Comparative Study of Bunch Length And Arrival Time Measurements at FLASH
Diagnostic devices to precisely measure the longitudinal electron beam profile and the bunch arrival time require elaborate new instrumentation techniques. At FLASH, two entirely different methods are used. The bunch profile can be determined with high precision by a transverse deflecting RF structure, but the method is disruptive and does not allow to monitor multiple bunches in a macro-pulse train. It is therefore complemented by two non-disruptive electrooptical devices, called EO and TEO. The EO setup uses a dedicated diagnostic laser synchronized to the machine RF. The longitudinal electron beam profile is encoded in the intensity profile of a chirped laser pulse and analyzed by looking at the spectral composition of the pulse. The second setup, TEO, utilizes the TiSa-based laser system used for pump-probe experiments. Here, the temporal electron shape is encoded into the spatial dimension of the laser pulse by an intersection angle between the laser and the electron beam at the EO-crystal. In this paper, we present a comparative study of bunch length and arrival time measurements performed simultaneously with all three experimental techniques.

title: BUNCH COMPRESSION MONITOR
abstract: The longitudinal charge distribution in the electron bunches has a strong impact on the lasing process in a Free-Electron Laser based on the principle of Self Amplified Spontaneous Emission of radiation. For the ultraviolet and soft X ray FEL FLASH at DESY, structures in the range of ten to hundred micrometers play a crucial role. The investigation of the longitudinal charge distribution in the electron bunches on a bunch-by-bunch basis is an important issue for optimizing the bunch compression and improving the performance of the machine. This paper introduces a new tool for longitudinal diagnostics based on THz spectroscopy of coherent radiation. A novel spectrometer has been designed which permits to analyze the radiation of single electron bunches in a broad spectral range and with high resolution. Preliminary measurements with this spectrometer are presented. A strong variation of the CTR intensity in the 40 μm regime is observed when the off-crest phase in the accelerating cavities preceding the first magnetic bunch compressor is changed in small steps. This variation in the CTR intensity is found to be correlated with a similar variation in the pulse energy of the FEL light. Hence the THz spectrometer appears to be a very sensitive device for controlling the parameters of the bunch compression scheme.

title: Ultrabroadband terahertz source and beamline based on coherent transition radiation
abstract: Coherent transition radiation (CTR) in the THz regime is an important diagnostic tool for analyzing the temporal structure of the ultrashort electron bunches needed in ultraviolet and x-ray free-electron lasers. It is also a powerful source of such radiation, covering an exceptionally broad frequency range from about 200 GHz to 100 THz. At the soft x-ray free-electron laser FLASH we have installed a beam transport channel for transition radiation (TR) with the intention to guide a large fraction of the radiation to a laboratory outside the accelerator tunnel. The radiation is produced on a screen inside the ultrahigh vacuum beam pipe of the linac, coupled out through a diamond window and transported to the laboratory through an evacuated tube equipped with five focusing and four plane mirrors. The design of the beamline has been based on a thorough analysis of the generation of TR on metallic screens of limited size. The optical propagation of the radiation has been computed taking into account the effects of near-field (Fresnel) diffraction. The theoretical description of the TR source is presented in the first part of the paper, while the design principles and the technical layout of the beamline are described in the second part. First experimental results demonstrate that the CTR beamline covers the specified frequency range and preserves the narrow time structure of CTR pulses emitted by short electron bunches.

title: Luminosity determination at HERA-B
abstract: A detailed description of an original method used to measure the luminosity accumulated by the HERA-B experiment for a data sample taken during the 2002–2003 HERA running period is reported. We show that, with this method, a total luminosity measurement can be achieved with a typical precision, including overall systematic uncertainties, at a level of 5% or better. We also report evidence for the detection of δ -rays generated in the target and comment on the possible use of such delta rays to measure luminosity.

title: HATSouth: A Global Network of Fully Automated Identical Wide-Field Telescopes*
abstract: HATSouth is the world's first network of automated and homogeneous telescopes that is capable of year-round 24 hr monitoring of positions over an entire hemisphere of the sky. The primary scientific goal of the network is to discover and characterize a large number of transiting extrasolar planets, reaching out to long periods and down to small planetary radii. HATSouth achieves this by monitoring extended areas on the sky, deriving high precision light curves for a large number of stars, searching for the signature of planetary transits, and confirming planetary candidates with larger telescopes. HATSouth employs six telescope units spread over three prime locations with large longitude separation in the southern hemisphere (Las Campanas Observatory, Chile; HESS site, Namibia; Siding Spring Observatory, Australia). Each of the HATSouth units holds four 0.18 m diameter f/2.8 focal ratio telescope tubes on a common mount producing an 8.2° × 8.2° field of view on the sky, imaged using four 4 K × 4 K CCD cameras and Sloan r filters, to give a pixel scale of 3.7'' pixel-1. The HATSouth network is capable of continuously monitoring 128 square arc degrees at celestial positions moderately close to the anti-solar direction. We present the technical details of the network, summarize operations, and present detailed weather statistics for the three sites. Robust operations have meant that on average each of the six HATSouth units has conducted observations on ~500 nights over a 2 years time period, yielding a total of more than 1 million science frames at a 4 minute integration time and observing ~10.65 hr day-1 on average. We describe the scheme of our data transfer and reduction from raw pixel images to trend-filtered light curves and transiting planet candidates. Photometric precision reaches ~6 mmag at 4 minute cadence for the brightest non-saturated stars at r ≈ 10.5. We present detailed transit recovery simulations to determine the expected yield of transiting planets from HATSouth. We highlight the advantages of networked operations, namely, a threefold increase in the expected number of detected planets, as compared to all telescopes operating from the same site.

title: Anisotropic low energy electron collision cross sections for methane derived from transport coefficients
abstract: Based on a comprehensive set of transport parameters of electrons in methane derived from single electron spectra in the range of field 0.01-15 Td the authors determined a set of elastic and inelastic scattering cross sections up to 3 eV. The necessity to include anisotropic elastic scattering in a Boltzmann analysis of methane is demonstrated. In addition the drift velocity in a mixture of methane with helium was used to enhance the reliability of the derived cross sections. The low energy part of the cross sections for elastic scattering is subject to a MERT analysis and is compared with total cross section data from single scattering experiments.

title: A new method based on noise counting to monitor the frontend electronics of the LHCb muon detector
abstract: A new method has been developed to check the correct behaviour of the frontend electronics of the LHCb muon detector. This method is based on the measurement of the electronic noise rate at different thresholds of the front-end discriminator. The method was used to choose the optimal discriminator thresholds. A procedure based on this method was implemented in the detector control system and allowed the detection of a small percentage of front-end channels which had deteriorated. A Monte Carlo simulation has been performed to check the validity of the method.

title: An Energetic Afterglow from a Distant Stellar Explosion
abstract: We present the discovery of radio afterglow emission from the high-redshift (z = 6.295) burst GRB 050904. The peak flux density for this burst is similar to typical low-redshift gamma-ray bursts (GRBs). We further show that beyond a redshift of order unity, the flux densities of radio afterglows are largely insensitive to redshift, consistent with predictions. By combining the existing X-ray, near-infrared, and radio measurements, we derive estimates for the kinetic energy and opening angle of the blast wave and for the density of the circumburst medium into which it expands. Both the kinetic and radiated energy indicate that GRB 050904 was an unusually energetic burst (10^52 ergs). More importantly, we are able to make an in situ measurement of the density structure of the circumburst medium. We conclude that GRB 050904 exploded into a constant-density medium with n0 = 680 cm^−3, which is 2 orders of magnitude above the nominal value for low-redshift GRBs. The next generation of centimeter (EVLA) and millimeter radio instruments (ALMA) will be able to routinely detect events such as GRB 050904 and use them to study magnetic fields and the atomic and molecular gas in the high-redshift universe.

title: Observation of $B^0_s\rightarrow\chi_{c1}\phi$ decay and study of $B^0\rightarrow\chi_{c1,2}K^{*0}$ decays
abstract: The first observation of the decay $B^0_s\rightarrow\chi_{c1}\phi$ and a study of $B^0\rightarrow\chi_{c1,2}K^{*0}$ decays are presented. The analysis is performed using a dataset, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 1.0 fb$^{-1}$, collected by the LHCb experiment in pp collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of 7 TeV. The following ratios of branching fractions are measured: \begin{equation*} \begin{array}{lll} \dfrac{\cal{B}(B^0_s\rightarrow\chi_{c1}\phi)}{\cal{B}(B^0_s\rightarrow J/\psi\phi)} &=& (18.9 \pm1.8\,(stat)\pm1.3\,(syst)\pm0.8\,(\cal{B})) \times 10^{-2}, \nonumber \\ \noalign{\vskip 3pt} \dfrac{\cal{B}(B^0\rightarrow\chi_{c1}K^{*0})}{\cal{B}(B^0\rightarrow J/\psiK^{*0})} &=& (19.8 \pm1.1\,(stat)\pm1.2\,(syst)\pm0.9\,(\cal{B})) \times 10^{-2}, \nonumber \\ \noalign{\vskip 3pt} \dfrac{\cal{B}(B^0\rightarrow\chi_{c2}K^{*0})}{\cal{B}(B^0\rightarrow\chi_{c 1}K^{*0})} &=& (17.1 \pm5.0\,(stat)\pm1.7\,(syst)\pm1.1\,(\cal{B})) \times 10^{-2}, \nonumber \\ \noalign{\vskip 3pt} \end{array} \end{equation*} \noindent where the third uncertainty is due to the limited knowledge of the branching fractions of ${\chi_{c}\rightarrow J/\psi \gamma}$ modes.

title: Absolute luminosity measurements with the LHCb detector at the LHC
abstract: Absolute luminosity measurements are of general interest for colliding-beam experiments at storage rings. These measurements are necessary to determine the absolute cross-sections of reaction processes and are valuable to quantify the performance of the accelerator. LHCb has applied two methods to determine the absolute scale of its luminosity measurements for proton-proton collisions at the LHC with a centre-of-mass energy of 7 TeV. In addition to the classic "van der Meer scan" method a novel technique has been developed which makes use of direct imaging of the individual beams using beam-gas and beam-beam interactions. This beam imaging method is made possible by the high resolution of the LHCb vertex detector and the close proximity of the detector to the beams, and allows beam parameters such as positions, angles and widths to be determined. The results of the two methods have comparable precision and are in good agreement. Combining the two methods, an overal precision of 3.5% in the absolute luminosity determination is reached. The techniques used to transport the absolute luminosity calibration to the full data-taking period are presented.

title: A study of quasi-elastic muon neutrino and antineutrino scattering in the NOMAD experiment
abstract: AbstractWe have studied the muon neutrino and antineutrino quasi-elastic (QEL) scattering reactions (νμn→μ−p and 
$\bar{\nu }_{\mu}p\to\mu^{+}n$
) using a set of experimental data collected by the NOMAD Collaboration. We have performed measurements of the cross-section of these processes on a nuclear target (mainly carbon) normalizing it to the total νμ (
$\bar{\nu}_{\mu}$
) charged-current cross section. The results for the flux-averaged QEL cross sections in the (anti)neutrino energy interval 3–100 GeV are 
$\langle \sigma_{\mathrm{qel}}\rangle_{\nu_{\mu}}=(0.92\pm0.02(\mathrm{stat})\pm0.06(\mathrm{syst}))\times10^{-38}~\mathrm{cm}^{2}$ 
and 
$\langle\sigma_{\mathrm{qel}}\rangle_{\bar{\nu}_{\mu}}=(0.81\pm0.05(\mathrm{stat})\pm0.09(\mathrm{syst}))\times10^{-38}~\mathrm{cm}^{2}$ 
for neutrino and antineutrino, respectively. The axial mass parameter MA was extracted from the measured quasi-elastic neutrino cross section. The corresponding result is MA=1.05±0.02(stat)±0.06(syst) GeV. It is consistent with the axial mass values recalculated from the antineutrino cross section and extracted from the pure Q2 shape analysis of the high purity sample of νμ quasi-elastic 2-track events, but has smaller systematic error and should be quoted as the main result of this work. Our measured MA is found to be in good agreement with the world average value obtained in previous deuterium filled bubble chamber experiments. The NOMAD measurement of MA is lower than those recently published by K2K and MiniBooNE Collaborations. However, within the large errors quoted by these experiments on MA, these results are compatible with the more precise NOMAD value.