2,168 research outputs found
Feed-forward and its role in conditional linear optical quantum dynamics
Nonlinear optical quantum gates can be created probabilistically using only
single photon sources, linear optical elements and photon-number resolving
detectors. These gates are heralded but operate with probabilities much less
than one. There is currently a large gap between the performance of the known
circuits and the established upper bounds on their success probabilities. One
possibility for increasing the probability of success of such gates is
feed-forward, where one attempts to correct certain failure events that
occurred in the gate's operation. In this brief report we examine the role of
feed-forward in improving the success probability. In particular, for the
non-linear sign shift gate, we find that in a three-mode implementation with a
single round of feed-forward the optimal average probability of success is
approximately given by p= 0.272. This value is only slightly larger than the
general optimal success probability without feed-forward, P= 0.25.Comment: 4 pages, 3 eps figures, typeset using RevTex4, problems with figures
resolve
Simulating merging binary black holes with nearly extremal spins
Astrophysically realistic black holes may have spins that are nearly extremal
(i.e., close to 1 in dimensionless units). Numerical simulations of binary
black holes are important tools both for calibrating analytical templates for
gravitational-wave detection and for exploring the nonlinear dynamics of curved
spacetime. However, all previous simulations of binary-black-hole inspiral,
merger, and ringdown have been limited by an apparently insurmountable barrier:
the merging holes' spins could not exceed 0.93, which is still a long way from
the maximum possible value in terms of the physical effects of the spin. In
this paper, we surpass this limit for the first time, opening the way to
explore numerically the behavior of merging, nearly extremal black holes.
Specifically, using an improved initial-data method suitable for binary black
holes with nearly extremal spins, we simulate the inspiral (through 12.5
orbits), merger and ringdown of two equal-mass black holes with equal spins of
magnitude 0.95 antialigned with the orbital angular momentum.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures, updated with version accepted for publication in
Phys. Rev. D, removed a plot that was incorrectly included at the end of the
article in version v
Characterization of a broad-based mosquito yeast interfering RNA larvicide with a conserved target site in mosquito semaphorin-1a genes
BACKGROUND:
RNA interference (RNAi), which has facilitated functional characterization of mosquito neural development genes such as the axon guidance regulator semaphorin-1a (sema1a), could one day be applied as a new means of vector control. Saccharomyces cerevisiae (baker's yeast) may represent an effective interfering RNA expression system that could be used directly for delivery of RNA pesticides to mosquito larvae. Here we describe characterization of a yeast larvicide developed through bioengineering of S. cerevisiae to express a short hairpin RNA (shRNA) targeting a conserved site in mosquito sema1a genes.
RESULTS:
Experiments conducted on Aedes aegypti larvae demonstrated that the yeast larvicide effectively silences sema1a expression, generates severe neural defects, and induces high levels of larval mortality in laboratory, simulated-field, and semi-field experiments. The larvicide was also found to induce high levels of Aedes albopictus, Anopheles gambiae and Culex quinquefasciatus mortality.
CONCLUSIONS:
The results of these studies indicate that use of yeast interfering RNA larvicides targeting mosquito sema1a genes may represent a new biorational tool for mosquito control
Hot entanglement in a simple dynamical model
How mixed can one component of a bi-partite system be initially and still
become entangled through interaction with a thermalized partner? We address
this question here. In particular, we consider the question of how mixed a
two-level system and a field mode may be such that free entanglement arises in
the course of the time evolution according to a Jaynes-Cummings type
interaction. We investigate the situation for which the two-level system is
initially in mixed state taken from a one-parameter set, whereas the field has
been prepared in an arbitrary thermal state. Depending on the particular choice
for the initial state and the initial temperature of the quantised field mode,
three cases can be distinguished: (i) free entanglement will be created
immediately, (ii) free entanglement will be generated, but only at a later time
different from zero, (iii) the partial transpose of the joint state remains
positive at all times. It will be demonstrated that increasing the initial
temperature of the field mode may cause the joint state to become distillable
during the time evolution, in contrast to a non-distillable state at lower
initial temperatures. We further assess the generated entanglement
quantitatively, by evaluating the logarithmic negativity numerically, and by
providing an analytical upper bound.Comment: 5 pages, 2 figures. Contribution to the proceedings of the
'International Conference on Quantum Information', Oviedo, July 13-18, 2002.
Discusses sudden changes of entanglement properties in a dynamical quantum
mode
Coincident count rates in absorbing dielectric media
A study of the effects of absorption on the nonlinear process of parametric
down conversion is presented. Absorption within the nonlinear medium is
accounted for by employing the framework of macroscopic QED and the Green
tensor quantization of the electromagnetic field. An effective interaction
Hamiltonian, which describes the nonlinear interaction of the electric field
and the linear noise polarization field, is used to derive the quantum state of
the light leaving a nonlinear crystal. The signal and idler modes of this
quantum state are found to be a superpositions of the electric and noise
polarization fields. Using this state, the expression for the coincident count
rates for both Type I and Type II conversion are found. The nonlinear
interaction with the noise polarization field were shown to cause an increase
in the rate on the order of 10^{-12} for absorption of 10% per cm. This
astonishingly small effect is found to be negligible compared to the decay
caused by linear absorption of the propagating modes. From the expressions for
the biphoton amplitude it can be seen the maximally entangled states can still
be produced even in the presence of strong absorption.Comment: Updated to journal version. 10 Pages, 8 figure
On Toroidal Horizons in Binary Black Hole Inspirals
We examine the structure of the event horizon for numerical simulations of
two black holes that begin in a quasicircular orbit, inspiral, and finally
merge. We find that the spatial cross section of the merged event horizon has
spherical topology (to the limit of our resolution), despite the expectation
that generic binary black hole mergers in the absence of symmetries should
result in an event horizon that briefly has a toroidal cross section. Using
insight gained from our numerical simulations, we investigate how the choice of
time slicing affects both the spatial cross section of the event horizon and
the locus of points at which generators of the event horizon cross. To ensure
the robustness of our conclusions, our results are checked at multiple
numerical resolutions. 3D visualization data for these resolutions are
available for public access online. We find that the structure of the horizon
generators in our simulations is consistent with expectations, and the lack of
toroidal horizons in our simulations is due to our choice of time slicing.Comment: Submitted to Phys. Rev.
Black Hole--Scalar Field Interactions in Spherical Symmetry
We examine the interactions of a black hole with a massless scalar field
using a coordinate system which extends ingoing Eddington-Finkelstein
coordinates to dynamic spherically symmetric-spacetimes. We avoid problems with
the singularity by excising the region of the black hole interior to the
apparent horizon. We use a second-order finite difference scheme to solve the
equations. The resulting program is stable and convergent and will run forever
without problems. We are able to observe quasi-normal ringing and power-law
tails as well an interesting nonlinear feature.Comment: 16 pages, 26 figures, RevTex, to appear in Phys. Rev.
Black Hole Area in Brans-Dicke Theory
We have shown that the dynamics of the scalar field
in Brans-Dicke theories of gravity makes the surface area of the black hole
horizon {\it oscillatory} during its dynamical evolution. It explicitly
explains why the area theorem does not hold in Brans-Dicke theory. However, we
show that there exists a certain non-decreasing quantity defined on the event
horizon which is proportional to the black hole entropy for the case of
stationary solutions in Brans-Dicke theory. Some numerical simulations have
been demonstrated for Oppenheimer-Snyder collapse in Brans-Dicke theory.Comment: 12 pages, latex, 5 figures, epsfig.sty, some statements clarified and
two references added, to appear in Phys. Rev.
What does a binary black hole merger look like?
We present a method of calculating the strong-field gravitational lensing
caused by many analytic and numerical spacetimes. We use this procedure to
calculate the distortion caused by isolated black holes and by numerically
evolved black hole binaries. We produce both demonstrative images illustrating
details of the spatial distortion and realistic images of collections of stars
taking both lensing amplification and redshift into account. On large scales
the lensing from inspiraling binaries resembles that of single black holes, but
on small scales the resulting images show complex and in some cases
self-similar structure across different angular scales.Comment: 10 pages, 12 figures. Supplementary images and movies can be found at
http://www.black-holes.org/the-science-numerical-relativity/numerical-relativity/gravitational-lensin
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