Synthesis and Reactivity of the First Isolated Hydrogen‐Bridged Silanol–Silanolate Anions

We report on the first examples of isolated silanol–silanolate anions, obtained by utilizing weakly coordinating phosphazenium counterions. The silanolate anions were synthesized from the recently published phosphazenium hydroxide hydrate salt with siloxanes. The silanol–silanolate anions are postulated intermediates in the hydroxide‐mediated polymerization of aryl and alkyl siloxanes. The silanolate anions are strong nucleophiles because of the weakly coordinating character of the phosphazenium cation, which is perceptible in their activity in polysiloxane depolymerization.     

Absolutely indecomposable symmetric matrices

Let A be a symmetric matrix of size n×n with entries in some (commutative) field K. We study the possibility of decomposing A into two blocks by conjugation by an orthogonal matrix T∈Mat_n(K). We say that A is absolutely indecomposable if it is indecomposable over every extension of the base field. If K is formally real then every symmetric matrix A diagonalizes orthogonally over the real closure of K. Assume that K is a not formally real and of level s. We prove that in Mat_n(K) there exist symmetric, absolutely indecomposable matrices iff n is congruent to 0, 1 or −1 modulo 2s.     

Effects of annealing conditions on the electrical properties of Bi4-xNdxTi3O12 (x = 0.46) thin films processed at low temperature

Neodymium-substituted Bi₄Ti₃O₁₂ (BNdT) thin films were prepared by a chemical solution deposition technique on platinum- coated silicon substrates. All of the samples were annealed at the relatively low temperature of 600 °C by a rapid thermal annealing process in different atmospheres, such as O₂, air, and nitrogen, and vacuum. Irrespective of different annealing atmospheres, all of the BNdT thin films exhibit good ferroelectric properties, such as a saturated hysteresis loop, good fatigue endurance, and low leakage current density. A large remanent polarization (P_r) of ∼48 μC/cm² with an electric field of 240 kV/cm was observed from the BNdT thin film annealed in O₂ atmosphere. The BNdT thin films annealed in nitrogen and vacuum, at reduced oxygen partial pressures, exhibit smaller P_r than that annealed in oxygen. The difference of P_r of the BNdT thin films annealed in different atmospheres may originate from differences in the grain sizes and the number of oxygen vacancies. PACS 77.55.+f; 77.80.-e; 77.80.Fm; 81.15.-z     

Quantum General Relativity,Torsion and Uncertainty Relations

It is shown that in gravitational theories with torsion one is led to commutation rules corresponding to Landau-Peierls type uncertainty relations.     

Energy loss effect in high energy nuclear Drell-Yan process

The energy loss effect in nuclear matter, which is a nuclear effect apart from the nuclear effect on the parton distribution as in deep-inelastic scattering process, can be measured best by the nuclear dependence of the high energy nuclear Drell-Yan process. By means of the nuclear parton distribution studied only with lepton deep-inelastic scattering experimental data, the measured Drell-Yan production cross sections for 800 GeV proton incident on a variety of nuclear targets are analyzed within the Glauber framework which takes into account the energy loss of the beam proton. It is shown that the theoretical results with considering the energy loss effect are in good agreement with the FNAL E866 data.Arrival of the final proofs: 24 June 2003