Oxford Centre for High Energy Density Science (OxCHEDS)

Abstract:

In this Letter, we investigate the effect of orbital angular momentum (OAM) on elastic photon-photon scattering in a vacuum for the first time. We define exact solutions to the vacuum electromagnetic wave equation which carry OAM. Using those, the expected coupling between three initial waves is derived in the framework of an effective field theory based on the Euler-Heisenberg Lagrangian and shows that OAM adds a signature to the generated photons thereby greatly improving the signal-to-noise ratio. This forms the basis for a proposed high-power laser experiment utilizing quantum optics techniques to filter the generated photons based on their OAM state.

Abstract:

We quantify the biases in the diurnal cycle of air temperature in ERA5, using hourly climate station data for four stations in Saskatchewan, Canada. Compared with ERA-Interim, the biases in ERA5 have been greatly reduced, and show no differences with snow cover. We compute fits to the ERA5 mean air temperature biases based on ERA5 effective cloud albedo. They can be used to improve the ERA5 diurnal cycle of air temperature for modeling agricultural processes. Diurnally, ERA5 has a negative wind speed bias, which increases quasi-linearly with wind speed, and is greater in the daytime than at night. We evaluate ERA5 precipitation against the original climate station precipitation data, and a second generation adjusted precipitation dataset by Mekis and Vincent (2011). For the warm season, ERA5 has a high bias of 8 ± 9% above the Mekis dataset. ERA5 is −22 ± 7% below the Mekis estimate in winter, suggesting that their correction with snow may be too large. It is likely that the ERA5 precipitation bias is small, which is encouraging for agricultural modeling. Data from a BSRN site near Regina shows that the biases in the downwelling shortwave and longwave radiation estimates in ERA5 are small, and have changed little from ERA-Interim. We show that the annual cycle of the Saskatchewan surface energy and water budgets in ERA5 are realistic. In particular the damping of extremes in summer precipitation by the extraction of soil water is comparable in ERA5 to our earlier observational estimate based on gravity satellite data.

Abstract:

While experimental and computational studies abound demonstrating the diverse range of phenomena caused by grain interactions under quasistatic loading conditions, far less attention has been given to these interactions under the comparatively dramatic conditions of shock compression. The consideration of grain interactions is essential within the context of contemporary shock-compression experiments that exploit the distinctive x-ray diffraction patterns of highly textured (and therefore strongly anisotropic) targets in order to interrogate local structural evolution. We present here a study of grain interaction effects in shock-compressed, body-centered cubic tantalum nanocrystals characterized by a columnar geometry and a strong fiber texture using large-scale molecular dynamics simulations. Our study reveals that contiguous grains deform cooperatively in directions perpendicular to the shock, driven by the gigapascal-scale stress gradients induced over their boundaries by the uniaxial compression, and in so doing are able to reach a state of reduced transverse shear stress. We compare the extent of this relaxation for two different columnar geometries (distinguished by their square or hexagonal cross-sections), and quantify the attendant change in the transverse elastic strains. We further show that cooperative deformation is able to replace ordinary plastic deformation mechanisms at lower shock pressures, and, under certain conditions, activate new mechanisms at higher pressures.