Techniques in atomic physics have delivered some of the most precise measurements ever made, with frequency measurements reaching fractional precisions of 10^18 . High precision measurements can be used to test fundamental physics, such as pursuing a variation in fundamental constants. A finite drift in measurable constants such as the...
An integral transform which reproduces a transformable input function after a finite number $N$ of successive applications is known as a {\it cyclic} transform. Of course, such a transform will reproduce an arbitrary transformable input after $N$ applications, but it also admits eigenfunction inputs which will be reproduced after a...
The advent of computers brought a profound change in the way the practical problems in the physics of materials are addressed. Within the last decade, a rapidly evolving area of research is oriented towards interfacing the existing numerical tools in an optimized way, by explicitly taking advantage of the specifics...
In this thesis we investigate the orbital evolution of planets in binaries.Unlike our own Solar System, at least one out of five planetary systems known to date is associated with additional stellar companions. Despite their large distances from the planetary systems, these stellar companions play an important role in significantly...
One of the central features of the now half-century old theory of the microscopic origins of superconductivity in elemental materials is the correlations between pairs of electrons with opposite spin and momentum. The constituent electrons of these Cooper pairs have the unusual property that their mean spatial separation is much...
B_s mixing studies provide a precision test of Charge-Parity violation in the Standard Model. A measurement of deltaMs constrains elements of the CKM quark rotation matrix, providing a probe of Standard Model Charge-Parity violation.
This thesis describes a study of B_s mixing in the semileptonic decay B_s -> D_s mu...
Since its emergence, the Ginzburg-Landau theory has had a tremendous success in describing thermodynamic properties of superconductivity. In the case of superfluid 3He, not all five fourth-order parameters in the theory are known. Only four combinations of the five parameters have been experimentally established and theoretical attempts to calculate the...
Weak optical signals, e.g., Raman scattering, fluorescence emission, etc., are typically enhanced by increasing both the excitation field and the collection efficiency. Near a surface, signals can be resonantly enhanced using either surface plasmon polaritons or a resonant dielectric waveguide, provided the sources lie within an evanescent decay length of...
Measurements of the ratios of charged kaon decay rates for Ke3/K2pi, Kmu3/K2pi and Kmu3/Ke3 are presented. These measurements are based on charged kaon decays collected in a dedicated run in 2003 by the NA48/2 experiment at CERN. The results obtained are Ke3/K2pi = 0.2470 +- 0.0009 (stat) +- 0.0004 (syst)...
This dissertation presents a Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) study of anisotropic superconductors, MgB$_2$ and Bi$_2$Sr$_2$CaCu$_2$O$_{8+\delta}$ (Bi2212), and diffusion in glass-forming aqueous solutions of glycerol. In glycerol and deuterated water mixtures, the diffusion of glycerol is measured selectively by the $^1$H NMR stimulated echo technique in the gradient field of a...