It is shown that a suspension of insulating particles in a liquid with low conductivity possesses bistability and has a “negative” effective viscosity effect in the electric field due to internal rotations. By Brownian dynamics simulation it has been found that thermal fluctuations of the angular velocity of particles in this bistable system can have a large effect on the viscosity of the suspension.

We demonstrate experimentally and numerically that, by spectrally filtering the delayed optical feedback into a semiconductor laser, one can elicit novel dynamics in the frequency of the laser output light on a time scale that is set by the delay time of the feedback. In particular, we show that through a judicious choice of the filter bandwidth, and its frequency relative to that of the laser, one can produce controlled oscillations in the frequency of light from the laser.

A new application of time-reversal processing of wave scattering data permits characterization of scatterers by analyzing the number and nature of the singular functions (or eigenfunctions) associated with individual scatterers when they have multiple contributions from monopole, dipole, and/or quadrupole scattering terms. We discuss acoustic, elastic, and electromagnetic scattering problems for low frequencies. Specific examples for electromagnetic scattering from one of a number of small conducting spheres show that each sphere can have up to six distinct time-reversal eigenfunctions associated with it.

Surface forces and shape changes were simultaneously measured during the approach and coalescence of two liquid-liquid and liquid-air interfaces. Large normal and lateral deformations were observed that are nevertheless consistent with a simple theoretical analysis of the long-range effects of short-range attractive van der Waals forces. The results imply that two fluidlike structures such as liquid droplets and soft biological cells can sense each other at much larger separations than previously assumed based on criteria taken from the interactions of hard particles.

We discuss a connection between two complementary views of the Lorenz attractor: the first is the accepted view where the attractor has a smooth measure on a fractal support. This complex system is alternatively manifest as a self-similar curve for the pointwise dimension alpha. We describe why the latter approach is accessible for the analysis of an experimental signal.

The evolution and spatial structure of displacement fronts in fractures with self-affine rough walls are studied by numerical simulations. The fractures are open and the two faces are identical but shifted along their mean plane, either parallel or perpendicular to the flow. An initially flat front advected by the flow is progressively distorted into a self-affine front with a Hurst exponent equal to that of the fracture walls. The lower cutoff of the self-affine regime depends only on the aperture, while the upper cutoff grows with the lateral shift and linearly with the width of the front.

The observation of initial time dynamics of self-trapping in photorefractive media indicates that optical spatial solitons supported by intense cumulative nonlinearities manifest temporally nonlocal signatures in the form of stretched exponential behavior. This general result, supported also by numerical predictions, is triggered by wave shaping in a time-constant buildup map, a consequence of the spatially resolved inertial response intrinsic to the geometrical transition from a diffracting to a self-focused beam, inherent to soliton appearance.

We consider the low-frequency limit (homogenization) for propagation of sound waves in periodic elastic medium (phononic crystals). Exact analytical formulas for the speed of sound propagating in a three-dimensional periodic arrangement of liquid and gas or in a two-dimensional arrangement of solids are derived. We apply our formulas to the well-known phenomenon of the drop of the speed of sound in mixtures. For air bubbles in water we obtain a perfect agreement with the recent results of coherent potential approximation obtained by M. Kafesaki, R. S. Penciu, and E. N. Economou [Phys. Rev. Lett. 84, 6050 (2000)] if the filling of air bubbles is far from close packing. When air spheres almost touch each other, the approximation gives 10 times lower speed of sound than the exact theory does.

We observed experimentally a new regime for granular flows in an inclined channel with a flow-rate-controlled system. For high flow rates, the flow occurs atop a static granular heap whose angle is considerably higher than those usually exhibited by granular heaps. The properties of such superstable heaps (SSH) are drastically affected by a change in the channel width $W$. This indicates that the unusual stability of these heaps can be accounted for by the flowing layer and its friction on the sidewalls. A simple depth-averaged model, assuming Coulomb friction, shows that the SSH angle scales as $h/W$ ($W$ being the channel width), and that grain size plays no part.

We report on the observation of Bloch oscillations in light transport through periodic dielectric systems. By introducing a linear refractive index gradient along the propagation direction the optical equivalent of a Wannier-Stark ladder was obtained. Bloch oscillations were observed as time-resolved oscillations in transmission, in direct analogy to electronic Bloch oscillations in conducting crystals where the Wannier-Stark ladder is obtained via an external electric field. The observed oscillatory behavior is in excellent agreement with transfer matrix calculations.

We report on the distribution spectra of the fluctations in the amount of power injected into a liquid crystal undergoing electroconvective flow. The probability distribution functions (PDFs) of the fluctuations as well as the magnitude of the fluctuations have been determined in a wide range of imposed stress both for unconfined and confined flow geometries. These spectra are compared to those found in other systems held far from equilibrium, and find that in certain conditions we obtain the universal PDF form reported by S. T. Bramwell et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 84, 3744 (2000)]. Moreover, the PDF approaches this universal form via an interesting mechanism whereby the distribution’s negative tail evolves towards form in a different manner than the positive tail.

The authors suggest that atomic experiments measuring the interference between magnetic-dipole and electric-field-induced electric-dipole transition amplitudes provide a valuable system to study magnetoelectric Jones effects.

Resonant behavior of dielectric objects occurs at certain frequencies for which the object permittivity is negative and the free-space wavelength is large in comparison with the object dimensions. Unique physical features of these resonances are studied and a novel technique for the calculation of resonance values of permittivity, and hence resonance frequencies, is proposed. Scale invariance of resonance frequencies, unusually strong orthogonality properties of resonance modes, and a two-dimensional phenomenon of “twin” spectra are reported. The paper concludes with brief discussions of optical controllability of these resonances in semiconductor nanoparticles and a plausible, electrostatic resonance based, mechanism for nucleation and formation of ball lightning.

When a macroscopic metallic wire is subject to tensile stress, it necks down smoothly as it elongates. We show that nanowires with radii comparable to the Fermi wavelength display remarkably different behavior. Using concepts from fluid dynamics, a partial differential equation for nanowire shape evolution is derived from a semiclassical energy functional that includes electron-shell effects. A rich dynamics involving movement and interaction of kinks connecting locally stable radii is found, and a new class of universal equilibrium shapes is predicted.

We investigate second harmonic generation (SHG) from a photonic crystal slab consisting of centrosymmetric materials. The SHG signal is observed in the transmission direction when the incident laser excites the quasiwaveguide mode. As the SHG frequency approaches the exciton level, the SHG intensity increases resonantly. When the incident angle is exactly 0, the SHG signal vanishes even if the transmission dip is excited. This fact is readily explained by a quadrupole theory based on the Lorentz oscillator model, where the source of the nonlinearity is the Lorentz force. When the unit cell in the photonic crystal lacks inversion symmetry, the SHG signal is expected even for the normal incidence. It is experimentally demonstrated for a square array of triangular semiconductor slabs.

We present a novel method for computing finite-time Lyapunov exponents and vectors, via generalizing a correction given by Goldhirsch, Sulem, and Orszag [Physica (Amsterdam) 27D, 311 (1987)] into higher-order corrections. This method is a generalized $LR$ method, which is, in contrast to the existing methods, applicable to multidimensional systems with degenerate spectra. The efficiency and accuracy is demonstrated by applying it to multidimensional dynamical systems. Without these corrections, we could not accurately detect, as an example, the coexistence of qualitatively different Lyapunov instabilities along a trajectory for a multidimensional oscillator system.

A new class of light-induced parametric scattering, not included in the conventional model, has been discovered in photorefractive ${\mathrm{S}\mathrm{r}}_{0.61}{\mathrm{B}\mathrm{a}}_{0.39}{\mathrm{N}\mathrm{b}}_2{\mathrm{O}}_6:\mathrm{C}\mathrm{r}$ illuminated by two coherent beams. A novel model of multiwave mixing of coherent noise and transmitted light is developed to explain the new scattering phenomena. The model includes all known types and predicts a multitude of new types of parametric scattering. Generalized phase-matching conditions for parametric scattering in photorefractive crystals are proposed.

We apply the theory of multiple wave scattering to two contemporary, related topics: imaging with diffuse correlations and stability of the time reversal of diffuse waves, using equipartition, coherent backscattering, and frequency speckles as fundamental concepts.

We report the results of an experimental investigation of the transition to turbulence in a pipe over approximately an order of magnitude range in the Reynolds number Re. A novel scaling law is uncovered using a systematic experimental procedure which permits contact to be made with modern theoretical thinking. The principal result we uncover is a scaling law which indicates that the amplitude of perturbation required to cause transition scales as $O({\mathrm{R}\mathrm{e}}^{-1})$.

Frequency-related oscillations in coupled oscillator systems, in which one or more oscillators oscillate at different frequencies than the other oscillators, have been studied using group theoretical methods by Armbruster and Chossat [Phys. Lett. A 254, 269 (1999)] and more recently by Golubitsky and Stewart [in Geometry, Mechanics, and Dynamics, edited by P. Newton, P. Holmes, and A. Weinstein (Springer, New York, 2002), p. 243]. We demonstrate, experimentally, via electronic circuits, the existence of frequency-related oscillations in a network of two arrays of $N$ oscillators, per array, coupled to one another. Under certain conditions, one of the arrays can be induced to oscillate at $N$ times the frequency of the other array. This type of behavior is different from the one observed in a driven system because it is dictated mainly by the symmetry of the coupled system.