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A. Marek

Publications and source records attributed to A. Marek.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

Towards the superlubricity of polymer-steel interfaces with ionic liquids and carbon nanotubes

Frictional losses are responsible for significant energy waste in many practical applications, and superlubricity with a coefficient of friction lower than 0.01 is the goal of tribologists. In this paper, metal-on-polymer contact was analysed and close to superlubricity conditions for this material configuration were explored. A new lubricant has been proposed hinge on the phosphorus-based ionic liquid and carbon nanotubes as thickeners. Additionally, carbon nanotube mesh was doped with copper nanoparticles that allowed for the close to superlubricity state in a mild steel/polymer contact configuration under low normal load conditions. The adsorption of phosphorus onto metallic and polymer surfaces has been reported in EDS analysis. The formulation of the new lubricant allowed for stable dispersion with a carbon nanotube content as low as 0.1% wt. The carbon nanotubes and Cu nanoparticles have been analysed using TEM and SEM imaging. A tribological test in a block-on-ring system has been carried out. The wear of material, topography, and surface free energy have been analysed along with SEM/EDS images to explore the underlying mechanisms of friction and wear.

physics.chem-ph

Optimizations of the Eigensolvers in the ELPA Library

The solution of (generalized) eigenvalue problems for symmetric or Hermitian matrices is a common subtask of many numerical calculations in electronic structure theory or materials science. Solving the eigenvalue problem can easily amount to a sizeable fraction of the whole numerical calculation. For researchers in the field of computational materials science, an efficient and scalable solution of the eigenvalue problem is thus of major importance. The ELPA-library is a well-established dense direct eigenvalue solver library, which has proven to be very efficient and scalable up to very large core counts. In this paper, we describe the latest optimizations of the ELPA-library for new HPC architectures of the Intel Skylake processor family with an AVX-512 SIMD instruction set, or for HPC systems accelerated with recent GPUs. We also describe a complete redesign of the API in a modern modular way, which, apart from a much simpler and more flexible usability, leads to a new path to access system-specific performance optimizations. In order to ensure optimal performance for a particular scientific setting or a specific HPC system, the new API allows the user to influence in straightforward way the internal details of the algorithms and of performance-critical parameters used in the ELPA-library. On top of that, we introduced an autotuning functionality, which allows for finding the best settings in a self-contained automated way. In situations where many eigenvalue problems with similar settings have to be solved consecutively, the autotuning process of the ELPA-library can be done "on-the-fly". Practical applications from materials science which rely on so-called self-consistency iterations can profit from the autotuning. On some examples of scientific interest, simulated with the FHI-aims application, the advantages of the latest optimizations of the ELPA-library are demonstrated.

cs.MS

Rotation-supported Neutrino-driven Supernova Explosions in Three Dimensions and the Critical Luminosity Condition

We present the first self-consistent, three-dimensional (3D) core-collapse supernova simulations performed with the Prometheus-Vertex code for a rotating progenitor star. Besides using the angular momentum of the 15 solar-mass model as obtained in the stellar evolution calculation with an angular frequency of about 0.001 rad/s (spin period of more than 6000 s) at the Si/Si-O interface, we also computed 2D and 3D cases with no rotation and with a ~300 times shorter rotation period and different angular resolutions. In 2D, only the nonrotating and slowly rotating models explode, while rapid rotation prevents an explosion within 500 ms after bounce because of lower radiated neutrino luminosities and mean energies and thus reduced neutrino heating. In contrast, only the fast rotating model develops an explosion in 3D when the Si/Si-O interface collapses through the shock. The explosion becomes possible by the support of a powerful SASI spiral mode, which compensates for the reduced neutrino heating and pushes strong shock expansion in the equatorial plane. Fast rotation in 3D leads to a "two-dimensionalization" of the turbulent energy spectrum (yielding roughly a -3 instead of a -5/3 power-law slope at intermediate wavelengths) with enhanced kinetic energy on the largest spatial scales. We also introduce a generalization of the "universal critical luminosity condition" of Summa et al. (2016) to account for the effects of rotation, and demonstrate its viability for a set of more than 40 core-collapse simulations including 9 and 20 solar-mass progenitors as well as black-hole forming cases of 40 and 75 solar-mass stars to be discussed in forthcoming papers.

astro-ph.HE

SASI Activity in Three-Dimensional Neutrino-Hydrodynamics Simulations of Supernova Cores

The relevance of the standing accretion shock instability (SASI) compared to neutrino-driven convection in three-dimensional (3D) supernova-core environments is still highly controversial. Studying a 27 Msun progenitor, we demonstrate, for the first time, that violent SASI activity can develop in 3D simulations with detailed neutrino transport despite the presence of convection. This result was obtained with the Prometheus-Vertex code with the same sophisticated neutrino treatment so far used only in 1D and 2D models. While buoyant plumes initially determine the nonradial mass motions in the postshock layer, bipolar shock sloshing with growing amplitude sets in during a phase of shock retraction and turns into a violent spiral mode whose growth is only quenched when the infall of the Si/SiO interface leads to strong shock expansion in response to a dramatic decrease of the mass accretion rate. In the phase of large-amplitude SASI sloshing and spiral motions, the postshock layer exhibits nonradial deformation dominated by the lowest-order spherical harmonics (l=1, m=0,-1,+1) in distinct contrast to the higher multipole structures associated with neutrino-driven convection. We find that the SASI amplitudes, shock asymmetry, and nonradial kinetic energy in 3D can exceed those of the corresponding 2D case during extended periods of the evolution. We also perform parametrized 3D simulations of a 25 Msun progenitor, using a simplified, gray neutrino transport scheme, an axis-free Yin-Yang grid, and different amplitudes of random seed perturbations. They confirm the importance of the SASI for another progenitor, its independence of the choice of spherical grid, and its preferred growth for fast accretion flows connected to small shock radii and compact proto-neutron stars as previously found in 2D setups.

astro-ph.SR

A New Multi-Dimensional General Relativistic Neutrino Hydrodynamics Code for Core-Collapse Supernovae II. Relativistic Explosion Models of Core-Collapse Supernovae

We present the first two-dimensional general relativistic (GR) simulations of stellar core collapse and explosion with the CoCoNuT hydrodynamics code in combination with the VERTEX solver for energy-dependent, three-flavor neutrino transport, using the extended conformal flatness condition for approximating the spacetime metric and a ray-by-ray-plus ansatz to tackle the multi-dimensionality of the transport. For both of the investigated 11.2 and 15 solar mass progenitors we obtain successful, though seemingly marginal, neutrino-driven supernova explosions. This outcome and the time evolution of the models basically agree with results previously obtained with the PROMETHEUS hydro solver including an approximative treatment of relativistic effects by a modified Newtonian potential. However, GR models exhibit subtle differences in the neutrinospheric conditions compared to Newtonian and pseudo-Newtonian simulations. These differences lead to significantly higher luminosities and mean energies of the radiated electron neutrinos and antineutrinos and therefore to larger energy-deposition rates and heating efficiencies in the gain layer with favorable consequences for strong non-radial mass motions and ultimately for an explosion. Moreover, energy transfer to the stellar medium around the neutrinospheres through nucleon recoil in scattering reactions of heavy-lepton neutrinos also enhances the mentioned effects. Together with previous pseudo-Newtonian models the presented relativistic calculations suggest that the treatment of gravity and energy-exchanging neutrino interactions can make differences of even 50-100% in some quantities and is likely to contribute to a finally successful explosion mechanism on no minor level than hydrodynamical differences between different dimensions.

astro-ph.SR

Neutrino Signal of Electron-Capture Supernovae from Core Collapse to Cooling

An 8.8 solar mass electron-capture supernova (SN) was simulated in spherical symmetry consistently from collapse through explosion to nearly complete deleptonization of the forming neutron star. The evolution time of about 9 s is short because of nucleon-nucleon correlations in the neutrino opacities. After a brief phase of accretion-enhanced luminosities (~200 ms), luminosity equipartition among all species becomes almost perfect and the spectra of electron antineutrinos and muon/tau antineutrinos very similar. We discuss consequences for the neutrino-driven wind as a nucleosynthesis site and for flavor oscillations of SN neutrinos.

astro-ph.SR

Axisymmetric General Relativistic Simulations of the Accretion-Induced Collapse of White Dwarfs

(Abridged.) The accretion-induced collapse (AIC) of a white dwarf (WD) may lead to the formation of a protoneutron star and a collapse-driven supernova explosion. This process represents a path alternative to thermonuclear disruption of accreting white dwarfs in Type Ia supernovae. Neutrino and gravitational-wave (GW) observations may provide crucial information necessary to reveal a potential AIC. Motivated by the need for systematic predictions of the GW signature of AIC, we present results from an extensive set of general-relativistic AIC simulations using a microphysical finite-temperature equation of state and an approximate treatment of deleptonization during collapse. Investigating a set of 114 progenitor models in rotational equilibrium, with a wide range of rotational configurations, temperatures and central densities, we extend previous Newtonian studies and find that the GW signal has a generic shape akin to what is known as a "Type III" signal in the literature. We discuss the detectability of the emitted GWs, showing that the signal-to-noise ratio for current or next-generation interferometer detectors could be high enough to detect such events in our Galaxy. Some of our AIC models form massive quasi-Keplerian accretion disks after bounce. In rapidly differentially rotating models, the disk mass can be as large as ~0.8-Msun. Slowly and/or uniformly rotating models produce much smaller disks. Finally, we find that the postbounce cores of rapidly spinning white dwarfs can reach sufficiently rapid rotation to develop a nonaxisymmetric rotational instability.

astro-ph.HE

Equation-of-State Dependent Features in Shock-Oscillation Modulated Neutrino and Gravitational-Wave Signals from Supernovae

We present 2D hydrodynamic simulations of the long-time accretion phase of a 15 solar mass star after core bounce and before the launch of a supernova explosion. Our simulations are performed with the Prometheus-Vertex code, employing multi-flavor, energy-dependent neutrino transport and an effective relativistic gravitational potential. Testing the influence of a stiff and a soft equation of state for hot neutron star matter, we find that the non-radial mass motions in the supernova core due to the standing accretion shock instability (SASI) and convection impose a time variability on the neutrino and gravitational-wave signals. These variations have larger amplitudes as well as higher frequencies in the case of a more compact nascent neutron star. After the prompt shock-breakout burst of electron neutrinos, a more compact accreting remnant radiates neutrinos with higher luminosities and larger mean energies. The observable neutrino emission in the direction of SASI shock oscillations exhibits a modulation of several 10% in the luminosities and ~1 MeV in the mean energies with most power at typical SASI frequencies of 20-100 Hz. At times later than 50-100 ms after bounce the gravitational-wave amplitude is dominated by the growing low-frequency (<200 Hz) signal associated with anisotropic neutrino emission. A high-frequency wave signal is caused by nonradial gas flows in the outer neutron star layers, which are stirred by anisotropic accretion from the SASI and convective regions. The gravitational-wave power then peaks at about 300-800 Hz with distinctively higher spectral frequencies originating from the more compact and more rapidly contracting neutron star. The detectability of the SASI effects in the neutrino and gravitational-wave signals is briefly discussed. (abridged)

astro-ph

Delayed neutrino-driven supernova explosions aided by the standing accretion-shock instability

We present results of 2D hydrodynamic simulations of stellar core collapse, which confirm that the neutrino-heating mechanism remains viable for the explosion of a wider mass range of supernova progenitors with iron cores. We used an energy-dependent treatment of the neutrino transport based on the "ray-by-ray plus" approximation, in which the number, energy, and momentum equations are closed with a variable Eddington factor obtained by iteratively solving a model Boltzmann equation. We focus on the evolution of a 15 Msun progenitor and show that shock revival and the explosion are initiated at about 600 ms post bounce, powered by neutrino energy deposition. Similar to previous findings for an 11.2 Msun star, but significantly later, the onset of the explosion is fostered by the standing accretion shock instability (SASI). This instability exhibits highest growth rates for the dipole and quadrupole modes, which lead to large-amplitude bipolar shock oscillations and push the shock to larger radii, thus increasing the time accreted matter is exposed to neutrino heating in the gain layer. Therefore also convective overturn behind the shock is strengthened. A "soft" nuclear equation of state that causes a rapid contraction and a smaller radius of the forming neutron star and thus a fast release of gravitational binding energy, seems to be more favorable for an explosion. Rotation has the opposite effect because it leads to a more extended and cooler neutron star and thus lower neutrino luminosities and mean energies and overall less neutrino heating. Neutron star g-mode oscillations and the acoustic mechanism play no important role in our simulations. (abridged)

astro-ph

Supernova explosions and the birth of neutron stars

We report here on recent progress in understanding the birth conditions of neutron stars and the way how supernovae explode. More sophisticated numerical models have led to the discovery of new phenomena in the supernova core, for example a generic hydrodynamic instability of the stagnant supernova shock against low-mode nonradial deformation and the excitation of gravity-wave activity in the surface and core of the nascent neutron star. Both can have supportive or decisive influence on the inauguration of the explosion, the former by improving the conditions for energy deposition by neutrino heating in the postshock gas, the latter by supplying the developing blast with a flux of acoustic power that adds to the energy transfer by neutrinos. While recent two-dimensional models suggest that the neutrino-driven mechanism may be viable for stars from about 8 solar masses to at least 15 solar masses, acoustic energy input has been advocated as an alternative if neutrino heating fails. Magnetohydrodynamic effects constitute another way to trigger explosions in connection with the collapse of sufficiently rapidly rotating stellar cores, perhaps linked to the birth of magnetars. The global explosion asymmetries seen in the recent simulations offer an explanation of even the highest measured kick velocities of young neutron stars.

astro-ph

Neutrino-driven explosions twenty years after SN1987A

The neutrino-heating mechanism remains a viable possibility for the cause of the explosion in a wide mass range of supernova progenitors. This is demonstrated by recent two-dimensional hydrodynamic simulations with detailed, energy-dependent neutrino transport. Neutrino-driven explosions were not only found for stars in the range of 8-10 solar masses with ONeMg cores and in case of the iron core collapse of a progenitor with 11 solar masses, but also for a ``typical'' progenitor model of 15 solar masses. For such more massive stars, however, the explosion occurs significantly later than so far thought, and is crucially supported by large-amplitude bipolar oscillations due to the nonradial standing accretion shock instability (SASI), whose low (dipole and quadrupole) modes can develop large growth rates in conditions where convective instability is damped or even suppressed. The dominance of low-mode deformation at the time of shock revival has been recognized as a possible explanation of large pulsar kicks and of large-scale mixing phenomena observed in supernovae like SN 1987A.

astro-ph

Effects of Inelastic Neutrino-Nucleus Scattering on Supernova Dynamics and Radiated Neutrino Spectra

Based on the shell model for Gamow-Teller and the Random Phase Approximation for forbidden transitions, we have calculated reaction rates for inelastic neutrino-nucleus scattering (INNS) under supernova (SN) conditions, assuming a matter composition given by Nuclear Statistical Equilibrium. The rates have been incorporated into state-of-the-art stellar core-collapse simulations with detailed energy-dependent neutrino transport. While no significant effect on the SN dynamics is observed, INNS increases the neutrino opacities noticeably and strongly reduces the high-energy tail of the neutrino spectrum emitted in the neutrino burst at shock breakout. Relatedly the expected event rates for the observation of such neutrinos by earthbound detectors are reduced by up to about 60%.

astro-ph

3D Collapse of Rotating Stellar Iron Cores in General Relativity including Deleptonization and a Nuclear Equation of State

We present results from the first 2D and 3D simulations of the collapse of rotating stellar iron cores in general relativity employing a finite-temperature equation of state and an approximate treatment of deleptonization during collapse. We compare fully nonlinear and conformally flat spacetime evolution methods and find that the conformally flat treatment is sufficiently accurate for the core-collapse supernova problem. We focus on the gravitational wave (GW) emission from rotating collapse, core bounce, and early postbounce phases. Our results indicate that the GW signature of these phases is much more generic than previously estimated. In addition, we track the growth of a nonaxisymmetric instability of dominant m = 1 character in one of our models that leads to prolonged narrow-band GW emission at ~930 Hz over several tens of milliseconds.

astro-ph

Relativistic neutron star merger simulations with non-zero temperature equations of state I. Variation of binary parameters and equation of state

An extended set of binary neutron star (NS) merger simulations is performed with an approximative conformally flat treatment of general relativity to systematically investigate the influence of the nuclear equation of state (EoS), the neutron star masses, and the NS spin states prior to merging. We employ the two non-zero temperature EoSs of Shen et al. (1998a,b) and Lattimer & Swesty (1991). In addition, we use the cold EoS of Akmal et al. (1998) with a simple ideal-gas-like extension according to Shibata & Taniguchi (2006), and an ideal-gas EoS with parameters fitted to the supernuclear part of the Shen-EoS. We estimate the mass sitting in a dilute high-angular momentum ``torus'' around the future black hole (BH). The dynamics and outcome of the models is found to depend strongly on the EoS and on the binary parameters. Larger torus masses are found for asymmetric systems (up to ~0.3 M_sun for a mass ratio of 0.55), for large initial NSs, and for a NS spin state which corresponds to a larger total angular momentum. We find that the postmerger remnant collapses either immediately or after a short time when employing the soft EoS of Lattimer& Swesty, whereas no sign of post-merging collapse is found within tens of dynamical timescales for all other EoSs used. The typical temperatures in the torus are found to be about 3-10 MeV depending on the strength of the shear motion at the collision interface between the NSs and thus depending on the initial NS spins. About 10^{-3}-10^{-2} M_sun of NS matter become gravitationally unbound during or right after the merging process. This matter consists of a hot/high-entropy component from the collision interface and (only in case of asymmetric systems) of a cool/low-entropy component from the spiral arm tips. (abridged)

astro-ph

Theory of Core-Collapse Supernovae

Advances in our understanding and the modeling of stellar core-collapse and supernova explosions over the past 15 years are reviewed, concentrating on the evolution of hydrodynamical simulations, the description of weak interactions and nuclear equation of state effects, and new insights into the nucleosynthesis occurring in the early phases of the explosion, in particular the neutrino-p process. The latter is enabled by the proton-richness of the early ejecta, which was discovered because of significant progress has been made in the treatment of neutrino transport and weak interactions. This progress has led to a new generation of sophisticated Newtonian and relativistic hydrodynamics simulations in spherical symmetry. Based on these, it is now clear that the prompt bounce-shock mechanism is not the driver of supernova explosions, and that the delayed neutrino-heating mechanism can produce explosions without the aid of multi-dimensional processes only if the progenitor star has an ONeMg core inside a very dilute He-core, i.e., has a mass in the 8--10 solar mass range. Hydrodynamic instabilities of various kinds have indeed been recognized to occur in the supernova core and to be of potential importance for the explosion. Neutrino-driven explosions, however, have been seen in two-dimensional simulations with sophisticated neutrino transport so far only when the star has a small iron core and low density in the surrounding shells as being found in stars near 10--11 solar masses. The explosion mechanism of more massive progenitors is still a puzzle. It might involve effects of three-dimensional hydrodynamics or might point to the relevance of rapid rotation and magnetohydrodynamics, or to still incompletely explored properties of neutrinos and the high-density equation of state.

astro-ph

Exploring the relativistic regime with Newtonian hydrodynamics: An improved effective gravitational potential for supernova simulations

We investigate the possibility to approximate relativistic effects in hydrodynamical simulations of stellar core collapse and post-bounce evolution by using a modified gravitational potential in an otherwise standard Newtonian hydrodynamic code. Different modifications of the effective relativistic potential introduced by Rampp & Janka (2002) are discussed. Corresponding hydrostatic solutions are compared with solutions of the TOV equations, and hydrodynamic simulations with two different codes are compared with fully relativistic results. One code is applied for one- and two-dimensional calculations with a simple equation of state, and employs either the modified effective relativistic potential in a Newtonian framework or solves the general relativistic field equations under the assumption of the conformal flatness condition (CFC) for the three-metric. The second code allows for full-scale supernova runs including a microphysical equation of state and neutrino transport based on the solution of the Boltzmann equation and its moments equations. We present prescriptions for the effective relativistic potential for self-gravitating fluids to be used in Newtonian codes, which produce excellent agreement with fully relativistic solutions in spherical symmetry, leading to significant improvements compared to previously published approximations. Moreover, they also approximate qualitatively well relativistic solutions for models with rotation.

astro-ph

On ion-ion correlation effects during stellar core collapse

The role of ion-ion correlations in suppressing neutrino-nucleus elastic scattering during stellar core collapse is reinvestigated, using two different equations of state. We test the improved description by Itoh et al. against the treatment suggested by Horowitz and find that the stronger cross section reduction for small momentum transfer in the former case does not lead to noticeable changes of the core deleptonization and entropy increase during collapse, because the improvements are relevant below neutrino trapping conditions only for very low neutrino energies, corresponding to a very small phase space volume. Treating screening effects for ionic mixtures by the linear mixing rule, applied to the collection of representative heavy nucleus, alpha particles, and free nucleons, which is assumed to characterize the composition in nuclear statistical equilibrium, we cannot determine mentionable differences during stellar collapse, because alpha particles are not sufficiently abundant and their coherent scattering opacity is too small.

astro-ph

Exploiting the neutronization burst of a galactic supernova

One of the robust features found in simulations of core-collapse supernovae (SNe) is the prompt neutronization burst, i.e. the first $\sim 25$ milliseconds after bounce when the SN emits with very high luminosity mainly $ν_e$ neutrinos. We examine the dependence of this burst on variations in the input of current SN models and find that recent improvements of the electron capture rates as well as uncertainties in the nuclear equation of state or a variation of the progenitor mass have only little effect on the signature of the neutronization peak in a megaton water Cherenkov detector for different neutrino mixing schemes. We show that exploiting the time-structure of the neutronization peak allows one to identify the case of a normal mass hierarchy and large 13-mixing angle $θ_{13}$, where the peak is absent. The robustness of the predicted total event number in the neutronization burst makes a measurement of the distance to the SN feasible with a precision of about 5%, even in the likely case that the SN is optically obscured.

astro-ph