Behaviour of ferrocholesterics under external magnetic fields

The influence of an external magnetic field on the orientational behaviour of a ferrocholesteric with a positive magnetic anisotropy is investigated. Both the phenomena arising when the field was switched on or switched off are considered. It is found that the field needed for a ferrocholesteric–ferronematic transition B_FC↑ is higher when compared to that obtained for the pure cholesteric (B_C↑). A similar result was obtained when estimating the critical field for the homeotropic ferronematic–ferrocholesteric (focal conic) transition, occurring when the magnetic field was decreased or switched off. We found that B_FC↓>B_C↓. These results are explained when considering that the magnetic moments of the magnetic powder are not oriented parallel to the liquid crystal molecular directors, therefore hindering their orientation under a magnetic field.     

Magnetic properties of ferrocholesterics with soft particle anchoring

The influence of the external magnetic field on the orientational structure and magnetic properties of the ferrocholesteric is analyzed. A soft homeotropic coupling between the magnetic particles and the cholesteric molecules is assumed. The diamagnetic anisotropy of the matrix is chosen to be positive. In this case, the dipolar and quadrupolar mechanisms of orientational interaction with the external field compete with each other. The field being applied normal to the helix. Using the continuum theory, the occurrence of magnetic-field-induced ferrocholesteric–ferronematic transition is studied. The transition field as a function of the material parameters of a ferrocholesteric is found. It is shown that rising the field strength in the ferronematic phase leads to a change in the coupling between the particles and the director from homeotropic to planar one. A study on the structure of the domain walls in ferronematic phase is undertaken.     

Reentrant behaviour in spin glasses

We present the phase diagram of thed-dimensional random bond Ising model as a representative system for spin glasses. We consider nearest neighbour ferromagnetic couplingsJ with concentration 1-p and impurity couplingsaJ (|a|1) with concentrationp. It is shown that for antiferromagnetic couplings, –1<a<0, the system quite generally exhibits reentrant behaviour, i.e. two phase transitions at finite temperatures, in certain ranges of the concentrationp. It is further argued that this behaviour is a quite common feature for spin glass systems characterized by competing interactions.Dedicated to B. Mühlschlegel on the occasion of his 60th birthday     

Reentrant Superconductivity in UTe2

JETP Letters - The reentrant superconductivity is the peculiar phenomenon observed in paramagnetic metal UTe2 in magnetic field parallel to the hard magnetisation axis. It is difficult to explain...     

Reentrant ferroelectricity in liquid crystals

The ferroelectric (Sm C*)-antiferroelectric (Sm C*A)-reentrant ferroelectric (re Sm C*) phase temperature sequence was observed for systems with competing synclinic-anticlinic interactions. The basic properties of this system are as follows: (i) the Sm C* phase is metastable in the temperature range of the Sm C*A; (ii) the helix handedness inverts at both Sm C*-Sm C*A and Sm C*A-re-Sm C* phase transitions; (iii) the threshold electric field that is necessary to induce synclinic ordering in the Sm C*A phase decreases near both Sm C*A-Sm C* and Sm C*A-re-Sm C* phase boundaries. All these properties are properly described by a simple Landau model that accounts for nearest neighboring layer steric interactions and quadrupolar ordering only.     

Reentrant superconductivity in superconductor-ferromagnetic-alloy bilayers

Oscillating behavior of superconductivity in ultrathin bilayers of niobium and ferromagnetic alloy Cu₄₁Ni₅₉ has been observed. This phenomenon was most pronounced at a Nb layer thickness of about 7.3 nm: the superconducting transition temperature T _c first sharply decreased with an increase in the ferromagnetic alloy thickness to complete suppression of superconductivity at the ferromagnetic alloy thickness d _CuNi ≈ 4 nm. With a further increase in the thickness d _CuNi, the superconductivity was restored at d _CuNi ≥ 13 nm. This strongly nonmonotonic and reentrant behavior of superconductivity in Nb/Cu₄₁Ni₅₉ bilayers is attributed to implementation of a state in the ferromagnetic alloy that is similar to the quasi-one-dimensional Fulde-Ferrell-Larkin-Ovchinnikov state.     

Optical gain in photoconductors made of compensated and partially compensated GaAs

The dc gain behaviour of GaAs photoconductors realized utilizing a partially compensated buffer layer of an epitaxial MESFET structure as well as a Cr-doped semiinsulating substrate is studied. The light-power dependence of the gain hints to the dominant role of the bimolecular recombination process and trapmediated gain, and only a minor role of the surface photovoltaic effect. The possible correlation between dark current and gain mechanism in the MESFET-like device is pointed out.     

Reentrant phase transitions in liquid crystals

A comprehensive review of the recent developments regarding the phenomenon of reentrant phase transitions (RPT) in liquid crystals is presented. In addition to liquid crystals this phenomenon has been observed in amazingly diverse systems. A critical assessment of the experimental investigations concerning single and multiple reentrances is given. A brief account of the theoretical efforts is also given. The article ends with the identification of the factors which impede the proper understanding of the phenomenon.     

Superresolution in compensated telescopes

We present a procedure for attaining resolution beyond the diffraction limit in ground-based telescopes. This procedure is based on the use of rotationally symmetric pupil plane filters that can be easily implemented in dynamic optical devices such as a deformable mirror of an adaptive-optics system. We show that a successful application of the technique requires partial compensation for atmospheric distortion by adaptive optics. Consequently, we derive the required level of compensation as a function of the atmospheric conditions. Finally, our results are checked using simulated data.     

Reentrant phase transition in granular superconductors

The conditions for the appearance of a reentrant superconducting phase in granular materials are studied in mean field approximation applied to periodic models. We assume that the relevant low-lying excitation is the transfer of a Cooper pair from a grain to one of its neighbours, and neglect pair breaking. Both on-grain (U) and nearest neighbour (V) Coulomb interactions are taken into account, and the Coulomb problem is treated in Bethe-Peierls approximation. WhenV/U is not too large, reentrance is predicted ifV/U>(4+3z)^?1/2 wherez is the coordination number. This result is different from a recent criterion suggested by ?imánek, which allows reentrance only in the immediate vicinities of certain discrete values ofV/U. For strong enoughV/U, the models treated here show a transition to an ionic-salt-like charge-ordered state. Reentrant superconductivity is shown to occur also on an ionic background. In actual systems, close-packing effects partially frustrate the ionic ordering and enhance the reentrant feature.     

Reentrant superconducting phase in conical-ferromagnet-superconductor nanostructures

We study a bilayer consisting of an ordinary superconductor and a magnet with a spiral magnetic structure of the Ho type. We use a self-consistent solution of the Bogolioubov-de Gennes equations to evaluate the pair amplitude, the transition temperature, and the thermodynamic functions, namely, the free energy and entropy. We find that for a range of thicknesses of the magnetic layer the superconductivity is reentrant with temperature T: as one lowers T the system turns superconducting, and when T is further lowered it turns normal again. This behavior is reflected in the condensation free energy and the pair potential, which vanish both above the upper transition and below the lower one. The transition is strictly reentrant: the low and high temperature phases are the same. The entropy further reveals a range of temperatures where the superconducting state is less ordered than the normal one.     

Reentrant adhesion behavior in nanocluster deposition

We simulate the collision of atomic clusters with a weakly attractive surface using molecular dynamics in a regime between soft landing and fragmentation, where the cluster undergoes large deformation but remains intact. As a function of incident kinetic energy, we find a transition from adhesion to reflection at low kinetic energies. We also identify a second adhesive regime at intermediate kinetic energies, where strong deformation of the cluster leads to an increase in contact area and adhesive energy.     

Reentrant oscillation in kinetic thin-film deposition

We have studied the origin of reentrant growth oscillation in kinetic thin-film deposition on stepped surfaces using a Monte Carlo simulation. The results show that reentrant oscillation occurs as a result of growth modes competition between two-dimension-nucleation growth and step-flow growth due to a variation of surface-diffusion-length with deposition temperature, and that it is a natural phenomenon in non-equilibrium thin-film deposition on a substrate with a permanent step source.     

Reentrant and whirling hexagons in non-Boussinesq convection

We review recent computational results for hexagon patterns in non-Boussinesq convection. For sufficiently strong dependence of the fluid parameters on the temperature we find reentrance of steady hexagons, i.e. while near onset the hexagon patterns become unstable to rolls as usually, they become again stable in the strongly nonlinear regime. If the convection apparatus is rotated about a vertical axis the transition from hexagons to rolls is replaced by a Hopf bifurcation to whirling hexagons. For weak non-Boussinesq effects they display defect chaos of the type described by the two-dimensional (2D) complex Ginzburg–Landau equation. For stronger non-Boussinesq effects the Hopf bifurcation becomes subcritical and localized bursting of the whirling amplitude is found. In this regime the coupling of the whirling amplitude to (small) deformations of the hexagon lattice becomes important. For yet stronger non-Boussinesq effects this coupling breaks up the hexagon lattice and strongly disordered states characterized by whirling and lattice defects are obtained.     

Reentrant spin-glass transition in a dilute magnet

We perform a large-scale Monte Carlo simulation of a dilute classical Heisenberg model with ferromagnetic nearest neighbor and antiferromagnetic next-nearest neighbor interactions. We found that the model reproduces a reentrant spin-glass transition. That is, as the temperature is decreased, the magnetization increases rapidly below a certain temperature, reaches a maximum value, and then disappears at some lower temperature. The low temperature phase was suggested to be a spin-glass phase that is characterized by ferromagnetic clusters.