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DOE OSTI2024

New horizons in the holographic conformal phase transition

Abstract We describe 5D dynamical cosmological solutions of the stabilized holographic dilaton and their role in completion of the conformal phase transition. This analysis corresponds, via the AdS/CFT dictionary, to a study of out-of-equilibrium dynamics where trajectories of the dilaton do not depend solely on thermodynamic quantities in the early universe, but have sensitivity also to initial conditions. Unlike the well-studied thermal transition, which requires quantum tunneling of an infrared brane through the surface of an AdS-Schwarzschild horizon, our approach instead invokes an early epoch in which the cosmology is fully 5-dimensional, with highly relativistic brane motion and with Rindler horizons obscuring the infrared brane at early times. In this context, we demonstrate the existence of a large class of natural initial conditions that seed trajectories where the brane simply passes through the Rindler horizon and into the basin of attraction of the stabilized dilaton potential. This corresponds to successful completion of the phase transition without sacrificing perturbativity of the 5D theory.

Physics↗

DOE OSTI2020

Towards full surface Brillouin zone mapping by coherent multi-photon photoemission

Abstract We report a novel approach for coherent multi-photon photoemission in the entire Brillouin zone with infrared light that is readily implemented in a laboratory setting. We excite a solid state material, Ag(110), with intense femtosecond laser pulses to excite higher-order multi-photon photoemission; angle-resolved electron spectroscopic acquisition records photoemission at large in-plane momenta involving optical transitions from the occupied to unoccupied bands of the sample that otherwise might remain hidden by the photoemission horizon. We propose this as a complementary ultrafast method to time- and angle-resolved two-color, e.g. infrared pump and extreme ultraviolet probe, photoemission spectroscopy, with the advantage of being able to measure and control the coherent electron dynamics.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗

DOE OSTI2020

Decreased Soil Organic Matter in a Long-Term Soil Warming Experiment Lowers Soil Water Holding Capacity and Affects Soil Thermal and Hydrological Buffering

Long-term soil warming can decrease soil organic matter (SOM), resulting in self-reinforcing feedback to the global climate system. We investigated additional consequences of SOM reduction for soil water holding capacity (WHC) and soil thermal and hydrological buffering. At a long-term soil warming experiment in a temperate forest in the northeastern United States, we suspended the warming treatment for 104 days during the summer of 2017. The formerly heated plot remained warmer (+0.39 °C) and drier (-0.024 cm 3 H 2 O cm -3 soil) than the control plot throughout the suspension. We measured decreased SOM content (-0.184 g SOM g -1 for O horizon soil, -0.010 g SOM g -1 for A horizon soil) and WHC (-0.82 g H 2 O g -1 for O horizon soil, -0.18 g H2O g -1 for A horizon soil) in the formerly heated plot relative to the control plot. Reduced SOM content accounted for 62% of the WHC reduction in the O horizon and 22% in the A horizon. We investigated differences in SOM composition as a possible explanation for the remaining reductions with Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectra. We found FTIR spectra that correlated more strongly with WHC than SOM, but those particular spectra did not differ between the heated and control plots, suggesting that SOM composition affects WHC but does not explain treatment differences in this study. We conclude that SOM reductions due to soil warming can reduce WHC and hydrological and thermal buffering, further warming soil and decreasing SOM. This feedback may operate in parallel, and perhaps synergistically, with carbon cycle feedbacks to climate change.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

DOE OSTI2022

Gravitational waves from an inflation triggered first-order phase transition

Large excursion of the inflaton field can trigger interesting dynamics. One important example is a first-order phase transition in a spectator sector which couples to the inflaton. Gravitational waves (GWs) from such a first-order phase transition during inflation, an example of an instantaneous source, have an oscillatory feature. In this work, we show that this feature is generic for a source in an era of accelerated expansion. We also demonstrate that the shape of the GW signal contains information about the evolution of the early universe following the phase transition. In particular, the slope of the infrared part of the GW spectrum is sensitive to the evolution of the Hubble parameter when the GW modes reenter the horizon after inflation. The slope of the profile of the intermediate oscillatory part and the ultraviolet part of the GW spectrum depend on the evolution of the Hubble parameter when the modes exit horizon during the inflation and when they reenter the horizon during the reheating. The ultraviolet spectrum also depends on the details of the dynamics of the phase transition. We consider the GW signal in several models of evolution during and after inflation, and compare them with the minimal scenario of quasi- de Sitter inflation followed by radiation domination after a fast reheating, and demonstrate that the shape of the GW can be used to distinguish them. In this way, the GW signal considered in this paper offers a powerful probe to the dynamics of the early universe which is otherwise difficult to explore directly through CMB, large scale structure, big bang nucleosynthesis (BBN), and other well-studied cosmological observables.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗

DOE OSTI2025

Multiple Carrier Generation at an Exceptionally Low Energy Threshold

Multiple carrier generation (MCG), a process wherein two or more carriers are generated from a single high-energy absorbed photon, holds immense promise for quantum sensing, metrology, low-threshold lasers, and photovoltaics. Despite its potential, MCG has faced obstacles such as low efficiency and a high threshold photon energy at least twice the band gap (2?Eg) of the semiconductor, limiting its application only to a class of materials with low Eg. Here, we present a new approach that overcomes this limitation by leveraging carrier-donor scattering to excite secondary electrons from donor states strategically positioned below the conduction band. Our method relies on strong Coulomb interaction, reduced dielectric screening, slow hot carrier cooling, and strictly follows the energy conservation rules. We experimentally demonstrated this idea in a model system of monolayer (1L) MoS2 by exploiting electron-donating chalcogen vacancy states. We observed an exceptionally low MCG threshold of ~1.12?Eg for the first time in 1L MoS2. Remarkably, the quantum yield can be further increased to >3 by increasing the photon energy to 1.65?Eg, representing a substantial advancement over existing methods. Our findings extend the horizon of MCG into next-generation high-performance optoelectronic devices with an on-demand operating spectral range spanning from infrared to ultraviolet.

CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2024

Logarithmic Corrections to Kerr Thermodynamics

Recent work has shown that loop corrections from massless particles generate $\frac{3}{2}$ ⁢log⁡𝑇 Hawking corrections to black hole entropy which dominate the thermodynamics of cold near-extreme charged black holes. Here we adapt this analysis to near-extreme Kerr black holes. Like AdS 2 ×𝑆 2 , the near-horizon extreme Kerr (NHEK) metric has a family of normalizable zero modes corresponding to reparametrizations of boundary time. The path integral over these zero modes leads to an infrared divergence in the one-loop approximation to the Euclidean NHEK partition function. We regulate this divergence by retaining the leading finite temperature correction in the NHEK scaling limit. This “not-NHEK” geometry lifts the eigenvalues of the zero modes, rendering the path integral infrared finite. The quantum-corrected near-extremal entropy exhibits $\frac{3}{2}$ ⁢log⁡𝑇 Hawking behavior characteristic of the Schwarzian model and predicts a lifting of the ground state degeneracy for the extremal Kerr black hole.

General relativity↗

DOE OSTI2024

Soil Carbon and Nitrogen Elemental Analysis and Middle Infrared Spectroscopy from the Kougarok Fire Complex, Seward Peninsula, Alaska, 2022

In September and October of 2022, soil samples were collected at the Kougarok Fire Complex near mile marker 86 of the Nome-Taylor Highway on the Seward Peninsula of Alaska. This study site was chosen due to its unique fire history, as the Kougarok Fire Complex has experienced multiple wildfires since 1971. As the Arctic warms, the risk of Arctic tundra fires continues to increase due to warmer summer temperatures and higher frequency of lightning. Burned soil carbon or pyrogenic carbon (PyC) is an important component of C cycling after wildfire, and one that is often overlooked in tundra systems where wildfires are historically rare. To better understand PyC signatures and quantify PyC presence in post-regeneration permafrost regions, soils were sampled from soil pits within the 1971, 2002, and 2019 burn sites, as well as two unburned control sites. At each site, three soil pits were dug to the permafrost table. Soil samples were collected with a trowel from the face of each pit at 10 cm increments down to the permafrost table. Thaw depth, maximum vegetation height, vegetation species composition, and O horizon depth were also collected at each soil pit. An HS2 Hydrosense II Handheld Soil Moisture Sensor was used to collect volumetric soil moisture content at each 10 cm sampling increment. This dataset includes one *.csv of middle infrared spectroscopy measurements of soil samples, one *.csv of field observations, one *.csv of carbon and nitrogen analysis of soil samples, and one *.kml of sampling locations.The Next-Generation Ecosystem Experiments: Arctic (NGEE Arctic) was a 15-year research effort (2012-2027) to reduce uncertainty in Earth System Models by developing a predictive understanding of carbon-rich Arctic ecosystems and feedbacks to climate. NGEE Arctic was supported by the Department of Energy’s Office of Biological and Environmental Research.The NGEE Arctic project had two field research sites: 1) located within the Arctic polygonal tundra coastal region on the Barrow Environmental Observatory (BEO) and the North Slope near Utqiagvik (Barrow), Alaska and 2) multiple areas on the discontinuous permafrost region of the Seward Peninsula north of Nome, Alaska.Through observations, experiments, and synthesis with existing datasets, NGEE Arctic provided an enhanced knowledge base for multi-scale modeling and contributed to improved process representation at global pan-Arctic scales within the Department of Energy’s Earth system Model (the Energy Exascale Earth System Model, or E3SM), and specifically within the E3SM Land Model component (ELM).

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

DOE OSTI2022

First Sagittarius A* Event Horizon Telescope Results. II. EHT and Multiwavelength Observations, Data Processing, and Calibration

We present Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) 1.3 mm measurements of the radio source located at the position of the supermassive black hole Sagittarius A* (Sgr A*), collected during the 2017 April 5–11 campaign. The observations were carried out with eight facilities at six locations across the globe. Novel calibration methods are employed to account for Sgr A*'s flux variability. The majority of the 1.3 mm emission arises from horizon scales, where intrinsic structural source variability is detected on timescales of minutes to hours. The effects of interstellar scattering on the image and its variability are found to be subdominant to intrinsic source structure. The calibrated visibility amplitudes, particularly the locations of the visibility minima, are broadly consistent with a blurred ring with a diameter of ∼50 μas, as determined in later works in this series. Contemporaneous multiwavelength monitoring of Sgr A* was performed at 22, 43, and 86 GHz and at near-infrared and X-ray wavelengths. Several X-ray flares from Sgr A* are detected by Chandra, one at low significance jointly with Swift on 2017 April 7 and the other at higher significance jointly with NuSTAR on 2017 April 11. The brighter April 11 flare is not observed simultaneously by the EHT but is followed by a significant increase in millimeter flux variability immediately after the X-ray outburst, indicating a likely connection in the emission physics near the event horizon. We compare Sgr A*’s broadband flux during the EHT campaign to its historical spectral energy distribution and find that both the quiescent emission and flare emission are consistent with its long-term behavior.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2020

Size and Shape Constraints of (486958) Arrokoth from Stellar Occultations

We present the results from four stellar occultations by (486958) Arrokoth, the flyby target of the New Horizons extended mission. Three of the four efforts led to positive detections of the body, and all constrained the presence of rings and other debris, finding none. Twenty-five mobile stations were deployed for 2017 June 3 and augmented by fixed telescopes. There were no positive detections from this effort. The event on 2017 July 10 was observed by the Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy with one very short chord. Twenty-four deployed stations on 2017 July 17 resulted in five chords that clearly showed a complicated shape consistent with a contact binary with rough dimensions of 20 by 30 km for the overall outline. A visible albedo of 10% was derived from these data. Twenty-two systems were deployed for the fourth event on 2018 August 4 and resulted in two chords. The combination of the occultation data and the flyby results provides a significant refinement of the rotation period, now estimated to be 15.9380 ± 0.0005 hr. The occultation data also provided high-precision astrometric constraints on the position of the object that were crucial for supporting the navigation for the New Horizons flyby. This work demonstrates an effective method for obtaining detailed size and shape information and probing for rings and dust on distant Kuiper Belt objects as well as being an important source of positional data that can aid in spacecraft navigation that is particularly useful for small and distant bodies.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2022

SCHOTT laser glass [Invited]

Laser glass is a highly engineered optical material that enables the amplification of light in laser systems. It is known for being the heart of the largest laser facilities ever built, where thousands of neodymium-doped meter-sized slabs of laser glass create intense beams of near-infrared laser radiation used to study fusion reactions. Or if doped with ytterbium and erbium, laser glass can be made into millimeter-sized components empowering range-finders and dermatological lasers. Decades of development have poised laser glass for the next challenge on the horizon: amplifying light for sustainable inertial fusion energy power plants.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗

DOE OSTI2022

First Sagittarius A* Event Horizon Telescope Results. I. The Shadow of the Supermassive Black Hole in the Center of the Milky Way

We present the first Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) observations of Sagittarius A* (Sgr A*), the Galactic center source associated with a supermassive black hole. These observations were conducted in 2017 using a global interferometric array of eight telescopes operating at a wavelength of λ = 1.3 mm. The EHT data resolve a compact emission region with intrahour variability. A variety of imaging and modeling analyses all support an image that is dominated by a bright, thick ring with a diameter of 51.8 ± 2.3 μas (68% credible interval). The ring has modest azimuthal brightness asymmetry and a comparatively dim interior. Using a large suite of numerical simulations, we demonstrate that the EHT images of Sgr A* are consistent with the expected appearance of a Kerr black hole with mass ∼4 × 10$^{6}$ M $_{⊙}$, which is inferred to exist at this location based on previous infrared observations of individual stellar orbits, as well as maser proper-motion studies. Our model comparisons disfavor scenarios where the black hole is viewed at high inclination (i > 50°), as well as nonspinning black holes and those with retrograde accretion disks. Our results provide direct evidence for the presence of a supermassive black hole at the center of the Milky Way, and for the first time we connect the predictions from dynamical measurements of stellar orbits on scales of 10$^{3}$–10$^{5}$ gravitational radii to event-horizon-scale images and variability. Furthermore, a comparison with the EHT results for the supermassive black hole M87* shows consistency with the predictions of general relativity spanning over three orders of magnitude in central mass.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2023

Visible to NIR‐II Photoluminescence of Atomically Precise Gold Nanoclusters

Abstract Atomically precise gold nanoclusters (NCs) have emerged as a new class of precision materials and attracted wide interest in recent years. One of the unique properties of such nanoclusters pertains to their photoluminescence (PL), for it can widely span visible to near‐infrared–I and –II wavelengths (NIR‐I/II), and even beyond 1700 nm by manipulating the size, structure, and composition. The current research efforts focus on the structure–PL correlation and the development of strategies for raising the PL quantum yields, which is nontrivial when moving from the visible to the near‐infrared wavelengths, especially in the NIR–II regions. This review summarizes the recent progress in the field, including i) the types of PL observed in gold NCs such as fluorescence, phosphorescence, and thermally activated delayed fluorescence, as well as dual emission; ii) some effective strategies that are devised to improve the PL quantum yield (QY) of gold NCs, such as heterometal doping, surface rigidification, and core phonon engineering, with double‐digit QYs for the NIR PL on the horizons; and iii) the applications of luminescent gold NCs in bioimaging, photosensitization, and optoelectronics. Finally, the remaining challenges and opportunities for future research are highlighted.

Liu, Zhongyu↗

DOE OSTI2024

Stochastic Averaging of Radiative Transfer Coefficients for Relativistic Electrons

Abstract Synchrotron emissivities, absorptivities, and Faraday rotation and conversion coefficients are needed in modeling a variety of astrophysical sources, including Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) sources. We develop a method for estimating transfer coefficients that exploits their linear dependence on the electron distribution function, decomposing the distribution function into a sum of parts each of whose emissivity can be calculated easily. We refer to this procedure as stochastic averaging and apply it in two contexts. First, we use it to estimate the emissivity of an isotropicκdistribution function with a high-energy cutoff. The resulting coefficients can be evaluated efficiently enough to be used directly in ray-tracing calculations, and we provide an example calculation. Second, we use stochastic averaging to assess the effect of subgrid turbulence on the volume-averaged emissivity and along the way provide a prescription for a turbulent emissivity. We find that for parameters appropriate to EHT sources turbulence reduces the emissivity slightly. In the infrared, turbulence can dramatically increase the emissivity.

Astronomy & Astrophysics↗

DOE OSTI2021

Data from : "Warming promotes loss of subsoil carbon through accelerated degradation of plant-derived organic matter". Blodgett warming experiment

This dataset contains data used for the paper: Warming promotes loss of subsoil carbon through accelerated degradation of plant-derived organic matter. Soil Biology and Biochemistry 156, 108185. doi:10.1016/j.soilbio.2021.108185On April 2018 (after 4.5 years of warming), we collected O-horizon (organic horizon) material and soil core down to 90 cm depth from a whole-soil warming experiment in a mixed-coniferous temperate forest, located at the University of California Blodgett experimental forest in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada, CA USA. The goal was to assess how 4.5 years of +4 °C whole-soil warming affected the quantity and quality of soil organic matter. Cores were collected from 6 experimental plots (three replicated blocks); samples were collected in 10 cm increments from 0 to 90 cm depth.This dataset contains a compressed (.zip) archive of the data used for this manuscript. The dataset includes files in .xlsx format, which can be accessed and processed using MS Excel or R. Carbon and nitrogen concentrations, as well as stable carbon isotope composition ((δ13C) and solvent extractable lipid biomarker (alkanoic acids and alkanes) data are provided as processed data files. Diffuse reflectance infrared Fourier transform (DRIFT) spectroscopy data are provided as raw output and processed data files.The dataset files "Blodgett_warming_Data" and "Blodgett_warming_raw_data.xlsx" were updated on July 7, 2021. The following updates were made: (1) specification of the units of measurements in the dataset (the unit of measurement was missing in some parameters) and (2) the column name "pulled depth" was changed to "pooled depth" in the updated data files.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

DOE OSTI2020

An Unusual Transmission Spectrum for the Sub-Saturn KELT-11b Suggestive of a Subsolar Water Abundance

We present an optical-to-infrared transmission spectrum of the inflated sub-Saturn KELT-11b measured with the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS), the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) Wide Field Camera 3 G141 spectroscopic grism, and the Spitzer Space Telescope (Spitzer) at 3.6 μm, in addition to a Spitzer 4.5 μm secondary eclipse. The precise HST transmission spectrum notably reveals a low-amplitude water feature with an unusual shape. Based on free-retrieval analyses with varying molecular abundances, we find strong evidence for water absorption. Depending on model assumptions, we also find tentative evidence for other absorbers (HCN, TiO, and AlO). The retrieved water abundance is generally ≲0.1× solar (0.001–0.7× solar over a range of model assumptions), several orders of magnitude lower than expected from planet formation models based on the solar system metallicity trend. We also consider chemical-equilibrium and self-consistent 1D radiative-convective equilibrium model fits and find that they, too, prefer low metallicities ([M/H] ≲ -2, consistent with the free-retrieval results). However, all of the retrievals should be interpreted with some caution because they either require additional absorbers that are far out of chemical equilibrium to explain the shape of the spectrum or are simply poor fits to the data. Finally, we find that the Spitzer secondary eclipse is indicative of full heat redistribution from KELT-11b’s dayside to nightside, assuming a clear dayside. These potentially unusual results for KELT-11b’s composition are suggestive of new challenges on the horizon for atmosphere and formation models in the face of increasingly precise measurements of exoplanet spectra.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2025

Model-independent measurement of the matter-radiation equality scale in DESI 2024

The peak of the matter power spectrum, known as the turnover (TO) scale, is determined by the horizon size at the time of matter-radiation equality. This scale can serve as a standard ruler, independent of other features in the matter power spectrum, such as baryon acoustic oscillations (BAO). Here, in this work, we present the first detection of the turnover in the galaxy autopower spectrum, utilizing the distribution of quasars and luminous red galaxies (LRG) measured by the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) during its first year of survey operations in a model-independent manner. To avoid confirmation bias, we first analyze the data using data blinding methods designed for the DESI baryon acoustic oscillation, redshift space distortion and scale-dependent bias signals. We measure the angle-averaged dilation distance 𝐷 V ⁡(𝑧 = 1.651) = (38.1 ± 2.5)⁢𝑟 H from the quasars and 𝐷 V ⁡(𝑧 = 0.733) = (21.8 ± 1.0)⁢𝑟 H from the LRG sample in units of the horizon 𝑟 H at the matter-radiation-equality epoch. Combining these two constraints and assuming a flat Λ⁢CDM model with three standard neutrino species, we can translate this into a constraint of Ω m ⁢ℎ 2 = 0.13⁢9$^{+0.036}_{−0.046}$. We can break the Ω m −𝐻 0 degeneracy with low-redshift distance measurements from type-Ia supernova (SN) data from Pantheon+, we obtain a sound-horizon free estimate of the Hubble-Lemaître parameter of 𝐻 0 = 65.2$^{+4.9}_{−6.2}$ km/s/Mpc, consistent with sound-horizon dependent DESI measurements. On the other hand, combining the DESI BAO and TO, we find a truly DESI-only measurement of 𝐻 0 = 74.0$^{+7.2}_{−3.5}$ km/s/Mpc, in line with DESI-only full-shape results where the sound-horizon scale is marginalized out. This discrepancy in 𝐻 0 can be reconciled in a 𝑤 0 ⁢𝑤 𝑎 ⁢ CDM cosmology, where the combination of DESI BAO and TO data yields 𝐻 0 = 66.5 ± 7.2 km/s/Mpc.

cosmological parameters↗