Search

GN-Vision is a compact, dual-modality imaging device designed to simultaneously localize the spatial origin of $\gamma$-ray and slow neutron sources, with potential applications in nuclear safety, security, and hadron therapy. The system utilizes two position-sensitive detection planes, combining Compton imaging techniques for $\gamma$-ray visualization with passive collimation for imaging slow and thermal neutrons (energies below 100 eV). This paper presents the first experimental outcomes from the initial GN-Vision prototype, focused on the development of its neutron imaging capabilities. Following this experimental assessment, we explore the device$'$s performance potential and discuss several Monte Carlo simulation-based optimizations aimed at refining the neutron collimation system. These optimizations seek to improve real-time imaging efficiency and cost-effectiveness, enhancing GN-Vision$'$s applicability for future practical deployments., Comment: 13 pages, 12 figures, submitted to App. Rad. Isot

In this work, we have developed and characterized a position-sensitive CLYC detector that acts as the neutron imaging layer and $\gamma$-ray Compton scatterer of the novel dual \g-ray and neutron imaging system GN-Vision, which aims at simultaneously obtaining information about the spatial origin of \g-ray and neutron sources. We first investigated the performance of large 50$\times$50~mm$^{2}$ monolithic CLYC crystals coupled to a pixelated SiPM in terms of energy resolution and neutron-gamma discrimination. The response of two different 95\% $^{6}$Li-enriched CLYC detectors coupled to an array of 8$\times$8 SiPMs was studied in comparison to the results of a conventional photo-multiplier tube. Energy resolution ranging from 6-8\% for the $^{137}$Cs peak and a figure of merit of 3-4 for the neutron-gamma discrimination have been obtained. The spatial response of the CLYC-SiPM detector to $\gamma$-rays and neutrons has also been characterized using charge modulation-based multiplexing techniques based on a diode-coupled charge division circuit. Average resolutions close to 5~mm FWHM with good linearity are obtained in the transverse crystal plane. Last, this work presents the first proof-of-concept experiments of the neutron imaging capability using a neutron pinhole collimator attached to the developed position sensitive CLYC detector., Comment: 14 pages, 15 Figures, submitted to NIM-A

Early identification and instruction aimed at addressing potential reading difficulties is the key to preventing prolonged difficulties in learning to read and ensuring that all students are reading with proficiency by the end of third grade. Tier 1 core reading curricula needs to be: (a) evidence based, (b) systematic and structured, (c) encompass explicit word reading skills and rich language and knowledge development. Tier 2 supports and interventions and Tier 3 intensive interventions need to be: (a) evidence- based, (b) targeted towards the unique needs of individual students and instructional contexts, (c) based on assessment. Universal Screening of students for signs of dyslexia and other reading difficulties beginning in kindergarten is one of the first steps in this prevention process. The use of evidence-based practices and materials in all tiers of instruction is key to the development of skilled readers. Systematic instruction that is coherent across instructional contexts and guided by a clear scope and sequence is essential. The use of reliable and valid screening, as well as diagnostic, progress monitoring, and assessment tools ensures that further assessments, intervention, and instruction are guided by data. The use of a range of explicit evidence-based instructional approaches ensure that all students receive the instruction they need. Educator training in the complexities of reading development and difficulties empowers educators to teach, assess, and progress monitor the development of foundational reading skills, understand student data, and use data to guide instruction. This document has been reviewed and updated by a collaborative of technical content experts, including Wyoming Department of Education (WDE) staff and Wyoming educators.

We introduce a new weighted version of the Hermite--Einstein equation, along with notions of weighted slope (semi/poly)stability, and prove that a vector bundle admits a weighted Hermite--Einstein metric if and only if it is weighted slope polystable. The new equation encompasses several well-known examples of canonical Hermitian metrics on vector bundles, including the usual Hermite--Einstein metrics, K\"ahler--Ricci solitons, and transversally Hermite--Einstein metrics on certain Sasaki manifolds. We prove that the equation arises naturally as a moment map, that solutions to the equation are unique up to scaling, and demonstrate a weighted Kobayashi--L\"ubke inequality satisfied by vector bundles admitting a weighted Hermite--Einstein metric. As an application of our techniques, we extend a bound of Tian on the Ricci curvature to a bound on a modified Ricci curvature, related to the existence of K\"ahler--Ricci solitons. Along the way, we introduce a new weighted vortex equation, as well as a weighted analogue of Gieseker stability. A key technical point is the application of a new extension of Inoue's equivariant intersection numbers to arbitrary weight functions on the moment polytope of a K\"ahler manifold with Hamiltonian torus action., Comment: 56 pages, comments welcome

False vacuum decay is a potential mechanism governing the evolution of the early Universe, with profound connections to non-equilibrium quantum physics, including quenched dynamics, the Kibble-Zurek mechanism, and dynamical metastability. The non-perturbative character of the false vacuum decay and the scarcity of its experimental probes make the effect notoriously difficult to study, with many basic open questions, such as how the bubbles of true vacuum form, move and interact with each other. Here we utilize a quantum annealer with 5564 superconducting flux qubits to directly observe quantized bubble formation in real time -- the hallmark of false vacuum decay dynamics. Moreover, we develop an effective model that describes the initial bubble creation and subsequent interaction effects. We demonstrate that the effective model remains accurate in the presence of dissipation, showing that our annealer can access coherent scaling laws in driven many-body dynamics of 5564 qubits for over $1\mu$s, i.e., more than 1000 intrinsic qubit time units. This work sets the stage for exploring late-time dynamics of the false vacuum at computationally intractable system sizes, dimensionality, and topology in quantum annealer platforms., Comment: 12 pages, 5 figures

Non-stabilizer states are a fundamental resource for universal quantum computation. However,despite broad significance in quantum computing, the emergence of "many-body" non-stabilizerness in interacting quantum systems remains poorly understood due to its analytical intractability. Here we show that Rydberg atom arrays provide a natural reservoir of non-stabilizerness that extends beyond single qubits and arises from quantum correlations engendered by the Rydberg blockade. We demonstrate that this non-stabilizerness can be experimentally accessed in two complementary ways, either by performing quench dynamics or via adiabatic ground state preparation. Using the analytical framework based on matrix product states, we explain the origin of Rydberg nonstabilizerness via a quantum circuit decomposition of the wave function., Comment: 15 pages, 7 figures

There is currently significant interest in emulating the essential characteristics of black holes, such as their Hawking radiation or their optimal scrambling behavior, using condensed matter models. In this article, we investigate a chiral spin-chain, whose mean field theory effectively captures the behavior of Dirac fermions in the curved spacetime geometry of a black hole. We find that within the region of the chain that describe the interior of the black hole, strong correlations prevail giving rise to many-body chaotic dynamics. Employing out-of-time-order correlations as a diagnostic tool, we numerically compute the associated Lyapunov exponent. Intriguingly, we observe a linear increase in the Lyapunov exponent with temperature within the black hole's interior at low temperatures, indicative of optimal scrambling behavior. This contrasts with the quadratic temperature dependence exhibited by the spin-chain on the region outside the black hole. Our findings contribute to a deeper understanding of the interplay between black hole geometry and quantum chaos, offering insights into fundamental aspects of quantum gravity., Comment: 12 pages, 6 figures

The low-lying structure of $^{13}$Be has remained an enigma for decades. Despite numerous experimental and theoretical studies, large inconsistencies remain. Being both unbound, and one neutron away from $^{14}$Be, the heaviest bound beryllium nucleus, $^{13}$Be is difficult to study through simple reactions with weak radioactive ion beams or more complex reactions with stable-ion beams. Here, we present the results of a study using the $^{12}$Be(d,p)$^{13}$Be reaction in inverse kinematics using a 9.5~MeV per nucleon $^{12}$Be beam from the ISAC-II facility. The solid deuteron target of IRIS was used to achieve an increased areal thickness compared to conventional deuterated polyethylene targets. The Q-value spectrum below -4.4~MeV was analyzed using a Bayesian method with GEANT4 simulations. A three-point angular distribution with the same Q-value gate was fit with a mixture of $s$- and $p$-wave, $s$- and $d$-wave, or pure $p$-wave transfer. The Q-value spectrum was also compared with GEANT simulations obtained using the energies and widths of states reported in four previous works. It was found that our results are incompatible with works that revealed a wide $5/2^+$ resonance but shows better agreement with ones that reported a narrower width., Comment: 10 pages, 5 figures

In a previous paper, we showed that the blowup of a weighted extremal K\"ahler manifold at a relatively stable fixed point admits a weighted extremal metric. Using this result, we prove that a weighted extremal manifold is relatively weighted K-polystable. In particular, a weighted cscK manifold is weighted K-polystable. This strengthens both the weighted K-semistability proved by Lahdili and Inoue, and the weighted K-polystability with respect to smooth degenerations by Apostolov--Jubert--Lahdili, allowing for possibly singular degenerations., Comment: 41 pages

Recent quantum simulation by Google [Nature 612, 240 (2022)] has demonstrated the formation of bound states of interacting photons in a quantum-circuit version of the XXZ spin chain. While such bound states are protected by integrability in a one-dimensional chain, the experiment found the bound states to be unexpectedly robust when integrability was broken by decorating the circuit with additional qubits, at least for small numbers of qubits ($\leq 24$) within the experimental capability. Here we scrutinize this result by state-of-the-art classical simulations, which greatly exceed the experimental system sizes and provide a benchmark for future studies in larger circuits. We find that the bound states consisting of a small and finite number of photons are indeed robust in the non-integrable regime, even after scaling to the infinite time and infinite system size limit. Moreover, we show that such systems possess unusual spectral properties, with level statistics that deviates from the random matrix theory expectation. On the other hand, for low but finite density of photons, we find a much faster onset of thermalization and significantly weaker signatures of bound states, suggesting that anomalous dynamics may only be a property of dilute systems with zero density of photons in the thermodynamic limit. The robustness of the bound states is also influenced by the number of decoration qubits and, to a lesser degree, by the regularity of their spatial arrangement., Comment: 19 pages, 15 figures

We say that a pair of nonnegative integer sequences $(\{a_k\}_{k\geq 0},\{b_k\}_{k\geq 0})$ is Whitney-realizable if there exists a poset $P$ for which (the absolute values) of the Whitney numbers of the first and second kind are given by the numbers $a_k$ and $b_k$ respectively. The pair is said to be Whitney-dualizable if, in addition, there exists another poset $Q$ for which their Whitney numbers of the first and second kind are instead given by $b_k$ and $a_k$ respectively. In this case, we say that $P$ and $Q$ are Whitney duals. We use results on Whitney duality, recently developed by the first two authors, to exhibit a family of sequences which allows for multiple realizations and Whitney-dual realizations. More precisely, we study edge labelings for the families of posets of pointed partitions $\Pi_n^{\bullet}$ and weighted partitions $\Pi_n^{w}$ which are associated to the operads $\mathcal{P}erm$ and $\mathcal{C}om^2$ respectively. The first author and Wachs proved that these two families of posets share the same pair of Whitney numbers. We find EW-labelings for $\Pi_n^{\bullet}$ and $\Pi_n^{w}$ and use them to show that they also share multiple nonisomorphic Whitney dual posets. In addition to EW-labelings, we also find two new EL-labelings for $\Pi_n^\bullet$ answering a question of Chapoton and Vallette. Using these EL-labelings of $\Pi_n^\bullet$, and an EL-labeling of $\Pi_n^w$ introduced by the first author and Wachs, we give combinatorial descriptions of bases for the operads $\mathcal{P}re\mathcal{L}ie, \mathcal{P}erm,$ and $\mathcal{C}om^2$. We also show that the bases for $\mathcal{P}erm$ and $\mathcal{C}om^2$ are PBW bases., Comment: 37 pages, 20 figures

In this paper we explore the properties of a 1-dimensional spin chain in the presence of chiral interactions, focusing on the system's transition to distinct chiral phases for various values of the chiral coupling. By employing the mean field theory approximation we establish a connection between this chiral system and a Dirac particle in the curved spacetime of a black hole. Surprisingly, the black hole horizon coincides with the interface between distinct chiral phases. We examine the chiral properties of the system for homogeneous couplings and in scenarios involving position dependent couplings that correspond to black hole geometries. To determine the significance of interactions in the chiral chain we employ bosonization techniques and derive the corresponding Luttinger liquid model. Furthermore, we investigate the classical version of the model to understand the impact of the chiral operator on the spins and gain insight into the observed chirality. Our findings shed light on the behavior of the spin chain under the influence of the chiral operator, elucidating the implications of chirality in various contexts, including black hole physics., Comment: 18 pages, 12 figures,. arXiv admin note: text overlap with arXiv:2212.12548

We show that if a compact K\"ahler manifold admits a weighted extremal metric for the action of a torus, so too does its blowup at a relatively stable point that is fixed by both the torus action and the extremal field. This generalises previous results on extremal metrics by Arezzo--Pacard--Singer and Sz\'ekelyhidi to many other canonical metrics, including extremal Sasaki metrics, deformations of K\"ahler--Ricci solitons and $\mu$-cscK metrics. In a sequel to this paper, we use this result to study the weighted K-stability of weighted extremal manifolds., Comment: 49 pages, minor corrections

We introduce a geometric approach to the construction of moment maps in finite and infinite-dimensional complex geometry. We apply this to two settings: K\"ahler manifolds and holomorphic vector bundles. Our new approach exploits the existence of universal families and the theory of equivariant differential forms. For K\"ahler manifolds we give a new, geometric proof of Donaldson-Fujiki's moment map interpretation of the scalar curvature. Associated to arbitrary products of Chern classes of the manifold - namely to a central charge - we further introduce a geometric PDE determining a $Z$-critical K\"ahler metric, and show that these general equations also satisfy moment map properties. For holomorphic vector bundles, using a similar strategy we give a geometric proof of Atiyah-Bott's moment map interpretation of the Hermitian Yang-Mills condition. We then go on to give a new, geometric proof that the PDE determining a $Z$-critical connection - again associated to a choice of central charge - can be viewed as a moment map; deformed Hermitian Yang-Mills connections are a special case, in which our work gives a geometric proof of a result of Collins-Yau. Our main assertion is that this is the canonical way of producing moment maps in complex geometry - associated to any geometric problem along with a choice of stability condition - and hence that this accomplishes one of the main steps towards producing PDE counterparts to stability conditions in large generality., Comment: 39 pages. v2: exposition improved, results strengthened, proofs simplified

Protecting coherent quantum dynamics from chaotic environment is key to realizations of fragile many-body phenomena and their applications in quantum technology. We present a general construction that embeds a desired periodic orbit into a family of non-integrable many-body Hamiltonians, whose dynamics is otherwise chaotic. Our construction is based on time dependent variational principle that projects quantum dynamics onto a manifold of low-entangled states, and it complements earlier approaches for embedding non-thermal eigenstates, known as quantum many-body scars, into thermalizing spectra. By designing terms that suppress "leakage" of the dynamics outside the variational manifold, we engineer families of Floquet models that host exact scarred dynamics, as we illustrate using a driven Affleck-Kennedy-Lieb-Tasaki model and a recent experimental realization of scars in a dimerized superconducting qubit chain., Comment: 6+13 pages

The Department for Education (DfE) commissioned Ipsos MORI, in partnership with Sheffield Hallam University (SHU) and the Centre for Education and Youth (CfEY), to carry out research among primary and secondary schools to understand how they have responded to the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic and what further support they believe they need looking forwards. This report presents interim findings from the first year of the research, conducted in the 2020/21 academic year. It is based on data collected from school leaders and their responses to an online survey (1,018 survey responses in total) and 40 qualitative interviews. The research is set to continue in the 2021/22 academic year.

Quantum dynamics in certain kinetically-constrained systems can display a strong sensitivity to the initial condition, wherein some initial states give rise to persistent quantum revivals -- a type of weak ergodicity breaking known as `quantum many-body scarring' (QMBS). Recent work [Phys.Rev.B 105, 125123 (2022)] pointed out that QMBS gets destroyed by tuning the system to a quantum critical point, echoing the disappearance of long-range order in the system's ground state at equilibrium. Here we show that this picture can be much richer in systems that display QMBS dynamics from a continuous family of initial conditions: as the system is tuned across the critical point while at the same time deforming the initial state, the dynamical signatures of QMBS at intermediate times can undergo an apparently smooth evolution across the equilibrium phase transition point. We demonstrate this using the PXP model -- a paradigmatic model of QMBS that has recently been realized in Rydberg atom arrays as well as ultracold bosonic atoms in a tilted optical lattice. Using exact diagonalization and matrix product state methods, we map out the dynamical phase diagram of the PXP model with the quenched chemical potential. We demonstrate the existence of a continuous family of initial states that give rise to QMBS and formulate a ramping protocol that can be used to prepare such states in experiment. Our results show the ubiquity of scarring in the PXP model and highlight its intriguing interplay with quantum criticality., Comment: 21 pages, 15 figures