13,736 research outputs found
Cosmological Density Perturbations with a Scale-Dependent Newton's G
We explore possible cosmological consequences of a running Newton's constant
, as suggested by the non-trivial ultraviolet fixed point
scenario in the quantum field-theoretic treatment of Einstein gravity with a
cosmological constant term. In particular we focus here on what possible
effects the scale-dependent coupling might have on large scale cosmological
density perturbations. Starting from a set of manifestly covariant effective
field equations derived earlier, we systematically develop the linear theory of
density perturbations for a non-relativistic, pressure-less fluid. The result
is a modified equation for the matter density contrast, which can be solved and
thus provides an estimate for the growth index parameter in the
presence of a running . We complete our analysis by comparing the fully
relativistic treatment with the corresponding results for the non-relativistic
(Newtonian) case, the latter also with a weakly scale dependent .Comment: 54 pages, 4 figure
Principles of Antifragile Software
The goal of this paper is to study and define the concept of "antifragile
software". For this, I start from Taleb's statement that antifragile systems
love errors, and discuss whether traditional software dependability fits into
this class. The answer is somewhat negative, although adaptive fault tolerance
is antifragile: the system learns something when an error happens, and always
imrpoves. Automatic runtime bug fixing is changing the code in response to
errors, fault injection in production means injecting errors in business
critical software. I claim that both correspond to antifragility. Finally, I
hypothesize that antifragile development processes are better at producing
antifragile software systems.Comment: see https://refuses.github.io
On the power counting of loop diagrams in general relativity
A class of loop diagrams in general relativity appears to have a behavior
which would upset the utility of the energy expansion for quantum effects. We
show through the study of specific diagrams that cancellations occur which
restore the expected behaviour of the energy expansion. By considering the
power counting in a physical gauge we show that the apparent bad behavior is a
gauge artifact, and that the quantum loops enter with a well behaved energy
expansion.Comment: 29 pages, uses axodraw and epsfig.tex, one small .eps file is
included. The full PostScript version is also available as
http://het.phast.umass.edu/students/kakukk/powercount_hepth.p
Oxidation of carbon monoxide over Ag (111) by preadsorbed active oxygen studied by XPS and UPS
N/
The Composite Spectrum of Strong Lyman-alpha Forest Absorbers
We present a new method for probing the physical conditions and metal
enrichment of the Intergalactic Medium: the composite spectrum of Ly-alpha
forest absorbers. We apply this technique to a sample of 9480 Ly-alpha
absorbers with redshift 2 < z < 3.5 identified in the spectra of 13,279
high-redshift quasars from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) Fifth Data
Release (DR5). Absorbers are selected as local minima in the spectra with 2.4 <
tau_Ly-alpha < 4.0; at SDSS resolution (~ 150km/s FWHM), these absorbers are
blends of systems that are individually weaker. In the stacked spectra we
detect seven Lyman-series lines and metal lines of O VI, N V, C IV, C III, Si
IV, C II, Al II, Si II, Fe II, Mg II, and O I. Many of these lines have peak
optical depths of < 0.02, but they are nonetheless detected at high statistical
significance. Modeling the Lyman-series measurements implies that our selected
systems have total H I column densities N_HI ~ 10^15.4cm-2. Assuming typical
physical conditions rho / = 10, T = 10^4 - 10^4.5 K, and [Fe/H]= -2
yields reasonable agreement with the line strengths of high-ionization species,
but it underpredicts the low-ionization species by two orders of magnitude or
more. This discrepancy suggests that the low ionization lines arise in dense,
cool, metal-rich clumps, present in some absorption systems.Comment: 7 pages, 4 figures, 1 table, accepted by ApJL, revisions mad
Radiation damage in high voltage silicon solar cells
Three high open-circuit voltage cell designs based on 0.1 ohm-cm p-type silicon were irradiated with 1 MeV electrons and their performance determined to fluences as high as 10 to the 15th power/sq cm. Of the three cell designs, radiation induced degradation was greatest in the high-low emitter (HLE cell). The diffused and ion implanted cells degraded approximately equally but less than the HLE cell. Degradation was greatest in an HLE cell exposed to X-rays before electron irradiation. The cell regions controlling both short-circuit current and open-circuit voltage degradation were defined in all three cell types. An increase in front surface recombination velocity accompanied time dependent degradation of an HLE cell after X-irradiation. It was speculated that this was indirectly due to a decrease in positive charge at the silicon-oxide interface. Modifications aimed at reducing radiation induced degradation are proposed for all three cell types
Nonlocal Effective Field Equations for Quantum Cosmology
The possibility that the strength of gravitational interactions might slowly
increase with distance, is explored by formulating a set of effective field
equations, which incorporate the gravitational, vacuum-polarization induced,
running of Newton's constant . The resulting long distance (or large time)
behaviour depends on only one adjustable parameter , and the implications
for the Robertson-Walker universe are calculated, predicting an accelerated
power-law expansion at later times .Comment: 9 page
Orthonormalization procedure for chiral effective nuclear field theory
We show that the Q-box expansion of nuclear many-body physics can be applied
in nuclear effective field theory with explicit pions and external sources. We
establish the corresponding power counting and give an algorithm for the
construction of a hermitean and energy-independent potential for arbitrary
scattering processes on nucleons and nuclei to a given order in the chiral
expansion. Various examples are discussed in some detail.Comment: 22 pp, 12 fig
Cosmic Voids and Galaxy Bias in the Halo Occupation Framework
(Abridged) We investigate the power of void statistics to constrain galaxy
bias and the amplitude of dark matter fluctuations. We use the halo occupation
distribution (HOD) framework to describe the relation between galaxies and dark
matter. After choosing HOD parameters that reproduce the mean space density
n_gal and projected correlation function w_p measured for galaxy samples with
M_r<-19 and M_r<-21 from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS), we predict the
void probability function (VPF) and underdensity probability function (UPF) of
these samples by populating the halos of a large, high-resolution N-body
simulation. If we make the conventional assumption that the HOD is independent
of large scale environment at fixed halo mass, then models constrained to match
n_gal and w_p predict nearly identical void statistics, independent of the
scatter between halo mass and central galaxy luminosity or uncertainties in HOD
parameters. Models with sigma_8=0.7 and sigma_8=0.9 also predict very similar
void statistics. However, the VPF and UPF are sensitive to environmental
variations of the HOD in a regime where these variations have little impact on
w_p. For example, doubling the minimum host halo mass in regions with large
scale (5 Mpc/h) density contrast delta<-0.65 has a readily detectable impact on
void probabilities of M_r<-19 galaxies, and a similar change for delta<-0.2
alters the void probabilities of M_r<-21 galaxies at a detectable level. The
VPF and UPF provide complementary information about the onset and magnitude of
density- dependence in the HOD. By detecting or ruling out HOD changes in low
density regions, void statistics can reduce systematic uncertainties in the
cosmological constraints derived from HOD modeling, and, more importantly,
reveal connections between halo formation history and galaxy properties.Comment: emulateapj, 16 pages, 13 figure
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