12,492 research outputs found
Aging vs crystallisation dynamics in hyperquenched glasses and a resolution of the water Tg controversy
The possibility of observing a glass transition in water before
crystallisation occurs has been debated vigorously but inconclusively over five
decades [1,2]. For two decades a glass transition at 136K [2,3] was accepted
but this transition has perplexing qualities [4]. Recently it has been
argued[2,5],that this assignment must be wrong. The re-assignment of Tg to
temperatures above the 150K crystallisation was vigorously contested [6]. Here
we use detailed anneal-and-scan studies of a hyperquenched inorganic glass,
which does not crystallize on heating, to interpret the perplexing aspects of
the 136K water phenomenon. We show that it is indeed linked to a glass
transition, though only via a cross-over phenomenon. The thermal history that
gives the same behaviour ("shadow" glass transition) in the inorganic glass is
linked by crossover to a "normal" glass transition 23% higher in temperature.
Thus a Tg is indeed unobservable for water, while the vitreous nature of
hyperquenched glassy water is strongly supported. The shadow Tg is reproducible
in the inorganic glass as it is in H2O. The observed aging dynamics are very
relevant to current glass theory, particularly to dynamical heterogeneity which
is seen to have an energy manifestation.Comment: 23 pages, 4 figure
Country Spreads and Emerging Countries: Who Drives Whom?
A number of studies have stressed the role of movements in US interest rates and country spreads in driving business cycles in emerging market economies. At the same time, country spreads have been found to respond to changes in both the US interest rate and domestic conditions in emerging markets. These intricate interrelationships leave open a number of fundamental questions: Do country spreads drive business cycles in emerging countries or vice versa, or both? Do US interest rates affect emerging countries directly or primarily through their effect on country spreads? This paper addresses these and other related questions using a methodology that combines empirical and theoretical elements. The main findings of the paper are: (1) US interest rate shocks explain about 20 percent of movements in aggregate activity in emerging market economies at business-cycle frequency. (2) Country spread shocks explain about 12 percent of business-cycle movements in emerging economies. (3) About 60 percent of movements in country spreads are explained by country-spread shocks. (4) In response to an increase in US interest rates, country spreads first fall and then display a large, delayed overshooting; (5) US-interest-rate shocks affect domestic variables mostly through their effects on country spreads. (6) The fact that country spreads respond to business conditions in emerging economies significantly exacerbates aggregate volatility in these countries. (7) The US-interest-rate shocks and country-spread shocks identified in this paper are plausible in the sense that they imply similar business cycles in the context of an empirical VAR model as they do in the context of a theoretical dynamic general equilibrium model of an emerging market economy.
Explicitly Broken Supersymmetry with Exactly Massless Moduli
There is an avatar of the little hierarchy problem of the MSSM in
3-dimensional supersymmetry. We propose a solution to this problem in AdS
based on the AdS/CFT correspondence. The bulk theory is a supergravity theory
in which U(1) U(1) R-symmetry is gauged by Chern-Simons fields. The
bulk theory is deformed by a boundary term quadratic in the gauge fields. It
breaks SUSY completely and sources an exactly marginal operator in the dual
CFT. SUSY breaking is communicated by gauge interactions to bulk scalar fields
and their spinor superpartners. Since the R-charges of scalar and spinor
differ, this generates a SUSY breaking shift of their masses. The Ward identity
facilitates the calculation of these mass shifts to any desired order in the
strength of the deformation. Moduli fields are massless -neutral bulk
scalars with vanishing potential in the undeformed theory. These properties are
maintained to all orders in the deformation despite the fact that moduli couple
in the bulk to loops of R-charged fields.Comment: Match to published version. All order corrections, i.e. exact results
after SUSY breaking, are show
Polarized positron beams via intense two-color laser pulses
Generation of ultrarelativistic polarized positrons during interaction of an
ultrarelativistic electron beam with a counterpropagating two-color petawatt
laser pulse is investigated theoretically. Our Monte Carlo simulation based on
a semi-classical model, incorporates photon emissions and pair productions,
using spin-resolved quantum probabilities in the local constant field
approximation, and describes the polarization of electrons and positrons for
the pair production and photon emission processes, as well as the classical
spin precession in-between. The main reason of the polarization is shown to be
the spin-asymmetry of the pair production process in strong external fields,
combined with the asymmetry of the two-color laser field. Employing a feasible
scenario, we show that highly polarized positron beams, with a polarization
degree of , can be produced in a femtosecond time scale,
with a small angular divergence, mrad, and high density cm. The laser-driven positron source, along with laser
wakefield acceleration, may pave the way to small scale facilities for high
energy physics studies
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