Statistical fluctuations of the parametric derivative of the transmission and reflection coefficients in absorbing chaotic cavities

Motivated by recent theoretical and experimental works, we study the statistical fluctuations of the parametric derivative of the transmission T and reflection R coefficients in ballistic chaotic cavities in the presence of absorption. Analytical results for the variance of the parametric derivative of T and R, with and without time-reversal symmetry, are obtained for both asymmetric and left-right symmetric cavities. These results are valid for arbitrary number of channels, in completely agreement with the one channel case in the absence of absorption studied in the literature.Comment: Modified version as accepted in PR

Statistical wave scattering through classically chaotic cavities in the presence of surface absorption

We propose a model to describe the statistical properties of wave scattering through a classically chaotic cavity in the presence of surface absorption. Experimentally, surface absorption could be realized by attaching an "absorbing patch" to the inner wall of the cavity. In our model, the cavity is connected to the outside by a waveguide with N open modes (or channels), while an experimental patch is simulated by an "absorbing mirror" attached to the inside wall of the cavity; the mirror, consisting of a waveguide that supports Na channels, with absorption inside and a perfectly reflecting wall at its end, is described by a subunitary scattering matrix Sa. The number of channels Na, as a measure of the geometric cross section of the mirror, and the lack of unitarity of Sa as a measure of absorption, are under our control: these parameters have an important physical significance for real experiments. The absorption strength in the cavity is quantified by the trace of the lack of unitarity. The statistical distribution of the resulting S matrix for N=1 open channel and only one absorbing channel, Na =1, is solved analytically for the orthogonal and unitary universality classes, and the results are compared with those arising from numerical simulations. The relation with other models existing in the literature, in some of which absorption has a volumetric character, is also studied.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figures, submitted to Phys. Rev.

Reply to "Comment on 'Gravitating Magnetic Monopole in the Global Monopole Spacetime' "

In this Reply I present some arguments in favor of the stability of the topological defect composed by global and magnetic monopoles.Comment: 1 page, no figures. Revised version improves the theoretical analysis about electrostatic self-interaction in the global monopole spacetim

Path Integral Approach to the Scattering Theory of Quantum Transport

The scattering theory of quantum transport relates transport properties of disordered mesoscopic conductors to their transfer matrix \bbox{T}. We introduce a novel approach to the statistics of transport quantities which expresses the probability distribution of \bbox{T} as a path integral. The path integal is derived for a model of conductors with broken time reversal invariance in arbitrary dimensions. It is applied to the Dorokhov-Mello-Pereyra-Kumar (DMPK) equation which describes quasi-one-dimensional wires. We use the equivalent channel model whose probability distribution for the eigenvalues of \bbox{TT}^{\dagger} is equivalent to the DMPK equation independent of the values of the forward scattering mean free paths. We find that infinitely strong forward scattering corresponds to diffusion on the coset space of the transfer matrix group. It is shown that the saddle point of the path integral corresponds to ballistic conductors with large conductances. We solve the saddle point equation and recover random matrix theory from the saddle point approximation to the path integral.Comment: REVTEX, 9 pages, no figure

Wave Scattering through Classically Chaotic Cavities in the Presence of Absorption: An Information-Theoretic Model

We propose an information-theoretic model for the transport of waves through a chaotic cavity in the presence of absorption. The entropy of the S-matrix statistical distribution is maximized, with the constraint $=\alpha n$: n is the dimensionality of S, and $0\leq \alpha \leq 1, \alpha =0(1)$ meaning complete (no) absorption. For strong absorption our result agrees with a number of analytical calculations already given in the literature. In that limit, the distribution of the individual (angular) transmission and reflection coefficients becomes exponential -Rayleigh statistics- even for n=1. For $n\gg 1$ Rayleigh statistics is attained even with no absorption; here we extend the study to $\alpha <1$. The model is compared with random-matrix-theory numerical simulations: it describes the problem very well for strong absorption, but fails for moderate and weak absorptions. Thus, in the latter regime, some important physical constraint is missing in the construction of the model.Comment: 4 pages, latex, 3 ps figure

A Multiwavelength Study on the Fate of Ionizing Radiation in Local Starbursts

The fate of ionizing radiation is vital for understanding cosmic ionization, energy budgets in the interstellar and intergalactic medium, and star formation rate indicators. The low observed escape fractions of ionizing radiation have not been adequately explained, and there is evidence that some starbursts have high escape fractions. We examine the spectral energy distributions of a sample of local star-forming galaxies, containing thirteen local starburst galaxies and ten of their ordinary star-forming counterparts, to determine if there exist significant differences in the fate of ionizing radiation in these galaxies. We find that the galaxy-to-galaxy variations in the SEDs is much larger than any systematic differences between starbursts and non-starbursts. For example, we find no significant differences in the total absorption of ionizing radiation by dust, traced by the 24um, 70um, and 160um MIPS bands of the Spitzer Space Telescope, although the dust in starburst galaxies appears to be hotter than that of non-starburst galaxies. We also observe no excess ultraviolet flux in the GALEX bands that could indicate a high escape fraction of ionizing photons in starburst galaxies. The small H-alpha fractions of the diffuse, warm ionized medium in starburst galaxies are apparently due to temporarily boosted H-alpha luminosity within the star-forming regions themselves, with an independent, constant WIM luminosity. This independence of the WIM and starburst luminosities contrasts with WIM behavior in non-starburst galaxies and underscores our poor understanding of radiation transfer in both ordinary and starburst galaxies.Comment: 10 pages, 8 figures, accepted to ApJ 10/11/1

Conductance and persistent current in quasi-one-dimensional systems with grain boundaries: Effects of the strongly reflecting and columnar grains

We study mesoscopic transport in the Q1D wires and rings made of a 2D conductor of width W and length L >> W. Our aim is to compare an impurity-free conductor with grain boundaries with a grain-free conductor with impurity disorder. A single grain boundary is modeled as a set of the 2D-$\delta$-function-like barriers positioned equidistantly on a straight line and disorder is emulated by a large number of such straight lines, intersecting the conductor with random orientation in random positions. The impurity disorder is modeled by the 2D $\delta$-barriers with the randomly chosen positions and signs. The electron transmission through the wires is calculated by the scattering-matrix method, and the Landauer conductance is obtained. We calculate the persistent current in the rings threaded by magnetic flux: We incorporate into the scattering-matrix method the flux-dependent cyclic boundary conditions and we introduce a trick allowing to study the persistent currents in rings of almost realistic size. We mainly focus on the numerical results for L much larger than the electron mean-free path, when the transport is diffusive. If the grain boundaries are weakly reflecting, the systems with grain boundaries show the same (mean) conductance and the same (typical) persistent current as the systems with impurities, and the results also agree with the single-particle theories treating disorder as a white-noise-like potential. If the grain boundaries are strongly reflecting, the typical persistent currents can be about three times larger than the results of the white-noise-based theory, thus resembling the experimental results of Jariwala et al. (PRL 2001). We extend our study to the 3D conductors with columnar grains. We find that the persistent current exceeds the white-noise-based result by another one order of magnitude, similarly as in the experiment of Chandrasekhar et al. (PRL 1991)

Exact Coupling Coefficient Distribution in the Doorway Mechanism

In many--body and other systems, the physics situation often allows one to interpret certain, distinct states by means of a simple picture. In this interpretation, the distinct states are not eigenstates of the full Hamiltonian. Hence, there is an interaction which makes the distinct states act as doorways into background states which are modeled statistically. The crucial quantities are the overlaps between the eigenstates of the full Hamiltonian and the doorway states, that is, the coupling coefficients occuring in the expansion of true eigenstates in the simple model basis. Recently, the distribution of the maximum coupling coefficients was introduced as a new, highly sensitive statistical observable. In the particularly important regime of weak interactions, this distribution is very well approximated by the fidelity distribution, defined as the distribution of the overlap between the doorway states with interaction and without interaction. Using a random matrix model, we calculate the latter distribution exactly for regular and chaotic background states in the cases of preserved and fully broken time--reversal invariance. We also perform numerical simulations and find excellent agreement with our analytical results.Comment: 22 pages, 4 figure

Intensity correlations in electronic wave propagation in a disordered medium: the influence of spin-orbit scattering

We obtain explicit expressions for the correlation functions of transmission and reflection coefficients of coherent electronic waves propagating through a disordered quasi-one-dimensional medium with purely elastic diffusive scattering in the presence of spin-orbit interactions. We find in the metallic regime both large local intensity fluctuations and long-range correlations which ultimately lead to universal conductance fluctuations. We show that the main effect of spin-orbit scattering is to suppress both local and long-range intensity fluctuations by a universal symmetry factor 4. We use a scattering approach based on random transfer matrices.Comment: 15 pages, written in plain TeX, Preprint OUTP-93-42S (University of Oxford), to appear in Phys. Rev.

Exact Solution for the Distribution of Transmission Eigenvalues in a Disordered Wire and Comparison with Random-Matrix Theory

An exact solution is presented of the Fokker-Planck equation which governs the evolution of an ensemble of disordered metal wires of increasing length, in a magnetic field. By a mapping onto a free-fermion problem, the complete probability distribution function of the transmission eigenvalues is obtained. The logarithmic eigenvalue repulsion of random-matrix theory is shown to break down for transmission eigenvalues which are not close to unity. ***Submitted to Physical Review B.****Comment: 20 pages, REVTeX-3.0, INLO-PUB-931028