The Colored Hofstadter Butterfly for the Honeycomb Lattice

We rely on a recent method for determining edge spectra and we use it to compute the Chern numbers for Hofstadter models on the honeycomb lattice having rational magnetic flux per unit cell. Based on the bulk-edge correspondence, the Chern number \(\sigma _\mathrm{H}\) is given as the winding number of an eigenvector of a \(2 \times 2\) transfer matrix, as a function of the quasi-momentum \(k\in (0,2\pi )\) . This method is computationally efficient (of order \(\mathcal {O}(n^4)\) in the resolution of the desired image). It also shows that for the honeycomb lattice the solution for \(\sigma _\mathrm{H}\) for flux \(p/q\) in the \(r\) -th gap conforms with the Diophantine equation \(r=\sigma _\mathrm{H}\cdot p+ s\cdot q\) , which determines \(\sigma _\mathrm{H}\mod q\) . A window such as \(\sigma _\mathrm{H}\in (-q/2,q/2)\) , or possibly shifted, provides a natural further condition for \(\sigma _\mathrm{H}\) , which however turns out not to be met. Based on extensive numerical calculations, we conjecture that the solution conforms with the relaxed condition \(\sigma _\mathrm{H}\in (-q,q)\) .     

Optimal N-Point Configurations on the Sphere: “Magic” Numbers and Smale’s 7th Problem

This paper inquires into the concavity of the map \(N\mapsto v_s(N)\) from the integers \(N\ge 2\) into the minimal average standardized Riesz pair-energies \(v_s(N)\) of \(N\) -point configurations on the sphere \(\mathbb {S}^2\) for various \(s\in \mathbb {R}\) . The standardized Riesz pair-energy of a pair of points on \(\mathbb {S}^2\) a chordal distance \(r\) apart is \(V_s(r)= s^{-1}\left( r^{-s}-1 \right) \) , \(s \ne 0\) , which becomes \(V_0(r) = \ln \frac{1}{r}\) in the limit \(s\rightarrow 0\) . Averaging it over the \(\left( \begin{array}{c} N\\ 2\end{array}\right) \) distinct pairs in a configuration and minimizing over all possible \(N\) -point configurations defines \(v_s(N)\) . It is known that \(N\mapsto v_s(N)\) is strictly increasing for each \(s\in \mathbb {R}\) , and for \(s<2\) also bounded above, thus “overall concave.” It is (easily) proved that \(N\mapsto v_{-2}^{}(N)\) is even locally strictly concave, and that so is the map \(2n\mapsto v_s(2n)\) for \(s<-2\) . By analyzing computer-experimental data of putatively minimal average Riesz pair-energies \(v_s^x(N)\) for \(s\in \{-1,0,1,2,3\}\) and \(N\in \{2,\ldots ,200\}\) , it is found that the map \(N\mapsto {v}_{-1}^x(N)\) is locally strictly concave, while \(N\mapsto {v}_s^x(N)\) is not always locally strictly concave for \(s\in \{0,1,2,3\}\) : concavity defects occur whenever \(N\in {\mathcal {C}}^{x}_+(s)\) (an \(s\) -specific empirical set of integers). It is found that the empirical map \(s\mapsto {\mathcal {C}}^{x}_+(s),\ s\in \{-2,-1,0,1,2,3\}\) , is set-theoretically increasing; moreover, the percentage of odd numbers in \({\mathcal {C}}^{x}_+(s),\ s\in \{0,1,2,3\}\) is found to increase with \(s\) . The integers in \({\mathcal {C}}^{x}_+(0)\) are few and far between, forming a curious sequence of numbers, reminiscent of the “magic numbers” in nuclear physics. It is conjectured that these new “magic numbers” are associated with optimally symmetric optimal-log-energy \(N\) -point configurations on \(\mathbb {S}^2\) . A list of interesting open problems is extracted from the empirical findings, and some rigorous first steps toward their solutions are presented. It is emphasized how concavity can assist in the solution to Smale’s \(7\) th Problem, which asks for an efficient algorithm to find near-optimal \(N\) -point configurations on \(\mathbb {S}^2\) and higher-dimensional spheres.     

Continuous and Discrete Painlevé Equations Arising from the Gap Probability Distribution of the Finite n Gaussian Unitary Ensembles

In this paper we study the gap probability problem in the Gaussian unitary ensembles of \(n\) by \(n\) matrices : The probability that the interval \(J := (-a,a)\) is free of eigenvalues. In the works of Tracy and Widom, Adler and Van Moerbeke, and Forrester and Witte on this subject, it has been shown that two Painlevé type differential equations arise in this context. The first is the Jimbo–Miwa–Okomoto \(\sigma \) -form and the second is a particular Painlevé IV. Using the ladder operator technique of orthogonal polynomials we derive three quantities associated with the gap probability, denoted as \(\sigma _n(a)\) , \(R_n(a)\) and \(r_n(a)\) . We show that each one satisfies a second order Painlevé type differential equation as well as a discrete Painlevé type equation. In particular, in addition to providing an elementary derivation of the aforementioned \(\sigma \) -form and Painlevé IV we are able to show that the quantity \(r_n(a)\) satisfies a particular case of Chazy’s second degree second order differential equation. For the discrete equations we show that the quantity \(r_n(a)\) satisfies a particular form of the modified discrete Painlevé II equation obtained by Grammaticos and Ramani in the context of Backlund transformations. We also derive second order second degree difference equations for the quantities \(R_n(a)\) and \(\sigma _n(a)\) .     

Near-Extreme Eigenvalues and the First Gap of Hermitian Random Matrices

We study the phenomenon of “crowding” near the largest eigenvalue \(\lambda _\mathrm{max}\) of random \(N \times N\) matrices belonging to the Gaussian Unitary Ensemble of random matrix theory. We focus on two distinct quantities: (i) the density of states (DOS) near \(\lambda _\mathrm{max}\) , \(\rho _\mathrm{DOS}(r,N)\) , which is the average density of eigenvalues located at a distance \(r\) from \(\lambda _\mathrm{max}\) and (ii) the probability density function of the gap between the first two largest eigenvalues, \(p_\mathrm{GAP}(r,N)\) . In the edge scaling limit where \(r = \mathcal{O}(N^{-1/6})\) , which is described by a double scaling limit of a system of unconventional orthogonal polynomials, we show that \(\rho _\mathrm{DOS}(r,N)\) and \(p_\mathrm{GAP}(r,N)\) are characterized by scaling functions which can be expressed in terms of the solution of a Lax pair associated to the Painlevé XXXIV equation. This provides an alternative and simpler expression for the gap distribution, which was recently studied by Witte et al. in Nonlinearity 26:1799, 2013. Our expressions allow to obtain precise asymptotic behaviors of these scaling functions both for small and large arguments.     

Semiclassical strings in supergravity PFT

In this paper, we introduce the bulk viscosity in the formalism of modified gravity theory in which the gravitational action contains a general function \(f(R,T)\) , where \(R\) and \(T\) denote the curvature scalar and the trace of the energy–momentum tensor, respectively, within the framework of a flat Friedmann–Robertson–Walker model. As an equation of state for a prefect fluid, we take \(p=(\gamma -1)\rho \) , where \(0 \le \gamma \le 2\) and a viscous term as a bulk viscosity due to the isotropic model, of the form \(\zeta =\zeta _{0}+\zeta _{1}H\) , where \(\zeta _{0}\) and \(\zeta _{1}\) are constants, and \(H\) is the Hubble parameter. The exact non-singular solutions to the corresponding field equations are obtained with non-viscous and viscous fluids, respectively, by assuming a simplest particular model of the form of \(f(R,T) = R+2f(T)\) , where \(f(T)=\alpha T\) ( \(\alpha \) is a constant). A big-rip singularity is also observed for \(\gamma <0\) at a finite value of cosmic time under certain constraints. We study all possible scenarios with the possible positive and negative ranges of \(\alpha \) to analyze the expansion history of the universe. It is observed that the universe accelerates or exhibits a transition from a decelerated phase to an accelerated phase under certain constraints of \(\zeta _0\) and \(\zeta _1\) . We compare the viscous models with the non-viscous one through the graph plotted between the scale factor and cosmic time and find that the bulk viscosity plays a major role in the expansion of the universe. A similar graph is plotted for the deceleration parameter with non-viscous and viscous fluids and we find a transition from decelerated to accelerated phase with some form of bulk viscosity.     

Fluctuation–Dissipation Relation for Systems with Spatially Varying Friction

When a particle diffuses in a medium with spatially dependent friction coefficient \(\alpha (r)\) at constant temperature \(T\) , it drifts toward the low friction end of the system even in the absence of any real physical force \(f\) . This phenomenon, which has been previously studied in the context of non-inertial Brownian dynamics, is termed “spurious drift”, although the drift is real and stems from an inertial effect taking place at the short temporal scales. Here, we study the diffusion of particles in inhomogeneous media within the framework of the inertial Langevin equation. We demonstrate that the quantity which characterizes the dynamics with non-uniform \(\alpha (r)\) is not the displacement of the particle \(\Delta r=r-r^0\) (where \(r^0\) is the initial position), but rather \(\Delta A(r)=A(r)-A(r^0)\) , where \(A(r)\) is the primitive function of \(\alpha (r)\) . We derive expressions relating the mean and variance of \(\Delta A\) to \(f\) , \(T\) , and the duration of the dynamics \(\Delta t\) . For a constant friction coefficient \(\alpha (r)=\alpha \) , these expressions reduce to the well known forms of the force-drift and fluctuation–dissipation relations. We introduce a very accurate method for Langevin dynamics simulations in systems with spatially varying \(\alpha (r)\) , and use the method to validate the newly derived expressions.     

Tracy–Widom at High Temperature

We investigate the marginal distribution of the bottom eigenvalues of the stochastic Airy operator when the inverse temperature \(\beta \) tends to \(0\) . We prove that the minimal eigenvalue, whose fluctuations are governed by the Tracy–Widom \(\beta \) law, converges weakly, when properly centered and scaled, to the Gumbel distribution. More generally we obtain the convergence in law of the marginal distribution of any eigenvalue with given index \(k\) . Those convergences are obtained after a careful analysis of the explosion times process of the Riccati diffusion associated to the stochastic Airy operator. We show that the empirical measure of the explosion times converges weakly to a Poisson point process using estimates proved in Dumaz and Virág (Ann Inst H Poincaré Probab Statist 49(4):915–933, 2013). We further compute the empirical eigenvalue density of the stochastic Airy ensemble on the macroscopic scale when \(\beta \rightarrow 0\) . As an application, we investigate the maximal eigenvalues statistics of \(\beta _N\) -ensembles when the repulsion parameter \(\beta _N\rightarrow 0\) when \(N\rightarrow +\infty \) . We study the double scaling limit \(N\rightarrow +\infty , \beta _N \rightarrow 0\) and argue with heuristic and numerical arguments that the statistics of the marginal distributions can be deduced following the ideas of Edelman and Sutton (J Stat Phys 127(6):1121–1165, 2007) and Ramírez et al. (J Am Math Soc 24:919–944, 2011) from our later study of the stochastic Airy operator.     

Microcanonical Analysis of the Curie–Weiss Anisotropic Quantum Heisenberg Model in a Magnetic Field

The anisotropic quantum Heisenberg model with Curie-Weiss-type interactions is studied analytically in several variants of the microcanonical ensemble. (Non)equivalence of microcanonical and canonical ensembles is investigated by studying the concavity properties of entropies. The microcanonical entropy \(s(e,\varvec{m})\) is obtained as a function of the energy \(e\) and the magnetization vector \({\varvec{m}}\) in the thermodynamic limit. Since, for this model, \(e\) is uniquely determined by \({\varvec{m}}\) , the same information can be encoded either in \(s(\varvec{m})\) or \(s(e,m_1,m_2)\) . Although these two entropies correspond to the same physical setting of fixed \(e\) and \({\varvec{m}}\) , their concavity properties differ. The entropy \(s_{{\varvec{h}}}(u)\) , describing the model at fixed total energy \(u\) and in a homogeneous external magnetic field \({\varvec{h}}\) of arbitrary direction, is obtained by reduction from the nonconcave entropy \(s(e,m_1,m_2)\) . In doing so, concavity, and therefore equivalence of ensembles, is restored. \(s_{{\varvec{h}}}(u)\) has nonanalyticities on surfaces of co-dimension 1 in the \((u,\varvec{h})\) -space. Projecting these surfaces into lower-dimensional phase diagrams, we observe that the resulting phase transition lines are situated in the positive-temperature region for some parameter values, and in the negative-temperature region for others. In the canonical setting of a system coupled to a heat bath of positive temperatures, the nonanalyticities in the microcanonical negative-temperature region cannot be observed, and this leads to a situation of effective nonequivalence even when formal equivalence holds.     

NMR in Magnetic Field of the Earth: Pre-Polarization of Nuclei with Alternating Magnetic Field

The polarization of nuclei in the low static magnetic field \(B_0\) with an alternating magnetic field \(B^{*} (B^{*} \gg B_0)\) at a very low frequency \(f_m\) (but \(f_m\gg 1\) / \({T_1}\) , where \(T_1\) is the spin-lattice relaxation time) has been investigated. The question of the optimization of the energy consumption during the pre-polarization is also considered. The possibilities of the method are illustrated by the observation of nuclear magnetic resonance signals from a few liquids.     

Toward a Mathematical Holographic Principle

In work started in [17] and continued in this paper our objective is to study selectors of multivalued functions which have interesting dynamical properties, such as possessing absolutely continuous invariant measures. We specify the graph of a multivalued function by means of lower and upper boundary maps \(\tau _{1}\) and \(\tau _{2}.\) On these boundary maps we define a position dependent random map \(R_{p}=\{\tau _{1},\tau _{2};p,1-p\},\) which, at each time step, moves the point \(x\) to \(\tau _{1}(x)\) with probability \(p(x)\) and to \(\tau _{2}(x)\) with probability \(1-p(x)\) . Under general conditions, for each choice of \(p\) , \(R_{p}\) possesses an absolutely continuous invariant measure with invariant density \(f_{p}.\) Let \(\varvec{\tau }\) be a selector which has invariant density function \(f.\) One of our objectives is to study conditions under which \(p(x)\) exists such that \(R_{p}\) has \(f\) as its invariant density function. When this is the case, the long term statistical dynamical behavior of a selector can be represented by the long term statistical behavior of a random map on the boundaries of \(G.\) We refer to such a result as a mathematical holographic principle. We present examples and study the relationship between the invariant densities attainable by classes of selectors and the random maps based on the boundaries and show that, under certain conditions, the extreme points of the invariant densities for selectors are achieved by bang-bang random maps, that is, random maps for which \(p(x)\in \{0,1\}.\)      

Phase Transitions in Layered Systems

We consider the Ising model on \(\mathbb Z\times \mathbb Z\) where on each horizontal line \(\{(x,i), x\in \mathbb Z\}\) , called “layer”, the interaction is given by a ferromagnetic Kac potential with coupling strength \(J_{ \gamma }(x,y)={ \gamma }J({ \gamma }(x-y))\) , where \(J(\cdot )\) is smooth and has compact support; we then add a nearest neighbor ferromagnetic vertical interaction of strength \({ \gamma }^{A}\) , where \(A\ge 2\) is fixed, and prove that for any \(\beta \) larger than the mean field critical value there is a phase transition for all \({ \gamma }\) small enough.     

Reunion Probabilities of N One-Dimensional Random Walkers with Mixed Boundary Conditions

In this work we extend the results of the reunion probability of \(N\) one-dimensional random walkers to include mixed boundary conditions between their trajectories. The level of the mixture is controlled by a parameter \(c\) , which can be varied from \(c=0\) (independent walkers) to \(c\rightarrow \infty \) (vicious walkers). The expressions are derived by using Quantum Mechanics formalism (QMf) which allows us to map this problem into a Lieb-Liniger gas (LLg) of \(N\) one-dimensional particles. We use Bethe ansatz and Gaudin’s conjecture to obtain the normalized wave-functions and use this information to construct the propagator. As it is well-known, depending on the boundary conditions imposed at the endpoints of a line segment, the statistics of the maximum heights of the reunited trajectories have some connections with different ensembles in Random Matrix Theory. Here we seek to extend those results and consider four models: absorbing, periodic, reflecting, and mixed. In all four cases, the probability that the maximum height is less or equal than \(L\) takes the form \(F_N(L)=A_N\sum _{\varvec{k}\in \Omega _{\text {B}}} \mathrm{e}^{-\sum _{j=1}^Nk_j^2}\mathcal {V}_N(\varvec{k})\) , where \(A_N\) is a normalization constant, \(\mathcal {V}_N(\varvec{k})\) contains a deformed and weighted Vandermonde determinant, and \(\Omega _{\text {B}}\) is the solution set of quasi-momenta \(\varvec{k}\) obeying the Bethe equations for that particular boundary condition.     

Quantum Measures on Finite Effect Algebras with the Riesz Decomposition Properties

One kind of generalized measures called quantum measures on finite effect algebras, which fulfil the grade-2 additive sum rule, is considered. One basis of vector space of quantum measures on a finite effect algebra with the Riesz decomposition property (RDP for short) is given. It is proved that any diagonally positive symmetric signed measure \(\lambda \) on the tensor product \(E\otimes E\) can determine a quantum measure \(\mu \) on a finite effect algebra \(E\) with the RDP such that \(\mu (x)=\lambda (x\otimes x)\) for any \(x\in E\) . Furthermore, some conditions for a grade-2 additive measure \(\mu \) on a finite effect algebra \(E\) are provided to guarantee that there exists a unique diagonally positive symmetric signed measure \(\lambda \) on \(E\otimes E\) such that \(\mu (x)=\lambda (x\otimes x)\) for any \(x\in E\) . At last, it is showed that any grade- \(t\) quantum measure on a finite effect algebra \(E\) with the RDP is essentially established by the values on a subset of \(E\) .     

How bosonic is a pair of fermions?

Composite particles made of two fermions can be treated as ideal elementary bosons as long as the constituent fermions are sufficiently entangled. In that case, the Pauli principle acting on the parts does not jeopardise the bosonic behaviour of the whole. An indicator for bosonic quality is the composite boson normalisation ratio \(\chi _{N+1}/\chi _{N}\) of a state of \(N\) composites. This quantity is prohibitively complicated to compute exactly for realistic two-fermion wavefunctions and large composite numbers \(N\) . Here, we provide an efficient characterisation in terms of the purity \(P\) and the largest eigenvalue \(\lambda _1\) of the reduced single-fermion state. We find the states that extremise \(\chi _N\) for given \(P\) and \(\lambda _1\) , and we provide easily evaluable, saturable upper and lower bounds for the normalisation ratio. Our results strengthen the relationship between the bosonic quality of a composite particle and the entanglement of its constituents.     

Antineutrino science in KamLAND

The primary goal of KamLAND is a search for the oscillation of \({\bar{\nu }}_\mathrm{e}\) ’s emitted from distant power reactors. The long baseline, typically 180 km, enables KamLAND to address the oscillation solution of the “solar neutrino problem” with \({\bar{\nu }}_{e} \) ’s under laboratory conditions. KamLAND found fewer reactor \({\bar{\nu }}_{e} \) events than expected from standard assumptions about \(\overline{\nu }_e\) propagation at more than 9 \(\sigma \) confidence level (C.L.). The observed energy spectrum disagrees with the expected spectral shape at more than 5 \(\sigma \) C.L., and prefers the distortion from neutrino oscillation effects. A three-flavor oscillation analysis of the data from KamLAND and KamLAND + solar neutrino experiments with CPT invariance, yields \(\Delta m_{21}^2 \) = [ \(7.54_{-0.18}^{+0.19} \times \) 10 \(^{-5}\) eV \(^{2}\) , \(7.53_{-0.18}^{+0.19} \times \) 10 \(^{-5}\) eV \(^{2}\) ], tan \(^{2}\theta _{12}\) = [ \(0.481_{-0.080}^{+0.092} \) , \(0.437_{-0.026}^{+0.029} \) ], and sin \(^{2}\theta _{13}\) = [ \(0.010_{-0.034}^{+0.033} \) , \(0.023_{-0.015}^{+0.015} \) ]. All solutions to the solar neutrino problem except for the large mixing angle region are excluded. KamLAND also demonstrated almost two cycles of the periodic feature expected from neutrino oscillation effects. KamLAND performed the first experimental study of antineutrinos from the Earth’s interior so-called geoneutrinos (geo \({\bar{\nu }}_{e} \) ’s), and succeeded in detecting geo \({\bar{\nu }}_{e} \) ’s produced by the decays of \(^{238}\) U and \(^{232}\) Th within the Earth. Assuming a chondritic Th/U mass ratio, we obtain \(116_{-27}^{+28} {\bar{\nu }}_{e}\) events from \(^{238}\) U and \(^{232}\) Th, corresponding a geo \({\bar{\nu }}_{e}\) flux of \(3.4_{-0.8}^{+0.8}\times \) 10 \(^{6}\) cm \(^{-2}\)  s \(^{-1}\) at the KamLAND location. We evaluate various bulk silicate Earth composition models using the observed geo \({\bar{\nu }}_{e} \) rate.     

DGP cosmological model with generalized Ricci dark energy

The Higgs-boson decay \(h \rightarrow \gamma \ell ^+ \ell ^-\) for various lepton states \(\ell = (e, \, \mu , \, \tau )\) is analyzed. The differential decay width and forward–backward asymmetry are calculated as functions of the dilepton invariant mass in a model where the Higgs boson interacts with leptons and quarks via a mixture of scalar and pseudoscalar couplings. These couplings are partly constrained from data on the decays to leptons, \(h \rightarrow \ell ^+ \ell ^-\) , and quarks \(h \rightarrow q \bar{q} \) (where \(q = (c, \, b)\) ), while the Higgs couplings to the top quark are chosen from the two-photon and two-gluon decay rates. Nonzero values of the forward–backward asymmetry will manifest effects of new physics in the Higgs sector. The decay width and asymmetry integrated over the dilepton invariant mass are also presented.     

Critical and Tricritical Wetting in the Two-Dimensional Blume–Capel model

The two-dimensional Blume–Capel model with free surfaces where a surface field \(H_1\) acts and the “crystal field” (controlling the density of the vacancies) takes a value \(D _s\) different from the value \(D\) in the bulk, is studied by Monte Carlo methods. Using a recently developed finite size scaling method that studies thin films in a \(L \times M\) geometry with antisymmetric surface fields \((H_L=-H_1)\) and keeps a generalized aspect ratio \(c = L^2/M\) constant, surface phase diagrams are computed for several typical choices of the parameters. It is shown that both second order and first order wetting transitions occur, separated by tricritical wetting behavior. The special role of vacancies near the surface is investigated in detail.     

The Distribution of the Area Under a Bessel Excursion and its Moments

A Bessel excursion is a Bessel process that begins at the origin and first returns there at some given time \(T\) . We study the distribution of the area under such an excursion, which recently found application in the context of laser cooling. The area \(A\) scales with the time as \(A \sim T^{3/2}\) , independent of the dimension, \(d\) , but the functional form of the distribution does depend on \(d\) . We demonstrate that for \(d=1\) , the distribution reduces as expected to the distribution for the area under a Brownian excursion, known as the Airy distribution, deriving a new expression for the Airy distribution in the process. We show that the distribution is symmetric in \(d-2\) , with nonanalytic behavior at \(d=2\) . We calculate the first and second moments of the distribution, as well as a particular fractional moment. We also analyze the analytic continuation from \(d<2\) to \(d>2\) . In the limit where \(d\rightarrow 4\) from below, this analytically continued distribution is described by a one-sided Lévy \(\alpha \) -stable distribution with index \(2/3\) and a scale factor proportional to \([(4-d)T]^{3/2}\) .     

Maximal Distance Travelled by N Vicious Walkers Till Their Survival

We consider N Brownian particles moving on a line starting from initial positions \(\mathbf{{u}}\equiv \{u_1,u_2,\ldots u_N\}\) such that \(0 . Their motion gets stopped at time \(t_s\) when either two of them collide or when the particle closest to the origin hits the origin for the first time. For \(N=2\) , we study the probability distribution function \(p_1(m|\mathbf{{u}})\) and \(p_2(m|\mathbf{{u}})\) of the maximal distance travelled by the \(1^{\text {st}}\) and \(2^{\text {nd}}\) walker till \(t_s\) . For general N particles with identical diffusion constants \(D\) , we show that the probability distribution \(p_N(m|\mathbf{u})\) of the global maximum \(m_N\) , has a power law tail \(p_i(m|\mathbf{{u}}) \sim {N^2B_N\mathcal {F}_{N}(\mathbf{u})}/{m^{\nu _N}}\) with exponent \(\nu _N =N^2+1\) . We obtain explicit expressions of the function \(\mathcal {F}_{N}(\mathbf{u})\) and of the N dependent amplitude \(B_N\) which we also analyze for large N using techniques from random matrix theory. We verify our analytical results through direct numerical simulations.     

Refractive index changes and nuclear activation upon irradiation of lithium niobate crystals with different low-mass,high-energy ions

Refractive index changes \(\Delta n\) in lithium niobate crystals upon irradiation with high-energy protons, deuterons, \(^3\) He, and \(^4\alpha \) particles (up to 14 MeV/nucleon) are created, and the accompanying, unwanted nuclear activation is investigated. The measurements give answers to the question which ion is the best choice depending on the requirements: largest values of \(\Delta n\) are achieved with \(^4\alpha \) particles, low nuclear activation with deuterons, or the best tradeoff between \(\Delta n\) and activation with \(^3\) He, respectively.