title:
Constraining the NFW Potential with Observations and Modeling of LSB
  Galaxy Velocity Fields

abstract:
  We model the NFW potential to determine if, and under what conditions, the
NFW halo appears consistent with the observed velocity fields of low surface
brightness (LSB) galaxies. We present mock DensePak IFU velocity fields and
rotation curves of axisymmetric and non-axisymmetric potentials that are
well-matched to the spatial resolution and velocity range of our sample
galaxies. We find that the DensePak IFU can accurately reconstruct the velocity
field produced by an axisymmetric NFW potential and that a tilted-ring fitting
program can successfully recover the corresponding NFW rotation curve. We also
find that non-axisymmetric potentials with fixed axis ratios change only the
normalization of the mock velocity fields and rotation curves and not their
shape. The shape of the modeled NFW rotation curves does not reproduce the
data: these potentials are unable to simultaneously bring the mock data at both
small and large radii into agreement with observations. Indeed, to match the
slow rise of LSB galaxy rotation curves, a specific viewing angle of the
non-axisymmetric potential is required. For each of the simulated LSB galaxies,
the observer's line-of-sight must be along the minor axis of the potential, an
arrangement which is inconsistent with a random distribution of halo
orientations on the sky.


title: Dilaton Gravity, Poisson Sigma Models and Loop Quantum Gravity

abstract:
  Spherically symmetric gravity in Ashtekar variables coupled to Yang-Mills
theory in two dimensions and its relation to dilaton gravity and Poisson sigma
models are discussed. After introducing its loop quantization, quantum
corrections for inverse triad components are shown to provide a consistent
deformation without anomalies. The relation to Poisson sigma models provides a
covariant action principle of the quantum corrected theory with effective
couplings. Results are also used to provide loop quantizations of spherically
symmetric models in arbitrary D space-time dimensions.


title: Absolute dimensions of the F-type eclipsing binary star VZ Cephei

abstract:
  We present new V-band differential photometry and radial-velocity
measurements of the unevolved 1.18-day period F+G-type double-lined eclipsing
binary VZ Cep. We determine accurate values for the absolute masses, radii, and
effective temperatures as follows: M(A) = 1.402 +/- 0.015 M(Sun), R(A) = 1.534
+/- 0.012 R(Sun), T(eff) = 6690 +/- 160 K for the primary, and M(B) = 1.1077
+/- 0.0083 M(Sun), R(B) = 1.042 +/- 0.039 R(Sun), T(eff) = 5720 +/- 120 K for
the secondary. A comparison with current stellar evolution models suggests an
age of 1.4 Gyr for a metallicity near solar. The temperature difference between
the stars, which is much better determined than the absolute values, is found
to be about 250 K larger than predicted by theory. If all of this discrepancy
is attributed to the secondary (which would then be too cool compared to
models), the effect would be consistent with similar differences found for
other low-mass stars, generally believed to be associated with chromospheric
activity. However, the radius of VZ Cep B (which unlike the primary, still has
a thin convective envelope) appears normal, whereas in other stars affected by
activity the radius is systematically larger than predicted. Thus, VZ Cep poses
a challenge not only to standard theory but to our understanding of the
discrepancies in other low-mass systems as well.


title: Helical Metal Inside a Topological Band Insulator

abstract:
  Topological defects, such as domain walls and vortices, have long fascinated
physicists. A novel twist is added in quantum systems like the B-phase of
superfluid helium He$_3$, where vortices are associated with low energy
excitations in the cores. Similarly, cosmic strings may be tied to propagating
fermion modes. Can analogous phenomena occur in crystalline solids that host a
plethora of topological defects? Here we show that indeed dislocation lines are
associated with one dimensional fermionic excitations in a `topological
insulator', a novel band insulator believed to be realized in the bulk material
Bi$_{0.9}$Sb$_{0.1}$. In contrast to fermionic excitations in a regular quantum
wire, these modes are topologically protected like the helical edge states of
the quantum spin-Hall insulator, and not scattered by disorder. Since
dislocations are ubiquitous in real materials, these excitations could dominate
spin and charge transport in topological insulators. Our results provide a
novel route to creating a potentially ideal quantum wire in a bulk solid.


title: Post-starburst galaxies: more than just an interesting curiosity

abstract:
  From the VIMOS VLT DEEP Survey (VVDS) we select a sample of 16 galaxies with
spectra which identify them as having recently undergone a strong starburst and
subsequent fast quenching of star formation. These post-starburst galaxies lie
in the redshift range 0.5<z<1.0 with masses >10^9.75Msun. They have a number
density of 1x10^-4 per Mpc^3, almost two orders of magnitude sparser than the
full galaxy population with the same mass limit. We compare with simulations to
show that the galaxies are consistent with being the descendants of gas rich
major mergers. Starburst mass fractions must be larger than ~5-10% and decay
times shorter than ~10^8 years for post-starburst spectral signatures to be
observed in the simulations. We find that the presence of black hole feedback
does not greatly affect the evolution of the simulated merger remnants through
the post-starburst phase. The multiwavelength spectral energy distributions of
the post-starburst galaxies show that 5/16 have completely ceased the formation
of new stars. These 5 galaxies correspond to a mass flux entering the
red-sequence of rhodot(A->Q, PSB) = 0.0038Msun/Mpc^3/yr, assuming the defining
spectroscopic features are detectable for 0.35Gyr. If the galaxies subsequently
remain on the red sequence, this accounts for 38(+4/-11)% of the growth rate of
the red sequence. Finally, we compare our high redshift results with a sample
of galaxies with 0.05<z<0.1 observed in the SDSS and UKIDSS surveys. We find a
very strong redshift evolution: the mass density of strong post-starburst
galaxies is 230 times lower at z~0.07 than at z~0.7.


title:
Photometric constraints on white dwarfs and the identification of
  extreme objects

abstract:
  It is possible to reliably identify white dwarfs (WDs) without recourse to
spectra, instead using photometric and astrometric measurements to distinguish
them from Main Sequence stars and quasars. WDs' colours can also be used to
infer their intrinsic properties (effective temperature, surface gravity,
etc.), but the results obtained must be interpreted with care. The difficulties
stem from the existence of a solid angle degeneracy, as revealed by a full
exploration of the likelihood, although this can be masked if a simple best-fit
approach is used. Conversely, this degeneracy can be broken if a Bayesian
approach is adopted, as it is then possible to utilise the prior information on
the surface gravities of WDs implied by spectroscopic fitting. The benefits of
such an approach are particularly strong when applied to outliers, such as the
candidate halo and ultra-cool WDs identified by Vidrih et al. (2007). A
reanalysis of these samples confirms their results for the latter sample but
suggests that that most of the halo candidates are thick disk WDs in the tails
of the photometric noise distribution.


title: Trigonometrically extended Cornell potential and deconfinement

abstract:
  Non-perturbative methods of effective field theory such like Lattice QCD have
allowed to establish connection between the QCD Lagrangian and quark potential
models, a prominent outcome being the Cornell (linear plus Coulomb) potential.
In being quite successful in explaining properties of heavy flavor hadrons, be
them quarkonia or baryons, this potential has been found less spectacular in
the description of the non-strange baryons, the nucleon and the Delta. This
behavior indicates that the one-gluon exchange and the flux-tube interaction do
not fully account for the complexity of the dynamics of three light quarks.
Very recently, the Cornell potential which is of infinte range has been
upgraded by us toward an exactly solvable trigonometric potential of finite
range that interpolates between the inverse-distance potential and the infinite
wells while passing through a region of linear growth, a reason for which it
contains the inverse distance and the linear potentials as first terms in its
Taylor series decomposition. We here first make the point that the upgraded
Cornell potential can be viewed as the exact counterpart on a curved space to a
flat space 1/r potential, a circumstance that equips it by two simultaneous
symmetries, SO(4), and SO(2,1). These allow to place the trigonometric
confinement potential in the context of AdS_5/CFT correspondence and thus to
establish the link of the algebraic aspects of the latter to QCD potentiology.
Next we report that the above potential when employed in the quark-diquark
system, provides a remarkably adequate description of both nucleon and Delta
spectra and the proton mean square charge radius as well, and moreover implies
an intriguing venue toward quark deconfinement as shut-down of the curvature
considered as temperature dependent.


title: Advanced localization of massive black hole coalescences with LISA

abstract:
  The coalescence of massive black holes is one of the primary sources of
gravitational waves (GWs) for LISA. Measurements of the GWs can localize the
source on the sky to an ellipse with a major axis of a few tens of arcminutes
to a few degrees, depending on source redshift, and a minor axis which is 2--4
times smaller. The distance (and thus an approximate redshift) can be
determined to better than a per cent for the closest sources we consider,
although weak lensing degrades this performance. It will be of great interest
to search this three-dimensional `pixel' for an electromagnetic counterpart to
the GW event. The presence of a counterpart allows unique studies which combine
electromagnetic and GW information, especially if the counterpart is found
prior to final merger of the holes. To understand the feasibility of early
counterpart detection, we calculate the evolution of the GW pixel with time. We
find that the greatest improvement in pixel size occurs in the final day before
merger, when spin precession effects are maximal. The source can be localized
to within 10 square degrees as early as a month before merger at $z = 1$; for
higher redshifts, this accuracy is only possible in the last few days.


title: Dark Matter and Dark Radiation

abstract:
  We explore the feasibility and astrophysical consequences of a new long-range
U(1) gauge field ("dark electromagnetism") that couples only to dark matter,
not to the Standard Model. The dark matter consists of an equal number of
positive and negative charges under the new force, but annihilations are
suppressed if the dark matter mass is sufficiently high and the dark
fine-structure constant $\hat\alpha$ is sufficiently small. The correct relic
abundance can be obtained if the dark matter also couples to the conventional
weak interactions, and we verify that this is consistent with particle-physics
constraints. The primary limit on $\hat\alpha$ comes from the demand that the
dark matter be effectively collisionless in galactic dynamics, which implies
$\hat\alpha \lesssim 10^{-4}$ for TeV-scale dark matter. These values are
easily compatible with constraints from structure formation and primordial
nucleosynthesis. We raise the prospect of interesting new plasma effects in
dark matter dynamics, which remain to be explored.


title:
Charge expulsion, Spin Meissner effect, and charge inhomogeneity in
  superconductors

abstract:
  Superconductivity occurs in systems that have a lot of negative charge: the
highly negatively charged $(CuO2)^{--}$ planes in the cuprates, negatively
charged $(FeAs)^-$ planes in the iron arsenides, and negatively charged $B^-$
planes in magnesium diboride. And, in the nearly filled (with negative
electrons) bands of almost all superconductors, as evidenced by their positive
Hall coefficient in the normal state. According to the theory of hole
superconductivity, metals become superconducting because they are driven to
expel negative charge (electrons) from their interior. This is why NIS
tunneling spectra are asymmetric, with larger current for negatively biased
samples. It is also why there is a Meissner effect: as electrons are expelled
towards the surface in the presence of a magnetic field, the Lorentz force
imparts them with azimuthal velocity, thus generating the surface Meissner
current that screens the interior magnetic field. In type II superconductors,
the Lorentz force acting on expelled electrons that don't reach the surface
gives rise to the azimuthal velocity of the vortex currents. In the absence of
applied magnetic field, expelled electrons still acquire azimuthal velocity,
due to the spin-orbit interaction, in opposite direction for spin-up and
spin-down electrons: the "Spin Meissner effect". This results in a macroscopic
spin current flowing near the surface of superconductors in the absence of
applied fields. In strongly type II superconductors this physics should give
rise to charge inhomogeneity and spin currents throughout the interior of the
superconductor, to large sensitivity to (non-magnetic) disorder and to a strong
tendency to phase separation.


title:
Watching Worlds Collide: Effects on the CMB from Cosmological Bubble
  Collisions

abstract:
  We extend our previous work on the cosmology of Coleman-de Luccia bubble
collisions. Within a set of approximations we calculate the effects on the
cosmic microwave background (CMB) as seen from inside a bubble which has
undergone such a collision. We find that the effects are always qualitatively
similar--an anisotropy that depends only on the angle to the collision
direction--but can produce a cold or hot spot of varying size, as well as power
asymmetries along the axis determined by the collision. With other parameters
held fixed the effects weaken as the amount of inflation which took place
inside our bubble grows, but generically survive order 10 efolds past what is
required to solve the horizon and flatness problems. In some regions of
parameter space the effects can survive arbitrarily long inflation.


title:
Dark energy constraints and correlations with systematics from CFHTLS
  weak lensing, SNLS supernovae Ia and WMAP5

abstract:
  We combine measurements of weak gravitational lensing from the CFHTLS-Wide
survey, supernovae Ia from CFHT SNLS and CMB anisotropies from WMAP5 to obtain
joint constraints on cosmological parameters, in particular, the dark energy
equation of state parameter w. We assess the influence of systematics in the
data on the results and look for possible correlations with cosmological
parameters.
  We implement an MCMC algorithm to sample the parameter space of a flat CDM
model with a dark-energy component of constant w. Systematics in the data are
parametrised and included in the analysis. We determine the influence of
photometric calibration of SNIa data on cosmological results by calculating the
response of the distance modulus to photometric zero-point variations. The weak
lensing data set is tested for anomalous field-to-field variations and a
systematic shape measurement bias for high-z galaxies.
  Ignoring photometric uncertainties for SNLS biases cosmological parameters by
at most 20% of the statistical errors, using supernovae only; the parameter
uncertainties are underestimated by 10%. The weak lensing field-to-field
variance pointings is 5%-15% higher than that predicted from N-body
simulations. We find no bias of the lensing signal at high redshift, within the
framework of a simple model. Assuming a systematic underestimation of the
lensing signal at high redshift, the normalisation sigma_8 increases by up to
8%. Combining all three probes we obtain -0.10<1+w<0.06 at 68% confidence
(-0.18<1+w<0.12 at 95%), including systematic errors. Systematics in the data
increase the error bars by up to 35%; the best-fit values change by less than
0.15sigma. [Abridged]


title: High-Velocity Clouds in the Nearby Spiral Galaxy M 83

abstract:
  We present deep HI 21-cm and optical observations of the face-on spiral
galaxy M 83 obtained as part of a project to search for high-velocity clouds
(HVCs) in nearby galaxies. Anomalous-velocity neutral gas is detected toward M
83, with 5.6x10^7 Msolar of HI contained in a disk rotating 40-50 km/s more
slowly in projection than the bulk of the gas. We interpret this as a
vertically extended thick disk of neutral material, containing 5.5% of the
total HI within the central 8 kpc. Using an automated source detection
algorithm to search for small-scale HI emission features, we find eight
distinct, anomalous-velocity HI clouds with masses ranging from 7x10^5 to
1.5x10^7 Msolar and velocities differing by up to 200 km/s compared to the HI
disk. Large on-disk structures are coincident with the optical spiral arms,
while unresolved off-disk clouds contain no diffuse optical emission down to a
limit of 27 r' mag per square arcsec. The diversity of the thick HI disk and
larger clouds suggests the influence of multiple formation mechanisms, with a
galactic fountain responsible for the slowly-rotating disk and on-disk discrete
clouds, and tidal effects responsible for off-disk cloud production. The mass
and kinetic energy of the HI clouds are consistent with the mass exchange rate
predicted by the galactic fountain model. If the HVC population in M 83 is
similar to that in our own Galaxy, then the Galactic HVCs must be distributed
within a radius of less than 25 kpc.


title:
Dust depletion, chemical uniformity and environment of CaII H&K quasar
  absorbers

abstract:
  CaII 3934,3969 absorbers, which are likely to be a subset of damped Lyman
alpha systems, are the most dusty quasar absorbers known, with an order of
magnitude more extinction in E(B-V) than other absorption systems. There is
also evidence that CaII absorbers trace galaxies with more ongoing
star-formation than the average quasar absorber. Despite this, relatively
little is known in detail about these unusual absorption systems. Here we
present the first high resolution spectroscopic study of 19 CaII quasar
absorbers, in the range 0.6<= z_abs<=1.2, with W3934>=0.2A. Their general
depletion patterns are similar to measurements in the warm halo phase of the
Milky Way and Magellanic Clouds ISM. Dust depletions and alpha-enrichments
profiles of sub-samples of 7 and 3 absorbers, respectively, are measured using
a combination of Voigt profile fitting and apparent optical depth techniques.
Deviations in [Cr/Zn]~0.3+-0.1dex and in [Si/Fe]>~0.8+-0.1dex are detected
across the profile of one absorber, which we attribute to differential dust
depletion. The remaining absorbers have <0.3dex (3sigma limit) variation in
[Cr/Zn], much like the general DLA population, though the dustiest CaII
absorbers remain relatively unprobed in our sample. A limit on electron
densities in CaII absorbers, n_e<0.1cm^-3, is derived using the ratio of
neutral and singly ionised species, assuming a MW-like radiation field. These
electron densities may imply hydrogen densities sufficient for the presence of
molecular hydrogen in the absorbers. The CaII absorber sample comprises a wide
range of velocity widths, v_90=50-470km/s, and velocity structures, thus a
range of physical models for their origin, from simple discs to galactic
outflows and mergers, would be required to explain the observations.


title: Dwarf Galaxy Starburst Statistics in the Local Volume

abstract:
  An unresolved question in galaxy evolution is whether the star formation
histories of low mass systems are preferentially dominated by starbursts or
modes that are more quiescent and continuous. Here, we quantify the prevalence
of global starbursts in dwarf galaxies at the present epoch, and infer their
characteristic durations and amplitudes. The analysis is based on the H-alpha
component of the 11 Mpc H-alpha UV Galaxy Survey (11HUGS), which is providing
H-alpha and GALEX UV imaging for an approximately volume-limited sample of ~300
star-forming galaxies within 11 Mpc. We first examine the completeness
properties of the sample, and then directly tally the number of bursting dwarfs
and compute the fraction of star formation that is concentrated in such
systems. Our results are consistent with a picture where dwarfs that are
currently experiencing massive global bursts are just the ~6% tip of a low-mass
galaxy iceberg. Moreover, bursts are only responsible for about a quarter of
the total star formation in the overall dwarf population, so the majority of
stars in low-mass systems are not formed in this mode today. Spirals and
irregulars devoid of H-alpha emission are rare, indicating that the complete
cessation of star formation generally does not occur in such galaxies and is
not characteristic of the inter-burst state, at least for the more luminous
systems with M(B)<-15. The starburst statistics presented here directly
constrain the duty cycle and the average burst amplitude under the simplest
assumptions where all dwarf irregulars share a common star formation history
and undergo similar bursts cycles with equal probability. Uncertainties in such
assumptions are discussed in the context of previous work.


title:
Sterile Neutrinos in Light of Recent Cosmological and Oscillation Data:
  a Multi-Flavor Scheme Approach

abstract:
  Light sterile neutrinos might mix with the active ones and be copiously
produced in the early Universe. In the present paper, a detailed multi-flavor
analysis of sterile neutrino production is performed. Making some justified
approximations allows us to consider not only neutrino interactions with the
primeval medium and neutrino coherence breaking effects, but also oscillation
effects arising from the presence of three light (mostly-active) neutrino
states mixed with two heavier (mostly-sterile) states. First, we emphasize the
underlying physics via an analytical description of sterile neutrino abundances
that is valid for cases with small mixing between active and sterile neutrinos.
Then, we study in detail the phenomenology of (3+2) sterile neutrino models in
light of short-baseline oscillation data, including the LSND and MiniBooNE
results. Finally, by using the information provided by this analysis, we obtain
the expected sterile neutrino cosmological abundances and then contrast them
with the most recent available data from Cosmic Microwave Background and Large
Scale Structure observations. We conclude that (3+2) models are significantly
more disfavored by the internal inconsistencies between sterile neutrino
interpretations of appearance and disappearance short-baseline data themselves,
rather than by the used cosmological data.


title: A Major X-ray Outburst from an Ultraluminous X-Ray Source in M82

abstract:
  We detected a major X-ray outburst from M82 with a duration of 79 days, an
average flux of 5E-11 erg cm^-2 s^-1 in the 2-10 keV band, and strong
variability. The X-ray spectrum remained hard throughout the outburst. We
obtained a Chandra observation during the outburst that shows that the emission
arises from the ultraluminous X-ray source X41.4+60. This source has an
unabsorbed flux of (5.4 +/- 0.2)E-11 erg cm^-2 s^-1 in the 0.3-8 keV band,
equivalent to an isotropic luminosity of 8.5E40 erg/s. The spectrum is
adequately fitted with an absorbed power-law with a photon index of 1.55 +/-
0.05. This photon index is very similar to the value of 1.61 +/- 0.06 measured
previously while the flux was (2.64 +/- 0.14)E-11 erg cm^-2 s^-1. Thus, the
source appears to remain in the hard state even at the highest flux levels
observed. The X-ray spectral and timing data available for X41.4+60 are
consistent with the source being in a luminous hard state and a black hole mass
in the range of one to a few thousand solar masses.


title:
Enhanced low-energy spin dynamics with diffusive character in the
  iron-based superconductor (La0.87Ca0.13)FePO: Analogy with high Tc cuprates
  (A short note)

abstract:
  In a recent NMR investigation of the iron-based superconductor
(La0.87Ca0.13)FePO [Phys. Rev. Lett. 101, 077006 (2008)] Y. Nakai et al.
reported an anomalous behavior of the nuclear spin-lattice relaxation of 31P
nuclei in the superconducting state: The relaxation rate 1/T1 strongly depends
on the measurement frequency and its T dependence does not show the typical
decrease expected for the superconducting state. In this short note, we point
out that these two observations bear similarity with the situation is some of
the high Tc cuprates.


title: HI Structure Observations of Reionization and Dark Energy

abstract:
  This proceeding concentrates on the BAO signature of dark energy, and how the
SKA dark energy case has been complicated by the emergence of HI structure
experiments modeled after the Epoch of Reionization observatories. The purpose
of the conference talk was to review the current status of the Murchison
Widefield Array (MWA), and show the applications of HI structure observations
for both reionization and dark energy measurements. Since the status of the MWA
is changing weekly, please see the website www.haystack.mit.edu/ast/arrays/mwa/
for the current status. This proceedings will instead concentrate on HI
structure observations, their applicability to reionization and cosmography,
and the implications for the SKA and future HI structure observations of dark
energy.


title: Ferromagnetism and increased ionicity in epitaxially grown TbMnO3 films

abstract:
  Thin films of TbMnO3 have been grown on SrTiO3 substrates. The films grow
under compressive strain and are only partially clamped to the substrate. This
produces remarkable changes in the magnetic properties and, unlike the bulk
material, the films display ferromagnetic interactions below the ordering
temperature of ~40K. X-ray photoemission measurements in the films show that
the Mn-3s splitting is 0.3eV larger than that of the bulk. Ab initio embedded
cluster calculations yield Mn-3s splittings that are in agreement with the
experiment and reveal that the larger observed values are due to a larger
ionicity of the films.


title:
Target star catalog for Darwin: Nearby Stellar sample for a search for
  terrestrial planets

abstract:
  In order to evaluate and develop mission concepts for a search for
Terrestrial Exoplanets, we have prepared a list of potential target systems. In
this paper we present and discuss the criteria for selecting potential target
stars suitable for the search for Earth like planets, with a special emphasis
on the aspects of the habitable zone for these stellar systems. Planets found
within these zones would be potentially able to host complex life forms. We
derive a final target star sample of potential target stars, the Darwin All Sky
Star Catalog (DASSC). The DASSC contains a sample of 2303 identified objects of
which 284 are F, 464 G, 883 K, 615 M type stars and 57 stars without B-V index.
Of these objects 949 objects are flagged in the DASSC as multiple systems,
resulting in 1229 single main sequence stars of which 107 are F, 235 are G, 536
are K, and 351 are M type. We derive configuration dependent subcatalogs from
the DASSC for two technical designs, the initial baseline design and the
advanced Emma design as well as a catalog using an inner working angle cut off.
We discuss the selection criteria, derived parameters and completeness of
sample for different classes of stars.


title: Evidence for Magnetic Flux Saturation in Rapidly Rotating M Stars

abstract:
  We present magnetic flux measurements in seven rapidly rotating M dwarfs. Our
sample stars have X-ray and H-alpha emission indicative of saturated emission,
i.e., emission at a high level independent of rotation rate. Our measurements
are made using near-infrared FeH molecular spectra observed with HIRES at Keck.
Because of their large convective overturn times, the rotation velocity of M
stars with small Rossby numbers is relatively slow and does not hamper the
measurement of Zeeman splitting. The Rossby numbers of our sample stars are as
small as 0.01. All our sample stars exhibit magnetic flux of kilo-Gauss
strength. We find that the magnetic flux saturates in the same regime as
saturation of coronal and chromospheric emission, at a critical Rossby number
of around 0.1. The filling factors of both field and emission are near unity by
then. We conclude that the strength of surface magnetic fields remains
independent of rotation rate below that; making the Rossby number yet smaller
by a factor of ten has little effect. These saturated M-star dynamos generate
an integrated magnetic flux of roughly 3 kG, with a scatter of about 1 kG. The
relation between emission and flux also has substantial scatter.


title:
A priori estimate for a family of semi-linear elliptic equations with
  critical nonlinearity

abstract:
  We consider positive solutions of $\Delta u-\mu u+Ku^{\frac{n+2}{n-2}}=0$ on
$B_1$ ($n\ge 5$) where $\mu $ and $K>0$ are smooth functions on $B_1$. If $K$
is very sub-harmonic at each critical point of $K$ in $B_{2/3}$ and the maximum
of $u$ in $\bar B_{1/3}$ is comparable to its maximum over $\bar B_1$, then all
positive solutions are uniformly bounded on $\bar B_{1/3}$. As an application,
a priori estimate for solutions of equations defined on $\mathbb S^n$ is
derived.


title: Challenges in Hadronic Form Factor Calculations

abstract:
  There is an extensive history of form factor calculations on the lattice,
primarily with ground states for both initial and final states. However, there
have never been any radially excited transition form factor calculations.
Furthermore, the lattice faces difficulty in extracting signal from noise at
large transfer momenta ($Q^2$). These measurements could give important
theoretical input to experiments, such as those of JLab's 12 GeV program and
studies of deformation of the nucleon. In this work, I will present a simple
technique to resolve both of these difficulties and present results from
anisotropic configurations showing improved signals for excited-state
quantities. It should also be possible to apply this technique to isotropic
lattices for calculating large-$Q^2$ form factors.


title: Mixing in Zero and Solar Metallicity Supernovae

abstract:
  Two-dimensional simulations of mixing and fall back in non-rotating massive
stars have been carried out using realistic initial models for the presupernova
star and assuming standard spherically symmetric explosions of 1.2*10^51ergs.
Stars of 15 and 25 solar masses with both primordial and solar composition were
modeled. The zero metallicity supernova progenitors were compact blue stars and
the amount of Rayleigh-Taylor induced mixing in them was greatly reduced
compared with what was seen in the red supergiants with solar metallicity. The
compact zero-metal stars also experienced more fallback than their solar
metallicity counterparts. As a result, the ejected nucleosynthesis from the two
populations was very different. For the simple explosion model assumed, low
metallicity stars ejected ejected too little iron and intermediate mass
elements even to explain the abundance patterns in the most iron-poor stars
found to date, suggesting that some important ingredient is missing. Rotation
is likely to alter these conclusions by producing a greater fraction of red
supergiants among Population III stars. The velocities of the heavy elements in
all models considered - both red and blue supergiants - were less than observed
in SN 1987A, suggesting that at least occasionally, asymmetric aspects of the
explosion mechanism and fallback play a major role in mixing.


title:
Asymptotic Behavior of Blowup Solutions for Elliptic Equations with
  Exponential Nonlinearity and Singular Data

abstract:
  We consider a sequence of blowup solutions of a two dimensional, second order
elliptic equation with exponential nonlinearity and singular data. This
equation has a rich background in physics and geometry. In a work of
Bartolucci-Chen-Lin-Tarantello it is proved that the profile of the solutions
differs from global solutions of a Liouville type equation only by a uniformly
bounded term. The present paper improves their result and establishes an
expansion of the solutions near the blowup points with a sharp error estimate.


title: Symplectic N and time reversal in frustrated magnetism

abstract:
  Identifying the time reversal symmetry of spins as a symplectic symmetry, we
develop a large N approximation for quantum magnetism that embraces both
antiferromagnetism and ferromagnetism. In SU(N), N>2, not all spins invert
under time reversal, so we have introduced a new large N treatment which builds
interactions exclusively out of the symplectic subgroup [SP(N)] of time
reversing spins, a more stringent condition than the symplectic symmetry of
previous SP(N) large N treatments. As a result, we obtain a mean field theory
that incorporates the energy cost of frustrated bonds. When applied to the
frustrated square lattice, the ferromagnetic bonds restore the frustration
dependence of the critical spin in the Neel phase, and recover the correct
frustration dependence of the finite temperature Ising transition.


title: Dissipation Efficiency in Turbulent Convective Zones in Low Mass Stars

abstract:
  We extend the analysis of Penev et al. (2007) to calculate effective
viscosities for the surface convective zones of three main sequence stars of
0.775Msun, 0.85Msun and the present day Sun. In addition we also pay careful
attention to all normalization factors and assumptions in order to derive
actual numerical prescriptions for the effective viscosity as a function of the
period and direction of the external shear. Our results are applicable for
periods that are too long to correspond to eddies that fall within the inertial
subrange of Kolmogorov scaling, but no larger than the convective turnover
time, when the assumptions of the calculation break down. We find linear
scaling of effective viscosity with period and magnitudes at least three times
larger than the Zahn (1966, 1989) prescription.


title: Semi-static hedging for certain Margrabe type options with barriers

abstract:
  It turns out that in the bivariate Black-Scholes economy Margrabe type
options exhibit symmetry properties leading to semi-static hedges of rather
general barrier options. Some of the results are extended to variants obtained
by means of Brownian subordination. In order to increase the liquidity of the
hedging instruments for certain currency options, the duality principle can be
applied to set up hedges in a foreign market by using only European vanilla
options sometimes along with a risk-less bond. Since the semi-static hedges in
the Black-Scholes economy are exact, closed form valuation formulas for certain
barrier options can be easily derived.


title: Iterated bar complexes of E-infinity algebras and homology theories

abstract:
  We proved in a previous article that the bar complex of an E-infinity algebra
inherits a natural E-infinity algebra structure. As a consequence, a
well-defined iterated bar construction B^n(A) can be associated to any algebra
over an E-infinity operad. In the case of a commutative algebra A, our iterated
bar construction reduces to the standard iterated bar complex of A. The first
purpose of this paper is to give a direct effective definition of the iterated
bar complexes of E-infinity algebras. We use this effective definition to prove
that the n-fold bar complex B^n(A) admits an extension to categories of
algebras over E_n-operads. Then we prove that the n-fold bar complex determines
the homology theory associated to a category of algebras over E_n-operads. For
n infinite, we obtain an isomorphism between the homology of an infinite bar
construction and the usual Gamma-homology with trivial coefficients.


title: Scheduling Kalman Filters in Continuous Time

abstract:
  A set of N independent Gaussian linear time invariant systems is observed by
M sensors whose task is to provide the best possible steady-state causal
minimum mean square estimate of the state of the systems, in addition to
minimizing a steady-state measurement cost. The sensors can switch between
systems instantaneously, and there are additional resource constraints, for
example on the number of sensors which can observe a given system
simultaneously. We first derive a tractable relaxation of the problem, which
provides a bound on the achievable performance. This bound can be computed by
solving a convex program involving linear matrix inequalities. Exploiting the
additional structure of the sites evolving independently, we can decompose this
program into coupled smaller dimensional problems. In the scalar case with
identical sensors, we give an analytical expression of an index policy proposed
in a more general context by Whittle. In the general case, we develop open-loop
periodic switching policies whose performance matches the bound arbitrarily
closely.


title:
Can a microscopic stochastic model explain the emergence of pain cycles
  in patients?

abstract:
  A stochastic model is here introduced to investigate the molecular mechanisms
which trigger the perception of pain. The action of analgesic drug compounds is
discussed in a dynamical context, where the competition with inactive species
is explicitly accounted for. Finite size effects inevitably perturb the
mean-field dynamics: Oscillations in the amount of bound receptors
spontaneously manifest, driven by the noise which is intrinsic to the system
under scrutiny. These effects are investigated both numerically, via stochastic
simulations and analytically, through a large-size expansion. The claim that
our findings could provide a consistent interpretative framework to explain the
emergence of cyclic behaviors in response to analgesic treatments, is
substantiated.


title: Evolution of Magnetic Fields in Supernova Remnants

abstract:
  Supernova remnants (SNR) are now widely believed to be a source of cosmic
rays (CRs) up to an energy of 1 PeV. The magnetic fields required to accelerate
CRs to sufficiently high energies need to be much higher than can result from
compression of the circumstellar medium (CSM) by a factor 4, as is the case in
strong shocks. Non-thermal synchrotron maps of these regions indicate that
indeed the magnetic field is much stronger, and for young SNRs has a dominant
radial component while for old SNRs it is mainly toroidal. How these magnetic
fields get enhanced, or why the field orientation is mainly radial for young
remnants, is not yet fully understood. We use an adaptive mesh refinement MHD
code, AMRVAC, to simulate the evolution of supernova remnants and to see if we
can reproduce a mainly radial magnetic field in early stages of evolution. We
follow the evolution of the SNR with three different configurations of the
initial magnetic field in the CSM: an initially mainly toroidal field, a
turbulent magnetic field, and a field parallel to the symmetry axis. Although
for the latter two topologies a significant radial field component arises at
the contact discontinuity due to the Rayleigh-Taylor instability, no radial
component can be seen out to the forward shock. Ideal MHD appears not
sufficient to explain observations. Possibly a higher compression ratio and
additional turbulence due to dominant presence of CRs can help us to better
reproduce the observations in future studies.


title:
First Results From New 3D Spectral Simulations Of Anelastic Turbulent
  Convection

abstract:
  We have adapted the anelastic spectral code of Barranco & Marcus (2006) to
simulate a turbulent convective layer with the intention of studying the
effectiveness of turbulent eddies in dissipating external shear (e.g. tides).
We derive the anelastic equations, show the time integration scheme we use to
evolve these equations and present the tests we ran to confirm that our code
does what we expect. Further we apply a perturbative approach to find an
approximate scaling of the effective eddy viscosity with frequency, and find
that it is in general agreement with an estimate obtained by applying the same
procedure to a realistic simulation of the upper layers of the solar convective
zone.


title:
Combinatorial bases of Feigin-Stoyanovsky's type subspaces of
  higher-level standard $\tilde{\gsl}(\ell+1,\C)$-modules

abstract:
  Let $\tilde{\mathfrak g}$ be an affine Lie algebra of the type
$A_\ell^{(1)}$. We find a combinatorial basis of Feigin-Stoyanovsky's type
subspace $W(\Lambda)$ given in terms of difference and initial conditions.
Linear independence of the generating set is proved inductively by using
coefficients of intertwining operators. A basis of $L(\Lambda)$ is obtained as
an "inductive limit" of the basis of $W(\Lambda)$.


title: Atomic three-body loss as a dynamical three-body interaction

abstract:
  We discuss how large three-body loss of atoms in an optical lattice can give
rise to effective hard-core three-body interactions. For bosons, in addition to
the usual atomic superfluid, a dimer superfluid can then be observed for
attractive two-body interactions. The non-equilibrium dynamics of preparation
and stability of these phases are studied in 1D by combining time-dependent
Density Matrix Renormalisation Group techniques with a quantum trajectories
method.


title:
A proposal for studying off-shell stability of vacuum geometries in
  string theory

abstract:
  We briefly review studies of off-shell stability of vacuum geometries in
semiclassical gravity. We propose a study of off-shell stability of vacua in
string theory by a distinct, though somewhat related approach -- by studying
their stability under suitable world-sheet sigma model renormalization group
(RG) flows. Stability under RG flow is a mathematically well-posed and
tractable problem in many cases, as we illustrate through examples. The
advantage is that we can make definite predictions about late time behaviour
and endpoints of off-shell processes in string theory. This is a contribution
to the proceedings of Theory Canada 4, CRM Montreal.


title:
Parametrization and Classification of 20 Billion LSST Objects: Lessons
  from SDSS

abstract:
  The Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST) will be a large, wide-field
ground-based system designed to obtain, starting in 2015, multiple images of
the sky that is visible from Cerro Pachon in Northern Chile. About 90% of the
observing time will be devoted to a deep-wide-fast survey mode which will
observe a 20,000 deg$^2$ region about 1000 times during the anticipated 10
years of operations (distributed over six bands, $ugrizy$). Each 30-second long
visit will deliver 5$\sigma$ depth for point sources of $r\sim24.5$ on average.
The co-added map will be about 3 magnitudes deeper, and will include 10 billion
galaxies and a similar number of stars. We discuss various measurements that
will be automatically performed for these 20 billion sources, and how they can
be used for classification and determination of source physical and other
properties. We provide a few classification examples based on SDSS data, such
as color classification of stars, color-spatial proximity search for wide-angle
binary stars, orbital-color classification of asteroid families, and the
recognition of main Galaxy components based on the distribution of stars in the
position-metallicity-kinematics space. Guided by these examples, we anticipate
that two grand classification challenges for LSST will be 1) rapid and robust
classification of sources detected in difference images, and 2) {\it
simultaneous} treatment of diverse astrometric and photometric time series
measurements for an unprecedentedly large number of objects.


title:
Comparing two approaches to Hawking radiation of Schwarzschild-de Sitter
  black holes

abstract:
  We study two different ways to analyze the Hawking evaporation of a
Schwarzschild-de Sitter black hole. The first one uses the standard approach of
surface gravity evaluated at the possible horizons. The second method derives
its results via the Generalized Uncertainty Principle (GUP) which offers a yet
different method to look at the problem. In the case of a Schwarzschild black
hole it is known that this methods affirms the existence of a black hole
remnant (minimal mass $M_{\rm min}$) of the order of Planck mass $m_{\rm pl}$
and a corresponding maximal temperature $T_{\rm max}$ also of the order of
$m_{\rm pl}$. The standard $T(M)$ dispersion relation is, in the GUP
formulation, deformed in the vicinity of Planck length $l_{\rm pl}$ which is
the smallest value the horizon can take. We generalize the uncertainty
principle to Schwarzschild-de Sitter spacetime with the cosmological constant
$\varLambda=1/m_\varLambda^2$ and find a dual relation which, compared to
$M_{\rm min}$ and $T_{\rm max}$, affirms the existence of a maximal mass
$M_{\rm max}$ of the order $(m_{\rm pl}/m_\varLambda)m_{\rm pl}$, minimum
temperature $T_{\rm min} \sim m_\varLambda$. As compared to the standard
approach we find a deformed dispersion relation $T(M)$ close to $l_{\rm pl}$
and in addition at the maximally possible horizon approximately at
$r_\varLambda=1/m_\varLambda$. $T(M)$ agrees with the standard results at
$l_{\rm pl} \ll r \ll r_\varLambda$ (or equivalently at $M_{\rm min} \ll M \ll
M_{\rm max}$).


title: Anomaly Detection in Streaming Sensor Data

abstract:
  In this chapter we consider a cell phone network as a set of automatically
deployed sensors that records movement and interaction patterns of the
population. We discuss methods for detecting anomalies in the streaming data
produced by the cell phone network. We motivate this discussion by describing
the Wireless Phone Based Emergency Response (WIPER) system, a proof-of-concept
decision support system for emergency response managers. We also discuss some
of the scientific work enabled by this type of sensor data and the related
privacy issues. We describe scientific studies that use the cell phone data set
and steps we have taken to ensure the security of the data. We describe the
overall decision support system and discuss three methods of anomaly detection
that we have applied to the data.


title:
SDSS Observations of the Milky Way vs. N-body Models: A Comparison of
  Stellar Distributions in the Position-Velocity-Metallicity Space

abstract:
  The data obtained by the recent modern sky surveys enable detailed studies of
the stellar distribution in the multi-dimensional space spanned by spatial
coordinates, velocity and metallicity, from the solar neighborhood all the way
out to the outer Milky Way halo. While these results represent exciting
observational breakthroughs, their interpretation is not simple. For example,
traditional decomposition of the thin and thick disks predicts a strong
correlation in metallicity and kinematics at $\sim$1 kpc from the Galactic
plane; however, recent SDSS--based work has demonstrated an absence of this
correlation for disk stars. Instead, the variation of the metallicity and
rotational velocity distributions can be modeled using non--Gaussian functions
that retain their shapes and only shift as the distance from the mid--plane
increases. To fully contextualize these recent observational results, a
detailed comparison with sophisticated numerical models is necessary. Modern
simulations have sufficient resolution and physical detail to study the
formation of stellar disks and spheroids over a large baseline of masses and
cosmic ages. We discuss preliminary comparisons of various observed maps and
N--body model predictions and find them encouraging. In particular, the N--body
disk models of Ro\v{s}kar et al. \cite{Roskar 2008} reproduce a change of disk
scale height reminiscent of thin/thick disk decomposition, as well as
metallicity and rotational velocity gradients, while not inducing a correlation
of the latter two quantities, in qualitative agreement with SDSS observations.


title: Time Variability of Quasars: the Structure Function Variance

abstract:
  Significant progress in the description of quasar variability has been
recently made by employing SDSS and POSS data. Common to most studies is a
fundamental assumption that photometric observations at two epochs for a large
number of quasars will reveal the same statistical properties as well-sampled
light curves for individual objects. We critically test this assumption using
light curves for a sample of $\sim$2,600 spectroscopically confirmed quasars
observed about 50 times on average over 8 years by the SDSS stripe 82 survey.
We find that the dependence of the mean structure function computed for
individual quasars on luminosity, rest-frame wavelength and time is
qualitatively and quantitatively similar to the behavior of the structure
function derived from two-epoch observations of a much larger sample. We also
reproduce the result that the variability properties of radio and X-ray
selected subsamples are different. However, the scatter of the variability
structure function for fixed values of luminosity, rest-frame wavelength and
time is similar to the scatter induced by the variance of these quantities in
the analyzed sample. Hence, our results suggest that, although the statistical
properties of quasar variability inferred using two-epoch data capture some
underlying physics, there is significant additional information that can be
extracted from well-sampled light curves for individual objects.


title: A construction for coisotropic subalgebras of Lie bialgebras

abstract:
  Given a Lie bialgebra (g,g*), we present an explicit procedure to construct
coisotropic subalgebras, i.e. Lie subalgebras of g whose annihilator is a Lie
subalgebra of g*. We write down families of examples for the case that g is a
classical complex simple Lie algebra.


title:
Nanotechnology and Quasicrystals: From self assembly to photonic
  applications

abstract:
  After providing a concise overview on quasicrystals and their discovery more
than a quarter of a century ago, I consider the unexpected interplay between
nanotechnology and quasiperiodic crystals. Of particular relevance are efforts
to fabricate artificial functional micro- or nanostructures, as well as efforts
to control the self-assembly of nanostructures, where current knowledge about
the possibility of having long-range order without periodicity can provide
significant advantages. I discuss examples of systems ranging from artificial
metamaterials for photonic applications, through self-assembled soft matter, to
surface waves and optically-induced nonlinear photonic quasicrystals.


title:
CP violation and chiral symmetry restoration in the hot linear sigma
  model in a strong magnetic background

abstract:
  We study the effects of CP violation on the nature of the chiral transition
within the linear sigma model with two flavors of quarks. The
finite-temperature effective potential containing contributions from nontrivial
values for the parameter $\theta$ is computed to one loop order and their
minima structure is analyzed. Motivated by the possibility of observing the
formation of CP-odd domains in high-energy heavy ion collisions, we also
investigate the behavior of the effective potential in the presence of a strong
magnetic background. We find that the nature of the chiral transition is
influenced by both $\theta$ and the magnetic field.


title: Group Averaging for de Sitter free fields

abstract:
  Perturbative gravity about global de Sitter space is subject to
linearization-stability constraints. Such constraints imply that quantum states
of matter fields couple consistently to gravity {\it only} if the matter state
has vanishing de Sitter charges; i.e., only if the state is invariant under the
symmetries of de Sitter space. As noted by Higuchi, the usual Fock spaces for
matter fields contain no de Sitter-invariant states except the vacuum, though a
new Hilbert space of de Sitter invariant states can be constructed via
so-called group-averaging techniques. We study this construction for free
scalar fields of arbitrary positive mass in any dimension, and for linear
vector and tensor gauge fields in any dimension. Our main result is to show in
each case that group averaging converges for states containing a sufficient
number of particles. We consider general $N$-particle states with smooth
wavefunctions, though we obtain somewhat stronger results when the
wavefunctions are finite linear combinations of de Sitter harmonics. Along the
way we obtain explicit expressions for general boost matrix elements in a
familiar basis.


title: On the Origin of Exponential Galaxy Disks

abstract:
  We use a disk galaxy evolution model to investigate whether galaxies with
exponential surface brightness profiles can be produced in a cosmologically
motivated framework for disk galaxy formation. Our model follows the accretion,
cooling, and ejection of baryonic mass, as a function of radius, inside growing
dark matter haloes. The surface density profile of the disk is determined by
detailed angular momentum conservation, starting from the distribution of
specific angular momentum as found in cosmological simulations. Exponential and
quasi-exponential disks can be produced by our model through a combination of
supernova driven galactic outflows (which preferentially remove low angular
momentum material), intrinsic variation in the angular momentum distribution of
the halo gas, and the inefficiency of star formation at large radii. We use
observations from the SDSS NYU-VAGC to show that the median Sersic index of
blue galaxies is a strong function of stellar mass. For blue galaxies, low mass
galaxies have a median n=1.3, while high mass galaxies have a median n=4. Our
model with energy driven outflows correctly reproduces this trend, whereas our
models with momentum driven outflows and no outflows over predict the Sersic
indices in low mass galaxies. We show that the observed fraction of
"bulge-less" exponential galaxies is a strong function of stellar mass. For
Milky-Way mass galaxies less than 0.1% of blue galaxies are bulge-less, whereas
for M33 mass galaxies bulge-less and quasi-bulgeless galaxies are typical.
These results suggest that the difficulty of hierarchical formation models to
produce bulge-less Milky-Way mass galaxies is in fact not a problem. However,
the problem of producing M33 like galaxies remains, and will provide a key test
for hierarchical galaxy formation models. [Abridged]


title:
Some computations about Kazhdan-Lusztig cells in affine Weyl groups of
  rank 2

abstract:
  In the last section of the paper "Generalized induction of Kazhdan-Lusztig
cells" and in "Kazhdan-Lusztig cells in affine Weyl groups of rank 2" the
author described the partition into Kazhdan-Lusztig cells of the affine Weyl
groups of rank 2 for all choices of parameters. The proof of these results
relies on some explicit computations with GAP. In these notes we give some
details of these computations.


title: Leptogenesis in Complex Hybrid Inflation

abstract:
  We study the transference of an initial leptonic charge contained in a
complex scalar field (waterfall field) at the end of the inflation to the
leptons of the standard model and then convert this leptonic charge in baryonic
charge by sphaleron process. The proposal is that this is done trough the decay
of the complex scalar field particles into the right-handed neutrino which in
turn decays into the left-handed lepton doublet and the Higgs field of the
standard model. It must be analyzed in what environment the transference is
done. We propose that the inflaton (the dominant energy density of the
universe) decay into ultrarelativistic fermions before the waterfall field
particles decay in the right-handed neutrino, leaving a thermalized bath where
the transference of the leptonic asymmetry can be achieved.


title: Slightly Non-Minimal Dark Matter in PAMELA and ATIC

abstract:
  We present a simple model in which dark matter couples to the standard model
through a light scalar intermediary that is itself unstable. We find this model
has several notable features, and allows a natural explanation for a surplus of
positrons, but no surplus of anti-protons, as has been suggested by early data
from PAMELA and ATIC. Moreover, this model yields a very small nucleon
coupling, well below the direct detection limits. In this paper we explore the
effect of this model in both the early universe and in the galaxy.


title:
Quantum Monte Carlo study of a magnetic-field-driven 2D
  superconductor-insulator transition

abstract:
  We numerically study the superconductor-insulator phase transition in a model
disordered 2D superconductor as a function of applied magnetic field. The
calculation involves quantum Monte Carlo calculations of the (2+1)D XY model in
the presence of both disorder and magnetic field. The XY coupling is assumed to
have the form -J\cos(\theta_i-\theta_j-A_{ij}), where A_{ij} has a mean of zero
and a standard deviation \Delta A_{ij}. In a real system, such a model would be
approximately realized by a 2D array of small Josephson-coupled grains with
slight spatial disorder and a uniform applied magnetic field. The different
values \Delta A_{ij} then corresponds to an applied field such that the average
number of flux quanta per plaquette has various integer values N: larger N
corresponds to larger \Delta A_{ij}. For any value of \Delta A_{ij}, there
appears to be a critical coupling constant K_c(\Delta
A_{ij})=\sqrt{[J/(2U)]_c}, where U is the charging energy, above which the
system is a Mott insulator; there is also a corresponding critical conductivity
\sigma^*(\Delta A_{ij}) at the transition. For \Delta A_{ij}=\infty, the order
parameter of the transition is a renormalized coupling constant g. Using a
numerical technique appropriate for disordered systems, we show that the
transition at this value of \Delta A_{ij} takes place from an insulating (I)
phase to a Bose glass (BG) phase, and that the dynamical critical exponent
characterizing this transition is z \sim 1.3. By contrast, z=1 for this model
at \Delta A_{ij}=0. We suggest that the superconductor to insulator transition
is actually of this I to BG class at all nonzero \Delta A_{ij}'s, and we
support this interpretation by both numerical evidence and an analytical
argument based on the Harris criterion.


title: A generalization of the Collatz problem and conjecture

abstract:
  We introduce an infinite set of integer mappings that generalize the
well-known Collatz-Ulam mapping and we conjecture that an infinite subset of
these mappings feature the remarkable property of the Collatz conjecture,
namely that they converge to unity irrespective of which positive integer is
chosen initially.


title: Action and Index Spectra and Periodic Orbits in Hamiltonian Dynamics

abstract:
  The main theme of this paper is the connection between the existence of
infinitely many periodic orbits for a Hamiltonian system and the behavior of
its action or index spectrum under iterations. We use the action and index
spectra to show that any Hamiltonian diffeomorphism of a closed, rational
manifold with zero first Chern class has infinitely many periodic orbits and
that, for a general rational manifold, the number of geometrically distinct
periodic orbits is bounded from below by the ratio of the minimal Chern number
and half of the dimension. These generalizations of the Conley conjecture
follow from another result proved here asserting that a Hamiltonian
diffeomorphism with a symplectically degenerate maximum on a closed rational
manifold has infinitely many periodic orbits.
  We also show that for a broad class of manifolds and/or Hamiltonian
diffeomorphisms the minimal action--index gap remains bounded for some infinite
sequence of iterations and, as a consequence, whenever a Hamiltonian
diffeomorphism has finitely many periodic orbits, the actions and mean indices
of these orbits must satisfy a certain relation. Furthermore, for Hamiltonian
diffeomorphisms of the n-dimensional complex projective space with exactly n+1
periodic orbits a stronger result holds. Namely, for such a Hamiltonian
diffeomorphism, the difference of the action and the mean index on a periodic
orbit is independent of the orbit, provided that the symplectic structure on
the projective space is normalized to be in the same cohomology class as the
first Chern class.


title:
Evolution in Surface Morphology of Epitaxial Graphene Layers on SiC
  Induced by Controlled Structural Strain

abstract:
  The evolution in the surface morphology of epitaxial graphene films and
6H-SiC(0001) substrates is studied by electron channeling contrast imaging.
Whereas film thickness is determined by growth temperature only, increasing
growth times at constant temperature affect both internal stress and film
morphology. Annealing times in excess of 8-10 minutes lead to an increase in
the mean square roughness of SiC step edges to which graphene films are pinned,
resulting in compressively stressed films at room temperature. Shorter
annealing times produce minimal changes in the morphology of the terrace edges
and result in nearly stress-free films upon cooling to room temperature.


title: The rigorous solution for the average distance of a Sierpinski network

abstract:
  The closed-form solution for the average distance of a deterministic
network--Sierpinski network--is found. This important quantity is calculated
exactly with the help of recursion relations, which are based on the
self-similar network structure and enable one to derive the precise formula
analytically. The obtained rigorous solution confirms our previous numerical
result, which shows that the average distance grows logarithmically with the
number of network nodes. The result is at variance with that derived from
random networks.


title: Discrete Coordinate Scattering Approach to Nano-optical Resonance

abstract:
  In this letter, we investigate the coherent tunneling process of photons
between a defected circular resonator and a waveguide based on the recently
developed discrete coordinate scattering methods (L. Zhou et al., Phys. Rev.
Lett. 101, 100501 (2008)). We show the detailed microscopic mechanism of the
tunneling and present a simple model for defect coupling in the resonator. The
Finite-Difference Time-Domain(FDTD) numerical results is explored to illustrate
the analysis results.


title: Derived Smooth Manifolds

abstract:
  We define a simplicial category called the category of derived manifolds. It
contains the category of smooth manifolds as a full discrete subcategory, and
it is closed under taking arbitrary intersections in a manifold. A derived
manifold is a space together with a sheaf of local $C^\infty$-rings that is
obtained by patching together homotopy zero-sets of smooth functions on
Euclidean spaces.
  We show that derived manifolds come equipped with a stable normal bundle and
can be imbedded into Euclidean space. We define a cohomology theory called
derived cobordism, and use a Pontrjagin-Thom argument to show that the derived
cobordism theory is isomorphic to the classical cobordism theory. This allows
us to define fundamental classes in cobordism for all derived manifolds. In
particular, the intersection $A\cap B$ of submanifolds $A,B\subset X$ exists on
the categorical level in our theory, and a cup product formula
$$[A]\smile[B]=[A\cap B]$$ holds, even if the submanifolds are not transverse.
One can thus consider the theory of derived manifolds as a {\em
categorification} of intersection theory.


title:
Global Existence Of Smooth Solutions Of A 3D Loglog Energy-Supercritical
  Wave Equation

abstract:
  We prove global existence of smooth solutions of the 3D loglog
energy-supercritical wave equation $\partial_{tt} u - \triangle u = -u^{5}
\log^{c} (log(10+u^{2})) $ with $0 < c < {8/225}$ and smooth initial data
$(u(0)=u_{0}, \partial_{t} u(0)=u_{1})$. First we control the $L_{t}^{4}
L_{x}^{12}$ norm of the solution on an arbitrary size time interval by an
expression depending on the energy and an \textit{a priori} upper bound of its
$L_{t}^{\infty} \tilde{H}^{2}(\mathbb{R}^{3})$ norm, with
$\tilde{H}^{2}(\mathbb{R}^{3}):=\dot{H}^{2}(\mathbb{R}^{3}) \cap
\dot{H}^{1}(\mathbb{R}^{3})$. The proof of this long time estimate relies upon
the use of some potential decay estimates \cite{bahger, shatstruwe} and a
modification of an argument in \cite{taolog}. Then we find an \textit{a
posteriori} upper bound of the $L_{t}^{\infty} \tilde{H}^{2}(\mathbb{R}^{3})$
norm of the solution by combining the long time estimate with an induction on
time of the Strichartz estimates.


title: The Modular number, Congruence number, and Multiplicity One

abstract:
  Let $N$ be a positive integer and let $f$ be a newform of weight 2 on
$\Gamma_0(N)$. In earlier joint work with K. Ribet and W. Stein, we introduced
the notions of the modular number and the congruence number of the quotient
abelian variety $A_f$ of $J_0(N)$ associated to the newform $f$. These
invariants are analogs of the notions of the modular degree and congruence
primes respectively associated to elliptic curves. We show that if $p$ is a
prime such that every maximal ideal of the Hecke algebra of characteristic $p$
that contains the annihilator ideal of $f$ satisfies multiplicity one, then the
modular number and the congruence number have the same $p$-adic valuation.


title: A visible factor for analytic rank one

abstract:
  Let $E$ be an optimal elliptic curve of conductor $N$, such that the
$L$-function of $E$ vanishes to order one at $s=1$. Let $K$ be a quadratic
imaginary field in which all the primes dividing $N$ split and such that the
$L$-function of $E$ over $K$ also vanishes to order one at $s=1$. In view of
the Gross-Zagier theorem, the second part of the Birch and Swinnerton-Dyer
conjecture says that the index in $E(K)$ of the subgroup generated by the
Heegner point is equal to the product of the Manin constant of $E$, the
Tamagawa numbers of $E$, and the square root of the order of the
Shafarevich-Tate group of $E$ (over $K$). We extract an integer factor from the
index mentioned above and relate this factor to certain congruences of the
newform associated to $E$ with eigenforms of analytic rank bigger than one. We
use the theory of visibility to show that, under certain hypotheses (which
includes the first part of the Birch and Swinnerton-Dyer conjecture on rank),
if an odd prime $q$ divides this factor, then $q$ divides the order of the
Shafarevich-Tate group or the order of an arithmetic component group of $E$, as
predicted by the second part of the Birch and Swinnerton-Dyer conjecture.


title: Minimal Kinematic Constraints and MT2

abstract:
  We clarify the relation between the variable MT2 and the method of kinematic
constraints, both of which can be used for mass determination in events with
two missing (dark matter) particles at hadron colliders. We identify a set of
minimal kinematic constraints, including the mass shell conditions for the
missing particles and their mother particles, as well as the constraint from
the measured missing transverse momentum. We show that MT2 is the boundary of
the mass region consistent with the minimal constraints. From this point of
view, we also obtained a more efficient algorithm for calculating MT2. When
more constraints are available in the events, we can develop more sophisticated
mass determination methods starting from the MT2 constraint. In particular, we
discuss cases when each decay chain contains two visible particles.


title: Squareness in the special L-value and special L-values of twists

abstract:
  Let N be a prime and let A be a quotient of J_0(N) over Q associated to a
newform such that the special L-value of A (at s=1) is non-zero. Suppose that
the algebraic part of the special L-value of A is divisible by an odd prime q
such that q does not divide the numerator of (N-1)/12. Then the Birch and
Swinnerton-Dyer conjecture predicts that the q-adic valuations of the algebraic
part of the special L-value of A and of the order of the Shafarevich-Tate group
are both positive even numbers. Under a certain mod q non-vanishing hypothesis
on special L-values of twists of A, we show that the q-adic valuations of the
algebraic part of the special L-value of A and of the Birch and Swinnerton-Dyer
conjectural order of the Shafarevich-Tate group of A are both positive even
numbers. We also give a formula for the algebraic part of the special L-value
of A over quadratic imaginary fields K in terms of the free abelian group on
isomorphism classes of supersingular elliptic curves in characteristic N
(equivalently, over conjugacy classes of maximal orders in the definite
quaternion algebra over Q ramified at N and infinity) which shows that this
algebraic part is a perfect square up to powers of the prime two and of primes
dividing the discriminant of K. Finally, for an optimal elliptic curve E, we
give a formula for the special L-value of the twist E_D of E by a negative
fundamental discriminant -D, which shows that this special L-value is an
integer up to a power of 2, under some hypotheses. In view of the second part
of the Birch and Swinnerton-Dyer conjecture, this leads us to the surprising
conjecture that the square of the order of the torsion subgroup of E_D divides
the product of the order of the Shafarevich-Tate group of E_D and the orders of
the arithmetic component groups of E_D, under certain mild hypotheses.


title:
Nonlinear excitation of photonikos and plasmons by high-power, short
  pulse lasers

abstract:
  Modulational excitation of longitudinal photons (photonikos) and electron
Langmuir waves, as well as ion sound waves by an incoherent strong and
superstrong radiation (high-power short pulse lasers, non-thermal equilibrium
cosmic field radiation, etc.) in plasmas are investigated. A simultaneous
generation of photonikos and plasmons are demonstrated. Furthermore, the
kinetic instability is considered when a low frequency photonikos are generated
alone. Growth rates of these new modes are obtained.


title: Rational torsion in elliptic curves and the cuspidal subgroup

abstract:
  Let $A$ be an elliptic curve over $\Q$ of square free conductor $N$. We prove
that if $A$ has a rational torsion point of prime order $r$ such that $r$ does
not divide $6N$, then $r$ divides the order of the cuspidal subgroup of
$J_0(N)$.


title:
First exclusive measurements of the K^-pp state - populated in the pp to
  K^+ Lambda p reaction at 2.85 GeV

abstract:
  We have analyzed data of the DISTO experiment on the exclusive pp to K^+
Lambda p process at T_p = 2.85$ GeV to search for a K^-pp (= X) nuclear bound
state to be formed in the pp to K^+ + X reaction. The deviation spectra of the
K^+ missing-mass MM (K^+) and Lambda p invariant-mass M(Lambda-p) with
selection of large-angle proton emission revealed a structure with M_X = 2265
+- 2 MeV/c2 and Gamma_X = 118 +- 8$ MeV.


title:
Sub-wavelength image manipulating through compensated anisotropic
  metamaterial prisms

abstract:
  Based on the concept of sub-wavelength imaging through compensated bilayer of
anisotropic metamaterials (AMMs), which is an expansion of the perfect lens
configuration, we propose two dimensional prism pair structures of compensated
AMMs that are capable of manipulating two dimensional sub-wavelength images. We
demonstrate that through properly designed symmetric and asymmetric compensated
prism pair structures planar image rotation with arbitrary angle, lateral image
shift, as well as image magnification could be achieved with sub-wavelength
resolution. Both theoretical analysis and full wave electromagnetic simulations
have been employed to verify the properties of the proposed prism structures.
Utilizing the proposed AMM prisms, flat optical image of objects with
sub-wavelength features can be projected and magnified to wavelength scale
allowing for further optical processing of the image by conventional optics.


title: Radio-frequency reflectometry on large gated 2-dimensional systems

abstract:
  We have embedded an AlGaAs/GaAs based, gated 2D hole system (2DHS) into an
impedance transformer $LC$ circuit, and show that by using radio-frequency
reflectometry it is possible to perform sensitive, large bandwidth, electrical
resistance measurements of 2D systems at mK temperatures. We construct a simple
lumped element model where the gated 2DHS is described as a resistive
transmission line. The model gives a qualitative understanding of the
experimental results. As an example, we use our method to map out the Landau
level evolution in a 2DHS as a function of magnetic field and gate voltage.


title: Representation dimension of $m$-replicated algebras

abstract:
  Let $A$ be a finite dimensional hereditary algebra over an algebraically
closed field and $A^{(m)}$ the $m$-replicated algebra of $A$. We prove that the
representation dimension of $A^{(m)}$ is at most three, and that the dominant
dimension of $A^{(m)}$ is at least $m$.


title:
Models of Jupiter's Growth Incorporating Thermal and Hydrodynamic
  Constraints

abstract:
  [Abridged] We model the growth of Jupiter via core nucleated accretion,
applying constraints from hydrodynamical processes that result from the
disk-planet interaction. We compute the planet's internal structure using a
Henyey-type stellar evolution code. The planet's interactions with the
protoplanetary disk are calculated using 3-D hydrodynamic simulations. Previous
models of Jupiter's growth have taken the radius of the planet to be
approximately one Hill sphere radius, Rhill. However, 3-D hydrodynamic
simulations show that only gas within 0.25Rhill remains bound to the planet,
with the more distant gas eventually participating in the shear flow of the
protoplanetary disk. Therefore in our new simulations, the planet's outer
boundary is placed at the location where gas has the thermal energy to reach
the portion of the flow not bound to the planet. We find that the smaller
radius increases the time required for planetary growth by ~5%. Thermal
pressure limits the rate at which a planet less than a few dozen times as
massive as Earth can accumulate gas from the protoplanetary disk, whereas
hydrodynamics regulates the growth rate for more massive planets. Within a
moderately viscous disk, the accretion rate peaks when the planet's mass is
about equal to the mass of Saturn. In a less viscous disk hydrodynamical limits
to accretion are smaller, and the accretion rate peaks at lower mass. To
account for disk dissipation, we perform some of our simulations of Jupiter's
growth within a disk whose surface gas density decreases on a timescale of
3Myr. According to our simulations, proto-Jupiter's distended and
thermally-supported envelope was too small to capture the planet's current
retinue of irregular satellites as advocated by Pollack et al. (1979).


title: Science with ASKAP - the Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder

abstract:
  [ABRIDGED VERSION] The future of cm and m-wave astronomy lies with the Square
Kilometre Array (SKA), a telescope under development by a consortium of 17
countries. The SKA will be 50 times more sensitive than any existing radio
facility. A majority of the key science for the SKA will be addressed through
large-area imaging of the Universe at frequencies from 300 MHz to a few GHz.
  The Australian SKA Pathfinder (ASKAP) is aimed squarely in this frequency
range, and achieves instantaneous wide-area imaging through the development and
deployment of phase-array feed systems on parabolic reflectors. This large
field-of-view makes ASKAP an unprecedented synoptic telescope poised to achieve
substantial advances in SKA key science. The central core of ASKAP will be
located at the Murchison Radio Observatory in inland Western Australia, one of
the most radio-quiet locations on the Earth and one of the sites selected by
the international community as a potential location for the SKA.
  Following an introductory description of ASKAP, this document contains 7
chapters describing specific science programmes for ASKAP.
  The combination of location, technological innovation and scientific program
will ensure that ASKAP will be a world-leading radio astronomy facility,
closely aligned with the scientific and technical direction of the SKA. A brief
summary chapter emphasizes the point, and considers discovery space.


title: Spectral transitions of an ultraluminous X-ray source, NGC 2403 Source 3

abstract:
  Suzaku observation of an ultraluminous X-ray source, NGC 2403 Source 3,
performed on 2006 March 16--17, is reported. The Suzaku XIS spectrum of Source
3 was described with a multi-color black-body-like emission from an optically
thick accretion disk. The innermost temperature and radius of the accretion
disk was measured to be $T_{\rm in} = 1.08_{-0.03}^{+0.02} $ keV and $R_{\rm
in} = 122.1_{-6.8}^{+7.7} \alpha^{1/2}$ km, respectively, where $\alpha = (\cos
60^\circ /\cos i)$ with $i$ being the disk inclination. The bolometric
luminosity of the source was estimated to be $L_{\rm bol} = 1.82 \times 10^{39}
\alpha $ ergs s$^{-1}$. Archival Chandra and XMM-Newton data of the source were
analyzed for long-term spectral variations. In almost all observations, the
source showed multi-color black-body-like X-ray spectra with parameters similar
to those in the Suzaku observation. In only one Chandra observation, however,
Source 3 was found to exhibit a power-law-like spectrum, with a photon index of
$\Gamma = 2.37 \pm 0.08$, when it was fainter by about $\sim 15 %$ than in the
Suzaku observation. The spectral behavior is naturally explained in terms of a
transition between the slim disk state and the "very high" states, both found
in Galactic black hole binaries when their luminosity approach the Eddington
limit. These results are utilized to argue that ultraluminous X-ray sources
generally have significantly higher black-hole masses than ordinary
stellar-mass black holes.


title: Symmetric Schroder paths and restricted involutions

abstract:
  Let $A_k$ be the set of permutations in the symmetric group $S_k$ with prefix
12. This paper concerns the enumeration of involutions which avoid the set of
patterns $A_k$. We present a bijection between symmetric Schroder paths of
length $2n$ and involutions of length $n+1$ avoiding $\mathcal{A}_4$.
Statistics such as the number of right-to-left maxima and fixed points of the
involution correspond to the number of steps in the symmetric Schroder path of
a particular type. For each $k> 2$ we determine the generating function for the
number of involutions avoiding the subsequences in $A_k$, according to length,
first entry and number of fixed points.


title: Partial tilting modules over $m$-replicated algebras

abstract:
  Let $A$ be a hereditary algebra over an algebraically closed field $k$ and
$A^{(m)}$ be the $m$-replicated algebra of $A$. Given an $A^{(m)}$-module $T$,
we denote by $\delta (T)$ the number of non isomorphic indecomposable summands
of $T$. In this paper, we prove that a partial tilting $A^{(m)}$-module $T$ is
a tilting $A^{(m)}$-module if and only if $\delta (T)=\delta (A^{(m)})$, and
that every partial tilting $A^{(m)}$-module has complements. As an application,
we deduce that the tilting quiver $\mathscr{K}_{A^{(m)}}$ of $A^{(m)}$ is
connected. Moreover, we investigate the number of complements to almost tilting
modules over duplicated algebras.


title: FeTe as a candidate material for new iron-based superconductor

abstract:
  Tetragonal FeSe is a superconductor with a transition temperature Tc of 8 K
and shows a huge enhancement of Tc with applying pressure. Tetragonal FeTe has
a structure very analogous to superconducting FeSe, but does not show
superconducting transition. We investigated the pressure effect of resistivity
on FeTe. The resistivity at room temperature decreased with increasing
pressure. An anomaly in resistivity around 80 K shifted towards a lower
temperature with increasing pressure.


title:
Causal dissipative hydrodynamics obtained from the
  nonextensive/dissipative correspondence

abstract:
  We derive the constitutive equations of causal relativistic dissipative
hydrodynamics ($d$-hydrodynamics) from perfect nonextensive hydrodynamics
($q$-hydrodynamics) using the nonextensive/dissipative correspondence (NexDC)
proposed by us recently. The $q$-hydrodynamics can be thus regarded as a
possible model for the $d$-hydrodynamics facilitating its application to high
energy multiparticle production processes. As an example we have shown that
applying the NexDC to the perfect 1+1 $q$-hydrodynamics, one obtains a proper
time evolution of the bulk pressure and the Reynolds number.


title: Complete bounded holomorphic curves immersed in C^2 with arbitrary genus

abstract:
  In the previous paper, the authors constructed a complete holomorphic
immersion of the unit disk D into C^2 whose image is bounded. In this paper, we
shall prove existence of complete holomorphic null immersions of Riemann
surfaces with arbitrary genus and finite topology, whose image is bounded in
C^2. To construct such immersions, we apply the method used by F. J. Lopez to
perturb the genus zero example changing its genus.
  As an analogue the above construction, we also give a new method to construct
complete bounded minimal immersions (resp. weakly complete maximal surface)
with arbitrary genus and finite topology in Euclidean 3-space (resp.
Lorentz-Minkowski 3-spacetime).


title: On the unification of dwarf and giant elliptical galaxies

abstract:
  The near orthogonal distributions of dwarf elliptical (dE) and giant
elliptical (E) galaxies in the mu_e-Mag and mu_e-log(R_e) diagrams have been
interpreted as evidence for two distinct galaxy formation processes. However,
continuous, linear relationships across the alleged dE/E boundary at M_B = -18
mag - such as those between central surface brightness (mu_0) and (i) galaxy
magnitude and (ii) light-profile shape (n) - suggest a similar, governing
formation mechanism. Here we explain how these latter two linear trends
necessitate a different behavior for dE and E galaxies, exactly as observed, in
diagrams involving mu_e (and also <mu>_e). A natural consequence is that the
distribution of dEs and Es in Fundamental Plane type analyses that use the
associated intensity I_e, or <I>_e, are expected to appear different. Together
with other linear trends across the alleged dE/E boundary, such as those
between luminosity and color, metallicity, and velocity dispersion, it appears
that the dEs form a continuous extension to the E galaxies. The presence of
partially depleted cores in luminous (M_B < -20.5 mag) Es does however signify
the action of a different physical process at the centers (< ~300 pc) of these
galaxies.


title: Abelian Fibrations, String Junctions, and Flux/Geometry Duality

abstract:
  In previous work, it was argued that the type IIB T^6/Z_2 orientifold with a
choice of flux preserving N=2 supersymmetry is dual to a class of purely
geometric type IIA compactifications on abelian surface (T^4) fibered
Calabi-Yau threefolds. We provide two explicit constructions of the resulting
Calabi-Yau duals. The first is a monodromy based description, analogous to
F-theory encoding of Calabi-Yau geometry via 7-branes and string junctions,
except for T^4 rather than T^2 fibers. The second is an explicit
algebro-geometric construction in which the T^4 fibers arise as the Jacobian
tori of a family of genus-2 curves. This improved description of the duality
map will be a useful tool to extend our understanding of warped
compactifications. We sketch applications to related work to define warped
Kaluza-Klein reduction in toroidal orientifolds, and to check the modified
rules for D-brane instanton zero mode counting due to the presence of flux and
other D-branes. The nontrivial fundamental groups of the Calabi-Yau manifolds
constructed also have potential applications to heterotic model building.


title:
Dynamics and modulation of ring dark soliton in 2D Bose-Einstein
  condensates with tunable interaction

abstract:
  We investigate the dynamics and modulation of ring dark soliton in 2D
Bose-Einstein condensates with tunable interaction both analytically and
numerically. The analytic solutions of ring dark soliton are derived by using a
new transformation method. For shallow ring dark soliton, it is stable when the
ring is slightly distorted, while for large deformation of the ring, vortex
pairs appear and they demonstrate novel dynamical behaviors: the vortex pairs
will transform into dark lumplike solitons and revert to ring dark soliton
periodically. Moreover, our results show that the dynamical evolution of the
ring dark soliton can be dramatically affected by Feshbach resonance, and the
lifetime of the ring dark soliton can be largely extended which offers a useful
method for observing the ring dark soliton in future experiments.


title: Moduli Stabilization from Fluxes

abstract:
  A brief overview of hep-th/0201028 prepared for NATO Advanced Study Institute
and EC Summer School on Progress in String, Field and Particle Theory, Cargese,
Corsica, France, 25 June - 11 July 2002.


title: Neuronal synchrony during anaesthesia - A thalamocortical model

abstract:
  There is growing evidence in favour of the temporal-coding hypothesis that
temporal correlation of neuronal discharges may serve to bind distributed
neuronal activity into unique representations and, in particular, that $\theta$
(3.5-7.5 Hz) and $\delta$ ($0.5<$3.5 Hz) oscillations facilitate information
coding. The $\theta$ and $\delta$ rhythms are shown to be involved in various
sleep stages, and during an{\ae}sthesia, and they undergo changes with the
depth of an{\ae}sthesia. We introduce a thalamocortical model of interacting
neuronal ensembles to describe phase relationships between $\theta$ and
$\delta$ oscillations, especially during deep and light an{\ae}sthesia.
Asymmetric and long range interactions among the thalamocortical neuronal
oscillators are taken into account. The model results are compared with the
experimental observations of Musizza et al. {\it J. Physiol. (London)} 2007
580:315-326. The $\delta$ and $\theta$ activities are found to be separately
generated and are governed by the thalamus and cortex respectively. Changes in
the degree of intra--ensemble and inter--ensemble synchrony imply that the
neuronal ensembles inhibit information coding during deep an{\ae}sthesia and
facilitate it during light an{\ae}sthesia.


title: Generating Functional for Bound States in QED

abstract:
  The manifestly Lorentz covariant formulation of quantum electrodynamics
disregards Coulomb instantaneous interaction and its consequence -
instantaneous bound states (IBS's). In this article we consider the way of
construction the IBS generating functional using the operator generalization of
the initial data in the Dirac Hamiltonian approach to QED.


title:
Mergers of luminous early-type galaxies in the local universe and
  gravitational wave background

abstract:
  Supermassive black hole (SMBH) coalescence in galaxy mergers is believed to
be one of the primary sources of very low frequency gravitational waves (GWs).
Significant contribution of the GWs comes from mergers of massive galaxies with
redshifts z<2. Very few previous studies gave the merger rate of massive
galaxies. % We selected a large sample (1209) of close pairs of galaxies with
projected separations 7<r_p<50 kpc from 87,889 luminous early-type galaxies
(M_r<-21.5) from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 6. These pairs
constitute a complete volume-limited sample in the local universe (z<0.12).
Using our newly developed technique, 249 mergers have been identified by
searching for interaction features. From them, we found that the merger
fraction of luminous early-type galaxies is 0.8%, and the merger rate in the
local universe is % R_g=(1.0+/-0.4)*10^{-5} Mpc^{-3} Gyr^{-1}} % with an
uncertainty mainly depending on the merging timescale. % We estimated the
masses of SMBHs in the centers of merging galaxies based on their luminosities.
We found that the chirp mass distribution of the SMBH binaries follows a power
law with an index of -3.0+/-0.5 in the range 5*10^8--5*10^{9} M_{\odot}. %
Using the SMBH population in the mergers and assuming that the SMBHs can be
efficiently driven into the GW regime, we investigated the stochastic GW
background in the frequency range 10^{-9}--10^{-7} Hz. We obtained the spectrum
of the GW background of h_c(f)=10^{-15}(f/yr^{-1})^{-2/3}, which is one
magnitude higher than that obtained by Jaffe & Backer in 2003, but consistent
with those calculated from galaxy-formation models.


title: The 6-GHz Multibeam Maser Survey I. Techniques

abstract:
  A new 7-beam 6-7 GHz receiver has been built to survey the Galaxy and the
Magellanic Clouds for newly forming high-mass stars that are pinpointed by
strong methanol maser emission at 6668 MHz. The receiver was jointly
constructed by Jodrell Bank Observatory (JBO) and the Australia Telescope
National Facility (ATNF) and allows simultaneous coverage at 6668 and 6035 MHz.
It was successfully commissioned at Parkes in January 2006 and is now being
used to conduct the Parkes-Jodrell multibeam maser survey of the Milky Way.
This will be the first systematic survey of the entire Galactic plane for
masers of not only 6668-MHz methanol, but also 6035-MHz excited-state hydroxyl.
The survey is two orders of magnitude faster than most previous systematic
surveys and has an rms noise level of ~0.17 Jy.This paper describes the
observational strategy, techniques and reduction procedures of the Galactic and
Magellanic Cloud surveys, together with deeper, pointed, follow-up observations
and complementary observations with other instruments. It also includes an
estimate of the survey detection efficiency. The 111 days of observations with
the Parkes telescope have so far yielded >800 methanol sources, of which ~350
are new discoveries. The whole project will provide the first comprehensive
Galaxy-wide catalogue of 6668-MHz and 6035-MHz masers.


title:
A local-density approximation for the exchange energy functional for
  excited states : the band gap problem

abstract:
  We present excited states density functional theory (DFT) to calculate band
gap for semiconductors and insulators. For the excited states
exchange-correlation functional, we use a simple local density approximation
(LDA) like functional and it gives the result which is very closed to
experimental results. The linear muffin-tin potential is used to solve the self
consistent Kohn-Sham equation


title: Monotonic Convergence in an Information-Theoretic Law of Small Numbers

abstract:
  An "entropy increasing to the maximum" result analogous to the entropic
central limit theorem (Barron 1986; Artstein et al. 2004) is obtained in the
discrete setting. This involves the thinning operation and a Poisson limit.
Monotonic convergence in relative entropy is established for general discrete
distributions, while monotonic increase of Shannon entropy is proved for the
special class of ultra-log-concave distributions. Overall we extend the
parallel between the information-theoretic central limit theorem and law of
small numbers explored by Kontoyiannis et al. (2005) and Harremo\"es et al.\
(2007, 2008). Ingredients in the proofs include convexity, majorization, and
stochastic orders.


title:
Near optimal thresholding estimation of a Poisson intensity on the real
  line

abstract:
  The purpose of this paper is to estimate the intensity of a Poisson process
$N$ by using thresholding rules. In this paper, the intensity, defined as the
derivative of the mean measure of $N$ with respect to $ndx$ where $n$ is a
fixed parameter, is assumed to be non-compactly supported. The estimator
$\tilde{f}_{n,\gamma}$ based on random thresholds is proved to achieve the same
performance as the oracle estimator up to a possible logarithmic term. Then,
minimax properties of $\tilde{f}_{n,\gamma}$ on Besov spaces ${\cal
B}^{\ensuremath \alpha}_{p,q}$ are established. Under mild assumptions, we
prove that $$\sup_{f\in B^{\ensuremath \alpha}_{p,q}\cap \ensuremath \mathbb
{L}_{\infty}} \ensuremath \mathbb {E}(\ensuremath | | \tilde{f}_{n,\gamma}-f|
|_2^2)\leq C(\frac{\log n}{n})^{\frac{\ensuremath \alpha}{\ensuremath
\alpha+{1/2}+({1/2}-\frac{1}{p})_+}}$$ and the lower bound of the minimax risk
for ${\cal B}^{\ensuremath \alpha}_{p,q}\cap \ensuremath \mathbb {L}_{\infty}$
coincides with the previous upper bound up to the logarithmic term. This new
result has two consequences. First, it establishes that the minimax rate of
Besov spaces ${\cal B}^{\ensuremath \alpha}_{p,q}$ with $p\leq 2$ when non
compactly supported functions are considered is the same as for compactly
supported functions up to a logarithmic term. When $p>2$, the rate exponent,
which depends on $p$, deteriorates when $p$ increases, which means that the
support plays a harmful role in this case. Furthermore, $\tilde{f}_{n,\gamma}$
is adaptive minimax up to a logarithmic term.


title:
Algorithms for Producing and Ordering Lexical and Nonlexical Sequences
  out of one Element

abstract:
  This paper deals with algorithms for producing and ordering lexical and
nonlexical sequences of a given degree. The notion of "elementary operations"
on positive integral sequences is introduced. Our main theorem answers the
question of when two lexical sequences are adjacent.


title: Signal Acquisition from Measurements via Non-Linear Models

abstract:
  We consider the problem of reconstruction of a non-linear finite-parametric
model $M=M_p(x),$ with $p=(p_1,...,p_r)$ a set of parameters, from a set of
measurements $\mu_j(M)$. In this paper $\mu_j(M)$ are always the moments
$m_j(M)=\int x^jM_p(x)dx$. This problem is a central one in Signal Processing,
Statistics, and in many other applications.
  We concentrate on a direct (and somewhat "naive") approach to the above
problem: we simply substitute the model function $M_p(x)$ into the measurements
$\mu_j$ and compute explicitly the resulting "symbolic" expressions of
$\mu_j(M_p)$ in terms of the parameters $p$. Equating these "symbolic"
expressions to the actual measurement results, we produce a system of nonlinear
equations on the parameters $p$, which we consequently try to solve.
  The aim of this paper is to review some recent results (mostly of
\cite{Vet5,Mil1,Mil2,Put1,Vet4,Vet3,Mil3,Mil4,Vet2}) in this direction,
stressing the algebraic structure of the arising systems and mathematical tools
required for their solutions.
  In particular, we discuss the relation of the reconstruction problem above
with the recent results of \cite{bfy,bry,chr,pak1,pak2,pak3,pry,ry} on the
vanishing problem of generalized polynomial moments and on the Cauchy-type
integrals of algebraic functions.
  The accompanying paper \cite{Kis1} (this volume) provides a solution method
for a wide class of reconstruction problems as above, based on the study of
linear differential equations with rational coefficient, which are satisfied by
the moment generating function of the problem.


title: Casimir densities for wedge-shaped boundaries

abstract:
  The vacuum expectation values of the field squared and the energy-momentum
tensor are investigated for a scalar field with Dirichlet boundary conditions
and for the electromagnetic field inside a wedge with a coaxial cylindrical
boundary. In the case of the electromagnetic field perfectly conducting
boundary conditions are assumed on the bounding surfaces. By using the
Abel-Plana-type formula for the series over the zeros of the Bessel function,
the vacuum expectation values are presented in the form of the sum of two
terms. The first one corresponds to the geometry without a cylindrical boundary
and the second one is induced by the presence of the cylindrical shell. The
additional vacuum forces acting on the wedge sides due the presence of the
cylindrical boundary are evaluated and it is shown that these forces are
attractive for both scalar and electromagnetic fields.


title:
Tenth-Order Lepton Anomalous Magnetic Moment -- Second-Order Vertex
  Containing Two Vacuum Polarization Subdiagrams, One Within the Other

abstract:
  This paper reports the tenth-order QED contribution to the g-2 of electron
and muon from two gauge-invariant sets, Set I(g) and Set I(h). In the case of
electron g-2 Set I(g) consists of 9 Feynman diagrams which have a 4th-order
vacuum-polarization loop containing another 4th-order vacuum-polarization loop.
Set I(h) consists of 30 Feynman diagrams which have a proper 6th-order
vacuum-polarization loop containing a second-order vacuum-polarization loop.
The results of numerical integration, including mass-dependent terms containing
one closed loop of muon, are 0.028 597 (4) (alpha/pi)^5 for Set I(g) and 0.001
685 (13) (alpha/pi)^5 for Set I(h), respectively. We also report the
contributions of Set I(g) and Set I(h) to the muon anomaly. Diagrams included
are those containing electron, muon, and tau-lepton loops. Their sums are 2.640
9 (4) (alpha/pi)^5 and -0.564 8 (11) (alpha/pi)^5, respectively. The sum of
contributions of Sets I(g) and I(h) containing only electron loops are in fair
agreement with the recently obtained asymptotic analytic results.


title:
Another Abundance Inhomogeneity in the South East Limb of the Cygnus
  Loop

abstract:
  We have observed the south-east (SE) limb of the Cygnus Loop with {\it
Suzaku}. Our spatially-resolved spectroscopic study shows that a
one-$kT_\mathrm{e}$ non-equilibrium ionization model represents our spectra
fairly well. We find that the metal abundances obtained are all depleted
relative to the solar values with a positional dependency along the radial
direction of the Cygnus Loop. The abundances in the very edge of the limb shows
about half the solar value, whereas other regions inside the Loop show about
0.2 times the solar value which has been believed as a typical value for the
Cygnus Loop limb. The "enhanced" abundance in the very edge in the SE limb is
quite similar to that found in the north-east (NE) limb of the Loop, and thus
this is another evidence of abundance inhomogeneity in the limb regions of the
Loop. The radio map shows a quite different feature: the NE limb is in the
radio bright region while the SE limb shows almost no radio. Therefore, the
metal abundance variation in the SE limb can not attribute to the non-thermal
emission. The abundance inhomogeneity as well as the metal depletion down to
0.2 times the solar value still remain an open question.


title: Langevin formulation for single-file diffusion

abstract:
  We introduce a stochastic equation for the microscopic motion of a tagged
particle in the single file model. This equation provides a compact
representation of several of the system's properties such as
Fluctuation-Dissipation and Linear Response relations, achieved by means of a
diffusion noise approach. Most important, the proposed Langevin Equation
reproduces quantitatively the \emph{three} temporal regimes and the
corresponding time scales: ballistic, diffusive and subdiffusive.