3,721 research outputs found
The inexorable resistance of inertia determines the initial regime of drop coalescence
Drop coalescence is central to diverse processes involving dispersions of
drops in industrial, engineering and scientific realms. During coalescence, two
drops first touch and then merge as the liquid neck connecting them grows from
initially microscopic scales to a size comparable to the drop diameters. The
curvature of the interface is infinite at the point where the drops first make
contact, and the flows that ensue as the two drops coalesce are intimately
coupled to this singularity in the dynamics. Conventionally, this process has
been thought to have just two dynamical regimes: a viscous and an inertial
regime with a crossover region between them. We use experiments and simulations
to reveal that a third regime, one that describes the initial dynamics of
coalescence for all drop viscosities, has been missed. An argument based on
force balance allows the construction of a new coalescence phase diagram
Unconventional antiferromagnetic correlations of the doped Haldane gap system YBaNiZnO
We make a new proposal to describe the very low temperature susceptibility of
the doped Haldane gap compound YBaNiZnO. We propose a new
mean field model relevant for this compound. The ground state of this mean
field model is unconventional because antiferromagnetism coexists with random
dimers. We present new susceptibility experiments at very low temperature. We
obtain a Curie-Weiss susceptibility as expected
for antiferromagnetic correlations but we do not obtain a direct signature of
antiferromagnetic long range order. We explain how to obtain the ``impurity''
susceptibility by subtracting the Haldane gap contribution to
the total susceptibility. In the temperature range [1 K, 300 K] the
experimental data are well fitted by . In the temperature range [100 mK, 1 K] the experimental data are
well fitted by , where increases with
. This fit suggests the existence of a finite N\'eel temperature which is
however too small to be probed directly in our experiments. We also obtain a
maximum in the temperature dependence of the ac-susceptibility which
suggests the existence of antiferromagnetic correlations at very low
temperature.Comment: 19 pages, 17 figures, revised version (minor modifications
Low-Temperature Features of Nano-Particle Dynamics
In view of better characterizing possible quantum effects in the dynamics of
nanometric particles, we measure the effect on the relaxation of a slight
heating cycle. The effect of the field amplitude is studied; its magnitude is
chosen in order to induce the relaxation of large particles (~7nm), even at
very low temperatures (100mK). Below 1K, the results significantly depart from
a simple thermal dynamics scenario.Comment: 1 tex file, 4 PostScript figure
Decoherence and Entanglement Dynamics in Fluctuating Fields
We study pure phase damping of two qubits due to fluctuating fields. As
frequently employed, decoherence is thus described in terms of random unitary
(RU) dynamics, i.e., a convex mixture of unitary transformations. Based on a
separation of the dynamics into an average Hamiltonian and a noise channel, we
are able to analytically determine the evolution of both entanglement and
purity. This enables us to characterize the dynamics in a concurrence-purity
(CP) diagram: we find that RU phase damping dynamics sets constraints on
accessible regions in the CP plane. We show that initial state and dynamics
contribute to final entanglement independently.Comment: 10 pages, 5 figures, added minor changes in order to match published
versio
Dynamics of Metal Centers Monitored by Nuclear Inelastic Scattering
Nuclear inelastic scattering of synchrotron radiation has been used now since
10 years as a tool for vibrational spectroscopy. This method has turned out
especially useful in case of large molecules that contain a M\"ossbauer active
metal center. Recent applications to iron-sulfur proteins, to iron(II) spin
crossover complexes and to tin-DNA complexes are discussed. Special emphasis is
given to the combination of nuclear inelastic scattering and density functional
calculations
Generalized Bell Inequality Experiments and Computation
We consider general settings of Bell inequality experiments with many
parties, where each party chooses from a finite number of measurement settings
each with a finite number of outcomes. We investigate the constraints that Bell
inequalities place upon the correlations possible in a local hidden variable
theories using a geometrical picture of correlations. We show that local hidden
variable theories can be characterized in terms of limited computational
expressiveness, which allows us to characterize families of Bell inequalities.
The limited computational expressiveness for many settings (each with many
outcomes) generalizes previous results about the many-party situation each with
a choice of two possible measurements (each with two outcomes). Using this
computational picture we present generalizations of the Popescu-Rohrlich
non-local box for many parties and non-binary inputs and outputs at each site.
Finally, we comment on the effect of pre-processing on measurement data in our
generalized setting and show that it becomes problematic outside of the binary
setting, in that it allows local hidden variable theories to simulate maximally
non-local correlations such as those of these generalised Popescu-Rohrlich
non-local boxes.Comment: 16 pages, 2 figures, supplemental material available upon request.
Typos corrected and references adde
Dynamic behavior of magnetic avalanches in the spin-ice compound DyTiO
Avalanches of the magnetization, that is to say an abrupt reversal of the
magnetization at a given field, have been previously reported in the spin-ice
compound DyTiO. This out-of-equilibrium process, induced by
magneto-thermal heating, is quite usual in low temperature magnetization
studies. A key point is to determine the physical origin of the avalanche
process. In particular, in spin-ice compounds, the origin of the avalanches
might be related to the monopole physics inherent to the system. We have
performed a detailed study of the avalanche phenomena in three single crystals,
with the field oriented along the [111] direction, perpendicular to [111] and
along the [100] directions. We have measured the changing magnetization during
the avalanches and conclude that avalanches in spin ice are quite slow compared
to the avalanches reported in other systems such as molecular magnets. Our
measurements show that the avalanches trigger after a delay of about 500 ms and
that the reversal of the magnetization then occurs in a few hundreds of
milliseconds. These features suggest an unusual propagation of the reversal,
which might be due to the monopole motion. The avalanche fields seem to be
reproducible in a given direction for different samples, but they strongly
depend on the initial state of magnetization and on how the initial state was
achieved.Comment: 11 pages, 14 figure
Optimal discrimination of quantum operations
We address the problem of discriminating with minimal error probability two
given quantum operations. We show that the use of entangled input states
generally improves the discrimination. For Pauli channels we provide a complete
comparison of the optimal strategies where either entangled or unentangled
input states are used.Comment: 4 pages, no figure
Domain Wall Spin Dynamics in Kagome Antiferromagnets
We report magnetization and neutron scattering measurements down to 60 mK on
a new family of Fe based kagome antiferromagnets, in which a strong local spin
anisotropy combined with a low exchange path network connectivity lead to
domain walls intersecting the kagome planes through strings of free spins.
These produce unfamiliar slow spin dynamics in the ordered phase, evolving from
exchange-released spin-flips towards a cooperative behavior on decreasing the
temperature, probably due to the onset of long-range dipolar interaction. A
domain structure of independent magnetic grains is obtained that could be
generic to other frustrated magnets.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure
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