Related papers: Toy Blocks and Rotational Physics
A program was recently initiated to bridge the gap between the Planck scale physics described by loop quantum gravity and the familiar low energy world. We illustrate the conceptual problems and their solutions through a toy model: quantum…
In this talk I present some of the recent theoretical results that have been obtained on glassy systems like spin glasses or structural glasses. The physical principles at the basis of the theory are explained in a simple language (without…
We discuss one of the most interesting phenomena exhibited by baby skyrmions -- breaking of rotational symmetry. The topics we will deal with here include the appearance of rotational symmetry breaking in the static solutions of baby Skyrme…
Experimental data suggest that the Earth short time dynamics is related to stochastic fluctuation of its shape. As a first approach to this problem, we derive a toy-model for the motion of a rotating ellipsoid in the framework of stochastic…
Design of robots at the small scale is a trial-and-error based process, which is costly and time-consuming. There are few dynamic simulation tools available to accurately predict the motion or performance of untethered microrobots as they…
In the present contribution the construction of particle physics models in theories with fuzzy extra dimensions is discussed. We focus on a bottom-up approach where the structure of a higher-dimensional theory arises within ordinary…
Paper strips, e.g. confetti, descending to the floor begin to rotate around the horizontal axis after a short time. This slows down the vertical velocity compared to free fall and adds a horizontal velocity component. The frequency of…
Thin shells in general relativity can be used both as models of collapsing objects and as probes in the space-time outside compact sources. Therefore they provide a useful tool for the analysis of the final fate of collapsing matter and of…
It is argued that substantial portions of both Newtonian particle mechanics and general relativity can be viewed as relational (rather than absolute) theories. I furthermore use the relational particle models as toy models to investigate…
Archetypal falling behaviors of impervious objects are classified into four modes: fluttering, tumbling, steady descent and chaotic motion. The classical scenario predicts these behaviors to be affected by two dimensionless quantities:…
We relate a Chaplygin type system to a Cartan decomposition of a real semi-simple Lie group. The resulting system is described in terms of the structure theory associated to the Cartan decomposition. It is shown to possess a preserved…
An exactly solvable bounce model in loop quantum cosmology is identified which serves as a perturbative basis for realistic bounce scenarios. Its bouncing solutions are derived analytically, demonstrating why recent numerical simulations…
The experiment consists of counting and measuring the size of the many fragments observed after the fall of a mercury drop on the floor. The size distribution follows a power-law for large enough fragments. We address the question of a…
We propose a toy model to illustrate how the effective Lagrangian for super QCD might go over to the one for ordinary QCD by a mechanism whereby the gluinos and squarks in the fundamental theory decouple below a given supersymmetry breaking…
A geyser can be reproduced by a toy experiment composed of a water pool located above a water reservoir, the two being connected by a long and narrow tube. When the bottom reservoir is heated, the system experiences periodic eruptions of…
We examine a toy model and a cascade effect for confinement and chiral symmetry breaking which consists in several phase transitions corresponding to the formation of bound states and chiral condensates with different number of fermions for…
We examine Maris' recent suggestion that the fission of electron-inhabited bubbles in liquid helium may give rise to a new form of electron fractionization. We introduce a one-dimensional toy-model--a simplified analogue of the helium…
We present a new model, and the validating experiments, that unveil the rich physics behind the flight of a conductive ring in the Thomson experiment, a physics veiled by the fast thrust that impels the ring. We uncover interesting features…
A computational study of sliding blocks on inclined surfaces is presented. Assuming that the friction coefficient $\mu$ is a function of position, the probability $P(\lambda)$ for the block to slide down over a length $\lambda$ is…
We give a brief overview of some three-dimensional toy models for higher-spin interactions. We first review the construction of pure higher-spin gauge theories in terms of Chern-Simons theories. We then discuss how this setup could be…