title:
Anisotropic flow of identified particles in Pb--Pb collisions at
  $\sqrt{s_{_{\rm NN}}} =$ 2.76 TeV with the ALICE detector

abstract:
  The measurement of anisotropic flow of identified particles, including
charged pion, kaon, (anti-)proton as well as strange and multi-strange
particles (${\rm K_{S}^{0}}$, ${\rm \Lambda}$, ${\rm \Xi}$ and ${\rm \Omega}$)
are measured in Pb--Pb collisions at $\sqrt{s_{_{{\rm NN}}}}$ = 2.76 TeV with
the ALICE detector. The results are compared to measurements at RHIC and
hydrodynamic model calculations. The mass splitting and the scaling with the
number of constituent quarks of the anisotropic flow are also discussed.


title:
Mode-locked Lasers Applied to Deflecting a Near Earth Object on
  Collision Course with Earth

abstract:
  We consider synchronized trains of sub-picosecond pulses generated by
mode-locked lasers applied to deflection of near Earth objects (NEO) on
collision course with Earth. Our method is designed to avoid a predicted
collision of the NEO with Earth by at least the diameter of Earth. We estimate
deflecting a 10,000 MT NEO, such as the asteroid which struck Earth near
Chelyabinsk, Russia to be feasible within several months using average power in
the ten kilowatt range. We see this deflection method as scalable to larger NEO
to a degree not possible using continuous laser systems.


title: Theoretical Field Limits for Multi-Layer Superconductors

abstract:
  The SIS structure---a thin superconducting film on a bulk superconductor
separated by a thin insulating film---was propsed as a method to protect
alternative SRF materials from flux penetration by enhancing the first critical
field $B_{c1}$. In this work, we show that in fact $B_{c1}$ = 0 for a SIS
structure. We calculate the superheating field $B_{sh}$, and we show that it
can be enhanced slightly using the SIS structure, but only for a small range of
film thicknesses and only if the film and the bulk are different materials. We
also show that using a multilayer instead of a single thick layer is
detrimental, as this decreases $B_{sh}$ of the film. We calculate the
dissipation due to vortex penetration above the $B_{sh}$ of the film, and find
that it is unmanageable for SRF applications. However, we find that if a
gradient in the phase of the order parameter is introduced, SIS structures may
be able to shield large DC and low frequency fields. We argue that the SIS
structure is not beneficial for SRF cavities, but due to recent experiments
showing low-surface-resistance performance above $B_{c1}$ in cavities made of
superconductors with small coherence lengths, we argue that enhancement of
$B_{c1}$ is not necessary, and that bulk films of alternative materials show
great promise.


title:
Tunable power law in the desynchronization events of coupled chaotic
  electronic circuits

abstract:
  We study the statistics of the amplitude of the synchronization error in
chaotic electronic circuits coupled through linear feedback. Depending on the
coupling strength, our system exhibits three qualitatively different regimes of
synchronization: weak coupling yields independent oscillations; moderate to
strong coupling produces a regime of intermittent synchronization known as
attractor bubbling; and stronger coupling produces complete synchronization. In
the regime of moderate coupling, the probability distribution for the sizes of
desynchronization events follows a power law, with an exponent that can be
adjusted by changing the coupling strength. Such power-law distributions are
interesting, as they appear in many complex systems. However, most of the
systems with such a behavior have a fixed value for the exponent of the power
law, while here we present an example of a system where the exponent of the
power law is easily tuned in real time.


title: Generalized Hermite processes, discrete chaos and limit theorems

abstract:
  We introduce a broad class of self-similar processes $\{Z(t),t\ge 0\}$ called
generalized Hermite process. They have stationary increments, are defined on a
Wiener chaos with Hurst index $H\in (1/2,1)$, and include Hermite processes as
a special case. They are defined through a homogeneous kernel $g$, called
"generalized Hermite kernel", which replaces the product of power functions in
the definition of Hermite processes. The generalized Hermite kernels $g$ can
also be used to generate long-range dependent stationary sequences forming a
discrete chaos process $\{X(n)\}$. In addition, we consider a
fractionally-filtered version $Z^\beta(t)$ of $Z(t)$, which allows $H\in
(0,1/2)$. Corresponding non-central limit theorems are established. We also
give a multivariate limit theorem which mixes central and non-central limit
theorems.


title:
Using memristor crossbar structure to implement a novel adaptive real
  time fuzzy modeling algorithm

abstract:
  Although fuzzy techniques promise fast meanwhile accurate modeling and
control abilities for complicated systems, different difficulties have been
re-vealed in real situation implementations. Usually there is no escape of
it-erative optimization based on crisp domain algorithms. Recently memristor
structures appeared promising to implement neural network structures and fuzzy
algorithms. In this paper a novel adaptive real-time fuzzy modeling algorithm
is proposed which uses active learning method concept to mimic recent
understandings of right brain processing techniques. The developed method is
based on processing fuzzy numbers to provide the ability of being sensitive to
each training data point to expand the knowledge tree leading to plasticity
while used defuzzification technique guaranties enough stability. An
outstanding characteristic of the proposed algorithm is its consistency to
memristor crossbar hardware processing concepts. An analog implemen-tation of
the proposed algorithm on memristor crossbars structure is also introduced in
this paper. The effectiveness of the proposed algorithm in modeling and pattern
recognition tasks is verified by means of computer simulations


title: Model of phenotypic evolution in hermaphroditic populations

abstract:
  We consider an individual based model of phenotypic evolution in
hermaphroditic populations which includes random and assortative mating of
individuals. By increasing the number of individuals to infinity we obtain a
nonlinear transport equation, which describes the evolution of distribution of
phenotypic traits. Existence of an one-dimensional attractor is proved and the
formula for the density of phenotypic traits in the limiting (asymptotic)
population is derived in some particular case.


title: Cosmic Neutrino Background as a Ferromagnet

abstract:
  If cosmic background neutrinos interact very weakly with each other, through
spin-spin interactions, then they may have experienced a phase transition,
leading to a ferromagnetic ordering. The small magnetic field resulting from
ferromagnetic ordering -- if present before galaxy formation -- could act as a
primordial seed of the magnetic fields observed in several galaxies. Our
findings suggest that the magnetization could occur in the right epoch, if the
exchange boson of neutrino-neutrino interaction is a massless boson beyond the
Standard Model, with a coupling constant of $2.2\times 10^{-13}
\left(\frac{m_\nu}{10^{-4}\,\rm{eV}}\right)^2<g<2.3\times 10^{-7}$. The
estimation of the magnetic seed is $2.3 \times 10^{-27}\,\rm{G}\lesssim B_{\rm
CNB}\lesssim 6.8\times 10^{-10}G$.


title: Transverse-momentum spectra of electroweak bosons near threshold at NNLO

abstract:
  We obtain the next-to-next-to-leading order corrections to
transverse-momentum spectra of W, Z and Higgs bosons near the partonic
threshold. In the threshold limit, the electroweak boson recoils against a
low-mass jet and all radiation is either soft, or collinear to the jet or the
beam directions. We extract the virtual corrections from known results for the
relevant two-loop four-point amplitudes and combine them with the soft and
collinear two-loop functions as defined in Soft-Collinear Effective Theory. We
have implemented these results in a public code PeTeR and present numerical
results for the threshold resummed cross section of W and Z bosons at
next-to-next-to-next-to-leading logarithmic accuracy, matched to
next-to-leading fixed-order perturbation theory. The two-loop corrections lead
to a moderate increase in the cross section and reduce the scale uncertainty by
about a factor of two. The corrections are significantly larger for Higgs
production.


title:
Ice Formation via Deposition Mode Nucleation on Bare and Alcohol-covered
  Graphite Surfaces

abstract:
  Deposition of water on aerosol particles contributes to ice cloud formation
in the atmosphere with implications for the water cycle and climate on Earth.
The heterogeneous ice nucleation process is influenced by physico-chemical
properties of the substrate, but the mechanisms remain incompletely understood.
Here, we report on ice formation on bare and alcohol-covered graphite at
temperatures from 175 to 213 K, probed by elastic helium and light scattering.
Water has a low wettability on bare and butanol-covered graphite resulting in
the growth of rough ice surfaces. In contrast, pre-adsorbed methanol provides
hydrophilic surface sites and results in the formation of smooth crystalline
ice; an effect that is pronounced also for sub-monolayer methanol coverages.
The alcohols primarily reside at the ice surface and at the ice-graphite
interface with a minor fraction being incorporated into the growing ice
structures. Methanol has no observable effect on gas/solid water vapor exchange
whereas butanol acts as a transport barrier for water resulting in a reduction
in ice evaporation rate at 185 K. Implications for the description of
deposition mode freezing are discussed.


title: SO(10) Yukawa Unification after the First Run of the LHC

abstract:
  In this talk we discuss SO(10) Yukawa unification and its ramifications for
phenomenology. The initial constraints come from fitting the top, bottom and
tau masses, requiring large $\tan\beta \sim 50$ and particular values for soft
SUSY breaking parameters. We perform a global $\chi^2$ analysis, fitting the
recently observed `Higgs' with mass of order 125 GeV in addition to fermion
masses and mixing angles and several flavor violating observables. We discuss
two distinct GUT scale boundary conditions for soft SUSY breaking masses. In
both cases we have a universal cubic scalar parameter, $A_0$. In the first case
we consider universal gaugino masses, and universal scalar masses, $m_{16}$,
for squarks and sleptons; while in the latter case we have non-universal
gaugino masses and either universal scalar masses, $m_{16}$, for squarks and
sleptons or D-term splitting of scalar masses. We discuss the spectrum of SUSY
particle masses and consequences for the LHC.


title: Finding Very Small Near-Earth Asteroids using Synthetic Tracking

abstract:
  We present an approach that significantly increases the sensitivity for
finding and tracking small and fast near Earth asteroids (NEA's). This approach
relies on a combined use of a new generation of high-speed cameras which allow
short, high frame-rate exposures of moving objects, effectively "freezing"
their motion, and a computationally enhanced implementation of the
"shift-and-add" data processing technique that helps to improve the signal to
noise ratio (SNR) for detection of NEA's. The SNR of a single short exposure of
a dim NEA is insufficient to detect it in one frame, but by computationally
searching for an appropriate velocity vector, shifting successive frames
relative to each other and then co-adding the shifted frames in
post-processing, we synthetically create a long-exposure image as if the
telescope were tracking the object. This approach, which we call "synthetic
tracking," enhances the familiar shift-and-add technique with the ability to do
a wide blind search, detect, and track dim and fast-moving NEA's in near real
time. We discuss also how synthetic tracking improves the astrometry of fast
moving NEA's. We apply this technique to observations of two known asteroids
conducted on the Palomar 200-inch telescope and demonstrate improved SNR and
10-fold improvement of astrometric precision over the traditional long exposure
approach. In the past 5 years, about 150 NEA's with absolute magnitudes H=28
(~10 m in size) or fainter have been discovered. With an upgraded version of
our camera and a field of view of (28 arcmin)^2 on the Palomar 200-inch
telescope, synthetic tracking could allow detecting up to 180 such objects per
night, including very small NEAs with sizes down to 7 m.


title:
Sharp estimates of transition probability density for Bessel process in
  half-line

abstract:
  In this paper we study the Bessel process R_t^{(\mu)} with index \mu\neq 0
starting from x>0 and killed when it reaches a positive level a, where x>a>0.
We provide sharp estimates of the transition probability density
p_a^{(\mu)}(t,x,y) for the whole range of space parameters x,y>a and every t>0.


title: Efficient Continuous-Time Markov Chain Estimation

abstract:
  Many problems of practical interest rely on Continuous-time Markov
chains~(CTMCs) defined over combinatorial state spaces, rendering the
computation of transition probabilities, and hence probabilistic inference,
difficult or impossible with existing methods. For problems with countably
infinite states, where classical methods such as matrix exponentiation are not
applicable, the main alternative has been particle Markov chain Monte Carlo
methods imputing both the holding times and sequences of visited states. We
propose a particle-based Monte Carlo approach where the holding times are
marginalized analytically. We demonstrate that in a range of realistic
inferential setups, our scheme dramatically reduces the variance of the Monte
Carlo approximation and yields more accurate parameter posterior approximations
given a fixed computational budget. These experiments are performed on both
synthetic and real datasets, drawing from two important examples of CTMCs
having combinatorial state spaces: string-valued mutation models in
phylogenetics and nucleic acid folding pathways.


title: Edge Boundaries for a Family of Graphs on $\mathbb{Z}^n$

abstract:
  We consider the family of graphs whose vertex set is $\mathbb{Z}^n$ where two
vertices are connected by an edge when their $\ell_\infty$-distance is 1.
Towards an edge isoperimetric inequality for this graph, we calculate the edge
boundary of any finite set $S \subset \mathbb{Z}^n$. This boundary calculation
leads to a desire to show that a set with optimal edge boundary has no ``gaps''
in any direction $\epsilon \in \{-1,0,1\}^n, \epsilon \not=0$. We show that one
can find a set with optimal edge boundary that does not have gaps in any
direction $e_i$ (or $-e_i$) where $e_i$ is the standard basis vector.


title: ABJM amplitudes and the positive orthogonal grassmannian

abstract:
  A remarkable connection between perturbative scattering amplitudes of
four-dimensional planar SYM, and the stratification of the positive
grassmannian, was revealed in the seminal work of Arkani-Hamed et. al. Similar
extension for three-dimensional ABJM theory was proposed. Here we establish a
direct connection between planar scattering amplitudes of ABJM theory, and
singularities there of, to the stratification of the positive orthogonal
grassmannian. In particular, scattering processes are constructed through
on-shell diagrams, which are simply iterative gluing of the fundamental
four-point amplitude. Each diagram is then equivalent to the merging of
fundamental OG_2 orthogonal grassmannian to form a larger OG_k, where 2k is the
number of external particles. The invariant information that is encoded in each
diagram is precisely this stratification. This information can be easily read
off via permutation paths of the on-shell diagram, which also can be used to
derive a canonical representation of OG_k that manifests the vanishing of
consecutive minors as the singularity of all on-shell diagrams. Quite
remarkably, for the BCFW recursion representation of the tree-level amplitudes,
the on-shell diagram manifests the presence of all physical factorization
poles, as well as the cancellation of the spurious poles. After analytically
continuing the orthogonal grassmannian to split signature, we reveal that each
on-shell diagram in fact resides in the positive cell of the orthogonal
grassmannian, where all minors are positive. In this language, the amplitudes
of ABJM theory is simply an integral of a product of dlog forms, over the
positive orthogonal grassmannian.


title:
The electronic transport of top subband and disordered sea in InAs
  nanowire in presence of a mobile gate

abstract:
  We performed measurements at helium temperatures of the electronic transport
in an InAs quantum wire ($R_{wire} \sim 30$\,k$\Omega$) in the presence of a
charged tip of an atomic force microscope serving as a mobile gate. The period
and the amplitude of the observed quasiperiodic oscillations are investigated
in detail as a function of electron concentration in the linear and non-linear
regime. We demonstrate the influence of the tip-to-sample distance on the
ability to locally affect the top subband electrons as well as the electrons in
the disordered sea. Furthermore, we introduce a new method of detection of the
subband occupation in an InAs wire, which allows us to evaluate the number of
the electrons in the conductive band of the wire.


title: NNMSM Type-II and III

abstract:
  We suggest two types of extension of the standard model, which are the
so-called next to new minimal standard model (NNMSM) type-II and -III. They can
achieve gauge coupling unification as well as suitable dark matter abundance,
small neutrino masses, baryon asymmetry of the universe, inflation, and dark
energy. The gauge coupling unification can be realized by introducing extra two
or three new fields, and could explain the charge quantization. We also show
that there are regions in which the vacuum stability, coupling perturbativity,
and correct dark matter abundance can be realized with current experimental
data at the same time.


title:
Dissipative transverse-field Ising model: steady-state correlations and
  spin squeezing

abstract:
  We study the transverse-field Ising model with infinite-range coupling and
spontaneous emission on every site. We find that there is spin squeezing in
steady state due to the presence of the transverse field. This means that there
is still entanglement, despite the decoherence from spontaneous emission. We
analytically calculate fluctuations beyond mean-field theory using a
phase-space approach, which involves converting the master equation into a
Fokker-Planck equation for the Wigner function. Our calculations are relevant
to current experiments with trapped ions.


title: Recovery guarantees for exemplar-based clustering

abstract:
  For a certain class of distributions, we prove that the linear programming
relaxation of $k$-medoids clustering---a variant of $k$-means clustering where
means are replaced by exemplars from within the dataset---distinguishes points
drawn from nonoverlapping balls with high probability once the number of points
drawn and the separation distance between any two balls are sufficiently large.
Our results hold in the nontrivial regime where the separation distance is
small enough that points drawn from different balls may be closer to each other
than points drawn from the same ball; in this case, clustering by thresholding
pairwise distances between points can fail. We also exhibit numerical evidence
of high-probability recovery in a substantially more permissive regime.


title: Marginal Deformations of Non-Relativistic Field Theories

abstract:
  We construct the supergravity duals of marginal deformations of a (0,2)
Landau-Ginsburg theory that describes the supersymmetric lowest Landau level.
These deformations preserve supersymmetry and it is proposed that they are
associated with the introduction of a phase in the (0,2) superpotential. We
also consider marginal deformations of various field theories that exhibit
Schrodinger symmetry and Lifshitz scaling. This includes countably-infinite
examples with dynamical exponent z=2 based on the Sasaki-Einstein spaces
Y^{p,q} and L^{p,q,r}, as well as an example with general dynamical exponent z
>= 1.


title:
Fast and accurate imputation of summary statistics enhances evidence of
  functional enrichment

abstract:
  Imputation using external reference panels is a widely used approach for
increasing power in GWAS and meta-analysis. Existing HMM-based imputation
approaches require individual-level genotypes. Here, we develop a new method
for Gaussian imputation from summary association statistics, a type of data
that is becoming widely available. In simulations using 1000 Genomes (1000G)
data, this method recovers 84% (54%) of the effective sample size for common
(>5%) and low-frequency (1-5%) variants (increasing to 87% (60%) when summary
LD information is available from target samples) versus 89% (67%) for HMM-based
imputation, which cannot be applied to summary statistics. Our approach
accounts for the limited sample size of the reference panel, a crucial step to
eliminate false-positive associations, and is computationally very fast. As an
empirical demonstration, we apply our method to 7 case-control phenotypes from
the WTCCC data and a study of height in the British 1958 birth cohort (1958BC).
Gaussian imputation from summary statistics recovers 95% (105%) of the
effective sample size (as quantified by the ratio of $\chi^2$ association
statistics) compared to HMM-based imputation from individual-level genotypes at
the 227 (176) published SNPs in the WTCCC (1958BC height) data. In addition,
for publicly available summary statistics from large meta-analyses of 4 lipid
traits, we publicly release imputed summary statistics at 1000G SNPs, which
could not have been obtained using previously published methods, and
demonstrate their accuracy by masking subsets of the data. We show that 1000G
imputation using our approach increases the magnitude and statistical evidence
of enrichment at genic vs. non-genic loci for these traits, as compared to an
analysis without 1000G imputation. Thus, imputation of summary statistics will
be a valuable tool in future functional enrichment analyses.


title:
CDMSlite: A Search for Low-Mass WIMPs using Voltage-Assisted
  Calorimetric Ionization Detection in the SuperCDMS Experiment

abstract:
  SuperCDMS is an experiment designed to directly detect Weakly Interacting
Massive Particles (WIMPs), a favored candidate for dark matter ubiquitous in
the Universe. In this paper, we present WIMP-search results using a
calorimetric technique we call CDMSlite, which relies on voltage- assisted
Luke-Neganov amplification of the ionization energy deposited by particle
interactions. The data were collected with a single 0.6 kg germanium detector
running for 10 live days at the Soudan Underground Laboratory. A low energy
threshold of 170 eVee (electron equivalent) was obtained, which allows us to
constrain new WIMP-nucleon spin-independent parameter space for WIMP masses
below 6 GeV/c2.

categories: physics.ins-det astro-ph.CO astro-ph.IM hep-ex


title:
Cooperative Topology Control with Adaptation for Improved Lifetime in
  Wireless Sensor Networks

abstract:
  Topology control algorithms allow each node in a wireless multi-hop network
to adjust the power at which it makes its transmissions and choose the set of
neighbors with which it communicates directly, while preserving global goals
such as connectivity or coverage. This allows each node to conserve energy and
contribute to increasing the lifetime of the network. In this paper, in
contrast to most previous work, we consider (i) both the energy costs of
communication as well as the amount of available energy at each node, (ii) the
realistic situation of varying rates of energy consumption at different nodes,
and (iii) the fact that co-operation between nodes, where some nodes make a
sacrifice by increasing energy consumption to help other nodes reduce their
consumption, can be used to extend network lifetime. This paper introduces a
new distributed topology control algorithm, called the Cooperative Topology
Control with Adaptation (CTCA), based on a game-theoretic approach that maps
the problem of maximizing the network's lifetime into an ordinal potential
game. We prove the existence of a Nash equilibrium for the game. Our simulation
results indicate that the CTCA algorithm extends the life of a network by more
than 50% compared to the best previously-known algorithm. We also study the
performance of the distributed CTCA algorithm in comparison to an optimal
centralized algorithm as a function of the communication ranges of nodes and
node density.


title: Uniformly accelerated observer in a thermal bath

abstract:
  We investigate the quantum field aspects in flat spacetime for an uniformly
accelerated observer moving in a thermal bath. In particular, we obtain an
exact closed expression of the reduced density matrix for an uniformly
accelerated observer with acceleration $a = 2\pi T$ when the state of the
quantum field is a thermal bath at temperature $T^\prime$. We find that the
density matrix has a simple form with an effective partition function $Z$ being
a product, $Z = Z_T Z_{T^\prime}$, of two thermal partition functions
corresponding to temperatures $T$ and $T^\prime$ and hence is not thermal, even
when $T = T^\prime$. We show that, even though the partition function has a
product structure, the two thermal baths are, in fact, interacting systems;
although in the high frequency limit $\omega_k \gg T$ and $\omega_k \gg
T^\prime$, the interactions are found to become sub-dominant. We further
demonstrate that the resulting spectrum of the Rindler particles can be
interpreted in terms of spontaneous and stimulated emission due to the
background thermal bath. The density matrix is also found to be symmetric in
the acceleration temperature $T$ and the thermal bath temperature $T^\prime$
indicating that thermodynamic experiments alone cannot distinguish between the
thermal effects due to $T$ and those due to $T^\prime$. The entanglement
entropy associated with the reduced density matrix (with the background
contribution of the Davies-Unruh bath removed) is shown to satisfy, in the
$\omega_k \gg T^\prime$ limit, a first law of thermodynamics relation of the
form $T \delta S = \delta E$ where $\delta E$ is the difference in the energies
corresponding to the reduced density matrix and the background Davies-Unruh
bath. The implications are discussed.


title: Cluster Functional Renormalization Group

abstract:
  Functional renormalization group (FRG) has become a diverse and powerful tool
to derive effective low-energy scattering vertices of interacting many-body
systems. Starting from a non-interacting expansion point of the action, the
flow of the RG parameter Lambda allows to trace the evolution of the effective
one-particle and two-particle vertices towards low energies by taking into
account the vertex corrections between all parquet channels in an unbiased
fashion. In this work, we generalize the expansion point at which the
diagrammatic resummation procedure is initiated from a free UV limit to a
cluster product state. We formulate a cluster FRG scheme where the
non-interacting building blocks (i.e., decoupled spin clusters) are treated
exactly, and the inter-cluster couplings are addressed via RG. As a benchmark
study, we apply our cluster FRG scheme to the spin-1/2 bilayer Heisenberg model
(BHM) on a square lattice where the neighboring sites in the two layers form
the individual 2-site clusters. Comparing with existing numerical evidence for
the BHM, we obtain reasonable findings for the spin susceptibility, magnon
dispersion, and magnon quasiparticle weight even in coupling regimes close to
antiferromagnetic order. The concept of cluster FRG promises applications to a
large class of interacting electron systems.


title: Quantum Conductivity for Metal-Insulator-Metal Nanostructures

abstract:
  We present a methodology based on quantum mechanics for assigning quantum
conductivity when an ac field is applied across a variable gap between two
plasmonic nanoparticles with an insulator sandwiched between them. The quantum
tunneling effect is portrayed by a set of quantum conductivity coefficients
describing the linear ac conductivity responding at the frequency of the
applied field and nonlinear coefficients that modulate the field amplitude at
the fundamental frequency and its harmonics. The quantum conductivity,
determined with no fit parameters, has both frequency and gap dependence that
can be applied to determine the nonlinear quantum effects of strong applied
electromagnetic fields even when the system is composed of dissimilar metal
nanostructures. Our methodology compares well to results on quantum tunneling
effects reported in the literature and it is simple to extend it to a number of
systems with different metals and different insulators between them.


title:
Terahertz electron-hole recollisions in GaAs/AlGaAs quantum wells:
  robustness to scattering by optical phonons and thermal fluctuations

abstract:
  Electron-hole recollisions are induced by resonantly injecting excitons with
a near-IR laser at frequency $f_{\text{NIR}}$ into quantum wells driven by a
~10 kV/cm field oscillating at $f_{\text{THz}} = 0.57$ THz. At $T=12$ K, up to
18 sidebands are observed at frequencies $f_{\text{sideband}}=f_{\text{NIR}}+2n
f_{\text{THz}}$, with $-8 \le 2n \le 28$. Electrons and holes recollide with
total kinetic energies up to 57 meV, well above the $E_{\text{LO}} = 36$ meV
threshold for longitudinal optical (LO) phonon emission. Sidebands with order
up to $2n=22$ persist up to room temperature. A simple model shows that LO
phonon scattering suppresses but does not eliminate sidebands associated with
kinetic energies above $E_{\text{LO}}$.


title: Uniformity of the late points of random walk on Z_n^d for d >= 3

abstract:
  Suppose that $X$ is a simple random walk on $\Z_n^d$ for $d \geq 3$ and, for
each $t$, we let $\U(t)$ consist of those $x \in \Z_n^d$ which have not been
visited by $X$ by time $t$. Let $\tcov$ be the expected amount of time that it
takes for $X$ to visit every site of $\Z_n^d$. We show that there exists $0 <
\alpha_0(d) \leq \alpha_1(d) < 1$ and a time $t_* = \tcov(1+o(1))$ as $n \to
\infty$ such that the following is true. For $\alpha > \alpha_1(d)$ (resp.\
$\alpha < \alpha_0(d)$), the total variation distance between the law of
$\U(\alpha t_*)$ and the law of i.i.d.\ Bernoulli random variables indexed by
$\Z_n^d$ with success probability~$n^{-\alpha d}$ tends to~$0$ (resp.\ $1$) as
$n \to \infty$. Let $\tau_\alpha$ be the first time $t$ that $|\U(t)| =
n^{d-\alpha d}$. We also show that the total variation distance between the law
of $\U(\tau_\alpha)$ and the law of a uniformly chosen set from $\Z_n^d$ with
size $n^{d-\alpha d}$ tends to $0$ (resp.\ $1$) for $\alpha > \alpha_1(d)$
(resp.\ $\alpha < \alpha_0(d)$) as $n \to \infty$.


title:
Localization of Supersymmetric Chern-Simons-Matter Theory on a Squashed
  $S^3$ with $SU(2)\times U(1)$ Isometry

abstract:
  Localization of supersymmetric $\mathcal{N}=2$ Chern-Simons-Matter theory on
a squashed $S^3$ with $SU(2)\times U(1)$ isometry has been studied by different
groups of authors. In this paper, we localize the theory on a squashed $S^3$
with $SU(2)\times U(1)$ isometry and a class of complex background. We see that
certain kinds of shifts of the background gauge fields are crucial in obtaining
nontrivial results, and the previously found results on this manifold can be
incorporated in our results as special limits.


title: The Apollonian structure of integer superharmonic matrices

abstract:
  We prove that the set of quadratic growths attainable by integer-valued
superharmonic functions on the lattice $\mathbb{Z}^2$ has the structure of an
Apollonian circle packing. This completely characterizes the PDE which
determines the continuum scaling limit of the Abelian sandpile on the lattice
$\mathbb{Z}^2$.


title: Transmuted Generalized Inverse Weibull Distribution

abstract:
  A generalization of the generalized inverse Weibull distribution so-called
transmuted generalized inverse Weibull dis- tribution is proposed and studied.
We will use the quadratic rank transmutation map (QRTM) in order to generate a
flexible family of probability distributions taking generalized inverse Weibull
distribution as the base value distribution by introducing a new parameter that
would offer more distributional flexibility. Various structural properties
including explicit expressions for the mo- ments, quantiles, and moment
generating function of the new dis- tribution are derived.We proposed the
method of maximum likelihood for estimating the model parameters and obtain the
observed information matrix. A real data set are used to compare the exibility
of the transmuted version versus the generalized inverseWeibull distribution.


title: Warm Intermediate Inflation in $F(T)$ Gravity

abstract:
  We investigate warm intermediate scenario of the cosmological inflation in
$F(T)$ gravity in the limit of high dissipation. The inflationary expansion is
driven by the scalar inflaton while the gravitational dynamics follow from the
$F(T)$ gravity. We calculate the relevant inflationary observables such as
scalar-tensor ratio, power-spectrum indices of density perturbations and
gravitational waves and the e-folding parameter. We obtain a ratio of slow-roll
parameters to be constant. Our calculations support the warm-intermediate
inflationary scenario in a spacetime with torsion. Moreover our results are
compatible with the astrophysical observations of cosmic microwave background
and Planck data.


title:
Excess Optical Enhancement Observed with ARCONS for Early Crab Giant
  Pulses

abstract:
  We observe an extraordinary link in the Crab pulsar between the enhancement
of an optical pulse and the timing of the corresponding giant radio pulse. At
optical through infrared wavelengths, our observations use the high time
resolution of ARCONS, a unique superconducting energy-resolving photon-counting
array at the Palomar 200-inch telescope. At radio wavelengths, we observe with
the Robert C. Byrd Green Bank Telescope and the GUPPI backend. We see an
$11.3\pm2.5\%$ increase in peak optical flux for pulses that have an
accompanying giant radio pulse arriving near the peak of the optical main
pulse, in contrast to a $3.2\pm0.5\%$ increase when an accompanying giant radio
pulse arrives soon after the optical peak. We also observe that the peak of the
optical main pulse is $2.8\pm0.8\%$ enhanced when there is a giant radio pulse
accompanying the optical interpulse. We observe no statistically significant
spectral differences between optical pulses accompanied by and not accompanied
by giant radio pulses. Our results extend previous observations of
optical-radio correlation to the time and spectral domains. Our refined
temporal correlation suggests that optical and radio emission are indeed
causally linked, and the lack of spectral differences suggests that the same
mechanism is responsible for all optical emission.


title:
How to combine correlated data sets -- A Bayesian hyperparameter matrix
  method

abstract:
  We construct a "hyperparameter matrix" statistical method for performing the
joint analyses of multiple correlated astronomical data sets, in which the
weights of data sets are determined by their own statistical properties. This
method is a generalization of the hyperparameter method constructed by Lahav et
al. (2000) and Hobson, Bridle, & Lahav (2002) which was designed to combine
independent data sets. The advantage of our method is to treat correlations
between multiple data sets and gives appropriate relevant weights of multiple
data sets with mutual correlations. We define a new "element-wise" product,
which greatly simplifies the likelihood function with hyperparameter matrix. We
rigorously prove the simplified formula of the joint likelihood and show that
it recovers the original hyperparameter method in the limit of no covariance
between data sets. We then illustrate the method by applying it to a
demonstrative toy model of fitting a straight line to two sets of data. We show
that the hyperparameter matrix method can detect unaccounted systematic errors
or underestimated errors in the data sets. Additionally, the ratio of Bayes'
factors provides a distinct indicator of the necessity of including
hyperparameters. Our example shows that the likelihood we construct for joint
analyses of correlated data sets can be widely applied to many astrophysical
systems.


title:
Very Wide Binary Stars as the Primary Source of Stellar Collisions in
  the Galaxy

abstract:
  We present numerical simulations modeling the orbital evolution of very wide
binaries, pairs of stars separated by over ~1000 AU. Due to perturbations from
other passing stars and the Milky Way's tide, the orbits of very wide binary
stars occasionally become extremely eccentric, which forces close encounters
between the companion stars (Kaib et al. 2013). We show that this process
causes a stellar collision between very wide binary companion stars once every
1000-7500 years on average in the Milky Way. One of the main uncertainties in
this collision rate is the amount of energy dissipated by dynamic tides during
close (but not collisional) periastron passages. This dissipation presents a
dynamical barrier to stellar collisions and can instead transform very wide
binaries into close or contact binaries. However, for any plausible tidal
dissipation model, very wide binary stars are an unrealized, and potentially
the dominant, source of stellar collisions in our Galaxy. Such collisions
should occur throughout the thin disk of the Milky Way. Stellar collisions
within very wide binaries should yield a small population of single,
Li-depleted, rapidly rotating massive stars.

categories: astro-ph.SR astro-ph.EP astro-ph.GA astro-ph.HE


title:
Basic Parameter Estimation of Binary Neutron Star Systems by the
  Advanced LIGO/Virgo Network

abstract:
  Within the next five years, it is expected that the Advanced LIGO/Virgo
network will have reached a sensitivity sufficient to enable the routine
detection of gravitational waves. Beyond the initial detection, the scientific
promise of these instruments relies on the effectiveness of our physical
parameter estimation capabilities. The majority of this effort has been towards
the detection and characterization of gravitational waves from compact binary
coalescence, e.g. the coalescence of binary neutron stars. While several
previous studies have investigated the accuracy of parameter estimation with
advanced detectors, the majority have relied on approximation techniques such
as the Fisher Matrix. Here we report the statistical uncertainties that will be
achievable for optimal detection candidates (SNR = 20) using the full parameter
estimation machinery developed by the LIGO/Virgo Collaboration via Markov-Chain
Monte Carlo methods. We find the recovery of the individual masses to be
fractionally within 9% (15%) at the 68% (95%) credible intervals for equal-mass
systems, and within 1.9% (3.7%) for unequal-mass systems. We also find that the
Advanced LIGO/Virgo network will constrain the locations of binary neutron star
mergers to a median uncertainty of 5.1 deg^2 (13.5 deg^2) on the sky. This
region is improved to 2.3 deg^2 (6 deg^2) with the addition of the proposed
LIGO India detector to the network. We also report the average uncertainties on
the luminosity distances and orbital inclinations of ideal detection candidates
that can be achieved by different network configurations.


title: Multiple scattering Sunyaev-Zeldovich signal II: relativistic effects

abstract:
  We study the multiple scattering Sunyaev-Zeldovich (SZ) signature, extending
our previous analysis to high-temperature clusters. We consistently treat the
anisotropy of the ambient radiation field caused by the first scattering and
also consider lowest order kinematic terms. We show that due to temperature
corrections monopole through octupole anisotropy of the singly scattered SZ
signal attain different spectra in the second scattering. The difference
becomes more pronounced at high temperature, and thus could be used to
constrain individual line of sight moments of the electron density and
temperature profiles. While very challenging from the observational point of
view, this further extends the list of possible SZ observables that will be
important for 3D cluster-profile reconstruction, possibly helping to break
geometric degeneracies caused by projection effects. We also briefly discuss
the scattering of primordial CMB anisotropies by SZ clusters.


title:
SPT 0538-50: Physical conditions in the ISM of a strongly lensed dusty
  star-forming galaxy at z=2.8

abstract:
  We present observations of SPT-S J053816-5030.8, a gravitationally-lensed
dusty star forming galaxy (DSFG) at z = 2.7817, first discovered at millimeter
wavelengths by the South Pole Telescope. SPT 0538-50 is typical of the
brightest sources found by wide-field millimeter-wavelength surveys, being
lensed by an intervening galaxy at moderate redshift (in this instance, at z =
0.441). We present a wide array of multi-wavelength spectroscopic and
photometric data on SPT 0538-50, including data from ALMA, Herschel PACS and
SPIRE, Hubble, Spitzer, VLT, ATCA, APEX, and the SMA. We use high resolution
imaging from HST to de-blend SPT 0538-50, separating DSFG emission from that of
the foreground lens. Combined with a source model derived from ALMA imaging
(which suggests a magnification factor of 21 +/- 4), we derive the intrinsic
properties of SPT 0538-50, including the stellar mass, far-IR luminosity, star
formation rate, molecular gas mass, and - using molecular line fluxes - the
excitation conditions within the ISM. The derived physical properties argue
that we are witnessing compact, merger-driven star formation in SPT 0538-50,
similar to local starburst galaxies, and unlike that seen in some other DSFGs
at this epoch.


title: Galaxy Masses

abstract:
  Galaxy masses play a fundamental role in our understanding of structure
formation models. This review addresses the variety and reliability of mass
estimators that pertain to stars, gas, and dark matter. The different sections
on masses from stellar populations, dynamical masses of gas-rich and gas-poor
galaxies, with some attention paid to our Milky Way, and masses from weak and
strong lensing methods, all provide review material on galaxy masses in a
self-consistent manner.


title: Magnetic Fields In Relativistic Collisionless Shocks

abstract:
  We present a systematic study on magnetic fields in Gamma-Ray Burst (GRB)
external forward shocks (FSs). There are 60 (35) GRBs in our X-ray (optical)
sample, mostly from Swift. We use two methods to study epsilon_B (fraction of
energy in magnetic field in the FS). 1. For the X-ray sample, we use the
constraint that the observed flux at the end of the steep decline is $\ge$ the
X-ray FS flux. 2. For the optical sample, we use the condition that the
observed flux arises from the FS (optical sample light curves decline as ~t^-1,
as expected for the FS). Making a reasonable assumption on E (jet isotropic
equivalent kinetic energy), we converted these conditions into an upper limit
(measurement) on epsilon_B n^{2/(p+1)} for our X-ray (optical) sample, where n
is the circumburst density and p is the electron index. Taking n=1 cm^-3, the
distribution of epsilon_B measurements (upper limits) for our optical (X-ray)
sample has a range of ~10^-8 -10^-3 (~10^-6 -10^-3) and median of ~few x 10^-5
(~few x 10^-5). To characterize how much amplification is needed, beyond shock
compression of a seed magnetic field ~10 muG, we expressed our results in terms
of an amplification factor, AF, which is very weakly dependent on n (AF propto
n^0.21 ). The range of AF measurements (upper limits) for our optical (X-ray)
sample is ~ 1-1000 (~10-300) with a median of ~50 (~50). These results suggest
that some amplification, in addition to shock compression, is needed to explain
the afterglow observations.


title: Diffusive transport in Weyl semimetals

abstract:
  Diffusion, a ubiquitous phenomenon in nature, is a consequence of particle
number conservation and locality, in systems with sufficient damping. In this
paper we consider diffusive processes in the bulk of Weyl semimetals, which are
exotic quantum materials, recently of considerable interest. In order to do
this, we first explicitly implement the analytical scheme by which disorder
with anisotropic scattering amplitude is incorporated into the diagrammatic
response-function formalism for calculating the `diffuson'. The result thus
obtained is consistent with transport coefficients evaluated from the Boltzmann
transport equation or the renormalized uniform current vertex calculation, as
it should be. We thus demonstrate that the computation of the diffusion
coefficient should involve the transport lifetime, and not the quasiparticle
lifetime. Using this method, we then calculate the density response function in
Weyl semimetals and discover an unconventional diffusion process that is
significantly slower than conventional diffusion. This gives rise to relaxation
processes that exhibit stretched exponential decay, instead of the usual
exponential diffusive relaxation. This result is then explained using a model
of thermally excited quasiparticles diffusing with diffusion coefficients which
are strongly dependent on their energies. We elucidate the roles of the various
energy and time scales involved in this novel process and propose an experiment
by which this process may be observed.


title: Neutron stars in Starobinsky model

abstract:
  We study the structure of neutron stars in $f(R)=R+\alpha R^{2}$ theory of
gravity (Starobinsky model), in an exact and non-perturbative approach. In this
model, apart from the standard General Relativistic junction conditions, two
extra conditions, namely the continuity of the curvature scalar and its first
derivative needs to be satisfied. For an exterior Schwarzschild solution, the
curvature scalar and its derivative has to be zero at the stellar surface. We
show that for some equation of state (EoS) of matter, matching all conditions
at the surface of the star is impossible. Hence the model brings two major
fine-tuning problems: (i) only some particular classes of EoS are consistent
with Schwarzschild at the surface and (ii) given that EoS, only a very
particular set of boundary conditions at the centre of the star will satisfy
the given boundary conditions at the surface. Hence we show that this model
(and subsequently many other f(R) models where uniqueness theorem is valid) is
highly unnatural, for the existence of compact astrophysical objects. This is
because the EoS of a compact star should be completely determined by the
physics of nuclear matter at high density and not the theory of gravity.


title: NuSTAR detection of the blazar B2 1023+25 at redshift 5.3

abstract:
  B2 1023+25 is an extremely radio-loud quasar at z=5.3 which was first
identified as a likely high-redshift blazar candidate in the SDSS+FIRST quasar
catalog. Here we use the Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) to
investigate its non-thermal jet emission, whose high-energy component we
detected in the hard X-ray energy band. The X-ray flux is ~5.5x10^(-14) erg
cm^(-2)s^(-1) (5-10keV) and the photon spectral index is Gamma_X=1.3-1.6.
Modeling the full spectral energy distribution, we find that the jet is
oriented close to the line of sight, with a viewing angle of ~3deg, and has
significant Doppler boosting, with a large bulk Lorentz factor ~13, which
confirms the identification of B2 1023+25 as a blazar. B2 1023+25 is the first
object at redshift larger than 5 detected by NuSTAR, demonstrating the ability
of NuSTAR to investigate the early X-ray Universe and to study extremely active
supermassive black holes located at very high redshift.


title:
Validation of the equilibrium model for galaxy evolution to z~3 through
  molecular gas and dust observations of lensed star-forming galaxies

abstract:
  We combine IRAM Plateau de Bure Interferometer and Herschel PACS and SPIRE
measurements to study the dust and gas contents of high-redshift star forming
galaxies. We present new observations for a sample of 17 lensed galaxies at
z=1.4-3.1, which allow us to directly probe the cold ISM of normal star-forming
galaxies with stellar masses of ~10^10Msun, a regime otherwise not (yet)
accessible by individual detections in Herschel and molecular gas studies. The
lensed galaxies are combined with reference samples of sub-millimeter and
normal z~1-2 star-forming galaxies with similar far-infrared photometry to
study the gas and dust properties of galaxies in the SFR-M*-redshift parameter
space. The mean gas depletion timescale of main sequence galaxies at z>2 is
measured to be only ~450Myr, a factor of ~1.5 (~5) shorter than at z=1 (z=0),
in agreement with a (1+z)^-1 scaling. The mean gas mass fraction at z=2.8 is
40+/-15% (44% after incompleteness correction), suggesting a flattening or even
a reversal of the trend of increasing gas fractions with redshift recently
observed up to z~2. The depletion timescale and gas fractions of the z>2 normal
star-forming galaxies can be explained under the "equilibrium model" for galaxy
evolution, in which the gas reservoir of galaxies is the primary driver of the
redshift evolution of specific star formation rates. Due to their high star
formation efficiencies and low metallicities, the z>2 lensed galaxies have warm
dust despite being located on the star formation main sequence. At fixed
metallicity, they also have a gas-to-dust ratio 1.7 times larger than observed
locally when using the same standard techniques, suggesting that applying the
local calibration of the relation between gas-to-dust ratio and metallicity to
infer the molecular gas mass of high redshift galaxies may lead to systematic
differences with CO-based estimates.


title:
Measuring the Thermal Sunyaev-Zel'dovich Effect Through the Cross
  Correlation of Planck and WMAP Maps with ROSAT Galaxy Cluster Catalogs

abstract:
  We measure a significant correlation between the thermal Sunyaev-Zel'dovich
effect in the Planck and WMAP maps and an X-ray cluster map based on ROSAT. We
use the 100, 143 and 343 GHz Planck maps and the WMAP 94 GHz map to obtain this
cluster cross spectrum. We check our measurements for contamination from dusty
galaxies using the cross correlations with the 220, 545 and 843 GHz maps from
Planck. Our measurement yields a direct characterization of the cluster power
spectrum over a wide range of angular scales that is consistent with large
cosmological simulations. The amplitude of this signal depends on cosmological
parameters that determine the growth of structure (\sigma_8 and \Omega_M) and
scales as \sigma_8^7.4 and \Omega_M^1.9 around the multipole (ell) ~ 1000. We
constrain \sigma_8 and \Omega_M from the cross-power spectrum to be \sigma_8
(\Omega_M/0.30)^0.26 = 0.8 +/- 0.02. Since this cross spectrum produces a tight
constraint in the \sigma_8 and \Omega_M plane the errors on a \sigma_8
constraint will be mostly limited by the uncertainties from external
constraints. Future cluster catalogs, like those from eRosita and LSST, and
pointed multi-wavelength observations of clusters will improve the constraining
power of this cross spectrum measurement. In principle this analysis can be
extended beyond \sigma_8 and \Omega_M to constrain dark energy or the sum of
the neutrino masses.


title:
Hot Big Planets Kepler Survey: Measuring the Repopulation Rate of the
  Shortest-Period Planets

abstract:
  By surveying new fields for the shortest-period "big" planets, the Kepler
spacecraft could provide the statistics to more clearly measure the occurrence
distributions of giant and medium planets. This would allow separate
determinations for giant and medium planets of the relationship between the
inward rate of tidal migration of planets and the strength of the stellar tidal
dissipation (as expressed by the tidal quality factor Q). We propose a "Hot Big
Planets Survey" to find new big planets to better determine the planet
occurrence distribution at the shortest period. We call planets that Kepler
will be able to find as "big", for the purpose of comparing the distribution of
giant and medium planets (above and below 8 earth radii). The distribution of
planets from one field has been interpreted to show that the shortest period
giant planets are at the end of an ongoing flow of high eccentricity migration,
likely from scattering from further out. The numbers of planets at these short
periods is still small, leaving uncertainty over the result that the
distribution shows the expected power index for inward tidal migration. The
current statistics make it hard to say whether the presence of more giant
planets at the shortest periods despite there being more medium planets at most
periods indicates a greater migration of giant than medium planets. We propose
a repurposed Kepler mission to make enough 45-day observations to survey 10
times as many stars as in the survey of the original field, to survey for
planets with periods of up to fifteen days with at least three transits. The
current statistics make it hard to say whether the presence of more giant
planets at the shortest periods despite there being more medium planets at most
periods indicates a greater migration of giant than medium planets.


title:
An Energy Balanced Dynamic Topology Control Algorithm for Improved
  Network Lifetime

abstract:
  In wireless sensor networks, a few sensor nodes end up being vulnerable to
potentially rapid depletion of the battery reserves due to either their central
location or just the traffic patterns generated by the application. Traditional
energy management strategies, such as those which use topology control
algorithms, reduce the energy consumed at each node to the minimum necessary.
In this paper, we use a different approach that balances the energy consumption
at each of the nodes, thus increasing the functional lifetime of the network.
We propose a new distributed dynamic topology control algorithm called Energy
Balanced Topology Control (EBTC) which considers the actual energy consumed for
each transmission and reception to achieve the goal of an increased functional
lifetime. We analyze the algorithm's computational and communication complexity
and show that it is equivalent or lower in complexity to other dynamic topology
control algorithms. Using an empirical model of energy consumption, we show
that the EBTC algorithm increases the lifetime of a wireless sensor network by
over 40% compared to the best of previously known algorithms.


title:
A tabu search algorithm with efficient diversification strategy for high
  school timetabling problem

abstract:
  The school timetabling problem can be described as scheduling a set of
lessons (combination of classes, teachers, subjects and rooms) in a weekly
timetable. This paper presents a novel way to generate timetables for high
schools. The algorithm has three phases. Pre-scheduling, initial phase and
optimization through tabu search. In the first phase, a graph based algorithm
used to create groups of lessons to be scheduled simultaneously; then an
initial solution is built by a sequential greedy heuristic. Finally, the
solution is optimized using tabu search algorithm based on frequency based
diversification. The algorithm has been tested on a set of real problems
gathered from Iranian high schools. Experiments show that the proposed
algorithm can effectively build acceptable timetables.


title:
Plasmonic quasicrystals for designable ultra broadband transmission
  enhancement and second harmonic generation

abstract:
  Quasi-crystals are intriguing as they exhibit rotational symmetry and long
range ordering but lack translational symmetry. 2-dimensional metal-dielectric
patterns are interesting to make use of surface plasmon polariton (SPP)
mediated local field enhancement and for near dispersionless SPP modes. In
plasmonic crystals, the orientation and periodicity of the pattern dictate the
polarization response and the discrete plasmon resonances while the interfaces
define the plasmon dispersion. However, unique properties of plasmonic
quasicrystals lead to polarization independence, designable k-space and
broadband transmission enhancement due to SPP mediation. These are useful in
many applications like energy harvesting, nonlinear optics and quantum
plasmonics. We demonstrate design and fabrication of large area quasicrystal
air hole patterns of pi/5 symmetry in metal film in which broadband, launch
angle and polarization independent transmission enhancement as well as
broadband second harmonic generation are observed. Designable transmission
response, other symmetries and tilings are possible.


title:
Expressing QFT in terms of QM with single extra dimension and classical
  hidden variable field

abstract:
  The goal of this paper is to re-express QFT in terms of two "classical"
fields living in ordinary space with single extra dimension. The role of the
first classical field is to set up an injection from the set of values of extra
dimension into the set of functions, and then said injection will be used in
order to convert the second field into a coarse grained functional, thereby
approximating QFT state. It turns out that this work also has a side-benefit of
modeling ensemble of states in terms of one single state which, in turn, is
interpretted in the above way. It is important to clarify that by "classical"
we mean functions over ordinary space rather than configuration, Fock or
function space. The "classical" theory that we propose is still non-local.


title: Links and Planar Diagram Codes

abstract:
  In this paper we formalize a combinatorial object for describing link
diagrams called a Planar Diagram Code. PD-codes are used by the KnotTheory
Mathematica package developed by Bar-Natan, et al. We present the set of
PD-codes as a stand alone object and discuss its relationship with link
diagrams. We give an explicit algorithm for reconstructing a knot diagram on a
surface from a PD-code. We also discuss the intrinsic symmetries of PD-codes
(i.e., invertibility and chirality). The moves analogous to the Reidemeister
moves are also explored, and we show that the given set of PD-codes modulo
these combinatorial Reidemeister moves is equivalent to classical link theory.


title: Nuclear landscape in covariant density functional theory

abstract:
  The neutron and proton drip lines represent the limits of the nuclear
landscape. While the proton drip line is measured experimentally up to rather
high $Z$-values, the location of the neutron drip line for absolute majority of
elements is based on theoretical predictions which involve extreme
extrapolations. The first ever systematic investigation of the location of the
proton and neutron drip lines in the covariant density functional theory has
been performed by employing a set of the state-of-the-art parametrizations.
Calculated theoretical uncertainties in the position of two-neutron drip line
are compared with those obtained in non-relativistic DFT calculations. Shell
effects drastically affect the shape of two-neutron drip line. In particular,
model uncertainties in the definition of two-neutron drip line at $Z\sim 54,
N=126$ and $Z\sim 82, N=184$ are very small due to the impact of spherical
shell closures at N=126 and 184.


title:
Planet formation in binaries: dynamics of planetesimals perturbed by the
  eccentric protoplanetary disk and the secondary

abstract:
  Detections of planets in eccentric, close (separations of ~20 AU) binary
systems such as \alpha Cen or \gamma Cep provide an important test of planet
formation theories. Gravitational perturbations from the companion are expected
to excite high planetesimal eccentricities resulting in destruction, rather
than growth, of objects with sizes of up to several hundred km in collisions of
similar-size bodies. It was recently suggested that gravity of a massive
axisymmetric gaseous disk in which planetesimals are embedded drives rapid
precession of their orbits, suppressing eccentricity excitation. However, disks
in binaries are themselves expected to be eccentric, leading to additional
planetesimal excitation. Here we develop secular theory of eccentricity
evolution for planetesimals perturbed by the gravity of an elliptical
protoplanetary disk (neglecting gas drag) and the companion. For the first time
we derive an expression for the disturbing function due to an eccentric disk,
which can be used for a variety of other astrophysical problems. We obtain
explicit analytical solutions for planetesimal eccentricity evolution and
delineate four different regimes of dynamical excitation. We show that in
systems with massive (>10^{-2}M_Sun) disks, planetesimal eccentricity is
usually determined by the gravity of the eccentric disk alone, and is
comparable to the disk eccentricity. As a result, the latter imposes a lower
limit on collisional velocities of solids, making their growth problematic.
This fragmentation barrier can be removed if the gaseous disk rapidly precesses
or if its own self-gravity is efficient at lowering disk eccentricity.


title: The Cauchy problem for the quasilinear Schrodinger equatio

abstract:
  These are lectures notes for a 6 hour course given at PCMI, Park City, Utah,
in the summer of 2003. The notes are based on a series of joint works of
Kenig-Ponce-Vega. Each lecture had problems assigned with it. The lecture notes
were prepared with the help of Justin Holmer. Justin Holmer also provided
solutions to the problems, in an appendix to the notes.


title:
MacWilliams' Extension Theorem for Bi-Invariant Weights over Finite
  Principal Ideal Rings

abstract:
  A finite ring R and a weight w on R satisfy the Extension Property if every
R-linear w-isometry between two R-linear codes in R^n extends to a monomial
transformation of R^n that preserves w. MacWilliams proved that finite fields
with the Hamming weight satisfy the Extension Property. It is known that finite
Frobenius rings with either the Hamming weight or the homogeneous weight
satisfy the Extension Property. Conversely, if a finite ring with the Hamming
or homogeneous weight satisfies the Extension Property, then the ring is
Frobenius.
  This paper addresses the question of a characterization of all bi-invariant
weights on a finite ring that satisfy the Extension Property. Having solved
this question in previous papers for all direct products of finite chain rings
and for matrix rings, we have now arrived at a characterization of these
weights for finite principal ideal rings, which form a large subclass of the
finite Frobenius rings. We do not assume commutativity of the rings in
question.


title: Nuclear fission in covariant density functional theory

abstract:
  The current status of the application of covariant density functional theory
to microscopic description of nuclear fission with main emphasis on superheavy
nuclei (SHN) is reviewed. The softness of SHN in the triaxial plane leads to an
emergence of several competing fission pathes in the region of the inner
fission barrier in some of these nuclei. The outer fission barriers of SHN are
considerably affected both by triaxiality and octupole deformation.


title:
A Short Proof that Minimal Sets of Planar Ordinary Differential
  Equations are Trivial

abstract:
  We present a short proof, relaying on the divergence theorem, verifying that
minimal sets in the plane are trivial.


title:
ecp: An R Package for Nonparametric Multiple Change Point Analysis of
  Multivariate Data

abstract:
  There are many different ways in which change point analysis can be
performed, from purely parametric methods to those that are distribution free.
The ecp package is designed to perform multiple change point analysis while
making as few assumptions as possible. While many other change point methods
are applicable only for univariate data, this R package is suitable for both
univariate and multivariate observations. Estimation can be based upon either a
hierarchical divisive or agglomerative algorithm. Divisive estimation
sequentially identifies change points via a bisection algorithm. The
agglomerative algorithm estimates change point locations by determining an
optimal segmentation. Both approaches are able to detect any type of
distributional change within the data. This provides an advantage over many
existing change point algorithms which are only able to detect changes within
the marginal distributions.


title:
Using D-operators to construct orthogonal polynomials satisfying higher
  order q-difference equations

abstract:
  Let $(p_n)_n$ be either the $q$-Meixner or the $q$-Laguerre polynomials. We
form a new sequence of polynomials $(q_n)_n$ by considering a linear
combination of two consecutive $p_n$: $q_n=p_n+\beta_np_{n-1}$, $\beta_n\in
\RR$. Using the concept of $\D$-operator, we generate sequences $(\beta_n)_n$
for which the polynomials $(q_n)_n$ are orthogonal with respect to a measure
and common eigenfunctions of a higher order $q$-difference operator.


title: The journey of the union-closed sets conjecture

abstract: We survey the state of the union-closed sets conjecture.


title: Foliations with a radial Kupka set on projective spaces

abstract:
  We consider the set $K(n,c,\rtt)$ of codimension one holomorphic foliations
on $\P^n,\,\, n\geq3$, with Chern class $c$, and with a compact, connected
Kupka set of radial transversal type. We will prove that foliations in this
set, have a rational first integral and define an irreducible component of the
space of foliations.


title: Newly identified YSO candidates towards the LDN 1188

abstract:
  We present an analysis of Young Stellar Object (YSO) candidates towards the
LDN 1188 molecular cloud. The YSO candidates were selected from the WISE
all-sky catalogue, based on a statistical method. We found 601 candidates in
the region, and classified them as Class I, Flat and Class II YSOs. Groups were
identified and described with the Minimal Spanning Tree (MST) method.
Previously identified molecular cores show evidence of ongoing star formation
at different stages throughout the cloud complex.


title:
Selected Spring 2013 Heavy Flavor, QCD, and Electroweak Physics Results
  from the Tevatron

abstract:
  With the full Tevatron data set collected and being analyzed, many new
results have been recently released. This includes heavy flavor physics studies
such as CP violation parameter measurements with B^{+/-} -> J/\psi K^{+/-} and
B^{+/-} -> J/\psi pi^{+/-} and $D^0-D^0bar mixing. Of the QCD and electroweak
results, photon plus heavy flavor measurements and a search for anomalous
quartic gauge couplings will be reviewed. These various studies help to clarify
the agreement between data and physics models and to search for new physics.


title:
Measurement of the lowest millimetre-wave transition frequency of the CH
  radical

abstract:
  The CH radical offers a sensitive way to test the hypothesis that fundamental
constants measured on earth may differ from those observed in other parts of
the universe. The starting point for such a comparison is to have accurate
laboratory frequencies. Here we measure the frequency of the lowest
millimetre-wave transition of CH, near 535 GHz, with an accuracy of 0.6 kHz.
This improves the uncertainty by roughly two orders of magnitude over previous
determinations and opens the way for sensitive new tests of varying constants.


title:
Impedance and Scattering Variance Ratios of Complicated Wave Scattering
  Systems in the Low Loss Regime

abstract:
  Random matrix theory (RMT) successfully predicts universal statistical
properties of complicated wave scattering systems in the semiclassical limit,
while the random coupling model offers a complete statistical model with a
simple additive formula in terms of impedance to combine the predictions of RMT
and nonuniversal system-specific features. The statistics of measured wave
properties generally have nonuniversal features. However, ratios of the
variances of elements of the impedance matrix are predicted to be independent
of such nonuniversal features and thus should be universal functions of the
overall system loss. In contrast with impedance variance ratios, scattering
variance ratios depends on nonuniversal features unless the system is in the
high loss regime. In this paper, we present numerical tests of the predicted
universal impedance variance ratios and show that an insufficient sample size
can lead to apparent deviation from the theory, particularly in the low loss
regime. Experimental tests are carried out in three two-port microwave cavities
with varied loss parameters, including a novel experimental system with a
superconducting microwave billiard, to test the variance-ratio predictions in
the low loss time-reversal-invariant regime. It is found that the experimental
results agree with the theoretical predictions to the extent permitted by the
finite sample size.


title: Spin Neurons: A Possible Path to Energy-Efficient Neuromorphic Computers

abstract:
  Recent years have witnessed growing interest in the field of brain-inspired
computing based on neural-network architectures. In order to translate the
related algorithmic models into powerful, yet energy-efficient
cognitive-computing hardware, computing-devices beyond CMOS may need to be
explored. The suitability of such devices to this field of computing would
strongly depend upon how closely their physical characteristics match with the
essential computing primitives employed in such models. In this work we discuss
the rationale of applying emerging spin-torque devices for bio-inspired
computing. Recent spin-torque experiments have shown the path to low-current,
low-voltage and high-speed magnetization switching in nano-scale magnetic
devices. Such magneto-metallic, current-mode spin-torque switches can mimic the
analog summing and thresholding operation of an artificial neuron with high
energy-efficiency. Comparison with CMOS-based analog circuit-model of neuron
shows that spin neurons can achieve more than two orders of magnitude lower
energy and beyond three orders of magnitude reduction in energy-delay product.
The application of spin neurons can therefore be an attractive option for
neuromorphic computers of future.


title: Imbrex geometries

abstract:
  We introduce an axiom on strong parapolar spaces of diameter 2, which arises
naturally in the framework of Hjelmslev geometries. This way, we characterize
the Hjelmslev-Moufang plane and its relatives (line Grassmannians, certain
half-spin geometries and Segre geometries). At the same time we provide a more
general framework for a Lemma of Cohen, which is widely used to study parapolar
spaces. As an application, if the geometries are embedded in projective space,
we provide a common characterization of (projections of) Segre varieties, line
Grassmann varieties, half-spin varieties of low rank, and the exceptional
variety $\mathcal{E}_{6,1}$ by means of a local condition on tangent spaces.


title:
12-band $\textbf{k}\cdot\textbf{p}$ model for dilute bismide alloys of
  (In)GaAs derived from supercell calculations

abstract:
  Incorporation of bismuth (Bi) in dilute quantities in (In)GaAs has been shown
to lead to unique electronic properties that can in principle be exploited for
the design of high efficiency telecomm lasers. This motivates the development
of simple models of the electronic structure of these dilute bismide alloys,
which can be used to evaluate their potential as a candidate material system
for optical applications. Here, we begin by using detailed calculations based
on an $sp^{3}s^{*}$ tight-binding model of (In)GaBi$_{x}$As$_{1-x}$ to verify
the presence of a valence band-anticrossing interaction in these alloys. Based
on the tight-binding model the derivation of a 12-band
$\textbf{k}\cdot\textbf{p}$ Hamiltonian for dilute bismide alloys is outlined.
We show that the band structure obtained from the 12-band model is in excellent
agreement with full tight-binding supercell calculations. Finally, we apply the
12-band model to In$_{0.53}$Ga$_{0.47}$Bi$_{x}$As$_{1-x}$ and compare the
calculated variation of the band gap and spin-orbit-splitting to a variety of
spectroscopic measurements performed on a series of MBE-grown
In$_{0.53}$Ga$_{0.47}$Bi$_{x}$As$_{1-x}$/InP layers.


title:
Energy-Efficient and Robust Associative Computing with Electrically
  Coupled Dual Pillar Spin-Torque Oscillators

abstract:
  Dynamics of coupled spin-torque oscillators can be exploited for non-Boolean
information processing. However, the feasibility of coupling large number of
STOs with energy-efficiency and sufficient robustness towards
parameter-variation and thermal-noise, may be critical for such computing
applications. In this work, the impacts of parameter-variation and
thermal-noise on two different coupling mechanisms for STOs, namely,
magnetic-coupling and electrical-coupling are analyzed. Magnetic coupling is
simulated using dipolar-field interactions. For electricalcoupling we employed
global RF-injection. In this method, multiple STOs are phase-locked to a common
RF-signal that is injected into the STOs along with the DC bias. Results for
variation and noise analysis indicate that electrical-coupling can be
significantly more robust as compared to magnetic-coupling. For
room-temperature simulations, appreciable phase-lock was retained among tens of
electrically coupled STOs for up to 20% 3s random variations in critical device
parameters. The magnetic-coupling technique however failed to retain locking
beyond ~3% 3s parameter-variations, even for small-size STO clusters with
near-neighborhood connectivity. We propose and analyze Dual-Pillar STO (DP-STO)
for low-power computing using the proposed electrical coupling method. We
observed that DP-STO can better exploit the electrical-coupling technique due
to separation between the biasing RF signal and its own RF output.


title:
Delay-Sensitive Communication over Fading Channel: Queueing Behavior and
  Code Parameter Selection

abstract:
  This article examines the queueing performance of communication systems that
transmit encoded data over unreliable channels. A fading formulation suitable
for wireless environments is considered where errors are caused by a discrete
channel with correlated behavior over time. Random codes and BCH codes are
employed as means to study the relationship between code-rate selection and the
queueing performance of point-to-point data links. For carefully selected
channel models and arrival processes, a tractable Markov structure composed of
queue length and channel state is identified. This facilitates the analysis of
the stationary behavior of the system, leading to evaluation criteria such as
bounds on the probability of the queue exceeding a threshold. Specifically,
this article focuses on system models with scalable arrival profiles, which are
based on Poisson processes, and finite-state channels with memory. These
assumptions permit the rigorous comparison of system performance for codes with
arbitrary block lengths and code rates. Based on the resulting
characterizations, it is possible to select the best code parameters for
delay-sensitive applications over various channels. The methodology introduced
herein offers a new perspective on the joint queueing-coding analysis of
finitestate channels with memory, and it is supported by numerical simulations.


title: Cosmological perturbation theory at three-loop order

abstract:
  We analyze the dark matter power spectrum at three-loop order in standard
perturbation theory of large scale structure. We observe that at late times the
loop expansion does not converge even for large scales (small momenta) well
within the linear regime, but exhibits properties compatible with an asymptotic
series. We propose a technique to restore the convergence in the limit of small
momentum, and use it to obtain a perturbative expansion with improved
convergence for momenta in the range where baryonic acoustic oscillations are
present. Our results are compared with data from N-body simulations at
different redshifts, and we find good agreement within this range.


title:
Theory of local electric polarization and its relation to internal
  strain: impact on the polarization potential and electronic properties of
  group-III nitrides

abstract:
  We present a theory of local electric polarization in crystalline solids and
apply it to study the case of wurtzite group-III nitrides. We show that a local
value of the electric polarization, evaluated at the atomic sites, can be cast
in terms of a summation over nearest-neighbor distances and Born effective
charges. Within this model, the local polarization shows a direct relation to
internal strain and can be expressed in terms of internal strain parameters.
The predictions of the present theory show excellent agreement with a formal
Berry phase calculation for random distortions of a test-case CuPt-like InGaN
alloy and InGaN supercells with randomly placed cations. While the present
level of theory is appropriate for highly ionic compounds, we show that a more
complex model is needed for less ionic materials, in which the strain
dependence of Born effective charges has to be taken into account. Moreover, we
provide ab initio parameters for GaN, InN and AlN, including hybrid functional
values for the piezoelectric coefficients and the spontaneous polarization,
which we use to accurately implement the local theory expressions. In order to
calculate the local polarization potential, we also present a point dipole
method. This method overcomes several limitations related to discretization and
resolution which arise when obtaining the local potential by solving Poisson's
equation on an atomic grid. Finally, we perform tight-binding supercell
calculations to assess the impact of the local polarization potential arising
from alloy fluctuations on the electronic properties of InGaN alloys. In
particular, we find that the large upward bowing with composition of the InGaN
valence band edge is strongly influenced by local polarization effects.
Furthermore, our analysis allows us to extract composition-dependent bowing
parameters for the energy gap and valence and conduction band edges.


title:
Using concatenated quantum codes for universal fault-tolerant quantum
  gates

abstract:
  We propose a method for universal fault-tolerant quantum computation using
concatenated quantum error correcting codes. Namely, other than computational
basis state preparation as required by the DiVincenzo criteria [1], our scheme
requires no special ancillary state preparation to achieve universality, as
opposed to schemes such as magic state distillation. The concatenation scheme
exploits the transversal properties of two different codes, combining them to
provide a means to protect against low-weight arbitrary errors. We give the
required properties of the error correcting codes to ensure universal
fault-tolerance and discuss a particular example using the 7-qubit Steane and
15-qubit Reed-Muller codes. We believe that optimizing the codes used in such a
scheme could provide a useful alternative to state distillation schemes that
exhibit high overhead costs.


title:
Description of 158Er at ultrahigh spin in nuclear density functional
  theory

abstract:
  Rotational bands in $^{158}$Er at ultra-high spin have been studied in the
framework of relativistic and non-relativistic nuclear density functional
theories. Consistent results are obtained across the theoretical models used
but some puzzles remain when confronted with experiment. Namely, the many-body
configurations which provide good description of experimental transition
quadrupole moments and dynamic moments of inertia require substantial increase
of the spins of observed bands as compared with experimental estimates, which
are still subject to large uncertainties. If, however, the theoretical spins
assignments turned out to be correct, the experimental band 1 in $^{158}$Er
would be the highest-spin structure ever observed.


title: Universality and predictability in molecular quantitative genetics

abstract:
  Molecular traits, such as gene expression levels or protein binding
affinities, are increasingly accessible to quantitative measurement by modern
high-throughput techniques. Such traits measure molecular functions and, from
an evolutionary point of view, are important as targets of natural selection.
We review recent developments in evolutionary theory and experiments that are
expected to become building blocks of a quantitative genetics of molecular
traits. We focus on universal evolutionary characteristics: these are largely
independent of a trait's genetic basis, which is often at least partially
unknown. We show that universal measurements can be used to infer selection on
a quantitative trait, which determines its evolutionary mode of conservation or
adaptation. Furthermore, universality is closely linked to predictability of
trait evolution across lineages. We argue that universal trait statistics
extends over a range of cellular scales and opens new avenues of quantitative
evolutionary systems biology.


title: Hadron Structure in Chiral Perturbation Theory

abstract:
  We present our predictions for meson form factors for the SU(3) octet and
investigate their impact on the pion electroproduction cross sections. The
electric and magnetic polarizabilities of the SU(3) octet of mesons and baryons
are analyzed in detail. These extensive calculations are made possible by the
recent implementation of semi-automatized calculations in fully-relativistic
chiral perturbation theory, which allows evaluation of polarizabilities from
Compton scattering up to next-to-the-leading order.


title: Progressive Compression of 3D Objects with an Adaptive Quantization

abstract:
  This paper presents a new progressive compression method for triangular
meshes. This method, in fact, is based on a schema of irregular
multi-resolution analysis and is centered on the optimization of the
rate-distortion trade-off. The quantization precision is adapted to each vertex
during the encoding / decoding process to optimize the rate-distortion
compromise. The Optimization of the treated mesh geometry improves the
approximation quality and the compression ratio at each level of resolution.
The experimental results show that the proposed algorithm gives competitive
results compared to the previous works dealing with the rate-distortion
compromise.


title: On the failure of concentration for the \ell_\infty-ball

abstract:
  Let $(X,d)$ be a compact metric space and $\mu$ a Borel probability on $X$.
For each $N\geq 1$ let $d^N_\infty$ be the $\ell_\infty$-product on $X^N$ of
copies of $d$, and consider $1$-Lipschitz functions $X^N\to\mathbb{R}$ for
$d^N_\infty$.
  If the support of $\mu$ is connected and locally connected, then all such
functions are close in probability to juntas: that is, functions that depend on
only a few coordinates of $X^N$. This describes the failure of measure
concentration for these product spaces, and can be seen as a Lipschitz-function
counterpart of the celebrated result of Friedgut that Boolean functions with
small influences are close to juntas.


title: A template method for carbon nanotube production from sugar water

abstract:
  The methods of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) growth inside nanoporous materials are
among the best candidates to fabricate CNTs with controlled geometrical
parameters. We report obtaining CNTs by pyrolysis of sugar water and show that
this chemical reaction is better suited for various applications than other
known template methods. The diameter of the obtained CNTs, their alignment, and
the distance between them can be controlled by choosing the bendable nanoporous
template (chrysotile). Electron microscopy shows good crystalline quality of
the obtained approximately 10 {\mu}m long CNTs after the template etching.
Quasi-metallic transport is observed in this material after annealing CNTs
under inert atmosphere.


title: Pole-placement in higher-order sliding-mode control

abstract:
  We show that the well-known formula by Ackermann and Utkin can be generalized
to the case of higher-order sliding modes. By interpreting the eigenvalue
assignment of the sliding dynamics as a zero-placement problem, the
generalization becomes straightforward and the proof is greatly simplified. The
generalized formula retains the simplicity of the original one while allowing
to construct the sliding variable of a single-input linear time-invariant
system in such a way that it has desired relative degree and desired
sliding-mode dynamics. The formula can be used as part of a higher-order
sliding-mode control design methodology, achieving high accuracy and robustness
at the same time.


title:
Emergent comet-like swarming of optically driven thermally active
  colloids

abstract:
  We propose a simple system of optically driven colloids that convert light
into heat and move in response to self- and collectively- generated thermal
gradients. We show that the system exhibits self-organization into a moving
comet-like swarm and characterize the structure and response of the swarm to a
light intensity dependent external tuning parameter. We observe many
interesting features in this nonequilibrium system including circulation and
evaporation, intensity-dependent shape, density and temperature fluctuations,
and ejection of hot colloids from the swarm tip.


title: OBST: A Self-Adjusting Peer-to-Peer Overlay Based on Multiple BSTs

abstract:
  The design of scalable and robust overlay topologies has been a main research
subject since the very origins of peer-to-peer (p2p) computing. Today, the
corresponding optimization tradeoffs are fairly well-understood, at least in
the static case and from a worst-case perspective.
  This paper revisits the peer-to-peer topology design problem from a
self-organization perspective. We initiate the study of topologies which are
optimized to serve the communication demand, or even self-adjusting as demand
changes. The appeal of this new paradigm lies in the opportunity to be able to
go beyond the lower bounds and limitations imposed by a static,
communication-oblivious, topology. For example, the goal of having short
routing paths (in terms of hop count) does no longer conflict with the
requirement of having low peer degrees.
  We propose a simple overlay topology Obst(k) which is composed of k (rooted
and directed) Binary Search Trees (BSTs), where k is a parameter. We first
prove some fundamental bounds on what can and cannot be achieved optimizing a
topology towards a static communication pattern (a static Obst(k)). In
particular, we show that the number of BSTs that constitute the overlay can
have a large impact on the routing costs, and that a single additional BST may
reduce the amortized communication costs from Omega(log(n)) to O(1), where n is
the number of peers. Subsequently, we discuss a natural self-adjusting
extension of Obst(k), in which frequently communicating partners are "splayed
together".


title:
High-spin transition quadrupole moments in neutron-rich Mo and Ru
  nuclei: testing $\gamma $ softness?

abstract:
  The transition quadrupole moments, $Q_{t}$, of rotational bands in the
neutron-rich, even-mass $^{102-108}$Mo and $^{108-112}$Ru nuclei were measured
in the 8 to 16 $\hbar $ spin range with the Doppler-shift attenuation method.
The nuclei were populated as fission fragments from $^{252}$Cf fission. The
detector setup consisted of the Gammasphere spectrometer and the HERCULES
fast-plastic array. At moderate spin, the $Q_{t}$ moments are found to be
reduced with respect to the values near the ground states. Attempts to describe
the observations in mean-field-based models, specifically cranked relativistic
Hartree-Bogoliubov theory, illustrate the challenge theory faces and the
difficulty to infer information on $\gamma $ softness and triaxiality from the
data.


title:
Wedge Sampling for Computing Clustering Coefficients and Triangle Counts
  on Large Graphs

abstract:
  Graphs are used to model interactions in a variety of contexts, and there is
a growing need to quickly assess the structure of such graphs. Some of the most
useful graph metrics are based on triangles, such as those measuring social
cohesion. Algorithms to compute them can be extremely expensive, even for
moderately-sized graphs with only millions of edges. Previous work has
considered node and edge sampling; in contrast, we consider wedge sampling,
which provides faster and more accurate approximations than competing
techniques. Additionally, wedge sampling enables estimation local clustering
coefficients, degree-wise clustering coefficients, uniform triangle sampling,
and directed triangle counts. Our methods come with provable and practical
probabilistic error estimates for all computations. We provide extensive
results that show our methods are both more accurate and faster than
state-of-the-art alternatives.


title:
Hadronic resonances in heavy-ion collisions at ALICE (Strangeness in
  Quark Matter 2013)

abstract:
  Properties of the hadronic phase of high-energy heavy-ion collisions can be
studied by measuring the ratios of hadronic resonance yields to the yields of
longer-lived particles. These ratios can be used to study the strength of
re-scattering effects, the chemical freeze-out temperature, and the lifetime
between chemical and kinetic freeze-out. The restoration of chiral symmetry
during the early hadronic phase or near the phase transition may lead to shifts
in the masses and increases in the widths of hadronic resonances. The ALICE
collaboration has measured the spectra, masses, and widths of the K*(892)0 and
phi(1020) resonances in Pb-Pb collisions at 2.76 TeV. These results, including
RAA and the ratios of the integrated resonance yields to stable hadron yields,
are presented and compared to results from other collision systems and to
theoretical predictions.


title: Mapping Mutable Genres in Structurally Complex Volumes

abstract:
  To mine large digital libraries in humanistically meaningful ways, scholars
need to divide them by genre. This is a task that classification algorithms are
well suited to assist, but they need adjustment to address the specific
challenges of this domain. Digital libraries pose two problems of scale not
usually found in the article datasets used to test these algorithms. 1) Because
libraries span several centuries, the genres being identified may change
gradually across the time axis. 2) Because volumes are much longer than
articles, they tend to be internally heterogeneous, and the classification task
needs to begin with segmentation. We describe a multi-layered solution that
trains hidden Markov models to segment volumes, and uses ensembles of
overlapping classifiers to address historical change. We test this approach on
a collection of 469,200 volumes drawn from HathiTrust Digital Library. To
demonstrate the humanistic value of these methods, we extract 32,209 volumes of
fiction from the digital library, and trace the changing proportions of first-
and third-person narration in the corpus. We note that narrative points of view
seem to have strong associations with particular themes and genres.


title: Blazes: Coordination Analysis for Distributed Programs

abstract:
  Distributed consistency is perhaps the most discussed topic in distributed
systems today. Coordination protocols can ensure consistency, but in practice
they cause undesirable performance unless used judiciously. Scalable
distributed architectures avoid coordination whenever possible, but
under-coordinated systems can exhibit behavioral anomalies under fault, which
are often extremely difficult to debug. This raises significant challenges for
distributed system architects and developers. In this paper we present Blazes,
a cross-platform program analysis framework that (a) identifies program
locations that require coordination to ensure consistent executions, and (b)
automatically synthesizes application-specific coordination code that can
significantly outperform general-purpose techniques. We present two case
studies, one using annotated programs in the Twitter Storm system, and another
using the Bloom declarative language.


title:
Photometry of Variable Stars from Dome A, Antarctica: Results from the
  2010 Observing Season

abstract:
  We present results from a season of observations with the Chinese Small
Telescope ARray (CSTAR), obtained over 183 days of the 2010 Antarctic winter.
We carried out high-cadence time-series aperture photometry of 20,000 stars
with i<15.3 mag located in a 23 square-degree region centered on the south
celestial pole.
  We identified 188 variable stars, including 67 new objects relative to our
2008 observations, thanks to broader synoptic coverage, a deeper magnitude
limit and a larger field of view.
  We used the photometric data set to derive site statistics from Dome A. Based
on two years of observations, we find that extinction due to clouds at this
site is less than 0.1 and 0.4 mag during 45% and 75% of the dark time,
respectively.


title: A non-perturbative study of massive gauge theories

abstract:
  We consider a non-perturbative formulation of an SU(2) massive gauge theory
on a space-time lattice, which is also a discretised gauged non-linear chiral
model. The lattice model is shown to have an exactly conserved global SU(2)
symmetry. If a scaling region for the lattice model exists and the lightest
degrees of freedom are spin one vector particles with the same quantum numbers
as the conserved current, we argue that the most general effective theory
describing their low-energy dynamics must be a massive gauge theory. We present
results of a exploratory numerical simulation of the model and find indications
for the presence of a scaling region where both a triplet vector and a scalar
remain light.


title:
Information-related changes in contact patterns may trigger oscillations
  in the endemic prevalence of infectious diseases

abstract:
  It is well known that behavioral changes in contact patterns may
significantly affect the spread of an epidemic outbreak. Here we focus on
simple endemic models for recurrent epidemics, by modelling the social contact
rate as a function of the available information on the present and past disease
prevalence. We show that social behaviour change alone may trigger sustained
oscillations. This indicates that human behavior might be a critical explaining
factor of oscillations in time-series of endemic diseases. Finally, we briefly
show how the inclusion of seasonal variations in contacts may imply chaos.


title:
Ring-apodized vortex coronagraphs for obscured telescopes. I.
  Transmissive ring apodizers

abstract:
  The vortex coronagraph (VC) is a new generation small inner working angle
(IWA) coronagraph currently offered on various 8-meter class ground-based
telescopes. On these observing platforms, the current level of performance is
not limited by the intrinsic properties of actual vortex devices, but by
wavefront control residuals and incoherent background (e.g. thermal emission of
the sky) or the light diffracted by the imprint of the secondary mirror and
support structures on the telescope pupil. In the particular case of unfriendly
apertures (mainly large central obscuration) when very high contrast is needed
(e.g. direct imaging of older exoplanets with extremely large telescopes or
space- based coronagraphs), a simple VC, as most coronagraphs, can not deliver
its nominal performance because of the contamination due to the diffraction
from the obscured part of the pupil. Here we propose a novel yet simple concept
that circumvents this problem. We combine a vortex phase mask in the image
plane of a high-contrast instrument with a single pupil-based amplitude ring
apodizer, tailor designed to exploit the unique convolution properties of the
VC at the Lyot-stop plane. We show that such a ring-apodized vortex coronagraph
(RAVC) restores the perfect attenuation property of the VC regardless of the
size of the central obscuration, and for any (even) topological charge of the
vortex. More importantly the RAVC maintains the IWA and conserves a fairly high
throughput, which are signature properties of the VC.


title:
Fractal growth of tumors and other cellular populations: Linking the
  mechanistic to the phenomenological modeling and vice versa

abstract:
  In this paper we study and extend the mechanistic mean field theory of growth
of cellular populations proposed by Mombach et al in (Mombach J. C. M. et al.,
Europhysics Letter, 59 (2002) 923) (MLBI model), and we demonstrate that the
original model and our generalizations lead to inferences of biological
interest. In the first part of this paper, we show that the model in study is
widely general since it admits, as particular cases, the main phenomenological
models of cellular growth. In the second part of this work, we generalize the
\emph{MLBI} model to a wider family of models by allowing the cells to have a
generic unspecified biologically plausible interaction. Then, we derive a
relationship between this generic microscopic interaction function and the
growth rate of the corresponding macroscopic model. Finally, we propose to use
this relationship in order to help the investigation of the biological
plausibility of phenomenological models of cancer growth.


title: Reliable Crowdsourcing for Multi-Class Labeling using Coding Theory

abstract:
  Crowdsourcing systems often have crowd workers that perform unreliable work
on the task they are assigned. In this paper, we propose the use of
error-control codes and decoding algorithms to design crowdsourcing systems for
reliable classification despite unreliable crowd workers. Coding-theory based
techniques also allow us to pose easy-to-answer binary questions to the crowd
workers. We consider three different crowdsourcing models: systems with
independent crowd workers, systems with peer-dependent reward schemes, and
systems where workers have common sources of information. For each of these
models, we analyze classification performance with the proposed coding-based
scheme. We develop an ordering principle for the quality of crowds and describe
how system performance changes with the quality of the crowd. We also show that
pairing among workers and diversification of the questions help in improving
system performance. We demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed
coding-based scheme using both simulated data and real datasets from Amazon
Mechanical Turk, a crowdsourcing microtask platform. Results suggest that use
of good codes may improve the performance of the crowdsourcing task over
typical majority-voting approaches.