On the possibility of terahertz wave generation upon dense gas optical breakdown

The possibility of applying the physical principles underlying the operation of a solid-state terahertz oscillator to plasma gas-discharge media is analyzed. A new method of electromagnetic wave generation in the terahertz frequency range is proposed. It is based on the excitation of plasma-oscillation current by a static electric field in a laser spark produced by an axicon lens, followed by the radiation of an electromagnetic pulse through the Cherenkov mechanism.     

Elemental composition of nanoclusters formed by pulsed irradiation with low-energy ions during Ge/Si epitaxy

Multilayer silicon structures with built-in layers of Ge nanoclusters were studied experimentally by Raman light scattering. The built-in layers were formed by the pulsed action of a low-energy beam of intrinsic ions during molecular-beam epitaxy. It is found that the ion-stimulated nucleation and the subsequent growth make it possible to obtain Ge nanoclusters almost free of Si.     

Capture of an Ensemble of Microparticles in the Field of Laser Multibeam Interference

Capture of an ensemble of polymeric microspheres in a water suspension under the action of optical gradient forces in the field of interfering laser beams has been investigated for the case of two-, three-, and four-beam interference. The self-diffraction and diffraction of radiation on induced ordered spatial distribution of particles have been obtained.     

Dynamics of Single-Pulse Echo Signals under the Conditions of Zeeman Switching

The signals of a single-pulse echo (SE) generated on nonresonant excitation of an inhomogeneously broadened two-level system by a radio-frequency pulse (RFP), against the background of which a magnetic video pulse (MVP) of certain length has been switched on, have been described analytically. It is established that under the conditions of such excitation several SE signals are formed whose generation moments are determined by the duration and amplitudes of the RFP and MVP. The amplitudes of some of these signals depend on the Rabi frequency according to a quadratic law, and the amplitudes of others depend on this frequency according to a biquadratic law. It has been established that the mechanism underlying the appearance of these signals is associated with zero beats arising as a result of superposition of the magnetization fluctuations at variable frequencies and at a frequency of detuning from resonance. It is shown that in the limiting case, where the RFP duration considerably exceeds the duration of the MVP or is comparable with it, the number of SE signals decreases to two. Theoretical results on the formation of SE and the dependence of the amplitude of these signals on the MVP amplitude agree with the experimental data on NMR pulsed signals in ferromagnetic materials.     

Spectral enhancement of Polish vowels to improve their identification by hearing impaired listeners

Abnormalities in the cochlear function usually cause broadening of the auditory filters which reduces the speech intelligibility. An attempt to apply a spectral enhancement algorithm has been undertaken to improve the identification of Polish vowels by subjects with cochlear-based hearing-impairment. The identification scores of natural (unprocessed) vowels and spectrally enhanced (processed) vowels has been measured for hearing-impaired subjects. It has been found that spectral enhancement improves vowel scores by about 10% for those subjects, however, a wide variation in individual performance among subjects has been observed. The overall vowels identification scores obtained were 85% for natural vowels and 96% for spectrally enhanced vowels.     

Photoluminescence of liquid-crystal azo derivatives in nanopores

Optics and Spectroscopy - The fluorescence of the nematic liquid crystal n-butyl-n′-methoxyazoxybenzene (BMAOB) in the form of a layer and in porous glasses with pores of different diameter...     

Commuting Rank 2 Differential Operators Corresponding to a Curve of Genus 2

We construct commuting rank 2 formally self-adjoint ordinary differential operators corresponding to a curve of genus 2.     

Smooth and Topological Equivalence of Functions on Surfaces

We obtain conditions under which the Morse functions defined on surfaces are smooth equivalent and functions with isolated critical (singular) points are topologically equivalent.     

Dynamical and Topological Methods in the Theory of Geodesically Equivalent Metrics

We suggest a new, more global, approach to the study of geodesically equivalent metrics which is based on application of the theory of integrable geodesic flows. Bibliography: 17 titles.