Classical Representation of a Quantum System at Equilibrium

A quantum system at equilibrium is represented by a corresponding classical system, chosen to reproduce the thermodynamic and structural properties. The objective is to develop a means for exploiting strong coupling classical methods (e.g., MD, integral equations, DFT) to describe quantum systems. The classical system has an effective temperature, local chemical potential, and pair interaction that are defined by requiring equivalence of the grand potential and its functional derivatives with respect to the external and pair potentials for the classical and quantum systems. Practical inversion of this mapping for the classical properties is effected via the hypernetted chain approximation, leading to representations as functionals of the quantum pair correlation function. As an illustration, the parameters of the classical system are determined approximately such that ideal gas and weak coupling RPA limits are preserved

Exploring the link between market orientation and innovation in the European and US insurance markets

Despite the increasing research importance of market orientation concept in the marketing literature, few comparative studies between Europe and U.S. have been conducted. Consequently, this void limits the understanding of marketing orientation strategy in global markets. The empirical study reported in this article investigates (a) the influence of competitive environments on the understanding and uses of market orientation in insurance flrms in Europe and U.S. and (b) the effects of market orientation on firms innovativeness. The results not only provide empirical support of the concept of market orientation as defmed in the literature, but also expands it

Estimating the power spectrum covariance matrix with fewer mock samples

The covariance matrices of power-spectrum (P(k)) measurements from galaxy surveys are difficult to compute theoretically. The current best practice is to estimate covariance matrices by computing a sample covariance of a large number of mock catalogues. The next generation of galaxy surveys will require thousands of large volume mocks to determine the covariance matrices to desired accuracy. The errors in the inverse covariance matrix are larger and scale with the number of P(k) bins, making the problem even more acute. We develop a method of estimating covariance matrices using a theoretically justified, few-parameter model, calibrated with mock catalogues. Using a set of 600 BOSS DR11 mock catalogues, we show that a seven parameter model is sufficient to fit the covariance matrix of BOSS DR11 P(k) measurements. The covariance computed with this method is better than the sample covariance at any number of mocks and only ~100 mocks are required for it to fully converge and the inverse covariance matrix converges at the same rate. This method should work equally well for the next generation of galaxy surveys, although a demand for higher accuracy may require adding extra parameters to the fitting function.Comment: 7 pages, 7 figure

A Detection of the Baryon Acoustic Oscillation Features in the SDSS BOSS DR12 Galaxy Bispectrum

We present the first high significance detection ($4.1\sigma$) of the Baryon Acoustic Oscillations (BAO) feature in the galaxy bispectrum of the twelfth data release (DR12) of the Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey (BOSS) CMASS sample ($0.43 \leq z \leq 0.7$). We measured the scale dilation parameter, $\alpha$, using the power spectrum, bispectrum, and both simultaneously for DR12, plus 2048 MultiDark-PATCHY mocks in the North and South Galactic Caps (NGC and SGC, respectively), and the volume weighted averages of those two samples (N+SGC). The fitting to the mocks validated our analysis pipeline, yielding values consistent with the mock cosmology. By fitting to the power spectrum and bispectrum separately, we tested the robustness of our results, finding consistent values from the NGC, SGC and N+SGC in all cases. We found $D_{\mathrm{V}} = 2032 \pm 24 (\mathrm{stat.}) \pm 15 (\mathrm{sys.})$ Mpc, $D_{\mathrm{V}} = 2038 \pm 55 (\mathrm{stat.}) \pm 15 (\mathrm{sys.})$ Mpc, and $D_{\mathrm{V}} = 2031 \pm 22 (\mathrm{stat.}) \pm 10 (\mathrm{sys.})$ Mpc from the N+SGC power spectrum, bispectrum and simultaneous fitting, respectively.Comment: Submitted to Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 13 pages, 11 figure

Noncollinear magnetic phases and edge states in graphene quantum Hall bars

Application of a perpendicular magnetic field to charge neutral graphene is expected to result in a variety of broken symmetry phases, including antiferromagnetic, canted and ferromagnetic. All these phases open a gap in bulk but have very different edge states and non-collinear spin order, recently confirmed experimentally. Here we provide an integrated description of both edge and bulk for the various magnetic phases of graphene Hall bars making use of a non-collinear mean field Hubbard model. Our calculations show that, at the edges, the three types of magnetic order are either enhanced (zigzag) or suppressed (armchair). Interestingly, we find that preformed local moments in zigzag edges interact with the quantum Spin Hall like edge states of the ferromagnetic phase and can induce back-scattering.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure