University of Grenoble

About: University of Grenoble is a education organization based out in Saint-Martin-d'Hères, France. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Large Hadron Collider. The organization has 25658 authors who have published 45143 publications receiving 909760 citations.

Planck intermediate results. XVII. Emission of dust in the diffuse interstellar medium from the far-infrared to microwave frequencies

Abstract: The dust-Hi correlation is used to characterize the emission properties of dust in the diffuse interstellar medium (ISM) from far infrared wavelengths to microwave frequencies. The field of this investigation encompasses the part of the southern sky best suited to study the cosmic infrared and microwave backgrounds. We cross-correlate sky maps from Planck, the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP), and the diffuse infrared background experiment (DIRBE), at 17 frequencies from 23 to 3000 GHz, with the Parkes survey of the 21 cm line emission of neutral atomic hydrogen, over a contiguous area of 7500 deg2 centred on the southern Galactic pole. We present a general methodology to study the dust-Hi correlation over the sky, including simulations to quantify uncertainties. Our analysis yields four specific results. (1) We map the temperature, submillimetre emissivity, and opacity of the dust per H-atom. The dust temperature is observed to be anti-correlated with the dust emissivity and opacity. We interpret this result as evidence of dust evolution within the diffuse ISM. The mean dust opacity is measured to be (7.1 ± 0.6) × 10-27 cm2 H-1 × (ν/ 353 GHz)1.53 ± 0.03 for 100 ≤ ν ≤ 353 GHz. This is a reference value to estimate hydrogen column densities from dust emission at submillimetre and millimetre wavelengths. (2) We map the spectral index βmm of dust emission at millimetre wavelengths (defined here as ν ≤ 353 GHz), and find it to be remarkably constant at βmm = 1.51 ± 0.13. We compare it with the far infrared spectral index βFIR derived from greybody fits at higher frequencies, and find a systematic difference, βmm − βFIR = − 0.15, which suggests that the dust spectral energy distribution (SED) flattens at ν ≤ 353 GHz. (3) We present spectral fits of the microwave emission correlated with Hi from 23 to 353 GHz, which separate dust and anomalous microwave emission (AME). We show that the flattening of the dust SED can be accounted for with an additional component with a blackbody spectrum. This additional component, which accounts for (26 ± 6)% of the dust emission at 100 GHz, could represent magnetic dipole emission. Alternatively, it could account for an increasing contribution of carbon dust, or a flattening of the emissivity of amorphous silicates, at millimetre wavelengths. These interpretations make different predictions for the dust polarization SED. (4) We analyse the residuals of the dust-Hi correlation. We identify a Galactic contribution to these residuals, which we model with variations of the dust emissivity on angular scales smaller than that of our correlation analysis. This model of the residuals is used to quantify uncertainties of the CIB power spectrum in a companion Planck paper.

Accumulation forms of Zn and Pb in Phaseolus vulgaris in the presence and absence of EDTA.

Abstract: The internalized speciation of Zn and Pb in roots and leaves of Phaseolus vulgaris grown in zinc sulfate, zinc EDTA, lead nitrate, and lead EDTA solutions were studied by electron microscopy (Zn) and extended X-ray absorption fine structure (EXAFS) spectroscopy (Zn and Pb). Zn was predominantly present as Zn phosphate dihydrate in the roots and leaves of the plant regardless of its form in solution. Pb was predominantly found in the leaves as cerussite (lead carbonate) when the plant was grown in Pb nitrate solution and as a mixture of PbEDTA and an undetermined species in contact with PbEDTA solution. Therefore, Phaseolus vulgaris is able to dissociate totally (Zn) or partly (Pb) the two metal-EDTA complexes from the nutrient solution and to bind these metals in other forms.

A map of high-mobility molecular semiconductors.

Abstract: The charge mobility of molecular semiconductors is limited by the large fluctuation of intermolecular transfer integrals, often referred to as off-diagonal dynamic disorder, which causes transient localization of the carriers' eigenstates. Using a recently developed theoretical framework, we show here that the electronic structure of the molecular crystals determines its sensitivity to intermolecular fluctuations. We build a map of the transient localization lengths of high-mobility molecular semiconductors to identify what patterns of nearest-neighbour transfer integrals in the two-dimensional (2D) high-mobility plane protect the semiconductor from the effect of dynamic disorder and yield larger mobility. Such a map helps rationalizing the transport properties of the whole family of molecular semiconductors and is also used to demonstrate why common textbook approaches fail in describing this important class of materials. These results can be used to rapidly screen many compounds and design new ones with optimal transport characteristics.