Properties of Turbulence in the Very Local Interstellar Clouds

We have investigated the degree to which turbulence in the Very Local Interstellar Clouds resembles the highly-studied turbulence in the solar corona and the solar wind. The turbulence diagnostics for the Local Clouds are the absorption line widths measured along 32 lines of sight to nearby stars, yielding measurements for 53 absorption components (Redfield and Linsky 2004). We have tested whether the Local Cloud turbulence has the following properties of turbulence in the solar corona or the solar wind: (a) velocity fluctuations mainly perpendicular to the average magnetic field, (b) a temperature anisotropy in the sense that the perpendicular temperature is larger than the parallel temperature (or at least enhanced relative to expectation), and (c) an ion temperature which is dependent on the ion Larmor radius, in the sense that more massive ions have higher temperatures. Our analysis of the data does not show compelling evidence for any of these properties in Local Cloud turbulence, indicating possible differences with heliospheric plasmas. In the case of anisotropy of velocity fluctuations, although the expected observational signature is not seen, we cannot exclude the possibility of relatively high degrees of anisotropy (anisotropy parameter $\epsilon \sim 0.50 - 0.70$), if some other process in the the Local Clouds is causing variations in the turbulent line width from one line of sight to another. We briefly consider possible reasons for differences between coronal and solar wind turbulence and that in the Local Clouds.Comment: Submitted to the Astrophysical Journa

Observational Tests of the Properties of Turbulence in the Very Local Interstellar Medium

The Very Local Interstellar Medium (VLISM) contains clouds which consist of partially-ionized plasma. These clouds can be effectively diagnosed via high resolution optical and ultraviolet spectroscopy of the absorption lines they form in the spectra of nearby stars. Among the information provided by these spectroscopic measurements are the root-mean-square velocity fluctuation due to turbulence in these clouds and the ion temperature, which may be partially determined by dissipation of turbulence. We consider whether this turbulence resembles the extensively studied and well-diagnosed turbulence in the solar wind and solar corona. Published observations are used to determine if the velocity fluctuations are primarily transverse to a large-scale magnetic field, whether the temperature perpendicular to the large scale field is larger than that parallel to the field, and whether ions with larger Larmor radii have higher temperatures than smaller gyroradius ions. Although a thorough investigation of the data is underway, a preliminary examination of the published data shows neither evidence for anisotropy of the velocity fluctuations or temperature, nor Larmor radius-dependent heating. These results indicate differences between solar wind and Local Cloud turbulence.Comment: Paper submitted to Nonlinear Processes in Geophysic

Ion-Neutral Collisions in the Interstellar Medium: Wave Damping and Elimination of Collisionless Processes

Most phases of the interstellar medium contain neutral atoms in addition to ions and electrons. This introduces differences in plasma physics processes in those media relative to the solar corona and the solar wind at a heliocentric distance of 1 astronomical unit. In this paper, we consider two well-diagnosed, partially-ionized interstellar plasmas. The first is the Diffuse Ionized Gas (DIG) which is probably the extensive phase in terms of volume. The second is the gas that makes up the Local Clouds of the Very Local Interstellar Medium (VLISM). Ion-neutral interactions seem to be important in both media. In the DIG, ion-neutral collisions are relatively rare, but sufficiently frequent to damp magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) waves (as well as propagating MHD eddies) within less than a parsec of the site of generation. This result raises interesting questions about the sources of turbulence in the DIG. In the case of the VLISM, the ion-neutral collision frequency is higher than that in the DIG, because the hydrogen is partially neutral rather than fully ionized. We present results showing that prominent features of coronal and solar wind turbulence seem to be absent in VLISM turbulence. For example, ion temperature does not depend on ion mass. This difference may be attributable to ion-neutral collisions, which distribute power from more effectively heated massive ions such as iron to other ion species and neutral atoms.Comment: Submitted to American Institute of Physics Conference Proceedings for conference "Partially Ionized Plasmas Throughout the Cosmos", Dastgeer Shaikh, edito

Dynamics of quantum dissipation systems interacting with bosonic canonical bath: Hierarchical equations of motion approach

A nonperturbative theory is developed, aiming at an exact and efficient evaluation of a general quantum system interacting with arbitrary bath environment at any temperature and in the presence of arbitrary time-dependent external fields. An exact hierarchical equations of motion formalism is constructed on the basis of calculus-on-path-integral algorithm, via the auxiliary influence generating functionals related to the interaction bath correlation functions in a parametrization expansion form. The corresponding continued-fraction Green's functions formalism for quantum dissipation is also presented. Proposed further is the principle of residue correction, not just for truncating the infinite hierarchy, but also for incorporating the small residue dissipation that may arise from the practical difference between the true and the parametrized bath correlation functions. The final residue-corrected hierarchical equations of motion can therefore be used practically for the evaluation of arbitrary dissipative quantum systems.Comment: 12 pages, submitted to PR

Ultraviolet C II and Si III Transit Spectroscopy and Modeling of the Evaporating Atmosphere of GJ436b

Hydrogen gas evaporating from the atmosphere of the hot-Neptune GJ436b absorbs over 50% of the stellar Ly$\alpha$ emission during transit. Given the planet's atmospheric composition and energy-limited escape rate, this hydrogen outflow is expected to entrain heavier atoms such as C and O. We searched for C and Si in the escaping atmosphere of GJ436b using far-ultraviolet HST COS G130M observations made during the planet's extended H I transit. These observations show no transit absorption in the C II 1334,1335 \AA\ and Si III 1206 \AA\ lines integrated over [-100, 100] km s$^{-1}$, imposing 95% (2$\sigma$) upper limits of 14% (C II) and 60% (Si III) depth on the transit of an opaque disk and 22% (C II) and 49% (Si III) depth on an extended, highly asymmetric transit similar to that of H I Ly$\alpha$. C$^+$ is likely present in the outflow according to a simulation we carried out using a spherically-symmetric, photochemical-hydrodynamical model. This simulation predicts a $\sim$2% transit over the integrated bandpass, consistent with the data. At line center, we predict the C II transit depth to be as high as 19%. Our model predicts a neutral hydrogen escape rate of $1.6\times10^{9}$ g s$^{-1}$ ($3.1\times10^{9}$ g s$^{-1}$ for all species) for an upper atmosphere composed of hydrogen and helium.Comment: 7 pages, 4 figures, 1 table; accepted to ApJ Letter

Exact quantum dissipative dynamics under external time-dependent fields driving

Exact and nonperturbative quantum master equation can be constructed via the calculus on path integral. It results in hierarchical equations of motion for the reduced density operator. Involved are also a set of well--defined auxiliary density operators that resolve not just system--bath coupling strength but also memory. In this work, we scale these auxiliary operators individually to achieve a uniform error tolerance, as set by the reduced density operator. An efficient propagator is then proposed to the hierarchical Liouville--space dynamics of quantum dissipation. Numerically exact studies are carried out on the dephasing effect on population transfer in the simple stimulated Raman adiabatic passage scheme. We also make assessments on several perturbative theories for their applicabilities in the present system of study

Gas Absorption Detected from the Edge-on Debris Disk Surrounding HD32297

Near-infrared and optical imaging of HD32297 indicate that it has an edge-on debris disk, similar to beta Pic. I present high resolution optical spectra of the NaI doublet toward HD32297 and stars in close angular proximity. A circumstellar absorption component is clearly observed toward HD32297 at the stellar radial velocity, which is not observed toward any of its neighbors, including the nearest only 0.9 arcmin away. An interstellar component is detected in all stars >90 pc, including HD32297, likely due to the interstellar material at the boundary of the Local Bubble. Radial velocity measurements of the nearest neighbors, BD+07 777s and BD+07 778, indicate that they are unlikely to be physically associated with HD32297. The measured circumstellar column density around HD32997, log N(NaI) ~ 11.4, is the strongest NaI absorption measured toward any nearby main sequence debris disk, even the prototypical edge-on debris disk, beta Pic. Assuming that the morphology and abundances of the gas component around HD32297 are similar to beta Pic, I estimate an upper limit to the gas mass in the circumstellar disk surrounding HD32297 of ~0.3 M_Earth.Comment: 13 pages, 2 figures; Accepted for publication in ApJ Letter

Non-additivity of decoherence rates in superconducting qubits

We show that the relaxation and decoherence rates 1/T_1 and 1/T_2 of a qubit coupled to several noise sources are in general not additive, i.e., that the total rates are not the sums of the rates due to each individual noise source. To demonstrate this, we calculate the relaxation and pure dephasing rates 1/T_1 and 1/T_\phi of a superconducting (SC) flux qubit in the Born-Markov approximation in the presence of several circuit impedances Z_i using network graph theory and determine their deviation from additivity (the mixing term). We find that there is no mixing term in 1/T_\phi and that the mixing terms in 1/T_1 and 1/T_2 can be positive or negative, leading to reduced or enhanced relaxation and decoherence times T_1 and T_2. The mixing term due to the circuit inductance L at the qubit transition frequency \omega_{01} is generally of second order in \omega_{01}L/Z_i, but of third order if all impedances Z_i are pure resistances. We calculate T_{1,2} for an example of a SC flux qubit coupled to two impedances.Comment: 5 pages, 2 figure

Ground-based near-IR observations of the secondary eclipse of CoRoT-2b

We present the results of a ground-based search for the secondary eclipse of the 3.3 Mjup transiting planet CoRoT-2b. We performed near infrared photometry using the LIRIS instrument on the 4.2 m William Herschel Telescope, in the H and K_s filters. We monitored the star around two expected secondary eclipses in two nights under very good observing conditions. For the depth of the secondary eclipse we find in H-band a 3 sigma upper limit of 0.17%, whereas we detected a tentative eclipse with a depth of 0.16+-0.09% in the K_s-band. These depths can be translated into brightness temperatures of T_H<2250 K and T_{K_s} = 1890(+260-350) K, which indicate an inefficient re-distribution of the incident stellar flux from the planet's dayside to its nightside. Our results are in agreement with the CoRoT optical measurement (Alonso et al. 09) and with Spitzer 4.5 and 8 micron results (Gillon et al. 09c).Comment: Astronomical Journal, accepte

Decoherence in a superconducting flux qubit with a pi-junction

We consider the use of a pi-junction for flux qubits to realize degenerate quantum levels without external magnetic field. On the basis of the Caldeira-Leggett model, we derive an effective spin-Boson model, and study decoherece of this type of qubits. We estimate the dephasing time by using parameters from recent experiments of SIFS junctions, and show that high critical current and large subgap resistance are required for the pi-junction to realize a long coherent time.Comment: 5 pages, 2 figure