arXiv subjects

Alex Hamilton

Publications and source records attributed to Alex Hamilton.

12 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2025

A Review of Cloud Computing in Seismology

Seismology has entered the petabyte era, driven by decades of continuous recordings of broadband networks, the increase in nodal seismic experiments, and the recent emergence of Distributed Acoustic Sensing (DAS). This review explains how commercial clouds - AWS, Google Cloud, and Azure - by providing object storage, elastic compute, and managed databases, enable researchers to "bring the code to the data," thereby overcoming traditional HPC solutions' bandwidth and capacity limitations. After literature reviews of cloud concepts and their research applications in seismology, we illustrate the capacities of cloud-native workflows using two canonical end-to-end demonstrations: 1) ambient noise seismology and cross-correlation, and 2) earthquake detection, discrimination, and phase picking. Both workflows utilized S3 for streaming I/O and DocumentDB for provenance, demonstrating that cloud throughput can rival on-premises HPC at comparable costs, scanning 100 TBs to 1.3 PBs of seismic data in a few hours or days of processing. The review also discusses research and education initiatives, the reproducibility benefits of containers, and cost pitfalls (e.g., egress, I/O fees) of energy-intensive seismological research computing. While designing cloud pipelines remains non-trivial, partnerships with research software engineers enable converting domain code into scalable, automated, and environmentally conscious solutions for next-generation seismology.

physics.geo-ph↗

arXiv2025

A Global-scale Database of Seismic Phases from Cloud-based Picking at Petabyte Scale

We present the first global-scale database of 4.3 billion P- and S-wave picks extracted from 1.3 PB continuous seismic data via a cloud-native workflow. Using cloud computing services on Amazon Web Services, we launched ~145,000 containerized jobs on continuous records from 47,354 stations spanning 2002-2025, completing in under three days. Phase arrivals were identified with a deep learning model, PhaseNet, through an open-source Python ecosystem for deep learning, SeisBench. To visualize and gain a global understanding of these picks, we present preliminary results about pick time series revealing Omori-law aftershock decay, seasonal variations linked to noise levels, and dense regional coverage that will enhance earthquake catalogs and machine-learning datasets. We provide all picks in a publicly queryable database, providing a powerful resource for researchers studying seismicity around the world. This report provides insights into the database and the underlying workflow, demonstrating the feasibility of petabyte-scale seismic data mining on the cloud and of providing intelligent data products to the community in an automated manner.

physics.geo-ph↗

arXiv2022

Observation of oscillating $g$-factor anisotropy arising from strong crystal lattice anisotropy in GaAs spin-3/2 hole quantum point contacts

Many modern spin-based devices rely on the spin-orbit interaction, which is highly sensitive to the host semiconductor heterostructure and varies substantially depending on crystal direction, crystal asymmetry (Dresselhaus), and quantum confinement asymmetry (Rashba). One-dimensional quantum point contacts are a powerful tool to probe both energy and directional dependence of spin-orbit interaction through the effect on the hole $g$-factor. In this work we investigate the role of cubic crystal asymmetry in driving an oscillation in the in-plane hole $g$-factor anisotropy when the quantum point contact is rotated with respect to the crystal axes, and we are able to separate contributions to the Zeeman Hamiltonian arising from Rashba and cubic crystal asymmetry spin-orbit interactions. The in-plane $g$-factor is found to be extremely sensitive to the orientation of the quantum point contact, changing by a factor of $5$ when rotated by $45^{\circ}$. This exceptionally strong crystal lattice anisotropy of the in-plane Zeeman splitting cannot be explained within axially symmetric theoretical models. Theoretical modelling based on the combined Luttinger, Rashba and Dresselhaus Hamiltonians that we use here reveals new spin-orbit contributions to the in-plane hole $g$-factor and provides an excellent agreement with our experimental data.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2018

Electrical control of the Zeeman spin splitting in two-dimensional hole systems

Semiconductor holes with strong spin-orbit coupling allow all-electrical spin control, with broad applications ranging from spintronics to quantum computation. Using a two-dimensional hole system in a GaAs quantum well, we demonstrate a new mechanism of electrically controlling the Zeeman splitting, which is achieved through altering the hole wave vector $k$. We find a threefold enhancement of the in-plane $g-$factor $g_{\parallel}(k)$. We introduce a new method for quantifying the Zeeman splitting from magnetoresistance measurements, since the conventional tilted field approach fails for two-dimensional systems with strong spin-orbit coupling. Finally, we show that the Rashba spin-orbit interaction suppresses the in-plane Zeeman interaction at low magnetic fields. The ability to control the Zeeman splitting with electric fields opens up new possibilities for future quantum spin-based devices, manipulating non-Abelian geometric phases, and realising Majorana systems in $p-$type superconductor systems.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2010

Lessons from giant gravitons on $AdS_{5}\times T^{1,1}$

We implement Mikhailov's holomorphic curve construction to explore various properties of giant gravitons in type IIB string theory on $AdS_{5}\times T^{1,1}$. By coloring the D-brane worldvolume, we are able to show how, in the string theory, the giant graviton factorizes at its maximal size into two dibaryons - topologically stable D-branes wrapping non-contractible cycles in the $T^{1,1}$. This is related to the structure of the symmetry group of the emergent Klebanov-Witten gauge theory being a product - $SU(N) \times SU(N)$ instead of the canonical $SU(N)$. Finally, we complete this study with a systematic and detailed construction of the spectrum of small fluctuations about the giant graviton configuration. Curiously, we find that the fluctuation spectrum depends on the size of the giant. The similarity of the operator structures in the Klebanov-Witten and ABJM theories leads us to believe that the D4-brane giant graviton in type IIA string theory on $AdS_{4}\times \mathbb{CP}^{3}$ factorizes into two $\mathbb{CP}^{2}$ dibaryons in a qualitatively similar way.

hep-th↗

arXiv2008

Local bulk operators in AdS/CFT and the fate of the BTZ singularity

This paper has two parts. First we review the description of local bulk operators in Lorentzian AdS in terms of non-local operators in the boundary CFT. We discuss how bulk locality arises in pure AdS backgrounds and how it is modified at finite N. Next we present some new results on BTZ black holes: local operators can be defined inside the horizon of a finite N BTZ black hole, in a way that suggests the BTZ geometry describes an average over black hole microstates, but with finite N effects resolving the singularity.

hep-th↗

arXiv2008

On the shoulders of Giants - Quantum gravity and braneworld stability

The semi-classical nature of braneworld cosmological models does not account for any quantum gravitational effects. In this letter we use the gauge/gravity correspondence to argue that quantum string corrections cannot be ignored in any study of braneworld stability. As an example, we find, by analysing the quantum gravitational backreaction, that a closed universe is unstable to radiation into the bulk.

gr-qc↗

arXiv2007

A note on the universality of the Hagedorn behavior of pp-wave strings

Following on from recent studies of string theory on a one-parameter family of integrable deformations of $AdS_{5}\times S^{5}$ proposed by Lunin and Maldacena, we carry out a systematic analysis of the high temperature properties of type IIB strings on the associated pp-wave geometries. In particular, through the computation of the thermal partition function and free energy we find that not only does the theory exhibit a Hagedorn transition in both the $(J,0,0)$ and $(J,J,J)$ class of pp-waves, but that the Hagedorn temperature is insensitive to the deformation suggesting an interesting universality in the high temperature behaviour of the pp-wave string theory. We comment also on the implications of this universality on the confinement/deconfinement transition in the dual $\mathcal{N}=1$ Leigh-Strassler deformation of ${\cal N}=4$ Yang-Mills theory.

hep-th↗

arXiv2006

Local bulk operators in AdS/CFT: A holographic description of the black hole interior

To gain insight into how bulk locality emerges from the holographic conformal field theory, we reformulate the bulk to boundary map in as local a way as possible. In previous work, we carried out this program for Lorentzian AdS, and showed the support on the boundary could always be reduced to a compact region spacelike separated from the bulk point. In the present work the idea is extended to a complexified boundary, where spatial coordinates are continued to imaginary values. This continuation enables us to represent a local bulk operator as a CFT operator with support on a finite disc on the complexified boundary. We treat general AdS in Poincare coordinates and AdS3 in Rindler coordinates. We represent bulk operators inside the horizon of a BTZ black hole and we verify that the correct bulk two point functions are reproduced, including the divergence when one point hits the BTZ singularity. We comment on the holographic description of black holes formed by collapse and discuss locality and holographic entropy counting at finite N.

hep-th↗

arXiv2006

Giant Gravitons on Deformed pp-waves

The recently constructed Lunin-Maldacena deformation of $AdS_{5}\times S^{5}$ is known to support two inequivalent Penrose limits that lead to BPS pp-wave geometries. In this note, we construct new giant graviton solutions on these backgrounds. A detailed study of the spectra of small fluctuations about these solutions reveals a remarkably rich structure. In particular, the giants that we contruct fall into two classes, one of which appears to remain stable in the Penrose limit independently of the strength of the deformation. The other class of giants, while more difficult to treat analytically, seems to exhibit a shape deformation not unlike the so-called "squashed giants" seen in the pp-wave with a constant NS $B$-field turned on. Some consideration is also given to the associated giant operators in the BMN limit of the dual ${\cal N}=1$ SYM gauge theory.

hep-th↗

arXiv2006

Holographic representation of local bulk operators

The Lorentzian AdS/CFT correspondence implies a map between local operators in supergravity and non-local operators in the CFT. By explicit computation we construct CFT operators which are dual to local bulk fields in the semiclassical limit. The computation is done for general dimension in global, Poincare and Rindler coordinates. We find that the CFT operators can be taken to have compact support in a region of the complexified boundary whose size is set by the bulk radial position. We show that at finite N the number of independent commuting operators localized within a bulk volume saturates the holographic bound.

hep-th↗

arXiv2005

Local bulk operators in AdS/CFT: a boundary view of horizons and locality

We develop the representation of local bulk fields in AdS by non-local operators on the boundary, working in the semiclassical limit and using AdS_2 as our main example. In global coordinates we show that the boundary operator has support only at points which are spacelike separated from the bulk point. We construct boundary operators that represent local bulk operators inserted behind the horizon of the Poincare patch and inside the Rindler horizon of a two dimensional black hole. We show that these operators respect bulk locality and comment on the generalization of our construction to higher dimensional AdS black holes.

hep-th↗