Characterization of LiNbO3 waveguides fabricated by proton exchange in water

Proton exchange of LiNbO₃ substrates has been achieved by immersing the samples in distilled water in sealed ampoules at temperatures between 190 °C and 300 °C. The samples have been studied by infrared spectra analysis, dark mode reflectivity and X-ray rocking curve diffraction. The results obtained show that exchange rates as high as with common acids (85%) are easily reached. The structure of the exchanged waveguides varies from the low index -phase to the high index -phases depending on the temperature and time length of the exchange process, as well as on the distilled water amount used. Optical waveguides made up of phases of high, sharp index jump (n_e0.12) as well as of low index jump and very low propagation losses (0.5 dB/cm) have been obtained and characterized. PACS 42.82.Et; 42.70.Mp     

Magnetic properties of Yb Mo O and Gd Mo O from rare earth Mössbauer measurements

Using ¹⁷⁰Yb and ¹⁵⁵Gd M?ssbauer measurements down to ∼ 0.03 K, we have examined the semiconducting pyrochlore Yb₂Mo₂O₇ where the Mo intra-sublattice interaction is anti-ferromagnetic and the metallic pyrochlore Gd₂Mo₂O₇ where this interaction is ferromagnetic. Additional information was obtained from susceptibility, magnetisation and ¹⁷²Yb perturbed angular correlation measurements. The microscopic measurements evidence lattice disorder which is important in Yb₂Mo₂O₇ and modest in Gd₂Mo₂O₇. Magnetic irreversibilities occur at 17 K in Yb₂Mo₂O₇ and at 75 K in Gd₂Mo₂O₇ and below these temperatures the rare earths carry magnetic moments which are induced through couplings with the Mo sublattice. In Gd₂Mo₂O₇, we observe the steady state Gd hyperfine populations at 0.027 K are out of thermal equilibrium, indicating that Gd and Mo spin fluctuations persist at very low temperatures. Frustration is thus operative in this essentially isotropic pyrochlore where the dominant Mo intra-sublattice interaction is ferromagnetic. Received 13 January 2003 Published online 4 June 2003 RID="a" ID="a"e-mail: hodges@drecam.saclay.cea.fr     

Equivalence of positive Hausdorff measure and the open set condition for self-conformal sets

A compact set is self-conformal if it is a finite union of its images by conformal contractions. It is well known that if the conformal contractions satisfy the ``open set condition' (OSC), then has positive -dimensional Hausdorff measure, where is the solution of Bowen's pressure equation. We prove that the OSC, the strong OSC, and positivity of the -dimensional Hausdorff measure are equivalent for conformal contractions; this answers a question of R. D. Mauldin. In the self-similar case, when the contractions are linear, this equivalence was proved by Schief (1994), who used a result of Bandt and Graf (1992), but the proofs in these papers do not extend to the nonlinear setting.

     

Paramagnetic fluctuations in Yb3Ga5O12 investigated with 172Yb PAC probe

¹⁷²Yb PAC measurements were carried out on Yb₃Ga₅O₁₂ at temperatures ranging from 14 to 1100 K. The time dependent hyperfine interaction is clearly evident below room temperature. It is attributed to spin fluctuations of Yb ion in the ground state of the ²F_7/2 multiplet. Above 500 K, the temperature dependence of the electric field gradient is shown to result from a varying population of the crystal electric field levels. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Quantum fidelity in the thermodynamic limit

We study quantum fidelity, the overlap between two ground states of a many-body system, focusing on the thermodynamic regime. We show how a drop in fidelity near a critical point encodes universal information about a quantum phase transition. Our general scaling results are illustrated in the quantum Ising chain for which a remarkably simple expression for fidelity is found.     

Magnetic structures and crystal field in the heavy electron materials YbAgGe and YbPtIn

We have examined the magnetic properties of the heavy electron compounds YbAgGe and YbPtIn by ¹⁷⁰Yb M?ssbauer spectroscopy down to 0.1 K, and the crystal field properties of YbAgGe by Perturbed Angular Correlations (PAC) measurements up to 900 K. In YbAgGe, we show that each of the two magnetically ordered phases below 0.8 K involves a specific incommensurate modulation of the Yb moment. An analysis of existing low temperature specific heat data suggests the persistence of fluctuations of the correlated Yb spins down to 0.1 K. The PAC data allow to discriminate among proposed Yb³⁺ crystal field level schemes. In YbPtIn, we show that the low temperature magnetic order phase has an antiferro-para structure, where zero moment Yb ions coexist with large moment ones, and that a 90° moment reorientation occurs at 1.4 K.     

Development and analysis of a malaria transmission mathematical model with seasonal mosquito life-history traits

In this paper, we develop and analyze a malaria model with seasonality of mosquito life-history traits: periodic-mosquitoes per capita birth rate, -mosquitoes death rate, -probability of mosquito to human disease transmission, -probability of human to mosquito disease transmission, and -mosquitoes biting rate. All these parameters are assumed to be time dependent leading to a nonautonomous differential equation system. We provide a global analysis of the model depending on two threshold parameters and (with ). When , then the disease-free stationary state is locally asymptotically stable. In the presence of the human disease-induced mortality, the global stability of the disease-free stationary state is guarantied when . On the contrary, if , the disease persists in the host population in the long term and the model admits at least one positive periodic solution. Moreover, by a numerical simulation, we show that a sub-critical (backward) bifurcation is possible at . Finally, the simulation results are in accordance with the seasonal variation of the reported cases of a malaria-epidemic region in Mpumalanga province in South Africa.     

Projective surfaces with many skew lines

We give an example of a smooth surface of degree that contains pairwise disjoint lines. In particular, our example shows that the degree in Miyaoka's bound is sharp.

     

Three-divisible families of skew lines on a smooth projective quintic

We give an example of a family of 15 skew lines on a quintic such that its class is divisible by 3. We study properties of the codes given by arrangements of disjoint lines on quintics.

     

Synthèse dc la pyrido[2,3-f] phtalazine et des diformyl-6,7; -4,6; -4,7; -2,4 quinoleines

This article describes the synthesis of a new heterocycle, pyrido[2,3,f]phtalazine and three new diformylquinolincs.