460 research outputs found
Silicon micromachined hollow microneedles for transdermal liquid transfer
This paper presents an improved design and fabrication process [ 13 for hollow micro needles with the proper mechanical strength and sharpness to be applied for painless transdermal transfer of liquids. Tests have shown that liquids like blood are drawn into the needle by capillary forces, reducing the need for active pumping. The fabrication method allows different needle shapes like blades and pencils, is robust enough to be applied for largerscale production, and enables the development of a complete micro-TAS for e.g. blood analysis
Stability of the Bragg glass phase in a layered geometry
We study the stability of the dislocation-free Bragg glass phase in a layered
geometry consisting of coupled parallel planes of d=1+1 vortex lines lying
within each plane, in the presence of impurity disorder. Using renormalization
group, replica variational calculations and physical arguments we show that at
temperatures the 3D Bragg glass phase is always stable for weak
disorder. It undergoes a weakly first order transition into a decoupled 2D
vortex glass upon increase of disorder.Comment: RevTeX. Submitted to EP
Scaling and exact solutions for the flux creep problem in a slab superconductor
The flux creep problem for a superconductor slab placed in a constant or
time-dependent magnetic field is considered. Logarithmic dependence of the
activation energy on the current density is assumed, U=U0 ln(J/Jc), with a
field dependent Jc. The density B of the magnetic flux penetrating into the
superconductor, is shown to obey a scaling law, i.e., the profiles B(x) at
different times can be scaled to a function of a single variable. We found
exact solution for the scaling function in some specific cases, and an
approximate solution for a general case. The scaling also holds for a slab
carrying transport current I resulting in a power-law V(I) with exponent p~1.
When the flux fronts moving from two sides of the slab collapse at the center,
the scaling is broken and p crosses over to U0/kT.Comment: RevTex, 10 pages including 6 figures, submitted to Phys.Rev.
Realization of random-field dipolar Ising ferromagnetism in a molecular magnet
The longitudinal magnetic susceptibility of single crystals of the molecular
magnet Mn-acetate obeys a Curie-Weiss law, indicating a transition to a
ferromagnetic phase due to dipolar interactions. With increasing magnetic field
applied transverse to the easy axis, the transition temperature decreases
considerably more rapidly than predicted by mean field theory to a T=0 quantum
critical point. Our results are consistent with an effective Hamiltonian for a
random-field Ising ferromagnet in a transverse field, where the randomness is
induced by an external field applied to Mn-acetate crystals that are
known to have an intrinsic distribution of locally tilted magnetic easy axes.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure
Experimental determination of the Weiss temperature of Mn-ac and Mn-ac-MeOH
We report measurements of the susceptibility in the temperature range from
K to K of a series of Mn-ac and Mn-ac-MeOH samples in
the shape of rectangular prisms of length and square cross-section of
side . The susceptibility obeys a Curie-Weiss Law, ,
where varies systematically with sample aspect ratio. Using published
demagnetization factors, we obtain for an infinitely long sample
corresponding to intrinsic ordering temperatures K and
K for Mn-ac and Mn-ac-MeOH, respectively. The
difference in for two materials that have nearly identical unit cell
volumes and lattice constant ratios suggests that, in addition to dipolar
interactions, there is a non-dipolar (exchange) contribution to the Weiss
temperature that differs in the two materials because of the difference in
ligand molecules.Comment: 4.5 page
Critical currents, flux-creep activation energy and potential barriers for the vortex motion from the flux creep experiments
We present an experimental study of thermally activated flux creep in a
superconducting ring-shaped epitaxial YBCO film as well as a new way of
analyzing the experimental data. The measurements were made in a wide range of
temperatures between 10 and 83 K. The upper temperature limit was dictated by
our experimental technique and at low temperatures we were limited by a
crossover to quantum tunneling of vortices. It is shown that the experimental
data can very well be described by assuming a simple thermally activated
hopping of vortices or vortex bundles over potential barriers, whereby the
hopping flux objects remain the same for all currents and temperatures. The new
procedure of data analysis also allows to establish the current and temperature
dependencies of the flux-creep activation energy U, as well as the temperature
dependence of the critical current Ic, from the flux-creep rates measured at
different temperatures. The variation of the activation energy with current,
U(I/Ic), is then used to reconstruct the profile of the potential barriers in
real space.Comment: 12 pages, 13 Postscript figures, Submitted to Physical Review
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