Effervescence in champagne and sparkling wines: From bubble bursting to droplet evaporation

When a bubble reaches an air-liquid interface, it ruptures, projecting a multitude of tiny droplets in the air. Across the oceans, an estimated 10¹⁸ to 10²⁰ bubbles burst every second, and form the so called sea spray, a major player in earth’s climate system. At a smaller scale, in a glass of champagne about a million bubbles nucleate on the wall, rise towards the surface and burst, giving birth to a particular aerosol that holds a concentrate of wine aromas. Based on the model experiment of a single bubble bursting in simple liquids, we depict each step of this effervescence, from bubble bursting to drop evaporation. In particular, we propose simple scaling laws for the jet velocity and the top drop size. We unravel experimentally the intricate roles of bubble shape, capillary waves, gravity, and liquid properties in the jet dynamics and the drop detachment. We demonstrate how damping action of viscosity produces faster and smaller droplets and more generally how liquid properties enable to control the bubble bursting aerosol characteristics. In this context, the particular case of Champagne wine aerosol is studied in details and the key features of this aerosol are identified. We demonstrate that compared to a still wine, champagne fizz drastically enhances the transfer of liquid into the atmosphere. Conditions on bubble radius and wine viscosity that optimize aerosol evaporation are provided. These results pave the way towards the fine tuning of aerosol characteristics and flavor release during sparkling wine tasting, a major issue of the sparkling wine industry.     

Driven production of cold antihydrogen and the first measured distribution of antihydrogen states

Cold antihydrogen is produced when antiprotons are repeatedly driven into collisions with cold positrons within a nested Penning trap. Efficient antihydrogen production takes place during many cycles of positron cooling of antiprotons. A first measurement of a distribution of antihydrogen states is made using a preionizing electric field between separated production and detection regions. Surviving antihydrogen is stripped in an ionization well that captures and stores the freed antiproton for background-free detection.     

Pseudorapidity distributions of charged particles from Au + Au collisions at the maximum RHIC energy,square root[s(NN)] = 200 GeV

We present charged-particle multiplicities as a function of pseudorapidity and collision centrality for the 197Au+197Au reaction at square root[s(NN)] = 200 GeV. For the 5% most central events we obtain dN(ch)/deta/(eta = 0) = 625+/-55 and N(ch)/(-4.7< or =eta < or =4.7) = 4630 +/- 370, i.e., 14% and 21% increases, respectively, relative to square root[s(NN)] = 130 GeV collisions. Charged-particle production per pair of participant nucleons is found to increase from peripheral to central collisions around midrapidity. These results constrain current models of particle production at the highest RHIC energy.     

X-ray emission spectroscopy of hydrogen bonding and electronic structure of liquid water

We use x-ray emission spectroscopy to examine the influence of the intermolecular interaction on the local electronic structure of liquid water. By comparing x-ray emission spectra of the water molecule and liquid water, we find a strong involvement of the a(1)-symmetry valence-orbital in the hydrogen bonding. The local electronic structure of water molecules, where one hydrogen bond is broken at the hydrogen site, is separately determined. Our results provide an illustration of the important potential of x-ray emission spectroscopy for elucidating basic features of liquids.     

Rho(0) meson production in the pp-->pppi(+)pi(-) reaction at 3.67 GeV/c

Total and differential cross sections for the exclusive reaction pp-->pp rho observed via the pi(+)pi(-) decay channel have been measured at p(beam)=3.67 GeV/c. The observed total meson production cross section is determined to be (23.4+/-0.8+/-8) mu b and is significantly lower than typical cross sections used in model calculations for heavy-ion collisions. The differential cross sections measured indicate a strong anisotropy (approximately cos(theta(CM)(rho)) in the rho(0) meson production.     

Symmetries and constants of the motion for singular Lagrangian systems

A classification of infinitesimal symmetries of singular autonomous and nonautonomous Lagrangian systems is obtained. The relationship between infinitesimal symmetries and constants of the motion is given.     

NMR studies of the chalcogen analogues of benzofuran. IV—Proton,carbon-13 and selenium-77 magnetic resonance in nitrobenzo[b]selenophenes

The ¹H, ¹³C and ⁷⁷Se chemical shifts have been measured for mononitrobenzo[ b ]selenophenes. For the homocyclic nuclei, the observed ¹H- and ¹³C-values calculated from the empirical increments of nitrobenzene. Anomalous effects are observed in the 2- and 3-substituted derivatives and the nature of the Se? NO₂ interactions in the former is discussed. ⁷⁷Se chemical shifts of the 4-, 5- and 7-nitro derivatives are approximately correlated with the CNDO calculated electron densities; they also compare well with those of selenoanisoles and other phenyl alkyl selenides. The chemical shifts are also compared with the corresponding values in other heterocycles containing a selenophene moiety.