90 research outputs found
Black Hole Entropy, Topological Entropy and the Baum-Connes Conjecture in K-Theory
We shall try to exhibit a relation between black hole entropy and topological
entropy using the famous Baum-Connes conjecture for foliated manifolds which
are particular examples of noncommutative spaces. Our argument is qualitative
and it is based on the microscopic origin of the Beckenstein-Hawking
area-entropy formula for black holes, provided by superstring theory, in the
more general noncommutative geometric context of M-Theory following the Connes-
Douglas-Schwarz article.Comment: 17 pages, Latex, contains an important paragraph in section 2 which
gives a better understandin
Quantum Metrology: Towards an alternative definition for the meter
The motivation for this article came from an attempt to give an alternative
definition for the meter, the SI unit for measuring length. As a starting point
towards this goal, in this piece of work we present the underlying theory
behind our approach which uses ideas from quantum field theory and
noncommutative geometry, in particular the notion of an odd K-cycle which is
based on the Dirac operator (and its inverse, the Dirac propagator). Using (the
perhaps more familiar) physics terminology, the key point in our strategy is
this: instead of measuring length directly in space-time we measure the
"algebraic (spectral) length" in the space of the corresponding quantum states
of some particle (fermion) acted upon by the Dirac propagator. This approach
shares the spirit of the unanimus vote of the 24th General Conference of
Standards and Measures (21st October 2011) in Serves, France for the
redefinition of the fundamental units using Planck's constant.Comment: Extended version of an invited talk during the 4th Tactical
Conference on Metrology, 3-4 February 2012, National Technical University of
Athens, Athens Greec
A Study of Muon Neutrino Disappearance Using the Fermilab Main Injector Neutrino Beam
We report the results of a search for muon-neutrino disappearance by the Main
Injector Neutrino Oscillation Search. The experiment uses two detectors
separated by 734 km to observe a beam of neutrinos created by the Neutrinos at
the Main Injector facility at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory. The data
were collected in the first 282 days of beam operations and correspond to an
exposure of 1.27e20 protons on target. Based on measurements in the Near
Detector, in the absence of neutrino oscillations we expected 336 +/- 14
muon-neutrino charged-current interactions at the Far Detector but observed
215. This deficit of events corresponds to a significance of 5.2 standard
deviations. The deficit is energy dependent and is consistent with two-flavor
neutrino oscillations according to delta m-squared = 2.74e-3 +0.44/-0.26e-3
eV^2 and sin^2(2 theta) > 0.87 at 68% confidence level.Comment: In submission to Phys. Rev.
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New constraints on muon-neutrino to electron-neutrino transitions in MINOS
This paper reports results from a search for ν_μ → ν_e transitions by the MINOS experiment based on a 7×10^(20) protons-on-target exposure. Our observation of 54 candidate ν_e events in the far detector with a background of 49.1±7.0(stat)±2.7(syst) events predicted by the measurements in the near detector requires 2sin^2(2θ_(13))sin^2θ_(23)<0.12(0.20) at the 90% C.L. for the normal (inverted) mass hierarchy at δ_(CP)=0. The experiment sets the tightest limits to date on the value of θ_(13) for nearly all values of δ_(CP) for the normal neutrino mass hierarchy and maximal sin^2(2θ_(23))
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