INTERNATIONAL PROFILE OF U.S. FOOD PROCESSORS

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Collective effects in charge transfer within a hybrid organic-inorganic system

A collective electron transfer (ET) process was discovered by studying the current noise in a field effect transistor with light-sensitive gate formed by nanocrystals linked by organic molecules to its surface. Fluctuations in the ET through the organic linker are reflected in the fluctuations of the transistor conductivity. The current noise has an avalanche character. Critical exponents obtained from the noise power spectra, avalanche distributions, and the dependence of the average avalanche size on avalanche duration are consistent with each other. A plausible model is proposed for this phenomenonComment: 15 pages 4 figures. Accepted for publication in Physical Review Letter

Reactions of Oxygen Atoms with Van der Waals Complexes: The Effect of Complex Formation on the Internal Energy Distribution in the Products

Reactions of atomic oxygen with complexes containing HCl are investigated and the OH product state distributions are compared to those observed for the corresponding reactions of HCl monomers. In previous studies of reactions of O(3P) with HCl and hydrocarbon complexes, rotationally colder OH product state distributions were observed, when compared to the corresponding reactions of monomers. In contrast, we find that reactions of O(1D) with HCl clusters yield OH rotational distributions that are unaffected by the incorporation of HCl into a van der Waals complex. Quasiclassical trajectories are run on collisions of oxygen with HCl and Ar⋯HCl at 1 eV collision energies to investigate the differences in the dynamics of the O(1D) and O(3P) reactions. It is found that when the van der Waals complex is longer lived than the collision complex, rotational and vibrational cooling are observed. In contrast, when the dissociation of the van der Waals complex is prompt, compared to the collision complex lifetime, the effects of complex formation on the internal energy of the OH product become negligible

Universal oscillations in counting statistics

Noise is a result of stochastic processes that originate from quantum or classical sources. Higher-order cumulants of the probability distribution underlying the stochastic events are believed to contain details that characterize the correlations within a given noise source and its interaction with the environment, but they are often difficult to measure. Here we report measurements of the transient cumulants > of the number n of passed charges to very high orders (up to m=15) for electron transport through a quantum dot. For large m, the cumulants display striking oscillations as functions of measurement time with magnitudes that grow factorially with m. Using mathematical properties of high-order derivatives in the complex plane we show that the oscillations of the cumulants in fact constitute a universal phenomenon, appearing as functions of almost any parameter, including time in the transient regime. These ubiquitous oscillations and the factorial growth are system-independent and our theory provides a unified interpretation of previous theoretical studies of high-order cumulants as well as our new experimental data.Comment: 19 pages, 4 figures, final version as published in PNA

Quantum Fluctuations in the Chirped Pendulum

An anharmonic oscillator when driven with a fast, frequency chirped voltage pulse can oscillate with either small or large amplitude depending on whether the drive voltage is below or above a critical value-a well studied classical phenomenon known as autoresonance. Using a 6 GHz superconducting resonator embedded with a Josephson tunnel junction, we have studied for the first time the role of noise in this non-equilibrium system and find that the width of the threshold for capture into autoresonance decreases as the square root of T, and saturates below 150 mK due to zero point motion of the oscillator. This unique scaling results from the non-equilibrium excitation where fluctuations, both quantum and classical, only determine the initial oscillator motion and not its subsequent dynamics. We have investigated this paradigm in an electrical circuit but our findings are applicable to all out of equilibrium nonlinear oscillators.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure

Poisson transition rates from time-domain measurements with finite bandwidth

In time-domain measurements of a Poisson two-level system, the observed transition rates are always smaller than those of the actual system, a general consequence of finite measurement bandwidth in an experiment. This underestimation of the rates is significant even when the measurement and detection apparatus is ten times faster than the process under study. We derive here a quantitative form for this correction using a straightforward state-transition model that includes the detection apparatus, and provide a method for determining a system's actual transition rates from bandwidth-limited measurements. We support our results with computer simulations and experimental data from time-domain measurements of quasiparticle tunneling in a single-Cooper-pair transistor.Comment: 4 pages, 5 figure

Fluctuation Dominated Josephson Tunneling with a Scanning Tunneling Microscope

We demonstrate Josephson tunneling in vacuum tunnel junctions formed between a superconducting scanning tunneling microscope tip and a Pb film, for junction resistances in the range 50-300 k$\Omega$. We show that the superconducting phase dynamics is dominated by thermal fluctuations, and that the Josephson current appears as a peak centered at small finite voltages. In the presence of microwave fields (f=15.0 GHz) the peak decreases in magnitude and shifts to higher voltages with increasing rf power, in agreement with theory.Comment: 4 pages, REVTeX, submitted to PR

Electron transfer via helical oligopeptide to laccase including chiral schiff base copper mediators

The oxygen reduction efficiency of a laccase-modified electrode was found to depend on the chirality of the oligopeptide linker used to bind the enzyme to the surface. At the same time, the electron transfer between the cathode electrode and the enzyme is improved by using a copper(II) complex with amino-acid derivative Schiff base ligand with/without azobenzene moiety as a mediator. The increased electrochemical current under both O2 and N2 proves that both the mediators are active towards the enzyme