28,999 research outputs found
A search for magnetic fields on central stars in planetary nebulae
One of the possible mechanisms responsible for the panoply of shapes in
planetary nebulae is the presence of magnetic fields that drive the ejection of
ionized material during the proto-planetary nebula phase. Therefore, detecting
magnetic fields in such objects is of key importance for understanding their
dynamics. Still, magnetic fields have not been detected using polarimetry in
the central stars of planetary nebulae. Circularly polarized light spectra have
been obtained with the Focal Reducer and Low Dispersion Spectrograph at the
Very Large Telescope of the European Southern Observatory and the Intermediate
dispersion Spectrograph and Imaging System at the William Herschel Telescope.
Nineteen planetary nebulae spanning very different morphology and evolutionary
stages have been selected. Most of central stars have been observed at
different rotation phases to point out evidence of magnetic variability. In
this paper, we present the result of two observational campaigns aimed to
detect and measure the magnetic field in the central stars of planetary nebulae
on the basis of low resolution spectropolarimetry. In the limit of the adopted
method, we can state that large scale fields of kG order are not hosted on the
central star of planetary nebulae.Comment: Paper accepted to be published in Astronomy and Astrophysics on
20/01/201
Shape evolution and shape coexistence in Pt isotopes: comparing interacting boson model configuration mixing and Gogny mean-field energy surfaces
The evolution of the total energy surface and the nuclear shape in the
isotopic chain Pt are studied in the framework of the interacting
boson model, including configuration mixing. The results are compared with a
self-consistent Hartree-Fock-Bogoliubov calculation using the Gogny-D1S
interaction and a good agreement between both approaches shows up. The
evolution of the deformation parameters points towards the presence of two
different coexisting configurations in the region 176 A 186.Comment: Submitted to PR
Time-Reversal Symmetry Breaking and Decoherence in Chaotic Dirac Billiards
In this work, we perform a statistical study on Dirac Billiards in the
extreme quantum limit (a single open channel on the leads). Our numerical
analysis uses a large ensemble of random matrices and demonstrates the
preponderant role of dephasing mechanisms in such chaotic billiards. Physical
implementations of these billiards range from quantum dots of graphene to
topological insulators structures. We show, in particular, that the role of
finite crossover fields between the universal symmetries quickly leaves the
conductance to the asymptotic limit of unitary ensembles. Furthermore, we show
that the dephasing mechanisms strikingly lead Dirac billiards from the extreme
quantum regime to the semiclassical Gaussian regime
Mean field study of structural changes in Pt isotopes with the Gogny interaction
The evolution of the nuclear shapes along the triaxial landscape is studied
in the Pt isotopic chain using the selfconsistent Hartree-Fock-Bogoliubov
approximation based on the Gogny interaction. In addition to the
parametrization D1S, the new incarnations D1N and D1M of this force are also
included in our analysis to asses to which extent the predictions are
independent of details of the effective interaction. The considered range of
neutron numbers 88<N<26 includes prolate, triaxial, oblate and spherical ground
state shapes and serves for a detailed comparison of the predictions obtained
with the new sets D1N and D1M against the ones provided by the standard
parametrization Gogny-D1S in a region of the nuclear landscape for which
experimental and theoretical fingerprints of shape transitions have been found.
Structural evolution along the Pt chain is discussed in terms of the
deformation dependence of single particle energies.Comment: 18 pages, 10 figures. Accepted for publication in Phys. Rev.
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