  We study exact renormalisation group equations for the 3d Ising universality
class. At the Wilson-Fisher fixed point, symmetric and antisymmetric
correction-to-scaling exponents are computed with high accuracy for an
optimised cutoff to leading order in the derivative expansion. Further results
are derived for other cutoffs including smooth, sharp and background field
cutoffs. An estimate for higher order corrections is given as well. We
establish that the leading antisymmetric corrections to scaling are strongly
subleading compared to the leading symmetric ones.


  The purpose of this paper is to generalize to $\mathbb{Z}_2$-graded case the
study of Hom-Lie bialgebras which were discussed first by D. Yau, then by C.
Bai and Y. Sheng. We provide different ways for constructing Hom-Lie
superbialgebras. Also we define Matched pairs, Manin supertriples and discuss
their relationships. Moreover, we study coboundary and triangular Hom-Lie
bialgebras, as well as infinitesimal deformations of the cobracket.


  Policy gradient methods hold great potential for solving complex continuous
control tasks. Still, their training efficiency can be improved by exploiting
structure within the optimization problem. Recent work indicates that
supervised learning can be accelerated by leveraging the fact that gradients
lie in a low-dimensional and slowly-changing subspace. In this paper, we
conduct a thorough evaluation of this phenomenon for two popular deep policy
gradient methods on various simulated benchmark tasks. Our results demonstrate
the existence of such gradient subspaces despite the continuously changing data
distribution inherent to reinforcement learning. These findings reveal
promising directions for future work on more efficient reinforcement learning,
e.g., through improving parameter-space exploration or enabling second-order
optimization.


  The Axelrod model has been widely studied since its proposal for social
influence and cultural dissemination. In particular, the community of
statistical physics focused on the presence of a phase transition as a function
of its two main parameters, $F$ and $Q$. In this work, we show that the Axelrod
model undergoes a second order phase transition in the limit of $F \rightarrow
\infty $ on a complete graph. This transition is equivalent to the
Erd\"os-R\'enyi phase transition in random networks when it is described in
terms of the probability of interaction at the initial state, which depends on
a scaling relation between $F$ and $Q$. We also found that this probability
plays a key role in sparse topologies by collapsing the transition curves for
different values of the parameter $F$.


  Soil water retention curve (SWRC) and saturated hydraulic conductivity (SHC)
are key hydraulic properties for unsaturated zone hydrology and groundwater. In
particular, SWRC provides useful information on entry pore-size distribution,
and SHC is required for flow and transport modeling in the hydrologic cycle.
Not only the SWRC and SHC measurements are time-consuming, but also scale
dependent. This means as soil column volume increases, variability of the SWRC
and SHC decreases. Although prediction of the SWRC and SHC from available
parameters, such as textural data, organic matter, and bulk density have been
under investigation for decades, up to now no research has focused on the
effect of measurement scale on the soil hydraulic properties pedotransfer
functions development. In the literature, several data mining approaches have
been applied, such as multiple linear regression, artificial neural networks,
group method of data handling. However, in this study we develop pedotransfer
functions using a novel approach called contrast pattern aided regression
(CPXR) and compare it with the multiple linear regression method. For this
purpose, two databases including 210 and 213 soil samples are collected to
develop and evaluate pedotransfer functions for the SWRC and SHC, respectively,
from the UNSODA database. The 10-fold cross-validation method is applied to
evaluate the accuracy and reliability of the proposed regression-based models.
Our results show that including measurement scale parameters, such as sample
internal diameter and length could substantially improve the accuracy of the
SWRC and SHC pedotransfer functions developed using the CPXR method, while this
is not the case when MLR is used. Moreover, the CPXR method yields remarkably
more accurate soil water retention curve and saturated hydraulic conductivity
predictions than the MLR approach.


  We present a content-based method for recommending citations in an academic
paper draft. We embed a given query document into a vector space, then use its
nearest neighbors as candidates, and rerank the candidates using a
discriminative model trained to distinguish between observed and unobserved
citations. Unlike previous work, our method does not require metadata such as
author names which can be missing, e.g., during the peer review process.
Without using metadata, our method outperforms the best reported results on
PubMed and DBLP datasets with relative improvements of over 18% in F1@20 and
over 22% in MRR. We show empirically that, although adding metadata improves
the performance on standard metrics, it favors self-citations which are less
useful in a citation recommendation setup. We release an online portal
(http://labs.semanticscholar.org/citeomatic/) for citation recommendation based
on our method, and a new dataset OpenCorpus of 7 million research articles to
facilitate future research on this task.


  Multiple news sources over the years have reported on the problematic effects
of Digital Rights Management, yet there are no reforms for DRM development,
simply removal. The issues are well-known to the public, frequently repeated
even when addressed: impact on the software and to the devices that run them.
Yet few, if any, have discussed it in recent years, especially with the intent
of eliminating the shown issues. This study reviews Digital Rights Management
as a general topic, including the various forms it can take, the current laws
that affect DRM, and the current public reception and responses. This study
describes the different types of DRM in general terms and then lists both
positive and negative examples.


  In this paper we show that the introduction of an attenuation factor in the
%image irradiance brightness equations relative to various perspective Shape
from Shading models allows to make the corresponding differential problems
well-posed. We propose a unified approach based on the theory of viscosity
solution and we show that the brightness equations with the attenuation term
admit a unique viscosity solution. We also discuss in detail the possible
boundary conditions that we can use for the Hamilton-Jacobi equations
associated to these models.


  Traditional signal processing methods relying on mathematical data generation
models have been cast aside in favour of deep neural networks, which require
vast amounts of data. Since the theoretical sample complexity is nearly
impossible to evaluate, these amounts of examples are usually estimated with
crude rules of thumb. However, these rules only suggest when the networks
should work, but do not relate to the traditional methods. In particular, an
interesting question is: how much data is required for neural networks to be on
par or outperform, if possible, the traditional model-based methods? In this
work, we empirically investigate this question in two simple examples, where
the data is generated according to precisely defined mathematical models, and
where well-understood optimal or state-of-the-art mathematical data-agnostic
solutions are known. A first problem is deconvolving one-dimensional Gaussian
signals and a second one is estimating a circle's radius and location in random
grayscale images of disks. By training various networks, either naive custom
designed or well-established ones, with various amounts of training data, we
find that networks require tens of thousands of examples in comparison to the
traditional methods, whether the networks are trained from scratch or even with
transfer-learning or finetuning.


  In this position paper, we discuss the potential for leveraging LLMs as
interactive research tools to facilitate collaboration between human coders and
AI to effectively annotate online risk data at scale. Collaborative human-AI
labeling is a promising approach to annotating large-scale and complex data for
various tasks. Yet, tools and methods to support effective human-AI
collaboration for data annotation are under-studied. This gap is pertinent
because co-labeling tasks need to support a two-way interactive discussion that
can add nuance and context, particularly in the context of online risk, which
is highly subjective and contextualized. Therefore, we provide some of the
early benefits and challenges of using LLMs-based tools for risk annotation and
suggest future directions for the HCI research community to leverage LLMs as
research tools to facilitate human-AI collaboration in contextualized online
data annotation. Our research interests align very well with the purposes of
the LLMs as Research Tools workshop to identify ongoing applications and
challenges of using LLMs to work with data in HCI research. We anticipate
learning valuable insights from organizers and participants into how LLMs can
help reshape the HCI community's methods for working with data.


  Utilizing an atomistic computational model which handles both translational
and spin degrees of freedom, combined molecular and spin dynamics simulations
have been performed to investigate the effect of vacancy defects on spin wave
excitations in ferromagnetic iron. Fourier transforms of space and
time-displaced correlation functions yield the dynamic structure factor,
providing characteristic frequencies and lifetimes of the spin wave modes.
Comparison of the system with a 5% vacancy concentration with pure lattice data
shows a decrease in frequency as well as a decrease in lifetime for all
transverse spin wave excitations observed. Additionally, a rugged spin wave
line shape for low-q spin waves indicates the presence of multiple localized
excitations near defect sites resulting in reduced excitation lifetimes due to
increased magnon-magnon scattering. We observe further evidence of increased
magnon-magnon scattering as the peaks in the longitudinal spin wave spectrum
become less distinct.


  Large-scale force generation is essential for biological functions such as
cell motility, embryonic development, and muscle contraction. In these
processes, forces generated at the molecular level by motor proteins are
transmitted by disordered fiber networks, resulting in large-scale active
stresses. While these fiber networks are well characterized macroscopically,
this stress generation by microscopic active units is not well understood. Here
we theoretically study force transmission in these networks, and find that
local active forces are rectified towards isotropic contraction and strongly
amplified as fibers collectively buckle in the vicinity of the active units.
This stress amplification is reinforced by the networks' disordered nature, but
saturates for high densities of active units. Our predictions are
quantitatively consistent with experiments on reconstituted tissues and
actomyosin networks, and shed light on the role of the network microstructure
in shaping active stresses in cells and tissue.


  Single-line spectroscopic binaries recently contribute to the stellar-mass
black hole discovery, independently of the X-ray transient method. We report
the identification of a single-line binary system LTD064402+245919, with an
orbital period of 14.50 days. The observed component is a subgiant with a mass
of 2.77$\pm$0.68M$_{\odot}$, radius 15.5$\pm$2.5R$_{\odot}$, effective
temperature $T_{\rm eff}$ 4500$\pm$200K, and surface gravity log\emph{g}
2.5$\pm$0.25dex. The discovery makes use of the LAMOST time-domain (LAMOST-TD)
and ZTF survey. Our general-purpose software pipeline applies the Lomb-Scargle
periodogram to determine the orbital period and uses machine-learning to
classify the variable type from the folded light curves. We apply a combined
model to estimate the orbital parameters from both the light and radial
velocity curves, taking constraints on the primary star mass, mass function,
and detection limit of secondary luminosity into consideration. We obtain a
radial velocity semi-amplitude of 44.6$\pm$1.5 km s$^{-1}$, mass ratio of
0.73$\pm$0.07, and an undetected component mass of 2.02$\pm$0.49M$_{\odot}$
when the type of the undetected component is not set. We conclude that the
inclination is not well constrained, and that the secondary mass is larger than
1M$_{\odot}$ when the undetected component is modelled as a compact object.
According to our investigations using an MCMC simulation, increasing the
spectra SNR by a factor of 3 would enable the secondary light to be
distinguished (if present). The algorithm and software in this work are able to
serve as general-purpose tools for the identification of compact objects
quiescent in X-rays.


  The intricate three-dimensional geometries of protein tertiary structures
underlie protein function and emerge through a folding process from
one-dimensional chains of amino acids. The exact spatial sequence and
configuration of amino acids, the biochemical environment and the temporal
sequence of distinct interactions yield a complex folding process that cannot
yet be easily tracked for all proteins. To gain qualitative insights into the
fundamental mechanisms behind the folding dynamics and generic features of the
folded structure, we propose a simple model of structure formation that takes
into account only fundamental geometric constraints and otherwise assumes
randomly paired connections. We find that despite its simplicity, the model
results in a network ensemble consistent with key overall features of the
ensemble of Protein Residue Networks we obtained from more than 1000 biological
protein geometries as available through the Protein Data Base. Specifically,
the distribution of the number of interaction neighbors a unit (amino acid)
has, the scaling of the structure's spatial extent with chain length, the
eigenvalue spectrum and the scaling of the smallest relaxation time with chain
length are all consistent between model and real proteins. These results
indicate that geometric constraints alone may already account for a number of
generic features of protein tertiary structures.


  Since its emergence in the 1990s the World Wide Web (WWW) has rapidly evolved
into a huge mine of global information and it is growing in size everyday. The
presence of huge amount of resources on the Web thus poses a serious problem of
accurate search. This is mainly because today's Web is a human-readable Web
where information cannot be easily processed by machine. Highly sophisticated,
efficient keyword based search engines that have evolved today have not been
able to bridge this gap. So comes up the concept of the Semantic Web which is
envisioned by Tim Berners-Lee as the Web of machine interpretable information
to make a machine processable form for expressing information. Based on the
semantic Web technologies we present in this paper the design methodology and
development of a semantic Web search engine which provides exact search results
for a domain specific search. This search engine is developed for an
agricultural Website which hosts agricultural information about the state of
West Bengal.


  Opacity is an information flow property that captures the notion of plausible
deniability in dynamic systems, that is whether an intruder can deduce that
"secret" behavior has occurred. In this paper we provide a general framework of
opacity to unify the many existing notions of opacity that exist for discrete
event systems. We use this framework to discuss language-based and state-based
notions of opacity over automata. We present several methods for language-based
opacity verification, and a general approach to transform state-based notions
into language-based ones. We demonstrate this approach for current-state and
initial-state opacity, unifying existing results. We then investigate the
notions of K-step opacity. We provide a language-based view of K-step opacity
encompassing two existing notions and two new ones. We then analyze the
corresponding language-based verification methods both formally and with
numerical examples. In each case, the proposed methods offer significant
reductions in runtime and space complexity.


  This article surveys many standard results about the braid group with
emphasis on simplifying the usual algebraic proofs.
  We use van der Waerden's trick to illuminate the Artin-Magnus proof of the
classic presentation of the algebraic mapping-class group of a punctured disc.
  We give a simple, new proof of the Dehornoy-Larue braid-group trichotomy,
and, hence, recover the Dehornoy right-ordering of the braid group.
  We then turn to the Birman-Hilden theorem concerning braid-group actions on
free products of cyclic groups, and the consequences derived by Perron-Vannier,
and the connections with the Wada representations. We recall the very simple
Crisp-Paris proof of the Birman-Hilden theorem that uses the Larue-Shpilrain
technique. Studying ends of free groups permits a deeper understanding of the
braid group; this gives us a generalization of the Birman-Hilden theorem.
Studying Jordan curves in the punctured disc permits a still deeper
understanding of the braid group; this gave Larue, in his PhD thesis,
correspondingly deeper results, and, in an appendix, we recall the essence of
Larue's thesis, giving simpler combinatorial proofs.


  Self-training is a powerful approach to deep learning. The key process is to
find a pseudo-label for modeling. However, previous self-training algorithms
suffer from the over-confidence issue brought by the hard labels, even some
confidence-related regularizers cannot comprehensively catch the uncertainty.
Therefore, we propose a new self-training framework to combine uncertainty
information of both model and dataset. Specifically, we propose to use
Expectation-Maximization (EM) to smooth the labels and comprehensively estimate
the uncertainty information. We further design a basis extraction network to
estimate the initial basis from the dataset. The obtained basis with
uncertainty can be filtered based on uncertainty information. It can then be
transformed into the real hard label to iteratively update the model and basis
in the retraining process. Experiments on image classification and semantic
segmentation show the advantages of our methods among confidence-aware
self-training algorithms with 1-3 percentage improvement on different datasets.


  We propose a new index, the $j$-index, which is defined for an author as the
sum of the square roots of the numbers of citations to each of the author's
publications. The idea behind the $j$-index it to remedy a drawback of the
$h$-index $-$ that the $h$-index does not take into account the full citation
record of a researcher. The square root function is motivated by our desire to
avoid the possible bias that may occur with a simple sum when an author has
several very highly cited papers. We compare the $j$-index to the $h$-index,
the $g$-index and the total citation count for three subject areas using
several association measures.
  Our results indicate that that the association between the $j$-index and the
other indices varies according to the subject area. One explanation of this
variation may be due to the proportion of citations to publications of the
researcher that are in the $h$-core. The $j$-index is {\em not} an $h$-index
variant, and as such is intended to complement rather than necessarily replace
the $h$-index and other bibliometric indicators, thus providing a more complete
picture of a researcher's achievements.


  Tabled logic programming is receiving increasing attention in the Logic
Programming community. It avoids many of the shortcomings of SLD execution and
provides a more flexible and often extremely efficient execution mechanism for
logic programs. In particular, tabled execution of logic programs terminates
more often than execution based on SLD-resolution. In this article, we
introduce two notions of universal termination of logic programming with
Tabling: quasi-termination and (the stronger notion of) LG-termination. We
present sufficient conditions for these two notions of termination, namely
quasi-acceptability and LG-acceptability, and we show that these conditions are
also necessary in case the tabling is well-chosen. Starting from these
conditions, we give modular termination proofs, i.e., proofs capable of
combining termination proofs of separate programs to obtain termination proofs
of combined programs. Finally, in the presence of mode information, we state
sufficient conditions which form the basis for automatically proving
termination in a constraint-based way.


  We have recently announced that the General Catalogue of Variable Stars
enters the stage of its fifth, purely electronic edition (GCVS 5.1). Recently,
we have incorporated a new, completely revised version for 1408 variable stars
in the constellation of Centaurus into the GCVS 5.1. Working on this revision,
we used current possibilities of data mining, suggested new variability types
for many variable stars, found new light elements for a large number of
periodic variables. This paper describes the work fulfilled during the
preparation of the GCVS 5.1 version for Centaurus, discusses in detail a number
of cases most significant astrophysically.


  The age of social media is rife with memes. Understanding and detecting
harmful memes pose a significant challenge due to their implicit meaning that
is not explicitly conveyed through the surface text and image. However,
existing harmful meme detection approaches only recognize superficial
harm-indicative signals in an end-to-end classification manner but ignore
in-depth cognition of the meme text and image. In this paper, we attempt to
detect harmful memes based on advanced reasoning over the interplay of
multimodal information in memes. Inspired by the success of Large Language
Models (LLMs) on complex reasoning, we first conduct abductive reasoning with
LLMs. Then we propose a novel generative framework to learn reasonable thoughts
from LLMs for better multimodal fusion and lightweight fine-tuning, which
consists of two training stages: 1) Distill multimodal reasoning knowledge from
LLMs; and 2) Fine-tune the generative framework to infer harmfulness. Extensive
experiments conducted on three meme datasets demonstrate that our proposed
approach achieves superior performance than state-of-the-art methods on the
harmful meme detection task.


  A system of $N$ non-canonical dynamically free 3D harmonic oscillators is
studied. The position and the momentum operators (PM-operators) of the system
do not satisfy the canonical commutation relations (CCRs). Instead they obey
the weaker postulates for the oscillator to be a Wigner quantum system. In
particular the PM-operators fulfil the main postulate, which is due to Wigner:
they satisfy the equations of motion (the Hamiltonian's equations) and the
Heisenberg equations. One of the relevant features is that the coordinate (the
momentum) operators do not commute, but instead their squares do commute. As a
result the space structure of the basis states corresponds to pictures when
each oscillating particle is measured to occupy with equal probability only
finite number of points, typically the eight vertices of a parallelepiped. The
state spaces are finite-dimensional, the spectrum of the energy is finite with
equally spaced energy levels. An essentially new feature is that the angular
momenta of all particles are aligned. Therefore there exists a strong
interaction or correlation between the particles, which is not of dynamical,
but of statistical origin. Another relevant feature is that the standard
deviations of, say, the $k$-th coordinate and the momenta of $\alpha$-th is $
\Delta \hat R_{\alpha k} \Delta \hat P_{\alpha k} \le {p \hbar/{|N-3|}}~(~N\ne
3,~ p -$fixed positive integer), namely instead of uncertainty relations one
has "certainty" relations. The underlying Lie superalgebraic structure of the
oscillator is also relevant and will be explained in the context.


  Let $\mathcal{S}$ be the set of all positive-definite, symmetrizable integer
matrices with non-zero upper and lower diagonal and $\mathcal{T}$ to be the set
of all positive-definite real symmetric matrices with nonzero upper diagonal
such that all non-zero entries are square-roots of some positive integers and
the matrices satisfy a certain cycle condition.
  In this paper, for any $n \times n$ matrix $A \in \mathcal{S} \cup
\mathcal{T}$ and any $k \in \mathbb{N}$ we find a general lower bound for
$Tr_{2^k}(A)$, i.e, the sum of $2^k$-th power of eigenvalues of $A$, which
depends on $n$ as well as some other variables. In particular, we obtain the
best possible lower bound for $Tr_2(A) $ that is $6n - 5$. As a strong outcome
of this result we show that the smallest limit point of $\overline{Tr_2(A)} =
\frac{Tr_2(A)}{n}$ is $6$. This is a solution of an analogue of ``Schur -
Siegel - Smyth trace problem" for characteristic polynomials of matrices in
$\mathcal{S} \cup \mathcal{T}$. We also obtain a lower bound of smallest limit
point of $\overline{Tr_{2^k}(A)}$ for any positive integer $k > 1$ and for the
same set of matrices. Furthermore, we exhibit that the famous results of Smyth
on density of absolute trace measure and absolute trace-2 measure of totally
positive integers are also true for the set of symmetric integer connected
positive definite matrices.


  With the proliferation of cheaper electronic devices, wireless communication
over multiple-channels in a multi-interface network is now possible. For
instace, wireless sensor nodes can now operate over multiplechannels. Moreover,
cognitive radio sensor networks are also evolving, which also operates over
multiple-channels. In the market, we can find antennas that can support the
operation of multiple channels, for e.g. the cc2420 antenna that is used for
communication between wireless sensor nodes consists of 16 programmable
channels. The proper utilization of multiple-channels reduces the interference
between the nodes and increase the network throughput. Recently, a Cognitive
Radio Cognitive Network (CRCN) patch for NS-2 simulator has proposed to support
multi-channel multi-interface capability in NS-2. In this tutorial, we consider
how to simulate a multi-channel multiinterface wireless network using the NS-2
simulator. This tutorial is trageted to the novice users who wants to
understand the implementation of multi-channel multi-interface in NS-2. We take
the Cognitive Radio Cognitive Network (CRCN) patch for NS-2 simulator and
demonstrate broadcasting over multiple-channels in a multi-interface network
setting. In our seeting, node braodcasts the Hello packets to its neighbors.
Neighboring nodes receive the Hello packets if and only if they are tuned to
the same channel. We demonstrate through example that the tuning of receivers
can be done in two fashions.


  The luminescence caused by the interband transitions of hot carriers in
graphene is considered theoretically. The dependencies of emission in mid- and
near-IR spectral regions versus energy and concentration of hot carriers are
analyzed; they are determined both by an applied electric field and a gate
voltage. The polarization dependency is determined by the angle between the
propagation direction and the normal to the graphene sheet. The characteristics
of radiation from large-scale-area samples of epitaxial graphene and from
microstructures of exfoliated graphene are considered. The averaged over angles
efficiency of emission is also presented.


  In this paper we discuss the optimal regularity of the variable coefficient
parabolic Signorini problem with $W^{1,1}_p$ coefficients and $L^p$
inhomogeneity, where $p>n+2$ with $n$ being the space dimension. Relying on an
parabolic Carleman estimate and an epiperimetric inequality, we show the
optimal regularity of the solutions as well as the regularity of the regular
free boundary.


  A response to a letter to the editor by Schilling regarding Bartroff, Lorden,
and Wang ("Optimal and fast confidence intervals for hypergeometric successes"
2022, arXiv:2109.05624)


  Co3V2O8 is an orthorhombic magnet in which S=3/2 magnetic moments reside on
two crystallographically inequivalent Co2+ sites, which decorate a stacked,
buckled version of the two dimensional kagome lattice, the stacked kagome
staircase. The magnetic interactions between the Co2+ moments in this structure
lead to a complex magnetic phase diagram at low temperature, wherein it
exhibits a series of five transitions below 11 K that ultimately culminate in a
simple ferromagnetic ground state below T~6.2 K. Here we report magnetization
measurements on single and polycrystalline samples of (Co(1-x)Mg(x))3V2O8 for
x<0.23, as well as elastic and inelastic neutron scattering measurements on
single crystals of magnetically dilute (Co(1-x)Mg(x))3V2O8 for x=0.029 and
x=0.194, in which non-magnetic Mg2+ ions substitute for magnetic Co2+. We find
that a dilution of 2.9% leads to a suppression of the ferromagnetic transition
temperature by ~15% while a dilution level of 19.4% is sufficient to destroy
ferromagnetic long-range order in this material down to a temperature of at
least 1.5 K. The magnetic excitation spectrum is characterized by two spin-wave
branches in the ordered phase for (Co(1-x)Mg(x))3V2O8 (x=0.029), similar to
that of the pure x=0 material, and by broad diffuse scattering at temperatures
below 10 K in (Co(1-x)Mg(x))3V2O8 (x=0.194). Such a strong dependence of the
transition temperatures to long range order in the presence of quenched
non-magnetic impurities is consistent with two-dimensional physics driving the
transitions. We further provide a simple percolation model that
semi-quantitatively explains the inability of this system to establish
long-range magnetic order at the unusually-low dilution levels which we observe
in our experiments.


  We prove that the only primes which may divide the order of the automorphism
group of a putative binary self-dual doubly-even [120, 60, 24] code are 2, 3,
5, 7, 19, 23 and 29. Furthermore we prove that automorphisms of prime order $p
\geq 5$ have a unique cycle structure.


  This paper introduces scour physics-informed neural networks (SPINNs), a
hybrid physics-data-driven framework for bridge scour prediction using deep
learning. SPINNs are developed based on historical scour monitoring data and
integrate physics-based empirical equations into neural networks as
supplementary loss components. We incorporated three architectures: LSTM, CNN,
and NLinear as the base data-driven model. Despite varying performance across
different base models and bridges, SPINNs overall outperformed pure data-driven
models. In some bridge cases, SPINN reduced forecasting errors by up to 50
percent. In this study, we also explored general models for bridge clusters,
trained by aggregating datasets across multiple bridges in a region. The pure
data-driven models mostly benefited from this approach, in particular bridges
with limited data. However, bridge-specific SPINNs provided more accurate
predictions than general SPINNs for almost all case studies. Also, the
time-dependent empirical equations derived from SPINNs showed reasonable
accuracy in estimating maximum scour depth, providing more accurate predictions
compared to HEC-18. Comparing both SPINNs and pure deep learning models with
traditional HEC-18 equation indicates substantial improvements in scour
prediction accuracy. This study can pave the way for hybrid physics-machine
learning methodologies to be implemented for bridge scour design and
maintenance.


  This paper describes a novel method for allowing an autonomous ground vehicle
to predict the intent of other agents in an urban environment. This method,
termed the cognitive driving framework, models both the intent and the
potentially false beliefs of an obstacle vehicle. By modeling the relationships
between these variables as a dynamic Bayesian network, filtering can be
performed to calculate the intent of the obstacle vehicle as well as its belief
about the environment. This joint knowledge can be exploited to plan safer and
more efficient trajectories when navigating in an urban environment. Simulation
results are presented that demonstrate the ability of the proposed method to
calculate the intent of obstacle vehicles as an autonomous vehicle navigates a
road intersection such that preventative maneuvers can be taken to avoid
imminent collisions.


  Recommendation system serves as a conduit connecting users to an incredibly
large, diverse and ever growing collection of contents. In practice, missing
information on fresh (and tail) contents needs to be filled in order for them
to be exposed and discovered by their audience. We here share our success
stories in building a dedicated fresh content recommendation stack on a large
commercial platform. To nominate fresh contents, we built a multi-funnel
nomination system that combines (i) a two-tower model with strong
generalization power for coverage, and (ii) a sequence model with near
real-time update on user feedback for relevance. The multi-funnel setup
effectively balances between coverage and relevance. An in-depth study uncovers
the relationship between user activity level and their proximity toward fresh
contents, which further motivates a contextual multi-funnel setup. Nominated
fresh candidates are then scored and ranked by systems considering prediction
uncertainty to further bootstrap content with less exposure. We evaluate the
benefits of the dedicated fresh content recommendation stack, and the
multi-funnel nomination system in particular, through user corpus co-diverted
live experiments. We conduct multiple rounds of live experiments on a
commercial platform serving billion of users demonstrating efficacy of our
proposed methods.


  We generalize the work of Kabat and Lifshytz (arXiv:1703.06523), of
reconstructing bulk scalar fields using the intersecting modular hamiltonian
approach discussed therein, to any locally $AdS_3$ space related to $AdS_3$ by
large diffeomorphisms. We present several checks for our result including
matcing with their result in appropriate limits as well as consistency with
bulk diffeomorphisms. As a further check, from our expressions we also compute
the first correction due to gravitational dressing to the bulk scalar field in
$AdS_3$ and match with known results in the literature.


  In this paper we extend some classical results of Convex Analysis to the
sub-Riemannian setting of the Heisenberg group. In particular, we provide a
horizontal version of Minty's theorem concerning maximal H-monotone operators
defined in the Heisenberg group with values in the first layer of its Lie
algebra.


  Recent neuroimaging studies have shown that functional connectomes are unique
to individuals, i.e., two distinct fMRIs taken over different sessions of the
same subject are more similar in terms of their connectomes than those from two
different subjects. In this study, we present significant new results that
identify, for the first time, specific parts of resting-state and task-specific
connectomes that code the unique signatures. We show that a very small part of
the connectome codes the signatures. A network of these features is shown to
achieve excellent training and test accuracy in matching imaging datasets. We
show that these features are statistically significant, robust to
perturbations, invariant across populations, and are localized to a small
number of structural regions of the brain. Furthermore, we show that for
task-specific connectomes, the regions identified by our method are consistent
with their known functional characterization. We present a new matrix sampling
technique to derive computationally efficient and accurate methods for
identifying the discriminating sub-connectome and support all of our claims
using state-of-the-art statistical tests and computational techniques.


  It is shown that the symmetry algebra of quantum superintegrable system can
be always chosen to be u(N),N being the number of degrees of freedom.


  We explain the recent diphoton excesses around $750$ GeV by both ATLAS and
CMS as a singlet scalar $\Phi$ which couples to SM gluon and neutral gauge
bosons only through higher dimensional operators. A natural explanation is that
$\Phi$ is a pseudo-Nambu-Goldstone boson (pNGB) which receives parity violation
through anomaly if there exists a hidden strong dynamics. The singlet and other
light pNGBs will decay into two SM gauge bosons and even serves as the
meta-stable coloured states which can be probed in the future. By accurately
measuring their relative decay and the total production rate in the future, we
will learn the underlying strong dynamics parameter. The lightest baryon in
this confining theory could serve as a viable dark matter candidate.


  In this paper, we study the problem of global reward maximization with only
partial distributed feedback. This problem is motivated by several real-world
applications (e.g., cellular network configuration, dynamic pricing, and policy
selection) where an action taken by a central entity influences a large
population that contributes to the global reward. However, collecting such
reward feedback from the entire population not only incurs a prohibitively high
cost but often leads to privacy concerns. To tackle this problem, we consider
differentially private distributed linear bandits, where only a subset of users
from the population are selected (called clients) to participate in the
learning process and the central server learns the global model from such
partial feedback by iteratively aggregating these clients' local feedback in a
differentially private fashion. We then propose a unified algorithmic learning
framework, called differentially private distributed phased elimination
(DP-DPE), which can be naturally integrated with popular differential privacy
(DP) models (including central DP, local DP, and shuffle DP). Furthermore, we
prove that DP-DPE achieves both sublinear regret and sublinear communication
cost. Interestingly, DP-DPE also achieves privacy protection ``for free'' in
the sense that the additional cost due to privacy guarantees is a lower-order
additive term. In addition, as a by-product of our techniques, the same results
of ``free" privacy can also be achieved for the standard differentially private
linear bandits. Finally, we conduct simulations to corroborate our theoretical
results and demonstrate the effectiveness of DP-DPE.


  Federated learning (FL) is a distributed machine learning paradigm where
enormous scattered clients (e.g. mobile devices or IoT devices) collaboratively
train a model under the orchestration of a central server (e.g. service
provider), while keeping the training data decentralized. Unfortunately, FL is
susceptible to a variety of attacks, including backdoor attack, which is made
substantially worse in the presence of malicious attackers. Most of algorithms
usually assume that the malicious at tackers no more than benign clients or the
data distribution is independent identically distribution (IID). However, no
one knows the number of malicious attackers and the data distribution is
usually non identically distribution (Non-IID). In this paper, we propose
RFLBAT which utilizes principal component analysis (PCA) technique and Kmeans
clustering algorithm to defend against backdoor attack. Our algorithm RFLBAT
does not bound the number of backdoored attackers and the data distribution,
and requires no auxiliary information outside of the learning process. We
conduct extensive experiments including a variety of backdoor attack types.
Experimental results demonstrate that RFLBAT outperforms the existing
state-of-the-art algorithms and is able to resist various backdoor attack
scenarios including different number of attackers (DNA), different Non-IID
scenarios (DNS), different number of clients (DNC) and distributed backdoor
attack (DBA).


  Recently a new phenomenological Hamiltonian was proposed to describe the
superconducting cuprates in which correlations and on-site Coulomb repulsion
are introduced by partial Gutzwiller projection. This Gossamer Hamiltonian has
an exact ground state and differs from the t-J and Hubbard Hamiltonians in
possessing a powerful attractive interaction among electrons responsible for
Cooper pairing in the d-wave channel. It is a faithful description for a
superconductor with strong on-site electronic repulsion. The superconducting
tunneling gap remains intact and despite on-site repulsion. Near half-filling
the Gossamer superconductor with strong repulsion has suppressed photoemission
intensities and superfluid density, is unstable toward an antiferromagnetic
insulator and possesses an incipient Mott-Hubbard gap. The Gossamer technique
can be applied to metallic ground states thus possibly serving as an apt
description of strongly correlated metals. Such a Gossamer metallic phase, just
as the Gossamer superconducting one, becomes arbitrarily hard to differentiate
from an insulator as one turns the Coulomb correlations up near half-filling.
Both the metallic and superconducting states undergo a quantum phase transition
to an antiferromagnetic insulator as one increases the on-site Coulomb
repulsion. In the Gossamer model we reach the critical point at half-filling by
fully projecting out the double occupancy. Such a critical point might be the
Anderson Resonating Valence bond state.


  Let n points be taken at random on a circle of unit circumference and
clockwise ordered. Uniform spacings are defined as the clockwise arc-lengths
between the successive points from this sample. We are interested in the
asymptotic behavior of the sum of functions of the m-tuples of successive
spacings under the assumption that m can grow together with n. Asymptotic
formulas for the expectation and variance of the sum and its asymptotic
normality are established.


  We present a new ``universal property'' of entropy, that is the ``entropy
sum'' relation of black holes in four dimensional (anti-)de-Sitter asymptotical
background. They depend only on the cosmological constant with the necessary
effect of the un-physical ``virtual'' horizon included in the spacetime where
only the cosmological constant, mass of black hole, rotation parameter and
Maxwell field exist. When there is more extra matter field in the spacetime,
one will find the ``entropy sum'' is also dependent of the strength of these
extra matter field. For both cases, we conclude that the ``entropy sum'' does
not depend on the conserved charges $M$, $Q$ and $J$, while it does depend on
the property of background spacetime. We will mainly test the ``entropy sum''
relation in static, stationary black hole and some black hole with extra matter
source (scalar hair and higher curvature) in the asymptotical (anti-)de-sitter
spacetime background. Besides, we point out a newly found counter example of
the mass independence of the ''entropy product'' relation in the spacetime with
extra scalar hair case, while the ``entropy sum'' relation still holds. These
result are indeed suggestive to some underlying microscopic mechanism.
Moreover, the cosmological constant and extra matter field dependence of the
``entropy sum'' of all horizon seems to reveal that ``entropy sum'' is more
general as it is only related to the background field. For the case of
asymptotical flat spacetime without any matter source, we give a note for the
Kerr black hole case in appendix. One will find only mass dependence of
``entropy sum'' appears. It makes us believe that, considering the dependence
of ``entropy sum'', the mass background field may be regarded as the next order
of cosmological constant background field and extra matter field.


  We investigate the mean star formation rates (SFRs) in the host galaxies of
~3000 optically selected QSOs from the SDSS survey within the Herschel-ATLAS
fields, and a radio-luminous sub-sample, covering the redshift range of z =
0.2-2.5. Using WISE & Herschel photometry (12 - 500{\mu}m) we construct
composite SEDs in bins of redshift and AGN luminosity. We perform SED fitting
to measure the mean infrared luminosity due to star formation, removing the
contamination from AGN emission. We find that the mean SFRs show a weak
positive trend with increasing AGN luminosity. However, we demonstrate that the
observed trend could be due to an increase in black hole (BH) mass (and a
consequent increase of inferred stellar mass) with increasing AGN luminosity.
We compare to a sample of X-ray selected AGN and find that the two populations
have consistent mean SFRs when matched in AGN luminosity and redshift. On the
basis of the available virial BH masses, and the evolving BH mass to stellar
mass relationship, we find that the mean SFRs of our QSO sample are consistent
with those of main sequence star-forming galaxies. Similarly, the
radio-luminous QSOs have mean SFRs that are consistent with both the overall
QSO sample and with star-forming galaxies on the main sequence. In conclusion,
on average QSOs reside on the main sequence of star-forming galaxies, and the
observed positive trend between the mean SFRs and AGN luminosity can be
attributed to BH mass and redshift dependencies.


  Ultra-Luminous X-ray sources are thought to be accreting black holes that
might host Intermediate Mass Black Holes (IMBH), proposed to exist by
theoretical studies, even though a firm detection (as a class) is still
missing. The brightest ULX in M82 (M82 X-1) is probably one of the best
candidates to host an IMBH. In this work we analyzed the data of the recent
release of observations obtained from M82 X-1 taken by XMM-Newton. We performed
a study of the timing and spectral properties of the source. We report on the
detection of (46+-2) mHz Quasi-Periodic Oscillations (QPOs) in the power
density spectra of two observations. A comparison of the frequency of these
high-frequency QPOs with previous detections supports the 1:2:3 frequency
distribution as suggested in other studies. We discuss the implications if the
(46+-2) mHz QPO detected in M82 X-1 is the fundamental harmonic, in analogy
with the High-Frequency QPOs observed in black hole binaries. For one of the
observations we have detected for the first time a QPO at 8 mHz (albeit at a
low significance), that coincides with a hardening of the spectrum. We suggest
that the QPO is a milli-hertz QPO originating from the close-by transient ULX
M82 X-2, with analogies to the Low-Frequency QPOs observed in black hole
binaries.


  We study quantization of a gauge analogon of the Grosse-Wulkenhaar model: we
find divergent one-loop contributions to the 1-point and 2-point Green
functions. We obtain that five counterterms are necessary for renormalization
and that all divergences are logarithmic.


  The dynamics of a quantum phase transition is inextricably woven with the
formation of excitations, as a result of the critical slowing down in the
neighborhood of the critical point. We design a transitionless quantum driving
through a quantum critical point that allows one to access the ground state of
the broken-symmetry phase by a finite-rate quench of the control parameter. The
method is illustrated in the one-dimensional quantum Ising model in a
transverse field. Driving through the critical point is assisted by an
auxiliary Hamiltonian, for which the interplay between the range of the
interaction and the modes where excitations are suppressed is elucidated.


  We provide sharp new estimates for distance function in a Siegel domain of
first and of second type


  Convolutions are one of the most relevant operations in artificial
intelligence (AI) systems. High computational complexity scaling poses
significant challenges, especially in fast-responding network-edge AI
applications. Fortunately, the convolution theorem can be executed on-the-fly
in the optical domain via a joint transform correlator (JTC) offering to
fundamentally reduce the computational complexity. Nonetheless, the iterative
two-step process of a classical JTC renders them unpractical. Here we introduce
a novel implementation of an optical convolution-processor capable of near-zero
latency by utilizing all-optical nonlinearity inside a JTC, thus minimizing
electronic signal or conversion delay. Fundamentally we show how this nonlinear
auto-correlator enables reducing the high $O(n^4)$ scaling complexity of
processing two-dimensional data to only $O(n^2)$. Moreover, this optical JTC
processes millions of channels in time-parallel, ideal for large-matrix machine
learning tasks. Exemplary utilizing the nonlinear process of four-wave mixing,
we show light processing performing a full convolution that is temporally
limited only by geometric features of the lens and the nonlinear material's
response time. We further discuss that the all-optical nonlinearity exhibits
gain in excess of $>10^{3}$ when enhanced by slow-light effects such as
epsilon-near-zero. Such novel implementation for a machine learning accelerator
featuring low-latency and non-iterative massive data parallelism enabled by
fundamental reduced complexity scaling bears significant promise for
network-edge, and cloud AI systems.


  There are two types of port-based teleportation (PBT) protocols:
deterministic -- when the state always arrives to the receiver but is
imperfectly transmitted and probabilistic -- when the state reaches the
receiver intact with high probability. We introduce the minimal set of
requirements that define a feasible PBT protocol and construct a simple PBT
protocol that satisfies these requirements: it teleports an unknown state of a
qubit with success probability $p_{succ}=1-\frac{N+2}{2^{N+1}}$ and fidelity
$1-O(\frac{1}{N})$ with the resource state consisting of $N$ maximally
entangled states. This protocol is not reducible from either the deterministic
or probabilistic PBT protocol. We define the corresponding efficient superdense
coding protocols which transmit more classical bits with fewer maximally
entangled states. Furthermore, we introduce rigorous methods for comparing and
converting between different PBT protocols.


  Indirect controllability of an arbitrary finite dimensional quantum system
(N-dimensional qudit) through a quantum accessor is investigated. Here, The
qudit is coupled to a quantum accessor which is modeled as a fully controllable
spin chain with nearest neighbor (anisotropic) XY-coupling. The complete
controllability of such indirect control system is investigated in detail. The
general approach is applied to the indirect controllability of two and three
dimensional quantum systems. For two and three dimensional systems, a simpler
indirect control scheme is also presented.


  In this paper, we state and prove two Fra\"{i}ss\'{e}-style results that
cover existence and uniqueness properties for twelve of the eighteen different
notions of homomorphism-homogeneity as introduced by Lockett and Truss, and
provide forward directions and implications for the remaining six cases.
Following these results, we completely determine the extent to which the
countable homogeneous undirected graphs (as classified by Lachlan and Woodrow)
are homomorphism-homogeneous; we also provide some insight into the directed
graph case.


  An important goal of current and future long baseline neutrino oscillation
experiments pertains to determination of the Dirac-type leptonic $CP$ phase,
$\delta_{13}$. We consider the new physics scenario of an eV scale sterile
neutrino along with three active neutrinos and demonstrate the impact on the
$CP$ and $T$ violation measurements in neutrino oscillations. We address the
question of disentangling the intrinsic effects from extrinsic effects in the
standard three neutrino paradigm as well as the scenario with added light
sterile neutrino. We define a metric to isolate the two kinds of effects and
our approach is general in the sense that it is independent of the choice of
$\delta_{13}$. We study the role of different appearance and disappearance
channels which can contribute to CP and T violation measurements. We perform
the analysis for different long baseline experiments which have different
detection capabilities such as Water Cherenkov (WC) and Liquid Argon Time
Projection Chamber (LArTPC).


  Sun-like stars have stellar, brown dwarf and planetary companions. To help
constrain their formation and migration scenarios, we analyse the close
companions (orbital period < 5 years) of nearby Sun-like stars. By using the
same sample to extract the relative numbers of stellar, brown dwarf and
planetary companions, we verify the existence of a very dry brown dwarf desert
and describe it quantitatively. With decreasing mass, the companion mass
function drops by almost two orders of magnitude from 1 M_Sun stellar
companions to the brown dwarf desert and then rises by more than an order of
magnitude from brown dwarfs to Jupiter-mass planets. The slopes of the
planetary and stellar companion mass functions are of opposite sign and are
incompatible at the 3 sigma level, thus yielding a brown dwarf desert. The
minimum number of companions per unit interval in log mass (the driest part of
the desert) is at M = 31^{+25}_{-18} M_Jup. Approximately 16% of Sun-like stars
have close (P < 5 years) companions more massive than Jupiter: 11% +- 3% are
stellar, <1% are brown dwarf and 5% +- 2% are giant planets. The steep decline
in the number of companions in the brown dwarf regime, compared to the initial
mass function of individual stars and free-floating brown dwarfs, suggests
either a different spectrum of gravitational fragmentation in the formation
environment or post-formation migratory processes disinclined to leave brown
dwarfs in close orbits.


  We report the discovery of an IR-selected galaxy cluster in the IRAC Distant
Cluster Survey (IDCS). New data from the Hubble Space Telescope
spectroscopically confirm IDCS J1433.2+3306 at z = 1.89 with robust
spectroscopic redshifts for seven members, two of which are based on the 4000
Angstrom break. Detected emission lines such as [OII] and Hbeta indicate star
formation rates of >20 solar masses per year for three galaxies within a 500
kpc projected radius of the cluster center. The cluster exhibits a red sequence
with a scatter and color indicative of a formation redshift z > 3.5. The
stellar age of the early-type galaxy population is approximately consistent
with those of clusters at lower redshift (1 < z < 1.5) suggesting that clusters
at these redshifts are experiencing ongoing or increasing star formation.


  We consider here square tilings of the plane. By extending the formalism
introduced in [3] we build a correspondence between plane maps endowed with an
harmonic vector and square tilings satisfying a condition of regularity. In the
case of periodic plane square tiling the relevant space of harmonic vectors is
actually isomorphic to the first homology group of a torus. So, periodic plane
square tilings are described by two parameters and the set of parameters is
split into angular sectors.
  The correspondence between symmetry of the square tiling and symmetry of the
plane maps and harmonic vectors is discussed and a method for enumerating the
regular periodic plane square tilings having r orbits of squares is outlined.


  Context. Solar activity cycles vary in amplitude and duration. The variations
can be at least partly explained by fluctuations in dynamo parameters. Aims. We
want to restrict uncertainty in fluctuating dynamo parameters and find out
which properties of the fluctuations control the amplitudes of the magnetic
field and energy in variable dynamo cycles. Methods. A flux-transport model for
the solar dynamo with fluctuations of the Babcock-Leighton type $\alpha$-effect
was applied to generate statistics of magnetic cycles for our purposes. The
statistics were compared with data on solar cycle periods to restrict the
correlation time of dynamo fluctuations. Results. A characteristic time of
fluctuations in the $\alpha$-effect is estimated to be close to the solar
rotation period. The fluctuations produce asymmetry between the times of rise
and descent of dynamo cycles, the rise time being on average shorter. The
affect of the fluctuations on cycle amplitudes depends on the phase of the
cycle in which the fluctuations occur. Negative fluctuations (decrease in
$\alpha$) in the rise phase delay decay of poloidal field and increase the
cycle amplitude in toroidal field and magnetic energy. Negative fluctuation in
the decline phase reduces the polar field at the end of a cycle and the
amplitude of the next cycle. The low amplitude of the 24th solar cycle compared
to the preceding 23rd cycle can be explained by this effect. Positive
fluctuations in the descent phase enhance the magnetic energy of the next cycle
by increasing the seed poloidal field for the next cycle. The statistics of the
computed energies of the cycles suggest that superflares of $\ge 10^{34}$ erg
are not possible on the Sun.


  The almost scale-invariant spectrum for the stochastic background wave (in
primordial Universe) is a firm prediction of inflationary scenarios. In the
present work, to study of primordial Gravitational Waves, one dimensional toy
model in generalizations of the Einstein-Hilbert frame, described by second
order curvature invariant (called pure Quadratic Gravity) is considered.
Solutions to the primordial perturbations are more varied than Einstein-Hilbert
frame and include simple incoming and outcoming waves. By examining the
spectrum diagram of the perturbation solutions, it can be seen that the
oscillating solutions are ruled out due to not having the necessary spectral
power, but the solutions as damping exponential have the ability to produce a
scale-invariant spectrum (confirmed by CMB data).


  In this paper we present an extension of Peirce's existential graphs to
provide a diagrammatic representation of expressions in Quantified Equilibrium
Logic (QEL). Using this formalisation, logical connectives are replaced by
encircled regions (circles and squares) and quantified variables are
represented as "identity" lines. Although the expressive power is equivalent to
that of QEL, the new representation can be useful for illustrative or
educational purposes.


  We study the dynamics of one-dimensional bosons trapped in a box potential,
in the presence of a barrier creating a tunable weak-link, thus realizing a one
dimensional Bose Josephson junction. By varying the initial population
imbalance and the barrier height we evidence different dynamical regimes. In
particular we show that at large barriers a two mode model captures accurately
the dynamics, while for low barriers the dynamics involves dispersive shock
waves and solitons. We study a quench protocol that can be readily implemented
in experiments and show that self-trapping resonances can occur. This
phenomenon can be understood qualitatively within the two-mode model.


  We prove a set of inequalities that interpolate the Cauchy-Schwarz inequality
and the triangle inequality. Every nondecreasing, convex function with a
concave derivative induces such an inequality. They hold in any metric space
that satisfies a metric version of the Cauchy-Schwarz inequality, including all
CAT(0) spaces and, in particular, all Euclidean spaces. Because these
inequalities establish relations between the six distances of four points, we
call them quadruple inequalities. In this context, we introduce the quadruple
constant - a real number that quantifies the distortion of the Cauchy-Schwarz
inequality by a given function. Additionally, for inner product spaces, we
prove an alternative, more symmetric version of the quadruple inequalities,
which generalizes the parallelogram law.


  We develop methods to deal with non-dynamical contributions to event-by-event
fluctuation measurements of net-particle numbers in relativistic nuclear
collisions. These contributions arise from impact parameter fluctuations and
from the requirement of overall net-baryon number or net-charge conservation
and may mask the dynamical fluctuations of interest, such as those due to
critical endpoints in the QCD phase diagram. Within a model of independent
particle sources we derive formulae for net-particle fluctuations and develop a
rigorous approach to take into account contributions from participant
fluctuations in realistic experimental environments and at any cumulant order.
Interestingly, contributions from participant fluctuations to the second and
third cumulants of net-baryon distributions are found to vanish at mid-rapidity
for LHC energies while higher cumulants of even order are non-zero even when
the net-baryon number at mid-rapidity is zero. At lower beam energies the
effect of participant fluctuations increases and induces spurious higher
moments. The necessary corrections become large and need to be carefully taken
into account before comparison to theory. We also provide a procedure for
selecting the optimal phase-space coverage of particles for fluctuation
analyses and discuss quantitatively the necessary correction due to global
charge conservation.


  Rotating modulation is a technique for indirect imaging in the hard x-ray and
soft gamma-ray energy bands, which may offer an advantage over coded aperture
imaging at high energies. A rotating modulator (RM) consists of a single mask
of co-planar parallel slats typically spaced equidistance apart, suspended
above an array of circular non-imaging detectors. The mask rotates, temporally
modulating the transmitted image of the object scene. The measured count rate
profiles of each detector are folded modulo the mask rotational period, and the
object scene is reconstructed using pre-determined characteristic modulation
profiles. The use of Monte Carlo simulation to derive the characteristic count
rate profiles is accurate but computationally expensive; an analytic approach
is preferred for its speed of computation. We present both the standard and a
new advanced characteristic formula describing the modulation pattern of the
RM; the latter is a more robust description of the instrument response
developed as part of the design of a wide-field high-resolution telescope for
gamma-ray astronomy. We examine an approximation to the advanced formula to
simplify reconstruction software and increase computational speed, and comment
on both the inherent limitations and usefulness of the approach. Finally, we
show comparisons to the standard formula and demonstrate image reconstructions
from Monte Carlo simulations.


  Due to the large kick velocities with which neutron stars are born in
supernovae explosions, their spatial distribution is more extended than that of
their progenitor stars. The large scale height of the neutron stars above the
disk plane makes them potential candidates for microlensing of stars in the
Large Magellanic Cloud. Adopting for the distribution of kicks the measured
velocities of young pulsars, we obtain a microlensing optical depth of $\tau
\sim 2 N_{10} \times 10^{-8}$ (where $N_{10}$ is the total number of neutron
stars born in the disk in units of $10^{10}$). The event duration distribution
has the interesting property of being peaked at $T \sim 60$--80 d, but for the
rates to be relevant for the present microlensing searches would require
$N_{10} \gtap 1$, a value larger than the usually adopted ones ($N_{10} \sim
0.1$--0.2).


  Molecular orientation is a fundamental requisite in the study of
stereodirected dynamics of collisional and photoinitiated processes. In this
last decade, variable hexapolar electric filters have been developed and
employed for the rotational-state selection and the alignment of molecules of
increasing complexity, for which main difficulties are their mass, their low
symmetry and the very dense rotational manifold. In this work, for the first
time, a complex molecule such as 2-bromobutane, an asymmetric-top containing a
heavy atom (the bromine), has been successfully oriented by a weak homogeneous
field placed downstream the hexapolar filter. Efficiency of the orientation has
been characterized experimentally, by combining time-of-flight measurements and
a slice-ion-imaging detection technique. The application is described to the
photodissociation dynamics of the oriented 2-bromobutane, which was carried out
at a laser wavelength of 234 nm, corresponding to the breaking of the C Br
bond. The Br photofragment is produced in both the ground Br (2P3/2) and the
excited Br (2P1/2) electronic states and both channels are studied by the slice
imaging technique, revealing new features in the velocity and angular
distributions with respect to previous investigations on non-oriented
molecules.


  I propose a quantum gravity model in which geometric space emerges from
random bits in a quantum phase transition driven by the combinatorial
Ollivier-Ricci curvature and corresponding to the condensation of short cycles
in random graphs. This quantum critical point defines quantum gravity
non-perturbatively. In the ordered geometric phase at large distances the
action reduces to the standard Einstein-Hilbert term.


  We study the notion of orderability of isotopy classes of Legendrian
submanifolds and their universal covers, with some weaker results concerning
spaces of contactomorphisms. Our main result is that orderability is equivalent
to the existence of spectral selectors analogous to the spectral invariants
coming from Lagrangian Floer Homology. A direct application is the existence of
Reeb chords between any closed Legendrian submanifolds of a same orderable
isotopy class. Other applications concern the Sandon conjecture, the Arnold
chord conjecture, Legendrian interlinking, the existence of time-functions and
the study of metrics due to Hofer-Chekanov-Shelukhin, Colin-Sandon,
Fraser-Polterovich-Rosen and Nakamura.


  Let $\delta$ be a derivation in a $K$-algebra $R$ and let ${\rm
Aut_{\delta}}(R)$ be the isotropy group with respect to the natural conjugation
action of $\rm Aut(R)$ of $K$-automorphisms on the set $\rm Der(R)$ of
$K$-derivations: that is, the subgroup of automorphisms that commute with the
derivation. We explore the characterization of ${\rm Aut_{\delta}}(R)$ for
quantum Weyl algebras and we prove that in the case of the Jordanian plane it
is always a finite cyclic group. Furthermore, we obtain an arithmetic
characterization that allows us to trivially demonstrate that these algebras
are not isomorphic.


  This contribution is an introduction to the metric aspect of noncommutative
geometry, with emphasize on the Moyal plane. Starting by questioning "how to
define a standard meter in a space whose coordinates no longer commute?", we
list several recent results regarding Connes's spectral distance calculated
between eigenstates of the quantum harmonic oscillator arXiv:0912.0906, as well
as between coherent states arXiv:1110.6164. We also question the difference
(which remains hidden in the commutative case) between the spectral distance
and the notion of quantum length inherited from the length operator defined in
various models of noncommutative space-time (DFR and \theta-Minkowski). We
recall that a standard procedure in noncommutative geometry, consisting in
doubling the spectral triple, allows to fruitfully confront the spectral
distance with the quantum length. Finally we refine the idea of discrete vs.
continuous geodesics in the Moyal plane, introduced in arXiv:1106.0261.


  This paper provides a linear time algorithm in the number of edges that,
given a simple 3-connected non-planar graph G with a Klein bottle rotation
system, outputs a straight line drawing of G with no crossings on the flat
Klein bottle.


  The first mathematical problems of the global analysis of dynamical models
can be traced back to the engineering problem of the Watt governor design.
Engineering requirements and corresponding mathematical problems led to the
fundamental discoveries in the global stability theory. Boundaries of global
stability in the space of parameters are limited by the birth of oscillations.
The excitation of oscillations from unstable equilibria can be easily analysed,
while the revealing of oscillations not connected with equilibria is a
chalfilenging task being studied in the theory of hidden oscillations. In this
survey, a brief history of the first global stability criteria development and
corresponding counterexamples with hidden oscillations are discussed.


  An inverse problem is considered for an inhomogeneous Schr\"odinger equation.
Assuming that the potential vanishes outside a finite interval and satisfies
some other technical assumptions, one proves the uniqueness of the recovery of
this potential from the knowledge of the wave function at the ends of the above
interval for all energies. An algorithm is given for the recovery of the
potential from the above data.


  We consider the nonunitary quantum dynamics of neutral massless scalar
particles used to model photons around a massive gravitational lens. The
gravitational interaction between the lensing mass and asymptotically free
particles is described by their second-quantized scattering wavefunctions.
Remarkably, the zero-point spacetime fluctuations can induce significant
decoherence of the scattered states with spontaneous emission of gravitons,
thereby reducing the particles' coherence as well as energy. This new effect
suggests that, when photon polarizations are negligible, such quantum gravity
phenomena could lead to measurable anomalous redshift of recently studied
astrophysical lasers through a gravitational lens in the range of black holes
and galaxy clusters.


  Suffix trees have emerged to be very fast for pattern searching yielding O
(m) time, where m is the pattern size. Unfortunately their high memory
requirements make it impractical to work with huge amounts of data. We present
a memory efficient algorithm of a generalized suffix tree which reduces the
space size by a factor of 10 when the size of the pattern is known beforehand.
Experiments on the chromosomes and Pizza&Chili corpus show significant
advantages of our algorithm over standard linear time suffix tree construction
in terms of memory usage for pattern searching.


  In this work we study the dimensional reduction of smooth circle invariant
Yang-Mills instantons defined on 4-manifolds which are non-trivial circle
fibrations over hyperbolic 3-space. A suitable choice of the 4-manifold metric
within a specific conformal class gives rise to singular and smooth hyperbolic
monopoles. A large class of monopoles is obtained if the conformal factor
satisfies the Helmholtz equation on hyperbolic 3-space. We describe simple
configurations and relate our results to the JNR construction, for which we
provide a geometric interpretation.


  Let $n$ particles move in standard Brownian motion in one dimension, with the
process terminating if two particles collide. This is a specific case of
Brownian motion constrained to stay inside a Weyl chamber; the Weyl group for
this chamber is $A_{n-1}$, the symmetric group. For any starting positions, we
compute a determinant formula for the density function for the particles to be
at specified positions at time $t$ without having collided by time $t$. We show
that the probability that there will be no collision up to time $t$ is
asymptotic to a constant multiple of $t^{-n(n-1)/4}$ as $t$ goes to infinity,
and compute the constant as a polynomial of the starting positions. We have
analogous results for the other classical Weyl groups; for example, the
hyperoctahedral group $B_n$ gives a model of $n$ independent particles with a
wall at $x=0$.
  We can define Brownian motion on a Lie algebra, viewing it as a vector space;
the eigenvalues of a point in the Lie algebra correspond to a point in the Weyl
chamber, giving a Brownian motion conditioned never to exit the chamber. If
there are $m$ roots in $n$ dimensions, this shows that the radial part of the
conditioned process is the same as the $n+2m$-dimensional Bessel process. The
conditioned process also gives physical models, generalizing Dyson's model for
$A_{n-1}$ corresponding to ${\mathfrak s}{\mathfrak u}_n$ of $n$ particles
moving in a diffusion with a repelling force between two particles proportional
to the inverse of the distance between them.


  We study relativistically expanding electromagnetic fields of cylindrical
geometry. The fields emerge from the side surface of a cylinder and are
invariant under translations parallel to the axis of the cylinder. The
expansion velocity is in the radial direction and is parametrized by
$v=R/(ct)$. We consider force-free magnetic fields by setting the total force
the electromagnetic field exerts on the charges and the currents equal to zero.
Analytical and semi-analytical separable solutions are found for the
relativistic problem. In the non-relativistic limit the mathematical form of
the equations is similar to equations that have already been studied in static
systems of the same geometry.


  Resorting to the characteristic polynomial of Lax matrix for the Dym-type
hierarchy, we define a trigonal curve, on which appropriate vector-valued
Baker-Akhiezer function and meromorphic function are introduced. Based on the
theory of trigonal curve and three kinds of Abelian differentials, we obtain
the explicit Riemann theta function representations of the meromorphic
function, from which we get the algebro-geometric constructions for the entire
Dym-type hierarchy


  We present the large-scale sidereal anisotropy ofgalactic cosmic-ray
intensity in the multi-TeV region observed with the Tibet-IIIair shower array
during the period from 1999 through 2003. The sidereal daily variation of
cosmic rays observed in this experiment shows an excess of relative intensity
around $4\sim7 $ hours local sidereal time, as well as a deficit around 12
hours local sidereal time. While the amplitude of the excess is not significant
when averaged over all declinations, the excess in individual declinaton bands
becomes larger and clearer as the viewing direction moves toward the south. The
maximum phase of the excess intensity changes from $\sim$7 at the northern
hemisphere to $\sim$4 hours at the equatorial region. We also show that both
the amplitude and the phase of the first harmonic vector of the daily variation
are remarkably independent of primary energy in the multi-TeV region. This is
the first result determining the energy and declination dependences of the full
24-hour profiles of the sidereal daily variation in the multi-TeV region with a
single air shower experiment.


  We present a study of the unidentified gamma-ray source 3EG J0542+2610. This
source is spatially superposed to the supernova remnant G180.0-1.7, but its
time variability makes unlikely a physical link. We have searched into the
EGRET location error box for compact radio sources that could be the low energy
counterpart of the gamma-ray source. Although 29 point-like radio sources were
detected and measured, none of them is strong enough as to be considered the
counterpart of a background gamma-ray emitting AGN. We suggest that the only
object within the 95 % error box capable of producing the required gamma-ray
flux is the X-ray transient A0535+26. We show that this Be/accreting pulsar can
produce variable hadronic gamma-ray emission through the mechanism originally
proposed by Cheng & Ruderman (1989), where a proton beam accelerated in a
magnetospheric electrostatic gap impacts the transient accretion disk.


  In this contribution we review the theory of integrability of quantum systems
in one spatial dimension. We introduce the basic concepts such as the
Yang-Baxter equation, commuting currents, and the algebraic Bethe ansatz. Quite
extensively we present the treatment of integrable quantum systems at finite
temperature on the basis of a lattice path integral formulation and a suitable
transfer matrix approach (quantum transfer matrix). The general method is
carried out for the seminal model of the spin-1/2 $XXZ$ chain for which
thermodynamic properties like specific heat, magnetic susceptibility and the
finite temperature Drude weight of the thermal conductivity are derived.


  Workplace bias creates negative psychological outcomes for employees,
permeating the larger organization. Workplace meetings are frequent, making
them a key context where bias may occur. Video conferencing (VC) is an
increasingly common medium for workplace meetings; we therefore investigated
how VC tools contribute to increasing or reducing bias in meetings. Through a
semi-structured interview study with 22 professionals, we found that VC
features push meeting leaders to exercise control over various meeting
parameters, giving leaders an outsized role in affecting bias. We demonstrate
this with respect to four core VC features -- user tiles, raise hand,
text-based chat, and meeting recording -- and recommend employing at least one
of two mechanisms for mitigating bias in VC meetings -- 1) transferring control
from meeting leaders to technical systems or other attendees and 2) helping
meeting leaders better exercise the control they do wield.


  We derive the equations of motion for a planar rigid body of circular shape
moving in a 2D perfect fluid with point vortices using symplectic reduction by
stages. After formulating the theory as a mechanical system on a configuration
space which is the product of a space of embeddings and the special Euclidian
group in two dimensions, we divide out by the particle relabelling symmetry and
then by the residual rotational and translational symmetry. The result of the
first stage reduction is that the system is described by a non-standard
magnetic symplectic form encoding the effects of the fluid, while at the second
stage, a careful analysis of the momentum map shows the existence of two
equivalent Poisson structures for this problem. For the solid-fluid system, we
hence recover the ad hoc Poisson structures calculated by Shashikanth, Marsden,
Burdick and Kelly on the one hand, and Borisov, Mamaev, and Ramodanov on the
other hand. As a side result, we obtain a convenient expression for the
symplectic leaves of the reduced system and we shed further light on the
interplay between curvatures and cocycles in the description of the dynamics.


  In this paper, by exploiting the weak measurement and quantum measurement re-
versal (WMQMR) procedure, we propose a scheme to show how one can protect the
geometric quantum discord (GQD) of a two-qutrit V-type atomic system each of
which interacts with a dissipative reservoir independently. We examine the
scheme for the GQD of the initial two-qutrit Werner and Horodecki states for
different classes of weak mea- surement strengthes. It is found out that the
presented protocol enables us to suppress decoherence due to the amplitude
damping (AD) channel and preserve the quantum dis- cord of the two-qutrit
system successfully.


  We introduce a constrained priority mechanism that combines outcome-based
matching from machine-learning with preference-based allocation schemes common
in market design. Using real-world data, we illustrate how our mechanism could
be applied to the assignment of refugee families to host country locations, and
kindergarteners to schools. Our mechanism allows a planner to first specify a
threshold $\bar g$ for the minimum acceptable average outcome score that should
be achieved by the assignment. In the refugee matching context, this score
corresponds to the predicted probability of employment, while in the student
assignment context it corresponds to standardized test scores. The mechanism is
a priority mechanism that considers both outcomes and preferences by assigning
agents (refugee families, students) based on their preferences, but subject to
meeting the planner's specified threshold. The mechanism is both strategy-proof
and constrained efficient in that it always generates a matching that is not
Pareto dominated by any other matching that respects the planner's threshold.


  We study cluster assignment in multi-agent networks. We consider homogeneous
diffusive networks, and focus on design of the graph that ensures the system
will converge to a prescribed cluster configuration, i.e., specifying the
number of clusters and agents within each cluster. Leveraging recent results
from cluster synthesis, we show that it is possible to design an oriented graph
such that the action of the automorphism group of the graph has orbits of
predetermined sizes, guaranteeing that the network will converge to the
prescribed cluster configuration. We provide upper and lower bounds on the
number of edges that are needed to construct these graphs along with a
constructive approach for generating these graphs. We support our analysis with
some numerical examples.


  The aim of these lectures is to give an introduction to several topics which
lie at the intersection of string theory, gravity theory and gravity
phenomenology. One successively reviews: (i) the "membrane" approach to the
dissipative dynamics of classical black holes, (ii) the current experimental
tests of gravity, and their theoretical interpretation, (iii) some aspects of
the string-inspired phenomenology of the gravitational sector, and (iv) some
possibilities for observing string-related signals in cosmology (including a
discussion of gravitational wave signals from cosmic superstrings).


  This paper studies the parabolic free boundary problem arising from pricing
American-style put options on an asset whose index follows a geometric Brownian
motion process. The contribution is to propose a condition for that the early
exercise boundary is a convex function.


  Security is one of the main issues in Internet of Things (IoT). Encryption
plays a curtail role in making these systems secure. Substitution Box (S-Box)
has an effective impact in block encryption methods. Due to the restricted
resource capacities of IoT nodes, providing a lightweight S-Box is a
challenging problem. This paper presents a key-dependent S-Box using
Hyperelliptic curve. The proposed S-Box is analytically evaluated using
performance criteria including bijection, nonlinearity, strict avalanche
effect, and algebraic degree. The evaluation results endorse that the offered
S-Box production algorithm is considerably an effective way to generate
cryptographic strong S-Box.


  The small-x behavior of the singlet contributions to the polarized structure
function g_2(x,Q^2) is calculated in the double-logarithmic approximation of
perturbative QCD. The dominant contribution is due to the gluons which, in
contrast to the unpolarized case, mix with the fermions also in the small-x
domain. We find a power-like growth in 1/x in the odd-signature parts of the
amplitude with the same power as in the singlet function g_1(x,Q^2) at x<< 1.


We discuss recent results on heavy and light baryon spectroscopy


  We present the results of 2D simulations of the magnetorotational model of a
supernova explosion. After the core collapse the core consists of rapidly a
rotating proto-neutron star and a differentially rotating envelope. The
toroidal part of the magnetic energy generated by the differential rotation
grows linearly with time at the initial stage of the evolution of the magnetic
field. The linear growth of the toroidal magnetic field is terminated by the
development of magnetohydrodynamic instability, leading to drastic acceleration
in the growth of magnetic energy. At the moment when the magnetic pressure
becomes comparable with the gas pressure at the periphery of the proto-neutron
star $\sim 10-15$km from the star centre the MHD compression wave appears and
goes through the envelope of the collapsed iron core. It transforms soon to the
fast MHD shock and produces a supernova explosion. Our simulations give the
energy of the explosion $0.6\cdot 10^{51}$ ergs. The amount of the mass ejected
by the explosion is $\sim 0.14M_\odot$. The implicit numerical method, based on
the Lagrangian triangular grid of variable structure, was used for the
simulations.


  Connecting multiple processors via quantum interconnect technologies could
help to overcome issues of scalability in single-processor quantum computers.
Transmission via these interconnects can be performed more efficiently using
quantum multiplexing, where information is encoded in high-dimensional photonic
degrees of freedom. We explore the effects of multiplexing on logical error
rates in surface codes and hypergraph product codes. We show that, although
multiplexing makes loss errors more damaging, assigning qubits to photons in an
intelligent manner can minimize these effects, and the ability to encode
higher-distance codes in a smaller number of photons can result in overall
lower logical error rates. This multiplexing technique can also be adapted to
quantum communication and multimode quantum memory with high-dimensional qudit
systems.


  This paper shows that conditional independence reasoning can be applied to
optimize epistemic model checking, in which one verifies that a model for a
number of agents operating with imperfect information satisfies a formula
expressed in a modal multi-agent logic of knowledge. The optimization has been
implemented in the epistemic model checker MCK. The paper reports experimental
results demonstrating that it can yield multiple orders of magnitude
performance improvements.


  We show that the refined Donaldson-Thomas invariants of C3, suitably
normalized, have a Gaussian distribution as limit law. Combinatorially these
numbers are given by weighted counts of 3D partitions. Our technique is to use
the Hardy-Littlewood circle method to analyze the bivariate asymptotics of a
q-deformation of MacMahon's function. The proof is based on that of E.M. Wright
who explored the single variable case.


  We argue that there may be no intermediate particle physics energy scale
between the Planck mass $M_{Pl}\sim 10^{19}$ GeV and the electroweak scale $M_W
\sim 100$ GeV. At the same time, the number of problems of the Standard Model
(neutrino masses and oscillations, dark matter, baryon asymmetry of the
Universe, strong CP-problem, gauge coupling unification, inflation) could find
their solution at $M_{Pl}$ or $M_W$. The crucial experimental predictions of
this point of view are outlined.


  The success of quantum physics in description of various physical interaction
phenomena relies primarily on the accuracy of analytical methods used. In
quantum mechanics, many of such interactions such as those found in quantum
optomechanics and quantum computing have a highly nonlinear nature, which makes
their analysis extraordinarily difficult using classical schemes. Typically,
modern quantum systems of interest nowadays come with four basic properties:
(i) quantumness, (ii) openness, (iii) randomness, and (iv) nonlinearity. The
newly introduced method of higher-order operators targets analytical solutions
to such systems, and while providing at least mathematically approximate
expressions with improved accuracy over the fully linearized schemes, some
cases admit exact solutions. Many different applications of this method in
quantum and classically nonlinear systems are demonstrated throughout. This
review is purposed to provide the reader with ease of access to this recent and
well-established operator algebra, while going over a moderate amount of
literature review. The reader with basic knowledge of quantum mechanics and
quantum noise theory should be able to start using this scheme to his or her
own problem of interest.


  In this paper we propose a time discretization of a system of two parabolic
equations describing diffusion-driven atom rearrangement in crystalline matter.
The equations express the balances of microforces and microenergy; the two
phase fields are the order parameter and the chemical potential. The initial
and boundary-value problem for the evolutionary system is known to be well
posed. Convergence of the discrete scheme to the solution of the continuous
problem is proved by a careful development of uniform estimates, by weak
compactness and a suitable treatment of nonlinearities. Moreover, for the
difference of discrete and continuous solutions we prove an error estimate of
order one with respect to the time step.


  We consider an example of vectorial AdS_5/CFT_4 duality when the boundary
theory is described by N free complex or real Maxwell fields. It is dual to a
particular ("type C") higher spin theory in AdS_5 containing fields in special
mixed-symmetry representations. We extend the study of this theory in
arXiv:1410.3273 by deriving the expression for the large N limit of the
corresponding singlet-sector partition function on S^1 x S^3. We find that in
both complex U(N) and real O(N) invariant cases the form of the one-particle
partition function is as required by the AdS/CFT duality. We also demonstrate
the matching of the Casimir energy on S^3 by assuming an integer shift in the
bulk theory coupling.


  We study the dynamics of Hamiltonian diffeomorphisms on convex symplectic
manifolds. To this end we first establish the Piunikhin-Salamon-Schwarz
isomorphism between the Floer homology and the Morse homology of such a
manifold, and then use this isomorphism to construct a biinvariant metric on
the group of compactly supported Hamiltonian diffeomorphisms analogous to the
metrics constructed by Viterbo and Schwarz. These tools are then applied to
prove and reprove results in Hamiltonian dynamics. Our applications comprise a
uniform lower estimate for the slow entropy of a compactly supported
Hamiltonian diffeomorphism, the existence of infinitely many nontrivial
periodic points of a compactly supported Hamiltonian diffeomorphism of a
subcritical Stein manifold, old and new cases of the Weinstein conjecture, and,
most noteworthy, new existence results for closed orbits of a charge in a
magnetic field on almost all small energy levels. We shall also obtain some old
and new Lagrangian intersection results. Applications to Hofer's geometry on
the group of compactly supported Hamiltonian diffeomorphisms will be given in a
sequel.


  We construct minimal electronic models for a newly discovered superconductor
LaO$_{1-x}$F$_x$BiS$_2$ ($T_c=$ 10.6K) possessing BiS$_2$ layers based on first
principles band calculation. First, we obtain a model consisting of two Bi $6p$
and two S $3p$ orbitals, which give nearly electron-hole symmetric bands.
Further focusing on the bands that intersect the Fermi level, we obtain a model
with two $p$ orbitals. The two bands (per BiS$_2$ layer) have
quasi-one-dimensional character with a double minimum dispersion, which gives
good nesting of the Fermi surface. At around $x\sim 0.5$ the topology of the
Fermi surface changes, so that the density of states at the Fermi level becomes
large. Possible pairing states are discussed.


  We examine the momentum and energy dependence of the scattering rate of the
high temperature cuprate superconductors using angle resolved photoemission
spectroscopy. The scattering rate is of the form a + b*w. The inelastic
coefficient b is found to be isotropic. The elastic term, a, however, is found
to be highly anisotropic in the pseudogap phase of optimal doped samples, with
an anisotropy which correlates with that of the pseudogap. This can be
contrasted with heavily overdoped samples, which show an isotropic scattering
rate in the normal state.


  We classify all warped product de-Sitter backgrounds in heterotic
supergravity, up to two loops. We find that warped $dS_n$ backgrounds, with
$n\ge 3$, are $\mathbb{R}^{1,n}\times M_{9-n}$, where $M_{9-n}$ is a
$(9-n)$-dimensional Riemannian manifold. Moreover, we establish that warped
$dS_2$ backgrounds are $AdS_3\times M_7$, where $M_7$ is a 7-dimensional
Riemannian manifold.


  Using QCD sum rule, we calculate valance quark distribution functions of
{\eta} and of {\eta}' in chiral limit. Extrapolating the calculated quark
distribution functions at both end regions, their first two moments have been
calculated and compared with those of other hadrons.


  In this comment, we show that the solutions of the-wave Dirac equation for
deformed generalized P\"{o}schl-Teller potential obtained by Wei et al are
valid only for $q\geq1$ and $\frac{1}{2\alpha}\ln{q}<r<\infty$. When $0<q<1$,
we prove that the energy eigenvalues for the bound states are given by the
solution of a transcendental equation involving the hypergeometric function. To
test our results, the Morse potential is considered as limiting case.


  In this paper we obtain strings that propagate in the quantized pp-wave
backgrounds. We can obtain these strings from the solutions of membrane. The
other way is the propagation of a massless string in a spacetime with two time
dimensions. This string sweeps a worldvolume, which enables us to obtain other
strings in the quantized pp-wave backgrounds in the spacetime with one time
direction. The associated algebras and Hamiltonians of these massive strings
will be studied.


  A multi-wavelength investigation of the candidate supernova remnant G63.7+1.1
and its surrounding interstellar medium is presented. On the basis of radio
continuum data we conclude that the object is a filled-center supernova
remnant, perhaps in the course of becoming a composite remnant. The morphology
of the remnant, along with HI, 12CO and high resolution IRAS data, suggest that
G63.7+1.1 is interacting directly with the ISM, and does not lie in a low
density region of the ISM. This in turn strongly suggests that the detected
nebula is not surrounded by an invisible halo of supernova ejecta. The
association between the SNR and HI and CO features near the tangent point
implies a kinematic distance for G63.7+1.1 of 3.8 +/- 1.5 kpc.


  Molecular design based on generative models, such as variational autoencoders
(VAEs), has become increasingly popular in recent years due to its efficiency
for exploring high-dimensional molecular space to identify molecules with
desired properties. While the efficacy of the initial model strongly depends on
the training data, the sampling efficiency of the model for suggesting novel
molecules with enhanced properties can be further enhanced via latent space
optimization. In this paper, we propose a multi-objective latent space
optimization (LSO) method that can significantly enhance the performance of
generative molecular design (GMD). The proposed method adopts an iterative
weighted retraining approach, where the respective weights of the molecules in
the training data are determined by their Pareto efficiency. We demonstrate
that our multi-objective GMD LSO method can significantly improve the
performance of GMD for jointly optimizing multiple molecular properties.


  We propose a class of field theories featuring solitonic solutions in which
topological defects can end when they intersect other defects of equal or
higher dimensionality. Such configurations may be termed ``Dirichlet
topological defects'', in analogy with the D-branes of string theory. Our
discussion focuses on defects in scalar field theories with either gauge or
global symmetries, in (3+1) dimensions; the types of defects considered include
walls ending on walls, strings on walls, and strings on strings.


  The formation of a cool disk in the innermost regions of black hole X-ray
transient systems in the low hard state is investigated. Taking into account
the combined cooling associated with the Compton and conductive energy
transport processes in a corona, the radial structure of a disk is described
for a range of mass accretion rates. The mass flow in an optically thick inner
region can be maintained by the condensation of matter from a corona with the
disk temperature and luminosity varying continuously as a function of the
accretion rate. Although such a disk component can be present, the contribution
of the optically thick disk component to the total luminosity can be small
since the mass flow due to condensation in the optically thick disk underlying
the corona can be significantly less than the mass flow rate in the corona. The
model is applied to the observations of the low quiescent state of the black
hole source GX 339-4 at luminosities of around $0.01 L_{Edd}$ and is able to
explain the temperature of the thermal component at the observed luminosities.
Since conductive cooling dominates Compton cooling at low mass accretion rates,
the luminosity corresponding to the critical mass accretion rate above which a
weak thermal disk component can be present in the low hard state is estimated
to be as low as $0.001 L_{Edd}$.


  Quantum memories are key components in quantum information networks. Their
ability to store and retrieve information on demand makes repeat-until-success
strategies scalable. Warm alkali-metal vapours are interesting candidates for
the implementation of such memories, thanks to their long storage times and
experimental simplicity. Operation with the Raman protocol enables high
time-bandwidth products, which allows for multiple synchronisation trials of
probabilistically operating quantum gates via memory-based temporal
multiplexing. This makes the Raman memory a promising tool, whose broad
spectral bandwidth facilitates direct interfacing with other photonic
primitives, such as single photon sources. Here, such a light-matter interface
is implemented in a warm caesium vapour. Firstly, we study the storage of
polarisation-encoded information in the memory. High quality polarisation
preservation for bright coherent state input signals can be achieved, when
operating the Raman memory in a dual-rail configuration inside a polarisation
interferometer. Secondly, heralded single photons are stored in the memory. To
this end, the memory is operated on-demand by feed-forward of source heralding
events, which is a key technological capability. Prior to storage, single
photons are produced in a spontaneous parametric down conversion source, whose
bespoke design spectrally tailors the photons to the memory acceptance line.
The faithful retrieval of stored single photons is found to be currently
limited by noise in the memory, with a signal-to-noise ratio of 0.3 in the
memory output. Nevertheless, a clear influence of the input's quantum nature is
observed in the retrieved light by measuring signal's photon statistics.
Finally, the memory noise processes are examined in detail. Four-wave-mixing
noise is determined as the sole important noise source for the Raman memory.