AMSB Demystified

We reinterpret anomaly-mediated supersymmetry breaking from a field-theoretic perspective in which superconformal anomalies couple to either the chiral compensator or the $U(1)_R$ vector superfield. As supersymmetry in the hidden sector is spontaneously broken by non-vanishing vacuum expectation values of the chiral compensator F-term and/or the $U(1)_R$ vector superfield D-term, the soft breakdown of supersymmetry emerges in the visible sector. This approach is physically more understandable compared with the conventional approach where the chiral compensator is treated on the same footing as a spurion in gauge-mediated supersymmetry breaking scenario.Comment: Submitted to the proceedings of SUSY09 conference, June 2009, Boston, US

Convergent and divergent patterns of morphological differentiation provide more evidence for reproductive character displacement in a wood cricket Gryllus fultoni (Orthoptera: Gryllidae)

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>In ecological character displacement, traits involved in reproductive isolation may not evolve in arbitrary directions when changes in these traits are by-products of adaptation to an ecological niche. In reproductive character displacement, however, selection acts directly on reproductive characters to enhance the degree of reproductive isolation between sympatric populations. Thus, the direction of change in reproductive characters may be arbitrary in relation to changes in other morphological characters. We characterized both tegminal characters and characters indicative of body size in sympatric and allopatric populations of <it>Gryllus fultoni</it>, a species displaying character displacement in its calling song characters in areas of sympatry with <it>G. vernalis </it>populations, to infer the nature and direction of selection acting on reproductive and morphological characters in sympatry.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Except for mirror area, the number of teeth in a file, and ovipositor length of <it>G. fultoni</it>, all male and female morphological characters in <it>G. fultoni </it>and <it>G. vernalis </it>exhibited a uniform tendency to decrease in size with increasing latitude. There was no significant variation in female morphological characters between sympatric and allopatric <it>G. fultoni </it>populations. However, males of sympatric and allopatric <it>G. fultoni </it>populations significantly differed in head width, hind femur length, and mirror area even after controlling for clinal factors. Head width and hind femur length of <it>G. fultoni </it>were more similar to those of <it>G. vernalis </it>in sympatric populations than in allopatric populations, resulting in morphological convergence of <it>G. fultoni </it>and <it>G. vernalis </it>in sympatry. However, the mirror area of <it>G. fultoni </it>displayed the divergent pattern in relation to the sympatric <it>G. vernalis </it>populations.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Divergence-enhancing selection may be acting on mirror area as well as calling song characters, whereas local adaptation or clinal effects may explain variation in other morphological characters in sympatric populations of <it>G. fultoni</it>. This study also suggests that structures and behaviors that directly enhance reproductive isolation may evolve together, independently of other morphological traits.</p

Relaxation of superfluid turbulence in highly oblate Bose-Einstein condensates

We investigate thermal relaxation of superfluid turbulence in a highly oblate Bose-Einstein condensate. We generate turbulent flow in the condensate by sweeping the center region of the condensate with a repulsive optical potential. The turbulent condensate shows a spatially disordered distribution of quantized vortices and the vortex number of the condensate exhibits nonexponential decay behavior which we attribute to the vortex pair annihilation. The vortex-antivortex collisions in the condensate are identified with crescent-shaped, coalesced vortex cores. We observe that the nonexponential decay of the vortex number is quantitatively well described by a rate equation consisting of one-body and two-body decay terms. In our measurement, we find that the local two-body decay rate is closely proportional to $T^2/\mu$, where $T$ is the temperature and $\mu$ is the chemical potential.Comment: 7 pages, 9 figure