Origin of low-coherence enhanced backscattering

The origin of low-coherence enhanced backscattering (EBS) of light in random media when the spatial coherence length of illumination is much smaller than the transport mean free path has been poorly understood. We report that in weakly scattering discrete random media low-coherence EBS originates from time-reversed paths of double scattering. Low spatial coherence illumination dephases the time-reversed waves outside its finite coherence area, which isolates the minimal number of scattering events in EBS from higher-order scattering. Moreover, we show the first experimental evidence that the minimal number of scattering events in EBS is double scattering, which has been hypothesized since the first observation of EBS.     

Coherent light transport in a cold strontium cloud

We study light coherent transport in the weak localization regime using magneto-optically cooled strontium atoms. The coherent backscattering cone is measured in the four polarization channels using light resonant with a J(g) = 0-->J(e) = 1 transition of the strontium atom. We find an enhancement factor close to 2 in the helicity preserving channel, in agreement with theoretical predictions. This observation confirms the effect of internal structure as the key mechanism for the contrast reduction observed with a rubidium cold cloud [G. Labeyrie et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 83, 5266 (1999)]. Experimental results are in good agreement with Monte Carlo simulations taking into account geometry effects.     

Backscattered polarization patterns, optical vortices, and the angular momentum of light

We demonstrate that the polarization patterns observed in backscattering of linearly polarized light are a manifestation of the conservation of angular momentum of light. We will show that this phenomenon can be described in terms of phase vortices that are acquired by the right and left circularly polarized components. The helicity and orbital angular momentum of these components satisfy the requirement for conservation of angular momentum.     

Nonlinear coherent transport of waves in disordered media

We present a diagrammatic theory for coherent backscattering from disordered dilute media in the nonlinear regime. We show that the coherent backscattering enhancement factor is strongly affected by the nonlinearity, and we corroborate these results by numerical simulations. Our theory can be applied to several physical scenarios such as scattering of light in a nonlinear Kerr medium or propagation of matter waves in disordered potentials.     

Deducing residual self-interference of inelastic photons in coherent backscattering of intense laser light from two atoms

A coherent backscattering of intense laser light by two isotropic atoms is studied in the helicity preserving polarization channel. It is demonstrated that single scattering has a non-negligible contribution to the background intensity L(θ) at small angles θ with respect to the backwards direction. This contribution can be subtracted from the total signal, and the value of L(0) necessary for evaluating the coherent backscattering enhancement factor – inferred from measurements of the backscattered light intensity beyond the interference peak.     

Effect of orbital angular momentum on valence-quark helicity distributions

We study the quark helicity distributions at large x in perturbative QCD, taking into account contributions from the valence Fock states of the nucleon which have nonzero orbital angular momentum. We find that the quark orbital angular momentum contributes a large logarithm to the negative helicity quark distributions in addition to its power behavior, scaling as (1-x){5}log{2}(1-x) in the limit of x-->1. Our analysis shows that the ratio of the polarized over unpolarized down quark distributions, Deltad/d, will still approach 1 in this limit. By comparing with the experimental data, we find that this ratio should cross zero at x approximately 0.75.     

Multi-parton cross sections at hadron colliders

We present an alternative method to calculate cross sections for multi-parton scattering processes in the standard model at leading order. The helicity amplitudes are computed using recursion relations in the number of particles, based on the Dyson–Schwinger equations, whereas the summation over colour and helicity configurations is performed by Monte Carlo methods. The computational cost of our algorithm grows asymptotically as 3ⁿ, where n is the number of particles involved in the process, as opposed to the n!-growth of the Feynman diagram approach. Typical results for the total cross section, the differential distributions of the invariant masses and the transverse momenta of the partons are presented and cross checked by explicit summation over colours.     

Double deeply virtual Compton scattering off the nucleon

We study the double deeply virtual Compton scattering (DDVCS) process off the nucleon, through the scattering of a space-like virtual photon with large virtuality resulting in the production of a time-like virtual photon, decaying into an e(+)e(-) pair. This process is expressed in the Bjorken regime in terms of generalized parton distributions (GPDs), and it is shown that by varying the invariant mass of the lepton pair, one can directly extract the GPDs from the observables. We give predictions for the DDVCS cross section and beam helicity asymmetry and discuss its experimental feasibility.     

Fast computation of MadGraph amplitudes on graphics processing unit (GPU)

Continuing our previous studies on QED and QCD processes, we use the graphics processing unit (GPU) for fast calculations of helicity amplitudes for general Standard Model (SM) processes. Additional HEGET codes to handle all SM interactions are introduced, as well as the program MG2CUDA that converts arbitrary MadGraph generated HELAS amplitudes (FORTRAN) into HEGET codes in CUDA. We test all the codes by comparing amplitudes and cross sections for multi-jet processes at the LHC associated with production of single and double weak bosons, a top-quark pair, Higgs boson plus a weak boson or a top-quark pair, and multiple Higgs bosons via weak-boson fusion, where all the heavy particles are allowed to decay into light quarks and leptons with full spin correlations. All the helicity amplitudes computed by HEGET are found to agree with those computed by HELAS within the expected numerical accuracy, and the cross sections obtained by gBASES, a GPU version of the Monte Carlo integration program, agree with those obtained by BASES (FORTRAN), as well as those obtained by MadGraph. The performance of GPU was over a factor of 10 faster than CPU for all processes except those with the highest number of jets.     

Coherence effects in scattering systems of two interacting dipoles at resonance

Coherence effects in the backward-scattering direction, such as enhanced backscattering (EBS) and the appearance of a negative polarization branch (NPB), are investigated for a simple scattering system composed of two dipolelike particles separated by a fixed distance. The influence on these effects of coupling resonances between the particles is analyzed. The appearance of these coherent phenomena (EBS and NPB) and their relationship as a function of the optical properties of the particles (polarizability) and particle separation are also studied.     

Ultimate degree of residual polarization of incoherently backscattered light for multiple scattering of linearly polarized light

By invoking ideas about the distribution of the optical paths of partial components of the scattered field, we obtain an expression for estimating the degree of residual polarization of light that is incoherently backscattered from a disordered multiply scattering semi-infinite medium illuminated by linearly polarized light. In the backscattering regime, the depolarization length of the linearly polarized light in the disordered medium becomes smaller with the passage from the isotropic to anisotropic scattering. Experiments with model media featuring substantially anisotropic scattering (the anisotropy parameter of 0.90 ≤ g ≤ 0.95) demonstrated that for backscattering of linearly polarized light, the depolarization length is close to the transport length of the scattering medium.     

Weak localization of light in a disordered microcavity

We report the observation of weak localization of light in a semiconductor microcavity. The intrinsic disorder in a microcavity leads to multiple scattering and hence to static speckle. We show that averaging over realizations of the disorder reveals a coherent backscattering cone that has a coherent enhancement factor > or =2, as required by reciprocity. The coherent backscattering cone is observed along a ring-shaped pattern due to confinement by the microcavity.     

Observational cross helicity on the solar surface

We analyzed the correlation of the solar magnetograms and Dopplergrams from SOHO/MDI and SDO/HMI respectively. It is found that the full disk correlation coefficient of Dopplergrams is more than 0.80 between SOHO/MDI and SDO/HMI. The full disk correlation coefficient of magnetograms is about 0.73 and is more than 0.95 for active regions only. We also analyzed the distribution of the cross helicity (velocity-magnetic-field correlation) on the solar surface. It is found that the latitude distributions of the cross helicity based on SOHO/MDI data and SDO/HMI data have similar tendencies, and in the analysis of solar active regions the amplitude of the horizontal component of the mean cross helicity is about two times the line-of-sight one.     

The pump-probe approach to coherent backscattering of intense laser light from cold atoms

We present a new approach to near-resonant coherent backscattering of light from cold two-level atoms. In the dilute regime, where the distance between atoms is much larger than the laser wavelength, this approach is able to account for multi-photon scattering processes between many atoms through solutions of single-atom optical Bloch equations. We elaborate the method for double scattering from two atoms, and discuss the way of its extension for dilute, cold atomic clouds.     

Coherent backscattering of light by complex random media of spherical scatterers: numerical solution

Novel Monte Carlo techniques are described for the computation of reflection coefficient matrices for multiple scattering of light in plane-parallel random media of spherical scatterers. The present multiple scattering theory is composed of coherent backscattering and radiative transfer. In the radiative transfer part, the Stokes parameters of light escaping from the medium are updated at each scattering process in predefined angles of emergence. The scattering directions at each process are randomized using probability densities for the polar and azimuthal scattering angles: the former angle is generated using the single-scattering phase function, whereafter the latter follows from Kepler's equation. For spherical scatterers in the Rayleigh regime, randomization proceeds semi-analytically whereas, beyond that regime, cubic spline presentation of the scattering matrix is used for numerical computations. In the coherent backscattering part, the reciprocity of electromagnetic waves in the backscattering direction allows the renormalization of the reversely propagating waves, whereafter the scattering characteristics are computed in other directions. High orders of scattering (~10 000) can be treated because of the peculiar polarization characteristics of the reverse wave: after a number of scatterings, the polarization state of the reverse wave becomes independent of that of the incident wave, that is, it becomes fully dictated by the scatterings at the end of the reverse path. The coherent backscattering part depends on the single-scattering albedo in a non-monotonous way, the most pronounced signatures showing up for absorbing scatterers. The numerical results compare favourably to the literature results for nonabsorbing spherical scatterers both in and beyond the Rayleigh regime.     

Light transport in cold atoms and thermal decoherence

We use the coherent backscattering interference effect to investigate experimentally and theoretically how coherent transport of light inside a cold atomic vapor is affected by the residual motion of atomic scatterers. As the temperature of the atomic cloud increases, the interference contrast decreases dramatically. This emphasizes the role of motion-induced decoherence for resonant scatterers even in the sub-Doppler regime of temperature. We derive analytical expressions for the corresponding coherence time.     

Polarization of light backscattered by small particles

We study scattering of light by wavelength-scale spherical, cubic, and spheroidal particles as well as clusters of spherical particles for equal-volume-sphere size parameters 4≤x≤10 and refractive indices 1.1≤m≤2.0. Such particles exhibit three specific features in the regime of backscattering: first, the intensity shows a backscattering peak; second, the degree of linear polarization for unpolarized incident light is negative; and, third, the depolarization ratio is double-lobed. We find that the overall characteristics of the scattering-matrix elements can be explained by an internal field composed of waves propagating in opposite directions near the particle perimeter and forming standing waves, as well as a wave propagating forward with the wavelength of the internal medium. When moving from the central axis of the particle toward its perimeter, the internal field changes from a forward-propagating wave with a wavelength dictated by the particle refractive index toward a standing wave with an apparent wavelength of the surrounding medium. The mapping of the internal field to the scattered far field is like an interference dial where rotation of the dial by a quarter of a wavelength on the particle perimeter results in a change from a destructive to constructive interference feature in the angular patterns (or vice versa). The dial is a manifestation of a well-known rule of thumb: the number of maxima or minima in the scattering-matrix elements is given by the size parameter. We explain the backscattering peak as deriving from the backward-propagating internal wave near the particle perimeter. Negative polarization follows from the spatial asymmetry of the internal fields: inside the particle, the fields are amplified near the central plane perpendicular to the polarization state of incident light, resulting in more pronounced interference effects for the perpendicular polarization than for the parallel polarization. The double-lobe feature in the depolarization results from the same internal-field structure with leading cross-polarized fields located slightly different from the copolarized fields. We discuss practical implications of these findings for the retrieval of particle sizes, shapes, and refractive indices from observations and laboratory experiments.     

Magnetic dynamo action at low magnetic Prandtl numbers

Amplification of magnetic field due to kinematic turbulent dynamo action is studied in the regime of small magnetic Prandtl numbers. Such a regime is relevant for planets and stars interiors, as well as for liquid-metal laboratory experiments. A comprehensive analysis based on the Kazantsev-Kraichnan model is reported, which establishes the dynamo threshold and the dynamo growth rates for varying kinetic helicity of turbulent fluctuations. It is proposed that in contrast with the case of large magnetic Prandtl numbers, the kinematic dynamo action at small magnetic Prandtl numbers is significantly affected by kinetic helicity, and it can be made quite efficient with an appropriate choice of the helicity spectrum.     

用卢瑟福背散射和弹性背散射分析高Tc超导薄膜中的元素组份及氧含量

提出了用能量为１．５－２．５ＭｅＶ的质子弹性背散射分析（ｅｌａｓｔｉｃ ｂａｃｋｓｃａｔｔｅｒｉｎｇ，缩写为ＥＢＳ）来测定薄膜中的氧含量，这个方法对于厚度为几十纳米到几个微米的样品，测量精度约５％。采用ＲＢＳ分析并结合ＥＢＳ分析，可全面测得薄膜中各元素的含量。 关键词：