Detection of nanoparticles by means of reflection electron energy loss spectroscopy depth profiling

The various studies of nanoparticles are of great importance because of the wide application of nanotechnology. The shape and structure of the nanoparticles can be determined by transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and their chemistry by electron energy loss spectroscopy. TEM sample preparation is an expensive and difficult procedure, however. Surface sensitive, analytical techniques, such as Auger electron spectroscopy (AES) and x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) are well applicable to detect the atoms that make up the nanoparticles, but cannot determine whether particle formation occurred. On the other hand, reflection electron energy loss spectroscopy (REELS) probes the electronic structures of atoms, which are strongly different for the atoms being in solution or in precipitated form. If the particle size is in the nm range, plasmon resonance can be excited in it, which appears as a loss feature in REELS spectrum. Thus, by measuring AES (XPS) spectra parallel with those of REELS, besides the atomic concentrations the presence of the nanoparticles can also be identified. As an example, the appearance of nanoparticles during ion beam induced mixing of C/Si layer will be shown

TRIDYN_FZR User Manual

The present report contains the User Manual of the FZR version of the dynamic binary-collision computer simulation code TRIDYN. The present version of the code is based on TRIDYN Vs. 4.0 by W.Möller and W.Eckstein, Department of Surface Physics, Max-Planck Institute of Plasma Physics, Boltzmannstraße 2, 85748 Garching, Germany (1989). Modifications, in particular for PC implementation, quasi-dynamic display and the input dialog have been performed at the Institute of Ion Beam Physics and Materials Research by V.Kharlamov, T.Schwieger, M.Posselt, and W.Möller (1995-2001)

Solution of the Nuclear Shell Model by Symmetry-Dictated Truncation

The dynamical symmetries of the Fermion Dynamical Symmetry Model are used as a principle of truncation for the spherical shell model. Utilizing the usual principle of energy-dictated truncation to select a valence space, and symmetry-dictated truncation to select a collective subspace of that valence space, we are able to reduce the full shell model space to one of manageable dimensions with modern supercomputers, even for the heaviest nuclei. The resulting shell model then consists of diagonalizing an effective Hamiltonian within the restricted subspace. This theory is not confined to any symmetry limits, and represents a full solution of the original shell model if the appropriate effective interaction of the truncated space can be determined. As a first step in constructing that interaction, we present an empirical determination of its matrix elements for the collective subspace with no broken pairs in a representative set of nuclei with $130\le A \le 250$. We demonstrate that this effective interaction can be parameterized in terms of a few quantities varying slowly with particle number, and is capable of describing a broad range of low-energy observables for these nuclei. Finally we give a brief discussion of extending these methods to include a single broken collective pair.Comment: invited paper for J. Phys. G, 57 pages, Latex, 18 figures a macro are available under request at [email protected]

Dynamic Lorentz force compensation with a fast piezoelectric tuner

Superconducting cavities are highly susceptible to small changes in resonance frequency due to their narrow bandwidth. At the proposed linac for the TESLA Linear Collider [1] the frequency changes resulting from mechanical deformations caused by Lorentz force detuning of the pulsed cavities will be of the order of the cavity bandwidth at the design operating gradient close to 25 MV/ m. The additional power required for field control is of the order of 10 % and will be intolerably high for the planned upgrade to 35 MV/m which appears to be feasible in the near future. While passive stiffening of the cavities is already applied to the present cavity design, the further reduction of the Lorentz force detuning constant is technically challenging. Therefore we propose an active scheme which reduces the timevarying Lorentz force detuning to much less than one cavity bandwidth. If successful, the scheme will improve the power efficiency of the TESLA linac significantly

Motion and twisting of magnetic particles ingested by alveolar macrophages in the human lung: effect of smoking and disease

BACKGROUND: Magnetic microparticles being ingested by alveolar macrophages can be used as a monitor for intracellular phagosome motions and cytoskeletal mechanical properties. These studies can be performed in the human lung after voluntary inhalation. The influence of cigarette smoking and lung diseases on cytoskeleton dependent functions was studied. METHODS: Spherical 1.3 μm diameter ferrimagnetic iron oxide particles were inhaled by 17 healthy volunteers (40 – 65 years), 15 patients with sarcoidosis (SAR), 12 patients with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF), and 18 patients with chronic obstructive bronchitis (COB). The retained particles were magnetized and aligned in an external 100 mT magnetic field. All magnetized particles induce a weak magnetic field of the lung, which was detected by a sensitive SQUID (superconducting quantum interference device) sensor. Cytoskeletal reorganizations within macrophages and intracellular transport cause stochastic magnetic dipole rotations, which are reflected in a decay of the magnetic lung field, called relaxation. Directed phagosome motion was induced in a weak magnetic twisting field. The resistance of the cytoplasm to particle twisting was characterized by the viscosity and the stiffness (ratio between stress to strain) of the cytoskeleton. RESULTS: One week after particle inhalation and later macrophage motility (relaxation) and cytoskeletal stiffness was not influenced by cigarette smoking, neither in healthy subjects, nor in the patients. Patients with IPF showed in tendency a faster relaxation (p = 0.06). Particle twisting revealed a non-Newtonian viscosity with a pure viscous and a viscoelastic compartment. The viscous shear was dominant, and only 27% of the shear recoiled and reflected viscoelastic properties. In patients with IPF, the stiffness was reduced by 60% (p < 0.02). An analysis of the shear rate and stress dependence of particle twisting allows correlating the rheological compartments to cytoskeletal subunits, in which microtubules mediate the pure viscous (non-recoverable) shear and microfilaments mediate the viscoelastic (recoverable) behavior. The missing correlation between relaxation and particle twisting shows that both stochastic and directed phagosome motion reflect different cytoskeletal mechanisms. CONCLUSION: Faster relaxation and a soft cytoskeleton in patients with IPF indicate alterations in cytoskeleton dependent functions of alveolar macrophages, which may cause dysfunction's in the alveolar defense, like a slower migration, a retarded phagocytosis, a disturbed phagosome lysosome fusion and an impaired clearance

Sicherheitsbeurteilung von Tragwerken mit Fuzzy-Modellen

Die Sicherheit von Tragwerken hängt von der zuverlässigen Modellierung sämtlicher Tragwerksparameter ab. Üblicherweise werden diese Parameter als deterministische oder stochastische Größen beschrieben. Stochastische Größen sind Zufallsgrößen, die unscharfe Informationen über Tragwerksparameter mit Hilfe von Dichtefunktionen erfassen. Nicht alle unscharfen Tragwerksparameter lassen sich als Zufallsgrößen darstellen. Sie können jedoch als Fuzzy-Größen modelliert werden. Fuzzy-Größen beschreiben unscharfe Tragwerksparameter als unscharfe Menge mit Bewertungsfunktion (Zugehörigkeitsfunktion). Die Fuzzy-Modellierung im Bauingenieurwesen umfaßt die Fuzzifizierung, die Fuzzy-Analyse, die Defuzzifizierung und die Sicherheitsbeurteilung. Sie erlaubt es, Tragwerke mit nicht-stochastischen unscharfen Eingangsinformationen zu untersuchen. Nicht-stochastische Eingangsinformationen treten sowohl bei bestehenden als auch bei neuen Tragwerken auf. Die unscharfen Ergebnisse der Fuzzy-Modellierung gestatten es, das Systemverhalten zutreffender zu beurteilen; sie sind die Ausgangspunkte für eine neue Sicherheitsbeurteilung auf der Grundlage der Möglichkeitstheorie. Bei der Fuzzy-Analyse ist die alpha-Diskretisierung vorteilhaft einsetzbar. Bei fehlender Monotonie der deterministischen Berechnungen und unter Berücksichtigung der Nichtlinearität wird die Fuzzy-Analyse mit Optimierungsalgorithmen durchgeführt. Zwei Beispiele werden diskutiert: die Lösung eines transzendenten Eigenwertproblems und eines linearen Gleichungssystems. Die Systemantworten der Fuzzy-Analyse werden der Sicherheitsbeurteilung zugrunde gelegt. Für ausgewählte physikalische Größen werden Versagensfunktionen definiert. Diese bewerten die Möglichkeit des Versagens. Mit Hilfe von Min-max-Operationen der Fuzzy-Set-Theorie erhält man aus Versagensfunktion und Fuzzy-Antwort die Versagensmöglichkeit bzw. die Überlebensmöglichkeit. Die ermittelte Versagensmöglichkeit repräsentiert die subjektive Beurteilung der Möglichkeit, daß das Ereignis &qout;Versagen&qout; eintritt. Beispiele zeigen die Unterschiede zwischen der Sicherheitsbeurteilung mittels Fuzzy-Modells und mittels deterministischen Modells

Enhanced Stability of Superheavy Nuclei due to High-Spin Isomerism

Configuration-constrained calculations of potential-energy surfaces in even-even superheavy nuclei reveal systematically the existence at low excitation energies of multi-quasiparticle states with deformed axially symmetric shapes and large angular momenta. These results indicate the prevalence of long-lived, multi-quasiparticle isomers. In a quantal system, the ground state is usually more stable than the excited states. In contrast, in superheavy nuclei the multi-qausiparticle excitations decrease the probability for both fission and $\alpha$ decay, implying enhanced stability. Hence, the systematic occurrence of multi-qausiparticle isomers may become crucial for future production and study of even heavier nuclei. The energies of multi-quasiparticle states and their $\alpha$ decays are calculated and compared to available data.Comment: 4 pages, 5 figures, accepted for publication in PR

Further explorations of Skyrme-Hartree-Fock-Bogoliubov mass formulas. II: Role of the effective mass

We have constructed four new complete mass tables, referred to as HFB-4 to HFB-7, each one including all the 9200 nuclei lying between the two drip lines over the range of Z and N>8 and Z<120. HFB-4 and HFB-5 have the isoscalar effective mass M*_s$ constrained to the value 0.92 M, with the former having a density-independent pairing, and the latter a density-dependent pairing. HFB-6 and HFB-7 are similar, except that M*_s is constrained to 0.8 M. The rms errors of the mass-data fits are 0.680, 0.675, 0.686, and 0.676 MeV, respectively, almost as good as for the HFB-2 mass formula, for which M*_s was unconstrained. However, as usual, the single-particle spectra depend significantly on M*_s. This decoupling of the mass fits from the fits to the single-particle spectra has been achieved only by making the cutoff parameter of the delta-function pairing force a free parameter. An improved treatment of the center-of-mass correction was adopted, but although this makes a difference to individual nuclei it does not reduce the overall rms error of the fit. The extrapolations of all four new mass formulas out to the drip lines are essentially the same as for the original HFB-2 mass formula.Comment: 12 pages revtex, 9 eps figures, accepted for publication in Phys. Rev.