290 research outputs found
The measurement of interfacial tension in polymer/polymer systems: The breaking thread method
Synopsis When blending incompatible polymers in the melt, the resulting morphology is strongly dependent on the interfacial tension. One stage of the mixing process is now used to determine this inter-facial tension: in the absence of an overall flow field, extended liquid threads in a liquid matrix exhibit sinusoidal disturbances which cause the threads to disintegrate into lines of droplets. From the growth rate of these disturbances, the interfacial tension between the thread phase and the matrix phase is calculated. For molten polymers, this so-called "breaking thread method" is relatively fast and simple since it does not require density data for the two phases. Upon addition of a diblock copolymer to the thread phase, a considerable decrease in interfacial tension is measured
The measurement of interfacial tension in polymer/polymer systems: The breaking thread method
Motor control by precisely timed spike patterns
A fundamental problem in neuroscience is to understand how sequences of
action potentials ("spikes") encode information about sensory signals and motor
outputs. Although traditional theories of neural coding assume that information
is conveyed by the total number of spikes fired (spike rate), recent studies of
sensory and motor activity have shown that far more information is carried by
the millisecond-scale timing patterns of action potentials (spike timing).
However, it is unknown whether or how subtle differences in spike timing drive
differences in perception or behavior, leaving it unclear whether the
information carried by spike timing actually plays a causal role in brain
function. Here we demonstrate how a precise spike timing code is read out
downstream by the muscles to control behavior. We provide both correlative and
causal evidence to show that the nervous system uses millisecond-scale
variations in the timing of spikes within multi-spike patterns to regulate a
relatively simple behavior - respiration in the Bengalese finch, a songbird.
These findings suggest that a fundamental assumption of current theories of
motor coding requires revision, and that significant improvements in
applications, such as neural prosthetic devices, can be achieved by using
precise spike timing information.Comment: 48 pages, 16 figure
Cooperative Jahn-Teller transition and resonant x-ray scattering in thin film
Epitaxial thin films of stoichiometric were grown on substrates using the pulsed laser deposition technique. From the
high resolution x-ray diffraction measurements, the lattice parameters were
determined as a function of temperature and the cooperative Jahn-Teller
transition was found to occur at =573.0 K. Also measured was resonant
x-ray scattering intensity of the orthorhombic (100) peak of
near the Mn K edge from low temperatures to above . We demonstrate that
the integrated intensity of the (100) peak is proportional to the 3/2 power of
the orthorhombic strain at all temperatures, and thus provide an experimental
evidence that the resonant scattering near the Mn K edge in is
largely due to the Jahn-Teller effect.Comment: 13 pages, 4 figure
Double Exchange Alone Does Not Explain the Resistivity of
The system with has
traditionally been modelled with a ``double exchange'' Hamiltonian, in which it
is assumed that the only relevant physics is the tendency of carrier hopping to
line up neighboring spins. We present a solution of the double exchange model,
show it is incompatible with many aspects of the resistivity data, and propose
that a strong electron-phonon interaction arising from a Jahn-Teller splitting
of the outer Mn d-level plays a crucial role.Comment: Figure available via concentional mail. Contact
[email protected]
Photoinduced IR absorption in (La(1-x)Sr(x)Mn)(1-\delta)O3: changes of the anti-Jahn-Teller polaron binding energy with doping
Photoinduced IR absorption was measured in (La(1-x)Sr(x)Mn)(1-\delta)O3. A
midinfrared peak centered at ~ 5000 cm was observed in the x=0
antiferromagnetic sample. The peak diminishes and softens as hole doping is
increased. The origin of the photoinduced absorption peak is atributted to the
photon assisted hopping of anti-Jahn-Teller polarons formed by photoexcited
charge carriers, whose binding energy decreases with increasing hole doping.
The shape of the peak indicates that the polarons are small.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figures, submitted to PR
Double exchange-driven spin pairing at the (001) surface of manganites
The (001) surface of La_{1-x}Ca_xMnO_3 system in various magnetic orderings
is studied by first principle calculations. A general occurrence is that z^2
dangling bond charge -- which is ``invisible'' in the formal valence picture --
is promoted to the bulk gap/Fermi level region. This drives a
double-exchange-like process that serves to align the surface Mn spin with its
subsurface neighbor, regardless of the bulk magnetic order. For heavy doping,
the locally ``ferromagnetic'' coupling is very strong and the moment enhanced
by as much as 30% over the bulk value.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figure
Charge Ordering and Phase Competition in the Layered Perovskite Lasr2mn2o7
Charge-lattice fluctuations are observed in the layered perovskite manganite
LaSr2Mn2O7 by Raman spectroscopy as high as 340 K and with decreasing
temperature they become static and form a charge ordered (CO) phase below
TCO=210 K. In the static regime, superlattice reflections are observed through
neutron and x-ray diffraction with a propagation vector (h+1/4,k-1/4,l).
Crystallographic analysis of the CO state demonstrates that the degree of
charge and orbital ordering in this manganite is weaker than the charge
ordering in three dimensional perovskite manganites. A TN=170K a type-A
antiferromagnetism (AF) develops and competes with the charge ordering, that
eventually melts below T*=100K. High resolution diffraction measurements
suggest that that CO- and AF-states do not coincide within the same region in
the material but rather co-exist as separate phases. The transition to type-A
antiferromagnetism at lower temperatures is characterized by the competition
between these two phases.Comment: 9 pages, 6 figure
Evidence for charge localization in the ferromagnetic phase of La_(1-x)Ca_(x)MnO_3 from High real-space-resolution x-ray diffraction
High real-space-resolution atomic pair distribution functions of
La_(1-x)Ca_(x)MnO_3 (x=0.12, 0.25 and 0.33) have been measured using
high-energy x-ray powder diffraction to study the size and shape of the MnO_6
octahedron as a function of temperature and doping. In the paramagnetic
insulating phase we find evidence for three distinct bond-lengths (~ 1.88, 1.95
and 2.15A) which we ascribe to Mn^{4+}-O, Mn^{3+}-O short and Mn^{3+}-O long
bonds respectively. In the ferromagnetic metallic (FM) phase, for x=0.33 and
T=20K, we find a single Mn-O bond-length; however, as the metal-insulator
transition is approached either by increasing T or decreasing x, intensity
progressively appears around r=2.15 and in the region 1.8 - 1.9A suggesting the
appearance of Mn^{3+}-O long bonds and short Mn^{4+}-O bonds. This is strong
evidence that charge localized and delocalized phases coexist close to the
metal-insulator transition in the FM phase.Comment: 8 pages, 8 postscript figures, submitted to Phys. Rev.
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