New approach of semiconductor laser related technologies for ultrafast photonics

Ultrashort laser pulses offer new jump in information and communication technology. Especially semiconductor laser based ultrafast photonic devices and systems are promising. We review our new approaches for femtosecond pulse generation, and thin film technology for broad band semiconductor optical amplifiers.     

Sorption and partial molar volumes of C2 and C3 hydrocarbons in polypropylene copolymers

The sorption of C₂ and C₃ hydrocarbons in two ethylene–propylene copolymers and a propylene homopolymer and the simultaneous dilation of the polymers were measured at temperatures of 287–363 K and pressures up to 4 MPa. The sorption isotherms were well described by the Flory–Huggins theory of dissolution. Dilation isotherms in the form of elongation versus pressure were similar in shape to the corresponding sorption isotherms. Solubility coefficients, partial molar volumes, and Flory–Huggins interaction parameters were determined from these isotherms. The thermal expansivities of the hydrocarbons dissolved in the polymers were 0.002–0.005 K^?1, and the Flory–Huggins interaction parameters depended not only on temperature but also on concentration. At 323 K, the calculated solubilities of propylene in the ethylene–propylene‐rubber regions of the copolymers were 1.8 times higher than in the amorphous regions of the propylene homopolymer. © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. J Polym Sci Part B: Polym Phys 39: 1255–1262, 2001     

Role of Arg123 in Light‐driven Anion Pump Mechanisms of pharaonis Halorhodopsin†

Halorhodopsin (HR) acts as a light‐driven chloride pump which transports a chloride ion from the extracellular (EC) to the cytoplasmic space during a photocycle reaction that includes some photointermediates initiated by illumination. To understand the chloride uptake mechanisms, we focused on a basic residue Arg123 of HR from Natronomonas pharaonis (NpHR), which is the only basic residue located in the EC half ion channel. By the measurements of the visible absorption spectra in the dark and the light‐induced inward current through the membrane, it was shown that the chloride binding and transport ability of NpHR completely disappeared by the change of arginine to glutamine. From flashphotolysis analysis, the photocycle of R123Q differed from that of wildtype NpHR completely. The response of the R123H mutant depended on pH. These facts imply that the positive charge at position 123 is essential for chloride binding in the ground state and for the chloride uptake under illumination. On the basis of the molecular structures of HR and the anion‐transportable mutants of bacteriorhodopsin, the effects of the positive charge and the conformational change of the Arg123 side chain as well as the chloride‐pumping mechanism are discussed.     

Gas sorption in poly(vinyl benzoate)

High-pressure sorption (up to 50 atm) for CO₂, N₂, and Ar in poly(vinyl benzoate) (PVB) was studied at temperatures from 25 to 70°C by a gravimetric method utilizing an electromicrobalance. The results are described by Henry's law above the glass transition temperature T_g for all gases. The dual-mode sorption model, Henry's law plus a Langmuir isotherm, applies to the sorption isotherms of N₂ and Ar in the glassy state, and the dual-mode parameters are given. For CO₂, a new type of sorption isotherm is observed below T_g. The isotherm is concave to the pressure axis in the low-pressure region and turns into a straight line with increasing CO₂ pressure which can be extrapolated back to the coordinate origin. The linear part of the isotherm is characteristic of the rubbery state, while the nonlinear part stems from glassystate behavior. The “glass transition solubility” of CO₂, at which PVB film changes from the glassy to the rubbery state, decrease as the temperature increases. The disappearance of microvoids, that is, the decrease of the Langmuir capacity, may be due to a large plasticizing effect of sorbed CO₂. The difference between the N₂ and Ar isotherms and the CO₂ isotherm is discussed from this standpoint.     

Origins of hole doping and relevant optoelectronic properties of wide gap p-type semiconductor, LaCuOSe

LaCuOSe is a wide band gap (～2.8 eV) semiconductor with unique optoelectronic properties, including room-temperature stable excitons, high hole mobility ～8 cm(2)/(Vs), and the capability of high-density hole doping (up to 1.7 × 10(21) cm(-3) using Mg). Moreover, its carrier transport and doping behaviors exhibit nonconventional results, e.g., the hole concentration increases with decreasing temperature and the high hole doping does not correlate with other properties such as optical absorption. Herein, secondary ion mass spectroscopy and photoemission spectroscopy reveal that aliovalent ion substitution of Mg at the La site is not the main source of hole doping and the Fermi level does not shift even in heavily doped LaCuOSe:Mg. As the hole concentration increases, the subgap optical absorption becomes more intense, but the increase in intensity does not correlate quantitatively. Transmission electron microscopy indicates that planar defects composed of Cu and Se deficiencies are easily created in LaCuOSe. These observations can be explained via the existence of a degenerate low-mobility layer and formation of complex Cu and Se vacancy defects with the assistance of generalized gradient approximation band calculations.     

Hierarchical orbital decompositions and extended decomposable distributions

Elliptically contoured distributions can be considered to be the distributions for which the contours of the density functions are proportional ellipsoids. Kamiya, Takemura and Kuriki [Star-shaped distributions and their generalizations, J. Statist. Plann. Inference, 2006, available at 〈http://arxiv.org/abs/math.ST/0605600〉, to appear] generalized the elliptically contoured distributions to star-shaped distributions, for which the contours are allowed to be arbitrary proportional star-shaped sets. This was achieved by considering the so-called orbital decomposition of the sample space in the general framework of group invariance. In the present paper, we extend their results by conducting the orbital decompositions in steps and obtaining a further, hierarchical decomposition of the sample space. This allows us to construct probability models and distributions with further independence structures. The general results are applied to the star-shaped distributions with a certain symmetric structure, the distributions related to the two-sample Wishart problem and the distributions of preference rankings.