Both Ba$_4$Mn$_3$O$_{10}$ and Sr$_4$Mn$_3$O$_{10}$ crystallize in an orthorhombic crystal structure consisting of corrugated layers containing Mn$_3$O$_{12}$ polydedra. The thermal variation of magnetic susceptibility of the compositions consists of
a broad hump like feature indicating the presence of low dimensional magnetic correlation. We have systematically investigated the magnetic data of these compounds and found that the experimental results match quite well with the two dimensional Heisenberg model of spin-spin interaction. The two dimensional nature of the magnetic spin-spin interaction is supported by the low temperature heat capacity data of Ba$_4$Mn$_3$O$_{10}$. Interestingly, both the samples show dielectric anomaly near the magnetic ordering temperature indicating multiferroic behavior.
The electromagnetic transition probabilities of the excited levels for the two nearly degenerate bands of $^{106}$Ag have been measured using the Doppler Shift Attenuation Method. A comparison with the calculated values using triaxial projected shell
model approach indicates that these bands originate from two different quasi-particle configurations but constructed from the same mean-field deformation.
The development of spin glass like state in a geometrically frustrated (GF) magnet is a matter of great debate. We investigated the effect of magnetic (Mn) and nonmagnetic (Ga) doping at the Cr site of the layered GF antiferromagnetic compound LiCrO2
. 10% Ga doping at the Cr site does not invoke any metastability typical of a glassy magnetic state. However, similar amount of Mn doping certainly drives the system to a spin glass state which is particularly evident from the relaxation, magnetic memory and heat capacity studies. The onset of glassy state in 10% Mn doped sample is of reentrant type developing out of higher temperature antiferromagnetic state. The spin glass state in the Mn-doped sample shows a true reentry with the complete disappearance of the antiferromagnetic phase below the spin glass transition. Mn doping at the Cr site can invoke random ferromagnetic Cr-Mn bonds in the otherwise 120 degree antiferromagnetic triangular lattice leading to the non-ergodic spin frozen state. The lack of spin glass state on Ga doping indicates the importance of random ferromagnetic/antiferromagnetic bonds for the glassy ground state in LiCrO2. Spin glass state in GF system has been earlier observed even for small non-magnetic disorder, and our result indicates that the issue is quite nontrivial and depends strongly on the material system concerned.
A prototype Gas Electron Multiplier (GEM) detector is under construction for medical imaging purposes. A single thick GEM of size 10x10 cm^2 is assembled inside a square shaped air-tight box which is made of Perspex glass. In order to ionize gas insi
de the drift field two types of voltage supplier circuits were fabricated, and array of 2x4 pads of each size 4x8 mm^2 were utilized for collecting avalanche charges. Preliminary testing results show that the circuit which produces high voltage and low current is better than that of low voltage and high current supplier circuit in terms of x-ray signal counting rates.
The mixed-valent multiferroic compound CaMn7O12 is studied for its magnetic and electric properties. The compound undergoes magnetic ordering below 90 K with a helimagnetic structure followed by a low temperature magnetic anomaly observed around 43 K
. The present study shows that the magnetic anomaly at 43 K is associated with thermal hysteresis indicating first order nature of the transition. The compound also shows field-cooled magnetic memory and relaxation below 43 K, although no zero-field-cooled memory is present. Clear magnetic hysteresis loop is present in the magnetization versus field measurements signifying the presence of some ferromagnetic clusters in the system. We doped trivalent La at the cite of divalent Ca expecting to enhance the fraction of Mn$^{3+}$ ions. The La doped samples show reduced magnetization, although the temperatures associated with the magnetic anomalies remain almost unaltered. Interestingly, the spontaneous electrical polarization below 90 K increases drastically on La substitution. We propose that the ground state of the pure as well as the La doped compositions contain isolated superparamagnetic like clusters, which can give rise to metastability in the form of field-cooled memory and relaxation. The ground state is not certainly spin glass type as it is evident from the absence of zero-field-cooled memory and frequency shift in the ac suceptibility measurements.
The single layered manganite Pr$_{0.22}$Sr$_{1.78}$MnO$_4$ undergoes structural transition from high temperature tetragonal phase to low temperature orthorhombic phase below room temperature. The orthorhombic phase was reported to have two structural
variants with slightly different lattice parameters and Mn-3$d$ levels show orbital ordering within both the variants, albeit having mutually perpendicular ordering axis. In addition to orbital ordering, the orthorhombic variants also order antiferromagnetically with different Neel temperatures. Our magnetic investigation on the polycrystalline sample of Pr$_{0.22}$Sr$_{1.78}$MnO$_4$ shows large thermal hysteresis indicating the first order nature of the tetragonal to orthorhombic transition. We observe magnetic memory, large relaxation, frequency dependent ac susceptbility and aging effects at low temperature, which indicate spin glass like magnetic ground state in the sample. The glassy magnetic state presumably arises from the interfacial frustration of orthorhombic domains with orbital and spin orderings playing crucial role toward the competing magnetic interactions.
The low cost and high resolution gas-based Multi-gap Resistive Plate Chamber (MRPC) opens a new possibility to find an efficient alternative detector for Time of Flight (TOF) based Positron Emission Tomography, where the sensitivity of the system dep
ends largely on the time resolution of the detector. Suitable converters can be used to increase the efficiency of detection of photons from annihilation. In this work, we perform a detailed GEANT4 simulation to optimize the converter thickness thereby improving the efficiency of photon conversion. Also we have developed a Monte Carlo based simulation of MRPC response thereby obtaining the intrinsic time resolution of the detector, making it possible to simulate the final response of MRPC-based systems for PET imaging. The result of the cosmic ray test of a four-gap Bakelite-based MRPC operating in streamer mode is discussed.
The lifetimes for the high spin levels of the yrast band of $^{110}$Cd has been measured. The estimated B(E2) values decrease with increase in angular momentum. This is the characteristic of Anti magnetic rotation as reported in $^{106,108}$Cd. Howev
er, alignment behavior of $^{110}$Cd is completely different from its even-even neighbors. A model based on classical particle plus rotor has been used to explore the underlying systematics and develop a self consistent picture for the observed behavior of these isotopes.
The High Level Trigger (HLT) system of the ALICE experiment is an online event filter and trigger system designed for input bandwidths of up to 25 GB/s at event rates of up to 1 kHz. The system is designed as a scalable PC cluster, implementing sever
al hundred nodes. The transport of data in the system is handled by an object-oriented data flow framework operating on the basis of the publisher-subscriber principle, being designed fully pipelined with lowest processing overhead and communication latency in the cluster. In this paper, we report the latest measurements where this framework has been operated on five different sites over a global north-south link extending more than 10,000 km, processing a ``real-time data flow.
