Fractional shot noise in the kondo regime

Transport through quantum dots in the Kondo regime obeys an effective low-temperature theory in terms of weakly interacting quasiparticles. Despite the weakness of the interaction, we find that the backscattering current and hence the shot noise are dominated by two-quasiparticle scattering. We show that the simultaneous presence of one- and two-quasiparticle scattering results in a universal average charge 5/3e as measured by shot-noise experiments. An experimental verification of our prediction would constitute a most stringent test of the low-energy theory of the Kondo effect.     

Interplay of spin and charge channels in zero-dimensional systems

We study the interplay of charge and spin (zero-mode) channels in quantum dots. The latter affects the former in the form of a distinct signature on the differential conductance. We also obtain both longitudinal and transverse spin susceptibilities. All these observables, underlain by spin fluctuations, become accentuated as one approaches the Stoner instability. The nonperturbative effects of zero-mode interaction are described in terms of the propagation of gauge bosons associated with charge [U(1)] and spin [SU(2)] fluctuations in the dot, while transverse spin fluctuations are analyzed perturbatively.     

Interaction of scanning probes with semiconductor nanocrystals; physical mechanism and basis for near-field optical imaging

We investigate the modification of photoluminescence (PL) from single semiconductor nanocrystal quantum dots (NCs) in the proximity of metal and semiconducting atomic force microscope (AFM) tips. The presence of the tip alters the radiative decay rate of an emitter via interference and opens efficient nonradiative decay channels via energy transfer to the tip material. These effects cause quenching (or enhancement) of the emitter's PL intensity as a function of its distance from the interacting tip. We take advantage of this highly distance-dependent effect to realize a contrast mechanism for high-resolution optical imaging. AFM tips are optimized as energy acceptors by chemical functionalization with InAs NCs to achieve optical resolution down to 30 nm. The presented experimental scheme offers high-resolution optical information while maintaining the benefits of traditional AFM imaging. We directly measure the PL intensity of single NCs as a function of the tip distance. Our results are in good agreement with calculations made by a classical theoretical model describing an oscillating dipole interacting with a planar mirror.     

Randomized algorithms for distributed computation of principal component analysis and singular value decomposition

Randomized algorithms provide solutions to two ubiquitous problems: (1) the distributed calculation of a principal component analysis or singular value decomposition of a highly rectangular matrix, and (2) the distributed calculation of a low-rank approximation (in the form of a singular value decomposition) to an arbitrary matrix. Carefully honed algorithms yield results that are uniformly superior to those of the stock, deterministic implementations in Spark (the popular platform for distributed computation); in particular, whereas the stock software will without warning return left singular vectors that are far from numerically orthonormal, a significantly burnished randomized implementation generates left singular vectors that are numerically orthonormal to nearly the machine precision.     

Biased tug-of-war, the biased infinity Laplacian, and comparison with exponential cones

We prove that if ${U\subset \mathbb {R}^n}$ is an open domain whose closure ${\overline U}$ is compact in the path metric, and F is a Lipschitz function on ?U, then for each ${\beta \in \mathbb {R}}$ there exists a unique viscosity solution to the β-biased infinity Laplacian equation $$\beta |\nabla u| + \Delta_\infty u=0$$ on U that extends F, where ${\Delta_\infty u= |\nabla u|^{-2} \sum_{i,j} u_{x_i}u_{x_ix_j} u_{x_j}}$ . In the proof, we extend the tug-of-war ideas of Peres, Schramm, Sheffield and Wilson, and define the β-biased ${\epsilon}$ -game as follows. The starting position is ${x_0 \in U}$ . At the kth step the two players toss a suitably biased coin (in our key example, player I wins with odds of ${\exp(\beta\epsilon)}$ to 1), and the winner chooses x _k with ${d(x_k,x_{k-1}) < \epsilon}$ . The game ends when ${x_k \in \partial U}$ , and player II pays the amount F(x _k ) to player I. We prove that the value ${u^{\epsilon}(x_0)}$ of this game exists, and that ${\|u^\epsilon - u\|_\infty \to 0}$ as ${\epsilon \to 0}$ , where u is the unique extension of F to ${\overline{U}}$ that satisfies comparison with β-exponential cones. Comparison with exponential cones is a notion that we introduce here, and generalizing a theorem of Crandall, Evans and Gariepy regarding comparison with linear cones, we show that a continuous function satisfies comparison with β-exponential cones if and only if it is a viscosity solution to the β-biased infinity Laplacian equation.     

Single molecule photon counting statistics for quantum mechanical chromophore dynamics

We extend the generating function technique for calculation of single molecule photon emission statistics (Zheng, Y.; Brown, F. L. H. Phys. Rev. Lett. 2003, 90, 238305) to systems governed by multi-level quantum dynamics. This opens up the possibility to study phenomena that are outside the realm of purely stochastic and mixed quantum-stochastic models. In particular, the present methodology allows for calculation of photon statistics that are spectrally resolved and subject to quantum coherence. Several model calculations illustrate the generality of the technique and highlight quantitative and qualitative differences between quantum mechanical models and related stochastic approximations when they arise. Calculations suggest that studying photon statistics as a function of photon frequency has the potential to reveal more about system dynamics than the usual broadband detection schemes.     

Suppression of flavor symmetry breaking in B decay sum rules

While flavor symmetries are useful for studying hadronic B   decays, symmetry relations for amplitudes and decay rates are usually violated by first order symmetry breaking corrections. We point out two cases in which first order symmetry breaking is suppressed by a small ratio of amplitudes: (1) An isospin sum rule for four B→Kπ$B\to K\pi$ decays, where isospin breaking is shown to be negligible. (2) An SU(3)$\mathrm{SU}(3)$ sum rule for pairs of B→Kπ$B\to K\pi$ and B→Kη₈$B\to K{\eta }_8$, generalized to pairs of B→Kπ$B\to K\pi$, B→Kη$B\to K\eta$ and B→Kη^′$B\to K{\eta }^{\prime }$.     

Mobile geometric graphs: detection, coverage and percolation

We consider the following dynamic Boolean model introduced by van den Berg et al. (Stoch. Process. Appl. 69:247–257, 1997). At time 0, let the nodes of the graph be a Poisson point process in ${\mathbb{R}^d}$ with constant intensity and let each node move independently according to Brownian motion. At any time t, we put an edge between every pair of nodes whose distance is at most r. We study three fundamental problems in this model: detection (the time until a target point—fixed or moving—is within distance r of some node of the graph); coverage (the time until all points inside a finite box are detected by the graph); and percolation (the time until a given node belongs to the infinite connected component of the graph). We obtain precise asymptotics for these quantities by combining ideas from stochastic geometry, coupling and multi-scale analysis.     

Weak values of electron spin in a double quantum dot

We propose a protocol for a controlled experiment to measure a weak value of the electron's spin in a solid state device. The weak value is obtained by a two step procedure--weak measurement followed by a strong one (postselection), where the outcome of the first measurement is kept provided a second postselected outcome occurs. The setup consists of a double quantum dot and a weakly coupled quantum point contact to be used as a detector. Anomalously large values of the spin of a two electron system are predicted, as well as negative values of the total spin. We also show how to incorporate the adverse effect of decoherence into this procedure.     

A graph-theoretic approach for comparing dimensions of components in simply-graded algebras

Any simple group-grading of a finite dimensional complex algebra induces a natural family of digraphs. We prove that in a digraph without parallel edges, the number of pairs of vertices having a common in-neighbor or a common out-neighbor is at least the number of edges. We deduce that for any simple group-grading, the dimension of the trivial component is maximal.