Hydrodynamics of Internal Shocks in Relativistic Outflows

We study the hydrodynamical effects of two colliding shells, adopted to model internal shocks in various relativistic outflows such as gamma-ray bursts and blazars. We find that the density profiles are significantly affected by the propagation of rarefaction waves. A split-feature appears at the contact discontinuity of the two shells. The shell spreading with a few ten percent of the speed of light is also shown to be a notable aspect. The conversion efficiency of the bulk kinetic energy to internal one shows deviations from the widely-used inelastic two-point-mass-collision model. Observational implications are also shortly discussed.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figures, Proceeding of International Symposium on High Energy Gamma-ray Astronomy (July 26-30, 2004, Heidelberg, Germany

Variation of Electrostatic Coupling and Investigation of Current Percolation Paths in Nanocrystalline Silicon Cross Transistors

Nanocrystalline silicon thin films are promising materials for the development of advanced Large Scale Integration compatible quantum-dot and single-electron charging devices. The films consist of nanometer-scale grains of crystalline silicon, separated by amorphous silicon or silicon dioxide grain boundaries up to a few nanometer thick. These films have been used to fabricate single-electron transistor and memory devices, where the grains form single-electron charging islands isolated by tunnel barriers formed by the grain boundaries. The grain boundary tunnel barrier isolating the grains is also of great importance, as this determines the extent of the electrostatic and tunnel coupling between different grains. These effects can lead to the nanocrystalline silicon thin film behaving as a system of coupled quantum dots.& more..

On the Neutralino as Dark Matter Candidate - I. Relic Abundance

The neutralino relic abundance is evaluated for a wide range of the neutralino mass, ${\rm 20\ GeV} \leq m_\chi \leq {\rm 1\ TeV}$, by taking into account the full set of final states in the neutralino-neutralino annihilation. The analysis is performed in the Minimal SuSy Standard Model; it is not restricted by stringent GUT assumptions but only constrained by present experimental bounds. We also discuss phenomenological aspects which are employed in the companion paper (II. Direct Detection) where the chances for a successful search for dark matter neutralino are investigated.Comment: (10 pages plain TeX, 8 figures not included, available from the authors) DFTT-37/9