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Mehta, A.

Publications and source records attributed to Mehta, A..

At least 19 records
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2026

Prompt Searches for Very-high-energy γ -Ray Counterparts to IceCube Astrophysical Neutrino Alerts

The search for sources of high-energy astrophysical neutrinos can be significantly advanced through a multimessenger approach, which seeks to detect the γ-rays that accompany neutrinos as they are produced at their sources. Multimessenger observations have so far provided the first evidence for a neutrino source, illustrated by the joint detection of the flaring blazar TXS 0506+056 in high-energy (E > 1 GeV) and very-high-energy (VHE; E > 100 GeV) γ-rays in coincidence with the high-energy neutrino IceCube-170922A, identified by IceCube. Imaging atmospheric Cherenkov telescopes (IACTs), namely FACT, H.E.S.S., MAGIC, and VERITAS, continue to conduct extensive neutrino target-of-opportunity follow-up programs. These programs have two components: follow-up observations of single astrophysical neutrino candidate events (such as IceCube-170922A), and observation of known γ-ray sources after the identification of a cluster of neutrino events by IceCube. Here we present a comprehensive analysis of follow-up observations of high-energy neutrino events observed by the four IACTs between 2017 September (after the IceCube-170922A event) and 2021 January. Our study found no associations between γ-ray sources and the observed neutrino events. We provide a detailed overview of each neutrino event and its potential counterparts. Furthermore, a joint analysis of all IACT data is included, yielding combined upper limits on the VHE γ-ray flux.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2024

Measurement of the 1-jettiness event shape observable in deep-inelastic electron-proton scattering at HERA

The H1 Collaboration reports the first measurement of the 1-jettiness event shape observable $τ^b_1$ in neutral-current deep-inelastic electron-proton scattering (DIS). The observable $τ^b_1$ is equivalent to a thrust observable defined in the Breit frame. The data sample was collected at the HERA ep collider in the years 2003–2007 with center-of-mass energy of $\sqrt{s}$ = 319 GeV, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 351.1 pb -1 . Triple differential cross sections are provided as a function of $τ^b_1$, event virtuality $Q^2$, and inelasticity y, in the kinematic region $Q^2$ > 150 GeV 2 . Single differential cross section are provided as a function of $τ^b_1$ in a limited kinematic range. Double differential cross sections are measured, in contrast, integrated over $τ^b_1$ and represent the inclusive neutral-current DIS cross section measured as a function of $Q^2$ and y. The data are compared to a variety of predictions and include classical and modern Monte Carlo event generators, predictions in fixed-order perturbative QCD where calculations up to $\mathcal{O}$($α^3_s$) are available for $τ^b_1$ or inclusive DIS, and resummed predictions at next-to-leading logarithmic accuracy matched to fixed order predictions at $\mathcal{O}$($α^2_s$). These comparisons reveal sensitivity of the 1-jettiness observable to QCD parton shower and resummation effects, as well as the modeling of hadronization and fragmentation. Within their range of validity, the fixed-order predictions provide a good description of the data. Monte Carlo event generators are predictive over the full measured range and hence their underlying models and parameters can be constrained by comparing to the presented data.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2024

Measurement of groomed event shape observables in deep-inelastic electron-proton scattering at HERA

The H1 Collaboration at HERA reports the first measurement of groomed event shape observables in deep inelastic electron-proton scattering (DIS) at $\sqrt{s} =319$ GeV, using data recorded between the years 2003 and 2007 with an integrated luminosity of 351 pb -1 . Event shapes provide incisive probes of perturbative and non-perturbative QCD. Grooming techniques have been used for jet measurements in hadronic collisions; this paper presents the first application of grooming to DIS data. The analysis is carried out in the Breit frame, utilizing the novel Centauro jet clustering algorithm that is designed for DIS event topologies. Events are required to have squared momentum-transfer $Q^2 > 150$ GeV 2 and inelasticity $0.2< y < 0.7$. We report measurements of the production cross section of groomed event 1-jettiness and groomed invariant mass for several choices of grooming parameter. Monte Carlo model calculations and analytic calculations based on Soft Collinear Effective Theory are compared to the measurements.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2024

Observation and differential cross section measurement of neutral current DIS events with an empty hemisphere in the Breit frame

The Breit frame provides a natural frame to analyze lepton–proton scattering events. In this reference frame, the parton model hard interactions between a quark and an exchanged boson defines the coordinate system such that the struck quark is back-scattered along the virtual photon momentum direction. In Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD), higher order perturbative or non-perturbative effects can change this picture drastically. As Bjorken-x decreases below one half, a rather peculiar event signature is predicted with increasing probability, where no radiation is present in one of the two Breit-frame hemispheres and all emissions are to be found in the other hemisphere. At higher orders in $\alpha$ s or in the presence of soft QCD effects, predictions of the rate of these events are far from trivial, and that motivates measurements with real data. We report on the first observation of the empty current hemisphere events in electron–proton collisions at the HERA collider using data recorded with the H1 detector at a center-of-mass energy of 319 GeV. The fraction of inclusive neutral-current DIS events with an empty hemisphere is found to be 0.0112 ± 3.9% stat ± 4.5% syst ± 1.6% mod in the selected kinematic region of 150 < Q 2 < 1500 GeV 2 and inelasticity 0.14 < y < 0.7. The data sample corresponds to an integrated luminosity of 351.1 pb -1 , sufficient to enable differential cross section measurements of these events. The results show an enhanced discriminating power at lower Bjorken-x among different Monte Carlo event generator predictions.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2024

Spectrum and extension of the inverse-Compton emission of the Crab Nebula from a combined Fermi -LAT and H.E.S.S. analysis

The Crab Nebula is a unique laboratory for studying the acceleration of electrons and positrons through their non-thermal radiation. Observations of very-high-energy γ rays from the Crab Nebula have provided important constraints for modelling its broadband emission. We present the first fully self-consistent analysis of the Crab Nebula’s γ-ray emission between 1 GeV and ∼100 TeV, that is, over five orders of magnitude in energy. Using the open-source software package GAMMAPY, we combined 11.4 yr of data from the Fermi Large Area Telescope and 80 h of High Energy Stereoscopic System (H.E.S.S.) data at the event level and provide a measurement of the spatial extension of the nebula and its energy spectrum. We find evidence for a shrinking of the nebula with increasing γ-ray energy. Furthermore, we fitted several phenomenological models to the measured data, finding that none of them can fully describe the spatial extension and the spectral energy distribution at the same time. Especially the extension measured at TeV energies appears too large when compared to the X-ray emission. Our measurements probe the structure of the magnetic field between the pulsar wind termination shock and the dust torus, and we conclude that the magnetic field strength decreases with increasing distance from the pulsar. We complement our study with a careful assessment of systematic uncertainties.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2024

Impact of beam–beam effects on absolute luminosity calibrations at the CERN Large Hadron Collider

At the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), absolute luminosity calibrations obtained by the van der Meer (vdM) method are affected by the mutual electromagnetic interaction of the two beams. The colliding bunches experience relative orbit shifts, as well as optical distortions akin to the dynamic-β effect, that both depend on the transverse beam separation and must therefore be corrected for when deriving the absolute luminosity scale. In the vdM regime, the beam–beam parameter is small enough that the orbit shift can be calculated analytically. The dynamic-β corrections to the luminometer calibrations, however, had until the end of Run 2 been estimated in the linear approximation only. In this report, the influence of beam–beam effects on the vdM-based luminosity scale is quantified, together with the associated systematic uncertainties, by means of simulations that fully take into account the non-linearity of the beam–beam force, as well as the resulting non-Gaussian distortions of the transverse beam distributions. Two independent multiparticle simulations, one limited to the weak-strong approximation and one that models strong-strong effects in a self-consistent manner, are found in excellent agreement; both predict a percent-level shift of the absolute pp-luminosity values with respect to those assumed until recently in the physics publications of the LHC experiments. These results also provide guidance regarding further studies aimed at reducing the beam–beam-related systematic uncertainty on beam–beam corrections to absolute luminosity calibrations by the van der Meer method.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2021

Measurement of charged particle multiplicity distributions in DIS at HERA and its implication to entanglement entropy of partons

Charged particle multiplicity distributions in positron-proton deep inelastic scattering at a centre-of-mass energy √s = 319 GeV are measured. The data are collected with the H1 detector at HERA corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 136 pb -1 . Charged particle multiplicities are measured as a function of photon virtuality Q 2 , inelasticity y and pseudorapidity η in the laboratory and the hadronic centre-of-mass frames. Predictions from different Monte Carlo models are compared to the data. The first and second moments of the multiplicity distributions are determined and the KNO scaling behaviour is investigated. The multiplicity distributions as a function of Q 2 and the Bjorken variable x bj are converted to the hadron entropy S hadron , and predictions from a quantum entanglement model are tested.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2019

High Precision Detection of Change in Intermediate Range Order of Amorphous Zirconia-Doped Tantala Thin Films Due to Annealing

Understanding the local atomic order in amorphous thin film coatings and how it relates to macroscopic performance factors, such as mechanical loss, provides an important path towards enabling the accelerated discovery and development of improved coatings. High precision x-ray scattering measurements of thin films of amorphous zirconia-doped tantala (ZrO 2 -Ta 2 O 5 ) show systematic changes in intermediate range order (IRO) as a function of postdeposition heat treatment (annealing). Atomic modeling captures and explains these changes, and shows that the material has building blocks of metal-centered polyhedra and the effect of annealing is to alter the connections between the polyhedra. The observed changes in IRO are associated with a shift in the ratio of corner-sharing to edge-sharing polyhedra. These changes correlate with changes in mechanical loss upon annealing, and suggest that the mechanical loss can be reduced by developing a material with a designed ratio of corner-sharing to edge-sharing polyhedra.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2019

Control of dopant crystallinity in electrochemically treated cuprate thin films

We present a methodology based on ex situ (postgrowth) electrochemistry to control the oxygen concentration in thin films of the superconducting oxide La 2 CuO 4+y grown epitaxially on substrates of isostructural LaSrAlO 4 . The superconducting transition temperature, which depends on the oxygen concentration, can be tuned by adjusting the pH level of the base solution used for the electrochemical reaction. As our main finding, we demonstrate that the dopant oxygens can either occupy the interstitial layer in an orientationally disordered state or organize into a crystalline phase via a mechanism in which dopant oxygens are inserted into the substrate, changing the lattice symmetry of both the substrate and the epitaxial film. Finally, we discuss this mechanism, and we describe the resulting methodology as a platform to be explored in thin films of other transition-metal oxides.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗
DOE OSTI2018

L1 0 -FeNi films on Au-Cu-Ni buffer-layer: a high-throughput combinatorial study

Here, the fct L1 0 -FeNi alloy is a promising candidate for the development of high performance critical-elements-free magnetic materials. Among the different materials, the Au-Cu-Ni alloy has resulted very promising; however, a detailed investigation of the effect of the buffer-layer composition on the formation of the hard FeNi phase is still missing. To accelerate the search of the best Au-Cu-Ni composition, a combinatorial approach based on High-Throughput (HT) experimental methods has been exploited in this paper. HT magnetic characterization methods revealed the presence of a hard magnetic phase with an out-of-plane easy-axis, whose coercivity increases from 0.49 kOe up to 1.30 kOe as the Au content of the Cu-Au-Ni buffer-layer decreases. Similarly, the out-of-plane magneto-crystalline anisotropy energy density increases from 0.12 to 0.35 MJ/m 3 . This anisotropy is attributed to the partial formation of the L1 0 FeNi phase induced by the buffer-layer. In the range of compositions we investigated, the buffer-layer structure does not change significantly and the modulation of the magnetic properties with the Au content in the combinatorial layer is mainly related to the different nature and extent of interlayer diffusion processes, which have a great impact on the formation and order degree of the L1 0 FeNi phase.

25 ENERGY STORAGE↗
DOE OSTI2017

The Complexity of the CaF 2 :Yb System: A Huge, Reversible, X-ray-Induced Valence Reduction

Here lanthanides are multivalent chemical systems whose luminescence activates numerous optical devices. Their multivalent nature sets a complex scenario that challenges widespread single-valent-ion models. Here we study the complexity inherent in the 2+/3+ mixed-valence nature of Yb in CaF 2 . We report X-ray absorption spectroscopy of CaF 2 :Yb that shows a maximal, huge Yb 3+ X-ray-induced valence reduction at 200 K for low Yb concentration (0.01%) samples, which reverts to the initial state upon warming to 300 K. Although reduction doubles the number of Yb 2+ ions, the anomalous emission that is normally observed at low temperatures completely disappears and never recovers. Surprisingly, however, after annealing at 900 K, some anomalous emission is again observed below 150 K. Under X-ray exposure electrons are ejected from the F – ions, including charge compensating interstitials, F i – . Removing an electron from F i – leaves a neutral atom which appears metastable. Ab initio calculations of the F i – -to-Yb 3+ electron transfer reveal there is a critical dopant–compensator distance below which reoxidation is spontaneous and above which it is not. This, together with temperature-dependent F i 0 and F i – mobilities, and the interpretation of the anomalous emission as an Yb 2+ -to-Yb 3+ electron transfer provide a model for interpreting the complex experimental observations.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
DOE OSTI2017

Fulfilling the promise of the materials genome initiative with high-throughput experimental methodologies

The Materials Genome Initiative, a national effort to introduce new materials into the market faster and at lower cost, has made significant progress in computational simulation and modeling of materials. To build on this progress, a large amount of experimental data for validating these models, and informing more sophisticated ones, will be required. High-throughput experimentation generates large volumes of experimental data using combinatorial materials synthesis and rapid measurement techniques, making it an ideal experimental complement to bring the Materials Genome Initiative vision to fruition. This paper reviews the state-of-the-art results, opportunities, and challenges in high-throughput experimentation for materials design. As a result, a major conclusion is that an effort to deploy a federated network of high-throughput experimental (synthesis and characterization) tools, which are integrated with a modern materials data infrastructure, is needed.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2016

Ideal charge-density-wave order in the high-field state of superconducting YBCO

Significance Compelling evidence of various forms of nonsuperconducting electronic order in the cuprate high-temperature superconductors has fundamentally altered our understanding of the essential physics of these materials. However, it has been difficult to establish the nature of the quantum (zero-temperature) phases that compete and/or coexist with superconductivity. By studying high-quality crystals of YBCO using an X-ray laser and pulsed magnetic fields, we have established that the field induced charge-density-wave (CDW) order that arises when superconductivity is suppressed at low temperatures is incommensurate, unidirectional, and 3D-ordered. While disorder ultimately precludes true CDW long-range order, there does appear to be a sharply defined crossover field, which we associate with a transition to a nematic state with long-range orientational order.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗