7,277 research outputs found
Comment on "Plasma ionization by annularly bounded helicon waves" [Phys . Plasmas 13, 063501 (2006)]
The neoclassical calculation of the helicon wave theory contains a
fundamental flaw. Use is made of a proportional relationship between the
magnetic field and its curl to derive the Helmholtz equation describing helicon
wave propagation; however, by the fundamental theorem of Stokes, the curl of
the magnetic field must be perpendicular to that portion of the field
contributing to the local curl. Reexamination of the equations of motion
indicates that only electromagnetic waves propagate through a stationary region
of constant pressure in a fully ionized, neutral medium.Comment: 7 pages, 1 figure, to be published in Phys. Plasmas,
http://link.aip.org/link/?PHPAEN/16/054701/
Spatial separation in a thermal mixture of ultracold Yb and Rb atoms
We report on the observation of unusually strong interactions in a thermal
mixture of ultracold atoms which cause a significant modification of the
spatial distribution. A mixture of Rb and Yb with a temperature
of a few K is prepared in a hybrid trap consisting of a bichromatic
optical potential superimposed on a magnetic trap. For suitable trap parameters
and temperatures, a spatial separation of the two species is observed. We infer
that the separation is driven by a large interaction strength between
Yb and Rb accompanied by a large three-body recombination rate.
Based on this assumption we have developed a diffusion model which reproduces
our observations
Algorithms for 3D rigidity analysis and a first order percolation transition
A fast computer algorithm, the pebble game, has been used successfully to
study rigidity percolation on 2D elastic networks, as well as on a special
class of 3D networks, the bond-bending networks. Application of the pebble game
approach to general 3D networks has been hindered by the fact that the
underlying mathematical theory is, strictly speaking, invalid in this case. We
construct an approximate pebble game algorithm for general 3D networks, as well
as a slower but exact algorithm, the relaxation algorithm, that we use for
testing the new pebble game. Based on the results of these tests and additional
considerations, we argue that in the particular case of randomly diluted
central-force networks on BCC and FCC lattices, the pebble game is essentially
exact. Using the pebble game, we observe an extremely sharp jump in the largest
rigid cluster size in bond-diluted central-force networks in 3D, with the
percolating cluster appearing and taking up most of the network after a single
bond addition. This strongly suggests a first order rigidity percolation
transition, which is in contrast to the second order transitions found
previously for the 2D central-force and 3D bond-bending networks. While a first
order rigidity transition has been observed for Bethe lattices and networks
with ``chemical order'', this is the first time it has been seen for a regular
randomly diluted network. In the case of site dilution, the transition is also
first order for BCC, but results for FCC suggest a second order transition.
Even in bond-diluted lattices, while the transition appears massively first
order in the order parameter (the percolating cluster size), it is continuous
in the elastic moduli. This, and the apparent non-universality, make this phase
transition highly unusual.Comment: 28 pages, 19 figure
Self-organization with equilibration: a model for the intermediate phase in rigidity percolation
Recent experimental results for covalent glasses suggest the existence of an
intermediate phase attributed to the self-organization of the glass network
resulting from the tendency to minimize its internal stress. However, the exact
nature of this experimentally measured phase remains unclear. We modify a
previously proposed model of self-organization by generating a uniform sampling
of stress-free networks. In our model, studied on a diluted triangular lattice,
an unusual intermediate phase appears, in which both rigid and floppy networks
have a chance to occur, a result also observed in a related model on a Bethe
lattice by Barre et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 94, 208701 (2005)]. Our results for
the bond-configurational entropy of self-organized networks, which turns out to
be only about 2% lower than that of random networks, suggest that a
self-organized intermediate phase could be common in systems near the rigidity
percolation threshold.Comment: 9 pages, 6 figure
Electric field inside a "Rossky cavity" in uniformly polarized water
Electric field produced inside a solute by a uniformly polarized liquid is
strongly affected by dipolar polarization of the liquid at the interface. We
show, by numerical simulations, that the electric "cavity" field inside a
hydrated non-polar solute does not follow the predictions of standard Maxwell's
electrostatics of dielectrics. Instead, the field inside the solute tends, with
increasing solute size, to the limit predicted by the Lorentz virtual cavity.
The standard paradigm fails because of its reliance on the surface charge
density at the dielectric interface determined by the boundary conditions of
the Maxwell dielectric. The interface of a polar liquid instead carries a
preferential in-plane orientation of the surface dipoles thus producing
virtually no surface charge. The resulting boundary conditions for
electrostatic problems differ from the traditional recipes, affecting the
microscopic and macroscopic fields based on them. We show that relatively small
differences in cavity fields propagate into significant differences in the
dielectric constant of an ideal mixture. The slope of the dielectric increment
of the mixture versus the solute concentration depends strongly on which
polarization scenario at the interface is realized. A much steeper slope found
in the case of Lorentz polarization also implies a higher free energy penalty
for polarizing such mixtures.Comment: 9 pages, 8 figure
Electronic response of aligned multishell carbon nanotubes
We report calculations of the effective electronic response of aligned
multishell carbon nanotubes. A local graphite-like dielectric tensor is
assigned to every point of the multishell tubules, and the effective transverse
dielectric function of the composite is computed by solving Maxwell's
equations. Calculations of both real and imaginary parts of the effective
dielectric function are presented, for various values of the filling fraction
and the ratio of the internal and external radii of hollow tubules. Our full
calculations indicate that the experimentally measured macroscopic dielectric
function of carbon nanotube materials is the result of a strong electromagnetic
coupling between the tubes, which cannot be accounted for with the use of
simplified effective medium theories. The presence of surface plasmons is
investigated, and both optical absorption cross sections and energy-loss
spectra of aligned tubules are calculated.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures, to appear in Phys. Rev.
Anomalous Rotational Relaxation: A Fractional Fokker-Planck Equation Approach
In this study we obtained analytically relaxation function in terms of
rotational correlation functions based on Brownian motion for complex
disordered systems in a stochastic framework. We found out that rotational
relaxation function has a fractional form for complex disordered systems, which
indicates relaxation has non-exponential character obeys to
Kohlrausch-William-Watts law, following the Mittag-Leffler decay.Comment: Revtex4, 9 pages. Paper was revised. References adde
Plasmon tunability in metallodielectric metamaterials
The dielectric properties of metamaterials consisting of periodically
arranged metallic nanoparticles of spherical shape are calculated by rigorously
solving Maxwell's equations. Effective dielectric functions are obtained by
comparing the reflectivity of planar surfaces limiting these materials with
Fresnel's formulas for equivalent homogeneous media, showing mixing and
splitting of individual-particle modes due to inter-particle interaction.
Detailed results for simple cubic and fcc crystals of aluminum spheres in
vacuum, silver spheres in vacuum, and silver spheres in a silicon matrix are
presented. The filling fraction of the metal f is shown to determine the
position of the plasmon modes of these metamaterials. Significant deviations
are observed with respect to Maxwell-Garnett effective medium theory for large
f, and multiple plasmons are predicted to exist in contrast to Maxwell-Garnett
theory.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figure
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