A unified projection formalism for the Al-Pd-Mn quasicrystal Xi-approximants and their metadislocations

The approximants xi, xi' and xi'_n of the quasicrystal Al-Mn-Pd display most interesting plastic properties as for example phason-induced deformation processes (Klein, H., Audier, M., Boudard, M., de Boissieu, M., Beraha, L., and Duneau, M., 1996, Phil. Mag. A, 73, 309.) or metadislocations (Klein, H., Feuerbacher, M., Schall, P., and Urban, K., 1999, Phys. Rev. Lett., 82, 3468.). Here we demonstrate that the phases and their deformed or defected states can be described by a simple projection formalism in three-dimensional space - not as usual in four to six dimensions. With the method we can interpret microstructures observed with electron microscopy as phasonic phase boundaries. Furthermore we determine the metadislocations of lowest energy and relate them uniquely to experimentally observed ones. Since moving metadislocations in the xi'-phase can create new phason-planes, we suggest a dislocation induced phase transition from xi' to xi'_n. The methods developed in this paper can as well be used for various other complex metallic alloys.Comment: 25 pages, 12 figure

Impact of Uncertainties in Hadron Production on Air-Shower Predictions

At high energy, cosmic rays can only be studied by measuring the extensive air showers they produce in the atmosphere of the Earth. Although the main features of air showers can be understood within a simple model of successive interactions, detailed simulations and a realistic description of particle production are needed to calculate observables relevant to air shower experiments. Currently hadronic interaction models are the main source of uncertainty of such simulations. We will study the effect of using different hadronic models available in CORSIKA and CONEX on extensive air shower predictions.Comment: 12 pages, 6 figures, to appear in the proceedings of International Conference on Interconnection between High Energy Physics and Astroparticle Physics: From Colliders to Cosmic Rays, Prague, Czech Republic, 7-13 Sep 200

Tiling models for metadislocations in AlPdMn approximants

The AlPdMn quasicrystal approximants xi, xi', and xi'_n of the 1.6 nm decagonal phase and R, T, and T_n of the 1.2 nm decagonal phase can be viewed as arrangements of cluster columns on two-dimensional tilings. We substitute the tiles by Penrose rhombs and show, that alternative tilings can be constructed by a simple cut and projection formalism in three dimensional hyperspace. It follows that in the approximants there is a phasonic degree of freedom, whose excitation results in the reshuffling of the clusters. We apply the tiling model for metadislocations, which are special textures of partial dislocations.Comment: 7 pages, 2 figures, Proceedings of International Conference on Quasicrystals

Spin Hall effect in a two-dimensional electron gas in the presence of a magnetic field

We study the spin Hall effect of a two-dimensional electron gas in the presence of a magnetic field and both the Rashba and Dresselhaus spin-orbit interactions. We show that the value of the spin Hall conductivity, which is finite only if the Zeeman spin splitting is taken into account, may be tuned by varying the ratio of the in-plane and out-of-plane components of the applied magnetic field. We identify the origin of this behavior with the different role played by the interplay of spin-orbit and Zeeman couplings for in-plane and out-of-plane magnetic field components.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figures, submitte

Stellar and Molecular Gas Kinematics of NGC1097: Inflow Driven by a Nuclear Spiral

We present spatially resolved distributions and kinematics of the stars and molecular gas in the central 320pc of NGC1097. The stellar continuum confirms the previously reported 3-arm spiral pattern extending into the central 100pc. The stellar kinematics and the gas distribution imply this is a shadowing effect due to extinction by gas and dust in the molecular spiral arms. The molecular gas kinematics show a strong residual (i.e. non-circular) velocity, which is manifested as a 2-arm kinematic spiral. Linear models indicate that this is the line-of-sight velocity pattern expected for a density wave in gas that generates a 3-arm spiral morphology. We estimate the inflow rate along the arms. Using hydrodynamical models of nuclear spirals, we show that when deriving the accretion rate into the central region, outflow in the disk plane between the arms has to be taken into account. For NGC1097, despite the inflow rate along the arms being ~1.2Msun/yr, the net gas accretion rate to the central few tens of parsecs is much smaller. The numerical models indicate that the inflow rate could be as little as ~0.06Msun/yr. This is sufficient to generate recurring starbursts, similar in scale to that observed, every 20-150Myr. The nuclear spiral represents a mechanism that can feed gas into the central parsecs of the galaxy, with the gas flow sustainable for timescales of a Gigayear.Comment: accepted by Ap

A new result on the Klein-Gordon equation in the background of a rotating black hole

This short paper should serve as basis for further analysis of a previously found new symmetry of the solutions of the wave equation in the gravitational field of a Kerr black hole. Its main new result is the proof of essential self-adjointness of the spatial part of a reduced normalized wave operator of the Kerr metric in a weighted L^2-space. As a consequence, it leads to a purely operator theoretic proof of the well-posedness of the initial value problem of the reduced Klein-Gordon equation in that field in that L^2-space and in this way generalizes a corresponding result of Kay (1985) in the case of the Schwarzschild black hole. It is believed that the employed methods are applicable to other separable wave equations

Ab Initio Treatment of Collective Correlations and the Neutrinoless Double Beta Decay of 48^{48}Ca

Working with Hamiltonians from chiral effective field theory, we develop a novel framework for describing arbitrary deformed medium-mass nuclei by combining the in-medium similarity renormalization group with the generator coordinate method. The approach leverages the ability of the first method to capture dynamic correlations and the second to include collective correlations without violating symmetries. We use our scheme to compute the matrix element that governs the neutrinoless double beta decay of $^{48}$Ca to $^{48}$Ti, and find it to have the value $0.61$, near or below the predictions of most phenomenological methods. The result opens the door to ab initio calculations of the matrix elements for the decay of heavier nuclei such as $^{76}$Ge, $^{130}$Te, and $^{136}$Xe.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figures and 1 table. supplementary material included. version to be publishe

Side-jumps in the spin-Hall effect: construction of the Boltzmann collision integral

We present a systematic derivation of the side-jump contribution to the spin-Hall current in systems without band structure spin-orbit interactions, focusing on the construction of the collision integral for the Boltzmann equation. Starting from the quantum Liouville equation for the density operator we derive an equation describing the dynamics of the density matrix in the first Born approximation and to first order in the driving electric field. Elastic scattering requires conservation of the total energy, including the spin-orbit interaction energy with the electric field: this results in a first correction to the customary collision integral found in the Born approximation. A second correction is due to the change in the carrier position during collisions. It stems from the part of the density matrix off-diagonal in wave vector. The two corrections to the collision integral add up and are responsible for the total side-jump contribution to the spin-Hall current. The spin-orbit-induced correction to the velocity operator also contains terms diagonal and off-diagonal in momentum space, which together involve the total force acting on the system. This force is explicitly shown to vanish (on the average) in the steady state: thus the total contribution to the spin-Hall current due to the additional terms in the velocity operator is zero.Comment: Added references, expanded discussion, revised introductio