8,814 research outputs found
Phase transitions, entanglement and quantum noise interferometry in cold atoms
We show that entanglement monotones can characterize the pronounced
enhancement of entanglement at a quantum phase transition if they are sensitive
to long-range high order correlations. These monotones are found to develop a
sharp peak at the critical point and to exhibit universal scaling. We
demonstrate that similar features are shared by noise correlations and verify
that these experimentally accessible quantities indeed encode entanglement
information and probe separability.Comment: 4 pages 4 figure
Better age estimations using UV-optical colours: breaking the age-metallicity degeneracy
We demonstrate that the combination of GALEX UV photometry in the FUV (~1530
angstroms) and NUV (~2310 angstroms) passbands with optical photometry in the
standard U,B,V,R,I filters can efficiently break the age-metallicity
degeneracy. We estimate well-constrained ages, metallicities and their
associated errors for 42 GCs in M31, and show that the full set of
FUV,NUV,U,B,V,R,I photometry produces age estimates that are ~90 percent more
constrained and metallicity estimates that are ~60 percent more constrained
than those produced by using optical filters alone. The quality of the age
constraints is comparable or marginally better than those achieved using a
large number of spectrscopic indices.Comment: Published in MNRAS (2007), 381, L74 (doi:
10.1111/j.1745-3933.2007.00370.x
Compact stellar systems in the Fornax cluster: a UV perspective
In recent years, increasing evidence for chemical complexity and multiple
stellar populations in massive globular clusters (GCs) has emerged, including
extreme horizontal branches (EHBs) and UV excess. Our goal is to improve our
understanding of UV excess in the regime of both massive GCs and ultra-compact
dwarf galaxies (UCDs). To this end, we use deep archival GALEX data of the
central Fornax cluster to measure NUV and FUV magnitudes of UCDs and massive
GCs. We obtain NUV photometry for a sample of 35 compact objects with
-13.5<M_V<-10 mag. Of those, 21 objects also have FUV photometry. Roughly half
of the sources fall into the UCD luminosity regime (M_V <=-11 mag). We find
that seven out of 17 massive Fornax GCs exhibit a NUV excess with respect to
expectations from stellar population models, even for models with enhanced
Helium abundance. This suggests that not only He-enrichment has contributed to
forming the EHB population of these GCs. The GCs extend to stronger UV excess
than GCs in M31 and massive GCs in M87, at the 97% confidence level. Most of
the UCDs with FUV photometry also show evidence for UV excess, but their UV
colours can be matched by isochrones with enhanced Helium abundances and old
ages 12-14 Gyrs. We find that Fornax compact objects with X-ray emission
detected from Chandra images are almost disjunct in colour from compact objects
with GALEX UV detection, with only one X-ray source among the 35 compact
objects. However, since this source is one of the three most UV bright GCs, we
cannot exclude that the physical processes causing X-ray emission also
contribute to some of the observed UV excess.Comment: Research Note, 7 pages, 3 figures, accepted for publication in A&
Towards an -theorem for granular gases
The -theorem, originally derived at the level of Boltzmann non-linear
kinetic equation for a dilute gas undergoing elastic collisions, strongly
constrains the velocity distribution of the gas to evolve irreversibly towards
equilibrium. As such, the theorem could not be generalized to account for
dissipative systems: the conservative nature of collisions is an essential
ingredient in the standard derivation. For a dissipative gas of grains, we
construct here a simple functional related to the original ,
that can be qualified as a Lyapunov functional. It is positive, and results
backed by three independent simulation approaches (a deterministic spectral
method, the stochastic Direct Simulation Monte Carlo technique, and Molecular
Dynamics) indicate that it is also non-increasing. Both driven and unforced
cases are investigated
Oscillations in a maturation model of blood cell production.
We present a mathematical model of blood cell production which describes both the development of cells through the cell cycle, and the maturation of these cells as they differentiate to form the various mature blood cell types. The model differs from earlier similar ones by considering primitive stem cells as a separate population from the differentiating cells, and this formulation removes an apparent inconsistency in these earlier models. Three different controls are included in the model: proliferative control of stem cells, proliferative control of differentiating cells, and peripheral control of stem cell committal rate. It is shown that an increase in sensitivity of these controls can cause oscillations to occur through their interaction with time delays associated with proliferation and differentiation, respectively. We show that the characters of these oscillations are quite distinct and suggest that the model may explain an apparent superposition of fast and slow oscillations which can occur in cyclical neutropenia. © 2006 Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics
Analytical approach to soliton ratchets in asymmetric potentials
We use soliton perturbation theory and collective coordinate ansatz to
investigate the mechanism of soliton ratchets in a driven and damped asymmetric
double sine-Gordon equation. We show that, at the second order of the
perturbation scheme, the soliton internal vibrations can couple {\it
effectively}, in presence of damping, to the motion of the center of mass,
giving rise to transport. An analytical expression for the mean velocity of the
soliton is derived. The results of our analysis confirm the internal mode
mechanism of soliton ratchets proposed in [Phys. Rev. E {\bf 65} 025602(R)
(2002)].Comment: 9 figures. Submitted to Phys. Rev.
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