Imprinting the memory into paste and its visualization as crack patterns in drying process

In the drying process of paste, we can imprint into the paste the order how it should be broken in the future. That is, if we vibrate the paste before it is dried, it remembers the direction of the initial external vibration, and the morphology of resultant crack patterns is determined solely by the memory of the direction. The morphological phase diagram of crack patterns and the rheological measurement of the paste show that this memory effect is induced by the plasticity of paste.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures, submitted to JPS

Pattern formation and selection in quasi-static fracture

Fracture in quasi-statically driven systems is studied by means of a discrete spring-block model. Developed from close comparison with desiccation experiments, it describes crack formation induced by friction on a substrate. The model produces cellular, hierarchical patterns of cracks, characterized by a mean fragment size linear in the layer thickness, in agreement with experiments. The selection of a stationary fragment size is explained by exploiting the correlations prior to cracking. A scaling behavior associated with the thickness and substrate coupling, derived and confirmed by simulations, suggests why patterns have similar morphology despite their disparity in scales.Comment: 4 pages, RevTeX, two-column, 5 PS figures include

Polyakov Lines in Yang-Mills Matrix Models

We study the Polyakov line in Yang-Mills matrix models, which include the IKKT model of IIB string theory. For the gauge group SU(2) we give the exact formulae in the form of integral representations which are convenient for finding the asymptotic behaviour. For the SU(N) bosonic models we prove upper bounds which decay as a power law at large momentum p. We argue that these capture the full asymptotic behaviour. We also indicate how to extend the results to some correlation functions of Polyakov lines.Comment: 19 pages, v2 typos corrected, v3 ref adde

Effect of Interaction on the Formation of Memories in Paste

A densely packed colloidal suspension with plasticity, called paste, is known to remember directions of vibration and flow. These memories in paste can be visualized by the morphology of desiccation crack patterns. Here, we find that paste made of charged colloidal particles cannot remember flow direction. If we add sodium chloride into such paste to screen the Coulombic repulsive interaction between particles, the paste comes to remember flow direction. That is, one drop of salt water changes memory effect in the paste and thereby we can tune the morphology of desiccation crack patterns more precisely.Comment: 10 pages, 11 figures, Title change

Stable propagation of an ordered array of cracks during directional drying

We study the appearance and evolution of an array of parallel cracks in a thin slab of material that is directionally dried, and show that the cracks penetrate the material uniformly if the drying front is sufficiently sharp. We also show that cracks have a tendency to become evenly spaced during the penetration. The typical distance between cracks is mainly governed by the typical distance of the pattern at the surface, and it is not modified during the penetration. Our results agree with recent experimental work, and can be extended to three dimensions to describe the properties of columnar polygonal patterns observed in some geological formations.Comment: 8 pages, 4 figures, to appear in PR

Matrix Models

Matrix models and their connections to String Theory and noncommutative geometry are discussed. Various types of matrix models are reviewed. Most of interest are IKKT and BFSS models. They are introduced as 0+0 and 1+0 dimensional reduction of Yang--Mills model respectively. They are obtained via the deformations of string/membrane worldsheet/worldvolume. Classical solutions leading to noncommutative gauge models are considered.Comment: Lectures given at the Winter School on Modern Trends in Supersymmetric Mechanics, March 2005 Frascati; 38p

Development and geometry of isotropic and directional shrinkage crack patterns

We have studied shrinkage crack patterns which form when a thin layer of an alumina/water slurry dries. Both isotropic and directional drying were studied. The dynamics of the pattern formation process and the geometric properties of the isotropic crack patterns are similar to what is expected from recent models, assuming weak disorder. There is some evidence for a gradual increase in disorder as the drying layer become thinner, but no sudden transition, in contrast to what has been seen in previous experiments. The morphology of the crack patterns is influenced by drying gradients and front propagation effects, with sharp gradients having a strong orienting and ordering effect.Comment: 8 pages, 11 figures, 8 in jpg format, 3 in postscript. See also http://mobydick.physics.utoronto.ca/mud.htm

Axial anomaly in the reduced model: Higher representations

The axial anomaly arising from the fermion sector of \U(N) or \SU(N) reduced model is studied under a certain restriction of gauge field configurations (the ``\U(1) embedding'' with $N=L^d$). We use the overlap-Dirac operator and consider how the anomaly changes as a function of a gauge-group representation of the fermion. A simple argument shows that the anomaly vanishes for an irreducible representation expressed by a Young tableau whose number of boxes is a multiple of $L^2$ (such as the adjoint representation) and for a tensor-product of them. We also evaluate the anomaly for general gauge-group representations in the large $N$ limit. The large $N$ limit exhibits expected algebraic properties as the axial anomaly. Nevertheless, when the gauge group is \SU(N), it does not have a structure such as the trace of a product of traceless gauge-group generators which is expected from the corresponding gauge field theory.Comment: 21 pages, uses JHEP.cls and amsfonts.sty, the final version to appear in JHE