Recent Developments in the Lorentz Integral Transform (LIT) Method

Recent results on electromagnetic reactions into the continuum of systems with A from 3 to 7 are presented. They have been obtained using the Lorentz Integral Transform (LIT) method. The method is shortly reviewed, emphasizing how all the results, though obtained with the sole ingredient of the N-N potential, contain the full complicated dynamics of the A-body system, both in the initial and in the final states.Comment: 7 pages, 6 figures, Proc. XIX European Few-Body Conf., Groningen, Aug. 23-27, 200

Physics of Electroweak Interactions with Nuclei

In this series of lectures it is illustrated how one can study the strong dynamics of nuclei by means of the electroweak probe. In particular, the most important steps to derive the cross sections in first order perturbation theory are reviewed. In the derivation the focus is put on the main ingredients entering the hadronic part (response functions), i.e. the initial and final states of the system and the operators relevant for the reaction. Emphasis is put on the electromagnetic interaction with few-nucleon systems. The Lorentz integral transform method to calculate the response functions ab initio is described. A few examples of the comparison between theoretical and experimental results are shown. The dependence of the response functions on the nuclear interaction and in particular on three-body forces is emphasized.Comment: Lectures given at the International Scientific Meeting on Nuclear Physics, La Rabida, Huelva (Spain), July 4-10, 200

Collapse transitions of a periodic hydrophilic hydrophobic chain

We study a single self avoiding hydrophilic hydrophobic polymer chain, through Monte Carlo lattice simulations. The affinity of monomer $i$ for water is characterized by a (scalar) charge $\lambda_{i}$, and the monomer-water interaction is short-ranged. Assuming incompressibility yields an effective short ranged interaction between monomer pairs $(i,j)$, proportional to $(\lambda_i+\lambda_j)$. In this article, we take $\lambda_i=+1$ (resp. ($\lambda_i=- 1$)) for hydrophilic (resp. hydrophobic) monomers and consider a chain with (i) an equal number of hydro-philic and -phobic monomers (ii) a periodic distribution of the $\lambda_{i}$ along the chain, with periodicity $2p$. The simulations are done for various chain lengths $N$, in $d=2$ (square lattice) and $d=3$ (cubic lattice). There is a critical value $p_c(d,N)$ of the periodicity, which distinguishes between different low temperature structures. For $p >p_c$, the ground state corresponds to a macroscopic phase separation between a dense hydrophobic core and hydrophilic loops. For $p <p_c$ (but not too small), one gets a microscopic (finite scale) phase separation, and the ground state corresponds to a chain or network of hydrophobic droplets, coated by hydrophilic monomers. We restrict our study to two extreme cases, $p \sim O(N)$ and $p\sim O(1)$ to illustrate the physics of the various phase transitions. A tentative variational approach is also presented.Comment: 21 pages, 17 eps figures, accepted for publication in Eur. Phys. J.

Monte Carlo Results for Projected Self-Avoiding Polygons: A Two-dimensional Model for Knotted Polymers

We introduce a two-dimensional lattice model for the description of knotted polymer rings. A polymer configuration is modeled by a closed polygon drawn on the square diagonal lattice, with possible crossings describing pairs of strands of polymer passing on top of each other. Each polygon configuration can be viewed as the two- dimensional projection of a particular knot. We study numerically the statistics of large polygons with a fixed knot type, using a generalization of the BFACF algorithm for self-avoiding walks. This new algorithm incorporates both the displacement of crossings and the three types of Reidemeister transformations preserving the knot topology. Its ergodicity within a fixed knot type is not proven here rigorously but strong arguments in favor of this ergodicity are given together with a tentative sketch of proof. Assuming this ergodicity, we obtain numerically the following results for the statistics of knotted polygons: In the limit of a low crossing fugacity, we find a localization along the polygon of all the primary factors forming the knot. Increasing the crossing fugacity gives rise to a transition from a self-avoiding walk to a branched polymer behavior.Comment: 36 pages, 30 figures, latex, epsf. to appear in J.Phys.A: Math. Ge

Interacting Elastic Lattice Polymers: a Study of the Free-Energy of Globular Rings

We introduce and implement a Monte Carlo scheme to study the equilibrium statistics of polymers in the globular phase. It is based on a model of "interacting elastic lattice polymers" and allows a sufficiently good sampling of long and compact configurations, an essential prerequisite to study the scaling behaviour of free energies. By simulating interacting self-avoiding rings at several temperatures in the collapsed phase, we estimate both the bulk and the surface free energy. Moreover from the corresponding estimate of the entropic exponent $\alpha-2$ we provide evidence that, unlike for swollen and $\Theta$-point rings, the hyperscaling relation is not satisfied for globular rings.Comment: 8 pages; v2: typos removed, published versio

Separation of traces of metal ions from sodium matrices

Method for isolating metal ion traces from sodium matrices consists of two extractions and an ion exchange step. Extraction is accomplished by using 2-thenoyltrifluoracetone and dithizone followed by cation exchange

Combining rare events techniques: phase change in Si nanoparticles

We introduce a combined Restrained MD/Parallel Tempering approach to study the difference in free energy as a function of a set of collective variables between two states in presence of unknown slow degrees of freedom. We applied this method to study the relative stability of the amorphous vs crystalline nanoparticles of size ranging between 0.8 and 1.8 nm as a function of the temperature. We found that, at variance with bulk systems, at low T small nanoparticles are amorphous and undergo an amorphous-to-crystalline phase transition at higher T. On the contrary, large nanoparticles recover the bulk-like behavior: crystalline at low $T$ and amorphous at high T