  To analyze possible generalizations of reaction-diffusion schemes for the
case of subdiffusion we discuss a simple monomolecular conversion A --> B. We
derive the corresponding kinetic equations for local A and B concentrations.
Their form is rather unusual: The parameters of reaction influence the
diffusion term in the equation for a component A, a consequence of the
nonmarkovian nature of subdiffusion. The equation for a product contains a term
which depends on the concentration of A at all previous times. Our discussion
shows that reaction-subdiffusion equations may not resemble the corresponding
reaction-diffusion ones and are not obtained by a trivial change of the
diffusion operator for a subdiffusion one.


  Object detection and instance recognition play a central role in many AI
applications like autonomous driving, video surveillance and medical image
analysis. However, training object detection models on large scale datasets
remains computationally expensive and time consuming. This paper presents an
efficient and open source object detection framework called SimpleDet which
enables the training of state-of-the-art detection models on consumer grade
hardware at large scale. SimpleDet supports up-to-date detection models with
best practice. SimpleDet also supports distributed training with near linear
scaling out of box. Codes, examples and documents of SimpleDet can be found at
https://github.com/tusimple/simpledet .


  (Short version) We present an analysis of selected fine structure lines
observed ISO toward the Radio Arc in the Galactic center region (GCR). We study
the density of the ionized gas and the large scale ionization structure in a
region of ~30x30 pc^2 by means of the NeIII 15.6 mum/NeII 12.8 mum and NIII 57
mum/NII 122 mum line ratios. The electron densities (n_e) derived from the OIII
lines ratio indicate the presence of diffuse ionized material with n_e of
\~10^{1.8-2.6} cm^{-3}. The NIII/NII ratio show two clear gradients, one
pointing toward the Quintuplet cluster and the other pointing toward the Arches
cluster. The model used to explain the ionization structure shows that the
large scale ionization of the whole region can be accounted for by the UV
radiation produced by the Quintuplet and the Arches cluster. Any other
ionization mechanism should play a minor role. We also investigate the
influence of the clusters on the bubble of warm dust seen in the MSX infrared
images. The warm dust is well correlated with the ionized gas indicating that
the dust is also heated by the radiation from both clusters. Furthermore, the
elliptical rather than circular symmetry of some structures like the Thermal
Filaments can also be explained when one considers the combined effects of both
the Arches and the Quintuplet clusters. The bubble is filled with continuum
emission of hard X rays and with emision from the 6.4 keV line of neutral or
low ionized Fe.


  The derivation of the state of the art tensorial versions of Fundamental
Measure Theory (a form of classical Density Functional Theory for hard spheres)
are re-examined in the light of the recently introduced concept of global
stability of the density functional based on its boundedness (Lutsko and Lam,
Phys. Rev. E 98, 012604 (2018)). It is shown that within the present paradigm,
explicitly stability of the functional can be achieved only at the cost of
giving up accuracy at low densities. It is argued that this is an acceptable
trade-off since the main value of DFT lies in the study of dense systems.
Explicit calculations for a wide variety of systems shows that a proposed
explicitly stable functional is competitive in all ways with the popular White
Bear model while sharing some of its weaknesses when applied to
non-close-packed solids.


  In this article we formulate and solve the problem of molecular beam
diffraction when each molecule consists of two interacting bodies. Then, using
our results, we present the diffraction patterns for various molecular sizes
employing the harmonic oscillator as interaction model between the two atoms.
Lastly, we analyze the corrections produced by the internal structure of the
molecule in applications that include beam focusing and Talbot carpets.


  We present a quantitative analysis of the SFH of 12 fields in the SMC. We
find that there are four main periods of enhancement of star formation: a young
one peaked at around 0.2-0.5 Gyr old, only present in the eastern and in the
central-most fields; two at intermediate ages present in all fields (a
conspicuous one peaked at 4-5 Gyr old, and a less significant one peaked at
1.5-2.5); and an old one, peaked at 10 Gyr in all fields but the western ones.
In the western fields, this old enhancement splits into two, one peaked at
around 8 Gyr old and another at around 12 Gyr old. This "two-enhancement" zone
seems to be a robust feature since it is unaffected by our choice of stellar
evolutionary library but more data covering other fields of the SMC are
necessary in order to ascertain its significancy.
  Some correlation could exist with encounters taken from the orbit
determination of Kallivayalil et al. (2006). But our results would be also fit
in a first pericenter passage scenario like the one claimed by Besla et al.
(2007). There is a strong dichotomy between East/Southeast and West in the
current irregular shape of the SMC. We find that this dichotomy is produced by
the youngest population and began about 1 Gyr ago or later. We do not find yet
a region dominated by an old halo at 4.5 kpc from the SMC center, indicating
either that this old stellar halo does not exist in the SMC or that its
contribution to the stellar populations, at the galactocentric distances of our
outermost field, is negligible. We derive the age-metallicity relation and find
that the metallicity increased continuously from early epochs until now.


  A realistic physical axiomatic approach of the relativistic quantum field
theory is presented. Following the action principle of Schwinger, a covariant
and general formulation is obtained. The correspondence principle is not
invoked and the commutation relations are not postulated but deduced. The most
important theorems such as spin-statistics, and CPT are proved. The theory is
constructed form the notion of basic field and system of basic fields. In
comparison with others formulations, in our realistic approach fields are
regarded as real things with symmetry properties. Finally, the general
structure is contrasted with other formulations.


  Phosphorene, a novel member of the two-dimensional nanomaterial family, has
been demonstrated a great potential in biomedical applications, such as
photothermal therapy, drug delivery and antibacterial. However, phosphorene is
unstable and easily oxidized in an aerobic environment. In this paper, using
the larger-scale molecular dynamics simulations, we investigated the disruption
of phosphorene oxide (PO) to the structure of a model protein, villin headpiece
subdomain (HP35). It shows that the disruption of PO nanosheets to protein
structure enhances with the increase of the oxidation concentration of PO, but
the oxidation mode has almost no effect on the PO-HP35 interaction. At low
oxidation concentration, PO is good biocompatibility to HP35. Oxygen atoms
filled into the groove region in puckered surface of phosphorene enhances the
dispersion interaction between phosphorene and HP35. Thus, oxidation enhances
the destructive effect of phosphorene on the structure of HP35. These findings
might shed light on understanding the biological toxicity of PO nanosheets and
would be helpful for the future potential biomedical applications of PO
nanosheets, such as nanodrugs and antibacterial agents.


  Text-driven fashion synthesis and design is an extremely valuable part of
artificial intelligence generative content(AIGC), which has the potential to
propel a tremendous revolution in the traditional fashion industry. To advance
the research on text-driven fashion synthesis and design, we introduce a new
dataset comprising a million high-resolution fashion images with rich
structured textual(FIRST) descriptions. In the FIRST, there is a wide range of
attire categories and each image-paired textual description is organized at
multiple hierarchical levels. Experiments on prevalent generative models
trained over FISRT show the necessity of FIRST. We invite the community to
further develop more intelligent fashion synthesis and design systems that make
fashion design more creative and imaginative based on our dataset. The dataset
will be released soon.


  The nonlinear Breit-Wheeler process is studied in the presence of strong and
short laser pulses. We show that for a relativistically intense plane-wave
laser field many features of the momentum distribution of the produced
electron-positron pair like its extension, region of highest probability and
carrier-envelope phase effects can be explained from the classical evolution of
the created particles in the background field. To this end an intuitive
semiclassical picture based on the local constant-crossed field approximation
applied on the probability-amplitude level is established and compared with the
standard approach used in QED-PIC codes. The main difference is the
substructure of the spectrum, which results from interference effects between
macroscopically separated formation regions. In order to compare the
predictions of the semiclassical approach with exact calculations, a very fast
numerical scheme is introduced. It renders the calculation of the fully
differential spectrum on a grid which resolves all interference fringes
feasible. Finally, the difference between classical and quantum absorption of
laser four-momentum in the process is pointed out and the dominance of the
former is proven. As a self-consistent treatment of the quantum absorption is
not feasible within existing QED-PIC approaches, our results provide reliable
error estimates relevant for regimes where the laser depletion due to a
developing QED cascade becomes significant.


  Charged-flat black holes in the R\'enyi extended phase space demonstrate
phase structures akin to those of a van der Waals fluid in four-dimensional
spacetime and mirror the behaviors of Reissner-Nordstrom-Anti-de-Sitter black
holes within the standard Gibbs-Boltzmann extended phase space. This study
delves into the dynamics of states initially positioned within the unstable
spinodal region of the phase space associated with the charged-flat black hole
when subjected to time-periodic thermal perturbations. Our analysis based on
the Mel'nikov method reveals that chaos emerges when the $\delta$ parameter
surpasses a critical threshold, $\delta_c$. This critical quantity is dependent
on the black hole charge; notably, a larger value of $Q$ impedes the onset of
chaos.
  Furthermore, we examine the effects of space-periodic thermal perturbations
on its equilibrium state and find that chaos invariably occurs, irrespective of
the perturbation amplitude. Hence, the chaotic dynamics observed in the
analysis of charged-flat black holes under R\'enyi statistics exhibit
resemblances to those of asymptotically AdS-charged black holes investigated
via the Gibbs-Boltzmann formalism. This serves as yet another example of a
potential and significant connection between the cosmological constant and the
nonextensivity R\'enyi parameter.


  A priori information on the positivity of source intensities is ubiquitous in
imaging fields and is also important for a multitude of super-resolution and
deconvolution algorithms. However, the fundamental resolution limit of positive
sources is still unknown, and research in this field is very limited indeed. In
this work, we analyze the super-resolving capacity for number and location
recoveries in the super-resolution of positive sources and aim to answer the
resolution limit problem in a rigorous manner. Specifically, we introduce the
computational resolution limit for respectively the number detection and
location recovery in the one-dimensional super-resolution problem and
quantitatively characterize their dependency on the cutoff frequency,
signal-to-noise ratio, and the sparsity of the sources. As a direct
consequence, we show that targeting at the sparest positive solution in the
super-resolution already provides the optimal resolution order. These results
are generalized to multi-dimensional spaces. Our estimates indicate that there
exist phase transitions in the corresponding reconstructions, which are
confirmed by numerical experiments. On the other hand, despite the fact that
positivity plays important roles in improving the resolution of certain
super-resolution algorithms, our theory has made several different but
significant discoveries: i) The a priori information of positivity cannot
further improve the order of the resolution limit; ii) The positivity of the
source sometimes deteriorates the resolution limit instead of enhancing it. In
particular, under certain signal-to-noise ratio, two point sources with
different phases actually have a better resolution limit than those with the
same one.


  Wilson's formulation of lattice QCD is attractive for many reasons, but
perhaps mainly because of its simplicity and conceptual clarity. Numerical
simulations of the Wilson theory (and of its improved versions) tend to be
extremely demanding, however, to the extent that they rapidly become
impractical at small quark masses. Recent advances in simulation algorithms now
allow such simulations to be pushed to significantly smaller masses without
having to compromise in other ways. Contact with chiral perturbation theory can
thus be made and many physics questions can be addressed that previously
appeared to be inaccessible.


  Accurate prediction is important for operating an autonomous vehicle in
interactive scenarios. Prediction must be fast, to support multiple requests
from a planner exploring a range of possible futures. The generated predictions
must accurately represent the probabilities of predicted trajectories, while
also capturing different modes of behaviour (such as turning left vs continuing
straight at a junction). To this end, we present DiPA, an interactive predictor
that addresses these challenging requirements. Previous interactive prediction
methods use an encoding of k-mode-samples, which under-represents the full
distribution. Other methods optimise closest-mode evaluations, which test
whether one of the predictions is similar to the ground-truth, but allow
additional unlikely predictions to occur, over-representing unlikely
predictions. DiPA addresses these limitations by using a Gaussian-Mixture-Model
to encode the full distribution, and optimising predictions using both
probabilistic and closest-mode measures. These objectives respectively optimise
probabilistic accuracy and the ability to capture distinct behaviours, and
there is a challenging trade-off between them. We are able to solve both
together using a novel training regime. DiPA achieves new state-of-the-art
performance on the INTERACTION and NGSIM datasets, and improves over the
baseline (MFP) when both closest-mode and probabilistic evaluations are used.
This demonstrates effective prediction for supporting a planner on interactive
scenarios.


  Notch stress intensity factors and stress intensity factors are obtained
analytically for isotoxal star-shaped polygonal voids and rigid inclusions (and
also for the corresponding limit cases of star-shaped cracks and stiffeners),
when loaded through remote inhomogeneous (self-equilibrated, polynomial)
antiplane shear stress in an infinite linear elastic matrix. Usually these
solutions show stress singularities at the inclusion corners. It is shown that
an infinite set of geometries and loading conditions exist for which not only
the singularity is absent, but the stress vanishes ('annihilates') at the
corners. Thus the material, which even without the inclusion corners would have
a finite stress, remains unstressed at these points in spite of the applied
remote load. Moreover, similar conditions are determined in which a star-shaped
crack or stiffener leaves the ambient stress completely unperturbed, thus
reaching a condition of 'quasi-static invisibility'. Stress annihilation and
invisibility define optimal loading modes for the overall strength of a
composite and are useful for designing ultra-resistant materials.


  In this short note, we derive a system of two nonlocal equations for the
water-wave problem following the work of [AFM06]. Specifically, we consider a
fluid with a one-dimensional free surface for an irrotational fluid both with,
and without, surface tension. We show that these equations can be useful for
deriving direct maps between boundary data at the various interfaces and
consider various asymptotic regimes. Finally, for periodic traveling wave
solutions, we derive a new single-equation that is derivative free and has the
potential to simplify the process of finding asymyptotic expansions of the
solutions as well as reduce numerical errors when solving computationally.


  We theoretically study the joint influence of uniform Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya
(DM) interactions, symmetric exchange anisotropy (with its axis parallel to the
DM vector) and arbitrarily oriented magnetic fields on one-dimensional spin 1/2
antiferromagnets. We show that the zero-temperature phase diagram contains
three competing phases: (i) an antiferromagnet with Neel vector in the plane
spanned by the DM vector and the magnetic field, (ii) a {\em dimerized}
antiferromagnet with Neel vector perpendicular to both the DM vector and the
magnetic field, and (iii) a gapless Luttinger liquid. Phase (i) is destroyed by
a small magnetic field component along the DM vector and is furthermore
unstable beyond a critical value of easy-plane anisotropy, which we estimate
using Abelian and non-Abelian bosonization along with perturbative
renormalization group. We propose a mathematical equivalent of the spin model
in a one-dimensional Josephson junction (JJ) array located in proximity to a
bulk superconductor.
  We discuss the analogues of the magnetic phases in the superconducting
context and comment on their experimental viability.


  This is Leonid Vaksman's monograph "Quantum bounded symmetric domains" (in
Russian), preceded with an English translation of the table of contents and (a
part) of the introduction.
  Quantum bounded symmetric domains are interesting from several points of
view. In particular, they provide interesting examples for noncommutative
complex analysis (i.e., the theory of subalgebras of C^*-algebars) initiated by
W. Arveson.


  Neon cluster ions Ne$_s^+$ grown in pre-ionized, mass-to-charge selected
helium nanodroplets (HNDs) reveal a strong enrichment of the heavy isotope
$^{22}$Ne that depends on cluster size s and the experimental conditions. For
small sizes the enrichment is much larger than previously reported for bare
neon clusters grown in nozzle expansions and subsequently ionized. The
enrichment is traced to the massive evaporation of neon atoms in a collision
cell that is used to strip helium from the HNDs. We derive a relation between
the enrichment of $^{22}$Ne in the cluster ion and its corresponding depletion
factor $F$ in the vapor phase. The value thus found for $F$ is in excellent
agreement with a theoretical expression that relates isotopic fractionation in
two-phase equilibria of atomic gases to the Debye temperature. Furthermore, the
difference in zero-point energies between the two isotopes computed from F
agrees reasonably well with theoretical studies of neon cluster ions that
include nuclear quantum effects in the harmonic approximation. Another fitting
parameter provides an estimate for the size s$_i$ of the precursor of the
observed Ne$_s^+$. The value is in satisfactory agreement with the size
estimated by modeling the growth of Ne$_s^+$, and with lower and upper limits
deduced from other experimental data. On the other hand, neon clusters grown in
neutral HNDs that are subsequently ionized by electron bombardment exhibit no
statistically significant isotope enrichment at all. The finding suggests that
the extent of ionization-induced dissociation of clusters embedded in HNDs is
considerably smaller than for bare clusters.


  In this paper, the 2-adic complexity of a class of balanced Whiteman
generalized cyclotomic sequences of period $pq$ is considered. Through
calculating the determinant of the circulant matrix constructed by one of these
sequences, we derive a lower bound on the 2-adic complexity of the
corresponding sequence, which further expands our previous work (Zhao C, Sun Y
and Yan T. Study on 2-adic complexity of a class of balanced generalized
cyclotomic sequences. Journal of Cryptologic Research,6(4):455-462, 2019). The
result shows that the 2-adic complexity of this class of sequences is large
enough to resist the attack of the rational approximation algorithm(RAA) for
feedback with carry shift registers(FCSRs), i.e., it is in fact lower bounded
by $pq-p-q-1$, which is far larger than one half of the period of the
sequences. Particularly, the 2-adic complexity is maximal if suitable
parameters are chosen.


  Resummation methods using continued functions are implemented to converge
divergent series appearing in perturbation problems related to continuous phase
transitions in field theories. In some cases, better convergence properties are
obtained using continued functions than diagonal Pade approximants, which are
extensively used in literature. We check the reliability of critical exponent
estimates derived previously in universality classes of O(n)-symmetric models
(classical phase transitions) and Gross-Neveu-Yukawa models (quantum phase
transitions) using new methods.


  High-dimensional data models, often with low sample size, abound in many
interdisciplinary studies, genomics and large biological systems being most
noteworthy. The conventional assumption of multinormality or linearity of
regression may not be plausible for such models which are likely to be
statistically complex due to a large number of parameters as well as various
underlying restraints. As such, parametric approaches may not be very
effective. Anything beyond parametrics, albeit, having increased scope and
robustness perspectives, may generally be baffled by the low sample size and
hence unable to give reasonable margins of errors. Kendall's tau statistic is
exploited in this context with emphasis on dimensional rather than sample size
asymptotics. The Chen--Stein theorem has been thoroughly appraised in this
study. Applications of these findings in some microarray data models are
illustrated.


  The unique electrical and material properties of 4H-silicon-carbide (4H-SiC)
make it a promising candidate material for high rate particle detectors. In
contrast to the ubiquitously used silicon (Si), 4H-SiC offers a higher carrier
saturation velocity and larger breakdown voltage, enabling a high intrinsic
time resolution and mitigating pile-up effects. Additionally, as radiation
hardness requirements grow more demanding, wide-bandgap materials such as
4H-SiC could offer better performance. In this work, the detector performance
of 50 micron thick 4H-SiC p-in-n planar pad sensors was investigated at room
temperature, using an 241Am alpha source at reverse biases of up to 1100 V.
Samples subjected to neutron irradiation with fluences of up to 1e16/cm^2 were
included in the study in order to quantify the radiation hardness properties of
4H-SiC. The obtained results are compared to previously performed UV-TCT
studies. Samples exhibit a drop in charge collection efficiency (CCE) with
increasing irradiation fluence, partially compensated at high reverse bias
voltages far above full depletion voltage. A plateau of the collected charges
is observed in accordance with the depletion of the volume the alpha particles
penetrate for an unirradiated reference detector. For the neutron-irradiated
samples, such a plateau only becomes apparent at higher reverse bias. For the
highest investigated fluence, CCE behaves almost linearly with increasing
reverse bias. Compared to UV-TCT measurements, the reverse bias required to
deplete a sensitive volume covering full energy deposition is lower, due to the
small penetration depth of the alpha particles. At the highest reverse bias,
the measured CCE values agree well with earlier UV-TCT studies, with
discrepancies between 1% and 5%.


  We develop the real vertex formalism for the computation of the topological
string partition function with D-branes and O-planes at the fixed point locus
of an anti-holomorphic involution acting non-trivially on the toric diagram of
any local toric Calabi-Yau manifold. Our results cover in particular the real
vertex with non-trivial fixed leg. We give a careful derivation of the relevant
ingredients using duality with Chern-Simons theory on orbifolds. We show that
the real vertex can also be interpreted in terms of a statistical model of
symmetric crystal melting. Using this latter connection, we also assess the
constant map contribution in Calabi-Yau orientifold models. We find that there
are no perturbative contributions beyond one-loop, but a non-trivial sum over
non-perturbative sectors, which we compare with the non-perturbative
contribution to the closed string expansion.


  The operator manifold formalism (part I) enables the unification of the
geometry and the field theory, and yields the quantization of geometry. This is
the mathematical framework for our physical outlook that the geometry and
fields, with the internal symmetries and all interactions, as well the four
major principles of relativity (special and general), quantum, gauge and colour
confinement, are derivative, and come into being simultaneously in the stable
system of the underlying ``primordial structures''. In part II we attempt to
develop, further, the microscopic approach to the Standard Model of particle
physics, which enables an insight to the key problems of particle
phenomenology. We suggest the microscopic theory of the unified electroweak
interactions. The Higgs bosons have arisen on an analogy of the Cooper pairs in
superconductivity. Besides of microscopic interpretation of all physical
parameters the resulting theory also makes plausible following testable
implications for the current experiments: 1. The Higgs bosons never could
emerge in spacetime continuum, thus, they cannot be discovered in these
experiments nor at any energy range. 2. For each of the three SM families of
quarks and leptons there are corresponding heavy family partners with the same
quantum numbers lying far above the electroweak scale, respectively, at the
energy threshold values: $E_{1}>(419.6 \pm 12.0)GeV, \quad E_{2}= (457.6 \pm
13.2)GeV$ and $E_{3}=(521.4 \pm 15.0)GeV.$


  The Johannsen-Psaltis (JP) black hole is a phenomenologically viable metric
obtained by judiciously deforming the Kerr black hole such that the metric is
asymptotically flat and causal and is consistent with the weak field,
post-Newtonian tests of gravity; however, it has additional hairs besides its
mass and angular momentum. As it deviates from the Kerr black hole in the
strong coupling regime, it is a useful metric to test the Kerr hypothesis that
states that all astrophysical black holes are of the Kerr type. Here we give a
membrane description of this black hole that effectively amounts to replacing
the observable part of the black hole with a fluid with thermal properties. A
timelike membrane, a stretched horizon local in time is assumed to exist. This
membrane is expected to approximate the null event horizon that is highly
non-local in time. We derive the energy-momentum tensor of the fluid and all
the transport coefficients using the action formulation to the membrane as
advocated by Parikh and Wilczek. In the fluid description, one observes that
the finiteness of the transport coefficients constrains the additional hairs of
the Johannsen-Psaltis black hole. Analytically continuing the pressure of the
fluid to all values of the radial coordinate $r$, one obtains interesting Van
der Waals-type behavior of the pressure of the fluid which diverges at the
radius of the outer ergosphere, lending support, from the membrane paradigm's
perspective to the claim that relativistic astrophysical jets are produced by
the ergoregion of the black hole.


  Deep inelastic scattering on nuclei at the Electron-Ion Collider will open
new opportunities to investigate the structure of matter. Heavy flavor-tagged
jets are complementary probes of the partonic composition and transport
coefficients of large nuclei, but introduce a new mass scale that modifies the
structure of parton showers and must be carefully accounted for in perturbative
calculations. In the framework of soft-collinear effective theory with Glauber
gluon interactions, we present the first calculation of inclusive charm-jet and
bottom-jet cross sections in electron-nucleus collisions at next-to-leading
order and compare them to the reference electron-proton case. We also show
predictions for the heavy flavor-tagged jet momentum sharing distributions to
further clarify the correlated in-medium modification of jet substructure.


  W.H.~Mills has determined, for a finitely generated abelian group $G$, the
regular subgroups $N \cong G$ of $S(G)$, the group of permutations on the set
$G$, which have the same holomorph of $G$, that is, such that $N_{S(G)}(N) =
N_{S(G)}(\rho(G))$, where $\rho$ is the (right) regular representation.
  We give an alternative approach to Mills' result, which relies on a
characterization of the regular subgroups of $N_{S(G)}(\rho(G))$ in terms of
commutative ring structures on $G$.
  We are led to solve, for the case of a finitely generated abelian group $G$,
the following problem: given an abelian group $(G, +)$, what are the
commutative ring structures $(G, +, \cdot)$ such that all automorphism of $G$
as a group are also automorphisms of $G$ as a ring?


  The technique of nuclear track emulsions is used to explore the fragmentation
of light relativistic nuclei down to the most peripheral interactions - nuclear
"white" stars. A complete pattern of therelativistic dissociation of a $^8$B
nucleus with target fragment accompaniment is presented. Relativistic
dissociation $^{9}$Be$\to2\alpha$ is explored using significant statistics and
a relative contribution of $^{8}$Be decays from 0$^+$ and 2$^+$ states is
established. Target fragment accompaniments are shown for relativistic
fragmentation $^{14}$N$\to$3He+H and $^{22}$Ne$\to$5He. The leading role of the
electromagnetic dissociation on heavy nuclei with respect to break-ups on
target protons is demonstrated in all these cases. It is possible to conclude
that the peripheral dissociation of relativistic nuclei in nuclear track
emulsion is a unique tool to study many-body systems composed of lightest
nuclei and nucleons in the energy scale relevant for nuclear astrophysics.


  This paper presents the application of an iterative learning control scheme
to improve the position tracking performance for an articulated soft robotic
arm during aggressive maneuvers. Two antagonistically arranged, inflatable
bellows actuate the robotic arm and provide high compliance while enabling fast
actuation. Switching valves are used for pressure control of the soft
actuators. A norm-optimal iterative learning control scheme based on a linear
model of the system is presented and applied in parallel with a feedback
controller. The learning scheme is experimentally evaluated on an aggressive
trajectory involving set point shifts of 60 degrees within 0.2 seconds. The
effectiveness of the learning approach is demonstrated by a reduction of the
root-mean-square tracking error from 13 degrees to less than 2 degrees after
applying the learning scheme for less than 30 iterations.


  We calculate the fundamental groups $\pi=\pi_1(P^2\setminus B)$ for all
irreducible plane sextics $B\subset\P^2$ with simple singularities for which
$\pi$ is known to admit a dihedral quotient $D_{10}$. All groups found are
shown to be finite, two of them being of large order: 960 and 21600.


  Two-dimensional (2D) Dirac-like electron gases have attracted tremendous
research interest ever since the discovery of free-standing graphene. The
linear energy dispersion and non-trivial Berry phase play the pivotal role in
the remarkable electronic, optical, mechanical and chemical properties of 2D
Dirac materials. The known 2D Dirac materials are gapless only within certain
approximations, for example, in the absence of SOC. Here we report a route to
establishing robust Dirac cones in 2D materials with nonsymmorphic crystal
lattice. The nonsymmorphic symmetry enforces Dirac-like band dispersions around
certain high-symmetry momenta in the presence of SOC. Through $\mu$-ARPES
measurements we observe Dirac-like band dispersions in $\alpha$-bismuthene. The
nonsymmorphic lattice symmetry is confirmed by $\mu$-LEED and STM. Our
first-principles simulations and theoretical topological analysis demonstrate
the correspondence between nonsymmorphic symmetry and Dirac states. This
mechanism can be straightforwardly generalized to other nonsymmorphic
materials. The results open the door for the search of symmetry enforced Dirac
fermions in the vast uncharted world of nonsymmorphic 2D materials.


  I summarize the highlights of the conference. First I provide a brief history
of the beach symposia series our massive star community has been organizing.
Then I use most of my allocated space discussing what I believe are the main
answered and open questions in the field. Finally I conclude with a perspective
of the future of massive star research.


  We study the classical Heisenberg model on the geometrically frustrated
Shastry-Sutherland (SS) lattice with additional Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya (DM)
interaction in the presence of an external magnetic field. We show that several
noncollinear and noncoplanar magnetic phases, such as the flux, all-in/all-out,
3in-1out/3out-1in, and canted-flux phases are stabilized over wide ranges of
parameters in the presence of the DM interaction. We discuss the role of DM
interaction in stabilizing these complex magnetic phases. When coupled to these
noncoplanar magnetic phases, itinerant electrons experience a finite Berry
phase, which manifests in the form of topological Hall effect, whereby a
non-zero transverse conductivity is observed even in the absence of a magnetic
field. We study this anomalous magneto-transport by calculating the electron
band structure and transverse conductivity for a wide range of parameter
values, and demonstrate the existence of topological Hall effect in the SS
lattice. We explore the role of the strength of itinerant electron-local moment
coupling on electron transport and show that the topological Hall features
evolve significantly from strong to intermediate values of the coupling
strength, and are accompanied by the appearance of a finite spin Hall
conductivity.


  Many video enhancement algorithms rely on optical flow to register frames in
a video sequence. Precise flow estimation is however intractable; and optical
flow itself is often a sub-optimal representation for particular video
processing tasks. In this paper, we propose task-oriented flow (TOFlow), a
motion representation learned in a self-supervised, task-specific manner. We
design a neural network with a trainable motion estimation component and a
video processing component, and train them jointly to learn the task-oriented
flow. For evaluation, we build Vimeo-90K, a large-scale, high-quality video
dataset for low-level video processing. TOFlow outperforms traditional optical
flow on standard benchmarks as well as our Vimeo-90K dataset in three video
processing tasks: frame interpolation, video denoising/deblocking, and video
super-resolution.


  Recent experiments on the Ba$_3$XSb$_2$O$_9$ family have revealed materials
that potentially realise spin- and spin-orbital liquid physics. However, the
lattice structure of these materials is complicated due to the presence of
charged X$^{2+}$-Sb$^{5+}$ dumbbells, with two possible orientations. To model
the lattice structure, we consider a frustrated model of charged dumbbells on
the triangular lattice, with long-range Coulomb interactions. We study this
model using Monte Carlo simulation, and find a freezing temperature, $T_{\sf
frz}$, at which the simulated structure factor matches well to low-temperature
x-ray diffraction data for Ba$_3$CuSb$_2$O$_9$. At $T=T_{\sf frz}$ we find a
complicated ``branching'' structure of superexchange-linked X$^{2+}$ clusters,
and show that this gives a natural explanation for the presence of orphan
spins. Finally we provide a plausible mechanism by which such dumbbell disorder
can promote a spin-orbital resonant state with delocalised orphan spins.


  We analyze the performance of a system composed of two interfering
point-to-point links where the transmitters can exploit a common relay to
improve their individual transmission rate. When the relay uses the
amplify-and-forward protocol we prove that it is not always optimal (in some
sense defined later on) to exploit all the relay transmit power and derive the
corresponding optimal amplification factor. For the case of the
decode-and-forward protocol, already investigated in [1], we show that this
protocol, through the cooperation degree between each transmitter and the
relay, is the only one that naturally introduces a game between the
transmitters. For the estimate-and-forward protocol, we derive two rate regions
for the general case of discrete interference relay channels (IRCs) and
specialize these results to obtain the Gaussian case; these regions correspond
to two compression schemes at the relay, having different resolution levels.
These schemes are compared analytically in some special cases. All the results
mentioned are illustrated by simulations, given in this part, and exploited to
study power allocation games in multi-band IRCs in the second part of this
two-part paper.


  The ALICE detector recorded Pb-Pb collisions at sqrtsNN = 2.76 TeV at the LHC
in November-December 2010. We present the results of the measurements that
provide a first characterization of the hot and dense state of
strongly-interacting matter produced in heavy-ion collisions at these energies.
In particular, we describe the measurements of the particle multiplicity,
collective flow, Bose-Einstein correlations, high-momentum suppression, and
their dependence on the collision centrality. These observables are related to
the energy density, the size, the viscosity, and the opacity of the system.
Finally, we give an outlook on the upcoming results, with emphasis on heavy
flavour production.


  We propose a new type of ultimate-Shannon-limit-approaching codes called
spatially coupled protograph-based low-density parity-check Hadamard
convolutional codes (SC-PLDPCH-CCs), which are constructed by spatially
coupling PLDPC-Hadamard block codes. We develop an efficient decoding algorithm
that combines pipeline decoding and layered scheduling for the decoding of
SC-PLDPCH-CCs, and analyze the latency and complexity of the decoder. To
estimate the decoding thresholds of SC-PLDPCHCCs, we first propose a layered
protograph extrinsic information transfer (PEXIT) algorithm to evaluate the
thresholds of spatially coupled PLDPC-Hadamard terminated codes
(SC-PLDPCH-TDCs) with a moderate coupling length. With the use of the proposed
layered PEXIT method, we develop a genetic algorithm to find good
SC-PLDPCH-TDCs in a systematic way. Then we extend the coupling length of these
SC-PLDPCH-TDCs to form good SC-PLDPCH-CCs. Results show that our constructed
SC-PLDPCH-CCs can achieve comparable thresholds to the block code counterparts.
Simulations illustrate the superiority of the SC-PLDPCH-CCs over the block code
counterparts and other state-of-the-art low-rate codes in terms of error
performance. For the rate-0.00295 SC-PLDPCH-CC, a bit error rate of 1e-5 is
achieved at Eb/N0 = -1.465 dB, which is only 0.125 dB from the ultimate Shannon
limit.


  The expansion of a polytope is an important parameter for the analysis of the
random walks on its graph. A conjecture of Mihai and Vazirani states that all
$0/1$-polytopes have expansion at least 1. We show that the generalization to
half-integral polytopes does not hold by constructing $d$-dimensional
half-integral polytopes whose expansion decreases exponentially fast with $d$.
We also prove that the expansion of half-integral zonotopes is uniformly
bounded away from $0$. As an intermediate result, we show that half-integral
zonotopes are always graphical.


  Spacetime Discontinuous Galerkin (DG) methods are used to solve hyperbolic
PDEs describing wavelike physical phenomena. When the PDEs are nonlinear, the
speed of propagation of the phenomena, called the wavespeed, at any point in
the spacetime domain is computed as part of the solution. We give an advancing
front algorithm to construct a simplicial mesh of the spacetime domain suitable
for DG solutions. Given a simplicial mesh of a bounded linear or planar space
domain M, we incrementally construct a mesh of the spacetime domain M x
[0,infinity) such that the solution can be computed in constant time per
element. We add a patch of spacetime elements to the mesh at every step. The
boundary of every patch is causal which means that the elements in the patch
can be solved immediately and that the patches in the mesh are partially
ordered by dependence. The elements in a single patch are coupled because they
share implicit faces; however, the number of elements in each patch is bounded.
The main contribution of this paper is sufficient constraints on the progress
in time made by the algorithm at each step which guarantee that a new patch
with causal boundary can be added to the mesh at every step even when the
wavespeed is increasing discontinuously. Our algorithm adapts to the local
gradation of the space mesh as well as the wavespeed that most constrains
progress at each step. Previous algorithms have been restricted at each step by
the maximum wavespeed throughout the entire spacetime domain.


  Fully automatic worst-case complexity analysis has a number of applications
in computer-assisted program manipulation. A classical and powerful approach to
complexity analysis consists in formally deriving, from the program syntax, a
set of constraints expressing bounds on the resources required by the program,
which are then solved, possibly applying safe approximations. In several
interesting cases, these constraints take the form of recurrence relations.
While techniques for solving recurrences are known and implemented in several
computer algebra systems, these do not completely fulfill the needs of fully
automatic complexity analysis: they only deal with a somewhat restricted class
of recurrence relations, or sometimes require user intervention, or they are
restricted to the computation of exact solutions that are often so complex to
be unmanageable, and thus useless in practice. In this paper we briefly
describe PURRS, a system and software library aimed at providing all the
computer algebra services needed by applications performing or exploiting the
results of worst-case complexity analyses. The capabilities of the system are
illustrated by means of examples derived from the analysis of programs written
in a domain-specific functional programming language for real-time embedded
systems.


  We propose new cross section ratios in ultra-peripheral A$+$A and $p+$A
collisions (UPCs) as a potential experimental signal of saturation physics. We
consider the ratio $R_1$ of elastic vector meson photoproduction cross section
to the inclusive hadron or jet photoproduction cross section. The ratio can be
measured in the $\gamma +$A and $\gamma + p$ collisions taking place in the
UPCs. We label the ratios $R_1 ({\rm A})$ and $R_1 (p)$, respectively.
Constructing the double ratio $R_{\rm{UPC}} ({\rm A}) = R_1 ({\rm A})/R_1 (p)$,
and performing a small-$x$ calculation both in the quasi-classical
approximation and by including small-$x$ evolution, we observe that
$R_{\rm{UPC}} ({\rm A})$ exhibits a markedly different dependence on the
nuclear atomic number inside and outside the saturation region. This result
indicates that $R_{\rm{UPC}} ({\rm A})$ and $R_1 ({\rm A})$ measurements in
UPCs may help in the experimental searches for the evidence of saturation
physics.


  Direction-of-arrival (DOA) estimation is widely applied in acoustic source
localization. A multi-frequency model is suitable for characterizing the
broadband structure in acoustic signals. In this paper, the continuous
(gridless) DOA estimation problem with multiple frequencies is considered. This
problem is formulated as an atomic norm minimization (ANM) problem. The ANM
problem is equivalent to a semi-definite program (SDP) which can be solved by
an off-the-shelf SDP solver. The dual certificate condition is provided to
certify the optimality of the SDP solution so that the sources can be localized
by finding the roots of a polynomial. We also construct the dual polynomial to
satisfy the dual certificate condition and show that such a construction exists
when the source amplitude has a uniform magnitude. In multi-frequency ANM,
spatial aliasing of DOAs at higher frequencies can cause challenges. We discuss
this issue extensively and propose a robust solution to combat aliasing.
Numerical results support our theoretical findings and demonstrate the
effectiveness of the proposed method.


  Rooted in collaborative efforts, cybersecurity spans the scope of cyber
competitions and warfare. Despite extensive research into team strategy in
sports and project management, empirical study in cyber-security is minimal.
This gap motivates this paper, which presents the Collaborative Cyber Team
Formation (CCTF) Simulation Framework. Using Agent-Based Modeling, we delve
into the dynamics of team creation and output. We focus on exposing the impact
of structural dynamics on performance while controlling other variables
carefully. Our findings highlight the importance of strategic team formations,
an aspect often overlooked in corporate cybersecurity and cyber competition
teams.


  We propose a new approach to generate a reliable reduced model for a
parametric elliptic problem, in the presence of noisy data. The reference model
reduction procedure is the directional HiPOD method, which combines
Hierarchical Model reduction with a standard Proper Orthogonal Decomposition,
according to an offline/online paradigm. In this paper we show that directional
HiPOD looses in terms of accuracy when problem data are affected by noise. This
is due to the interpolation driving the online phase, since it replicates, by
definition, the noise trend. To overcome this limit, we replace interpolation
with Machine Learning fitting models which better discriminate relevant
physical features in the data from irrelevant unstructured noise. The numerical
assessment, although preliminary, confirms the potentialities of the new
approach.


  We consider the following quasi-linear parabolic system of backward partial
differential equations: $(\partial_t+L)u+f(\cdot,\cdot,u, \nabla u\sigma)=0$ on
$[0,T]\times \mathbb{R}^d\qquad u_T=\phi$, where $L$ is a possibly degenerate
second order differential operator with merely measurable coefficients. We
solve this system in the framework of generalized Dirichlet forms and employ
the stochastic calculus associated to the Markov process with generator $L$ to
obtain a probabilistic representation of the solution $u$ by solving the
corresponding backward stochastic differential equation. The solution satisfies
the corresponding mild equation which is equivalent to being a generalized
solution of the PDE. A further main result is the generalization of the
martingale representation theorem using the stochastic calculus associated to
the generalized Dirichlet form given by $L$. The nonlinear term $f$ satisfies a
monotonicity condition with respect to $u$ and a Lipschitz condition with
respect to $\nabla u$.


  We prove that any noetherian quasi-excellent scheme of characteristic zero
admits a strong desingularization which is functorial with respect to all
regular morphisms. We show that as an easy formal consequence of this result
one obtains strong functorial desingularization for many other spaces of
characteristic zero including quasi-excellent stacks and formal schemes, and
complex and non-archimedean analytic spaces. Moreover, these functors easily
generalize to non-compact setting by use of converging blow up hyper-sequences
with regular centers.


  We consider Aichinger's equation
$$f(x_1+\cdots+x_{m+1})=\sum_{i=1}^{m+1}g_i(x_1,x_2,\cdots,
\widehat{x_i},\cdots, x_{m+1})$$ for functions defined on commutative
semigroups which take values on commutative groups. The solutions of this
equation are, under very mild hypotheses, generalized polynomials. We use the
canonical form of generalized polynomials to prove that compositions and
products of generalized polynomials are again generalized polynomials and that
the bounds for the degrees are, in this new context, the natural ones. In some
cases, we also show that a polynomial function defined on a semigroup can
uniquely be extended to a polynomial function defined on a larger group. For
example, if $f$ solves Aichinger's equation under the additional restriction
that $x_1,\cdots,x_{m+1}\in \mathbb{R}_+^p$, then there exists a unique
polynomial function $F$ defined on $\mathbb{R}^p$ such that
$F_{|\mathbb{R}_+^p}=f$. In particular, if $f$ is also bounded on a set
$A\subseteq \mathbb{R}_+^p$ with positive Lebesgue measure then its unique
polynomial extension $F$ is an ordinary polynomial of $p$ variables with total
degree $\leq m$, and the functions $g_i$ are also restrictions to
$\mathbb{R}_+^{pm}$ of ordinary polynomials of total degree $\leq m$ defined on
$\mathbb{R}^{pm}$.


  Recently Stochastic Kronecker Graph (SKG), a network generation model, and
vertex-centric BSP, a graph processing framework like Pregel, have attracted
much attention in the network analysis community. Unfortunately the two are not
very well-suited for each other and thus an implementation of SKG on
vertex-centric BSP must either be done serially or in an unnatural manner.
  In this paper, we present a new network generation model, which we call
Poisson Stochastic Kronecker Graph (PSKG), that generate edges according to the
Poisson distribution. The advantage of PSKG is that it is easily parallelizable
on vertex-centric BSP, requires no communication between computational nodes,
and yet retains all the desired properties of SKG.


  We define quantum W-algebras generalizing the results of Reshetikhin and the
second author, and Shiraishi-Kubo-Awata-Odake. The quantum W-algebra associated
to sl_N is an associative algebra depending on two parameters. For special
values of parameters it becomes the ordinary W-algebra of sl_N, or the
q-deformed classical W-algebra of sl_N. We construct free field realizations of
the quantum W-algebras and the screening currents. We also point out some
interesting elliptic structures arising in these algebras. In particular, we
show that the screening currents satisfy elliptic analogues of the Drinfeld
relations in U_q(n^).


  This paper presents aplib, a Java library for programming intelligent agents,
featuring BDI and multi agency, but adding on top of it a novel layer of
tactical programming inspired by the domain of theorem proving. Aplib is also
implemented in such a way to provide the fluency of a Domain Specific Language
(DSL). Compared to dedicated BDI agent programming languages such as JASON,
2APL, or GOAL,aplib's embedded DSL approach does mean that \aplib\ programmers
will still be limited by Java syntax, but on other hand they get all the
advantages that Java programmers get: rich language features (object
orientation, static type checking, $\lambda$-expression, libraries, etc), a
whole array of development tools, integration with other technologies, large
community, etc.


  Event-by-event fluctuations of the average transverse momentum of produced
particles near mid-rapidity have been measured by the PHENIX Collaboration in
sqrt(s_NN)=200 GeV Au+Au and p+p collisions at the Relativistic Heavy Ion
Collider. The fluctuations are observed to be in excess of the expectation for
statistically independent particle emission for all centralities. The excess
fluctuations exhibit a dependence on both the centrality of the collision and
on the transverse momentum window over which the average is calculated. Both
the centrality and p_T dependence can be well reproduced by a simulation of
random particle production with the addition of contributions from hard
scattering processes.


  We provide new elementary proofs of the following two results: every complex
variety is locally the graphs of a Dir-minimizing function, first proved by
Almgren; the gradients of Dir-minimizing functions, in principle
square-summable, are p-integrable for some p > 2, proved by De Lellis and the
author. In the planar case, we prove that our integrability exponents are
optimal.


  A new stable pyrrolidine functionalized fullerene derivative, C69H10N2O2, has
been synthesized, purified by high performance liquid chromatography, and
characterized by MALDI mass spectrometry, ultraviolet-visible spectroscopy,
Fourier transform infrared, 1H and 13C nuclear magnetic resonance. The magnetic
properties of the analogous endohedral species have been studied by both
continuous wave (CW) and pulsed EPR. CW-EPR spectra indicated an anisotropic
hyperfine interaction and a permanent zero-field-splitting (ZFS). Both CW and
pulsed EPR showed the ZFS parameter Deff to be around 17 MHz. Pulsed EPR
revealed a biexponential decay in both T1 and T2, yielding a molecular tumbling
correlation time of 31.4 +/- 2.5 ps.


  Accurate computational identification of promoters remains a challenge as
these key DNA regulatory regions have variable structures composed of
functional motifs that provide gene specific initiation of transcription. In
this paper we utilize Convolutional Neural Networks (CNN) to analyze sequence
characteristics of prokaryotic and eukaryotic promoters and build their
predictive models. We trained the same CNN architecture on promoters of four
very distant organisms: human, plant (Arabidopsis), and two bacteria
(Escherichia coli and Mycoplasma pneumonia). We found that CNN trained on
sigma70 subclass of Escherichia coli promoter gives an excellent classification
of promoters and non-promoter sequences (Sn=0.90, Sp=0.96, CC=0.84). The
Bacillus subtilis promoters identification CNN model achieves Sn=0.91, Sp=0.95,
and CC=0.86. For human and Arabidopsis promoters we employ CNNs for
identification of two well-known promoter classes (TATA and non-TATA
promoters). CNNs models nicely recognize these complex functional regions. For
human Sn/Sp/CC accuracy of prediction reached 0.95/0.98/0,90 on TATA and
0.90/0.98/0.89 for non-TATA promoter sequences, respectively. For Arabidopsis
we observed Sn/Sp/CC 0.95/0.97/0.91 (TATA) and 0.94/0.94/0.86 (non-TATA)
promoters. Thus, the developed CNN models (implemented in CNNProm program)
demonstrated the ability of deep learning with grasping complex promoter
sequence characteristics and achieve significantly higher accuracy compared to
the previously developed promoter prediction programs. As the suggested
approach does not require knowledge of any specific promoter features, it can
be easily extended to identify promoters and other complex functional regions
in sequences of many other and especially newly sequenced genomes. The CNNProm
program is available to run at web server http://www.softberry.com.


  We perform a comprehensive analysis of a collective decision-making model
inspired by honeybee behavior. This model integrates individual exploration for
option discovery and social interactions for information sharing, while also
considering option qualities. Our assessment of the decision process outcome
employs standard consensus metrics and investigates its correlation with
convergence time, revealing common trade-offs between speed and accuracy.
Furthermore, we investigate fluctuations arising from finite-size effects. In
scenarios with strong interdependence, we identify an absorbing phase
transition and scrutinize its key features, including critical fluctuations in
finite spatial systems. We find that fluctuations play a significant role in
the collective decision-making process, particularly when options have similar
qualities. Our findings are especially relevant for finite adaptive systems, as
they provide insights into navigating decision-making scenarios with similar
options more effectively. Finally, we show that this model also fulfills
Weber's Law of perception, aligning with previous analyses of
collective-decision problems in their adherence to different psychophysical
laws.


  We compare three graphical methods for displaying evidence in a legal case:
Wigmore Charts, Bayesian Networks and Chain Event Graphs. We find that these
methods are aimed at three distinct audiences, respectively lawyers, forensic
scientists and the police. The methods are illustrated using part of the
evidence in the case of the murder of Meredith Kercher. More specifically, we
focus on representing the list of propositions, evidence, testimony and facts
given in the first trial against Raffaele Sollecito and Amanda Knox with these
graphical methodologies.


  In this paper we first extend the diminishing stepsize method for nonconvex
constrained problems presented in [4] to deal with equality constraints and a
nonsmooth objective function of composite type. We then consider the particular
case in which the constraints are convex and satisfy a standard constraint
qualification and show that in this setting the algorithm can be considerably
simplified, reducing the computational burden of each iteration.


  As our cities become more intelligent and more connected with new
technologies like 6G, improving communication between vehicles and
infrastructure is essential while reducing energy consumption. This study
proposes a secure framework for vehicle-to-infrastructure (V2I) backscattering
near an eavesdropping vehicle to maximize the sum secrecy rate of V2I
backscatter communication over multiple coherence slots. This sustainable
framework aims to jointly optimize the reflection coefficients at the
backscattering vehicle, carrier emitter power, and artificial noise at the
infrastructure, along with the target vehicle's linear trajectory in the
presence of an eavesdropping vehicle in the parallel lane. To achieve this
optimization, we separated the problem into three parts: backscattering
coefficient, power allocation, and trajectory design problems. We respectively
adopted parallel computing, fractional programming, and finding all the
candidates for the global optimal solution to obtain the global optimal
solution for these three problems. Our simulations verified the fast
convergence of our alternating optimization algorithm and showed that our
proposed secure V2I backscattering outperforms the existing benchmark by over
4.7 times in terms of secrecy rate for 50 slots. Overall, this fundamental
research on V2I backscattering provided insights to improve vehicular
communication's connectivity, efficiency, and security.


  Hoare and He's theory of reactive processes provides a unifying foundation
for the formal semantics of concurrent and reactive languages. Though highly
applicable, their theory is limited to models that can express event histories
as discrete sequences. In this paper, we show how their theory can be
generalised by using an abstract trace algebra. We show how the algebra,
notably, allows us to also consider continuous-time traces and thereby
facilitate models of hybrid systems. We then use this algebra to reconstruct
the theory of reactive processes in our generic setting, and prove
characteristic laws for sequential and parallel processes, all of which have
been mechanically verified in the Isabelle/HOL proof assistant.


  Koopman-von Neumann in the 30's gave an operatorial formululation of
Classical Mechanics. It was shown later on that this formulation could also be
written in a path-integral form. We will label this functional approach as CPI
(for classical path-integral) to distinguish it from the quantum mechanical
one, which we will indicate with QPI. In the CPI two Grassmannian partners of
time make their natural appearance and in this manner time becomes something
like a three dimensional supermanifold. Next we introduce a metric in this
supermanifold and show that a particular choice of the supermetric reproduces
the CPI while a different one gives the QPI.


  In the functional linear regression model, many methods have been proposed
and studied to estimate the slope function while the functional predictor was
observed in the entire domain. However, works on functional linear regression
models with partially observed trajectories have received less attention. In
this paper, to fill the literature gap we consider the scenario where
individual functional predictor may be observed only on part of the domain.
Depending on whether measurement error is presented in functional predictors,
two methods are developed, one is based on linear functionals of the observed
part of the trajectory and the other one uses conditional principal component
scores. We establish the asymptotic properties of the two proposed methods.
Finite sample simulations are conducted to verify their performance. Diffusion
tensor imaging (DTI) data from Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative
(ADNI) study is analyzed.


  We demonstrate how structured decompositions of unitary operators can be
employed to derive control schemes for finite-level quantum systems that
require only sequences of simple control pulses such as square wave pulses with
finite rise and decay times or Gaussian wavepackets. To illustrate the
technique it is applied to find control schemes to achieve population transfers
for pure-state systems, complete inversions of the ensemble populations for
mixed-state systems, create arbitrary superposition states and optimize the
ensemble average of dynamic observables.


  The positive part $U^+_q$ of $U_q(\hat{\mathfrak{sl}}_2)$ has a presentation
with two generators $W_0$, $W_1$ and two relations called the $q$-Serre
relations. The algebra $U^+_q$ contains some elements, said to be alternating.
There are four kinds of alternating elements, denoted $\lbrace
W_{-k}\rbrace_{k\in \mathbb N}$, $\lbrace W_{k+1}\rbrace_{k\in \mathbb N}$,
$\lbrace G_{k+1}\rbrace_{k\in \mathbb N}$, $\lbrace {\tilde G}_{k+1}\rbrace_{k
\in \mathbb N}$. The alternating elements of each kind mutually commute. A
tridiagonal pair is an ordered pair of diagonalizable linear maps $A, A^*$ on a
nonzero, finite-dimensional vector space $V$, that each act in a (block)
tridiagonal fashion on the eigenspaces of the other one. Let $A$, $A^*$ denote
a tridiagonal pair on $V$. Associated with this pair are six well-known direct
sum decompositions of $V$; these are the eigenspace decompositions of $A$ and
$A^*$, along with four decompositions of $V$ that are often called split.
  In our main results, we assume that $A$, $A^*$ has $q$-Serre type. Under this
assumption $A$, $A^*$ satisfy the $q$-Serre relations, and $V$ becomes an
irreducible $U^+_q$-module on which $W_0=A$ and $W_1=A^*$. We describe how the
alternating elements of $U^+_q$ act on the above six decompositions of $V$. We
show that for each decomposition, every alternating element acts in either a
(block) diagonal, (block) upper bidiagonal, (block) lower bidiagonal, or
(block) tridiagonal fashion. We investigate two special cases in detail. In the
first case the eigenspaces of $A$ and $A^*$ all have dimension one. In the
second case $A$ and $A^*$ are obtained by adjusting the adjacency matrix and a
dual adjacency matrix of a distance-regular graph that has classical parameters
and is formally self-dual.


  In this paper, we focus on developing randomized algorithms for the
computation of low multilinear rank approximations of tensors based on the
random projection and the singular value decomposition. Following the theory of
the singular values of sub-Gaussian matrices, we make a probabilistic analysis
for the error bounds for the randomized algorithm. We demonstrate the
effectiveness of proposed algorithms via several numerical examples.


  Color centers in host semiconductors are prime candidates for spin-photon
interfaces that would enable numerous quantum applications. The discovery of an
optimal spin-photon interface in silicon would move quantum information
technologies towards a mature semiconductor technology. However, the space of
possible charged defects in a host is very large, making the identification of
promising quantum defects from experiments only extremely challenging. Here, we
use high-throughput first principles computational screening to identify
spin-photon interfaces among more than 1000 substitutional and interstitial
charged defects in silicon. We evaluate the most promising defects by
considering their optical properties, spin multiplicity, and formation
energies. The use of a single-shot hybrid functional approach is critical in
enabling the screening of a large number of defects with a reasonable accuracy
in the calculated optical and electronic properties. We identify three new
promising spin-photon interface as potential bright emitters in the telecom
band: $\rm Ti_{i}^{+}$, $\rm Fe_{i}^{0}$, and $\rm Ru_{i}^{0}$. These
candidates are excited through defect-bound excitons, stressing the importance
of considering these type of defects in silicon if operations in the telecom
band is targeted. Our work paves the way to further large scale computational
screening for quantum defects in silicon and other hosts.


  The aim of path planning is to reach the goal from starting point by
searching for the route of an agent. In the path planning, the routes may vary
depending on the number of variables such that it is important for the agent to
reach various goals. Numerous studies, however, have dealt with a single goal
that is predefined by the user. In the present study, I propose a novel
reinforcement learning framework for a fully controllable agent in the path
planning. To do this, I propose a bi-directional memory editing to obtain
various bi-directional trajectories of the agent, in which the behavior of the
agent and sub-goals are trained on the goal-conditioned RL. As for moving the
agent in various directions, I utilize the sub-goals dedicated network,
separated from a policy network. Lastly, I present the reward shaping to
shorten the number of steps for the agent to reach the goal. In the
experimental result, the agent was able to reach the various goals that have
never been visited by the agent in the training. We confirmed that the agent
could perform difficult missions such as a round trip and the agent used the
shorter route with the reward shaping.


  If the stable, center, and unstable foliations of a partially hyperbolic
system are quasi-isometric, the system has Global Product Structure. This
result also applies to Anosov systems and to other invariant splittings.
  If a partially hyperbolic system on a manifold with abelian fundamental group
has quasi-isometric stable and unstable foliations, the center foliation is
without holonomy. If, further, the system has Global Product Structure, then
all center leaves are homeomorphic.


  In this paper, we analyse a single server polling model with two queues.
Customers arrive at the two queues according to two independent Poisson
processes. There is a single server that serves both queues with generally
distributed service times. The server spends an exponentially distributed
amount of time in each queue. After the completion of this residing time, the
server instantaneously switches to the other queue, i.e., there is no
switch-over time. For this polling model we derive the steady-state marginal
workload distribution, as well as heavy traffic and heavy tail asymptotic
results. Furthermore, we also calculate the joint queue length distribution for
the special case of exponentially distributed service times using singular
perturbation analysis.


  Business systems these days need to be agile to address the needs of a
changing world. Business modelling requires business process management to be
highly adaptable with the ability to support dynamic workflows,
inter-application integration (potentially between businesses) and process
reconfiguration. Designing systems with the in-built ability to cater for
evolution is also becoming critical to their success. To handle change, systems
need the capability to adapt as and when necessary to changes in users
requirements. Allowing systems to be self-describing is one way to facilitate
this. Using our implementation of a self-describing system, a so-called
description-driven approach, new versions of data structures or processes can
be created alongside older versions providing a log of changes to the
underlying data schema and enabling the gathering of traceable (provenance)
data. The CRISTAL software, which originated at CERN for handling physics data,
uses versions of stored descriptions to define versions of data and workflows
which can be evolved over time and thereby to handle evolving system needs. It
has been customised for use in business applications as the Agilium-NG product.
This paper reports on how the Agilium-NG software has enabled the deployment of
an unique business process management solution that can be dynamically evolved
to cater for changing user requirement.


  The squared Wasserstein distance is a natural quantity to compare probability
distributions in a non-parametric setting. This quantity is usually estimated
with the plug-in estimator, defined via a discrete optimal transport problem
which can be solved to $\epsilon$-accuracy by adding an entropic regularization
of order $\epsilon$ and using for instance Sinkhorn's algorithm. In this work,
we propose instead to estimate it with the Sinkhorn divergence, which is also
built on entropic regularization but includes debiasing terms. We show that,
for smooth densities, this estimator has a comparable sample complexity but
allows higher regularization levels, of order $\epsilon^{1/2}$, which leads to
improved computational complexity bounds and a strong speedup in practice. Our
theoretical analysis covers the case of both randomly sampled densities and
deterministic discretizations on uniform grids. We also propose and analyze an
estimator based on Richardson extrapolation of the Sinkhorn divergence which
enjoys improved statistical and computational efficiency guarantees, under a
condition on the regularity of the approximation error, which is in particular
satisfied for Gaussian densities. We finally demonstrate the efficiency of the
proposed estimators with numerical experiments.


  This paper gives a theoretical discussion of the orbits and isotropies which
arise in a space-time which admits a Lie algebra of Killing vector fields. The
submanifold structure of the orbits is explored together with their induced
Killing vector structure. A general decomposition of a space-time in terms of
the nature and dimension of its orbits is given and the concept of stability
and instability for orbits introduced. A general relation is shown linking the
dimensions of the Killing algebra, the orbits and the isotropies. The
well-behaved nature of "stable" orbits and the possible miss-behaviour of the
"unstable" ones is pointed out and, in particular, the fact that independent
Killing vector fields in space-time may not induce independent such vector
fields on unstable orbits. Several examples are presented to exhibit these
features. Finally, an appendix is given which revisits and attempts to clarify
the well-known theorem of Fubini on the dimension of Killing orbits.


  Consider an Erd\"os-Renyi random graph in which each edge is present
independently with probability 1/2, except for a subset $\sC_N$ of the vertices
that form a clique (a completely connected subgraph). We consider the problem
of identifying the clique, given a realization of such a random graph.
  The best known algorithm provably finds the clique in linear time with high
probability, provided $|\sC_N|\ge 1.261\sqrt{N}$ \cite{dekel2011finding}.
Spectral methods can be shown to fail on cliques smaller than $\sqrt{N}$. In
this paper we describe a nearly linear time algorithm that succeeds with high
probability for $|\sC_N|\ge (1+\eps)\sqrt{N/e}$ for any $\eps>0$. This is the
first algorithm that provably improves over spectral methods.
  We further generalize the hidden clique problem to other background graphs
(the standard case corresponding to the complete graph on $N$ vertices). For
large girth regular graphs of degree $(\Delta+1)$ we prove that `local'
algorithms succeed if $|\sC_N|\ge (1+\eps)N/\sqrt{e\Delta}$ and fail if
$|\sC_N|\le(1-\eps)N/\sqrt{e\Delta}$.


  This paper studies the convex hull of $d$-dimensional samples i.i.d.
generated from spherically symmetric distributions. Specifically, we derive a
complete integration formula for the expected facet number of the convex hull.
This formula is with respect to the CDF of the radial distribution. As the
number of samples approaches infinity, the integration formula enables us to
obtain the asymptotic value of the expected facet number for three categories
of spherically symmetric distributions. Additionally, the asymptotic result can
be applied to estimating the sample complexity in order that the probability
measure of the convex hull tends to one.


  In this paper, we study the well-posedness theory and the scattering
asymptotics for the energy-critical, Schr\"odinger equation with indefinite
potential \begin{equation*}
  \left\{\begin{array}{l} i \partial_t u+\Delta u-V(x)u
+|u|^{\frac{4}{N-2}}u=0,\ (x, t) \in \mathbb{R}^N \times \mathbb{R}, \\
\left.u\right|_{t=0}=u_0 \in H ^1(\mathbb{R}^N), \end{array}\right.
\end{equation*} where $V(x):\mathbb{R}^N\rightarrow \mathbb{R}$ is indefinite
and satisfies appropriate conditions. Using contraction mapping method and
concentration compactness argument, we obtain the well-posedness theory in
proper function spaces and scattering asymptotics. Moreover, we get a positive
ground state solution which is radially symmetric by using variational methods.
This paper extends the results of \cite{KCEMF2006}(Invent. Math) to the
potential equation and develops the recent conclusions.


  Continuous-time signals are well known for not being perfectly localized in
both time and frequency domains. Conversely, a signal defined over the vertices
of a graph can be perfectly localized in both vertex and frequency domains. We
derive the conditions ensuring the validity of this property and then, building
on this theory, we provide the conditions for perfect reconstruction of a graph
signal from its samples. Next, we provide a finite step algorithm for the
reconstruction of a band-limited signal from its samples and then we show the
effect of sampling a non perfectly band-limited signal and show how to select
the bandwidth that minimizes the mean square reconstruction error.


  Kerr optical frequency combs with multi-gigahertz spacing have previously
been demonstrated in chip-scale microresonators, with potential applications in
coherent communication, spectroscopy, arbitrary waveform generation, and radio
frequency photonic oscillators. In general, the harmonics of a frequency comb
are identically polarized in a single microresonator. In this work, we report
that one comb in one polarization is generated by an orthogonally polarized
soliton comb and two low-noise, orthogonally polarized combs interact with each
other and exist simultaneously in a single microresonator. The second comb
generation is attributed to the strong cross-phase modulation with the
orthogonally polarized soliton comb and the high peak power of the intracavity
soliton pulse. Experimental results show that a second frequency comb is
excited even when a continuous wave light as a "seed"-with power as low as 0.1
mW-is input, while its own power level is below the threshold of comb
generation. Moreover, the second comb has a concave envelope, which is
different from the sech2 envelope of the soliton comb. This is due to the
frequency mismatch between the harmonics and the resonant frequency. We also
find that the repetition rates of these two combs coincide, although two
orthogonal resonant modes are characterized by different free spectral ranges.


  We study the entropy rate of pattern sequences of stochastic processes, and
its relationship to the entropy rate of the original process. We give a
complete characterization of this relationship for i.i.d. processes over
arbitrary alphabets, stationary ergodic processes over discrete alphabets, and
a broad family of stationary ergodic processes over uncountable alphabets. For
cases where the entropy rate of the pattern process is infinite, we
characterize the possible growth rate of the block entropy.


  We present high resolution (3" - 5") observations of CO(1-0) and HCN(1-0)
emission from the circumnuclear star forming ring in the barred spiral galaxy
NGC 6951, a host of a type-2 Seyfert, using the Nobeyama Millimeter Array and
45 m telescope. We find that most of the HCN emission is associated with the
circumnuclear ring, where vigorous star formation occurs. The HCN to CO
integrated intensity ratio is also enhanced in the star forming ring; the peak
value of HCN/CO ratio is 0.18, which is comparable to the ratio in the
starbursts NGC 253 and M82. The formation mechanism of dense molecular gas has
been investigated. We find that the shocks along the orbit crowding do not
promote the formation of the dense molecular gas effectively but enhance the
presence of low density GMCs. Instead, gravitational instabilities of the gas
can account for the dense molecular gas formation. The HCN/CO ratio toward the
Seyfert nucleus of NGC 6951 is a rather normal value (0.086), in contrast with
other Seyferts NGC 1068 and M51 where extremely high HCN/CO value of ~ 0.5 have
been reported.


  Eleven-dimensional supergravity on $S^8\times S^1$ is conjectured to be dual
to the M-theory matrix model. We prove that the dynamics of a subset of
fluctuations around this background is consistently described by D=2 SO(9)
gauged maximal supergravity. We provide the full non-linear uplift formulae for
all bosonic fields. We also present a further truncation to the
SO(3)$\times$SO(6) invariant sector and discuss its relation to the BMN matrix
model at finite temperature. The construction relies on the framework of
generalised Scherk-Schwarz reductions, established for E$_9$ exceptional field
theory in a companion paper. As a by-product, we severely constrain the most
general gauge deformations in D=2 admitting an uplift to higher dimensions.


  We study an online version of the noisy binary search problem where feedback
is generated by a non-stochastic adversary rather than perturbed by random
noise. We reframe this as maintaining an accurate estimate for the median of an
adversarial sequence of integers, $x_1, x_2, \dots$, in a model where each
number $x_t$ can only be accessed through a single threshold query of the form
${1(x_t \leq q_t)}$. In this online comparison feedback model, we explore
estimation of general sample statistics, providing robust algorithms for
median, CDF, and mean estimation with nearly matching lower bounds. We conclude
with several high-dimensional generalizations.


  Between 17th and 19th centuries, mathematically orientated votive tablets
appeared in Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples all over Japan. Known as
sangaku, they contained problems of a largely geometrical nature. In the 17th
century, the Japanese mathematician Seki Takakazu developed a form of algebra
known as tenzan jutsu. I compare one mathematical problem from the 1810
Japanese text Sanp\=o Tenzan Shinan solved using tenzan jutsu to a similar
problem found on the Kijimadaira Tenman-g\=u shrine sangaku to show how sangaku
problems can be solved using the traditional Japanese methods.


  To realize the braiding operations of Majorana zero mode in the vortex cores
of a topological superconductor (TSC), a novel approach is proposed in this
letter to replace the common tip (or tip-like) method. Instead of on top of the
TSC thin film, arrays of electrically controllable pining centers are built
beneath the film, hence detecting can proceed along with braiding. It does not
only increase the braiding rate, but also enables the braiding to be performed
in an electrically controllable way and to be integrated into large scale. Our
work paves the way towards large-scale topological quantum computation.


  Motivated by recent experiments we study theoretically the dynamics of
vortices in the crossover from two to one-dimension in atomic condensates in
elongated traps. We explore the transition from the dynamics of a vortex to
that of a dark soliton as the one-dimensional limit is approached, mapping this
transition out as a function of the key system parameters. Moreover, we probe
this transition dynamically through the hysteresis under time-dependent
deformation of the trap at the dimensionality crossover. When the solitonic
regime is probed during the hysteresis, significant angular momentum is lost
from the system but, remarkably, the vortex can re-emerge.


  A primary goal of exoplanet characterization is to use a planet's current
composition to understand how that planet formed. For example, the C/O ratio
has long been recognized as carrying important information on the chemistry of
volatile species. Refractory elements, like Fe, Mg, and Si, are usually not
considered in this conversation because they condense into solids like Fe(s) or
MgSiO$_3$ and would be removed from the observable, gaseous atmosphere in
exoplanets cooler than about 2000~K. However, planets hotter than about 2000~K,
called ultra-hot Jupiters (UHJs), are warm enough to largely avoid the
condensation of refractory species. In this paper, we explore the insight that
the measurement of refractory abundances can provide into a planet's origins.
Through refractory-to-volatile elemental abundance ratios, we can estimate a
planet's atmospheric rock-to-ice fraction and constrain planet formation and
migration scenarios. We first relate a planet's present-day
refractory-to-volatile ratio to its rock-to-ice ratio from formation using
various compositional models for the rocky and icy components of the
protoplanetary disk. We discuss potential confounding factors like the
sequestration of heavy metals in the core and condensation. We then show such a
measurement using atmospheric retrievals of the low-resolution UV-IR
transmission spectrum of WASP-121b with PETRA, from which we estimate a
refractory-to-volatile ratio of 5.0$^{+6.0}_{-2.7}\times$ solar and a
rock-to-ice ratio greater than 2/3. This result is consistent with significant
atmospheric enrichment by rocky planetismals. Lastly, we discuss the rich
future potential for measuring refractory-to-volatile ratios in ultra-hot
Jupiters with the arrival of JWST and by combining observations at low- and
high-resolution.


  The current methods of video-based 3D human pose estimation have achieved
significant progress; however, they continue to confront the significant
challenge of depth ambiguity. To address this limitation, this paper presents
the spatio-temporal GraphFormer framework for 3D human pose estimation in
video, which integrates body structure graph-based representations with
spatio-temporal information. Specifically, we develop a spatio-temporal
criss-cross graph (STG) attention mechanism. This approach is designed to learn
the long-range dependencies in data across both time and space, integrating
graph information directly into the respective attention layers. Furthermore,
we introduce the dual-path modulated hop-wise regular GCN (MHR-GCN) module,
which utilizes modulation to optimize parameter usage and employs
spatio-temporal hop-wise skip connections to acquire higher-order information.
Additionally, this module processes temporal and spatial dimensions
independently to learn their respective features while avoiding mutual
influence. Finally, we demonstrate that our method achieves state-of-the-art
performance in 3D human pose estimation on the Human3.6M and MPI-INF-3DHP
datasets.


  Let $\text{G}(n)$ be equal either to $\text{PO}(n,1),\text{PU}(n,1)$ or
$\text{PSp}(n,1)$ and let $\Gamma \leq \text{G}(n)$ be a uniform lattice.
Denote by $\mathbb{H}^n_K$ the hyperbolic space associated to $\text{G}(n)$,
where $K$ is a division algebra over the reals of dimension
$d=\dim_{\mathbb{R}} K$. Assume $d(n-1) \geq 2$.
  In this paper we generalize natural maps to measurable cocycles. Given a
standard Borel probability $\Gamma$-space $(X,\mu_X)$, we assume that a
measurable cocycle $\sigma:\Gamma \times X \rightarrow \text{G}(m)$ admits an
essentially unique boundary map $\phi:\partial_\infty \mathbb{H}^n_K \times X
\rightarrow \partial_\infty \mathbb{H}^m_K$ whose slices $\phi_x:\mathbb{H}^n_K
\rightarrow \mathbb{H}^m_K$ are atomless for almost every $x \in X$. Then,
there exists a $\sigma$-equivariant measurable map $F: \mathbb{H}^n_K \times X
\rightarrow \mathbb{H}^m_K$ whose slices $F_x:\mathbb{H}^n_K \rightarrow
\mathbb{H}^m_K$ are differentiable for almost every $x \in X$ and such that
$\text{Jac}_a F_x \leq 1$ for every $a \in \mathbb{H}^n_K$ and almost every $x
\in X$.
  The previous properties allow us to define the natural volume
$\text{NV}(\sigma)$ of the cocycle $\sigma$. This number satisfies the
inequality $\text{NV}(\sigma) \leq \text{Vol}(\Gamma \backslash
\mathbb{H}^n_K)$. Additionally, the equality holds if and only if $\sigma$ is
cohomologous to the cocycle induced by the standard lattice embedding $i:\Gamma
\rightarrow \text{G}(n) \leq \text{G}(m)$, modulo possibly a compact subgroup
of $\text{G}(m)$ when $m>n$.
  Given a continuous map $f:M \rightarrow N$ between compact hyperbolic
manifolds, we also obtain an adaptation of the mapping degree theorem to this
context.


  IGR J17091--3624 is a transient X-ray source and is believed to be a Galactic
black hole candidate. Recently, it has received a considerable attention due to
the detection of peculiar variability patterns known as `heartbeats', which are
quasi-periodic mini-outbursts repeated over timescales ranging between 5 and 70
s. So far, such variability patterns have been observed only in GRS 1915+105
and these are classified as $\rho$- and $\nu$-variability classes. Here, we
present the results of `phase-resolved' spectroscopy of the `heartbeat'
oscillations of IGR J17091-3624 using data from simultaneous observations made
by RXTE and XMM-Newton. We find that the 0.7--35 keV spectra can be fitted with
a `canonical' model for black hole sources consisting of only two
components---a multi-temperature disk black body and a power law (or its
equivalent). We attempt to constrain the system parameters of the source by
simultaneously fitting spectra during different phases of the burst profile
while tying the system parameters across the phases. The results indicate that
the source is a high inclination binary ($i$>53$^\circ$). Further, the observed
low flux from the source can be explained only if the black hole spin is very
low, along with constraints on the black hole mass (<5 M$_\odot$) and the
distance (>20 kpc). For higher inclination angles, which is favored by the
data, the black hole spin is required to be negative. Thus, low or retrograde
spin could be the reason for the low luminosity of the source.


  It is explicitly shown that a one-family parameter model reproducing the
nonlinear Newton-Schr\"odinger equation as the parameter goes to infinity is
free from any causality violation problem for any finite value of it. This
circumstance arises from the intrinsic mechanism of spontaneous state reduction
of the model, absent in the Newton-Schr\"odinger limit. A specific ideal EPR
experiment involving a superposition of two distinct CM's position states of a
massive lump is analyzed, showing recovered compatibility with QM. Besides, the
new framework suggests a soft version of the Many Worlds Interpretation, in
which the typical indiscriminate proliferation of Everett branches, together
with the bizarre inter-branches communications made possible by nonlinearity,
are strongly suppressed in the macroscopic world by the same mechanism of state
reduction.


  Studying the albedos of the planets and moons of the Solar System dates back
at least a century. Of particular interest is the relationship between the
albedo measured at superior conjunction, known as the ``geometric albedo", and
the albedo considered over all orbital phase angles, known as the ``spherical
albedo". Determining the relationship between the geometric and spherical
albedos usually involves complex numerical calculations and closed-form
solutions are restricted to simple reflection laws. Here we report the
discovery of closed-form solutions for the geometric albedo and integral phase
function, which apply to any law of reflection that only depends on the
scattering angle. The shape of a reflected light phase curve, quantified by the
integral phase function, and the secondary eclipse depth, quantified by the
geometric albedo, may now be self-consistently inverted to retrieve globally
averaged physical parameters. Fully Bayesian phase curve inversions for
reflectance maps and simultaneous light curve detrending may now be performed
due to the efficiency of computation. Demonstrating these innovations for the
hot Jupiter Kepler-7b, we infer a geometric albedo of $0.25^{+0.01}_{-0.02}$, a
phase integral of $1.77 \pm0.07$, a spherical albedo of $0.44^{+0.02}_{-0.03}$
and a scattering asymmetry factor of $0.07^{+0.12}_{-0.11}$.


  Measurements on resistivity and magnetic susceptibility have been carried out
for Bi single crystals under pressures up to 10.5GPa. The temperature dependent
resistivity shows a semimetallic behavior at ambient and low pressures (below
about 1.6GPa). This is followed by an upturn of resistivity in low temperature
region when the pressure is increased, which is explained as a semiconductor
behavior. This feature gradually gets enhanced up to a pressure of about
2.52GPa. Then a non-monotonic temperature dependent resistivity appears upon
further increasing pressure, which is accompanied by a strong suppression to
the low temperature resistivity upturn. Simultaneously, a superconducting
transition occurs at about 3.92K under a pressure of about 2.63GPa. With
further increasing pressure, a second superconducting transition emerges at
about 7K under about 2.8GPa. For these two superconducting states, the
superconductivity induced magnetic screening volumes are quite large. As the
pressure further increased to 8.1GPa, we observe the third superconducting
transition at about 8.2K. The resistivity measurements under magnetic field
allow us to determine the upper critical fields $\mu_0 H_{c2}$ of the
superconducting phases. The upper critical field for the phase with $T_c=3.92$K
is extremely low. Based on the Werthamer-Helfand-Hohenberg (WHH) theory, the
estimated value of $\mu_0 H_{c2}$ for this phase is about 0.103T. While the
upper critical field for the phase with $T_c$=7K is very high with a value of
about 4.56T. Finally, we present a pressure dependent phase diagram of Bi
single crystals. Our results reveal the interesting and rich physics in bismuth
single crystals under high pressure.


  Zurek has derived the quantum probabilities for Schmidt basis states of
bipartite quantum systems in pure joint states, from the assumption that they
should be not be affected by one party's action if the action can be undone by
the other party (``envariance of probability'') and an auxiliary assumption. We
argue that a natural generalization of the auxiliary assumption is actually
strong enough to yield the Born rule itself, but that Zurek's argument and
protocol can be adapted to do without this assumption, at the cost of using
envariance of probability in both directions. We consider alternative
motivations for envariance, one based on the no-signalling constraint that
actions on one subsystem of a quantum system not allow signalling to another
subsystem entirely distinct from the first, and another which is perhaps
strongest in the context of a relative-state interpretation of quantum
mechanics. In part because of this, we argue that the relative appeal of our
version and the original version of Zurek's argument depends in part upon
whether one interprets the quantum formalism in terms of relative states or
definite measurement outcomes.


  We relate the phenomenon of local indistinguishability of orthogonal states
with the properties of unextendibility and uncompletability of entangled bases
for bipartite and multipartite quantum systems. We prove that all two-qubit
unextendible entangled bases are of size three and they cannot be perfectly
distinguished by separable measurements. We identify a method of constructing
two-element orthogonal ensembles, based on the concept of unextendible
entangled bases, that can potentially lead to information sharing applications.
Two-element ensembles form the fundamental unit of ensembles, and yet does not
offer locally indistinguishable ensembles for pure state elements. Going over
to mixed states does open this possibility, but can be difficult to identify.
The method provided using unextendible entangled bases can be used for their
systematic generation. In multipartite systems, we find a class of unextendible
entangled bases for which the unextendibility property remains conserved across
all bipartitions. We also identify nonlocal operations, local implementation of
which require entangled resource states from a higher-dimensional quantum
system.


  In this article, we present a graph-based method using a cubic template for
volumetric segmentation of vertebrae in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)
acquisitions. The user can define the degree of deviation from a regular cube
via a smoothness value Delta. The Cube-Cut algorithm generates a directed graph
with two terminal nodes (s-t-network), where the nodes of the graph correspond
to a cubic-shaped subset of the image's voxels. The weightings of the graph's
terminal edges, which connect every node with a virtual source s or a virtual
sink t, represent the affinity of a voxel to the vertebra (source) and to the
background (sink). Furthermore, a set of infinite weighted and non-terminal
edges implements the smoothness term. After graph construction, a minimal
s-t-cut is calculated within polynomial computation time, which splits the
nodes into two disjoint units. Subsequently, the segmentation result is
determined out of the source-set. A quantitative evaluation of a C++
implementation of the algorithm resulted in an average Dice Similarity
Coefficient (DSC) of 81.33% and a running time of less than a minute.


  Contrastive losses yield state-of-the-art performance for person
re-identification, face verification and few shot learning. They have recently
outperformed the cross-entropy loss on classification at the ImageNet scale and
outperformed all self-supervision prior results by a large margin (SimCLR).
Simple and effective regularization techniques such as label smoothing and
self-distillation do not apply anymore, because they act on multinomial label
distributions, adopted in cross-entropy losses, and not on tuple comparative
terms, which characterize the contrastive losses.
  Here we propose a novel, simple and effective regularization technique, the
Class Interference Regularization (CIR), which applies to cross-entropy losses
but is especially effective on contrastive losses. CIR perturbs the output
features by randomly moving them towards the average embeddings of the negative
classes. To the best of our knowledge, CIR is the first regularization
technique to act on the output features.
  In experimental evaluation, the combination of CIR and a plain Siamese-net
with triplet loss yields best few-shot learning performance on the challenging
tieredImageNet. CIR also improves the state-of-the-art technique in person
re-identification on the Market-1501 dataset, based on triplet loss, and the
state-of-the-art technique in person search on the CUHK-SYSU dataset, based on
a cross-entropy loss. Finally, on the task of classification CIR performs on
par with the popular label smoothing, as demonstrated for CIFAR-10 and -100.


  While solid-state devices offer naturally reliable hardware for modern
classical computers, thus far quantum information processors resemble vacuum
tube computers in being neither reliable nor scalable. Strongly correlated many
body states stabilized in topologically ordered matter offer the possibility of
naturally fault tolerant computing, but are both challenging to engineer and
coherently control and cannot be easily adapted to different physical
platforms. We propose an architecture which achieves some of the robustness
properties of topological models but with a drastically simpler construction.
Quantum information is stored in the symmetry-protected degenerate ground
states of spin-1 chains, while quantum gates are performed by adiabatic
non-Abelian holonomies using only single-site fields and nearest-neighbor
couplings. Gate operations respect the symmetry, and so inherit some protection
from noise and disorder from the symmetry-protected ground states.


  The choice of approximate posterior distribution is one of the core problems
in variational inference. Most applications of variational inference employ
simple families of posterior approximations in order to allow for efficient
inference, focusing on mean-field or other simple structured approximations.
This restriction has a significant impact on the quality of inferences made
using variational methods. We introduce a new approach for specifying flexible,
arbitrarily complex and scalable approximate posterior distributions. Our
approximations are distributions constructed through a normalizing flow,
whereby a simple initial density is transformed into a more complex one by
applying a sequence of invertible transformations until a desired level of
complexity is attained. We use this view of normalizing flows to develop
categories of finite and infinitesimal flows and provide a unified view of
approaches for constructing rich posterior approximations. We demonstrate that
the theoretical advantages of having posteriors that better match the true
posterior, combined with the scalability of amortized variational approaches,
provides a clear improvement in performance and applicability of variational
inference.