Luttinger liquid behaviour of Li0.9Mo6O17 studied by scanning tunnelling microscopy
Scanning tunnelling spectroscopy (STS) was used to study the Luttinger liquid behaviour of the purple bronze Li0.9Mo6O17 in the temperature range 5 K < T < 300 K. In the entire temperature range the suppression of the density of states at the Fermi energy can be fitted very well by a model describing the tunnelling into a Luttinger liquid at ambient temperature. The power-law exponent extracted from these fits reveals a significant increase above 200 K. It changes from α = 0.6 at low temperature to α = 1.0 at room temperature.
Calculated Effects of Disorder on the Mo Core Levels in Purple Bronze Li2Mo12O34
The band structures of ordered and thermally disordered Li 2 Mo 12 O 34 are calculated by use of ab initio density functional theory (DFT)–Linear Muffin-Tin Method (LMTO) with a focus on the behavior of the Mo 3d -core levels. It is shown that thermal disorder and zero-point motion lead to substantial core level broadening, and the broadening at room temperature is predicted to be sufficiently larger than at zero degrees to allow for a detection by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) measurements. However, real purple bronze has 10% Li vacancies, and static disorder will attenuate the T-dependent broadening. It is argued that core level spectroscopies could be a useful tool for the measurement of thermal disorders in many materials, especially for those with minor static disorder. Studies of core levels in magnetic materials will be helpful for an understanding of T-dependent spin moments.
Mass Loss History of Evolved Stars
We provide high-resolution maps of the circumstellar dust shells of several dozen Asymptotic Giant Branch (AGB) stars using data from the Spitzer space telescope Multiband Imaging Photometer (MIPS) imaged at 70μm. AGB stars are the major contributors of chemical elements such as carbon, oxygen and silicon, which are essential to the existence of life in the universe, through mass loss processes that take place at the surface of the star. We probe the spatial distribution of cold (∼40 K) dust grains in order to trace the history of mass loss from the observed radial density variation in these shells. Our images illustrate that different morphologies may evolve because AGB stars can already interact with the interstellar medium (ISM) that surrounds them even at these early stages of the AGB mass loss history. Relative motion of the star as well as the ISM with respect to the local environment may be of particular importance for shell structure evolution.