The phase composition, morphology and compressibility of graphene-zirconia composite nanostructured powder.

Nanostructured composite particles of nano- and submicron sizes were synthesized by a combination of sol-gel and sonochemical techniques. Their graphene content was 0.8-0.9 wt%. These layered particles consisted of graphene sheets in which zirconia nanocrystals were discretely incorporated. The synthesized powders were characterized using XRD, TEM, HRTEM, diffusion aerosol spectrometry and elemental analysis. A comparison of the compressibility modulus, limit values of linear section deformation and compressibility factor shows that the compressibility of the composite is difficult to achieve compared to that of pure zirconia, apparently, due to the low elasticity of graphene sheets.

Interconversion between the orbital and spin angular momentum of light beams in three-wave mixing processes in the bulk of an isotropic chiral medium.

A phenomenological description of nondegenerate and degenerate three-wave mixing in the bulk of an isotropic chiral medium is given for the wide class of fundamental light beams with nonuniform polarization distribution and multimode transverse structure. Special attention is paid to the classical and quantum interpretation of interconversion between spin and orbital parts of the angular momentum of the input and output beams.

Toward the Ultra-incompressible Carbon Materials. Computational Simulation and Experimental Observation.

The common opinion that diamond is the stiffest material is disproved by a number of experimental studies where the fabrication of carbon materials based on polymerized fullerenes with outstanding mechanical stiffness was reported. Here we investigated the nature of this unusual effect. We present a model constituted of compressed polymerized fullerite clusters implemented in a diamond matrix with bulk modulus B0 much higher than that of diamond. The calculated B0 value depends on the sizes of both fullerite grain and diamond environment and shows close correspondence with measured data. Additionally, we provide results of experimental study of atomic structure and mechanical properties of ultrahard carbon material supported the presented model.

Modeling of nonlinear optical activity in propagation of ultrashort elliptically polarized laser pulses.

We propose a general model of third-order nonlinear optical susceptibility of isotropic gyrotropic medium with frequency and spatial dispersion. Our model allows for the description of the propagation of ultrashort (several oscillations) elliptically polarized laser pulses in such a medium and does not require smallness of the characteristic nonlocality dimension, unlike the conventional phenomenological model. We implemented our model numerically by means of a modified finite-difference time-domain method with an auxiliary differential equation. We have validated the correctness of our model by the comparison of the results obtained in our numerical simulations with generally known effects observed experimentally and described earlier theoretically for the monochromatic radiation or within the slowly varying envelope approach. We investigated effects accompanying the propagation of ultrashort (several oscillations) light pulses in nonlinear isotropic gyrotropic medium with frequency and spatial dispersion of cubic nonlinearity.

Numerical solution of Maxwell equations by a finite-difference time-domain method in a medium with frequency and spatial dispersion.

We propose an alternative method of integration of Maxwell equations. This method is the generalization of a finite-difference time-domain method with an auxiliary differential equation for the case of a linear optical medium with a frequency dispersion and an arbitrary source of spatial dispersion. We apply this method to the problem of the propagation of short plane-wave linearly polarized light pulses in such a medium. It is shown that some features of their propagation are completely different from those that are generally recognized for the linear optical activity phenomenon. For example, in some cases an initially linearly polarized light pulse becomes elliptically polarized during the propagation. This effect is more prominent in the front part of the pulse.