Strukturelle, chemische und isotopische Analysen nanoskaliger präsolarer und früher solarer Kondensate

Neben astronomischen Beobachtungen mittels boden- und satellitengestützer Instrumente existiert ein weiterer experimenteller Zugang zu astrophysikalischen Fragestellungen in Form einer Auswahl extraterrestrischen Materials, das für Laboruntersuchungen zur Verfügung steht. Hierzu zählen interplanetare Staubpartikel, Proben, die von Raumfahrzeugen zur Erde zurückgebracht wurden und primitive Meteorite. Von besonderem Interesse sind sog. primitive kohlige Chondrite, eine Klasse von Meteoriten, die seit ihrer Entstehung im frühen Sonnensystem kaum verändert wurden. Sie enthalten neben frühem solarem Material präsolare Minerale, die in Sternwinden von Supernovae und roten Riesensternen kondensiert sind und die Bildung unseres Sonnensystems weitgehend unverändert überstanden haben. Strukturelle, chemische und isotopische Analysen dieser Proben besitzen demnach eine große Relevanz für eine Vielzahl astrophysikalischer Forschungsgebiete. Im Rahmen der vorliegenden Arbeit wurden Laboranalysen mittels modernster physikalischer Methoden an Bestandteilen primitiver Meteorite durchgeführt. Aufgrund der Vielfalt der zu untersuchenden Eigenschaften und der geringen Größen der analysierten Partikel zwischen wenigen Nanometern und einigen Mikrometern mussten hierbei hohe Anforderungen an Nachweiseffizienz und Ortsauflösung gestellt werden. Durch die Kombination verschiedener Methoden wurde ein neuer methodologischer Ansatz zur Analyse präsolarer Minerale (beispielsweise SiC) entwickelt. Aufgrund geringer Mengen verfügbaren Materials basiert dieses Konzept auf der parallelen nichtdestruktiven Vorcharakterisierung einer Vielzahl präsolarer Partikel im Hinblick auf ihren Gehalt diagnostischer Spurenelemente. Eine anschließende massenspektrometrische Untersuchung identifizierter Partikel mit hohen Konzentrationen interessanter Elemente ist in der Lage, Informationen zu nukleosynthetischen Bedingungen in ihren stellaren Quellen zu liefern. Weiterhin wurden Analysen meteoritischer Nanodiamanten durchgeführt, deren geringe Größen von wenigen Nanometern zu stark modifizierten Festkörpereigenschaften führen. Im Rahmen dieser Arbeit wurde eine quantitative Beschreibung von Quanteneinschluss-Effekten entwickelt, wie sie in diesen größenverteilten Halbleiter-Nanopartikeln auftreten. Die abgeleiteten Ergebnisse besitzen Relevanz für nanotechnologische Forschungen. Den Kern der vorliegenden Arbeit bilden Untersuchungen an frühen solaren Partikeln, sog. refraktären Metall Nuggets (RMN). Mit Hilfe struktureller, chemischer und isotopischer Analysen, sowie dem Vergleich der Ergebnisse mit thermodynamischen Rechnungen, konnte zum ersten Mal ein direkter Nachweis von Kondensationsprozessen im frühen solaren Nebel erbracht werden. Die analysierten RMN gehören zu den ersten Festkörperkondensaten, die im frühen Sonnensystem gebildet wurden und scheinen seit ihrer Entstehung nicht durch sekundäre Prozesse verändert worden zu sein. Weiterhin konnte erstmals die Abkühlrate des Gases des lokalen solaren Nebels, in dem die ersten Kondensationsprozesse stattfanden, zu 0.5 K/Jahr bestimmt werden, wodurch ein detaillierter Blick in die thermodynamische Geschichte des frühen Sonnensystems möglich wird. Die extrahierten Parameter haben weitreichende Auswirkungen auf die Modelle der Entstehung erster solarer Festkörper, welche die Grundbausteine der Planetenbildung darstellen.

Theoretical analysis of hidden photon searches in high-precision experiments

Although the Standard Model of particle physics (SM) provides an extremely successful description of the ordinary matter, one knows from astronomical observations that it accounts only for around 5% of the total energy density of the Universe, whereas around 30% are contributed by the dark matter. Motivated by anomalies in cosmic ray observations and by attempts to solve questions of the SM like the (g-2)_mu discrepancy, proposed U(1) extensions of the SM gauge group have raised attention in recent years. In the considered U(1) extensions a new, light messenger particle, the hidden photon, couples to the hidden sector as well as to the electromagnetic current of the SM by kinetic mixing. This allows for a search for this particle in laboratory experiments exploring the electromagnetic interaction. Various experimental programs have been started to search for hidden photons, such as in electron-scattering experiments, which are a versatile tool to explore various physics phenomena. One approach is the dedicated search in fixed-target experiments at modest energies as performed at MAMI or at JLAB. In these experiments the scattering of an electron beam off a hadronic target e+(A,Z)->e+(A,Z)+l^+l^- is investigated and a search for a very narrow resonance in the invariant mass distribution of the lepton pair is performed. This requires an accurate understanding of the theoretical basis of the underlying processes. For this purpose it is demonstrated in the first part of this work, in which way the hidden photon can be motivated from existing puzzles encountered at the precision frontier of the SM. The main part of this thesis deals with the analysis of the theoretical framework for electron scattering fixed-target experiments searching for hidden photons. As a first step, the cross section for the bremsstrahlung emission of hidden photons in such experiments is studied. Based on these results, the applicability of the Weizsäcker-Williams approximation to calculate the signal cross section of the process, which is widely used to design such experimental setups, is investigated. In a next step, the reaction e+(A,Z)->e+(A,Z)+l^+l^- is analyzed as signal and background process in order to describe existing data obtained by the A1 experiment at MAMI with the aim to give accurate predictions of exclusion limits for the hidden photon parameter space. Finally, the derived methods are used to find predictions for future experiments, e.g., at MESA or at JLAB, allowing for a comprehensive study of the discovery potential of the complementary experiments. In the last part, a feasibility study for probing the hidden photon model by rare kaon decays is performed. For this purpose, invisible as well as visible decays of the hidden photon are considered within different classes of models. This allows one to find bounds for the parameter space from existing data and to estimate the reach of future experiments.

Stable isotope composition of atmospheric carbon monoxide : a modelling study

Stable isotope composition of atmospheric carbon monoxide: A modelling study.rnrnThis study aims at an improved understanding of the stable carbon and oxygen isotope composition of the carbon monoxide (CO) in the global atmosphere by means of numerical simulations. At first, a new kinetic chemistry tagging technique for the most complete parameterisation of isotope effects has been introduced into the Modular Earth Submodel System (MESSy) framework. Incorporated into the ECHAM/MESSy Atmospheric Chemistry (EMAC) general circulation model, an explicit treatment of the isotope effects on the global scale is now possible. The expanded model system has been applied to simulate the chemical system containing up to five isotopologues of all carbon- and oxygen-bearing species, which ultimately determine the δ13C, δ18O and Δ17O isotopic signatures of atmospheric CO. As model input, a new stable isotope-inclusive emission inventory for the relevant trace gases has been compiled. The uncertainties of the emission estimates and of the resulting simulated mixing and isotope ratios have been analysed. The simulated CO mixing and stable isotope ratios have been compared to in-situ measurements from ground-based observatories and from the civil-aircraft-mounted CARIBIC−1 measurement platform.rnrnThe systematically underestimated 13CO/12CO ratios of earlier, simplified modelling studies can now be partly explained. The EMAC simulations do not support the inferences of those studies, which suggest for CO a reduced input of the highly depleted in 13C methane oxidation source. In particular, a high average yield of 0.94 CO per reacted methane (CH4) molecule is simulated in the troposphere, to a large extent due to the competition between the deposition and convective transport processes affecting the CH4 to CO reaction chain intermediates. None of the other factors, assumed or disregarded in previous studies, however hypothesised to have the potential in enriching tropospheric CO in 13C, were found significant when explicitly simulated. The inaccurate surface emissions, likely underestimated over East Asia, are responsible for roughly half of the discrepancies between the simulated and observed 13CO in the northern hemisphere (NH), whereas the remote southern hemisphere (SH) compositions suggest an underestimated fractionation during the oxidation of CO by the hydroxyl radical (OH). A reanalysis of the kinetic isotope effect (KIE) in this reaction contrasts the conventional assumption of a mere pressure dependence, and instead suggests an additional temperature dependence of the 13C KIE, which is driven by changes in the partitioning of the reaction exit channels. This result is yet to be confirmed in the laboratory.rnrnApart from 13CO, for the first time the atmospheric distribution of the oxygen mass-independent fractionation (MIF) in CO, Δ17O, has been consistently simulated on the global scale with EMAC. The applicability of Δ17O(CO) observations to unravelling changes in the tropospheric CH4-CO-OH system has been scrutinised, as well as the implications of the ozone (O3) input to the CO isotope oxygen budget. The Δ17O(CO) is confirmed to be the principal signal for the CO photochemical age, thus providing a measure for the OH chiefly involved in the sink of CO. The highly mass-independently fractionated O3 oxygen is estimated to comprise around 2% of the overall tropospheric CO source, which has implications for the δ18O, but less likely for the Δ17O CO budgets. Finally, additional sensitivity simulations with EMAC corroborate the nearly equal net effects of the present-day CH4 and CO burdens in removing tropospheric OH, as well as the large turnover and stability of the abundance of the latter. The simulated CO isotopologues nonetheless hint at a likely insufficient OH regeneration in the NH high latitudes and the upper troposphere / lower stratosphere (UTLS).rn