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We describe designs for practical detectors of absolute rotation, which rely on the creation of magnetic fields by charged objects that are rotating with respect to an inertial frame. Our designs, motivated by an original suggestion by R.M. Brady, utilise the properties of superconductors, both to shield and confine the magnetic fields, and also as the basis of a SQUID detector of the fields produced. We show that with commercially available SQUIDs, our designs can have sufficient sensitivity and signal-to-noise ratio to measure the sidereal rate of rotation of the Earth. We consider three different designs: two of these can also be configured to provide a confirmation of the form that Maxwell's equations take in a rotating frame. We can also make a direct experimental test of whether low-frequency electromagnetic energy experience the same inertial rest-frame as matter.

During the last ten years or so, derivations of the Born rule based on decision theory have been proposed and developed, and it is claimed that these are valid in the context of the Everett interpretation. This claim is critically assessed and it is shown that one of its key assumptions, although natural in the context of the Copenhagen interpretation, is not consistent with that of Everett. It is further argued that any interpretation that relates outcome likelihood to the expansion coefficients connecting the wavefunction with the eigenfunctions of the measurement operator must be inconsistent with the Everett interpretation., Comment: 22 pages 1 figure

In the high-temperature superconductor BSCCO, local measurements of magnetic field at the surface of a crystal in the mixed state show sharp changes as a function of applied field or temperature. We show that if `intermediate state' effects are accounted for, a first-order transition leads to a sharp jump in the global magnetisation only in the case of samples that are significantly non-ellipsoidal in shape. We also investigate the relationship between a jump in magnetisation, M, and the associated change in the B-field immediately above the crystal surface and show that deltaM is expected to be twice deltaB/muo. In addition, we emphasise that the Clausius-Clapeyron relationship between magnetisation jump and entropy jump should involve the local H-field, not the B-field or the applied H-field. Re-interpreting some published experimental data leads to the conclusion that the entropy change can be as much as 4.0 kB per flux line per layer, compared with less than 2 kB previously reported. We present and analyse new experimental data on local field jumps and global magnetisation measurements and find that they agree with the above. We also show that these data are consistent with the boundary region between the liquid and solid phases having a width of around 20 flux-line spacings at a field of 10 mT., Comment: 20 pages,6 Postscript figures, amended following referees' Reports, to be published in Physica C

In the HTC superconductor BSCCO, local measurements of magnetic field in the mixed state show sharp changes as a function of applied field or temperature, which have been interpreted as evidence for a first-order flux-lattice melting (or sublimation) transition . The entropy associated with such a transition was calculated from the magnetisation jumps using a Clausius-Clapeyron-type relationship and was found to increase with temperature up to a value of nearly 1.5kB per flux-line per CuO layer near Tc. This is considerably larger than would be expected, even if the fluid phase consisted of completely dissociated `pancake' vortices. We re-examine this calculation and show that the total change in entropy associated with the transition is actually over 4kB per flux-line per CuO layer. However, we also show that the major portion of this entropy can be attributed to the cores of the extra flux lines formed in the transition and that the residue is consistent with that expected for the disorder associated with melting or sublimation, thereby resolving an important controversy., Comment: 7 pages, 1 Postscript figure