Current-induced coupling between conductance channels in membranes

The driven system of conducting channels in a nerve membrane is investigated. A current flow generates a coupling between the channels: the current through a channel is influenced by the presence of other conducting channels via the deformation of the equipotential surfaces within the media adjacent to the membrane. We derive an integral equation for the membrane voltageV(s) (s in the membrane plane) and solve it for different membrane conductance distributions(s) including models for stochastic distributions of conducting channels.V(s) is a nonlinear functional of(s). The system of coupled channels is compared with an Ising model. The system exhibits a multi-channel interaction which can be characterized by two different rangesd _int andD ₁. For a mean channel distanced ₀d _int interaction effects are negligible, and ford ₀D ₁ all channel-voltages are equal and thus represent a mean-field for the channels. Increasing conductivity of the medium decreasesd _int and increasesD ₁. With experimental data on sodium channels in nerve membranes we find:d _intd ₀, i.e. a 50% decrease of the channel-voltages by the interaction, andD ₁10³10⁴ d ₀, which indicates mean-field behaviour of the channels. In a subsequent paper we shall treat the statistics of channels which open and close stochastically under the influence of the local membrane voltage.     

Rotational energy and limits to fusion reactions between two nuclei

The energy balance of the fusion process between two nuclei is discussed with respect to the rotational energy. Two energy regimes are obtained. In the first regime the increase of rotational energy of the compound system as function of incident energy is governed by the moment of inertia of the two-fragment system at the barrier configuration. The faster increase of rotational energy of the compound system is furnished by theQ-value. In a sliding collision only part of theQ-value can be converted into rotational energy. Therefore, the Yrast limit in the population of the compound nucleus cannot be reached. When this source of energy is exhausted at a certain angular momentum, a second regime is obtained; then the increase of angular momentum and rotational energy as function of incident energy must be determined by the moment of inertia of the compound system.     

Boundary Element Methods for Maxwell Transmission Problems in Lipschitz Domains

Summary. We consider the Maxwell equations in a domain with Lipschitz boundary and the boundary integral operator A occuring in the Calderón projector. We prove an inf-sup condition for A using a Hodge decomposition. We apply this to two types of boundary value problems: the exterior scattering problem by a perfectly conducting body, and the dielectric problem with two different materials in the interior and exterior domain. In both cases we obtain an equivalent boundary equation which has a unique solution. We then consider Galerkin discretizations with Raviart-Thomas spaces. We show that these spaces have discrete Hodge decompositions which are in some sense close to the continuous Hodge decomposition. This property allows us to prove quasioptimal convergence of the resulting boundary element methods. Mathematics Subject Classification (2000):65N30     

The experimental structure of199Au and the interacting boson-fermion model

Gamma rays of¹⁹⁹Au obtained after double neutron capture in¹⁹⁷Au were measured at the ILL high flux reactor. A level scheme up to 1770 keV excitation energy is established. The result is compared with IBFM and Boson-Fermion-Symmetry calculations.     

Quantum General Relativity and the Meaning of (R + R2) Theories

It is argued that, due to the cut-off lengths arising in Quantum General Relativity, R2 corrections of Einstein's theory cannot be interpreted as quantum corrections.     

Two-phonon resonant Raman scattering at the indirect exciton in silver chloride

Resonant Raman scattering in AgCl is reported for the first time. With excitation in the indirect absorption edge at 1.8K the observed scattering processes involve pairs of momentum-conserving TA(L) and LA(L) phonons with energies of 8.2 meV and 12.9 meV, respectively. The dependence of the scattered intensity on excitation energy suggests that, in contrast to AgBr, intravalley scattering by long wavelength acoustic phonons and intervalley scattering are negligibly small, the main relaxation mechanism of the free exciton being self-trapping. Some enhancement in the 2LO scattering intensity observed is probably due to resonance with the lowest direct exciton.     

Significance of intra-cavity power density in synchronous mode-locking of CW-dye lasers

It is shown that there is a well-defined relation between the intra-cavity power density and the temporal structure of ultrashort light pulses generated by a synchronously pumped cw dye laser. To obtain pulses of good quality with high output power the beam cross-section in the lasing medium must be large, because the best performance is achieved at low power density.     

Random fields in the diluted Ising system Fe1−xMgxCl2

We discuss how random fields (RFs) are generated in uniaxial random antiferromagnets by applied fields and report a systematic specific heat study on the three-dimensional (3-D) system Fe_1?xMg_xCl₂ to demonstrate their effects. The RF crossover exponent ø is determined by measuring the shape of the phase boundary in the TH plane and we obtain ø=1.26 ± 0.10, in agreement with theoretical prediction. Drastic changes in the shape of the specific anomaly are observed. We argue that they are due to the temperature dependence of the random fields.