883 research outputs found
The Impact of Physical Distancing in the Pandemic Situation: Considering the Role of Loneliness and Social Brain
The new normal has made social distancing a new way of experiencing sociality. Social neuroscience has for a long time been concerned with studying the beneficial effects of social relationships, of physical contact. It is known that physical contact activates neurophysiological processes that reduce the perception of discomfort and even physical pain. So in the absence of physical contact, our social brain may be modulated differently when we are with others. But what could be the long-term effects of this normality? This mini-review focuses on highlighting with the support of social neuroscience evidence such as isolation, distancing can affect people’s health
The planetary nebula population in the halo of M87
We investigate the diffuse light in the outer regions of the nearby
elliptical galaxy M87 in the Virgo cluster, using planetary nebulas (PNs) as
tracers. The surveyed areas (0.43 squared degrees) cover M87 up to a radial
distance of 150 kpc, in the ransition region between galaxy halo and
intracluster light (ICL). All PNs are identified through the on-off band
technique using automatic selection criteria based on the distribution of the
detected sources in the colour-magnitude diagram and the properties of their
point-spread function. We extract a catalogue of 688 objects down to
m_5007=28.4, with an estimated residual contamination from foreground stars and
background Lyalpha galaxies, which amounts to ~35% of the sample. This is one
of the largest extragalactic PN samples in number of candidates, magnitude
depth, and radial extent, which allows us to carry out an unprecedented
photometric study of the PN population in the outer regions of M87. We find
that the logarithmic density profile of the PN distribution is shallower than
the surface brightness profile at large radii. This behaviour is consistent
with the superposition of two components associated with the halo of M87 and
with the ICL, which have different luminosity specific PN numbers, the ICL
contributing three times more PNs per unit light. Because of the depth of this
survey we are also able to study the shape of the PN luminosity function (PNLF)
in the outer regions of M87. We find a slope for the PNLF that is steeper at
fainter magnitudes than the standard analytical PNLF formula and adopt a
generalised model that treats the slope as a free parameter. Comparing the PNLF
of M87 and the M31 bulge, both normalised by the sampled luminosity, the M87
PNLF contains fewer bright PNs and has a steeper slope towards fainter
magnitudes.Comment: 16 pages, 13 figures, 5 tables, accepted for publication in A&
Electronic coupling between Bi nanolines and the Si(001) substrate: An experimental and theoretical study
Atomic nanolines are one dimensional systems realized by assembling many
atoms on a substrate into long arrays. The electronic properties of the
nanolines depend on those of the substrate. Here, we demonstrate that to fully
understand the electronic properties of Bi nanolines on clean Si(001) several
different contributions must be accounted for. Scanning tunneling microscopy
reveals a variety of different patterns along the nanolines as the imaging bias
is varied. We observe an electronic phase shift of the Bi dimers, associated
with imaging atomic p-orbitals, and an electronic coupling between the Bi
nanoline and neighbouring Si dimers, which influences the appearance of both.
Understanding the interplay between the Bi nanolines and Si substrate could
open a novel route to modifying the electronic properties of the nanolines.Comment: 6 pages (main), 2 pages (SI), accepted by Phys. Rev.
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