The Greater Planetary Good: From A Precept to a Program

The author unequivocally sets forth the shortcomings of neoliberalism and what it has wrought worldwide. For without understanding the deficiencies ― and with hope, the remedies ― of conducting “business as usual,” global challenges such as climate change will remain unabated. For the greater planetary good, Manolopoulos puts forth certain tasks which must be undertaken to fully comprehend the necessity of conceiving the greater planetary good. He offers, in lieu of a negative critique, a blueprint of sorts … detailing how to fundamentally inform, and reform, global social organization

Charged R\'enyi Entropies in CFTs with Einstein-Gauss-Bonnet Holographic Duals

We calculate the R\'enyi entropy $S_q(\mu,\lambda)$, for a spherical entangling surface in CFT's with Einstein-Gauss-Bonnet-Maxwell holographic duals. R\'enyi entropies must obey some interesting inequalities by definition. However, for Gauss-Bonnet couplings $\lambda$, larger than a specific value, but still allowed by causality, we observe a violation of the inequality $\frac{\partial}{{\partial q}}\left({\frac{{q - 1}}{q}S_q(\mu,\lambda)} \right) \ge 0$, which is related to the existence of negative entropy black holes, providing interesting restrictions in the bulk theory. Moreover, we find an interesting distinction of the behaviour of the analytic continuation of $S_q(\mu,\lambda)$ for imaginary chemical potential, between negative and non-negative $\lambda$.Comment: 50 pages, 16 figures. v3: Version to appear in JHE

Efficient first-principles calculation of the quantum kinetic energy and momentum distribution of nuclei

Light nuclei at room temperature and below exhibit a kinetic energy which significantly deviates from the predictions of classical statistical mechanics. This quantum kinetic energy is responsible for a wide variety of isotope effects of interest in fields ranging from chemistry to climatology. It also furnishes the second moment of the nuclear momentum distribution, which contains subtle information about the chemical environment and has recently become accessible to deep inelastic neutron scattering experiments. Here we show how, by combining imaginary time path integral dynamics with a carefully designed generalized Langevin equation, it is possible to dramatically reduce the expense of computing the quantum kinetic energy. We also introduce a transient anisotropic Gaussian approximation to the nuclear momentum distribution which can be calculated with negligible additional effort. As an example, we evaluate the structural properties, the quantum kinetic energy, and the nuclear momentum distribution for a first-principles simulation of liquid water

Analytic continuation of Wolynes theory into the Marcus inverted regime

The Wolynes theory of electronically nonadiabatic reaction rates [P. G. Wolynes, J. Chem. Phys. 87, 6559 (1987)] is based on a saddle point approximation to the time integral of a reactive flux autocorrelation function in the nonadiabatic (golden rule) limit. The dominant saddle point is on the imaginary time axis at $t_{\rm sp}=i\lambda_{\rm sp}\hbar$, and provided $\lambda_{\rm sp}$ lies in the range $-\beta/2\le\lambda_{\rm sp}\le\beta/2$, it is straightforward to evaluate the rate constant using information obtained from an imaginary time path integral calculation. However, if $\lambda_{\rm sp}$ lies outside this range, as it does in the Marcus inverted regime, the path integral diverges. This has led to claims in the literature that Wolynes theory cannot describe the correct behaviour in the inverted regime. Here we show how the imaginary time correlation function obtained from a path integral calculation can be analytically continued to $\lambda_{\rm sp}<-\beta/2$, and the continuation used to evaluate the rate in the inverted regime. Comparisons with exact golden rule results for a spin-boson model and a more demanding (asymmetric and anharmonic) model of electronic predissociation show that the theory it is just as accurate in the inverted regime as it is in the normal regime.Comment: 9 pages, 8 figure

Knowledge transfer of microstrip detectors from particle to medical physics

This project is a demonstration of Knowledge Transfer. Knowledge in the fabrication, operation and application of radiation detectors originally developed for particle physics experiments has been exploited in diverse areas of research like medical applications. Microstrip detectors, commonplace in particle physics "trackers", have been evaluated as dosimeters for radiotherapy modalities. Hospital trails conducted under the supervision of clinical scientists demonstrated the viability of these detectors as dosimeters both in the quality assurance of linear accelerators and potentially in treatment planning verification. Important quantities of interest to the clinical scientist, like depth-dose distributions, output factors, off axis ratios etc. were measured with MV X-Rays from a clinical Linac and compared with the present day standard dosimeters. All results showed the performance of our novel dosimeter to be as good as or even better than that of the hospital dosimeters. Moreover the ability of our system for dose distribution measurements in real time was proven