Neutrinos and Primordial Nucleosynthesis

The importance of the Big Bang Nucleosynthesis (BBN) as a unique tool for studying neutrino properties is discussed, and the recent steps towards a self-consistent and robust handling of the weak reaction decoupling from the thermal bath as well as of the neutrino reheating following the e+e- annihilation are summarized. We also emphasize the important role of the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) anisotropy in providing an accurate and independent determination of the baryon density parameter omegab. The BBN is presently a powerful parameter-free theory that can test the standard scenario of the neutrino decoupling in the early Universe. Moreover it can constrain new physics in the neutrino sector. The perspectives for improvements in the next years are outlined.Comment: Talk given by G. Mangano at NOW2004, Conca Specchiulla, Otranto Italy, september 2004. To appear in the Proceedings of the Worksho

Persistent Currents in Multichannel Interacting Systems

Persistent currents of disordered multichannel mesoscopic rings of spinless interacting fermions threaded by a magnetic flux are calculated using exact diagonalizations and self-consistent Hartree-Fock methods. The validity of the Hartree-Fock approximation is controled by a direct comparison with the exact results on small $4\times4$ clusters. For sufficiently large disorder (diffusive regime), the effect of repulsive interactions on the current distribution is to slightly decrease its width (mean square current) but to {\it increase} its mean value (mean current). This effect is stronger in the case of a long range repulsion. Our results suggest that the coupling between the chains is essential to understand the large currents observed experimentally.Comment: Revised version, uuencoded compressed file including fig

Individual Goal Orientations, Team Empowerment, and Employee Creative Performance: A Case of Cross-Level Interactions

Intrigued by relationship between team motivational context and individual characteristics in the organizational reality, we developed and tested a cross-level model to investigate the interactive effects of team empowerment and individual goal orientations on individual creative performance through the mediating mechanism of an individual\u27s creative self-efficacy. Using multi-wave multi-source data from 63 R&D teams in three IT companies, we found that (1) team empowerment, individual learning goal orientation, and individual performance orientation are all positively related to individual creative performance through mediation of creative self-efficacy; (2) learning orientation and performance approach orientation could both supplement the effects of team empowerment on individual creative self-efficacy. Our findings point to the importance of individual goal orientation in shaping the effects of team motivation climates and provide insights for both scholars and practitioners. The specific practical implications include but are not limited to (1) individuals with learning and performance approach orientations should be identified during hiring procedures given that they could still thrive in less empowered teams and maintain a relatively high level of creative self-efficacy and creative outcomes; (2) managers should consider assigning employees who are more learning oriented to more empowering and open-ended tasks in order to obtain better creative results

Momentum flux density, kinetic energy density and their fluctuations for one-dimensional confined gases of non-interacting fermions

We present a Green's function method for the evaluation of the particle density profile and of the higher moments of the one-body density matrix in a mesoscopic system of N Fermi particles moving independently in a linear potential. The usefulness of the method is illustrated by applications to a Fermi gas confined in a harmonic potential well, for which we evaluate the momentum flux and kinetic energy densities as well as their quantal mean-square fluctuations. We also study some properties of the kinetic energy functional E_{kin}[n(x)] in the same system. Whereas a local approximation to the kinetic energy density yields a multi-valued function, an exact single-valued relationship between the density derivative of E_{kin}[n(x)] and the particle density n(x) is demonstrated and evaluated for various values of the number of particles in the system.Comment: 10 pages, 5 figure

A New Approach to Systematic Uncertainties and Self-Consistency in Helium Abundance Determinations

Tests of big bang nucleosynthesis and early universe cosmology require precision measurements for helium abundance determinations. However, efforts to determine the primordial helium abundance via observations of metal poor H II regions have been limited by significant uncertainties. This work builds upon previous work by providing an updated and extended program in evaluating these uncertainties. Procedural consistency is achieved by integrating the hydrogen based reddening correction with the helium based abundance calculation, i.e., all physical parameters are solved for simultaneously. We include new atomic data for helium recombination and collisional emission based upon recent work by Porter et al. and wavelength dependent corrections to underlying absorption are investigated. The set of physical parameters has been expanded here to include the effects of neutral hydrogen collisional emission. Because of a degeneracy between the solutions for density and temperature, the precision of the helium abundance determinations is limited. Also, at lower temperatures (T \lesssim 13,000 K) the neutral hydrogen fraction is poorly constrained resulting in a larger uncertainty in the helium abundances. Thus the derived errors on the helium abundances for individual objects are larger than those typical of previous studies. The updated emissivities and neutral hydrogen correction generally raise the abundance. From a regression to zero metallicity, we find Y_p as 0.2561 \pm 0.0108, in broad agreement with the WMAP result. Tests with synthetic data show a potential for distinct improvement, via removal of underlying absorption, using higher resolution spectra. A small bias in the abundance determination can be reduced significantly and the calculated helium abundance error can be reduced by \sim 25%.Comment: 51 pages, 13 figure

Coherent electron-phonon coupling and polaron-like transport in molecular wires

We present a technique to calculate the transport properties through one-dimensional models of molecular wires. The calculations include inelastic electron scattering due to electron-lattice interaction. The coupling between the electron and the lattice is crucial to determine the transport properties in one-dimensional systems subject to Peierls transition since it drives the transition itself. The electron-phonon coupling is treated as a quantum coherent process, in the sense that no random dephasing due to electron-phonon interactions is introduced in the scattering wave functions. We show that charge carrier injection, even in the tunneling regime, induces lattice distortions localized around the tunneling electron. The transport in the molecular wire is due to polaron-like propagation. We show typical examples of the lattice distortions induced by charge injection into the wire. In the tunneling regime, the electron transmission is strongly enhanced in comparison with the case of elastic scattering through the undistorted molecular wire. We also show that although lattice fluctuations modify the electron transmission through the wire, the modifications are qualitatively different from those obtained by the quantum electron-phonon inelastic scattering technique. Our results should hold in principle for other one-dimensional atomic-scale wires subject to Peierls transitions.Comment: 21 pages, 8 figures, accepted for publication in Phys. Rev. B (to appear march 2001

Primordial Nucleosynthesis for the New Cosmology: Determining Uncertainties and Examining Concordance

Big bang nucleosynthesis (BBN) and the cosmic microwave background (CMB) have a long history together in the standard cosmology. The general concordance between the predicted and observed light element abundances provides a direct probe of the universal baryon density. Recent CMB anisotropy measurements, particularly the observations performed by the WMAP satellite, examine this concordance by independently measuring the cosmic baryon density. Key to this test of concordance is a quantitative understanding of the uncertainties in the BBN light element abundance predictions. These uncertainties are dominated by systematic errors in nuclear cross sections. We critically analyze the cross section data, producing representations that describe this data and its uncertainties, taking into account the correlations among data, and explicitly treating the systematic errors between data sets. Using these updated nuclear inputs, we compute the new BBN abundance predictions, and quantitatively examine their concordance with observations. Depending on what deuterium observations are adopted, one gets the following constraints on the baryon density: OmegaBh^2=0.0229\pm0.0013 or OmegaBh^2 = 0.0216^{+0.0020}_{-0.0021} at 68% confidence, fixing N_{\nu,eff}=3.0. Concerns over systematics in helium and lithium observations limit the confidence constraints based on this data provide. With new nuclear cross section data, light element abundance observations and the ever increasing resolution of the CMB anisotropy, tighter constraints can be placed on nuclear and particle astrophysics. ABRIDGEDComment: 54 pages, 20 figures, 5 tables v2: reflects PRD version minor changes to text and reference

Extended Theories of Gravity and their Cosmological and Astrophysical Applications

We review Extended Theories of Gravity in metric and Palatini formalism pointing out their cosmological and astrophysical application. The aim is to propose an alternative approach to solve the puzzles connected to dark components.Comment: 44 pages, 11 figure