No Arabic abstract
The INTEGRAL satellite, which studies the Universe in the hard X-ray and soft Gamma-ray domain, has been operational for 5 years now. The X-ray telescopes, which use the coded mask technique, provide unprecedented spectral and imaging resolution. This led to a number of discoveries, such as the distribution of diffuse emission in the Galaxy, the discovery of highly absorbed sources and fast X-ray transients in the Galactic Plane, localization of ~50 Gamma-ray bursts, and the resolution of the cosmic X-ray background around its peak at 30 keV. About 300 previously known X-ray sources have been detected and in addition more than 200 new sources have been discovered. INTEGRAL provides spectra starting at 3 keV and ranging up to several hundred keV. This article gives a brief overview about the major discoveries of INTEGRAL.
Details of the design, fabrication, ground and flight calibration of the High Energy Transmission Grating, HETG, on the Chandra X-ray Observatory are presented after five years of flight experience. Specifics include the theory of phased transmission gratings as applied to the HETG, the Rowland design of the spectrometer, details of the grating fabrication techniques, and the results of ground testing and calibration of the HETG. For nearly six years the HETG has operated essentially as designed, although it has presented some subtle flight calibration effects.
Water Cherenkov Detectors (WCD) are efficient detectors for detecting GRBs in the 10 GeV - 1 TeV energy range using the single particle technique, given their sensitivity to low energy secondary photons produced by high energy photons when cascading in the atmosphere. The Large Aperture GRB Observatory (LAGO) operates arrays of WCD in high altitude sites (above 4500 m a.s.l.) in Bolivia, Mexico and Venezuela, with planned extension to Peru. Details on the operation and stability of these WCD in remote sites with high background rates of particles will be detailed, and compared to simulations. Specific issues due to operation at high altitude, atmospheric effects and solar activity, as well as possible hardware enhancements will also be presented.
We investigate the operation of WSi superconducting nanowire single-photon detectors (SNSPDs) at 2.5 K, a temperature which is ~ 70 % of the superconducting transition temperature (TC) of 3.4 K. We demonstrate saturation of the system detection efficiency at 78 +- 2 % with a jitter of 191 ps. We find that the jitter at 2.5 K is limited by the noise of the readout, and can be improved through the use of cryogenic amplifiers. Operation of SNSPDs with high efficiency at temperatures very close to TC appears to be a unique property of amorphous WSi.
We present technology computer-aided design (TCAD) models for AlGaAs/InGaAs and AlGaN/GaN and silicon TeraFETs, plasmonic field effect transistors (FETs), for terahertz (THz) detection validated over a wide dynamic range. The modeling results are in good agreement with the experimental data for the AlGaAs/InGaAs heterostructure FETs (HFETs) and, to the low end of the dynamic range, with the analytical theory of the TeraFET detectors. The models incorporate the response saturation effect at high intensities of the THz radiation observed in experiments and reveal the physics of the response saturation associated with different mechanisms for different material systems. These mechanisms include the gate leakage, the velocity saturation and the avalanche effect.
In 1995, C. I. Christov and M. G. Velarde introduced the concept of a dissipative soliton in a long-wave thin-film equation [Physica D 86, 323--347]. In the 25 years since, the subject has blossomed to include many related phenomena. The focus of this short note is to survey the conceptual influence of the concept of a production-dissipation (input-output) energy balance that they identified. Our recent results on nonlinear periodic waves as dissipative solitons (in a model equation for a ferrofluid interface in a parallel-flow rectangular geometry subject to an inhomogeneous magnetic field) have shown that the classical concept also applies to nonlocalized (specifically, spatially periodic) nonlinear coherent structures. Thus, we revisit the so-called KdV-KSV equation studied by C. I. Christov and M. G. Velarde to demonstrate that it also possesses spatially periodic dissipative soliton solutions. These coherent structures arise when the linearly unstable flat film state evolves to sufficiently large amplitude. The linear instability is then arrested when the nonlinearity saturates, leading to permanent traveling waves. Although the two model equations considered in this short note feature the same prototypical linear long-wave instability mechanism, along with similar linear dispersion, their nonlinearities are fundamentally different. These nonlinear terms set the shape and eventual dynamics of the nonlinear periodic waves. Intriguingly, the nonintegrable equations discussed in this note also exhibit multiperiodic nonlinear wave solutions, akin to the polycnoidal waves discussed by J. P. Boyd in the context of the completely integrable KdV equation.