Charge-density waves and superlattices in the metallic layered transition metal dichalcogenides

The d1 layer metals TaS 2 , TaSe 2 , NbSe 2 , in all their various polytypic modifications, acquire, below some appropriate temperature, phase conditions that their electromagnetic properties have previously revealed as 'anomalous'. Our present electron-microscopic studies indicate that this anomalous behaviour usually included the adoption, at some stage, of a superlattice. The size of superlattice adopted often is forecast in the pattern of satellite spotting and strong diffuse scattering found above the transition. Our conclusions are that charge-density waves and their concomitant periodic structural distortions occur in all these 4d 1 /5d 1 dichalcogenides. We have related the observed periodicities of these CDW states to the theoretical form of the parent Fermi surfaces. Particularly for the 1T octahedrally coordinated polytypes the Fermi surface is very simple and markedly two-dimensional in character, with large near-parallel walls. Such a situation is known theoretically to favour the formation of charge and spin-density waves. When they first appear, the CDWs in the 1T (and 4Hb) polytypes are incommensurate with the lattice. This condition produes a fair amount of gapping in the density of states at the Fermi level. For the simplest case of 1T-TaSe 2 , the room temperature superlattice is realized when this existing CDW rotates into an orientation for which it then become commensurate. At this first-order transition the Fermi surface energy gapping increases beyond that generated by the incommensurate CDW, as is clearly evident in the electromagnetic properties. For the trigonal prismatically coordinated polytypes, CDW formation is withheld to low temperatures, probably because of the more complex band structures. This CDW state (in the cases measured) would seem at once commensurate, even though the transition is, from a wide variety of experiments, apparently second order. A wide range of doped and intercalated materials have been used to substantiate the presence of CDWs in these compounds, and to clarify the effect that their occurrence has on the physical properties. The observations further demonstrate the distinctiveness of the transition metal dichalcogenide layer compounds, and of the group VA metals in particular.     

Direct observation of nucleation and early stages of growth of GaN nanowires

We report direct observations of the nucleation and early stages of growth of GaN nanowires. The nanowires were formed by exposing Au+Ga droplets to ammonia. The formation process was observed in situ, and controlled in real time using an environmental transmission electron microscope. Observations show that nuclei forms only at thin region of the Au+Ga, following only the VLS mechanism. The droplet–nanowire interface in the initial stages is multi-faceted, and become planar during the growth. Chemical and structural analysis shows that the resulting nuclei are GaN with the wurtzite structure.     

Dynamical Casimir effect in superradiant light scattering by Bose–Einstein condensate in an optomechanical cavity

We investigate the effects of dynamical Casimir effect in superradiant light scattering by Bose-Einstein condensate in an optomechanical cavity. The system is studied using both classical and quantized mirror motions. The cavity frequency is harmonically modulated in time for both the cases. The main quantity of interest is the number of intracavity scattered photons. The system has been investigated under the weak and strong modulations. It has been observed that the amplitude of the scattered photons is more for the classical mirror motion than the quantized mirror motion. Also, initially, the amplitude of scattered photons is high for lower modulation amplitude than higher modulation amplitude. We also found that the behavior of the plots are similar under strong and weak modulations for the quantized mirror motion.     

A nonlinear stability analysis of a double-diffusive magnetized ferrofluid with magnetic field-dependent viscosity

A rigorous nonlinear stability result is derived by introducing a suitable generalized energy functional for a magnetized ferrofluid layer heated and soluted from below with magnetic field-dependent (MFD) viscosity, for stress-free boundaries. The mathematical emphasis is on how to control the nonlinear terms caused by magnetic body and inertia forces. For ferrofluids, we find that there is possibility of existence of subcritical instabilities, however, it is noted that in case of non-ferrofluid, global nonlinear stability Rayleigh number is exactly the same as that for linear instability. For lower values of magnetic parameters, this coincidence is immediately lost. The effects of magnetic parameter, M₃, solute gradient, S₁ and MFD viscosity parameter, δ, on the subcritical instability region have also been analyzed.     

Cycloaddition reactions of cross-conjugated enaminones

A detailed study on the cycloaddition reactions of cross-conjugated enaminones 1 and 9 with dimethyl acetylenedicarboxylate (DMAD) and ketenes is described. The reactions provide a variety of pyran (4, 11), pyran-2-one 14 and pyrrol-3-ylidene 8 derivatives having great pharmacological and medicinal significance. Moreover, the preferred formation of product 8 over 7 has been explained on the basis of molecular dynamics (MD) simulations performed on the intermediate 5 in the gas phase. The synthetic potential of enaminones 9 has further been explored by treating them with Lawesson's reagent (LR) and trapping the in situ generated enaminothiones 16 with some acrylates 17 leading to the formation of thiopyran derivatives 19. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report in which cross-conjugated enaminothiones 16 have been utilized in cycloaddition reactions.     

Study of micellar and phase separation behavior of mixed systems of triblock polymers

Cyclic voltammetric (CV) techniques have been employed to study the mixed micellar behavior of binary mixtures of triblock polymers (TBP) such as F127+P85, F127+P85, F88+P85, and F88+P123 using 2,2,6,6-tetramethyl-1-piperidinyloxy (Tempo) as an electroactive probe. Critical micellar concentration (cmc) has been obtained for pure triblock polymers and their mixed systems from the plots of peak current (i_p) variation versus the total concentration. Diffusion coefficients of the electroactive species have been determined from the Randles–Sevcik equation. The interaction parameter (β) for the mixed micelles was obtained from the regular solution theory. The values of β suggest that the synergism does exist especially with the F88+P123 system. Cloud point measurements have also been made on the binary mixtures of triblock polymers following similar mixing criteria. An effort has been made to correlate the micellar behavior and phase separation (cloud point) phenomenon. From the correlation, it can be concluded that in the systems studied, an increase in cmc increases the cloud point of mixed systems of triblock polymers.     

Studies on Structural,Optical, Thermal and Electrical Properties of Perylene-Doped p-terphenyl Luminophors

A simple solid state reaction technique was employed for the preparation of polycrystalline luminophors of p-terphenyl containing different amounts of perylene followed by spectral characterization techniques viz. XRD, SEM, TGA-DSC, UV–Visible spectroscopy, thermo-electrical conductivity, fluorescence spectroscopy, fluorescence life time spectroscopy and temperature dependent fluorescence. X-ray diffraction profiles of the doped p-terphenyl reveal well-defined and sharp peaks indicate homogeneity and crystallinity. The SEM micrograph of pure p-terphenyl exhibit flakes like grains and then compact and finally gets separately with perylene amounts. The observed results indicate that closed packed crystal structures of doped p-terphenyl during crystal formation. The band gaps estimated from UV–visible spectroscopy decreased from 5.20 to 4.10 eV, while thermo-electrical conductivity increases with perylene content. The fluorescence spectra showed partial quenching of p-terphenyl fluorescence and simultaneously sensitization of perylene fluorescence at the excitation wavelength of p-terphenyl (290 nm) due to excitation energy transfer from p-terphenyl to perylene. The observed sensitization results are in harmony with intense blue color seen in fluorescence microscopy images and has high demand in scintillation process.     

Quantum perspective on the localized strand separation and cyclization of DNA double helix

We apply Heisenberg model to study local strand separation and cyclization of double-stranded DNA molecule. By mapping the conformational properties of DNA onto the Heisenberg spin system, we show that denaturation can be viewed as a quench-induced quantum phase transition (QPT) at a finite non-zero temperature. These phase transitions lead to the formation of kinks in Heisenberg model that, in turn, correspond to sharp bends in helical axes of double-stranded DNA molecule. In this scenario we study the cyclization of DNA fragments of short length. Our results are in agreement with the reported observation that there is 1 open bp per circle of about 70 bp. Also we have computed the probability of the formation of kinks in circles of various sizes and have observed that beyond 100 bp it decreases sharply which is in agreement with experimental result.     

Ageing and rejuvenation in glassy amorphous polymers

Physical ageing of amorphous polymers well below their glass transition temperature leads to changes in almost all physical properties. Of particular interest is the increase in yield stress and post-yield strain softening that accompanies ageing of these materials. Moreover, at larger strain polymers seem to rejuvenate, i.e. aged and non-aged samples have identical stress-strain responses. Also, plastically deforming an aged sample seems to rejuvenate the polymer. In this work we use molecular dynamic simulations with a detailed force field suitable for macromolecular ensembles to simulate and understand the effects of ageing on the mechanical response of these materials. We show that within the timescales of these simulations it is possible to simulate both ageing and rejuvenation. The short range potentials play an important role in ageing and rejuvenation. A typical yield drop exhibited by glassy polymers is a manifestation of a sudden relaxation in the short range structure of an aged polymer. Moreover, the aged polymers are known to be brittle. We show that this is intimately related to its typical stress-strain response which allows it to carry arbitrarily large mean stresses ahead of a notch.     

Particle creation,classicality and related issues in quantum field theory: I. Formalism and toy models

The quantum theory of a harmonic oscillator with a time dependent frequency arises in several important physical problems, especially in the study of quantum field theory in an external background. While the mathematics of this system is straightforward, several conceptual issues arise in such a study. We present a general formalism to address some of the conceptual issues like the emergence of classicality, definition of particle content, back reaction etc. In particular, we parameterize the wave function in terms of a complex number (which we call excitation parameter) and express all physically relevant quantities in terms it. Many of the notions—like those of particle number density, effective Lagrangian etc., which are usually defined using asymptotic in–out states—are generalized as time-dependent concepts and we show that these generalized definitions lead to useful and reasonable results. Having developed the general formalism we apply it to several examples. Exact analytic expressions are found for a particular toy model and approximate analytic solutions are obtained in the extreme cases of adiabatic and highly non-adiabatic evolution. We then work out the exact results numerically for a variety of models and compare them with the analytic results and approximations. The formalism is useful in addressing the question of emergence of classicality of the quantum state, its relation to particle production and to clarify several conceptual issues related to this. In Paper II which is a sequel to this, the formalism will be applied to analyze the corresponding issues in the context of quantum field theory in background cosmological models and electric fields.