An Egyptian green schist palette and an amazonite gemstone from the “Palace of the Copper Axes” at Batrawy, Jordan

The exploration of the “Palace of the Copper Axes”, the Early Bronze Age III palace of the easternmost city of Southern Levant during the 3rd millennium BC, was resumed in 2018, during the 14th season of excavation at Khirbet al-Batrawy in north-central Jordan, and completed in 2019. In the entrance hall of the palace, a square space with ceilings supported by four pillars, an Egyptian green schist palette, a cyan gemstone of amazonite and a pierced bead of fluorapatite were found buried under the destruction layer, while a barrel-shaped carnelian bead from Mesopotamia was found in the destruction layer just outside the Eastern Pavilion of the palace. These finds again testify to the inclusion of the palace and the city into a wide international trade network and its special connections with Pharaonic Egypt

Exploring quantum quasicrystal patterns: a variational study

We study the emergence of quasicrystal configurations produced purely by quantum fluctuations in the ground-state phase diagram of interacting bosonic systems. By using a variational mean-field approach, we determine the relevant features of the pair interaction potential that stabilize such quasicrystalline states in two dimensions. Unlike their classical counterpart, in which the interplay between only two wave vectors determines the resulting symmetries of the solutions, the quantum picture relates in a more complex way to the instabilities of the excitation spectrum. Moreover, the quantum quasicrystal patterns are found to emerge as the ground state with no need of moderate thermal fluctuations. The study extends to the exploration of the excitation properties and the possible existence of super-quasicrystals, i.e. supersolid-like quasicrystalline states in which the long-range non-periodic density profile coexist with a non-zero superfluid fraction. Our calculations show that, in an intermediate region between the homogeneous superfluid and the normal quasicrystal phases, these exotic states indeed exist at zero temperature. Comparison with full numerical simulations provides a solid verification of the variational approach adopted in this work.Comment: 10 pages, 6 Figure

Tunneling of polarized fermions in 3D double wells

We study the tunneling of a spin polarized Fermi gas in a three-dimensional double well potential, focusing on the time dynamics starting from an initial state in which there is an imbalance in the number of particles in the two wells. Although fermions in different doublets of the double well tunnel with different frequencies, we point out that (incoherent) oscillations of a large number of particles can arise, as a consequence of the presence of transverse degrees of freedom. Estimates of the doublet structure and of the occupation of transverse eigenstates for a realistic experimental setup are provided.Comment: 10 pages, Typos corrected and figures changed - published in Laser Physics, issue on the LPHYS'11 conference (Sarajevo, 2011

Geological reconstruction in the area of maximum co-seismic subsidence during the 2009 Mw=6.1 L’Aquila earthquake using geophysical analyses and borehole stratigraphy.

InSAR images showed that the 2009 Mw=6.1 normal faulting L'Aquila earthquake (Abruzzi region, central Italy) produced a maximum co-seismic subsidence of ca. 24 cm in the epicentral area. We report new results about the stratigraphic architecture of this area by means of the integration of geophysical and stratigraphic data from a new 151 m deep borehole. According to the indication of preliminary geophysical (electrical resistivity tomography and seismic noise) surveys, the borehole was drilled where maximum thicknesses of fine-grained sediments were expected. The geophysical results were also useful to estimate the basin substrate depth and to define the geometry of the continental deposits, successively constrained by the core stratigraphy. The core is characterized by two sequences separated by an erosional discontinuity. The upper sequence is composed by silty, sandy and gravelly deposits, mainly characterized by high values of electrical resistivity. The lower sequence is characterized by prevalence of grey clayey silt and sandy sediments, with low values of resistivity. Based on correlations among the stratigraphic core and outcrop data of the Aterno Valley, we interpret the upper sequence as related to fluvial-alluvial depositional environment during Middle Pleistocene-Holocene, whereas the lower sequence is related to deposition in a prevalent marshy floodplain environment during Early Pleistocene.Published350-3621A. Geomagnetismo e PaleomagnetismoJCR Journalrestricte

Interference Study of the chi_c0 (1^3P_0) in the Reaction Proton-Antiproton -> pi^0 pi^0

Fermilab experiment E835 has observed proton-antiproton annihilation production of the charmonium state chi_c0 and its subsequent decay into pi^0 pi^0. Although the resonant amplitude is an order of magnitude smaller than that of the non-resonant continuum production of pi^0 pi^0, an enhanced interference signal is evident. A partial wave expansion is used to extract physics parameters. The amplitudes J=0 and 2, of comparable strength, dominate the expansion. Both are accessed by L=1 in the entrance proton-antiproton channel. The product of the input and output branching fractions is determined to be B(pbar p -> chi_c0) x B(chi_c0 -> pi^0 pi^0)= (5.09 +- 0.81 +- 0.25) x 10^-7.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures, Accepted by PRL (July 2003

Study of the reaction pbar p -> phi phi from 1.1 to 2.0 GeV/c

A study has been performed of the reaction pbar p -> 4K using in-flight antiprotons from 1.1 to 2.0 GeV/c incident momentum interacting with a hydrogen jet target. The reaction is dominated by the production of a pair of phi mesons. The pbar p -> phi phi cross section rises sharply above threshold and then falls continuously as a function of increasing antiproton momentum. The overall magnitude of the cross section exceeds expectations from a simple application of the OZI rule by two orders of magnitude. In a fine scan around the xi/f_J(2230) resonance, no structure is observed. A limit is set for the double branching ratio B(xi -> pbar p) * B(xi -> phi phi) < 6e-5 for a spin 2 resonance of M = 2.235 GeV and Width = 15 MeV.Comment: 13 pages, 13 figures, 2 tables, Latex. To be published in Phys. Rev.

Precision measurements of the total and partial widths of the psi(2S) charmonium meson with a new complementary-scan technique in antiproton-proton annihilations

We present new precision measurements of the psi(2S) total and partial widths from excitation curves obtained in antiproton-proton annihilations by Fermilab experiment E835 at the Antiproton Accumulator in the year 2000. A new technique of complementary scans was developed to study narrow resonances with stochastically cooled antiproton beams. The technique relies on precise revolution-frequency and orbit-length measurements, while making the analysis of the excitation curve almost independent of machine lattice parameters. We study the psi(2S) meson through the processes pbar p -> e+ e- and pbar p -> J/psi + X -> e+ e- + X. We measure the width to be Gamma = 290 +- 25(sta) +- 4(sys) keV and the combination of partial widths Gamma_e+e- * Gamma_pbarp / Gamma = 579 +- 38(sta) +- 36(sys) meV, which represent the most precise measurements to date.Comment: 17 pages, 3 figures, 3 tables. Final manuscript accepted for publication in Phys. Lett. B. Parts of the text slightly expanded or rearranged; results are unchange

The Space of Stability Conditions on Abelian Threefolds, and on some Calabi-Yau Threefolds

We describe a connected component of the space of stability conditions on abelian threefolds, and on Calabi-Yau threefolds obtained as (the crepant resolution of) a finite quotient of an abelian threefold. Our proof includes the following essential steps: 1. We simultaneously strengthen a conjecture by the first two authors and Toda, and prove that it follows from a more natural and seemingly weaker statement. This conjecture is a Bogomolov-Gieseker type inequality involving the third Chern character of "tilt-stable" two-term complexes on smooth projective threefolds; we extend it from complexes of tilt-slope zero to arbitrary tilt-slope. 2. We show that this stronger conjecture implies the so-called support property of Bridgeland stability conditions, and the existence of an explicit open subset of the space of stability conditions. 3. We prove our conjecture for abelian threefolds, thereby giving reproving and generalizing a result by Maciocia and Piyaratne. Important in our approach is a more systematic understanding on the behaviour of quadratic inequalities for semistable objects under wall-crossing, closely related to the support property.Comment: 45 pages, 1 figure. v2: addressed referee comments. To appear in Inventiones Mat