Determination of the composition of rarefied neutral atmospheres by mass spectrometers carried on high-speed spacecraft

The quantitative measurement of atomic and molecular O2 in rarefied atmospheres by mass spectrometers onboard high speed spacecraft is reported. Data are also given on instrument performance in high speed molecular beams and in the fly through mode

An explicit model for the adiabatic evolution of quantum observables driven by 1D shape resonances

This paper is concerned with a linearized version of the transport problem where the Schr\"{o}dinger-Poisson operator is replaced by a non-autonomous Hamiltonian, slowly varying in time. We consider an explicitly solvable model where a semiclassical island is described by a flat potential barrier, while a time dependent 'delta' interaction is used as a model for a single quantum well. Introducing, in addition to the complex deformation, a further modification formed by artificial interface conditions, we give a reduced equation for the adiabatic evolution of the sheet density of charges accumulating around the interaction point.Comment: latex; 26 page

Optimal non-reversible linear drift for the convergence to equilibrium of a diffusion

We consider non-reversible perturbations of reversible diffusions that do not alter the invariant distribution and we ask whether there exists an optimal perturbation such that the rate of convergence to equilibrium is maximized. We solve this problem for the case of linear drift by proving the existence of such optimal perturbations and by providing an easily implementable algorithm for constructing them. We discuss in particular the role of the prefactor in the exponential convergence estimate. Our rigorous results are illustrated by numerical experiments

Accurate WKB Approximation for a 1D Problem with Low Regularity

2000 Mathematics Subject Classification: 34L40, 65L10, 65Z05, 81Q20.This article is concerned with the analysis of the WKB expansion in a classically forbidden region for a one dimensional boundary value Schrodinger equation with a non smooth potential. The assumed regularity of the potential is the one coming from a non linear problem and seems to be the critical one for which a good exponential decay estimate can be proved for the first remainder term. The treatment of the boundary conditions brings also some interesting subtleties which require a careful application of Carleman’s method

Adiabatic evolution of 1D shape resonances: an artificial interface conditions approach

Artificial interface conditions parametrized by a complex number $\theta_{0}$ are introduced for 1D-Schr\"odinger operators. When this complex parameter equals the parameter $\theta\in i\R$ of the complex deformation which unveils the shape resonances, the Hamiltonian becomes dissipative. This makes possible an adiabatic theory for the time evolution of resonant states for arbitrarily large time scales. The effect of the artificial interface conditions on the important stationary quantities involved in quantum transport models is also checked to be as small as wanted, in the polynomial scale $(h^N)_{N\in \N}$ as $h\to 0$, according to $\theta_{0}$.Comment: 60 pages, 13 figure

Payment systems, inside money and financial intermediation

This paper assesses the impact of introducing an efficient payment system on the amount of credit provided by the banking system. Two channels are investigated. First, innovations in wholesale payments technology enhance the security and speed of deposits as a payment medium for customers and therefore affect the split between holdings of cash and the holdings of deposits that can be intermediated by the banking system. Second, innovations in wholesale payments technology help establish well-functioning interbank markets for end-of-day funds, which reduces the need for banks to hold excess reserves. The authors examine these links empirically using payment system reforms in Eastern European countries as a laboratory. The analysis finds evidence that reforms led to a shift away from cash in favor of demand deposits and that this in turn enabled a prolonged credit expansion in the sample countries. By contrast, while payment system innovations also led to a reduction in excess reserves in some countries, this effect was not causal for the credit boom observed in these countries.Banks&Banking Reform,Debt Markets,Bankruptcy and Resolution of Financial Distress,Access to Finance,Currencies and Exchange Rates

Spectral asymptotics for large skew-symmetric perturbations of the harmonic oscillator

Originally motivated by a stability problem in Fluid Mechanics, we study the spectral and pseudospectral properties of the differential operator $H_\epsilon = -\partial_x^2 + x^2 + i\epsilon^{-1}f(x)$ on $L^2(R)$, where $f$ is a real-valued function and $\epsilon > 0$ a small parameter. We define $\Sigma(\epsilon)$ as the infimum of the real part of the spectrum of $H_\epsilon$, and $\Psi(\epsilon)^{-1}$ as the supremum of the norm of the resolvent of $H_\epsilon$ along the imaginary axis. Under appropriate conditions on $f$, we show that both quantities $\Sigma(\epsilon)$, $\Psi(\epsilon)$ go to infinity as $\epsilon \to 0$, and we give precise estimates of the growth rate of $\Psi(\epsilon)$. We also provide an example where $\Sigma(\epsilon)$ is much larger than $\Psi(\epsilon)$ if $\epsilon$ is small. Our main results are established using variational "hypocoercive" methods, localization techniques and semiclassical subelliptic estimates.Comment: 38 pages, 4 figure

Quantitative analysis of metastability in reversible diffusion processes via a Witten complex approach: the case with boundary.

Prépublication 04-40, IRMAR, UMR-CNRS 6625, Université de Rennes 1 (Août 2004)This article is a continuation of previous works by Bovier-Eckhoff-Gayrard-Klein, Bovier-Gayrard-Klein and Helffer-Klein-Nier. It is concerned with the analysis of the exponentially small eigenvalues of a semiclassical Witten Laplacian. We consider here the case of riemanian manifolds with boundary with a Dirichlet realization of the Witten Laplacian. A modified version of this preprint has been published in Mémoires de la SMF vol. 105, (2006

Mean field limit for bosons and infinite dimensional phase-space analysis

International audienceThis article proposes the construction of Wigner measures in the infinite dimensional bosonic quantum field theory, with applications to the derivation of the mean field dynamics. Once these asymptotic objects are well defined, it is shown how they can be used to make connections between different kinds of results or to prove new ones