We present results of a search for giant radio galaxies (GRGs) with a projected largest linear size in excess of 1 Mpc. We designed a computational algorithm to identify contiguous emission regions, large and elongated enough to serve as GRG candidat
es, and applied it to the entire 1.4-GHz NRAO VLA Sky survey (NVSS). In a subsequent visual inspection of 1000 such regions we discovered 15 new GRGs, as well as many other candidate GRGs, some of them previously reported, for which no redshift was known. Our follow-up spectroscopy of 25 of the brighter hosts using two 2.1-m telescopes in Mexico, and four fainter hosts with the 10.4-m Gran Telescopio Canarias (GTC), yielded another 24 GRGs. We also obtained higher-resolution radio images with the Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array for GRG candidates with inconclusive radio structures in NVSS.
Massive young star clusters contain dozens or hundreds of massive stars that inject mechanical energy in the form of winds and supernova explosions, producing an outflow which expands into their surrounding medium, shocking it and forming structures
called superbubbles. The regions of shocked material can have temperatures in excess of 10$^6$ K, and emit mainly in thermal X-rays (soft and hard). This X-ray emission is strongly affected by the action of thermal conduction, as well as by the metallicity of the material injected by the massive stars. We present three-dimensional numerical simulations exploring these two effects, metallicity of the stellar winds and supernova explosions, as well as thermal conduction.
The non--mesonic weak decay of double--$Lambda$ hypernuclei is studied within a microscopic diagrammatic approach. Besides the nucleon--induced mechanism, $Lambda Nto nN$, widely studied in single--$Lambda$ hypernuclei, additional hyperon--induced me
chanisms, $Lambda Lambdato Lambda n$, $Lambda Lambdato Sigma^0 n$ and $Lambda Lambdato Sigma^-p$, are accessible in double--$Lambda$ hypernuclei and are investigated here. As in previous works on single--$Lambda$ hypernuclei, we adopt a nuclear matter formalism extended to finite nuclei via the local density approximation and a one--meson exchange weak transition potential (including the ground state pseudoscalar and vector octets mesons) supplemented by correlated and uncorrelated two--pion--exchange contributions. The weak decay rates are evaluated for hypernuclei in the region of the experimentally accessible light hypernuclei $^{10}_{LambdaLambda}$Be and $^{13}_{LambdaLambda}$B. Our predictions are compared with a few previous evaluations. The rate for the $Lambda Lambdato Lambda n$ decay is dominated by $K$--, $K^*$-- and $eta$--exchange and turns out to be about 2.5% of the free $Lambda$ decay rate, $Gamma_{Lambda}^{rm free}$, while the total rate for the $Lambda Lambdato Sigma^0 n$ and $Lambda Lambdato Sigma^- p$ decays, dominated by $pi$--exchange, amounts to about 0.25% of $Gamma_{Lambda}^{rm free}$. The experimental measurement of these decays would be essential for the beginning of a systematic study of the non--mesonic decay of strangeness $-2$ hypernuclei. This field of research could also shed light on the possible existence and nature of the $H$--dibaryon.
A single crystal of the Co2+ based pyrochlore NaCaCo2F7 was studied by inelastic neutron scattering. This frustrated magnet with quenched exchange disorder remains in a strongly correlated paramagnetic state down to one 60th of the Curie-Weiss temper
ature. Below T_f = 2.4 K, diffuse elastic scattering develops and comprises 30 +/- 10% of the total magnetic scattering, as expected for J_{eff} = 1/2 moments frozen on a time scale that exceeds hbar/delta E=3.8 ps. The diffuse scattering is consistent with short range XY antiferromagnetism with a correlation length of 16 AA. The momentum (Q) dependence of the inelastic intensity indicates relaxing XY-like antiferromagnetic clusters at energies below ~ 5.5 meV, and collinear antiferromagnetic fluctuations above this energy. The relevant XY configurations form a continuous manifold of symmetry-related states. Contrary to well-known models that produce this continuous manifold, order-by-disorder does not select an ordered state in NaCaCo2F7 despite evidence for weak (~12 %) exchange disorder. Instead, NaCaCo2F7 freezes into short range ordered clusters that span this manifold.
We present spectra of the nuclear regions of 50 nearby (D = 1 - 92 Mpc, median = 20 Mpc) galaxies of morphological types E to Sm. The spectra, obtained with the Gemini Near-IR Spectrograph on the Gemini North telescope, cover a wavelength range of ap
proximately 0.85-2.5 microns at R~1300--1800. There is evidence that most of the galaxies host an active galactic nucleus (AGN), but the range of AGN luminosities (log (L2-10 keV [erg/s]) = 37.0-43.2) in the sample means that the spectra display a wide variety of features. Some nuclei, especially the Seyferts, exhibit a rich emission-line spectrum. Other objects, in particular the type 2 Low Ionisation Nuclear Emission Region galaxies, show just a few, weak emission lines, allowing a detailed view of the underlying stellar population. These spectra display numerous absorption features sensitive to the stellar initial mass function, as well as molecular bands arising in cool stars, and many other atomic absorption lines. We compare the spectra of subsets of galaxies known to be characterised by intermediate-age and old stellar populations, and find clear differences in their absorption lines and continuum shapes. We also examine the effect of atmospheric water vapor on the signal-to-noise ratio achieved in regions between the conventional NIR atmospheric windows, of potential interest to those planning observations of redshifted emission lines or other features affected by telluric H2O. Further exploitation of this data set is in progress, and the reduced spectra and data reduction tools are made available to the community.
The Spherical Proportional Counter is a novel type of radiation detector, with a low energy threshold (typically below 100 eV) and good energy resolution. This detector is being developed by the network NEWS, which includes several applications. We c
an name between many others Dark Matter searches, low level radon and neutron counting or low energy neutrino detection from supernovas or nuclear reactors via neutrino-nucleus elastic scattering. In this context, this works will present the characterization of a spherical detector of 1 meter diameter using two argon-based mixtures (with methane and isobutane) and for gas pressures between 50 and 1250 mbar. In each case, the energy resolution shows its best value in a wide range of gains, limited by the ballistic effect at low gains and by ion-backflow at high gains. Moreover, the best energy resolution shows a degradation with pressure. These effects will be discussed in terms of gas avalanche properties. Finally, the effect of an electrical field corrector in the homogenity of the gain and the energy threshold measured in our setup will be also discussed.
We derive the stellar-to-halo mass relations, SHMR, of local blue and red central galaxies separately, as well as the fraction of halos hosting blue/red central galaxies. We find that: 1) the SHMR of central galaxies is segregated by color, with blue
centrals having a SHMR above the one of red centrals; at logMh~12, the Ms/Mh ratio of the blue centrals is ~0.05, which is ~1.7 times larger than the value of red centrals. 2) The intrinsic scatters of the SHMRs of red and blue centrals are ~0.14 and ~0.11dex, respectively. The intrinsic scatter of the average SHMR of all central galaxies changes from ~0.20dex to ~0.14dex in the 11.3<logMh<15 range. 3) The fraction of halos hosting blue centrals at Mh=1E11Msun is 87%, but at 2x1E12Msun decays to ~20%, approaching to a few per cents at higher masses. The characteristic mass at which this fraction is the same for blue and red galaxies is Mh~7x1E11Msun. Our results suggest that the SHMR of central galaxies at large masses is shaped by halo mass quenching (likely through shock virial heating and AGN feedback), but group richness also plays an important role: central galaxies living in less dense environments quenched their star formation later or did not quench it yet. At low masses, processes that delay star formation without invoking too strong supernova-driven outflows could explain the high Ms/Mh ratios of blue centrals as compared to those of the scarce red centrals.
In this Letter we present evidences of the occurrence of a tricritical filling transition for an Ising model in a linear wedge. We perform Monte Carlo simulations in a double wedge where antisymmetric fields act at the top and bottom wedges, decorate
d with specific field acting only along the wegde axes. A finite-size scaling analysis of these simulations shows a novel critical phenomenon, which is distinct from the critical filling. We adapt to tricritical filling the phenomenological theory which successfully was applied to the finite-size analysis of the critical filling in this geometry, observing good agreement between the simulations and the theoretical predictions for tricritical filling.
A structural understanding of whole cells in three dimensions at high spatial resolution remains a significant challenge and, in the case of X-rays, has been limited by radiation damage. By alleviating this limitation, cryogenic coherent diffraction
imaging (cryo-CDI) could bridge the important resolution gap between optical and electron microscopy in bio-imaging. Here, we report for the first time 3D cryo-CDI of a whole, frozen-hydrated cell - in this case a Neospora caninum tachyzoite - using 8 keV X-rays. Our 3D reconstruction reveals the surface and internal morphology of the cell, including its complex, polarized sub-cellular architecture with a 3D resolution of ~75-100 nm, which is presently limited by the coherent X-ray flux and detector size. Given the imminent improvement in the coherent X-ray flux at the facilities worldwide, our work forecasts the possibility of routine 3D imaging of frozen-hydrated cells with spatial resolutions in the tens of nanometres.
PbZr_{1-x}Ti_xO_3 (PZT) and Pb(Mg_{1/3}Nb_{2/3})_{1-x}Ti_xO_3 (PMN-$x$PT) are complex lead-oxide perovskites that display exceptional piezoelectric properties for pseudorhombohedral compositions near a tetragonal phase boundary. In PZT these composit
ions are ferroelectrics, but in PMN-xPT they are relaxors because the dielectric permittivity is frequency dependent and exhibits non-Arrhenius behavior. We show that the nanoscale structure unique to PMN-xPT and other lead-oxide perovskite relaxors is absent in PZT and correlates with a greater than 100% enhancement of the longitudinal piezoelectric coefficient in PMN-xPT relative to that in PZT. By comparing dielectric, structural, lattice dynamical, and piezoelectric measurements on PZT and PMN-xPT, two nearly identical compounds that represent weak and strong random electric field limits, we show that quenched (static) random fields establish the relaxor phase and identify the order parameter.
