Intermolecular structural correlations in model globular and unconcatenated ring polymer liquids

We employ the field theoretic polymer integral equation theory to construct a segment-level theory for the pair structure and thermodynamics of dense liquids of simple globule and ring polymers. We find that the partially interpenetrating behavior of rings is reflected in a deeper correlation hole and in a limited number of neighbors, in stark contrast to chains.

Dynamical manifestations of quantum chaos: correlation hole and bulge

A main feature of a chaotic quantum system is a rigid spectrum where the levels do not cross. We discuss how the presence of level repulsion in lattice many-body quantum systems can be detected from the analysis of their time evolution instead of their energy spectra. This approach is advantageous to experiments that deal with dynamics, but have limited or no direct access to spectroscopy. Dynamical manifestations of avoided crossings occur at long times. They correspond to a drop, referred to as correlation hole, below the asymptotic value of the survival probability and to a bulge above the saturation point of the von Neumann entanglement entropy and the Shannon information entropy. By contrast, the evolution of these quantities at shorter times reflects the level of delocalization of the initial state, but not necessarily a rigid spectrum. The correlation hole is a general indicator of the integrable–chaos transition in disordered and clean models and as such can be used to detect the transition to the many-body localized phase in disordered interacting systems. This article is part of the themed issue ‘Breakdown of ergodicity in quantum systems: from solids to synthetic matter’.

Dynamic cross-correlations between entangled biofilaments as they diffuse

Entanglement in polymer and biological physics involves a state in which linear interthreaded macromolecules in isotropic liquids diffuse in a spatially anisotropic manner beyond a characteristic mesoscopic time and length scale (tube diameter). The physical reason is that linear macromolecules become transiently localized in directions transverse to their backbone but diffuse with relative ease parallel to it. Within the resulting broad spectrum of relaxation times there is an extended period before the longest relaxation time when filaments occupy a time-averaged cylindrical space of near-constant density. Here we show its implication with experiments based on fluorescence tracking of dilutely labeled macromolecules. The entangled pairs of aqueous F-actin biofilaments diffuse with separation-dependent dynamic cross-correlations that exceed those expected from continuum hydrodynamics up to strikingly large spatial distances of ≈15 µm, which is more than 104 times the size of the solvent water molecules in which they are dissolved, and is more than 50 times the dynamic tube diameter, but is almost equal to the filament length. Modeling this entangled system as a collection of rigid rods, we present a statistical mechanical theory that predicts these long-range dynamic correlations as an emergent consequence of an effective long-range interpolymer repulsion due to the de Gennes correlation hole, which is a combined consequence of chain connectivity and uncrossability. The key physical assumption needed to make theory and experiment agree is that solutions of entangled biofilaments localized in tubes that are effectively dynamically incompressible over the relevant intermediate time and length scales.

UNIVERSALITY OF NUCLEON–NUCLEON SHORT-RANGE CORRELATIONS AND NUCLEON MOMENTUM DISTRIBUTIONS

By analyzing recent microscopic many-body calculations of few-nucleon systems and complex nuclei performed by different groups in terms of realistic nucleon–nucleon (NN) interactions, it is shown that NN short-range correlations (SRCs) have a universal character, in that the correlation hole that they produce in nuclei appears to be almost A-independent and similar to the correlation hole in the deuteron. The correlation hole creates high-momentum components, missing in a mean-field (MF) description and exhibiting several scaling properties and a peculiar spin–isospin structure. In particular, the momentum distribution of a pair of nucleons in spin–isospin state (ST) = (10), depending upon the pair relative (k rel ) and center-of-mass (c.m.) (K c.m. ) momenta, as well as upon the angle Θ between them, exhibits a remarkable property: in the region k rel ≳2 fm -1 and K c.m. ≲1 fm -1, the relative and c.m. motions are decoupled and the two-nucleon momentum distribution factorizes into the deuteron momentum distribution and an A-dependent momentum distribution describing the c.m. motion of the pair in the medium. The impact of these and other properties of one- and two-nucleon momentum distributions on various nuclear phenomena, on ab initio calculations in terms of low-momentum interactions, as well as on ongoing experimental investigations of SRCs, are briefly commented.