New insight into the shape coexistence and shape evolution of Yb-157
High-spin states in Yb-157 have been populated in the Sm-144( O-16,3n)Yb-157 fusion-evaporation reaction at a beam energy of 85 MeV. Two rotational bands built on the nu f(7/2) and nu h(9/2) intrinsic states, respectively, have been established for the first time. The newly observed nu f(7/2) band and previously known nu i(13/2) band in Yb-157 are discussed in terms of total Routhian surface methods and compared with the structures in the neighboring N = 87 isotones. The structural characters observed in Yb-157 provide evidence for shape coexistence of three distinct shapes: prolate, triaxial, and oblate. At higher spins, both the nu f(7/2) band and nu i(13/2) band in Yb-157 undergo a shape evolution with sizable alignments occurring.

title: Chirality in odd-A Rh isotopes within the triaxial particle rotor model
abstract: By adopting the fully quantal triaxial particle-rotor model, the candidate chiral doublet bands in odd-A nuclei {sup 103}Rh and {sup 105}Rh with {pi}g{sub 9/2}{sup -1} x {nu}h{sub 11/2}{sup 2} configuration are studied. For the doublet bands in both nuclei, agreement is excellent for the observed energies over the entire spin range and B(M1)/B(E2) at higher spin range. The evolution of the chiral geometry with angular momentum is discussed in detail by using the angular momentum components and their probability distributions. Chirality is found to change from chiral vibration to nearly static chirality at spin I=37/2 and back to another type of chiral vibration at higher spin. The influence of the triaxial deformation {gamma} is also studied.

title: High-spin states in near-spherical Y-88

title: Measurement of the cross section for prompt isolated diphoton production using the full CDF run II data sample.
abstract: This Letter reports a measurement of the cross section for producing pairs of central prompt isolated photons in proton-antiproton collisions at a total energy sqrt[s] = 1.96 TeV using data corresponding to 9.5 fb(-1) integrated luminosity collected with the CDF II detector at the Fermilab Tevatron. The measured differential cross section is compared to three calculations derived from the theory of strong interactions. These include a prediction based on a leading order matrix element calculation merged with a parton shower model, a next-to-leading order calculation, and a next-to-next-to-leading order calculation. The first and last calculations reproduce most aspects of the data, thus showing the importance of higher-order contributions for understanding the theory of strong interaction and improving measurements of the Higgs boson and searches for new phenomena in diphoton final states.

title: X-ray astronomy in the laboratory with a miniature compact object produced by laser-driven implosion
abstract: It has been suggested that the extreme states of matter generated by high-intensity lasers could allow conditions similar to those in the vicinity of black holes to be studied in the lab. The observation of striking similarities between the X-ray spectra emitted by a laser-driven laboratory plasma and those measured from two high-mass binary star systems suggests such potential has been realized.

title: Corner-cube retro-reflector instrument for advanced lunar laser ranging
abstract: Lunar laser ranging (LLR) has made major contributions to our understanding of the Moon’s internal structure and the dynamics of the Earth–Moon system. Because of the recent improvements of the ground-based laser ranging facilities, the present LLR measurement accuracy is limited by the retro-reflectors currently on the lunar surface, which are arrays of small corner-cubes. Because of lunar librations, the surfaces of these arrays do not, in general, point directly at the Earth. This effect results in a spread of arrival times, because each cube that comprises the retroreflector is at a slightly different distance from the Earth, leading to the reduced ranging accuracy. Thus, a single, wide aperture corner-cube could have a clear advantage. In addition, after nearly four decades of successful operations the retro-reflectors arrays currently on the Moon started to show performance degradation; as a result, they yield still useful, but much weaker return signals. Thus, fresh and bright instruments on the lunar surface are needed to continue precision LLR measurements. We have developed a new retro-reflector design to enable advanced LLR operations. It is based on a single, hollow corner cube with a large aperture for which preliminary thermal, mechanical, and optical design and analysis have been performed. The new instrument will be able to reach an Earth–Moon range precision of 1-mm in a single pulse while being subjected to significant thermal variations present on the lunar surface, and will have low mass to allow robotic deployment. Here we report on our design results and instrument development effort.

title: First simultaneous measurement of the top quark mass in the lepton + jets and dilepton channels at CDF
abstract: We present a measurement of the mass of the top quark using data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 1.9 fb{sup -1} of pp collisions collected at {radical}(s)=1.96 TeV with the CDF II detector at Fermilab's Tevatron. This is the first measurement of the top quark mass using top-antitop pair candidate events in the lepton+jets and dilepton decay channels simultaneously. We reconstruct two observables in each channel and use a nonparametric kernel density estimation technique to derive two-dimensional probability density functions from simulated signal and background samples. The observables are the top quark mass and the invariant mass of two jets from the W decay in the lepton+jets channel, and the top quark mass and the scalar sum of transverse energy of the event in the dilepton channel. We perform a simultaneous fit for the top quark mass and the jet energy scale, which is constrained in situ by the hadronic W boson mass. Using 332 lepton+jets candidate events and 144 dilepton candidate events, we measure the top quark mass to be M{sub top}=171.9{+-}1.7(stat+JES){+-}1.1(other syst) GeV/c{sup 2}=171.9{+-}2.0 GeV/c{sup 2}.

title: First Flare-related Rapid Change of Photospheric Magnetic Field Observed by Solar Dynamics Observatory
abstract: Photospheric magnetic field not only plays important roles in building up free energy and triggering solar eruptions, but also has been observed to change rapidly and permanently responding to the coronal magnetic field restructuring due to coronal transients. The Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager instrument (HMI) on board the newly launched Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) produces seeing-free full-disk vector magnetograms at consistently high resolution and high cadence, which finally makes possible an unambiguous and comprehensive study of this important back-reaction process. In this study, we present a near disk-center, GOES-class X2.2 flare occurred at NOAA AR 11158 on 2011 February 15 using the magnetic field measurements made by HMI. We obtained the first solid evidence of an enhancement in the transverse magnetic field at the flaring magnetic polarity inversion line (PIL) by a magnitude of 70%. This rapid and irreversible field evolution is unequivocally associated with the flare occurrence, with the enhancement area located in between the two chromospheric flare ribbons. Similar findings have been made for another two major flare events observed by SDO. These results strongly corroborate our previous suggestion that the photospheric magnetic field near the PIL must become more horizontal after eruptions. 
In-depth studies will follow to further link the photospheric magnetic field changes with the dynamics of coronal mass ejections, when full Stokes inversion is carried out to generate accurate magnetic field vectors.