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This paper presents a numerical method for the simulation of fluid-structure interaction specifically tailored to interactions between Newtonian fluids and a large number of slender viscoelastic Cosserat rods. Because of their high flexibility and low weight the rods considered here exhibit large deflections, even under moderate fluid loads. Their motion, in turn, modifies the flow so that fluid and structures are strongly coupled to each other which is numerically very challenging. The paper proposes a new coupling approach based on an immersed boundary method which improves upon existing methods for this problem. It is numerically stable and exempt from any global iteration between the fluid part and the structure part, thus yielding high stability and low computational cost of the coupling scheme. The contribution presents the underlying methodology and its algorithmic realization, including an assessment of accuracy and convergence by systematic studies. Various validation cases illustrate performance and versatility of the proposed method.

We consider quantum chains whose Hamiltonians are perturbations by interactions of short range of a Hamiltonian that does not couple the degrees of freedom located at different sites of the chain and has a strictly positive energy gap above its ground-state energy. For interactions that are form-bounded w.r.t. the on-site Hamiltonian terms, we have proven that the spectral gap of the perturbed Hamiltonian above its ground-state energy is bounded from below by a positive constant uniformly in the length of the chain, for small values of a coupling constant; see [DFPR]. The main result of this paper is that, under the same hypotheses, the ground-state energy is analytic for values of the coupling constant belonging to a fixed interval, uniformly in the length of the chain. Furthermore, assuming that the interaction potentials are invariant under translations, we prove that, in the thermodynamic limit, the energy per site is analytic for values of the coupling constant in the same fixed interval. In our proof we use a new method introduced in [FP], which is based on local Lie-Schwinger conjugations of the Hamiltonians associated with connected subsets of the chain. We prove a rather strong result concerning complex Hamiltonians corresponding to complex values of the coupling constant., Comment: arXiv admin note: text overlap with arXiv:1812.02457, arXiv:1908.07450

We study quantum chains whose Hamiltonians are perturbations by interactions of short range of a Hamiltonian that does not couple the degrees of freedom located at different sites of the chain and has a strictly positive energy gap above its ground-state energy. For interactions that are form-bounded w.r.t. the on-site Hamiltonian terms, we prove that the spectral gap of the perturbed Hamiltonian above its ground-state energy is bounded from below by a positive constant uniformly in the length of the chain, for small values of a coupling constant. In our proof we use a novel method introduced in [FP] and based on local Lie-Schwinger conjugations of the Hamiltonians associated with connected subsets of the chain., Comment: arXiv admin note: substantial text overlap with arXiv:1812.02457, arXiv:1908.07486

The quantum theory of indirect measurements in physical systems is studied. The example of an indirect measurement of an observable represented by a self-adjoint operator $\mathcal{N}$ with finite spectrum is analysed in detail. The Hamiltonian generating the time evolution of the system in the absence of direct measurements is assumed to be given by the sum of a term commuting with $\mathcal{N}$ and a small perturbation not commuting with $\mathcal{N}$. The system is subject to repeated direct (projective) measurements using a single instrument whose action on the state of the system commutes with $\mathcal{N}$. If the Hamiltonian commutes with the observable $\mathcal{N}$ (i.e., if the perturbation vanishes) the state of the system approaches an eigenstate of $\mathcal{N}$, as the number of direct measurements tends to $\infty$. If the perturbation term in the Hamiltonian does \textit{not} commute with $\mathcal{N}$ the system exhibits "jumps" between different eigenstates of $\mathcal{N}$. We determine the rate of these jumps to leading order in the strength of the perturbation and show that if time is re-scaled appropriately a maximum likelihood estimate of $\mathcal{N}$ approaches a Markovian jump process on the spectrum of $\mathcal{N}$, as the strength of the perturbation tends to $0$., Comment: 42 pages

It has recently been established that, in a non-demolition measurement of an observable $\mathcal{N}$ with a finite point spectrum, the density matrix of the system approaches an eigenstate of $\mathcal{N}$, i.e., it "purifies" over the spectrum of $\mathcal{N}$. We extend this result to observables with general spectra. It is shown that the spectral density of the state of the system converges to a delta function exponentially fast, in an appropriate sense. Furthermore, for observables with absolutely continuous spectra, we show that the spectral density approaches a Gaussian distribution over the spectrum of $\mathcal{N}$. Our methods highlight the connection between the theory of non-demolition measurements and classical estimation theory., Comment: 22 pages

The magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) description of plasmas with relativistic particles necessarily includes an additional new field, the chiral chemical potential associated with the axial charge (i.e., the number difference between right- and left-handed relativistic fermions). This chiral chemical potential gives rise to a contribution to the electric current density of the plasma (\emph{chiral magnetic effect}). We present a self-consistent treatment of the \emph{chiral MHD equations}, which include the back-reaction of the magnetic field on a chiral chemical potential and its interaction with the plasma velocity field. A number of novel phenomena are exhibited. First, we show that the chiral magnetic effect decreases the frequency of the Alfv\'{e}n wave for incompressible flows, increases the frequencies of the Alfv\'{e}n wave and of the fast magnetosonic wave for compressible flows, and decreases the frequency of the slow magnetosonic wave. Second, we show that, in addition to the well-known laminar chiral dynamo effect, which is not related to fluid motions, there is a dynamo caused by the joint action of velocity shear and chiral magnetic effect. In the presence of turbulence with vanishing mean kinetic helicity, the derived mean-field chiral MHD equations describe turbulent large-scale dynamos caused by the chiral alpha effect, which is dominant for large fluid and magnetic Reynolds numbers. The chiral alpha effect is due to an interaction of the chiral magnetic effect and fluctuations of the small-scale current produced by tangling magnetic fluctuations (which are generated by tangling of the large-scale magnetic field by sheared velocity fluctuations). These dynamo effects may have interesting consequences in the dynamics of the early universe, neutron stars, and the quark--gluon plasma., Comment: 23 pages, 4 figures

The problem of reconstructing information on a physical system from data acquired in long sequences of direct (projective) measurements of some simple physical quantities - histories - is analyzed within quantum mechanics; that is, the quantum theory of indirect measurements, and, in particular, of non-demolition measurements is studied. It is shown that indirect measurements of time-independent features of physical systems can be described in terms of quantum-mechanical operators belonging to an algebra of asymptotic observables. Our proof involves associating a natural measure space with certain sets of histories of a system and showing that quantum-mechanical states of the system determine probability measures on this space. Our main result then says that functions on that space of histories measurable at infinity (i.e., functions that only depend on the tails of histories) correspond to operators in the algebra of asymptotic observables., Comment: 18 pages, 1 figure

We consider a non-relativistic quantum gas of $N$ bosonic atoms confined to a box of volume $\Lambda$ in physical space. The atoms interact with each other through a pair potential whose strength is inversely proportional to the density, $\rho=\frac{N}{\Lambda}$, of the gas. We study the time evolution of coherent excitations above the ground state of the gas in a regime of large volume $\Lambda$ and small ratio $\frac{\Lambda}{\rho}$. The initial state of the gas is assumed to be close to a \textit{product state} of one-particle wave functions that are approximately constant throughout the box. The initial one-particle wave function of an excitation is assumed to have a compact support independent of $\Lambda$. We derive an effective non-linear equation for the time evolution of the one-particle wave function of an excitation and establish an explicit error bound tracking the accuracy of the effective non-linear dynamics in terms of the ratio $\frac{\Lambda}{\rho}$. We conclude with a discussion of the dispersion law of low-energy excitations, recovering Bogolyubov's well-known formula for the speed of sound in the gas, and a dynamical instability for attractive two-body potentials., Comment: 42 pages

We attempt to contribute some novel points of view to the "foundations of quantum mechanics", using mathematical tools from "quantum probability theory" (such as the theory of operator algebras). We first introduce an abstract algebraic framework for the formulation of mathematical models of physical systems that is general enough to encompass classical and quantum mechanical models. After a short discussion on the properties of classical systems (realism and determinism), we move on to the study of a general class of quantum-mechanical models of physical systems and explain what some of the key problems in a quantum theory of observations and measurements are. In the last part of our essay, we attempt to elucidate the roles played by entanglement between a system and its environment and of information loss in understanding "decoherence" and "dephasing", which are key mechanisms in a quantum theory of measurements and experiments. We also discuss the problem of "time in quantum mechanics" and sketch an answer to the question when an experiment can be considered to have been completed successfully.

We study a system consisting of a heavy quantum particle, called tracer particle, coupled to an ideal gas of light Bose particles, the ratio of masses of the tracer particle and a gas particle being proportional to the gas density. All particles have non-relativistic kinematics. The tracer particle is driven by an external potential and couples to the gas particles through a pair potential. We compare the quantum dynamics of this system to an effective dynamics given by a Newtonian equation of motion for the tracer particle coupled to a classical wave equation for the Bose gas. We quantify the closeness of these two dynamics as the mean-field limit is approached (gas density $\to\infty$). Our estimates allow us to interchange the thermodynamic with the mean-field limit., Comment: 27 pages, typos corrected, a few more explanations added

We show that, in a model where a non-relativistic particle is coupled to a quantized relativistic scalar Bose field, the embedded mass shell of the particle dissolves in the continuum when the interaction is turned on, provided the coupling constant is sufficiently small. More precisely, under the assumption that the fiber eigenvectors corresponding to the putative mass shell are differentiable as functions of the total momentum of the system, we show that a mass shell could exist only at a strictly positive distance from the unperturbed embedded mass shell near the boundary of the energy-momentum spectrum., Comment: Revised version: a remark added at the end of Section 5

We prove the limiting absorption principle for a dressed electron at a fixed total momentum in the standard model of non-relativistic quantum electrodynamics. Our proof is based on an application of the smooth Feshbach-Schur map in conjunction with Mourre's theory., Comment: 42 pages, 2 figures

We consider a heavy quantum particle with an internal degree of freedom moving on the $d$-dimensional lattice $\bbZ^d$ (e.g., a heavy atom with finitely many excited states). The particle is coupled to a thermal medium (bath) consisting of free relativistic bosons through an interaction of strength $\la$ linear in creation and annihilation operators. The mass of the quantum particle is assumed to be of order $\la^{-2}$, and we assume that the internal degree of freedom is coupled "effectively" to the thermal medium. We prove that the motion of the quantum particle is diffusive in $d\geq 4$ and for $\la$ small enough., Comment: v3 to v4, layout changes, to appear in CMP

We prove the limiting absorption principle for the standard model of the non-relativistic quantum electrodynamics (QED) and for the Nelson model describing interactions of electrons with phonons. To this end we use the spectral renormalization group technique on the continuous spectrum in conjunction with the Mourre theory.

We study the collision of two fast solitons for the nonlinear Schr\"odinger equation in the presence of a spatially adiabatic external potential. For a high initial relative speed $\|v\|$ of the solitons, we show that, up to times of order $\log\|v\|$ after the collision, the solitons preserve their shape (in $L^2$-norm), and the dynamics of the centers of mass of the solitons is approximately determined by the external potential, plus error terms due to radiation damping and the extended nature of the solitons. We remark on how to obtain longer time scales under stronger assumptions on the initial condition and the external potential., Comment: 27 pages

We study the mathematical theory of quantum resonances in the standard model of non-relativistic QED and in Nelson's model. In particular, we estimate the survival probability of metastable states corresponding to quantum resonances and relate the resonances to poles of an analytic continuation of matrix elements of the resolvent of the quantum Hamiltonian., Comment: 28 pages

We consider two limiting regimes, the large-spin and the mean-field limit, for the dynamical evolution of quantum spin systems. We prove that, in these limits, the time evolution of a class of quantum spin systems is determined by a corresponding Hamiltonian dynamics of classical spins. This result can be viewed as a Egorov-type theorem. We extend our results to the thermodynamic limit of lattice spin systems and continuum domains of infinite size, and we study the time evolution of coherent spin states in these limiting regimes., Comment: 16 pages

For a model of atoms and molecules made from static nuclei and non-relativistic electrons coupled to the quantized radiation field (the standard model of non-relativistic QED), we prove a Mourre estimate and a limiting absorption principle in a neighborhood of the ground state energy. As corollaries we derive local decay estimates for the photon dynamics, and we prove absence of (excited) eigenvalues and absolute continuity of the energy spectrum near the ground state energy, a region of the spectrum not understood in previous investigations. The conjugate operator in our Mourre estimate is the second quantized generator of dilatations on Fock space., Comment: 37 pages, to appear in CMP

Scattering of photons at an atom with a dynamical nucleus is studied on the subspace of states of the system with a total energy below the threshold for ionization of the atom (Rayleigh scattering). The kinematics of the electron and the nucleus is chosen to be non-relativistic, and their spins are neglected. In a simplified model of a hydrogen atom or a one-electron ion interacting with the quantized radiation field in which the helicity of photons is neglected and the interactions between photons and the electron and nucleus are turned off at very high photon energies and at photon energies below an arbitrarily small, but fixed energy (infrared cutoff), asymptotic completeness of Rayleigh scattering is established rigorously. On the way towards proving this result, it is shown that, after coupling the electron and the nucleus to the photons, the atom still has a stable ground state, provided its center of mass velocity is smaller than the velocity of light; but its excited states are turned into resonances. The proof of asymptotic completeness then follows from extensions of a positive commutator method and of propagation estimates for the atom and the photons developed in previous papers. The methods developed in this paper can be extended to more realistic models. It is, however, not known, at present, how to remove the infrared cutoff., Comment: 45 pages, 1 figure

The huge spin precession frequency observed in recent experiments with spin-polarized beams of hot electrons shot through magnetized films is interpreted as being caused by Zeeman coupling of the electron spins to the so-called Weiss exchange field in the film. A "Stern-Gerlach experiment" for electrons moving through an inhomogeneous exchange field is proposed. The microscopic origin of exchange interactions and of large mean exchange fields, leading to different types of magnetic order, is elucidated. A microscopic derivation of the equations of motion of the Weiss exchange field is presented. Novel proofs of the existence of phase transitions in quantum XY-models and antiferromagnets, based on an analysis of the statistical distribution of the exchange field, are outlined., Comment: 36 pages, 3 figures

We study the motion of solitary-wave solutions of a family of focusing generalized nonlinear Schroedinger equations with a confining, slowly varying external potential, $V(x)$. A Lyapunov-Schmidt decomposition of the solution combined with energy estimates allows us to control the motion of the solitary wave over a long, but finite, time interval. We show that the center of mass of the solitary wave follows a trajectory close to that of a Newtonian point particle in the external potential $V(x)$ over a long time interval., Comment: 42 pages, 2 figures

A general form of the ``Wick rotation'', starting from imaginary-time Green functions of quantum-mechanical systems in thermal equilibrium at positive temperature, is established. Extending work of H. Araki, the role of the KMS condition and of an associated anti-unitary symmetry operation, the ``modular conjugation'', in constructing analytic continuations of Green functions from real- to imaginary times, and back, is clarified. The relationship between the KMS condition for the vacuum with respect to Lorentz boosts, on one hand, and the spin-statistics connection and the PCT theorem, on the other hand, in local, relativistic quantum field theory is recalled. General results on the reconstruction of local quantum theories in various non-trivial gravitational backgrounds from ``Euclidian amplitudes'' are presented. In particular, a general form of the KMS condition is proposed and applied, e.g., to the Unruh- and the Hawking effects. This paper is dedicated to Huzihiro Araki on the occasion of his seventieth birthday, with admiration, affection and best wishes., Comment: 56 pages, submitted to J. Math. Phys

We discuss the ordinary quantum Hall effect and a higher-dimensional cousin. We consider the dimensional reduction of these effects to 1+1 and 3+1 space-time dimensions, respectively. After dimensional reduction, an axion field appears, which plays the role of a space-time dependent difference of chemical potentials of chiral modes. As applications, we sketch a theory of quantum pumps and a mechanism for the generation of primeval magnetic fields in the early universe., Comment: 15 pages, 1 figure, LaTeX2e, AMSLaTeX

Scattering in a model of a massive quantum-mechanical particle, an ``electron'', interacting with massless, relativistic bosons, ``photons'', is studied. The interaction term in the Hamiltonian of our model describes emission and absorption of ``photons'' by the ``electron''; but ``electron-positron'' pair production is suppressed. An ultraviolet cutoff and an (arbitrarily small, but fixed) infrared cutoff are imposed on the interaction term. In a range of energies where the propagation speed of the dressed ``electron'' is strictly smaller than the speed of light, unitarity of the scattering matrix is proven, provided the coupling constant is small enough; (asymptotic completeness of Compton scattering). The proof combines a construction of dressed one--electron states with propagation estimates for the ``electron'' and the ``photons''., Comment: gap of previous version closed, large parts rewritten, more general results and more comprehensive exposition. 64 pages, 3 figures

We describe a new order parameter for the confinement-deconfinement transition in lattice SU(2) Yang-Mills theory. It is expressed in terms of magnetic monopole field correlators represented as sums over sheets of center vortices. Our construction establishes a link between "abelian" and "center dominance". It avoids an inconsistency in the treatment of small scales present in earlier definitions of monopole fields by respecting Dirac's quantization condition for magnetic fluxes., Comment: LaTeX file, 6 pages; Lattice2001(plenary)

It is expected that the state of an atom or molecule, initially put into an excited state with an energy below the ionization threshold, relaxes to a groundstate by spontaneous emission of photons which propagate to spatial infinity. In this paper, this picture is established for a large class of models of non-relativistic atoms and molecules coupled to the quantized radiation field, but with the simplifying feature that an (arbitrarily tiny, but positive) infrared cutoff is imposed on the interaction Hamiltonian. This result relies on a proof of asymptotic completeness for Rayleigh scattering of light on an atom. We establish asymptotic completeness of Rayleigh scattering for a class of model Hamiltonians with the features that the atomic Hamiltonian has point spectrum coexisting with absolutely continuous spectrum, and that either an infrared cutoff is imposed on the interaction Hamiltonian or photons are treated as massive particles. We show that, for models of massless photons, the spectrum of the Hamiltonian strictly below the ionization threshold is purely continuous, except for the groundstate energy., Comment: 63 pages

We analyze the free energy and construct the Gibbs-KMS states for a class of quantum lattice systems, at low temperatures and when the interactions are almost diagonal in a suitable basis. We study systems with continuous symmetry, but our results are valid for discrete symmetry breaking only. Such phase transitions occur at intermediate temperatures where the continuous symmetry is not broken, while at very low temperature continuous symmetry breaking may occur., Comment: 25 pages, 6 figures

We analyze previously proposed order parameters for the confinement - deconfinement transition in lattice SU(2) Yang-Mills theory, defined as vacuum expectation value (v.e.v.) of monopole fields in abelian projection gauges. We show that they exhibit some inconsistency in the treatment of small scales, due to a violation of Dirac quantization condition for fluxes. We propose a new order parameter avoiding this inconsistency. It can be interpreted as v.e.v. of the field of a regular monopole in any abelian projection gauge, but it is independent of the choice of the abelian projection. Furthermore, being constructed in terms of surfaces of center vortices, it has also a natural interpretation in the approach of center dominance., Comment: TeX file, 31 pages

In models of (non-relativistic and pseudo-relativistic) electrons interacting with static nuclei and with the (ultraviolet-cutoff) quantized radiation field, the existence of asymptotic electromagnetic fields is established. Our results yield some mathematically rigorous understanding of Rayleigh scattering and of the phenomenon of relaxation of isolated atoms to their ground states. Our proofs are based on propagation estimates for electrons inspired by similar estimates known from $N$-body scattering theory., Comment: 38 pages

We describe consequences of the chiral anomaly in the theory of quantum wires, the (quantum) Hall effect, and of a four-dimensional cousin of the Hall effect. We explain which aspects of conductance quantization are related to the chiral anomaly. The four-dimensional analogue of the Hall effect involves the axion field, whose time derivative can be interpreted as a (space-time dependent) difference of chemical potentials of left-handed and right-handed charged fermions. Our four-dimensional analogue of the Hall effect may play a significant role in explaining the origin of large magnetic fields in the (early) universe., Comment: 39 pages, LaTeX2e, AMSTeX, 1 figure; typos corrected, refernces added. To appear in "Mathematical Physics 2000", T. Kibble editor, Imperial College Press, July 2000

Incompressible Quantum Hall fluids (QHF's) can be described in the scaling limit by three-dimensional topological field theories. Thanks to the correspondence between three-dimensional topological field theories and two dimensional chiral conformal field theories (CCFT's), we propose to study QHF's from the point of view of CCFT's. We derive consistency conditions and stability criteria for those CCFT's that can be expected to describe a QHF. A general algorithm is presented which uses simple currents to construct interesting examples of such CCFT's. It generalizes the description of QHF's in terms of Quantum Hall lattices. Explicit examples, based on the coset construction, provide candidates for the description of Quantum Hall fluids with Hall conductivity s_H=1/2 e^2/h, 1/4 e^2/h, 3/5 e^2/h, e^2/h,..., Comment: 36 pages, LaTeX2e, AMSLaTeX; dedicated to the memory of Quin Luttinger. References added, typos fixed

We study conformal field theory correlation functions relevant for string diagrams with open strings that stretch between several parallel branes of different dimensions. In the framework of conformal field theory, they involve boundary condition changing twist fields which intertwine between Neumann and Dirichlet conditions. A Knizhnik-Zamolodchikov-like differential equation for correlators of such boundary twist fields and ordinary string vertex operators is derived, and explicit integral formulas for its solutions are provided., Comment: 30 pages, Plain TeX, 2 ps-figures; references added

The structures in target space geometry that correspond to conformally invariant boundary conditions in WZW theories are determined both by studying the scattering of closed string states and by investigating the algebra of open string vertex operators. In the limit of large level, we find branes whose world volume is a regular conjugacy class or, in the case of symmetry breaking boundary conditions, a `twined' version thereof. In particular, in this limit one recovers the commutative algebra of functions over the brane world volume, and open strings connecting different branes disappear. At finite level, the branes get smeared out, yet their approximate localization at (twined) conjugacy classes can be detected unambiguously. As a by-product, it is demonstrated how the pentagon identity and tetrahedral symmetry imply that in any rational conformal field theory the structure constants of the algebra of boundary operators coincide with specific entries of fusing matrices., Comment: 29 pages, LaTeX2e; Reference to [9] clarified, where the relation between boundary structure constants and fusing matrices has appeared independently