7,436 research outputs found
Atom lithography without laser cooling
Using direct-write atom lithography, Fe nanolines are deposited with a pitch
of 186 nm, a full width at half maximum (FWHM) of 50 nm, and a height of up to
6 nm. These values are achieved by relying on geometrical collimation of the
atomic beam, thus without using laser collimation techniques. This opens the
way for applying direct-write atom lithography to a wide variety of elements.Comment: 7 pages, 11 figure
Optimising the multiplex factor of the frequency domain multiplexed readout of the TES-based microcalorimeter imaging array for the X-IFU instrument on the Athena Xray observatory
Athena is a space-based X-ray observatory intended for exploration of the hot
and energetic universe. One of the science instruments on Athena will be the
X-ray Integrated Field Unit (X-IFU), which is a cryogenic X-ray spectrometer,
based on a large cryogenic imaging array of Transition Edge Sensors (TES) based
microcalorimeters operating at a temperature of 100mK. The imaging array
consists of 3800 pixels providing 2.5 eV spectral resolution, and covers a
field of view with a diameter of of 5 arc minutes. Multiplexed readout of the
cryogenic microcalorimeter array is essential to comply with the cooling power
and complexity constraints on a space craft. Frequency domain multiplexing has
been under development for the readout of TES-based detectors for this purpose,
not only for the X-IFU detector arrays but also for TES-based bolometer arrays
for the Safari instrument of the Japanese SPICA observatory. This paper
discusses the design considerations which are applicable to optimise the
multiplex factor within the boundary conditions as set by the space craft. More
specifically, the interplay between the science requirements such as pixel
dynamic range, pixel speed, and cross talk, and the space craft requirements
such as the power dissipation budget, available bandwidth, and electromagnetic
compatibility will be discussed
Casimir force between two ideal-conductor walls revisited
The high-temperature aspects of the Casimir force between two neutral
conducting walls are studied. The mathematical model of "inert" ideal-conductor
walls, considered in the original formulations of the Casimir effect, is based
on the universal properties of the electromagnetic radiation in the vacuum
between the conductors, with zero boundary conditions for the tangential
components of the electric field on the walls. This formulation seems to be in
agreement with experiments on metallic conductors at room temperature. At high
temperatures or large distances, at least, fluctuations of the electric field
are present in the bulk and at the surface of a particle system forming the
walls, even in the high-density limit: "living" ideal conductors. This makes
the enforcement of the inert boundary conditions inadequate. Within a hierarchy
of length scales, the high-temperature Casimir force is shown to be entirely
determined by the thermal fluctuations in the conducting walls, modelled
microscopically by classical Coulomb fluids in the Debye-H\"{u}ckel regime. The
semi-classical regime, in the framework of quantum electrodynamics, is studied
in the companion letter by P.R.Buenzli and Ph.A.Martin, cond-mat/0506363,
Europhys.Lett.72, 42 (2005).Comment: 7 pages.One reference updated. Domain of validity of eq.(11)
correcte
Going abroad!: Studeren in Amerika
Wij willen ons even voorstellen als de aanstaande verslaggevers van de BB in Amerika. Wij; Bart Kollen en Hester van Leeuwen verstrekken begin januari met zeven anderen naar Bloomington in Indiana om daar één semester te studeren
Evidence for nonhadronic degrees of freedom in the transverse mass spectra of kaons from relativistic nucleus-nucleus collisions?
We investigate transverse hadron spectra from relativistic nucleus-nucleus
collisions which reflect important aspects of the dynamics - such as the
generation of pressure - in the hot and dense zone formed in the early phase of
the reaction. Our analysis is performed within two independent transport
approaches (HSD and UrQMD) that are based on quark, diquark, string and
hadronic degrees of freedom. Both transport models show their reliability for
elementary as well as light-ion (C+C, Si+Si) reactions. However, for
central Au+Au (Pb+Pb) collisions at bombarding energies above 5
AGeV the measured transverse mass spectra have a larger
inverse slope parameter than expected from the calculation. Thus the pressure
generated by hadronic interactions in the transport models above 5
AGeV is lower than observed in the experimental data. This finding shows
that the additional pressure - as expected from lattice QCD calculations at
finite quark chemical potential and temperature - is generated by strong
partonic interactions in the early phase of central Au+Au (Pb+Pb) collisions.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures,discussions extended, references added, to be
published in Phys. Rev. Let
Comments on "The long-period Galactic Cepheid RS Puppis. I. A geometric distance from its light echoes"
The luminous Galactic Cepheid RS Puppis is unique in being surrounded by a
dust nebula illuminated by the variable light of the Cepheid. In a recent paper
in this journal, Kervella et al. (2008) report a very precise geometric
distance to RS Pup, based on measured phase lags of the light variations of
individual knots in the reflection nebula. In this commentary, we examine the
validity of the distance measurement, as well as the reality of the spatial
structure of the nebula determined by Feast (2008) based upon the phase lags of
the knots. {Kervella et al. assumed that the illuminated dust knots lie, on
average, in the plane of the sky (otherwise it is not possible to derive a
geometric distance from direct imaging of light echoes). We consider the
biasing introduced by the high efficiency of forward scattering. We conclude
that most of the knots are in fact likely to lie in front of the plane of the
sky, thus invalidating the Kervella et al. result. We also show that the flat
equatorial disk structure determined by Feast is unlikely; instead, the
morphology of the nebula is more probably bipolar, with a significant tilt of
its axis with respect to the plane of the sky. Although the Kervella et al.
distance result is invalidated, we show that high-resolution polarimetric
imaging has the potential to yield a valid geometric distance to this important
Cepheid.Comment: 10 pages, 5 figures, 1 table; accepted by Astronomy & Astrophysic
Multidisciplinary decision-making in older patients with cancer, does it differ from younger patients?
Background: In order to tailor treatment to the individual patient, it is important to take the patients context and preferences into account, especially for older patients. We assessed the quality of information used in the decision-making process in different oncological MDTs and compared this for older (>70 years) and younger patients. Patients and methods: Cross-sectional observations of oncological MDTs were performed, using an observation tool in a University Hospital. Primary outcome measures were quality of input of information into the discussion for older and younger patients. Secondary outcomes were the contribution of different team members, discussion time for each case and whether or not a treatment decision was formulated. Results: Five-hundred and three cases were observed. The median patient age was 63 year, 32% were >70. In both age groups quality of patient-centered information (psychosocial information and patient's view) was poor. There was no difference in quality of information between older and younger patients, only for comorbidities the quality of information for older patients was better. There was no significant difference in the contributions by team members, discussion time (median 3.54 min) or number of decision reached (87.5%). Conclusion: For both age groups, we observed a lack of patient-centered information. The only difference between the age groups was for information on comorbidities. There were also no differences in contributions by different team members, case discussion time or number of decisions. Decision-making in the observed oncological MDTs was mostly based on medical technical information. (c) 2021 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)
Leading-edge vortices elevate lift of autorotating plant seeds
As they descend, the autorotating seeds of maples and some other trees generate unexpectedly high lift, but how they attain this elevated performance is unknown. To elucidate the mechanisms responsible, we measured the three-dimensional flow around dynamically scaled models of maple and hornbeam seeds. Our results indicate that these seeds attain high lift by generating a stable leading-edge vortex (LEV) as they descend. The compact LEV, which we verified on real specimens, allows maple seeds to remain in the air more effectively than do a variety of nonautorotating seeds. LEVs also explain the high lift generated by hovering insects, bats, and possibly birds, suggesting that the use of LEVs represents a convergent aerodynamic solution in the evolution of flight performance in both animals and plants
Long-Ranged Orientational Order in Dipolar Fluids
Recently Groh and Dietrich claimed the thermodynamic state of a dipolar fluid
depends on the shape of the fluid's container. For example, a homogeneous fluid
in a short fat container would phase separate when transferred to a tall skinny
container of identical volume and temperature. Their calculation thus lacks a
thermodynamic limit. We show that removal of demagnetizing fields restores the
true, shape independent, thermodynamic limit. As a consequence, spontaneously
magnetized liquids display inhomogeneous magnetization textures.Comment: 3 pages, LaTex, no figures. Submitted as comment to PRL, May 199
Phase Coexistence of a Stockmayer Fluid in an Applied Field
We examine two aspects of Stockmayer fluids which consists of point dipoles
that additionally interact via an attractive Lennard-Jones potential. We
perform Monte Carlo simulations to examine the effect of an applied field on
the liquid-gas phase coexistence and show that a magnetic fluid phase does
exist in the absence of an applied field. As part of the search for the
magnetic fluid phase, we perform Gibbs ensemble simulations to determine phase
coexistence curves at large dipole moments, . The critical temperature is
found to depend linearly on for intermediate values of beyond the
initial nonlinear behavior near and less than the where no
liquid-gas phase coexistence has been found. For phase coexistence in an
applied field, the critical temperatures as a function of the applied field for
two different are mapped onto a single curve. The critical densities
hardly change as a function of applied field. We also verify that in an applied
field the liquid droplets within the two phase coexistence region become
elongated in the direction of the field.Comment: 23 pages, ReVTeX, 7 figure
- …