471 research outputs found
Three dimensional Casimir piston for massive scalar fields
We consider Casimir force acting on a three dimensional rectangular piston
due to a massive scalar field subject to periodic, Dirichlet and Neumann
boundary conditions. Exponential cut-off method is used to derive the Casimir
energy in the interior region and the exterior region separated by the piston.
It is shown that the divergent term of the Casimir force acting on the piston
due to the interior region cancels with that due to the exterior region, thus
render a finite well-defined Casimir force acting on the piston. Explicit
expressions for the total Casimir force acting on the piston is derived, which
show that the Casimir force is always attractive for all the different boundary
conditions considered. As a function of a -- the distance from the piston to
the opposite wall, it is found that the magnitude of the Casimir force behaves
like when and decays exponentially when .
Moreover, the magnitude of the Casimir force is always a decreasing function of
a. On the other hand, passing from massless to massive, we find that the effect
of the mass is insignificant when a is small, but the magnitude of the force is
decreased for large a in the massive case.Comment: 22 pages, 8 figure
Influence of enhanced melt supply on upper crustal structure at a mid-ocean ridge discontinuity: A three-dimensional seismic tomographic study of 9°N East Pacific Rise
We present a three-dimensional upper crustal model of the 9°03′N overlapping spreading center (OSC) on the East Pacific Rise that assists in understanding the relationship between melt sills and upper crustal structure at a ridge discontinuity with enhanced melt supply at crustal levels. Our P wave velocity model obtained from tomographic inversion of ∼70,000 crustal first arrival travel times suggests that the geometry of extrusive emplacement are significantly different beneath the overlapping spreading limbs. Extrusive volcanic rocks above the western melt sill are inferred to be thin (∼250 m). More extensive accumulation of extrusives is inferred to the west than to the east of the western melt sill. The extrusive layer inferred above the eastern melt sill thickens from ∼350 (at the neovolcanic axis) to 550 m (to the west of the melt sill). Volcanic construction is likely to be significant in the formation of ridge crest morphology at the OSC, particularly at the tip of the eastern limb. On the basis of our interpretation of the velocity model, we propose that enhanced magma supply at crustal levels at the OSC may provide an effective mechanism for the migration of ridge discontinuities. This “dynamic magma supply model” may explain the commonly observed nonsteady migration pattern of ridge discontinuities by attributing this to the temporal fluctuations in melt availability to the overlapping spreading limbs
Measurement of the Intrinsic Radiopurity of Cs-137/U-235/U-238/Th-232 in CsI(Tl) Crystal Scintillators
The inorganic crystal scintillator CsI(Tl) has been used for low energy
neutrino and Dark Matter experiments, where the intrinsic radiopurity is an
issue of major importance. Low-background data were taken with a CsI(Tl)
crystal array at the Kuo-Sheng Reactor Neutrino Laboratory. The pulse shape
discrimination capabilities of the crystal, as well as the temporal and spatial
correlations of the events, provide powerful means of measuring the intrinsic
radiopurity of Cs-137 as well as the U-235, U-238 and Th-232 series. The event
selection algorithms are described, with which the decay half-lives of Po-218,
Po-214, Rn-220, Po-216 and Po-212 were derived. The measurements of the
contamination levels, their concentration gradients with the crystal growth
axis, and the uniformity among different crystal samples, are reported. The
radiopurity in the U-238 and Th-232 series are comparable to those of the best
reported in other crystal scintillators. Significant improvements in
measurement sensitivities were achieved, similar to those from dedicated
massive liquid scintillator detector. This analysis also provides in situ
measurements of the detector performance parameters, such as spatial
resolution, quenching factors, and data acquisition dead time.Comment: 28 pages, 12 figure
Time-resolved local pH measurements during CO2 reduction using scanning electrochemical microscopy: buffering and tip effects
The electrochemical reduction of CO2 is widely studied as a sustainable alternative for the production of fuels and chemicals. The electrolyte’s bulk pH and composition play an important role in the reaction activity and selectivity and can affect the extent of the buildup of pH gradients between the electrode surface and the bulk of the electrolyte. Quantifying the local pH and how it is affected by the solution species is desirable to gain a better understanding of the CO2 reduction reaction. Local pH measurements can be realized using Scanning Electrochemical Microscopy (SECM); however, finding a pH probe that is stable and selective under CO2 reduction reaction conditions is challenging. Here, we have used our recently developed voltammetric pH sensor to perform pH measurements in the diffusion layer during CO2 reduction using SECM, with high time resolution. Using a 4-hydroxylaminothiophenol (4-HATP)/4-nitrosothiophenol (4-NSTP) functionalized gold ultramicroelectrode, we compare the local pH developed above a gold substrate in an argon atmosphere, when only hydrogen evolution is taking place, to the pH developed in a CO2 atmosphere. The pH is monitored at a fixed distance from the surface, and the sample potential is varied in time. In argon, we observe a gradual increase of pH, while a plateau region is present in CO2 atmosphere due to the formation of HCO3– buffering the reaction interface. By analyzing the diffusion layer dynamics once the sample reaction is turned “off”, we gain insightful information on the time scale of the homogeneous reactions happening in solution and on the time required for the diffusion layer to fully recover to the initial bulk concentration of species. In order to account for the effect of the presence of the SECM tip on the measured pH, we performed finite element method simulations of the fluid and reaction dynamics. The results show the significant localized diffusion hindrance caused by the tip, so that in its absence, the pH values are more acidic than when the tip is present. Nonetheless, through the simulation, we can account for this effect and estimate the real local pH values across the diffusion layer.Horizon 2020(H2020)722614-ELCORELTheoretical Chemistr
Cosmology, Particle Physics and Superfluid 3He
Many direct parallels connect superfluid 3He with the field theories
describing the physical vacuum, gauge fields and elementary fermions.
Superfluid He exhibits a variety of topological defects which can be
detected with single-defect sensitivity. Modern scenarios of defect-mediated
baryogenesis can be simulated by the interaction of the 3He vortices and domain
walls with fermionic quasiparticles. Formation of defects in a
symmetry-breaking phase transition in the early Universe, which could be
responsible for large-scale structure formation and for microwave-background
anisotropy, also may be modelled in the laboratory. This is supported by the
recent observation of vortex formation in neutron-irradiated 3He-B where the
"primordial fireball" is formed in an exothermic nuclear reaction.Comment: Invited talk at LT-21 Conference, 20 pages, 3 figures available at
request, compressed ps file of the camera-ready format with 3 figures is at
ftp://boojum.hut.fi/pub/publications/lowtemp/LTL-96006.ps.g
Finite temperature Casimir effect in piston geometry and its classical limit
We consider the Casimir force acting on a -dimensional rectangular piston
due to massless scalar field with periodic, Dirichlet and Neumann boundary
conditions and electromagnetic field with perfect electric conductor and
perfect magnetic conductor boundary conditions. It is verified analytically
that at any temperature, the Casimir force acting on the piston is always an
attractive force pulling the piston towards the interior region, and the
magnitude of the force gets larger as the separation gets smaller. Explicit
exact expressions for the Casimir force for small and large plate separations
and for low and high temperatures are computed. The limits of the Casimir force
acting on the piston when some pairs of transversal plates are large are also
derived. An interesting result regarding the influence of temperature is that
in contrast to the conventional result that the leading term of the Casimir
force acting on a wall of a rectangular cavity at high temperature is the
Stefan--Boltzmann (or black body radiation) term which is of order ,
it is found that the contributions of this term from the interior and exterior
regions cancel with each other in the case of piston. The high temperature
leading order term of the Casimir force acting on the piston is of order ,
which shows that the Casimir force has a nontrivial classical
limit
Search for direct production of charginos and neutralinos in events with three leptons and missing transverse momentum in √s = 7 TeV pp collisions with the ATLAS detector
A search for the direct production of charginos and neutralinos in final states with three electrons or muons and missing transverse momentum is presented. The analysis is based on 4.7 fb−1 of proton–proton collision data delivered by the Large Hadron Collider and recorded with the ATLAS detector. Observations are consistent with Standard Model expectations in three signal regions that are either depleted or enriched in Z-boson decays. Upper limits at 95% confidence level are set in R-parity conserving phenomenological minimal supersymmetric models and in simplified models, significantly extending previous results
Jet size dependence of single jet suppression in lead-lead collisions at sqrt(s(NN)) = 2.76 TeV with the ATLAS detector at the LHC
Measurements of inclusive jet suppression in heavy ion collisions at the LHC
provide direct sensitivity to the physics of jet quenching. In a sample of
lead-lead collisions at sqrt(s) = 2.76 TeV corresponding to an integrated
luminosity of approximately 7 inverse microbarns, ATLAS has measured jets with
a calorimeter over the pseudorapidity interval |eta| < 2.1 and over the
transverse momentum range 38 < pT < 210 GeV. Jets were reconstructed using the
anti-kt algorithm with values for the distance parameter that determines the
nominal jet radius of R = 0.2, 0.3, 0.4 and 0.5. The centrality dependence of
the jet yield is characterized by the jet "central-to-peripheral ratio," Rcp.
Jet production is found to be suppressed by approximately a factor of two in
the 10% most central collisions relative to peripheral collisions. Rcp varies
smoothly with centrality as characterized by the number of participating
nucleons. The observed suppression is only weakly dependent on jet radius and
transverse momentum. These results provide the first direct measurement of
inclusive jet suppression in heavy ion collisions and complement previous
measurements of dijet transverse energy imbalance at the LHC.Comment: 15 pages plus author list (30 pages total), 8 figures, 2 tables,
submitted to Physics Letters B. All figures including auxiliary figures are
available at
http://atlas.web.cern.ch/Atlas/GROUPS/PHYSICS/PAPERS/HION-2011-02
Thermal Casimir effect in ideal metal rectangular boxes
The thermal Casimir effect in ideal metal rectangular boxes is considered
using the method of zeta functional regularization. The renormalization
procedure is suggested which provides the finite expression for the Casimir
free energy in any restricted quantization volume. This expression satisfies
the classical limit at high temperature and leads to zero thermal Casimir force
for systems with infinite characteristic dimensions. In the case of two
parallel ideal metal planes the results, as derived previously using thermal
quantum field theory in Matsubara formulation and other methods, are reproduced
starting from the obtained expression. It is shown that for rectangular boxes
the temperature-dependent contribution to the electromagnetic Casimir force can
be both positive and negative depending on side lengths. The numerical
computations of the scalar and electromagnetic Casimir free energy and force
are performed for cubesComment: 10 pages, 4 figures, to appear in Europ. Phys. J.
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