22,940 research outputs found
Field-induced structure transformation in electrorheological solids
We have computed the local electric field in a body-centered tetragonal (BCT)
lattice of point dipoles via the Ewald-Kornfeld formulation, in an attempt to
examine the effects of a structure transformation on the local field strength.
For the ground state of an electrorheological solid of hard spheres, we
identified a novel structure transformation from the BCT to the face-centered
cubic (FCC) lattices by changing the uniaxial lattice constant c under the hard
sphere constraint. In contrast to the previous results, the local field
exhibits a non-monotonic transition from BCT to FCC. As c increases from the
BCT ground state, the local field initially decreases rapidly towards the
isotropic value at the body-centered cubic lattice, decreases further, reaching
a minimum value and increases, passing through the isotropic value again at an
intermediate lattice, reaches a maximum value and finally decreases to the FCC
value. An experimental realization of the structure transformation is
suggested. Moreover, the change in the local field can lead to a generalized
Clausius-Mossotti equation for the BCT lattices.Comment: Submitted to Phys. Rev.
Nonlinear ac response of anisotropic composites
When a suspension consisting of dielectric particles having nonlinear
characteristics is subjected to a sinusoidal (ac) field, the electrical
response will in general consist of ac fields at frequencies of the
higher-order harmonics. These ac responses will also be anisotropic. In this
work, a self-consistent formalism has been employed to compute the induced
dipole moment for suspensions in which the suspended particles have nonlinear
characteristics, in an attempt to investigate the anisotropy in the ac
response. The results showed that the harmonics of the induced dipole moment
and the local electric field are both increased as the anisotropy increases for
the longitudinal field case, while the harmonics are decreased as the
anisotropy increases for the transverse field case. These results are
qualitatively understood with the spectral representation. Thus, by measuring
the ac responses both parallel and perpendicular to the uniaxial anisotropic
axis of the field-induced structures, it is possible to perform a real-time
monitoring of the field-induced aggregation process.Comment: 14 pages and 4 eps figure
A New Computer Approach to Mixed Feature Classification for Forestry Application
A new computer approach for mapping mixed forest features (i.e., classes, types) from computes classification maps is presented in both theory and application.
This approach is particularly useful and applicable to forestry stand mapping, where small areas are required to be absorbed into the surrounding to form homogeneous stands, and where mixed stands contain mixed proportions of different species of trees. Previous studies involving LANDSAT data show that mixed pine-hardwood stands are often erroneously classified as either pine or hardwood.
The present work utilizes a modification and an iterative application of a previously developed computer program called CLEAN . The program CLEAN was tested on binary (2 classes, labeled 0 or 1) classification images.
The modification called GETMIX operates on a multi-class image and works on one prespecified class in any one application. In any iteration, small sets of pixels with labels other than the prespecified class are eliminated, while small sets of pixels of the prespecified class are retained and have their labels temporarily changed to a new unique class.
This new iterative approach was tested on LANDSAT-1 data over Sam Houston National Forest, and proved to be successful in mapping those mixed softwood/hardwood stands which were unidentifiable previously. Also due to the cleaning effect of the program GETMIX, the spotty appearance on computer classification maps was smoothed, resulting in postprocessed maps that more closely resembled resource maps
A size of ~1 AU for the radio source Sgr A* at the centre of the Milky Way
Although it is widely accepted that most galaxies have supermassive black
holes (SMBHs) at their centers^{1-3}, concrete proof has proved elusive.
Sagittarius A* (Sgr A*)^4, an extremely compact radio source at the center of
our Galaxy, is the best candidate for proof^{5-7}, because it is the closest.
Previous Very Long Baseline Interferometry (VLBI) observations (at 7mm) have
detected that Sgr A* is ~2 astronomical unit (AU) in size^8, but this is still
larger than the "shadow" (a remarkably dim inner region encircled by a bright
ring) arising from general relativistic effects near the event horizon^9.
Moreover, the measured size is wavelength dependent^{10}. Here we report a
radio image of Sgr A* at a wavelength of 3.5mm, demonstrating that its size is
\~1 AU. When combined with the lower limit on its mass^{11}, the lower limit on
the mass density is 6.5x10^{21} Msun pc^{-3}, which provides the most stringent
evidence to date that Sgr A* is an SMBH. The power-law relationship between
wavelength and intrinsic size (The size is proportional to wavelength^{1.09}),
explicitly rules out explanations other than those emission models with
stratified structure, which predict a smaller emitting region observed at a
shorter radio wavelength.Comment: 18 pages, 4 figure
Multi-Prover Commitments Against Non-Signaling Attacks
We reconsider the concept of multi-prover commitments, as introduced in the
late eighties in the seminal work by Ben-Or et al. As was recently shown by
Cr\'{e}peau et al., the security of known two-prover commitment schemes not
only relies on the explicit assumption that the provers cannot communicate, but
also depends on their information processing capabilities. For instance, there
exist schemes that are secure against classical provers but insecure if the
provers have quantum information processing capabilities, and there are schemes
that resist such quantum attacks but become insecure when considering general
so-called non-signaling provers, which are restricted solely by the requirement
that no communication takes place.
This poses the natural question whether there exists a two-prover commitment
scheme that is secure under the sole assumption that no communication takes
place; no such scheme is known.
In this work, we give strong evidence for a negative answer: we show that any
single-round two-prover commitment scheme can be broken by a non-signaling
attack. Our negative result is as bad as it can get: for any candidate scheme
that is (almost) perfectly hiding, there exists a strategy that allows the
dishonest provers to open a commitment to an arbitrary bit (almost) as
successfully as the honest provers can open an honestly prepared commitment,
i.e., with probability (almost) 1 in case of a perfectly sound scheme. In the
case of multi-round schemes, our impossibility result is restricted to
perfectly hiding schemes.
On the positive side, we show that the impossibility result can be
circumvented by considering three provers instead: there exists a three-prover
commitment scheme that is secure against arbitrary non-signaling attacks
Spin-one ferromagnets with single-ion anisotropy in a perpendicular external field
In this paper, the conventional Holstein-Primakoff method is generalized with
the help of the characteristic angle transformation [Lei Zhou and Ruibao Tao,
J. Phys. A {\bf 27} 5599 (1994)] for the spin-one magnetic systems with
single-ion anisotropies. We find that the weakness of the conventional method
for such systems can be overcome by the new approach. Two models will be
discussed to illuminate the main idea, which are the ``easy-plane" and the
``easy-axis" spin-one ferromagnet, respectively. Comparisons show that the
current approach can give reasonable ground state properties for the magnetic
system with ``easy-plane" anisotropy though the conventional method never can,
and can give a better representation than the conventional one for the magnetic
system with ``easy-axis" anisotropy though the latter is usually believed to be
a good approximation in such case. Study of the easy-plane model shows that
there is a phase transition induced by the external field, and the
low-temperature specific heat may have a peak as the field reaches the critical
value.Comment: Using LaTex. To be published in the September 1 issue of Physical
Review B (1996). Email address: [email protected]
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