The superheated Melting of Grain Boundary

Based on a model of the melting of Grain Boundary (GB), we discuss the possibility of the existence of superheated GB state. A Molecular Dynamics simulation presented here shows that the superheated GB state can realized in the high symmetric tilt GB. Whether the sizes of liquid nuclei exceed a critical size determined the superheating grain boundary melting or not. Our results also indicate that the increase of melting point due to pressure is smaller than the superheating due to nucleation mechanism.Comment: Accepted by PRB, 7 pages and 5 figure

The water vapour distribution in the Arctic lowermost stratosphere during the LAUTLOS campaign and related transport processes including stratosphere-troposphere exchange

International audienceBalloon-borne water vapour measurements during January and February 2004, which were obtained as part of the LAUTLOS campaign at Sodankylä, Finland, 67° N, were used to analyse the water vapour distribution in the wintertime Arctic lowermost stratosphere. A 2.5 km thick layer (or 30 K in the potential temperature scale) above the tropopause is characterized by a significant water vapour variability on a synoptic timescale with values between stratospheric and tropospheric, which is in good agreement with previously reported measurements. A cross-correlation analysis of ozone and water vapour confirms that this layer contains a mixture of stratospheric and tropospheric air masses. Some of the flights sampled laminae of enhanced water vapour above the tropopause. Meteorological analyses and backward trajectory calculations show that these features were related to filaments that had developed along the flanks of cut-off anticyclones, which had been active at this time over the Northern Atlantic. The role of the filaments was however not to transport water vapour from the troposphere to the stratosphere but rather to transport it within the stratosphere away from regions where intensive two-way stratosphere-troposphere exchange (STE) was identified. Intensive STE occurred around cut-off anticyclones in regions of strong winds, where calculations suggest the presence of clear-air turbulence (CAT). Evidences that CAT contributes to the troposphere-to-stratosphere transport (TST) are presented. However, statistically, relation between TST and CAT during the studied period is weak

The water vapour distribution in the Arctic lowermost stratosphere during LAUTLOS campaign and related transport processes including stratosphere-troposphere exchange

International audienceBalloon-borne water vapour measurements during January and February 2004, which were obtained as part of the LAUTLOS campaign at Sodankylä, Finland, 67° N, were used to analyse the water vapour distribution in the wintertime Arctic lowermost stratosphere. A 2.5 km thick layer (or 30 K in the potential temperature scale) above the local tropopause is characterized by a significant water vapour variability on a synoptic timescale with values between stratospheric and tropospheric, which is in good agreement with previously reported measurements. A cross-correlation analysis of ozone and water vapour confirms that this layer contains a mixture of stratospheric and tropospheric air masses. Some of the flights sampled laminae of enhanced water vapour above the tropopause. Meteorological analyses and backward trajectory calculations show that these features are related to filaments that had developed along the flanks of cut-off anticyclones, which had been active at this time over the Northern Atlantic. Cross-tropopause mass fluxes calculated following the Wei method are used to identify regions and processes that are important for stratosphere-troposphere exchange (STE) in high-latitudes. Intensive STE occurs around cut-off anticyclones in regions of strong winds, where calculations suggest the presence of developed clear-air turbulence. The decay of the filaments is also shown to be important for STE

Electric field induced strong localization of electrons on solid hydrogen surface: possible applications to quantum computing

Two-dimensional electron system on the liquid helium surface is one of the leading candidates for constructing large analog quantum computers (P.M. Platzman and M.I. Dykman, Science 284, 1967 (1999)). Similar electron systems on the surfaces of solid hydrogen or solid neon may have some important advantages with respect to electrons on liquid helium in quantum computing applications, such as larger state separation $\Delta E$, absence of propagating capillary waves (or ripplons), smaller vapor pressure, etc. As a result, it may operate at higher temperatures. Surface roughness is the main hurdle to overcome in building a realistic quantum computer using these states. Electric field induced strong localization of surface electrons is shown to be a convenient tool to characterize surface roughness.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure

Metal-insulator transition in disordered 2DEG including temperature effects

We calculate self-consistently the mutual dependence of electron correlations and electron-defect scattering for a two dimensional electron gas at finite temperature. We employ an STLS approach to calculate the electron correlations while the electron scattering rate off Coulombic impurities and surface roughness is calculated using self-consistent current-relaxation theory. The methods are combined and self-consistently solved. We discuss a metal-insulator transition for a range of disorder levels and electron densities. Our results are in good agreement with recent experimental observations.Comment: 4 pages, RevTeX + epsf, 5 figure

The KHOLOD Experiment: A Search for a New Population of Radio Sources

Published data from long-term observations of a strip of sky at declination +5 degrees carried out at 7.6 cm on the RATAN-600 radio telescope are used to estimate some statistical properties of radio sources. Limits on the sensitivity of the survey due to noise imposed by background sources, which dominates the radiometer sensitivity, are refined. The vast majority of noise due to background sources is associated with known radio sources (for example, from the NVSS with a detection threshold of 2.3 mJy) with normal steep spectra ({\alpha} = 0.7-0.8, S \propto {\nu}^{- \alpha}), which have also been detected in new deep surveys at decimeter wavelengths. When all such objects are removed from the observational data, this leaves another noise component that is observed to be roughly identical in independent groups of observations. We suggest this represents a new population of radio sources that are not present in known catalogs at the 0.6 mJy level at 7.6 cm. The studied redshift dependence of the number of steep-spectrum objects shows that the sensitivity of our survey is sufficient to detect powerful FRII radio sources at any redshift, right to the epoch of formation of the first galaxies. The inferred new population is most likely associated with low-luminosity objects at redshifts z < 1. In spite of the appearance of new means of carrying out direct studies of distant galaxies, searches for objects with very high redshifts among steep and ultra-steep spectrum radio sources remains an effective method for studying the early Universe.Comment: 13 pages, 10 figure

Quantum Point Contacts and Coherent Electron Focusing

I. Introduction II. Electrons at the Fermi level III. Conductance quantization of a quantum point contact IV. Optical analogue of the conductance quantization V. Classical electron focusing VI. Electron focusing as a transmission problem VII. Coherent electron focusing (Experiment, Skipping orbits and magnetic edge states, Mode-interference and coherent electron focusing) VIII. Other mode-interference phenomenaComment: #3 of a series of 4 legacy reviews on QPC'