811 research outputs found
Critical behavior of interacting surfaces with tension
Wetting phenomena, molecular protrusions of lipid bilayers and membrane
stacks under lateral tension provide physical examples for interacting surfaces
with tension. Such surfaces are studied theoretically using functional
renormalization and Monte Carlo simulations. The critical behavior arising from
thermally-excited shape fluctuations is determined both for global quantities
such as the mean separation of these surfaces and for local quantities such as
the probabilities for local contacts.Comment: 13 pages, 17 figures; accepted for publication in The European
Physical Journa
Deeply-Virtual Compton Scattering on Deuterium and Neon at HERMES
We report the first observation of azimuthal beam-spin asymmetries in hard
electroproduction of real photons off nuclei. Attributed to the interference
between the Bethe-Heitler process and the deeply-virtual Compton scattering
process, the asymmetry gives access to the latter at the amplitude level. This
process appears to be the theoretically cleanest way to access generalized
parton distributions. The data presented here have been accumulated by the
HERMES experiment at DESY, scattering the HERA 27.6 GeV positron beam off
deuterium and neon gas targets.Comment: 5 pages, 6 figures. Talk given by F. Ellinghaus at the "15th
International Spin Physics Symposium", SPIN 2002, September 9-14, 2002, BNL,
Upton, NY, USA. To be published in the proceeding
Evaluation of a Mutually Coupled Diversity Receiver
A quick, reliable, and simple evaluation of mutual coupling effects is essential for the optimization of antenna arrays for small mobile communications devices. In recent papers we have proposed novel figures of merit that quantify the impact on diversity reception in terms of scattering matrix of the array and have confirmed the validity of these formulas by practical diversity measurements. The present paper provides an extended analysis of the measurement data and contrasts the benefits of this method of array characterization with existing approaches
Test of classical nucleation theory on deeply supercooled high-pressure simulated silica
We test classical nucleation theory (CNT) in the case of simulations of
deeply supercooled, high density liquid silica, as modelled by the BKS
potential. We find that at density ~g/cm, spontaneous nucleation
of crystalline stishovite occurs in conventional molecular dynamics simulations
at temperature T=3000 K, and we evaluate the nucleation rate J directly at this
T via "brute force" sampling of nucleation events. We then use parallel,
constrained Monte Carlo simulations to evaluate , the free energy
to form a crystalline embryo containing n silicon atoms, at T=3000, 3100, 3200
and 3300 K. We find that the prediction of CNT for the n-dependence of fits reasonably well to the data at all T studied, and at 3300 K yields a
chemical potential difference between liquid and stishovite that matches
independent calculation. We find that , the size of the critical nucleus,
is approximately 10 silicon atoms at T=3300 K. At 3000 K, decreases to
approximately 3, and at such small sizes methodological challenges arise in the
evaluation of when using standard techniques; indeed even the
thermodynamic stability of the supercooled liquid comes into question under
these conditions. We therefore present a modified approach that permits an
estimation of at 3000 K. Finally, we directly evaluate at T=3000
K the kinetic prefactors in the CNT expression for J, and find physically
reasonable values; e.g. the diffusion length that Si atoms must travel in order
to move from the liquid to the crystal embryo is approximately 0.2 nm. We are
thereby able to compare the results for J at 3000 K obtained both directly and
based on CNT, and find that they agree within an order of magnitude.Comment: corrected calculation, new figure, accepted in JC
Geometrical Frustration: A Study of 4d Hard Spheres
The smallest maximum kissing-number Voronoi polyhedron of 3d spheres is the
icosahedron and the tetrahedron is the smallest volume that can show up in
Delaunay tessalation. No periodic lattice is consistent with either and hence
these dense packings are geometrically frustrated. Because icosahedra can be
assembled from almost perfect tetrahedra, the terms "icosahedral" and
"polytetrahedral" packing are often used interchangeably, which leaves the true
origin of geometric frustration unclear. Here we report a computational study
of freezing of 4d hard spheres, where the densest Voronoi cluster is compatible
with the symmetry of the densest crystal, while polytetrahedral order is not.
We observe that, under otherwise comparable conditions, crystal nucleation in
4d is less facile than in 3d. This suggest that it is the geometrical
frustration of polytetrahedral structures that inhibits crystallization.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures; revised interpretatio
Hard sphere crystallization gets rarer with increasing dimension
We recently found that crystallization of monodisperse hard spheres from the
bulk fluid faces a much higher free energy barrier in four than in three
dimensions at equivalent supersaturation, due to the increased geometrical
frustration between the simplex-based fluid order and the crystal [J.A. van
Meel, D. Frenkel, and P. Charbonneau, Phys. Rev. E 79, 030201(R) (2009)]. Here,
we analyze the microscopic contributions to the fluid-crystal interfacial free
energy to understand how the barrier to crystallization changes with dimension.
We find the barrier to grow with dimension and we identify the role of
polydispersity in preventing crystal formation. The increased fluid stability
allows us to study the jamming behavior in four, five, and six dimensions and
compare our observations with two recent theories [C. Song, P. Wang, and H. A.
Makse, Nature 453, 629 (2008); G. Parisi and F. Zamponi, Rev. Mod. Phys, in
press (2009)].Comment: 15 pages, 5 figure
Homogeneous nucleation near a second phase transition and Ostwald's step rule
Homogeneous nucleation of the new phase of one transition near a second phase
transition is considered. The system has two phase transitions, we study the
nucleation of the new phase of one of these transitions under conditions such
that we are near or at the second phase transition. The second transition is an
Ising-like transition and lies within the coexistence region of the first
transition. It effects the formation of the new phase in two ways. The first is
by reducing the nucleation barrier to direct nucleation. The second is by the
system undergoing the second transition and transforming to a state in which
the barrier to nucleation is greatly reduced. The second way occurs when the
barrier to undergoing the second phase transition is less than that of the
first phase transition, and is in accordance with Ostwald's rule.Comment: 11 pages, 5 figure
Nanosecond spin lifetimes in single- and few-layer graphene-hBN heterostructures at room temperature
We present a new fabrication method of graphene spin-valve devices which
yields enhanced spin and charge transport properties by improving both the
electrode-to-graphene and graphene-to-substrate interface. First, we prepare
Co/MgO spin injection electrodes onto Si/SiO. Thereafter, we
mechanically transfer a graphene-hBN heterostructure onto the prepatterned
electrodes. We show that room temperature spin transport in single-, bi- and
trilayer graphene devices exhibit nanosecond spin lifetimes with spin diffusion
lengths reaching 10m combined with carrier mobilities exceeding 20,000
cm/Vs.Comment: 15 pages, 5 figure
How to solve problems in micro- and nanofabrication caused by the emission of electrons and charged metal atoms during e-beam evaporation
We discuss how the emission of electrons and ions during
electron-beam-induced physical vapor deposition can cause problems in micro-
and nanofabrication processes. After giving a short overview of different types
of radiation emitted from an electron-beam (e-beam) evaporator and how the
amount of radiation depends on different deposition parameters and conditions,
we highlight two phenomena in more detail: First, we discuss an unintentional
shadow evaporation beneath the undercut of a resist layer caused by the one
part of the metal vapor which got ionized by electron-impact ionization. These
ions first lead to an unintentional build-up of charges on the sample, which in
turn results in an electrostatic deflection of subsequently incoming ionized
metal atoms towards the undercut of the resist. Second, we show how low-energy
secondary electrons during the metallization process can cause cross-linking,
blisters, and bubbles in the respective resist layer used for defining micro-
and nanostructures in an e-beam lithography process. After the metal
deposition, the cross-linked resist may lead to significant problems in the
lift-off process and causes leftover residues on the device. We provide a
troubleshooting guide on how to minimize these effects, which e.g. includes the
correct alignment of the e-beam, the avoidance of contaminations in the
crucible and, most importantly, the installation of deflector electrodes within
the evaporation chamber.Comment: 13 pages, 7 figure
Capillary pressure of van der Waals liquid nanodrops
The dependence of the surface tension on a nanodrop radius is important for
the new-phase formation process. It is demonstrated that the famous Tolman
formula is not unique and the size-dependence of the surface tension can
distinct for different systems. The analysis is based on a relationship between
the surface tension and disjoining pressure in nanodrops. It is shown that the
van der Waals interactions do not affect the new-phase formation thermodynamics
since the effect of the disjoining pressure and size-dependent component of the
surface tension cancel each other.Comment: The paper is dedicated to the 80th anniversary of A.I. Rusano
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