be through the π-π interaction of the ligand- quinizarin and is measured to be 1.73 × 10-2 Scm-1. Its potential role as supercapacitor electrodes is discussed