Calculation of the Regularized Vacuum Energy in Cavity Field Theories

A novel technique based on Schwinger's proper time method is applied to the Casimir problem of the M.I.T. bag model. Calculations of the regularized vacuum energies of massless scalar and Dirac spinor fields confined to a static and spherical cavity are presented in a consistent manner. While our results agree partly with previous calculations based on asymptotic methods, the main advantage of our technique is that the numerical errors are under control. Interpreting the bag constant as a vacuum expectation value, we investigate potential cancellations of boundary divergences between the canonical energy and its bag constant counterpart in the fermionic case. It is found that such cancellations do not occur.Comment: 14 pages, 4 figures, accepted for publication in Eur.Phys.J.

Vacuum structure of a modified MIT Bag

An alternative to introducing and subsequently renormalizing classical parameters in the expression for the vacuum energy of the MIT bag for quarks is proposed in the massless case by appealing to the QCD trace anomaly and scale separation due to asymptotic freedom. The explicit inclusion of gluons implies an unrealistically low separation scale.Comment: 5 pages, 2 figure

Solution to the problem of the poor cyclic fatigue resistance of bulk metallic glasses

The recent development of metallic glass-matrix composites represents a particular milestone in engineering materials for structural applications owing to their remarkable combination of strength and toughness. However, metallic glasses are highly susceptible to cyclic fatigue damage, and previous attempts to solve this problem have been largely disappointing. Here, we propose and demonstrate a microstructural design strategy to overcome this limitation by matching the microstructural length scales (of the second phase) to mechanical crack-length scales. Specifically, semisolid processing is used to optimize the volume fraction, morphology, and size of second-phase dendrites to confine any initial deformation (shear banding) to the glassy regions separating dendrite arms having length scales of ≈2 μm, i.e., to less than the critical crack size for failure. Confinement of the damage to such interdendritic regions results in enhancement of fatigue lifetimes and increases the fatigue limit by an order of magnitude, making these “designed” composites as resistant to fatigue damage as high-strength steels and aluminum alloys. These design strategies can be universally applied to any other metallic glass systems

Near-Infrared-Spectroscopy with Extremely Large Telescopes: Integral-Field- versus Multi-Object-Instruments

Integral-field-spectroscopy and multi-object-spectroscopy provide the high multiplex gain required for efficient use of the upcoming generation of extremely large telescopes. We present instrument developments and designs for both concepts, and how these designs can be applied to cryogenic near-infrared instrumentation. Specifically, the fiber-based concept stands out the possibility to expand it to any number of image points, and its modularity predestines it to become the new concept for multi-field-spectroscopy. Which of the three concepts --- integral-field-, multi-object-, or multi-field-spectroscopy --- is best suited for the largest telescopes is discussed considering the size of the objects and their density on the sky.Comment: 8 pages, 4 figures (converted to bitmap), to appear in the proceedings of the Workshop on Extremely Large Telescopes, Sweden, June 1-2, 1999, uses spie.sty (V0.91) and spiebib.bst (V0.91

Spin induced gigahertz polarization oscillations in vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser devices

Spin-controlled vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers (VCSELs) have been intensively studied in recent years because of the low threshold feasibility and the nonlinearity above threshold, which make spin-VCSELs very promising for spintronic devices. Here we investigate the circular polarization dynamics of VCSELs on a picosecond time scale after pulsed optical spin injection at room temperature. A hybrid excitation technique combining continuous-wave (cw) unpolarized electrical excitation slightly above threshold and pulsed polarized optical excitation is applied. The experimental results demonstrate ultrafast circular polarization oscillations with a frequency of about 11 GHz. The oscillations last inside the first undulation of the intensity relaxation oscillations. Via theoretical calculations based on a rate equation model we analyze these oscillations as well as the underlying physical mechanisms

Ultrafast circular polarization oscillations in spin-polarized vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser devices

Spin-polarized lasers offer new encouraging possibilities for future devices. We investigate the polarization dynamics of electrically pumped vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers after additional spin injection at room temperature. We find that the circular polarization degree exhibits faster dynamics than the emitted light. Moreover the experimental results demonstrate a strongly damped ultrafast circular polarization oscillation due to spin injection with an oscillation frequency of approximately 11GHz depending on the birefringence in the VCSEL device. We compare our experimental results with theoretical calculations based on rate-equations. This allows us to predict undamped long persisting ultrafast polarization oscillations, which reveal the potential of spin-VCSELs for ultrafast modulation applications

Optimized phase switching using a single atom nonlinearity

We show that a nonlinear phase shift of pi can be obtained by using a single two level atom in a one sided cavity with negligible losses. This result implies that the use of a one sided cavity can significantly improve the pi/18 phase shift previously observed by Turchette et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 75, 4710 (1995)].Comment: 6 pages, 3 figures, added comments on derivation and assumption