Spiral Spin Order and Transport Anisotropy in Underdoped Cuprates

We discuss the spiral spin density wave model and its application to explain properties of underdoped La$_{2-x}$Sr$_x$CuO$_4$. We argue that the spiral picture is theoretically well justified in the context of the extended $t-J$ model, and then show that it can explain a number of observed features, such as the location and symmetry of the incommensurate peaks in elastic neutron scattering, as well as the in-plane resistivity anisotropy. A consistent description of the low doping region (below 10% or so) emerges from the spiral formulation, in which the holes show no tendency towards any type of charge order and the physics is purely spin driven.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figures; Proceedings of the International Workshop on Effective Models for Low-Dimensional Strongly Correlated Systems, September 2005, Peyresq, Franc

Decay Rate of a Positronium. Review of Theory and Experiment

The present status of theoretical and experimental investigations of the decay rate of a positronium is considered. The increasing interest to this problem has been caused by the disagreement of the calculated value of $\Gamma_3 (o-Ps)$ and the recent series of precise experiments. The necessity of new calculations on the basis of the quantum field methods in bound state theory is pointed out with taking into account the dependence of the interaction kernel on relative energies.Comment: LaTeX file, 9 pp., Preprint IFUNAM FT-93-01

Energy Levels Of Hydrogen-Like Atomsand Fundamental Constants

The present review includes the description of theoretical methods for the investigations of the spectra of hydrogen-like systems. Various versions of the quasipotential approach and the method of the effective Dirac equation are considered. The new methods, which have been developed in the eighties, are described. These are the method for the investigation of the spectra by means of the quasipotential equation with the relativistic reduced mass and the method for a selection of the logarithmic corrections by means of the renormalization group equation. The special attention is given to the construction of a perturbation theory and the selection of graphs, whereof the contributions of different orders of $\alpha$, the fine structure constant, to the energy of the fine and hyperfine splitting in a positronium, a muonium and a hydrogen atom could be calculated. In the second part of this article the comparison of the experimental results and the theoretical results concerning the wide range of topics is produced. They are the fine and hyperfine splitting in the hydrogenic systems, the Lamb shift and the anomalous magnetic moments of an electron and a muon. Also, the problem of the precision determination of a numerical value of the fine structure constant, connected with the above topics, is discussed.Comment: LaTeX file, 68 pp. (figures are available on request

The Structure and the Distance of Collinder 121 from Hipparcos and Photometry: Resolving the Discrepancy

We present further arguments that the Hipparcos parallaxes for some of the clusters and associations represented in the Hipparcos catalog should be used with caution in the study of the Galactic structure. It has been already shown that the discrepancy between the Hipparcos and ground based parallaxes for several clusters including the Pleiades, Coma Ber and NGC 6231 can be resolved by recomputing the Hipparcos astrometric solutions with an improved algorithm diminishing correlated errors in the attitude parameters. Here we present new parallaxes obtained with this algorithm for another group of stars with discrepant data - the galactic cluster Cr 121. The original Hipparcos parallaxes led de Zeeuw et al. to conclude that Cr 121 and the surrounding association of OB stars form a relatively compact and coherent moving group at a distance of 550 -- 600 pc. Our corrected parallaxes reveal a different spatial distribution of young stellar populace in this area. Both the cluster Cr 121 and the extended OB association are considerably more distant (750 -- 1000 pc), and the latter has a large depth probably extending beyond 1 kpc. Therefore, not only are the recalculated parallaxes in complete agreement with the photometric uvbybeta parallaxes, but the structure of the field they reveal is no longer in discrepancy with that found by the photometric method.Comment: 7 pages, 1 figure, ApJL accepte

Relativistic peculiarities at stepped surfaces: surprising energetics and unexpected diffusion patterns

We revive intriguing, yet still unexplained, experimental results of Ehrlich and co-workers [ Phys. Rev. Lett. 77 1334 (1996); Phys. Rev. Lett. 67 2509 (1991)] who have observed, that 5d adatoms distributed on (111) surface islands of 5d metals favor the adsorption at the cluster's edge rather than at the cluster's interior, which lies in contrast with the behavior of 4d and 3d elements. Our state of the art ab initio calculations demonstrate that such behavior is a direct consequence of the relativity of 5d metals.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figure