GRB afterglows: deep Newtonian phase and its application

Gamma-ray burst afterglows have been observed for months or even years in a few cases. It deserves noting that at such late stages, the remnants should have entered the deep Newtonian phase, during which the majority of shock-accelerated electrons will no longer be highly relativistic. To calculate the afterglows, we must assume that the electrons obey a power-law distribution according to their kinetic energy, not simply the Lorentz factor.Comment: Poster at the 4th workshop "Gamma-Ray Bursts in the Afterglow Era" (Rome, 2004), accepted for publication in the proceedings. 4 pages, with 3 figures inserte

Beaming effects in GRBs and orphan afterglows

The overall dynamical evolution and radiation mechanism of $\gamma$-ray burst jets are briefly introduced. Various interesting topics concerning beaming in $\gamma$-ray bursts are discussed, including jet structures, orphan afterglows and cylindrical jets. The possible connection between $\gamma$-ray bursts and neutron star kicks is also addressed.Comment: 10 Pages, 4 figures, to appear in a special issue of ApSS. Oral report presented at "The Multiwavelength Approach to Unidentified Gamma-Ray Sources" (Hong Kong, June 1 - 4, 2004; Conference organizers: K.S. Cheng and G.E. Romero

Statistics Of The Burst Model At Super-critical Phase

We investigate the statistics of a model of type-I X-ray burst [Phys. Rev. E, {\bf 51}, 3045 (1995)] in its super-critical phase. The time evolution of the burnable clusters, places where fire can pass through, is studied using simple statistical arguments. We offer a simple picture for the time evolution of the percentage of space covered by burnable clusters. A relation between the time-average and the peak percentage of space covered by burnable clusters is also derived.Comment: 11 Pages in Revtex 3.0. Two figures available by sending request to [email protected]

Synergistic Anti-Candida Activity of Bengazole A in the Presence of Bengamide A †.

Bengazoles A⁻G from the marine sponge Jaspis sp. exhibit potent in vitro antifungal activity against Candida spp. and other pathogenic fungi. The mechanism of action (MOA) of bengazole A was explored in Candida albicans under both liquid culture and surface culture on Mueller-Hinton agar. Pronounced dose-dependent synergistic antifungal activity was observed with bengazole A in the presence of bengamide A, which is also a natural product from Jaspis sp. The MOA of bengazole A was further explored by monitoring the sterol composition of C. albicans in the presence of sub-lethal concentrations of bengazole A. The GCMS of solvent extracts prepared from liquid cultures of C. albicans in the presence of clotrimazole-a clinically approved azole antifungal drug that suppresses ergosterol biosynthesis by the inhibition of 14α-demethylase-showed reduced cellular ergosterol content and increased concentrations of lanosterol and 24-methylenedihydrolanosterol (a shunt metabolite of ergosterol biosynthesis). No change in relative sterol composition was observed when C. albicans was cultured with bengazole A. These results eliminate an azole-like MOA for the bengazoles, and suggest that another as-yet unidentified mechanism is operative

Chirally symmetric but confining dense and cold matter

The folklore tradition about the QCD phase diagram is that at the chiral restoration phase transition at finite density hadrons are deconfined and there appears the quark matter. We address this question within the only known exactly solvable confining and chirally symmetric model. It is postulated within this model that there exists linear Coulomb-like confining interaction. The chiral symmetry breaking and the quark Green function are obtained from the Schwinger-Dyson (gap) equation while the color-singlet meson spectrum results from the Bethe-Salpeter equation. We solve this model at T=0 and finite chemical potential $\mu$ and obtain a clear chiral restoration phase transition at the critical value \mu_{cr}. Below this value the spectrum is similar to the previously obtained one at \mu = 0. At \mu > \mu_{cr} the quarks are still confined and the physical spectrum consists of bound states which are arranged into a complete set of exact chiral multiplets. This explicitly demonstrates that a chirally symmetric matter consisting of confined but chirally symmetric hadrons at finite chemical potential is also possible in QCD. If so, there must be nontrivial implications for astrophysics.Comment: 7 pp; the paper has been expanded to make some technical details more clear; 3 new figures have been added. To appear in PR

Dark matter and dark gauge fields

Following the unexpected theoretical discovery of a mass dimension one fermionic quantum field of spin one half, we now present first results on two _local_ versions. The Dirac and Majorana fields of the standard model of particle physics are supplemented by their natural counterparts in the dark matter sector. The possibility that a mass dimension transmuting symmetry may underlie a new standard model of particle physics is briefly suggested.Comment: This manuscript combines a plenary talk (by DVA) and an invited talk (by DS) at "Dark 2007 - Sixth International Heidelberg Conference on Dark Matter in Astro and Particle Physics (Sydney, Australia, 24th-28th September 2007)." 11 pages. v2: minor typos correcte

Beaming Effects in Gamma-Ray Bursts

Based on a refined generic dynamical model, we investigate afterglows from jetted gamma-ray burst (GRB) remnants numerically. In the relativistic phase, the light curve break could marginally be seen. However, an obvious break does exist at the transition from the relativistic phase to the non-relativistic phase, which typically occurs at time 10 to 30 days. It is very interesting that the break is affected by many parameters, especially by the electron energy fraction (xi_e), and the magnetic energy fraction (xi_B^2). Implication of orphan afterglow surveys on GRB beaming is investigated. The possible existence of a kind of cylindrical jets is also discussed.Comment: Minor changes; 10 pages, with 9 eps figures embedded. Talk given at the Sixth Pacific Rim Conference on Stellar Astrophysics (Xi'an, China, July 11-17, 2002). A slightly revised version will appear in the proceeding