Relaxation Behavior by Time-Salt and Time-Temperature Superpositions of Polyelectrolyte Complexes from Coacervate to Precipitate

Complexation between anionic and cationic polyelectrolytes results in solid-like precipitates or liquid-like coacervate depending on the added salt in the aqueous medium. However, the boundary between these polymer-rich phases is quite broad and the associated changes in the polymer relaxation in the complexes across the transition regime are poorly understood. In this work, the relaxation dynamics of complexes across this transition is probed over a wide timescale by measuring viscoelastic spectra and zero-shear viscosities at varying temperatures and salt concentrations for two different salt types. We find that the complexes exhibit time-temperature superposition (TTS) at all salt concentrations, while the range of overlapped-frequencies for time-temperature-salt superposition (TTSS) strongly depends on the salt concentration (Cs) and gradually shifts to higher frequencies as Cs is decreased. The sticky-Rouse model describes the relaxation behavior at all Cs. However, collective relaxation of polyelectrolyte complexes gradually approaches a rubbery regime and eventually exhibits a gel-like response as Cs is decreased and limits the validity of TTSS.Comment: 12 pages, 5 figures, Follow Gels journal link for latest versio

Entrainment of marginally stable excitation waves by spatially extended sub-threshold periodic forcing

We analyze the effects of spatially extended periodic forcing on the dynamics of one-dimensional excitation waves. Entrainment of unstable primary waves has been studied numerically for different amplitudes and frequencies of additional sub-threshold stimuli. We determined entrainment regimes under which excitation blocks were transformed into consistent 1:1 responses. These responses were spatially homogeneous and synchronized in the entire excitable medium. Compared to primary pulses, pulses entrained by secondary stimulations were stable at considerably shorter periods which decreased at higher amplitudes and greater number of secondary stimuli. Our results suggest a practical methodology for stabilization of excitation in reaction-diffusion media with regions of reduced excitability.Comment: 6 pages, 6 figure

Photon mass via current confinement

A parity invariant theory, consisting of two massive Dirac fields, defined in three dimensional space-time, with the confinement of a certain current is studied. It is found that the electromagnetic field, when coupled minimally to these Dirac fields, becomes massive owing to the current confinement. It is seen that the origin of photon mass is not due to any kind of spontaneous symmetry breaking, but only due to current confinement.Comment: LaTeX2e, 14 pages, No figures, to appear in Physics Letters B. arXiv admin note: text overlap with arXiv:1107.552