Observation of geometric phases for mixed states using NMR interferometry

Examples of geometric phases abound in many areas of physics. They offer both fundamental insights into many physical phenomena and lead to interesting practical implementations. One of them, as indicated recently, might be an inherently fault-tolerant quantum computation. This, however, requires one to deal with geometric phases in the presence of noise and interactions between different physical subsystems. Despite the wealth of literature on the subject of geometric phases very little is known about this very important case. Here we report the first experimental study of geometric phases for mixed quantum states. We show how different they are from the well-understood, noiseless, pure-state case.     

Tritium recovery from co-deposited layers using 193-nm laser

Recovery of tritium from co-deposited layers formed in deuterium–tritium plasma operations of the TFTR (Tokamak Fusion Test Reactor) was investigated by the use of an ArF excimer laser operating at the wavelength of 193 nm. At the laser energy density of 0.1 J/cm², a transient spike of the tritium-release rate was observed at initial irradiation. Hydrogen isotopes were released in the form of hydrogen-isotope molecules during the laser irradiation in vacuum, suggesting that tritium can be recovered readily from the released gases. In a second experiment, hydrogen (tritium) recovery from the co-deposited layers on JT-60 tiles that had experienced hydrogen-plasma operations was investigated by laser ablation with a focused beam of the excimer laser. The removal rate of the co-deposited layers was quite low when the laser energy density was smaller than the ablation threshold (1.0 J/cm²), but reached 1.1 μm/pulse at the laser energy density of 7.6 J/cm². The effective absorption coefficient in the co-deposited layers at the laser wavelength was determined to be 1.9 μm^-1. The temperature of the surface during the irradiation at the laser energy density of 0.5 J/cm² was measured on the basis of Planck’s law of radiation, and the maximum temperature during the irradiation decreased from 3570 K at the initial irradiation to 2550 K at the 1000th pulse of the irradiation. Received: 5 August 2002 / Accepted: 7 August 2002 / Published online: 28 October 2002 RID="*" ID="*"Corresponding author. Fax: +81-29/2825917, E-mail: shu@tpl.tokai.jaeri.go.jp     

Absolute potassium cation affinities (PCAs) in the gas phase

The potassium cation affinities (PCAs) of 136 ligands (20 classes) in the gas phase were established by hybrid density functional theory calculations (B3-LYP with the 6-311+G(3df,2p) basis set). For these 136 ligands, 70 experimental values are available for comparison. Except for five specific PCA values-those of phenylalanine, cytosine, guanine, adenine (kinetic-method measurement), and Me(2)SO (by high-pressure mass spectrometric equilibrium measurement)-our theoretical estimates and the experimental affinities are in excellent agreement (mean absolute deviation (MAD) of 4.5 kJ mol(-1)). Comparisons with previously reported theoretical PCAs are also made. The effect of substituents on the modes of binding and the PCAs of unsubstituted parent ligands are discussed. Linear relations between Li+/Na+ and K+ affinities suggest that for the wide range of ligands studied here, the nature of binding between the cations and a given ligand is similar, and this allows the estimation of PCAs from known Li+ and/or Na+ affinities. Furthermore, empirical equations relating the PCAs of ligands with their dipole moments, polarizabilities (or molecular weights), and the number of binding sites were established. Such equations offer a simple method for estimating the PCAs of ligands not included in the present study.     

Synthesis of a hexaalkoxybenzo[b]triphenylene mesogen

The synthesis of the first mesogenic hexaalkoxybenzo[b]triphenylene derivative is reported; this compound exhibits a broad columnar liquid crystal phase at temperatures only slightly above room temperature.     

A chemically modified carbon paste electrode with d-lactate dehydrogenase and alanine aminotranferase enzyme sequences for d-lactic acid analysis

An amperometric biosensor was constructed for the analysis of d-lactic acid based on immobilizing d-lactate dehydrogenase(d-LDH), alanine aminotransferase (ALT), NAD(+), a redox polymer and polyethylenimine in carbon paste. The effect of addition of ALT in the paste, using enzyme sequences of ALT/d-LDH, was insignificant for d-lactic acid analysis. The responses of d-lactic acid in ALT/d-LDH paste electrode are the same as those in d-LDH paste electrode. However, the interference effect of pyruvate in the sample can be substantially reduced if sodium glutamate was applied in the carrier solution. When ALT immobilized in control porous glass as an immobilized enzyme reactor (IMER) was mounted in flow injection analysis system with the d-LDH paste electrode as detector for d-lactate analysis, the interference of the pyruvate can be significantly eliminated. The adverse effect of pyruvate in the samples for d-lactic acid analysis was reduced more effectively in ALT IMER with d-LDH electrode than in ALT/d-LDH electrode.     

Oscillations of nonlinear partial difference systems

This paper studies the following two-dimensional nonlinear partial difference systems

     

Enhanced accuracy by post-processing for finite element methods for hyperbolic equations

We consider the enhancement of accuracy, by means of a simple post-processing technique, for finite element approximations to transient hyperbolic equations. The post-processing is a convolution with a kernel whose support has measure of order one in the case of arbitrary unstructured meshes; if the mesh is locally translation invariant, the support of the kernel is a cube whose edges are of size of the order of only. For example, when polynomials of degree are used in the discontinuous Galerkin (DG) method, and the exact solution is globally smooth, the DG method is of order in the -norm, whereas the post-processed approximation is of order ; if the exact solution is in only, in which case no order of convergence is available for the DG method, the post-processed approximation converges with order in , where is a subdomain over which the exact solution is smooth. Numerical results displaying the sharpness of the estimates are presented.

     

On the p—Local Rank of Finite Groups

In this paper,we shall mainly study the p-solvable finite group in terms of p-local rank,and a group theoretic characterization will be given of finite p-solvabel groups with p-local rank two.Theorem A Let G be a finite p-solvable group with p-local rank plr(G)=2 and Op(G)=1.If P is a Sylow p-subgrounp of G,then P has a normal subgroup Q such that P/Q is cyclic or a generalized quaternion 2-group and the p-rank of Q is at most two.Theorem B Let G be a finite p-solvable group with Op(G)=1.Then the p-length lp(G)≤plr(G);if in addition plr(G)=lp (G) and p≥5 is odd,then plr(G)=0 or 1.