Metastable ferroelectricity in optically strained $SrTiO_3$

Kavli Affiliate: Ankit Disa | Summary:Fluctuating orders in solids are generally considered high-temperature precursors of broken symmetry phases. However, in some cases these fluctuations persist to zero temperature and prevent the emergence of long-range order, as for example observed in quantum spin and dipolar liquids. $SrTiO_3$ is a quantum paraelectric in which dipolar fluctuations grow […]


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Enhanced energy transfer in a Dicke quantum battery

Kavli Affiliate: Miriam Blaauboer | Summary:We theoretically investigate the enhancement of the charging power in a Dicke quantum battery which consists of an array of $N$ two-level systems (TLS) coupled to a single mode of cavity photons. In the limit of small $N$, we analytically solve the time evolution for the full charging process. The […]


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Surface curvature guides early construction activity in mound-building termites

Kavli Affiliate: Radhika Nagpal | First 5 Authors: Daniel S. Calovi, Paul Bardunias, Nicole Carey, J. Scott Turner, Radhika Nagpal | Summary: Termite colonies construct towering, complex mounds, in a classic example of distributed agents coordinating their activity via interaction with a shared environment. The traditional explanation for how this coordination occurs focuses on the […]


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Jetting to dripping transition: critical aspect ratio in step emulsifiers

Kavli Affiliate: David Weitz | First 5 Authors: Andrea Montessori, Marco Lauricella, Elad Stolovicki, David Weitz, Sauro Succi | Summary: Fully three-dimensional, time-dependent, direct simulations of the non-ideal Navier-Stokes equations for a two-component fluid, shed light into the mechanism which inhibits droplet breakup in step emulsifiers below a critical threshold of the the width-to-height ($w/h$) […]


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Vernier spectrometer using counter-propagating soliton microcombs

Kavli Affiliate: Amnon Yariv | Summary:Acquisition of laser frequency with high resolution under continuous and abrupt tuning conditions is important for sensing, spectroscopy and communications. Here, a single microresonator provides rapid and broad-band measurement of frequencies across the optical C-band with a relative frequency precision comparable to conventional dual frequency comb systems. Dual-locked counter-propagating solitons […]


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Realization of the degenerate parametric oscillator in electromechanical systems

Kavli Affiliate: Ya Blanter | Summary:We consider an electromechanical system where a microwave cavity is coupled to a mechanical resonator, with a mechanical frequency twice the microwave frequency. In this regime, the effective photon-phonon interaction is equivalent to that of a degenerate parametric amplifier, instead of the typical radiation pressure interaction. If the mechanical resonator […]


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Suppressing Diffusion-Mediated Exciton Annihilation in 2D Semiconductors Using the Dielectric Environment

Kavli Affiliate: Ali Javey | Summary:Atomically thin semiconductors such as monolayer MoS2 and WS2 exhibit nonlinear exciton-exciton annihilation at notably low excitation densities (below ~10 excitons/um2 in MoS2). Here, we show that the density threshold at which annihilation occurs can be tuned by changing the underlying substrate. When the supporting substrate is changed from SiO2 […]


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Untethered microbot powered by giant magnetoelastic strain

Kavli Affiliate: Zhigang Suo | First 5 Authors: Yukun Xia, Jikun Wang, Ruisen Yang, Tongqing Lu, Tiejun Wang | Summary: Magnetic elastomers deform under a magnetic field, working as a soft actuator. Untethered microbot made of magnetic elastomers have great potentials in performing medical tasks inside human body as mini doctors. However, the lack of […]


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Robust Model Predictive Control of Irrigation Systems with Active Uncertainty Learning and Data Analytics

Kavli Affiliate: Abraham Duncan Stroock | First 5 Authors: Chao Shang, Wei-Han Chen, Abraham Duncan Stroock, Fengqi You, | Summary: We develop a novel data-driven robust model predictive control (DDRMPC) approach for automatic control of irrigation systems. The fundamental idea is to integrate both mechanistic models, which describe dynamics in soil moisture variations, and data-driven […]


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