Interferometers for displacement-noise-free gravitational-wave detection

We propose a class of displacement- and laser-noise-free gravitational-wave-interferometer configurations, which does not sense nongeodesic mirror motion and laser noise, but provides a nonvanishing gravitational-wave signal. Our interferometers consist of four mirrors and two beam splitters, which form four Mach-Zehnder interferometers. By contrast to previous works, no composite mirrors with multiple reflective surfaces are required. Each mirror in our configuration is sensed redundantly, by at least two pairs of incident and reflected beams. Displacement- and laser-noise-free detection is achieved when output signals from these four interferometers are combined appropriately. Our 3-dimensional interferometer configuration has a low-frequency response proportional to f2, which is better than the f3 achievable by previous 2-dimensional configurations.     

Study of the energy stability of ultra-short pulses from an yttrium-aluminium garnet laser

The energy stability of ultra-short pulses (USPs) from an yttrium-aluminium garnet laser with passive mode locking (PML) has been investigated. Experimental results of passive mode locking based on solutions of widely used dyes are given for comparison. Using these saturable absorbers we found that the energy distribution of USP did not depend on the laser working frequency nor on the duration of the experiment.     

Modeling of the scattering of electromagnetic waves by cavities of elliptic cross section

Based on the mode method, we develop a technique for calculation of the effective scattering area (ESA) of a perfectly conducting cavity of elliptic cross section with the rear wall covered by a radio-absorbing coating (RAC) of constant thickness. In the case where the incident electromagnetic wave is E-polarized, we numerically calculate the angular dependences of the monostatic ESA of an elliptic cavity with and without the RAC. The results of calculations are compared with the obtained experimental data. Voronezh State University, Voronezh, Russia. Translated from Izvestiya Vysshikh Uchebnykh Zavedenii, Radiofizika, Vol. 43, No. 5, pp. 426–432, May, 2000.     

High-spin nuclear states and persistent currents in mesoscopic rings

An analogy is presented between periodic persistent currents in mesoscopic rings and staggerings of gamma energy transitions from some nuclear high-spin states. Various sources of damping of the expected periodic structures in both physical systems are compared. This discussion provides, in the nuclear case, a tentative explanation of the scarcity of such staggerings, their appearance near ¹⁵⁰Gd and the existence of a spin-window for their observation. Received: 21 July 1997 / Revised version: 13 October 1997     

Transmission passband,optical crosstalk and cascadability of free-space concave grating demultiplexer for dense WDM networks

We describe the performance of a 100 channel free-space concave grating demultiplexer with 1dB transmission passband of ±7GHz (FWHM 14–22GHz). The influence of optical aberrations and defocusing on the transmission spectrum is demonstrated. Crosstalk between neighbouring channels separated by >0.3nm is lower than –25dB and no penalty due to crosstalk is observed using 2.6Gbit/s directly modulated DFB lasers. Penalty-free transmission through a cascade of 30 demultiplexers is demonstrated in an optical fibre recirculating loop experiment, and the permitted tolerances on the laser frequency misalignments for a larger number of cascaded demultiplexers are investigated.     

Dynamical gain saturation in Kerr-lens mode-locked CW solid- state lasers

It is shown that dynamical gain saturation, usually neglected for solid-state lasers, can contribute significantly to the pulse-shaping mechanism in Kerr-lens mode-locked lasers. In particular, in combination with self-phase modulation it can cause red shifts and blue shifts of the laser spectrum. A control of the reciprocal gain and loss saturation rates using these shifts leads to improved mode- locking stability.     

Investigation of preheating of laser thermonuclear targets

The preheating level of the thermonuclear fuel and of the gas-compressing shell is the main criterion of the target-compression efficiency in experiments on laserdriven thermonuclear fusion. This paper contains the result of investigations of electronic, radiative, and impact preheating in experiments on compression and heating of hlgh-aspect shell targets in the Del'fin-l laser-derived thermonuclear facility. A procedure, based on analysis of the epithermal emission of the plasma, is considered for measuring the target preheating by fast electrons. The radiative and impact preheating of compressing shells in DD gas are estimated. The results of the investigation demonstrate the high degree of adiabaticity of the compression of the thermonuclear fuel in experiments with the Del'fin-l facility.Nuclear Plasma Laboratory of the Lebedev Physics Institute. Translated from Preprint No. 3, Lebedev Physics Institute, Academy of Sciences of the USSR, Moscow, 1990.     

Mobility of Dirac electrons in HgTe quantum wells

The mobility of Dirac electrons (DEs) in HgTe quantum wells with the thickness close to the critical value corresponding to the transition from the direct to inverted spectrum has been studied experimentally and theoretically. The nonmonotonic dependence of this mobility on the electron density is found experimentally. The theory of DE scattering on impurities and fluctuations of the thickness of a well caused by its roughnesses is elaborated. This theory is in good agreement with experiment and explains the observed nonmonotonicity by the decrease in the ratio of the de Broglie wavelength of DEs to the characteristic size of the roughness with the increase in their concentration.