Stefan W. Hell received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2014 “for the development of super‐resolved fluorescence microscopy”, together with Eric Betzig and William Moerner. With the invention of STED (Stimulated Emission Depletion) microscopy experimentally realized in 1999, he has revolutionized light microscopy, overcoming the resolution limit of conventional optical microscopes – a breakthrough that has enabled new ground‐breaking discoveries in biological and medical research.
Shuji Nakamura discovered p‐type doping in Gallium Nitride (GaN) and developed blue, green, and white “InGaN‐based” light emitting diodes (LEDs) and blue laser diodes (LDs). His inventions made possible energy efficient, solid‐state lighting systems and enabled the next generation of optical storage. In this biography, Shuji Nakamura tells the story of his personal life and his scientific career.
A single spin‐1/2 particle obeys the Dirac equation in spatial dimension and is bound by an attractive central monotone potential which vanishes at infinity (in one dimension the potential is even). This work refines the relativistic comparison theorems which were derived by Hall 1 . The new theorems allow the graphs of the two comparison potentials and to crossover in a controlled way and still imply the spectral ordering for the eigenvalues at the bottom of each angular momentum subspace. More specifically in a simplest case we have: in dimension , if , then ; and in dimensions, if , where and , then .
We determine the regularized van der Waals contribution to pressure within a spherical cavity of vapor in a homogeneous, isotropic, infinite medium. The spherical Hamaker function, , has been defined, for the first time, in contrast to the conventional Hamaker function for planar surfaces, . For the materials under consideration, the pressure inside the cavity varies as , where a is the radius of the cavity. For radii below a transition radius, the surface energy (or surface tension) becomes size dependent and could have important implications for homogeneous nucleation of nanosized bubbles in liquids, as well as cavitation of bubbles.
In the paper, for the Kerr field, we prove that Chandrasekhar's Dirac Hamiltonian and the self‐adjoint Hamiltonian with a flat scalar product of the wave functions are physically equivalent. Operators of transformation of Chandrasekhar's Hamiltonian and wave functions to the η representation with a flat scalar product are defined explicitly. If the domain of the wave functions of Dirac's equation in the Kerr field is bounded by two‐dimensional surfaces of revolution around the z axis, Chandrasekhar's Hamiltonian and the self‐adjoint Hamiltonian in the η representation are Hermitian with equality of the scalar products, .
It was previously argued that the phenomenon of quantum gravitational decoherence described by the Wheeler‐DeWitt equation is responsible for the emergence of the arrow of time. Here we show that the characteristic spatio‐temporal scales of quantum gravitational decoherence are typically logarithmically larger than a characteristic curvature radius of the background space‐time. This largeness is a direct consequence of the fact that gravity is a non‐renormalizable theory, and the corresponding effective field theory is nearly decoupled from matter degrees of freedom in the physical limit . Therefore, as such, quantum gravitational decoherence is too ineffective to guarantee the emergence of the arrow of time and the “quantum‐to‐classical” transition to happen at scales of physical interest. We argue that the emergence of the arrow of time is directly related to the nature and properties of physical observer.
Optical properties of a metasurface which can be considered a monolayer of uniaxial metamaterials ‐ parallel‐plate and nanorod arrays – are investigated. It is shown that such metasurface acts as an ultimately thin sub‐100 nm wave plate. This is achieved via an interplay of epsilon‐near‐zero and epsilon‐near‐pole behavior along different axes in the plane of the metasurface allowing for extremely rapid phase difference accumulation in very thin metasurface layers. These effects are shown to not be disrupted by non‐locality and can be applied to the design of ultrathin wave plates, Pancharatnam‐Berry phase optical elements and plasmon‐carrying optical torque wrench devices.
Presuming that CMB photons are described by the deconfining phase of an SU(2) Yang‐Mills theory with the critical temperature for the deconfining‐preconfining phase transition matching the present CMB temperature K (SU(2)CMB), we investigate how CMB temperature T connects with the cosmological scale factor a in a Friedmann‐Lemaître‐Robertson‐Walker Universe. Owing to a violation of conformal scaling at late times, the tension between the (instantaneous) redshift of reionisation from CMB observation () and quasar spectra () is repealed. Also, we find that the redshift of CMB decoupling moves from to which questions ΛCDM cosmology at high redshifts. Adapting this model to the conventional physics of three flavours of massless cosmic neutrinos, we demonstrate inconsistency with the value Neff ～ 3.36 extracted from Planck data. Interactions between cosmic neutrinos and the CMB implies a common temperature T of (no longer separately conserved) CMB and neutrino fluids. Neff ～ 3.36 then entails a universal, temperature induced cosmic neutrino mass with . Our above results on zre and zdec, derived from SU(2)CMB alone, are essentially unaffected when including such a neutrino sector.
Information‐theoretical concepts are employed for the analysis of the interplay between a transverse electric field applied to a one‐dimensional surface and Robin boundary condition (BC), which with the help of the extrapolation length Λ zeroes at the interface a linear combination of the quantum mechanical wave function and its spatial derivative, and its influence on the properties of the structure. For doing this, exact analytical solutions of the corresponding Schrödinger equation are derived and used for calculating energies, dipole moments, position and momentum quantum information entropies and their Fisher information and and Onicescu information energies and counterparts. It is shown that the weak (strong) electric field changes the Robin wall into the Dirichlet, (Neumann, ), surface. This transformation of the energy spectrum and associated waveforms in the growing field defines an evolution of the quantum‐information measures; for example, it is proved that for the Dirichlet and Neumann BCs the position (momentum) quantum information entropy varies as a positive (negative) natural logarithm of the electric intensity what results in their field‐independent sum . Analogously, at and the position and momentum Fisher informations (Onicescu energies) depend on the applied voltage as () and its inverse, respectively, leading to the field‐independent product (). Peculiarities of their transformations at the finite nonzero Λ are discussed and similarities and differences between the three quantum‐information measures in the electric field are highlighted with the special attention being paid to the configuration with the negative extrapolation length.
Analytical solutions of the Schrödinger equation for the one‐dimensional quantum well with all possible permutations of the Dirichlet and Neumann boundary conditions (BCs) in perpendicular to the interfaces uniform electric field are used for the comparative investigation of their interaction and its influence on the properties of the system. Limiting cases of the weak and strong voltages allow an easy mathematical treatment and its clear physical explanation; in particular, for the small , the perturbation theory derives for all geometries a linear dependence of the polarization on the field with the BC‐dependent proportionality coefficient being positive (negative) for the ground (excited) states. Simple two‐level approximation elementary explains the negative polarizations as a result of the field‐induced destructive interference of the unperturbed modes and shows that in this case the admixture of only the neighboring states plays a dominant role. Different magnitudes of the polarization for different BCs in this regime are explained physically and confirmed numerically. Hellmann‐Feynman theorem reveals a fundamental relation between the polarization and the speed of the energy change with the field. It is proved that zero‐voltage position entropies are BC independent and for all states but the ground Neumann level (which has ) are equal to while the momentum entropies depend on the edge requirements and the level. Varying electric field changes position and momentum entropies in the opposite directions such that the entropic uncertainty relation is satisfied. Other physical quantities such as the BC‐dependent zero‐energy and zero‐polarization fields are also studied both numerically and analytically. Applications to different branches of physics, such as ocean fluid dynamics and atmospheric and metallic waveguide electrodynamics, are discussed.
Van der Waals heterostructures of graphene and hexagonal boron nitride feature a moiré superlattice for graphene's Dirac electrons. Here, we review the effects generated by this superlattice, including a specific miniband structure featuring gaps and secondary Dirac points, and a fractal spectrum of magnetic minibands known as Hofstadter's butterfly.
In this paper, an implementation of energetic damping for fermionic transport simulations which respects particle conservation is presented. For this, nonhermitian terms in the Hamiltonian of the system are used. After an explanation of the method, it is demonstrated studying the current over time and I/V characteristics in the noninteracting resonant level model for spinless fermions.
A possible scenario of the Lorentz symmetry violation is discussed based on the arising of geometric quantum phases yielded by the effects of the Lorentz symmetry violation in the CPT‐even gauge sector of Standard Model Extension. Analogues of the Anandan quantum phase and the scalar Aharonov‐Bohm effect for a neutral particle [J. Anandan, Phys. Lett. A 138 , 347 (1989)] are obtained from the parity‐odd sector of the tensor . Moreover, we build quantum holonomies associated with the analogue of the Anandan quantum phase and discuss a possible analogy with the geometric quantum computation [A. Ekert et al., J. Mod. Opt. 47 , 2501 (2000)].
Shuji Nakamura discovered p‐type doping in Gallium Nitride (GaN) and developed blue, green, and white InGaN based light emitting diodes (LEDs) and blue laser diodes (LDs). His inventions made possible energy efficient, solid‐state lighting systems and enabled the next generation of optical storage. Together with Isamu Akasaki and Hiroshi Amano, he is one of the three recipients of the 2014 Nobel Prize in Physics. In his Nobel lecture, Shuji Nakamura gives an overview of this research and the story of his inventions *** .
The so‐called Jackiw–Pi (JP) model for massive vector fields is a three‐dimensional, gauge‐invariant and parity‐preserving model that was discussed in several contexts. In this paper we have discussed its quantum aspects through the introduction of Planck‐scale objects, i.e., via noncommutativity and the well‐known BV quantization. Namely, we have constructed the JP noncommutative space‐time version, we have provided the BV quantization of the commutative JP model and we have discussed its features. The noncommutativity has introduced interesting new objects in JP's Planck‐scale framework.
In modern Kaluza‐Klein theories which successfully unify gravity, electromagnetism and a scalar field, null geodesics in five dimensions lead to simplified expressions for phase shifts in four‐dimensional spacetime. It might be possible to test for an extra dimension by experiments such as those where neutron interferometry is used to measure the Aharonov‐Bohm effect.
We study the spin orientation of the neutron scattered by light‐irradiated graphene and calculate the average value of spin z‐component of the neutron in terms of a generating functional technique. Our calculation results indicate that there is a remarkable neutron polarization effect when a neutron penetrates graphene irradiated by a circularly polarized light. We analyse the dynamical source of generating this effect from the aspect of photon‐mediated interaction between the neutron spin and valley pseudospin. By comparing with the polarization induced by a magnetic field, we find that this polarization may be equivalent to the one led by a magnetic field of several hundred Teslas if the photon frequency is in the X‐ray frequency range. This provides an approach of polarizing neutrons.
The circular dichroism of titanium‐doped silver chiral nanorod arrays grown using the glancing angle deposition (GLAD) method is investigated in the visible and near infrared ranges using transmission ellipsometry and spectroscopy. These films are found to have significant circular polarization effects across broad ranges of the visible to NIR spectrum, including large values for optical rotation. The characteristics of these circular polarization effects are strongly influenced by the morphology of the deposited arrays. Thus, the morphological control of the optical activity in these nanostructures demonstrates significant optimization capability of the GLAD technique for fabricating chiral plasmonic materials.
Classes of solvable potentials are presented within an standard application of supersymmetric quantum mechanics. Sets of exceptional orthogonal polynomials generated by these solvable potentials are introduced and examined in detail. Several properties of these polynomials including orthogonality conditions, weight functions, differential equations, the Wronskains, possible recurrence relations are also investigated.
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