Streamlining the walls of an empty two-dimensional flexible-walled test section

The techniques used to find aerodynamically straight wall contours in a test section of a transonic wind tunnel are discussed. The walls were defined as aerodynamically straight up to Mach 0.9

Anisotropic magnetoresistance and anisotropic tunneling magnetoresistance due to quantum interference in ferromagnetic metal break junctions

We measure the low-temperature resistance of permalloy break junctions as a function of contact size and the magnetic field angle, in applied fields large enough to saturate the magnetization. For both nanometer-scale metallic contacts and tunneling devices we observe large changes in resistance with angle, as large as 25% in the tunneling regime. The pattern of magnetoresistance is sensitive to changes in bias on a scale of a few mV. We interpret the effect as a consequence of conductance fluctuations due to quantum interference.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures. Changes in response to reviewer comments. New data provide information about the mechanism causing the AMR and TAM

Matrix Product State Representations

This work gives a detailed investigation of matrix product state (MPS) representations for pure multipartite quantum states. We determine the freedom in representations with and without translation symmetry, derive respective canonical forms and provide efficient methods for obtaining them. Results on frustration free Hamiltonians and the generation of MPS are extended, and the use of the MPS-representation for classical simulations of quantum systems is discussed.Comment: Minor changes. To appear in QI

Unbounded violations of bipartite Bell Inequalities via Operator Space theory

In this work we show that bipartite quantum states with local Hilbert space dimension n can violate a Bell inequality by a factor of order $\sqrt{n}$ (up to a logarithmic factor) when observables with n possible outcomes are used. A central tool in the analysis is a close relation between this problem and operator space theory and, in particular, the very recent noncommutative $L_p$ embedding theory. As a consequence of this result, we obtain better Hilbert space dimension witnesses and quantum violations of Bell inequalities with better resistance to noise

Matrix Product States: Symmetries and Two-Body Hamiltonians

We characterize the conditions under which a translationally invariant matrix product state (MPS) is invariant under local transformations. This allows us to relate the symmetry group of a given state to the symmetry group of a simple tensor. We exploit this result in order to prove and extend a version of the Lieb-Schultz-Mattis theorem, one of the basic results in many-body physics, in the context of MPS. We illustrate the results with an exhaustive search of SU(2)--invariant two-body Hamiltonians which have such MPS as exact ground states or excitations.Comment: PDFLatex, 12 pages and 6 figure

Collective mechanism of dilepton production in high-energy nuclear collisions

Collective bremsstrahlung of vector meson fields in relativistic nuclear collisions is studied within the time-dependent Walecka model. Mutual deceleration of the colliding nuclei is described by introducing the effective stopping time and average rapidity loss of baryons. It is shown that electromagnetic decays of virtual omega-mesons produced by bremsstrahlung mechanism can provide a substantial contribution to the soft dilepton yield at the SPS bombarding energies. In particular, it may be responsible for the dilepton enhancement observed in 160 AGev central Pb+Au collisions. Suggestions for future experiments to estimate the relative contribution of the collective mechanism are given.Comment: 6 page

Grain boundary energies and cohesive strength as a function of geometry

Cohesive laws are stress-strain curves used in finite element calculations to describe the debonding of interfaces such as grain boundaries. It would be convenient to describe grain boundary cohesive laws as a function of the parameters needed to describe the grain boundary geometry; two parameters in 2D and 5 parameters in 3D. However, we find that the cohesive law is not a smooth function of these parameters. In fact, it is discontinuous at geometries for which the two grains have repeat distances that are rational with respect to one another. Using atomistic simulations, we extract grain boundary energies and cohesive laws of grain boundary fracture in 2D with a Lennard-Jones potential for all possible geometries which can be simulated within periodic boundary conditions with a maximum box size. We introduce a model where grain boundaries are represented as high symmetry boundaries decorated by extra dislocations. Using it, we develop a functional form for the symmetric grain boundary energies, which have cusps at all high symmetry angles. We also find the asymptotic form of the fracture toughness near the discontinuities at high symmetry grain boundaries using our dislocation decoration model.Comment: 12 pages, 19 figures, changed titl