Dynamic heterogeneity in the glass-like monoclinic phases of some halogen methane compounds

In this work we study the heterogeneity of the dynamics on the low-temperature monoclinic phases of the simple molecular glassy systems CBrnCl4−nCBrnCl4−n, n = 0, 1, 2. In these systems the disorder comes exclusively from reorientational jumps mainly around the C3 molecular axes. The different time scales are determined by means of the analysis of the spin-lattice relaxation time obtained through Nuclear Quadrupole Resonance (NQR) technique. Results are compared with those obtained from dielectric spectroscopy, from which two α- and β-relaxation times appear. NQR results enable us to ascribe with no doubt that the existence of two relaxations is due to dynamical heterogeneities which are the consequence of the different molecular surroundings of the molecules in the asymmetric unit cell of systems here studied.Fil: Zuriaga, Mariano Jose. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba. Instituto de Física Enrique Gaviola. Universidad Nacional de Córdoba. Instituto de Física Enrique Gaviola; ArgentinaFil: Perez, S. C.. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba. Instituto de Física Enrique Gaviola. Universidad Nacional de Córdoba. Instituto de Física Enrique Gaviola; ArgentinaFil: Pardo, L. C.. Universidad Politecnica de Catalunya; EspañaFil: Tamarit, J. L.. Universidad Politecnica de Catalunya; Españ

FACSGen 2.0 animation software: Generating 3D FACS-valid facial expressions for emotion research

In this article, we present FACSGen 2.0, new animation software for creating static and dynamic three-dimensional facial expressions on the basis of the Facial Action Coding System (FACS). FACSGen permits total control over the action units (AUs), which can be animated at all levels of intensity and applied alone or in combination to an infinite number of faces. In two studies, we tested the validity of the software for the AU appearance defined in the FACS manual and the conveyed emotionality of FACSGen expressions. In Experiment 1, four FACS-certified coders evaluated the complete set of 35 single AUs and 54 AU combinations for AU presence or absence, appearance quality, intensity, and asymmetry. In Experiment 2, lay participants performed a recognition task on emotional expressions created with FACSGen software and rated the similarity of expressions displayed by human and FACSGen faces. Results showed good to excellent classification levels for all AUs by the four FACS coders, suggesting that the AUs are valid exemplars of FACS specifications. Lay participants' recognition rates for nine emotions were high, and comparisons of human and FACSGen expressions were very similar. The findings demonstrate the effectiveness of the software in producing reliable and emotionally valid expressions, and suggest its application in numerous scientific areas, including perception, emotion, and clinical and neuroscience research

Implanted muon spin spectroscopy on 2-O-adamantane: a model system that mimics the liquid

The transition taking place between two metastable phases in 2-O-adamantane, namely the [Formula: see text] cubic, rotator phase and the lower temperature P21/c, Z  =  4 substitutionally disordered crystal is studied by means of muon spin rotation and relaxation techniques. Measurements carried out under zero, weak transverse and longitudinal fields reveal a temperature dependence of the relaxation parameters strikingly similar to those exhibited by structural glass[Formula: see text]liquid transitions (Bermejo et al 2004 Phys. Rev. B 70 214202; Cabrillo et al 2003 Phys. Rev. B 67 184201). The observed behaviour manifests itself as a square root singularity in the relaxation rates pointing towards some critical temperature which for amorphous systems is located some tens of degrees above that shown as the characteristic transition temperature if studied by thermodynamic means. The implications of such findings in the context of current theoretical approaches concerning the canonical liquid-glass transition are discussed.Postprint (author's final draft

Comparison of short-range-order in liquid- and rotator-phase states of a simple molecular liquid: A reverse Monte Carlo and molecular dynamics analysis of neutron diffraction data

6 págs.; 6 figs.; 1 tab. ; PACS number s : 61.25.Em, 61.20. p, 61.43. j, 61.12. qThe short-range order (SRO) correlations in liquid- and rotator-phase states of carbon tetrachloride are revisited here. The correlation of some angular magnitudes is used to evaluate the positional and orientational correlations in the liquid as well as in the rotator phase. The results show significant similitudes in the relative position of the molecules surrounding a central one but striking differences in their relative orientations, which could explain the changes in SRO between the two phases and the puzzling behavior of the local density in the liquid and rotator phases. © 2007 The American Physical Society.We would also like to acknowledge “Generalitat de Catalunya” Project No. 2005SGR- 00535 and MEC Project No. FIS2005-00975 for partial support of this work.Peer Reviewe

Aging in a Two-Dimensional Ising Model with Dipolar Interactions

Aging in a two-dimensional Ising spin model with both ferromagnetic exchange and antiferromagnetic dipolar interactions is established and investigated via Monte Carlo simulations. The behaviour of the autocorrelation function $C(t,t_w)$ is analyzed for different values of the temperature, the waiting time $t_w$ and the quotient $\delta=J_0/J_d$, $J_0$ and $J_d$ being the strength of exchange and dipolar interactions respectively. Different behaviours are encountered for $C(t,t_w)$ at low temperatures as $\delta$ is varied. Our results show that, depending on the value of $\delta$, the dynamics of this non-disordered model is consistent either with a slow domain dynamics characteristic of ferromagnets or with an activated scenario, like that proposed for spin glasses.Comment: 4 pages, RevTex, 5 postscript figures; acknowledgment added and some grammatical corrections in caption

Fitting in a complex chi^2 landscape using an optimized hypersurface sampling

Fitting a data set with a parametrized model can be seen geometrically as finding the global minimum of the chi^2 hypersurface, depending on a set of parameters {P_i}. This is usually done using the Levenberg-Marquardt algorithm. The main drawback of this algorithm is that despite of its fast convergence, it can get stuck if the parameters are not initialized close to the final solution. We propose a modification of the Metropolis algorithm introducing a parameter step tuning that optimizes the sampling of parameter space. The ability of the parameter tuning algorithm together with simulated annealing to find the global chi^2 hypersurface minimum, jumping across chi^2{P_i} barriers when necessary, is demonstrated with synthetic functions and with real data

Dynamical properties of the hypercell spin glass model

The spreading of damage technique is used to study the sensibility to initial conditions in a heath bath Monte Carlo simulation of the spin glass hypercubic cell model. Since the hypercubic cell in dimension 2D and the hypercubic lattice in dimension D resemble each other closely at finite dimensions and both converge to mean field when dimension goes to infinity, it allows us to study the effect of dimensionality on the dynamical behavior of spin glasses.Comment: 13 pages, RevTex, 8 ps figure

Monopoles, noncommutative gauge theories in the BPS limit and some simple gauge groups

For three conspicuous gauge groups, namely, SU(2), SU(3) and SO(5), and at first order in the noncommutative parameter matrix h\theta^{\mu\nu}, we construct smooth monopole --and, some two-monopole-- fields that solve the noncommutative Yang-Mills-Higgs equations in the BPS limit and that are formal power series in h\theta^{\mu\nu}. We show that there exist noncommutative BPS (multi-)monopole field configurations that are formal power series in h\theta^{\mu\nu} if, and only if, two a priori free parameters of the Seiberg-Witten map take very specific values. These parameters, that are not associated to field redefinitions nor to gauge transformations, have thus values that give rise to sharp physical effects.Comment: 30 pages, no figure