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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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NASA NTRS2018

Dense matter with eXTP

In this White Paper we present the potential of the Enhanced X-ray Timing and Polarimetry (eXTP) mission for determining the nature of dense matter; neutron star cores host an extreme density regime which cannot be replicated in a terrestrial laboratory. The tightest statistical constraints on the dense matter equation of state will come from pulse profile modelling of accretion-powered pulsars, burst oscillation sources, and rotation-powered pulsars. Additional constraints will derive from spin measurements, burst spectra, and properties of the accretion flows in the vicinity of the neutron star. Under development by an international Consortium led by the Institute of High Energy Physics of the Chinese Academy of Science, the eXTP mission is expected to be launched in the mid 2020s.

Anna L. Watts↗
DOE OSTI2019

Multi-Messenger Astronomy with Extremely Large Telescopes

The field of time-domain astrophysics has entered the era of Multi-messenger Astronomy (MMA). One key science goal for the next decade (and beyond) will be to characterize gravitational wave (GW) and neutrino sources using the next generation of Extremely Large Telescopes (ELTs). These studies will have a broad impact across astrophysics, informing our knowledge of the production and enrichment history of the heaviest chemical elements, constrain the dense matter equation of state, provide independent constraints on cosmology, increase our understanding of particle acceleration in shocks and jets, and study the lives of black holes in the universe. Future GW detectors will greatly improve their sensitivity during the coming decade, as will near-infrared telescopes capable of independently finding kilonovae from neutron star mergers. However, the electromagnetic counterparts to high-frequency (LIGO/Virgo band) GW sources will be distant and faint and thus demand ELT capabilities for characterization. ELTs will be important and necessary contributors to an advanced and complete multi-messenger network.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2022

Snowmass2021 Cosmic Frontier White Paper: Future Gravitational-Wave Detector Facilities

The next generation of gravitational-wave observatories can explore a wide range of fundamental physics phenomena throughout the history of the universe. These phenomena include access to the universe's binary black hole population throughout cosmic time, to the universe's expansion history independent of the cosmic distance ladders, to stochastic gravitational-waves from early-universe phase transitions, to warped space-time in the strong-field and high-velocity limit, to the equation of state of nuclear matter at neutron star and post-merger densities, and to dark matter candidates through their interaction in extreme astrophysical environments or their interaction with the detector itself. We present the gravitational-wave detector concepts than can drive the future of gravitational-wave astrophysics. We summarize the status of the necessary technology, and the research needed to be able to build these observatories in the 2030s.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗
DOE OSTI2018

Advances in the studies of the nucleon resonance spectrum in experiments with electromagnetic probes

The studies of the nucleon resonance spectrum with the focus on the search for new baryon states for a long time remain the challenging topic in hadron physics. Full resonance spectrum plays a critical role in the evolution of ~ millisecond age Universe in the transition from the quark-gluon to the hadron gas phases. Recent LQCD evaluations of the N*-spectrum from the first QCD principles suggest existence as much new nucleon resonances as expected in the quark models employed SU(6)*O(3) symmetry. Discovery of several new nucleon resonances in the global analyses of exclusive meson photoproduction off protons data with decisive impact from the CLAS measurements of exclusive KY photoproduction will be presented. Combined studies of charged double pion photo- and electroproduction data from CLAS revealed strong evidence for another N'(1720)3/2+ new baryon state. The information on electroexcitation amplitudes of this state has become available for the first time offering the insight to the new baryon state structure. The prospects for the search of the new states of baryon matter with glue as the structural component in the experiments with the CLAS12 detector will be outlined.

Mokeev, Viktor↗
DOE OSTI2023

Neutron Skin Measurement of 208Pb and 48Ca Using Parity Violating Electron Scattering

Parity-violating electron scattering experiments (PVES) provides a clean probe of neutron densities that is model independent and free from strong interaction uncertainties in interpretation. The PREX-2 and CREX experiments were run in 2019 and 2020 at Jefferson laboratory measured the nucleon skin thickness, the difference between the r.m.s. neutron radius Rn and the r.m.s. proton radius Rp, of 208Pb and 48Ca via parity violating electroweak asymmetry in the elastic scattering of longitudinally polarized electrons. PREX-2 experiment was performed with 950 MeV electrons scattered at a 5¿ angle with Q2 = 0.00616 ± 0.00004 (GeV/c)2, while CREX used 2182 MeV electrons at the same angle with Q2 = 0.0297 ± 0.0002 (GeV/c)2. For PREX-2 the measured asymmetry was AP V = 550 ± 16 (stat.) ± (syst.) ppb, which corresponds to Rskin = 0.278 ± 0.078 (exp.) ± 0.012 (theo.) fm. The CREX asymmetry was AP V = 2668 ± 106 (stat.) ± 40 (syst.) ppb, which corresponds to Rskin = 0.121 ± 0.026 (exp.) ±0.024 (model) fm. One of the crucial systematic uncertainty that PREX-2 and CREX were sensitive to was the non-parity violating asymmetries that resulted from the helicity correlated false asymmetries in the polarized electron beam. There was a lot of work put towards understanding and suppressing the asymmetries arising from these effects. The parity violating asymmetry measurement required a very precise determination of the electron beam polarization. To accurately determine the beam polarization, a Compton polarimeter was used during both PREX-2 and CREX. A careful alignment of the laser to the Fabry-Perot cavity, data analysis and systematic control was employed to get a precise beam polarization result for the experiments. The PREX-2 measurement has broad implications for increasing our knowledge about neutron star structure and the equation of state of nuclear matter. The combined PREX and CREX results will have implications for future energy density functional calculations and the theory of nuclear structure.

Premathilake, Sachinthani↗
DOE OSTI2026

dSph-obic dark matter

We present a mechanism that allows thermal relic dark matter to annihilate efficiently in the Galactic Halo and in galaxy clusters, but not in the lower-velocity environments of dwarf spheroidal (dSph) galaxies. We realize this within a complete model in which the dark matter consists of two distinct states separated by a small mass splitting. An indirect detection signal is generated only through the coannihilations of these two states, requiring both to be present. In the halo of the Milky Way, the dark matter particles in the lighter state can be excited into the long-lived heavier state through scattering. Once excited, these heavier particles can coannihilate with those in the lighter state, yielding a gamma-ray signal with little or no suppression. By contrast, the dark matter particles in dwarf galaxies do not possess enough kinetic energy to be excited, thereby suppressing the coannihilation rate and corresponding indirect detection signals from those systems. This framework breaks the predictive relationship that ordinarily exists between these respective gamma-ray signals and complicates our ability to interpret the results of indirect detection searches.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2015

Cooling of neutron stars and hybrid stars with a stiff hadronic EoS

Within the “nuclear medium cooling” scenario of neutron stars all reliably known temperature—age data, including those of the central compact objects in the supernova remnants of Cassiopeia A and XMMU-J1732, can be comfortably explained by a set of cooling curves obtained by variation of the star mass within the range of typical observed masses. The recent measurements of the masses of the pulsars PSR J1616-2230, PSR J0348-0432 and J00737-3039B and the companion of J1756-2251 provide independent proof for the existence of neutron stars with masses in a broad range from 1.2 to 2M{sub ⊙} The values M > 2M{sub ⊙} call for sufficiently stiff equations of state for neutron star matter. We investigate the response of the set of neutron star cooling curves to a stiffening of the nuclear equation of state so that maximum masses of about 2.4M{sub ⊙} would be accessible and to a deconfinement phase transition from such stiff nuclear matter in the outer core to color superconducting quark matter in the inner core. Without a readjustment of cooling inputs the mass range required to cover all cooling data for the stiff DD2 equation of state should include masses of 2.426M{sub ⊙} for describing the fast cooling of CasA while the existence of a quark matter core accelerates the cooling so that CasA cooling data are described with a hybrid star of mass 1.674M{sub ⊙}.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2024

Impact of composition and symmetry energy on the temperature of quasiprojectiles simulated with antisymmetrized molecular dynamics

The equation of state describes the emergent physical properties of matter. Experimental data is needed to help constrain the equation of state for nuclear matter. These constraints can help distinguish between an “asy-stiff” and an “asy-soft” equation of state, which has astrophysical implications. One path to help constrain the models is to analyze the nuclear caloric curve; some experiments have shown dependence on neutron excess, and may thus be sensitive to the asymmetry. A difference in the caloric curve based on the asymmetry of the reconstructed quasiprojectile (QP) had been observed using 70 Zn on 70 Zn at 35 MeV/nucleon taken with the NIMROD array. Antisymmetrized molecular dynamics calculations were performed for the same system and deexcited with gemini++. Both Gogny (asy-soft) and Gogny-as (asy-stiff) data sets were generated. The particles were then filtered based on detector geometric acceptance and thresholds. From the accepted particles, the excitation energy and temperature were calculated in the same way as for experimental data. Additionally, filter effects on the observed nuclear caloric curves were investigated. A tendency for the asy-stiff nuclear caloric curves to have higher temperatures than their asy-soft counterparts was observed for a number of probes. In addition, some probes may show sensitivity to the reconstructed composition of the QP, but this is inconclusive due to high statistical fluctuations and a large dependence on the exact method of event selection.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2016

Constraints on light dark matter from single-photon decays of heavy quarkonium

In this work, we investigate constraints on the interactions of light dark matter with Standard Model quarks in a framework with effective contact operators mediating the decay of heavy flavor bound state quarkonium to dark matter and a photon. When considered in combination with decays to purely invisible final states, constraints from heavy quarkonium decays at high intensity electron-positron colliders can complement missing energy searches at high energy colliders and provide sensitivity to dark matter masses difficult to probe at direct and indirect detection experiments. We calculate the approximate limits on the branching fraction for Υ(1S) decays to dark matter and a photon. Given the approximate limits on the branching fractions for all dimension 6 or lower contact operators, we present the corresponding limits on the interaction strength for each operator and the inferred limits on dark matter-nucleon scattering. Lastly, complementary constraints on dark matter annihilation from gamma-ray searches from dwarf spheroidal galaxies are also considered

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2011

Nearly Supersymmetric Dark Atoms

Theories of dark matter that support bound states are an intriguing possibility for the identity of the missing mass of the Universe. This article proposes a class of models of supersymmetric composite dark matter where the interactions with the Standard Model communicate supersymmetry breaking to the dark sector. In these models supersymmetry breaking can be treated as a perturbation on the spectrum of bound states. Using a general formalism, the spectrum with leading supersymmetry effects is computed without specifying the details of the binding dynamics. The interactions of the composite states with the Standard Model are computed and several benchmark models are described. General features of non-relativistic supersymmetric bound states are emphasized.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2018

Search for top squarks and dark matter particles in opposite-charge dilepton final states at $\sqrt{s}=$ 13 TeV

A search for new physics is presented in final states with two oppositely charged leptons (electrons or muons), jets identified as originating from b quarks, and missing transverse momentum (pTmiss). The search uses proton-proton collision data at s=13 TeV amounting to 35.9 fb-1 of integrated luminosity collected using the CMS detector in 2016. Hypothetical signal events are efficiently separated from the dominant tt¯ background with requirements on pTmiss and transverse-mass variables. No significant deviation is observed from the expected background. Exclusion limits are set in the context of simplified supersymmetric models with pair-produced top squarks. For top squarks, decaying exclusively to a top quark and a neutralino, exclusion limits are placed at 95% confidence level on the mass of the lightest top squark up to 800 GeV and on the lightest neutralino up to 360 GeV. These results, combined with searches in the single-lepton and all-jet final states, raise the exclusion limits up to 1050 GeV for the lightest top squark and up to 500 GeV for the lightest neutralino. For top squarks undergoing a cascade decay through charginos and sleptons, the mass limits reach up to 1300 GeV for top squarks and up to 800 GeV for the lightest neutralino. The results are also interpreted in a simplified model with a dark matter (DM) particle coupled to the top quark through a scalar or pseudoscalar mediator. For light DM, mediator masses up to 100 (50) GeV are excluded for scalar (pseudoscalar) mediators. The result for the scalar mediator achieves some of the most stringent limits to date in this model.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2017

Zero-sound condensate in a Fermi liquid

We consider a normal Fermi liquid with a local scalar interaction given by the Landau parameter f{sub 0}. The system becomes unstable for f{sub 0} < −1 against a growth of scalar-mode excitations (Pomeranchuk instability). We show that the instability may be tamed by the formation of a static Bose condensate of the scalar modes. We study a possible reconstruction of the isospin-symmetric nuclear matter owing to the appearance of the condensate. Possibility of a novel metastable state at subnuclear densities is demonstrated.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2021

Superradiance and Subradiance due to Quantum Interference of Entangled Free Electrons

When multiple quantum emitters radiate, their emission rate may be enhanced or suppressed due to collective interference in a process known as super- or subradiance. Such processes are well known to occur also in light emission from free electrons, known as coherent cathodoluminescence. Unlike atomic systems, free electrons have an unbounded energy spectrum, and, thus, all their emission mechanisms rely on electron recoil, in addition to the classical properties of the dielectric medium. To date, all experimental and theoretical studies of super- and subradiance from free electrons assumed only classical correlations between particles. However, dependence on quantum correlations, such as entanglement between free electrons, has not been studied. Recent advances in coherent shaping of free-electron wave functions motivate the investigation of such quantum regimes of super- and subradiance. In this Letter, we show how a pair of coincident path-entangled electrons can demonstrate either super- or subradiant light emission, depending on the two-particle wave function. By choosing different free-electron Bell states, the spectrum and emission pattern of the light can be reshaped, in a manner that cannot be accounted for by a classical mixed state. We show these results for light emission in any optical medium and discuss their generalization to many-body quantum states. Furthermore, our findings suggest that light emission can be sensitive to the explicit quantum state of the emitting matter wave and possibly serve as a nondestructive measurement scheme for measuring the quantum state of many-body systems.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2011

Constraints on dark matter models from a Fermi LAT search for high-energy cosmic-ray electrons from the Sun

During its first year of data taking, the Large Area Telescope (LAT) onboard the Fermi Gamma-Ray Space Telescope has collected a large sample of high-energy cosmic-ray electrons and positrons (CREs). We present the results of a directional analysis of the CRE events, in which we searched for a flux excess correlated with the direction of the Sun. Two different and complementary analysis approaches were implemented, and neither yielded evidence of a significant CRE flux excess from the Sun. Here, we derive upper limits on the CRE flux from the Sun’s direction, and use these bounds to constrain two classes of dark matter models which predict a solar CRE flux: (1) models in which dark matter annihilates to CREs via a light intermediate state, and (2) inelastic dark matter models in which dark matter annihilates to CREs.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2019

Nuclear matter properties at finite temperatures from effective interactions

We study if commonly used nucleon-nucleon effective interactions, obtained from fitting the properties of cold nuclear matter and of finite nuclei, can properly describe the hot dense nuclear matter produced in intermediate-energy heavy-ion collisions. We use two representative effective interactions, i.e., an improved isospin- and momentum-dependent interaction with its isovector part calibrated by the results from the ab initio nonperturbative self-consistent Green's function (SCGF) approach with chiral forces, and a Skyme-type interaction fitted to the equation of state of cold nuclear matter from chiral effective many-body perturbation theory and the binding energy of finite nuclei. In the mean-field approximation, we evaluate the equation of state and the single-nucleon potential for nuclear matter at finite temperatures and compare them to those from the SCGF approach. We find that the improved isospin- and momentum-dependent interaction reproduces reasonably well the SCGF results due to its weaker momentum dependence of the mean-field potential than in the Skyrme-type interaction. Furthermore, our study thus indicates that effective interactions with the correct momentum dependence of the mean-filed potential can properly describe the properties of hot dense nuclear matter and are thus suitable for use in transport models to study heavy-ion collisions at intermediate energies.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2011

Influence of strange matter admixtures on macroscopic properties of neutron stars

We used the equations of state (EoS) of dense nuclear matter to construct the macroscopic properties of neutron stars and test them using available observational results. The Dirac-Brueckner-Hartree-Fock mean field calculations approximated by their parameterized form are the basis of our calculations for the star interior. We calculated the central pressure, density, radius and mass both without and with allowance for hyperons, and compared these results with astronomical observations.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2015

Strong optimized conservative Fermi-LAT constraints on dark matter models from the inclusive photon spectrum

Here, we set conservative, robust constraints on the annihilation and decay of dark matter into various Standard Model final states under various assumptions about the distribution of the dark matter in the Milky Way halo. We use the inclusive photon spectrum observed by the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope through its main instrument, the Large Area Telescope. We use simulated data to first find the “optimal” regions of interest in the γ-ray sky, where the expected dark matter signal is largest compared with the expected astrophysical foregrounds. We then require the predicted dark matter signal to be less than the observed photon counts in the a priori optimal regions. This yields a very conservative constraint as we do not attempt to model or subtract astrophysical foregrounds. The resulting limits are competitive with other existing limits and, for some final states with cuspy dark-matter distributions in the Galactic Center region, disfavor the typical cross section required during freeze-out for a weakly interacting massive particle to obtain the observed relic abundance.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2024

Quasiparticle Poisoning of Superconducting Qubits from Resonant Absorption of Pair-Breaking Photons

The ideal superconductor provides a pristine environment for the delicate states of a quantum computer: because there is an energy gap to excitations, there are no spurious modes with which the qubits can interact, causing irreversible decay of the quantum state. As a practical matter, however, there exists a high density of excitations out of the superconducting ground state even at ultralow temperature; these are known as quasiparticles. Observed quasiparticle densities are of order 1 μ m - 3 , tens of orders of magnitude greater than the equilibrium density expected from theory. Nonequilibrium quasiparticles extract energy from the qubit mode and can induce dephasing. Here we show that a dominant mechanism for quasiparticle poisoning is direct absorption of high-energy photons at the qubit junction. We use a Josephson junction-based photon source to controllably dose qubit circuits with millimeter-wave radiation, and we use an interferometric quantum gate sequence to reconstruct the charge parity of the qubit. We find that the structure of the qubit itself acts as a resonant antenna for millimeter-wave radiation, providing an efficient path for photons to generate quasiparticles. A deep understanding of this physics will pave the way to realization of next-generation superconducting qubits that are robust against quasiparticle poisoning.

Liu, Chuan-Hong↗