Determination of Carrier-Envelope Phase of Relativistic Few-Cycle Laser Pulses by Thomson Backscattering Spectroscopy

A novel method is proposed to determine the carrier-envelope phase (CEP) of a relativistic few-cycle laser pulse via the central frequency of the isolated light generated from Thomson backscattering (TBS). We theoretically investigate the generation of a uniform flying mirror when a few-cycle drive pulse with relativistic intensity (I > 10^{18} {{\rm{W}} \mathord{/ {\vphantom {{\rm{W}} {{\rm{cm}}^{\rm{2}}}}}. \kern-\nulldelimiterspace} {{\rm{cm}}^{\rm{2}}}}) interacts with a target combined with a thin and a thick foil. The central frequency of the isolated TBS light generated from the flying mirror shows a sensitive dependence on the CEP of the drive pulse. The obtained results are verified by one dimensional particle in cell (1D-PIC) simulations

On the conservation of spin currents in spin-orbit coupled systems

Applying the Gordon-decomposition-like technique, the convective spin current (CSC) is extracted from the total angular-momentum current. The CSC describes the transport properties of the electron spin and is conserved in the relativistic quantum mechanics approach where the spin-orbit coupling has been intrinsically taken into account. Arrestingly, in the presence of external electromagnetic field, the component of the convective spin along the field remain still conserved. This conserved CSC is also derived for the first time in the nonrelativistic limit using the Foldy-Wouthuysen transformation.Comment: 5 pages, RevTeX

Optical supercavitation in soft-matter

We investigate theoretically, numerically and experimentally nonlinear optical waves in an absorbing out-of-equilibrium colloidal material at the gelification transition. At sufficiently high optical intensity, absorption is frustrated and light propagates into the medium. The process is mediated by the formation of a matter-shock wave due to optically induced thermodiffusion, and largely resembles the mechanism of hydrodynamical supercavitation, as it is accompanied by a dynamic phase-transition region between the beam and the absorbing material.Comment: 4 pages, 5 figures, revised version: corrected typos and reference

Entanglement, subsystem particle numbers and topology in free fermion systems

We study the relationship between bipartite entanglement, subsystem particle number and topology in a half-filled free fermion system. It is proposed that the spin-projected particle numbers can distinguish the quantum spin Hall state from other states, and can be used to establish a new topological index for the system. Furthermore, we apply the new topological invariant to a disordered system and show that a topological phase transition occurs when the disorder strength is increased beyond a critical value. It is also shown that the subsystem particle number fluctuation displays behavior very similar to that of the entanglement entropy. This provides a lower-bound estimation for the entanglement entropy, which can be utilized to obtain an estimate of the entanglement entropy experimentally.Comment: 14 pages, 6 figure

Giant Enhancement of Surface Second Harmonic Generation in BaTiO_3 due to Photorefractive Surface Wave Excitation

We report observation of strongly enhanced surface SHG in BaTiO_3 due to excitation of a photorefractive surface electromagnetic wave. Surface SH intensity may reach 10^{-2} of the incident fundamental light intensity. Angular, crystal orientation and polarization dependencies of this SHG are presented. Possible applications of this effect in nonlinear surface spectroscopy are discussed.Comment: 5 pages, 6 figures, submitted to Physical Review Letters on the 3/29/199

Aging of the Nonlinear Optical Susceptibility of colloidal solutions

Using Z-scan and dynamic light scattering measurements we investigate the nonlinear optics response of a colloidal solution undergoing dynamics slowing down with age. We study the high optical nonlinearity of an organic dye (Rhodamine B) dispersed in a water-clay (Laponite) solution, at different clay concentrations (2.0 wt% - 2.6 wt%), experiencing the gelation process. We determine the clay platelets self diffusion coefficient and, by its comparison with the structural relaxation time, we conclude that the gelation process proceeds through the structuring of interconnecting clay platelets network rather than through clusters growth and aggregation.Comment: 4 figures, 4 page

Doping induced metal-insulator transition in two-dimensional Hubbard, t−Ut-U, and extended Hubbard, t−U−Wt-U-W, models

We show numerically that the nature of the doping induced metal-insulator transition in the two-dimensional Hubbard model is radically altered by the inclusion of a term, $W$, which depends upon a square of a single-particle nearest-neighbor hopping. This result is reached by computing the localization length, $\xi_l$, in the insulating state. At finite values of $W$ we find results consistent with $\xi_l \sim | \mu - \mu_c|^{- 1/2}$ where $\mu_c$ is the critical chemical potential. In contrast, $\xi_l \sim | \mu - \mu_c|^{-1/4}$ for the Hubbard model. At finite values of $W$, the presented numerical results imply that doping the antiferromagnetic Mott insulator leads to a $d_{x^2 - y ^2}$ superconductor.Comment: 19 pages (latex) including 7 figures in encapsulated postscript format. Submitted for publication in Phys. Rev.

Global axisymmetric stability analysis for a composite system of two gravitationally coupled scale-free discs

In a composite system of gravitationally coupled stellar and gaseous discs, we perform linear stability analysis for axisymmetric coplanar perturbations using the two-fluid formalism. The background stellar and gaseous discs are taken to be scale-free with all physical variables varying as powers of cylindrical radius $r$ with compatible exponents. The unstable modes set in as neutral modes or stationary perturbation configurations with angular frequency $\omega=0$.Comment: 7 pages using AAS styl

Magnetodielectric effect and optic soft mode behaviour in quantum paraelectric EuTiO3 ceramics

Infrared reflectivity and time-domain terahertz transmission spectra of EuTiO3 ceramics revealed a polar optic phonon at 6 - 300K, whose softening is fully responsible for the recently observed quantum paraelectric behaviour. Even if our EuTiO3 ceramics show lower permittivity than the single crystal due to a reduced density and/or small amount of secondary pyrochlore Eu2Ti2O7 phase, we confirmed the magnetic field dependence of the permittivity, also slightly smaller than in single crystal. Attempt to reveal the soft phonon dependence at 1.8K on the magnetic field up to 13T remained below the accuracy of our infrared reflectivity experiment