657 research outputs found
The Nature of the Gould Belt from a Fractal Analysis of its Stellar Population
The Gould Belt (GB) is a system of gas and young, bright stars distributed
along a plane that is inclined with respect to the main plane of the Milky Way.
Observational evidence suggests that the GB is our closest star formation
complex, but its true nature and origin remain rather controversial. In this
work we analyze the fractal structure of the stellar component of the GB. In
order to do this, we tailor and apply an algorithm that estimates the fractal
dimension in a precise and accurate way, avoiding both boundary and small data
set problems. We find that early OB stars (of spectral types earlier than B4)
in the GB have a fractal dimension very similar to that of the gas clouds in
our Galaxy. On the contrary, stars in the GB of later spectral types show a
larger fractal dimension, similar to that found for OB stars of both age groups
in the local Galactic disk (LGD). This result seems to indicate that while the
younger OB stars in the GB preserve the memory of the spatial structure of the
cloud where they were born, older stars are distributed following a similar
morphology as that found for the LGD stars. The possible causes for these
differences are discussed.Comment: 20 pages including 7 figures and 1 table. ApJ (in press
OB Stars in the Solar Neighborhood I: Analysis of their Spatial Distribution
We present a newly-developed, three-dimensional spatial classification
method, designed to analyze the spatial distribution of early type stars within
the 1 kpc sphere around the Sun. We propose a distribution model formed by two
intersecting disks -the Gould Belt (GB) and the Local Galactic Disk (LGD)-
defined by their fundamental geometric parameters. Then, using a sample of
about 550 stars of spectral types earlier than B6 and luminosity classes
between III and V, with precise photometric distances of less than 1 kpc, we
estimate for some spectral groups the parameters of our model, as well as
single membership probabilities of GB and LGD stars, thus drawing a picture of
the spatial distribution of young stars in the vicinity of the Sun.Comment: 28 pages including 9 Postscript figures, one of them in color.
Accepted for publication in The Astronomical Journal, 30 January 200
Giant Molecular Clouds are More Concentrated to Spiral Arms than Smaller Clouds
From our catalog of Milky Way molecular clouds, created using a temperature
thresholding algorithm on the Bell Laboratories 13CO Survey, we have extracted
two subsets:(1) Giant Molecular Clouds (GMCs), clouds that are definitely
larger than 10^5 solar masses, even if they are at their `near distance', and
(2) clouds that are definitely smaller than 10^5 solar masses, even if they are
at their `far distance'. The positions and velocities of these clouds are
compared to the loci of spiral arms in (l, v) space. The velocity separation of
each cloud from the nearest spiral arm is introduced as a `concentration
statistic'. Almost all of the GMCs are found near spiral arms. The density of
smaller clouds is enhanced near spiral arms, but some clouds (~10%) are
unassociated with any spiral arm. The median velocity separation between a GMC
and the nearest spiral arm is 3.4+-0.6 km/s, whereas the median separation
between smaller clouds and the nearest spiral arm is 5.5+-0.2 km/s.Comment: 11 pages, 3 figure
Chandra observation of the central galaxies in A1060 cluster of galaxies
Chandra observation of the central region of the A1060 cluster of galaxies
resolved X-ray emission from two giant elliptical galaxies, NGC 3311 and NGC
3309. The emission from these galaxies consists of two components, namely the
hot interstellar medium (ISM) and the low-mass X-ray binaries (LMXBs). We found
the spatial extent of the ISM component was much smaller than that of stars for
both galaxies, while the ratios of X-ray to optical blue-band luminosities were
rather low but within the general scatter for elliptical galaxies. After
subtracting the LMXB component, the ISM is shown to be in pressure balance with
the intracluster medium of A1060 at the outer boundary of the ISM. These
results imply that the hot gas supplied from stellar mass loss is confined by
the external pressure of the intracluster medium, with the thermal conduction
likely to be suppressed. The cD galaxy NGC 3311 does not exhibit the extended
potential structure which is commonly seen in bright elliptical galaxies, and
we discuss the possible evolution history of the very isothermal cluster A1060.Comment: 12 pages, 7 figures, Latex2e(emulateapj5), accepted in Ap
Environment Induced Entanglement in Markovian Dissipative Dynamics
We show that two, non interacting 2-level systems, immersed in a common bath,
can become mutually entangled when evolving according to a Markovian,
completely positive reduced dynamics.Comment: 4 pages, LaTex, no figures, added reference
Optimal control of entanglement via quantum feedback
It has recently been shown that finding the optimal measurement on the
environment for stationary Linear Quadratic Gaussian control problems is a
semi-definite program. We apply this technique to the control of the
EPR-correlations between two bosonic modes interacting via a parametric
Hamiltonian at steady state. The optimal measurement turns out to be nonlocal
homodyne measurement -- the outputs of the two modes must be combined before
measurement. We also find the optimal local measurement and control technique.
This gives the same degree of entanglement but a higher degree of purity than
the local technique previously considered [S. Mancini, Phys. Rev. A {\bf 73},
010304(R) (2006)].Comment: 10 pages, 5 figure
Optimal Unravellings for Feedback Control in Linear Quantum Systems
For quantum systems with linear dynamics in phase space much of classical
feedback control theory applies. However, there are some questions that are
sensible only for the quantum case, such as: given a fixed interaction between
the system and the environment what is the optimal measurement on the
environment for a particular control problem? We show that for a broad class of
optimal (state-based) control problems (the stationary
Linear-Quadratic-Gaussian class), this question is a semi-definite program.
Moreover, the answer also applies to Markovian (current-based) feedback.Comment: 5 pages. Version published by Phys. Rev. Let
Models for local ohmic quantum dissipation
We construct model master equations for local quantum dissipation. The master
equations are in the form of Lindblad generators, with imposed constraints that
the dissipations be strictly linear (i.e. ohmic), isotropic and translationally
invariant. A particular form for is chosen to satisfy the constraints. The
resulting master equations are given in both the Schr\"odinger and Heisenberg
forms. We obtain fluctuation-dissipation relations, and discuss the relaxation
of average kinetic energy to effective thermal equilibrium values. We compare
our results to the Dekker and the Caldeira-Leggett master equations. These
master equations allow a more general approach to quantum dissipation and the
dynamics of quantum coherence to account for the nontrivial system-environment
coupling in a local environment.Comment: 19 pages, REVTEX, PSU/TH/12
High photon energy spectroscopy of NiO: experiment and theory
We have revisited the valence band electronic structure of NiO by means of
hard x-ray photoemission spectroscopy (HAXPES) together with theoretical
calculations using both the GW method and the local density approximation +
dynamical mean-field theory (LDA+DMFT) approaches. The effective impurity
problem in DMFT is solved through the exact diagonalization (ED) method. We
show that the LDA+DMFT method alone cannot explain all the observed structures
in the HAXPES spectra. GW corrections are required for the O bands and Ni-s and
p derived states to properly position their binding energies. Our results
establish that a combination of the GW and DMFT methods is necessary for
correctly describing the electronic structure of NiO in a proper ab-initio
framework. We also demonstrate that the inclusion of photoionization cross
section is crucial to interpret the HAXPES spectra of NiO.We argue that our
conclusions are general and that the here suggested approach is appropriate for
any complex transition metal oxide.Comment: 16 pages, 5 figure
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