Quantisation of the Electromagnetic Field and Spontaneous Photon Emission

We develop the method of canonical quantisation for the case of the free electromagnetic field. We choose the Coulomb gauge, which has a simpler physical interpretation. We introduce the creation and annihilation operators in this framework. The formalism is applied to the problem of spontaneous emission of radiation from an excited atomic state at first order in the perturbation expansion. This allows us to obtain a concrete physical result, namely the computation of an excited state decay rate, and, at the same time, have a first look at abstract concepts, such as gauge invariance and renormalisation.

A Miniature Permanent Magnet Assembly with Localized and Uniform Field with an Application to Optical Pumping of Helium

Atomic state preparation can benefit from a compact and uniform magnetic field source. Simulations and experimental measurements have been used to design, build, and test such a source and then apply it to the optical pumping of atomic helium. This source is a 9.5 mm (3/8″) OD × 6.7 mm (1/4″) ID × 9.5 mm (3/8″) long, NdFeB-N42 assembly of 1.6 mm (1/16″) thick customized annular magnets. It has octupole decay with a residual dipole far field from imperfect dipole cancelations. Fast B-field decay localizes the field, minimizing the need for shielding in applications. It has a greater than 50% clear aperture with a uniform and collimated magnetic field consistent with the prediction of several models. The device is applied to a high precision 3,4He laser spectroscopy experiment using σ+ or σ− optical pumping currently resulting in a measured 99.3% preparation efficiency and in accordance with a rate equation model.

A Miniature Permanent Magnet Assembly with Localized and Uniform Field with an Application to Optical Pumping of Helium

Atomic state preparation can benefit from a compact and uniform magnetic field source. Simulations and experimental measurements have been used to design, build, and test such a source as shown by optical pumping of atomic Helium. This source is a 9.5 mm (3/8") OD x 6.7 mm (1/4") ID x 9.5 mm (3/8") long, NdFeB-N42 assembly of 1.6 mm (1/16") thick customized annular magnets. It has octopole decay with a residual dipole far field from imperfect dipole cancelations. It has greater than 50% clear aperture with uniform and collimated magnetic field consistent with the prediction of several models. Octopole roll-off localizes the field minimizing the need for shielding in applications. The device is applied to a high precision 3,4He laser spectroscopy experiment using σ+ or σ- optical pumping currently resulting in a measured 99.3% preparation efficiency and in accordance with a rate-equation model.

Atomic-state-dependent screening model for hot and warm dense plasmas

An ion embedded in warm/hot dense plasmas will greatly alter its microscopic structure and dynamics, as well as the macroscopic radiation transport properties of the plasmas, due to complicated many-body interactions with surrounding particles. Accurate theoretically modeling of such kind of quantum many-body interactions is essential but very challenging. In this work, we propose an atomic-state-dependent screening model for treating the plasmas with a wide range of temperatures and densities, in which the contributions of three-body recombination processes are included. We show that the electron distributions around an ion are strongly correlated with the ionic state studied due to the contributions of three-body recombination processes. The feasibility and validation of the proposed model are demonstrated by reproducing the experimental result of the line-shift of hot-dense plasmas as well as the classical molecular dynamic simulations of moderately coupled ultra-cold neutral plasmas. Our work opens a promising way to treat the screening effect of hot and warm dense plasma, which is a bottleneck of those extensive studies in high-energy-density physics, such as atomic processes in plasma, plasma spectra and radiation transport properties, among others.

Enhancing Steady-State Entanglement Generated by a Nondegenerate Three-Level Laser with Thermal Reservoir

We analyze a nondegenerate three-level cascade laser with an open cavity and coupled to a two-mode thermal reservoir employing the stochastic differential equations for atomic operators associated with the normal ordering. Applying the large-time approximation scheme, we obtain the solutions for the corresponding equations of evolution of the expectation values of atomic operators. Furthermore, employing the resulting solutions, we studied the photon as well as cavity atomic-state entanglement amplification of the cavity radiation.

FORMATION OF NANO-AND ULTRAFINE PALLADIUM POWDERS IN THE PRESENCE OF «RED-OX»SYSTEM«TITANIUM (III) - TITANIUM (IV)»

The results of studies on the processes of obtaining ultra - and nanodispersed palladium powders from sulphate solutions by a combined chemical and electrochemical method in the presence of a "red-ox" system of titanium (III) - titanium (IV) are presented. It has been shown that when a titanium trivalent sulphate solution is added to a solution containing palladium (II) ions, palladium ions are immediately reduced to elemental state to form a nanodispersed powder. The completeness of the above-mentioned oxidizing-reducing reactions is established on the basis of calculating the equilibrium constant (K), which is 1034 and indicates that trivalent titanium ions completely reduce palladium ions to elemental state. Effect of initial concentration of palladium ions on amount of formed palladium powder with addition of equivalent amount of trivalent titanium ions is investigated. According to the authors, upon reduction of palladium ions, elemental palladium is formed in the atomic state, and over time, the atoms begin to combine with each other. Subsequently, atomic particles are combined into colloidal particles. It has been found that in the absence of coagulants, the colloidal palladium solution is stable for 2-3 hours, and in the presence of gelatin, the stability increases and remains for 36 hours. It was shown that in all experiments powders with spherical particles are formed, the average sizes of which range from 0.116-0.240 microns. Based on the results of the presented studies, a new technology for producing ultra - and nano-sized palladium powders is proposed.