title: Modeling Software Development Methodologies: A Logic Based Approach

abstract:
  In the last two decades, the growing trend of software development industry
has made different aspects of software engineering more interesting for the
computer science research community. Software development life-cycle is one of
these aspects that has a significant impact on the success/failure of software
development projects. Since each software development methodology relatively
provides its own software development life-cycle, encoding software development
life-cycle in a workflow representation language can help developers to
properly manage their software projects. In addition, such encoding can also be
used in CASE tools. In this report, we consider the software development
life-cycle as a workflow that can be represented by semantic web and rule based
languages. Such consideration let one analyze the properties of the life-cycle.
Specifically, we take a well-known agent oriented software development
methodology and show that its corresponding life-cycle can be specified by
Transaction Logic easily and concisely. Finally, the compact and clear
representation of the life-cycle in Transaction Logic can be used in CASE tools
to guide software developers.


title:
Testing theories of Gravity and Supergravity with inflation and
  observations of the cosmic microwave background

abstract:
  Many extensions of Einstein's theory of gravity have been studied and
proposed with various motivations like the quest for a quantum theory of
gravity to extensions of anomalies in observations at the solar system,
galactic and cosmological scales. These extensions include adding higher powers
of Ricci curvature $R$, coupling the Ricci curvature with scalar fields and
generalized functions of $R$. In addition when viewed from the perspective of
Supergravity (SUGRA) many of these theories may originate from the same SUGRA
theory interpreted in different frames. SUGRA therefore serves as a good
framework for organizing and generalizing theories of gravity beyond General
Relativity. All these theories when applied to inflation (a rapid expansion of
early Universe in which primordial gravitational waves might be generated and
might still be detectable by the imprint they left or by the ripples that
persist today) can have distinct signatures in the Cosmic Microwave Background
radiation temperature and polarization anisotropies. In this review we give a
detailed discussion on the standard model of cosmology ($\Lambda$CDM),
inflation and cosmological perturbation theory. We survey the theories of
gravity beyond Einstein's General Relativity, specially which arise from SUGRA,
and study the consequences of these theories in the context of inflation and
put bounds on the theories and the parameters therein from the observational
experiments like Planck, Keck/BICEP. The possibility of testing these theories
in the near future in CMB observations and new data coming from colliders like
the LHC, provides an unique opportunity for constructing verifiable models of
particle physics and General Relativity.


title: A Note on Weyl invariance in gravity and the Wess-Zumino functional

abstract:
  It is shown that the explicit calculation of the Wess-Zumino functional
pertaining to the breaking term of the Weyl symmetry for the Einstein-Hilbert
action allows to restore the Weyl symmetry by introducing the extra dilaton
field as Goldstone field. Adding the Wess-Zumino counter-term to the
Einstein-Hilbert action reproduces the usual Weyl invariant action used in
standard literature. Further consideration might confer to the Einstein-Hilbert
action a new status.


title: $B_s\pi$--$B\bar{K}$ interactions in finite volume and the $X(5568)$

abstract:
  The recent observation of $X(5568)$ by the D0 Collaboration has aroused a lot
of interest both theoretically and experimentally. In the present work, we
first point out that $X(5568)$ and $D_{s0}^*(2317)$ cannot simultaneously be of
molecular nature, from the perspective of heavy-quark symmetry and chiral
symmetry, based on a previous study of the lattice QCD scattering lengths of
$DK$ and its coupled channels. Then we compute the discrete energy levels of
the $B_s\pi$ and $B\bar{K}$ system in finite volume using unitary chiral
perturbation theory. The comparison with the latest lattice QCD simulation,
which disfavors the existence of $X(5568)$, supports our picture where the
$B_s\pi$ and $B\bar{K}$ interactions are weak and $X(5568)$ cannot be a
$B_s\pi$ and $B\bar{K}$ molecular state. In addition, we show that the extended
Weinberg compositeness condition also indicates that $X(5568)$ cannot be a
molecular state made from $B_s\pi$ and $B\bar{K}$ interactions.


title: Lepton number violation in 331 models

abstract:
  Different models based on the extended $SU(3)_{C}\times SU(3)_{L}\times
U(1)_{X}$ (331) gauge group have been proposed over the past four decades. Yet,
despite being an active research topic, the status of lepton number in 331
models has not been fully addressed in the literature, and furthermore many of
the original proposals can not explain the observed neutrino masses. In this
paper we review the basic features of various 331 models, focusing on potential
sources of lepton number violation. We then describe different modifications
which can be made to the original models in order to accommodate neutrino (and
charged lepton) masses.


title: Universal features of quantum bounce in loop quantum cosmology

abstract:
  In this Letter, we study analytically the evolutions of the flat
Friedmann-Lemaitre-Robertson-Walker (FLRW) universe and its linear
perturbations in the framework of {\em the dressed metric approach} in loop
quantum cosmology (LQC). Assuming that the evolution of the background is
dominated by the kinetic energy of the inflaton at the quantum bounce, we find
that both evolutions of the background and its perturbations are independent of
the inflationary potentials during the pre-inflationary phase. During this
period the effective potentials of the perturbations can be well approximated
by a P\"oschl-Teller (PT) potential, from which we find analytically the mode
functions and then calculate the corresponding Bogoliubov coefficients at the
onset of the slow-roll inflation, valid for any inflationary model with a
single scalar field. Imposing the Bunch-Davies (BD) vacuum in the contracting
phase prior to the bounce when the modes are all inside the Hubble horizon, we
show that particles are generically created due to the pre-inflation dynamics.
Matching them to those obtained in the slow-roll inflationary phase, we
investigate the effects of the pre-inflation dynamics on the scalar and tensor
power spectra and find features that can be tested by current and forthcoming
observations. In particular, to be consistent with the Planck 2015 data, we
find that the universe must have expanded at least $141$ e-folds since the
bounce.


title:
La representaci\'on de la variaci\'on contextual mediante definiciones
  terminol\'ogicas flexibles

abstract:
  In this doctoral thesis, we apply premises of cognitive linguistics to
terminological definitions and present a proposal called the flexible
terminological definition. This consists of a set of definitions of the same
concept made up of a general definition (in this case, one encompassing the
entire environmental domain) along with additional definitions describing the
concept from the perspective of the subdomains in which it is relevant. Since
context is a determining factor in the construction of the meaning of lexical
units (including terms), we assume that terminological definitions can, and
should, reflect the effects of context, even though definitions have
traditionally been treated as the expression of meaning void of any contextual
effect. The main objective of this thesis is to analyze the effects of
contextual variation on specialized environmental concepts with a view to their
representation in terminological definitions. Specifically, we focused on
contextual variation based on thematic restrictions. To accomplish the
objectives of this doctoral thesis, we conducted an empirical study consisting
of the analysis of a set of contextually variable concepts and the creation of
a flexible definition for two of them. As a result of the first part of our
empirical study, we divided our notion of domain-dependent contextual variation
into three different phenomena: modulation, perspectivization and
subconceptualization. These phenomena are additive in that all concepts
experience modulation, some concepts also undergo perspectivization, and
finally, a small number of concepts are additionally subjected to
subconceptualization. In the second part, we applied these notions to
terminological definitions and we presented we presented guidelines on how to
build flexible definitions, from the extraction of knowledge to the actual
writing of the definition.


title:
Deterministic light focusing in space and time through multiple
  scattering media with a Time-Resolved Transmission Matrix approach

abstract:
  We report a method to characterize the propagation of an ultrashort pulse of
light through a multiple scattering medium by measuring its time-resolved
transmission matrix. This method is based on the use of a spatial light
modulator together with a coherent time-gated detection of the transmitted
speckle field. Using this matrix, we demonstrate the focusing of the scattered
pulse at any arbitrary position in space and time after the medium. Our
approach opens new perspectives for both fundamental studies and applications
in imaging and coherent control in disordered media.


title: Modelling Office Energy Consumption: An Agent Based Approach

abstract:
  In this paper, we develop an agent-based model which integrates four
important elements, i.e. organisational energy management policies/regulations,
energy management technologies, electric appliances and equipment, and human
behaviour, based on a case study, to simulate the energy consumption in office
buildings. With the model, we test the effectiveness of different energy
management strategies, and solve practical office energy consumption problems.
This paper theoretically contributes to an integration of four elements
involved in the complex organisational issue of office energy consumption, and
practically contributes to an application of agent-based approach for office
building energy consumption study.


title: Uncovering Causality from Multivariate Hawkes Integrated Cumulants

abstract:
  We design a new nonparametric method that allows one to estimate the matrix
of integrated kernels of a multivariate Hawkes process. This matrix not only
encodes the mutual influences of each nodes of the process, but also
disentangles the causality relationships between them. Our approach is the
first that leads to an estimation of this matrix without any parametric
modeling and estimation of the kernels themselves. A consequence is that it can
give an estimation of causality relationships between nodes (or users), based
on their activity timestamps (on a social network for instance), without
knowing or estimating the shape of the activities lifetime. For that purpose,
we introduce a moment matching method that fits the third-order integrated
cumulants of the process. We show on numerical experiments that our approach is
indeed very robust to the shape of the kernels, and gives appealing results on
the MemeTracker database.


title: Classifying Virtually Special Tubular Groups

abstract:
  A group is tubular if it acts on a tree with $\mathbb{Z}^2$ vertex
stabilizers and $\mathbb{Z}$ edge stabilizers. We prove that a tubular group is
virtually special if and only if it acts freely on a locally finite CAT(0) cube
complex. Furthermore, we prove that if a tubular group acts freely on a finite
dimensional CAT(0) cube complex, then it virtually acts freely on a three
dimensional CAT(0) cube complex.


title:
Admissible Hierarchical Clustering Methods and Algorithms for Asymmetric
  Networks

abstract:
  This paper characterizes hierarchical clustering methods that abide by two
previously introduced axioms -- thus, denominated admissible methods -- and
proposes tractable algorithms for their implementation. We leverage the fact
that, for asymmetric networks, every admissible method must be contained
between reciprocal and nonreciprocal clustering, and describe three families of
intermediate methods. Grafting methods exchange branches between dendrograms
generated by different admissible methods. The convex combination family
combines admissible methods through a convex operation in the space of
dendrograms, and thirdly, the semi-reciprocal family clusters nodes that are
related by strong cyclic influences in the network. Algorithms for the
computation of hierarchical clusters generated by reciprocal and nonreciprocal
clustering as well as the grafting, convex combination, and semi-reciprocal
families are derived using matrix operations in a dioid algebra. Finally, the
introduced clustering methods and algorithms are exemplified through their
application to a network describing the interrelation between sectors of the
United States (U.S.) economy.


title:
Observational Constraints on First-Star Nucleosynthesis. I. Evidence for
  Multiple Progenitors of CEMP-no Stars

abstract:
  We investigate anew the distribution of absolute carbon abundance, $A$(C) $=
\log\,\epsilon $(C), for carbon-enhanced metal-poor (CEMP) stars in the halo of
the Milky Way, based on high-resolution spectroscopic data for a total sample
of 305 CEMP stars. The sample includes 147 CEMP-$s$ (and CEMP-r/s) stars, 127
CEMP-no stars, and 31 CEMP stars that are unclassified, based on the currently
employed [Ba/Fe] criterion. We confirm previous claims that the distribution of
$A$(C) for CEMP stars is (at least) bimodal, with newly determined peaks
centered on $A$(C)$=7.96$ (the high-C region) and $A$(C)$ =6.28$ (the low-C
region). A very high fraction of CEMP-$s$ (and CEMP-r/s) stars belong to the
high-C region, while the great majority of CEMP-no stars reside in the low-C
region. However, there exists complexity in the morphology of the $A$(C)-[Fe/H]
space for the CEMP-no stars, a first indication that more than one class of
first-generation stellar progenitors may be required to account for their
observed abundances. The two groups of CEMP-no stars we identify exhibit
clearly different locations in the $A$(Na)-$A$(C) and $A$(Mg)-$A$(C) spaces,
also suggesting multiple progenitors. The clear distinction in $A$(C) between
the CEMP-$s$ (and CEMP-$r/s$) stars and the CEMP-no stars appears to be $as\
successful$, and $likely\ more\ astrophysically\ fundamental$, for the
separation of these sub-classes as the previously recommended criterion based
on [Ba/Fe] (and [Ba/Eu]) abundance ratios. This result opens the window for its
application to present and future large-scale low- and medium-resolution
spectroscopic surveys.


title:
Phonon broadening from supercell lattice dynamics: random and correlated
  disorder

abstract:
  We demonstrate how supercell implementations of conventional lattice
dynamical calculations can be used to determine the extent and nature of
disorder-induced broadening in the phonon dispersion spectrum of disordered
crystalline materials. The approach taken relies on band unfolding, and is
first benchmarked against virtual crystal approximation phonon calculations.
The different effects of mass and interaction disorder on the phonon broadening
are then presented, focussing on the example of a simple cubic binary alloy.
For the mass disorder example, the effect of introducing correlated disorder is
also explored by varying the fraction of homoatomic and heteroatomic
neighbours. Systematic progression in the degree of phonon broadening, on the
one hand, and the form of the phonon dispersion curves from primitive to
face-centered cubic type, on the other hand, is observed as homoatomic
neighbours are disfavoured. The implications for rationalising selection rule
violations in disordered materials and for using inelastic neutron scattering
measurements as a means of characterising disorder are discussed.


title: Single Layer PbI2 : Hydrogenation-driven Reconstructions

abstract:
  By performing density functional theory-based calculations, we investigate
how hydrogen atom interacts with the surfaces of monolayer PbI2 and how one and
two side hydrogenation modify its structural, electronic, and magnetic
properties. Firstly, it was shown that T-phase of single layer PbI2 is
energetically favorable than the H-phase. It is found that hydrogenation of its
surfaces is possible through the adsorption of each hydrogen on iodine sites.
While H atoms do not form a particular bonding-type at low concentration, by
increasing the number of hydrogenated I-sites well-ordered hydrogen patterns
are formed on PbI2 matrix. In addition, we found that for one-side
hydrogenation, the structure forms a (2x1) Jahn-Teller type distorted structure
and band gap is dramatically reduced compared to hydrogen-free single layer
PbI2 . Moreover, in the case of full-hydrogenation, the structure also
possesses another (2x2) reconstruction with reduction in the band gap.
Easy-tunable electronic and structural properties of single layer PbI2 by
hydrogenation reveal its potential use in nanoscale semiconducting device
applications.


title: Excisive Hierarchical Clustering Methods for Network Data

abstract:
  We introduce two practical properties of hierarchical clustering methods for
(possibly asymmetric) network data: excisiveness and linear scale preservation.
The latter enforces imperviousness to change in units of measure whereas the
former ensures local consistency of the clustering outcome. Algorithmically,
excisiveness implies that we can reduce computational complexity by only
clustering a data subset of interest while theoretically guaranteeing that the
same hierarchical outcome would be observed when clustering the whole dataset.
Moreover, we introduce the concept of representability, i.e. a generative model
for describing clustering methods through the specification of their action on
a collection of networks. We further show that, within a rich set of admissible
methods, requiring representability is equivalent to requiring both
excisiveness and linear scale preservation. Leveraging this equivalence, we
show that all excisive and linear scale preserving methods can be factored into
two steps: a transformation of the weights in the input network followed by the
application of a canonical clustering method. Furthermore, their factorization
can be used to show stability of excisive and linear scale preserving methods
in the sense that a bounded perturbation in the input network entails a bounded
perturbation in the clustering output.


title: On the topology of the Milnor fibration of a hyperplane arrangement

abstract:
  This note is mostly an expository survey, centered on the topology of
complements of hyperplane arrangements, their Milnor fibrations, and their
boundary structures. An important tool in this study is provided by the degree
1 resonance and characteristic varieties of the complement, and their tight
relationship with orbifold fibrations and multinets on the underlying matroid.
In favorable situations, this approach leads to a combinatorial formula for the
first Betti number of the Milnor fiber and the algebraic monodromy. We also
produce a pair of arrangements for which the respective Milnor fibers have the
same Betti numbers, yet are not homotopy equivalent: the difference is picked
up by isolated torsion points in the higher-depth characteristic varieties.


title: Seasonal and geographical impact on human resting periods

abstract:
  We study the influence of seasonally and geographically related daily
dynamics of daylight and ambient temperature on human resting or sleeping
patterns using mobile phone data of a large number of individuals. We observe
two daily inactivity periods in the people's aggregated mobile phone calling
patterns and infer these to represent the resting times of the population. We
find that the nocturnal resting period is strongly influenced by the length of
daylight, and that its seasonal variation depends on the latitude, such that
for people living in two different cities separated by eight latitudinal
degrees, the difference in the resting period of people between the summer and
winter in southern cities is almost twice that in the northern cities. We also
observe that the duration of the afternoon resting period is influenced by the
temperature, and that there is a threshold from which this influence sets in.
Finally, we observe that the yearly dynamics of the afternoon and nocturnal
resting periods appear to be counterbalancing each other. This also lends
support to the notion that the total daily resting time of people is more or
less conserved across the year.


title:
Relaxed Highest Weight Modules from $\mathcal{D}$-Modules on the
  Kashiwara Flag Scheme

abstract:
  The relaxed highest weight representations introduced by Feigin et al. are a
special class of representations of the affine Kac-Moody algebra
$\hat{\mathfrak{sl}_2}$, which do not have a highest (or lowest) weight. We
formulate a generalization of this notion for an arbitrary affine Kac-Moody
algebra $\mathfrak{g}$. We then realize induced $\mathfrak{g}$-modules of this
type and their duals as global sections of twisted $\mathcal{D}$-modules on the
Kashiwara flag scheme $X$ associated to $\mathfrak{g}$. The
$\mathcal{D}$-modules that appear in our construction are direct images from
subschemes of $X$ that are intersections of finite dimensional Schubert cells
with their translate by a simple reflection. Besides the twist $\lambda$, they
depend on a complex number describing the monodromy of the local systems we
construct on these intersections. We describe the global sections of the
$*$-direct images as a module over the Cartan subalgebra of $\mathfrak{g}$ and
show that the higher cohomology vanishes. We obtain a complete description of
the cohomology groups of the direct images as $\mathfrak{g}$-modules in the
following two cases. First, we address the case when the intersection is
isomorphic to $\mathbb{C}^{\times}$. Secondly, we address the case of the
$*$-direct image from an arbitrary intersection when the twist is regular
antidominant and the monodromy is trivial. For the proof of this case we
introduce an exact auto-equivalence of the category of $\mathcal{D}$-modules
$\text{Hol}(\lambda)$ induced by the automorphism of $X$ defined by a lift of a
simple reflection. These results describe for the first time explicit
non-highest weight $\mathfrak{g}$-modules as global sections on the Kashiwara
flag scheme and extend several results of Kashiwara-Tanisaki to the case of
relaxed highest weight representations.


title: Data Scaling in OBDA Benchmarks: The VIG Approach

abstract:
  In this paper we describe VIG, a data scaler for benchmarks in the context of
ontology-based data access (OBDA). Data scaling is a relatively recent
approach, proposed in the database community, that allows for quickly scaling
up an input data instance to s times its size, while preserving certain
application-specific characteristics. The advantage of the approach is that the
user is not required to manually input the characteristics of the data to be
produced, making it particularly suitable for OBDA benchmarks, where the
complexity of database schemas might pose a challenge for manual input (e.g.,
the NPD benchmark contains 70 tables with some containing more than 60
columns). As opposed to a traditional data scaler, VIG includes domain
information provided by the OBDA mappings and the ontology in order to produce
data. VIG is currently used in the NPD benchmark, but it is not NPD-specific
and can be seeded with any data instance. The distinguishing features of VIG
are (1) its simple and clear generation strategy; (2) its efficiency, as each
value is generated in constant time, without accesses to the disk or to RAM to
retrieve previously generated values; (3) and its generality, as the data is
exported in CSV files that can be easily imported by any RDBMS system. VIG is a
java implementation licensed under Apache 2.0, and its source code is available
on GitHub (https://github.com/ontop/vig) in the form of a Maven project. The
code is being maintained since two years by the -ontop- team at the Free
University of Bozen-Bolzano.


title: Solving equations and optimization problems with uncertainty

abstract:
  We study the problem of detecting zeros of continuous functions that are
known only up to an error bound, extending the earlier theoretical work with
explicit algorithms and experiments with an implementation. More formally, the
robustness of zero of a continuous map $f: X\to \mathbb{R}^n$ is the maximal
$r>0$ such that each $g:X\to\mathbb{R}^n$ with $\|f-g\|_\infty\le r$ has a
zero. We develop and implement an efficient algorithm approximating the
robustness of zero. Further, we show how to use the algorithm for approximating
worst-case optima in optimization problems in which the feasible domain is
defined by equations that are only known approximately.
  An important ingredient is an algorithm for deciding the topological
extension problem based on computing cohomological obstructions to
extendability and their persistence. We describe an explicit algorithm for the
primary and secondary obstruction, two stages of a sequence of algorithms with
increasing complexity. We provide experimental evidence that for random
Gaussian fields, the primary obstruction---a much less computationally
demanding test than the secondary obstruction---is typically sufficient for
approximating robustness of zero.


title: Categorical proof of Holomorphic Atiyah-Bott formula

abstract:
  Given a symmetric monoidal $(\infty,2)$-category $\mathscr E$ we promote the
trace construction to a functor. We then apply this formalism to the case when
$\mathscr{E}$ is the $(\infty,2)$-category of $k$-linear presentable categories
which in combination of various calculations in the setting of derived
algebraic geometry gives a categorical proof of the classical Atiyah-Bott
formula (also known as the Holomorphic Lefschetz fixed point formula).


title:
Relativistic k.p Hamiltonians for centrosymmetric topological insulators
  from ab initio wave functions

abstract:
  We present a method to microscopically derive a small-size k$\cdot$p
Hamiltonian in a Hilbert space spanned by physically chosen ab initio spinor
wave functions. Without imposing any complementary symmetry constraints, our
formalism equally treats three- and two-dimensional systems and simultaneously
yields the Hamiltonian parameters and the true $\mathbb{Z}_2$ topological
invariant. We consider bulk crystals and thin films of Bi$_{2}$Se$_{3}$,
Bi$_{2}$Te$_{3}$, and Sb$_{2}$Te$_{3}$. It turns out that the effective
continuous k$\cdot$p models with open boundary conditions often incorrectly
predict the topological character of thin films.


title:
Asymptotic analysis of solutions to transmission problems in solids with
  many inclusions

abstract:
  We construct an asymptotic approximation to the solution of a transmission
problem for a body containing a region occupied by many small inclusions. The
cluster of inclusions is characterised by two small parameters that determine
the nominal diameter of individual inclusions and their separation within the
cluster. These small parameters can be comparable to each other. Remainder
estimates of the asymptotic approximation are rigorously justified. Numerical
illustrations demonstrate the efficiency of the asymptotic approach when
compared with benchmark finite element algorithms.


title: Electron impact excitation of F-like W LXVI

abstract:
  Electron impact excitation collision strengths are calculated for all
transitions among 113 levels of the 2s$^2$2p$^5$, 2s2p$^6$,
2s$^2$2p$^4$3$\ell$, 2s2p$^5$3$\ell$, and 2p$^6$3$\ell$ configurations of
F-like W~LXVI. For this purpose Dirac Atomic R-matrix Code (DARC) has been
adopted and results are listed over a wide energy range of 1000 to 6000 Ryd.
For comparison purpose analogous calculations have also been performed with the
Flexible Atomic Code (FAC), and the results obtained are comparable with those
from DARC.


title:
Fast Robust Monocular Depth Estimation for Obstacle Detection with Fully
  Convolutional Networks

abstract:
  Obstacle Detection is a central problem for any robotic system, and critical
for autonomous systems that travel at high speeds in unpredictable environment.
This is often achieved through scene depth estimation, by various means. When
fast motion is considered, the detection range must be longer enough to allow
for safe avoidance and path planning. Current solutions often make assumption
on the motion of the vehicle that limit their applicability, or work at very
limited ranges due to intrinsic constraints. We propose a novel
appearance-based Object Detection system that is able to detect obstacles at
very long range and at a very high speed (~300Hz), without making assumptions
on the type of motion. We achieve these results using a Deep Neural Network
approach trained on real and synthetic images and trading some depth accuracy
for fast, robust and consistent operation. We show how photo-realistic
synthetic images are able to solve the problem of training set dimension and
variety typical of machine learning approaches, and how our system is robust to
massive blurring of test images.


title:
The effect of surface transport on water desalination by porous
  electrodes undergoing capacitive charging

abstract:
  Capacitive deionization (CDI) is a technology in which water is desalinated
by ion electrosorption into the electric double layers (EDLs) of charging
porous electrodes. In recent years significant advances have been made in
modeling the charge and salt dynamics in a CDI cell, but the possible effect of
surface transport within diffuse EDLs on these dynamics has not been
investigated. We here present theory which includes surface transport in
describing the dynamics of a charging CDI cell. Through our numerical solution
to the presented models, the possible effect of surface transport on the CDI
process is elucidated. While at some model conditions surface transport
enhances the rate of CDI cell charging, counter-intuitively this additional
transport pathway is found to slow down cell charging at other model
conditions.


title:
Performance of Massive MIMO Uplink with Zero-Forcing receivers under
  Delayed Channels

abstract:
  In this paper, we analyze the performance of the uplink communication of
massive multi-cell multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) systems under the
effects of pilot contamination and delayed channels because of terminal
mobility. The base stations (BSs) estimate the channels through the uplink
training, and then use zero-forcing processing to decode the transmit signals
from the users. The probability density function (PDF) of the
signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio is derived for any finite number of
antennas. From this PDF, we derive an achievable ergodic rate with a finite
number of BS antennas in closed form. Insights of the impact of the Doppler
shift (due to terminal mobility) at the low signal-to-noise ratio regimes are
exposed. In addition, the effects on the outage probability are investigated.
Furthermore, the power scaling law and the asymptotic performance result by
infinitely increasing the numbers of antennas and terminals (while their ratio
is fixed) are provided. The numerical results demonstrate the performance loss
for various Doppler shifts. Among the interesting observations revealed is that
massive MIMO is favorable even in channel aging conditions.


title: Density redistribution effects in fermionic optical lattices

abstract:
  We simulate a one dimensional fermionic optical lattice to analyse heating
due to non-adiabatic lattice loading. Our simulations reveal that, similar to
the bosonic case, density redistribution effects are the major cause of heating
in harmonic traps. We suggest protocols to modulate the local density
distribution during the process of lattice loading, in order to reduce the
excess energy. Our numerical results confirm that linear interpolation of the
trapping potential and/or the interaction strength is an efficient method of
doing so, bearing practical applications relevant to experiments.


title: Two-dimensional topological superconductivity in Pb/Co/Si(111)

abstract:
  Just like insulators can host topological Dirac states at their edges,
superconductors can also exhibit topological phases characterized by Majorana
edge states. Remarkable zero-energy states have been recently observed at the
two ends of proximity induced superconducting wires, and were interpreted as
localized Majorana end states in one-dimensional (1D) topological
superconductor. By contrast, propagating Majorana states should exist at the 1D
edges of two-dimensional (2D) topological superconductors. Here we report the
direct observation of dispersive in-gap states surrounding topological
superconducting domains made of a single atomic layer of Pb covering magnetic
islands of Co/Si(111). We interpret the observed continuous dispersion across
the superconducting gap in terms of a spatial topological transition
accompanied by a chiral edge mode and residual gaped helical edge states. Our
experimental approach enables the engineering and control of a large variety of
novel quantum phases. This opens new horizons in the field of quantum materials
and quantum electronics where the magnetization of the domains could be used as
a control parameter for the manipulation of topological states.


title:
QCD radiative corrections for $h\to b\bar b$ in the Standard Model
  Dimension-6 EFT

abstract:
  We calculate the $\mathcal{O}(\alpha_s)$ QCD corrections to the inclusive
$h\to b\bar b$ decay rate in the dimension-6 Standard Model Effective Field
Theory (SMEFT). The QCD corrections multiplying the dimension-6 Wilson
coefficients which alter the $hb\bar b$-vertex at tree-level are proportional
to the Standard Model (SM) ones, so next-to-leading order results can be
obtained through a simple rescaling of the tree-level decay rate. On the other
hand, contributions from the operators $Q_{bG}$ and $Q_{HG}$, which alter the
$gb\bar b$-vertex and introduce a $hgg$-vertex respectively, enter at
$\mathcal{O}(\alpha_s)$ and induce sizeable corrections which are unrelated to
the SM ones and cannot be anticipated through a renormalisation-group analysis.
We present compact analytic results for these contributions, which we recommend
to be included in future phenomenological studies.


title: Little Higgs Dark Matter after PandaX-II/LUX 2016 and LHC Run-1

abstract:
  In the Littlest Higgs model with $T$ parity (LHT), the $T$-odd heavy photon
($A_H$) is weakly interacting and can play the role of dark matter. We
investigate the lower limit on the mass of $A_H$ dark matter under the
constraints from Higgs data, EWPOs, $R_b$, Planck 2015 dark matter relic
abundance, PandaX-II/LUX 2016 direct detections and LHC-8 TeV monojet results.
We find that (1) Higgs data, EWPOs and $R_b$ can exclude the mass of $A_H$ up
to 99 GeV. To produce the correct dark matter relic abundance, $A_H$ has to
co-annihilate with $T$-odd quarks ($q_H$) or leptons ($\ell_H$); (2) the LUX
(PandaX-II) 2016 data can further exclude $m_{A_H}<380 (270)$ GeV for
$\ell_H$-$A_H$ co-annihilation and $m_{A_H}<350 (240)$ GeV for $q_H-A_H$
co-annihilation; (3) LHC-8 TeV monojet result can give a strong lower limit,
$m_{A_H}>540$ GeV, for $q_H$-$A_H$ co-annihilation; (4) future XENON1T (2017)
experiment can fully cover the parameter space of $\ell_H$-$A_H$
co-annihilation and will push the lower limit of $m_{A_H}$ up to about 640 GeV
for $q_H$-$A_H$ co-annihilation.


title: Reasoning about Body-Parts Relations for Sign Language Recognition

abstract:
  Over the years, hand gesture recognition has been mostly addressed
considering hand trajectories in isolation. However, in most sign languages,
hand gestures are defined on a particular context (body region). We propose a
pipeline to perform sign language recognition which models hand movements in
the context of other parts of the body captured in the 3D space using the MS
Kinect sensor. In addition, we perform sign recognition based on the different
hand postures that occur during a sign. Our experiments show that considering
different body parts brings improved performance when compared to other methods
which only consider global hand trajectories. Finally, we demonstrate that the
combination of hand postures features with hand gestures features helps to
improve the prediction of a given sign.


title:
Superconductivity with two-fold symmetry in topological superconductor
  SrxBi2Se3

abstract:
  Topological superconductivity is the quantum condensate of paired electrons
with an odd parity of the pairing function. One of the candidates is the
triplet pairing superconductor derived from topological insulator Bi2Se3 by
chemical doping. Theoretically it was predicted that a two-fold superconducting
order parameter may exist in this kind of bulk topological superconductor.
Earlier experiments by nuclear magnetic resonance and angle-resolved
magnetocaloric measurements seem to support this picture. By using a
Corbino-shape like electrode configuration, we measure the c-axis resistivity
without the influence of the vortex motion and find clear evidence of two-fold
superconductivity in the recently discovered topological superconductor
SrxBi2Se3. The Laue diffraction measurements on these samples show that the
maximum gap direction is either parallel or perpendicular to the main
crystallographic axis.


title:
Bayesian uncertainty analysis for complex systems biology models:
  emulation, global parameter searches and evaluation of gene functions

abstract:
  Background: Many mathematical models have now been employed across every area
of systems biology. These models increasingly involve large numbers of unknown
parameters, have complex structure which can result in substantial evaluation
time relative to the needs of the analysis, and need to be compared to observed
data. The correct analysis of such models usually requires a global parameter
search, over a high dimensional parameter space, that incorporates and respects
the most important sources of uncertainty. This can be an extremely difficult
task, but it is essential for any meaningful inference or prediction to be made
about any biological system. It hence represents a fundamental challenge for
the whole of systems biology.
  Results: Bayesian statistical methodology for the uncertainty analysis of
complex models is introduced, which is designed to address the high dimensional
global parameter search problem. Bayesian emulators that mimic the systems
biology model but which are extremely fast to evaluate are embedded within an
iterative history match: an efficient method to search high dimensional spaces
within a more formal statistical setting, while incorporating major sources of
uncertainty. The approach is demonstrated via application to two models of
hormonal crosstalk in Arabidopsis root development, which have 32 rate
parameters, for which we identify the sets of rate parameter values that lead
to acceptable matches to observed trend data. The biological consequences of
the resulting comparison, including the evaluation of gene functions, are
described.

categories: q-bio.MN q-bio.CB q-bio.QM stat.AP stat.ME


title:
#Sleep_as_Android: Feasibility of Using Sleep Logs on Twitter for Sleep
  Studies

abstract:
  Social media enjoys a growing popularity as a platform to seek and share
personal health information. For sleep studies using data from social media,
most researchers focused on inferring sleep-related artifacts from
self-reported anecdotal pointers to sleep patterns or issues such as insomnia.
The data shared by "quantified-selfers" on social media presents an opportunity
to study more quantitative and objective measures of sleep. We propose and
validate the approach of collecting and analyzing sleep logs that are generated
and shared through a sleep-tracking mobile application. We highlight the value
of this data by combining it with users' social media data. The results provide
a validation of using social media for sleep studies as the collected sleep
data is aligned with sleep data from other sources. The results of combining
social media data with sleep data provide preliminary evidence that higher
social media activity is associated with lower sleep duration and quality.


title: $\theta$ dependence of 4D $SU(N)$ gauge theories in the large-$N$ limit

abstract:
  We study the large-$N$ scaling behavior of the $\theta$ dependence of the
ground-state energy density $E(\theta)$ of four-dimensional (4D) $SU(N)$ gauge
theories and two-dimensional (2D) $CP^{N-1}$ models, where $\theta$ is the
parameter associated with the Lagrangian topological term. We consider its
$\theta$ expansion around $\theta=0$, $E(\theta)-E(0) = {1\over 2}\chi
\,\theta^2 ( 1 + b_2 \theta^2 + b_4\theta^4 +\cdots)$ where $\chi$ is the
topological susceptibility and $b_{2n}$ are dimensionless coefficients. We
focus on the first few coefficients $b_{2n}$, which parametrize the deviation
from a simple Gaussian distribution of the topological charge at $\theta=0$. We
present a numerical analysis of Monte Carlo simulations of 4D $SU(N)$ lattice
gauge theories for $N=3,\,4,\,6$ in the presence of an imaginary $\theta$ term.
The results provide a robust evidence of the large-$N$ behavior predicted by
standard large-$N$ scaling arguments, i.e. $b_{2n}= O(N^{-2n})$. In particular,
we obtain $b_2=\bar{b}_2/N^2 + O(1/N^4)$ with $\bar{b}_2=-0.23(3)$. We also
show that the large-$N$ scaling scenario applies to 2D $CP^{N-1}$ models as
well, by an analytic computation of the leading large-$N$ dependence.


title:
A class of marked invariant subspaces with an application to algebraic
  Riccati equations

abstract:
  Invariant subspaces of a matrix $A$ are considered which are obtained by
truncation of a Jordan basis of a generalized eigenspace of $A$. We
characterize those subspaces which are independent of the choice of the Jordan
basis. An application to Hamilton matrices and algebraic Riccati equations is
given.


title:
On the fractional Fisher information with applications to a
  hyperbolic-parabolic system of chemotaxis

abstract:
  We introduce new lower bounds for the fractional Fisher information. Equipped
with these bounds we study a hyperbolic-parabolic model of chemotaxis and prove
the global existence of solutions in certain dissipation regimes.


title:
Search for heavy resonances decaying to a $Z$ boson and a photon in $pp$
  collisions at $\sqrt{s}=13$ TeV with the ATLAS detector

abstract:
  This Letter presents a search for new resonances with mass larger than 250
GeV, decaying to a $Z$ boson and a photon. The dataset consists of an
integrated luminosity of 3.2 fb$^{-1}$ of $pp$ collisions collected at
$\sqrt{s} = 13$ TeV with the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider. The
$Z$ bosons are identified through their decays either to charged, light, lepton
pairs ($e^+e^-$, $\mu^+\mu^-$) or to hadrons. The data are found to be
consistent with the expected background in the whole mass range investigated
and upper limits are set on the production cross section times decay branching
ratio to $Z\gamma$ of a narrow scalar boson with mass between 250 GeV and 2.75
TeV.


title: Distributed Supervised Learning using Neural Networks

abstract:
  Distributed learning is the problem of inferring a function in the case where
training data is distributed among multiple geographically separated sources.
Particularly, the focus is on designing learning strategies with low
computational requirements, in which communication is restricted only to
neighboring agents, with no reliance on a centralized authority. In this
thesis, we analyze multiple distributed protocols for a large number of neural
network architectures. The first part of the thesis is devoted to a definition
of the problem, followed by an extensive overview of the state-of-the-art.
Next, we introduce different strategies for a relatively simple class of single
layer neural networks, where a linear output layer is preceded by a nonlinear
layer, whose weights are stochastically assigned in the beginning of the
learning process. We consider both batch and sequential learning, with
horizontally and vertically partitioned data. In the third part, we consider
instead the more complex problem of semi-supervised distributed learning, where
each agent is provided with an additional set of unlabeled training samples. We
propose two different algorithms based on diffusion processes for linear
support vector machines and kernel ridge regression. Subsequently, the fourth
part extends the discussion to learning with time-varying data (e.g.
time-series) using recurrent neural networks. We consider two different
families of networks, namely echo state networks (extending the algorithms
introduced in the second part), and spline adaptive filters. Overall, the
algorithms presented throughout the thesis cover a wide range of possible
practical applications, and lead the way to numerous future extensions, which
are briefly summarized in the conclusive chapter.


title: Viscous time lags between starburst and AGN activity

abstract:
  There is strong observational evidence indicating a time lag of order of some
100 Myr between the onset of starburst and AGN activity in galaxies. Dynamical
time lags have been invoked to explain this. We extend this approach by
introducing a viscous time lag the gas additionally needs to flow through the
AGN's accretion disc before it reaches the central black hole. Our calculations
reproduce the observed time lags and are in accordance with the observed
correlation between black hole mass and stellar velocity dispersion.


title:
On the equation $ \boldsymbol{n_1n_2=n_3n_4}$ restricted to factor
  closed sets

abstract:
  We study the number of solutions $N(B,F)$ of the diophantine equation
$n_1n_2=n_3n_4$, where $1\le n_1\le B$, $1\le n_3\le B$, $n_2, n_4\in F$ and
$F\subset [1,B]$ is a factor closed set. We study more particularly the case
when $F= \big\{m=p_1^{\e_1}\ldots p_k^{\e_k}, \e_j\in \{0,1\}, 1\le j\le
k\big\}$,
  $p_1,\ldots,p_k$ being distinct prime numbers.


title: Temperature Dependent Heterogeneous Rotational Correlation in Lipids

abstract:
  Lipid structures exhibit complex and highly dynamic lateral structure; and
changes in lipid density and fluidity are believed to play an essential role in
membrane targeting and function. The dynamic structure of liquids on the
molecular scale can exhibit complex transient density fluctuations. Here the
lateral heterogeneity of lipid dynamics is explored in free standing lipid
monolayers. As the temperature is lowered the probes exhibit increasingly broad
and heterogeneous rotational correlation. This increase in heterogeneity
appears to exhibit a critical onset, similar to those observed for glass
forming fluids. We explore heterogeneous relaxation in in a single constituent
lipid monolayer of 1,2-dimyristoyl-sn-glycero-3-phosphocholine (DMPC) by
measuring the rotational diffusion of a fluorescent probe,
1-palmitoyl-2-[1]-sn-glycero-3-phosphocholine (NBD-PC), using wide-field
time-resolved fluorescence anisotropy (TRFA). The observed relaxation exhibits
a narrow, liquid-like distribution at high temperatures ({\tau} ~ 2.4 ns),
consistent with previous experimental measures [1, 2]. However, as the
temperature is quenched, the distribution broadens, and we observe the
appearance of a long relaxation population ({\tau} ~ 16.5 ns). This supports
the heterogeneity observed for lipids at high packing densities, and
demonstrates that the nanoscale diffusion and reorganization in lipid
structures can be significantly complex, even in the simplest amorphous
architectures. Dynamical heterogeneity of this form can have a significant
impact on the organization, permeability and energetics of lipid membrane
structures.


title: The Eruption of the Candidate Young Star ASASSN-15qi

abstract:
  Outbursts on young stars are usually interpreted as accretion bursts caused
by instabilities in the disk or the star-disk connection. However, some
protostellar outbursts may not fit into this framework. In this paper, we
analyze optical and near-infrared spectra and photometry to characterize the
2015 outburst of the probable young star ASASSN-15qi. The $\sim 3.5$ mag
brightening in the $V$ band was sudden, with an unresolved rise time of less
than one day. The outburst decayed exponentially by 1 mag for 6 days and then
gradually back to the pre-outburst level after 200 days. The outburst is
dominated by emission from $\sim10,000$ K gas. An explosive release of energy
accelerated matter from the star in all directions, seen in a spectacular cool,
spherical wind with a maximum velocity of 1000 km/s. The wind and hot gas both
disappeared as the outburst faded and the source returned to its quiescent
F-star spectrum. Nebulosity near the star brightened with a delay of 10-20
days. Fluorescent excitation of H$_2$ is detected in emission from vibrational
levels as high as $v=11$, also with a possible time delay in flux increase. The
mid-infrared spectral energy distribution does not indicate the presence of
warm dust emission, although the optical photospheric absorption and CO
overtone emission could be related to a gaseous disk. Archival photometry
reveals a prior outburst in 1976. Although we speculate about possible causes
for this outburst, none of the explanations are compelling.


title: Retardation of Bulk Water Dynamics by Disaccharide Osmolytes

abstract:
  The bioprotective nature of disaccharides is hypothesized to derive from the
modification of the hydrogen bonding network of water which protects
biomolecules through lowered water activity at the protein interface. Using
ultrafast fluorescence spectroscopy we measured the relaxation of bulk water
dynamics around the induced dipole moment of two fluorescent probes (Lucifer
Yellow Ethylenediamine and Tryptophan). Our results indicate a reduction in
bulk water reorganization rate of approximately of 30%. We observe this
retardation in the low concentration regime measured at 0.1M and 0.25 M, far
below the onset of glassy dynamics. This reduction in water activity could be
significant in crowded biological systems, contributing to global change in
protein energy landscape, resulting in a significant enhancement of protein
stability under environmental stress. We observed similar dynamic reduction for
two disaccharide osmolytes, sucrose and trehalose, with trehalose being the
more effective dynamic reducer.


title:
Homomorphisms of modules associated with polynomial matrices with
  infinite elementary divisors

abstract:
  If the inverse of a nonsingular polynomial matrix $L$ has a polynomial part
then one can associate with $L$ a module over the ring of proper rational
functions, which is related to the structure of $L$ at infinity. In this paper
we characterize homomorphisms of such modules.


title:
Mirage in Temporal Correlation functions for Baryon-Baryon Interactions
  in Lattice QCD

abstract:
  Single state saturation of the temporal correlation function is a key
condition to extract physical observables such as energies and matrix elements
of hadrons from lattice QCD simulations. A method commonly employed to check
the saturation is to seek for a plateau of the observables for large Euclidean
time. Identifying the plateau in the cases having nearby states, however, is
non-trivial and one may even be misled by a fake plateau. Such a situation
takes place typically for the system with two or more baryons. In this study,
we demonstrate explicitly the danger from a possible fake plateau in the
temporal correlation functions mainly for two baryons ($\Xi\Xi$ and $NN$), and
three and four baryons ($^3{\rm He}$ and $^4{\rm He})$ as well, employing
(2+1)-flavor lattice QCD at $m_{\pi}=0.51$ GeV on four lattice volumes with
$L=$ 2.9, 3.6, 4.3 and 5.8 fm. Caution is given for drawing conclusion on the
bound $NN$, $3N$ and $4N$ systems only based on the temporal correlation
functions.


title:
Continuum dynamics of the intention field under weakly cohesive social
  interactions

abstract:
  We investigate the long-time dynamics of an opinion formation model inspired
by a work by Borghesi, Bouchaud and Jensen. Firstly, we derive a Fokker-Planck
type equation under the assumption that interactions between individuals
produce little consensus of opinion (grazing collision approximation).
Secondly, we study conditions under which the Fokker-Planck equation has
non-trivial equilibria and derive the macroscopic limit (corresponding to the
long-time dynamics and spatially localized interactions) for the evolution of
the mean opinion. Finally, we compare two different types of interaction rates:
the original one given in the work of Borghesi, Bouchaud and Jensen (symmetric
binary interactions) and one inspired from works by Motsch and Tadmor
(non-symmetric binary interactions). We show that the first case leads to a
conservative model for the density of the mean opinion whereas the second case
leads to a non-conservative equation. We also show that the speed at which
consensus is reached asymptotically for these two rates has fairly different
density dependence.


title: Systemic Risk and Stochastic Games with Delay

abstract:
  We propose a model of inter-bank lending and borrowing which takes into
account clearing debt obligations. The evolution of log-monetary reserves of
$N$ banks is described by coupled diffusions driven by controls with delay in
their drifts. Banks are minimizing their finite-horizon objective functions
which take into account a quadratic cost for lending or borrowing and a linear
incentive to borrow if the reserve is low or lend if the reserve is high
relative to the average capitalization of the system. As such, our problem is
an $N$-player linear-quadratic stochastic differential game with delay. An
open-loop Nash equilibrium is obtained using a system of fully coupled forward
and advanced backward stochastic differential equations. We then describe how
the delay affects liquidity and systemic risk characterized by a large number
of defaults. We also derive a close-loop Nash equilibrium using an HJB
approach.


title:
Interleaving Optimization with Sampling-Based Motion Planning (IOS-MP):
  Combining Local Optimization with Global Exploration

abstract:
  Computing globally optimal motion plans for a robot is challenging in part
because it requires analyzing a robot's configuration space simultaneously from
both a macroscopic viewpoint (i.e., considering paths in multiple homotopic
classes) and a microscopic viewpoint (i.e., locally optimizing path quality).
We introduce Interleaved Optimization with Sampling-based Motion Planning
(IOS-MP), a new method that effectively combines global exploration and local
optimization to quickly compute high quality motion plans. Our approach
combines two paradigms: (1) asymptotically-optimal sampling-based motion
planning, which is effective at global exploration but relatively slow at
locally refining paths, and (2) optimization-based motion planning, which
locally optimizes paths quickly but lacks a global view of the configuration
space. IOS-MP iteratively alternates between global exploration and local
optimization, sharing information between the two, to improve motion planning
efficiency. We evaluate IOS-MP as it scales with respect to dimensionality and
complexity, as well as demonstrate its effectiveness on a 7-DOF manipulator for
tasks specified using goal configurations and workspace goal regions.


title:
Ionic profiles close to dielectric discontinuities: Specific ion-surface
  interactions

abstract:
  We study, by incorporating short-range ion-surface interactions, ionic
profiles of electrolyte solutions close to a non-charged interface between two
dielectric media. In order to account for important correlation effects close
to the interface, the ionic profiles are calculated beyond mean-field theory,
using the loop expansion of the free energy. We show how it is possible to
overcome the well-known deficiency of the regular loop expansion close to the
dielectric jump, and treat the non-linear boundary conditions within the
framework of field theory. The ionic profiles are obtained analytically to
one-loop order in the free energy, and their dependence on different
ion-surface interactions is investigated. The Gibbs adsorption isotherm, as
well as the ionic profiles are used to calculate the surface tension, in
agreement with the reverse Hofmeister series. Consequently, from the
experimentally-measured surface tension, one can extract a single adhesivity
parameter, which can be used within our model to quantitatively predict hard to
measure ionic profiles.

categories: cond-mat.soft cond-mat.mtrl-sci cond-mat.stat-mech physics.bio-ph physics.chem-ph


title:
Effects of Nuclear Potential on the Cumulants of Net-Proton and
  Net-Baryon Multiplicity Distributions in Au+Au Collisions at
  $\sqrt{s_{\text{NN}}} = 5\,\text{GeV}$

abstract:
  We analyze the rapidity and transverse momentum dependence for the cumulants
of the net-proton and net-baryon distributions in Au+Au collisions at
$\sqrt{s_{\text{NN}}} = 5\,\text{GeV}$ with a microscopic hadronic transport
(JAM) model. To study the effects of mean field potential and softening of
equation of state (EoS) on the fluctuations of net-proton (baryon) in heavy-ion
collisions, the calculations are performed with two different modes. The
softening of EoS is realized in the model by implementing the attractive orbit
in the two-body scattering to introduce a reduction pressure of the system. By
comparing the results from the two modes with the results from default cascade,
we find the mean field potential and softening of EoS have strong impacts on
the rapidity distributions ($\text{d}N/\text{d}y$) and the shape of the
net-proton (baryon) multiplicity distributions. The net-proton (baryon)
cumulants and their ratios calculated from all of the three modes are with
similar trends and show significant suppression with respect to unity, which
can be explained by the presence of baryon number conservations. It indicates
that the effects of mean field potential and softening of EoS might be not the
ingredients that are responsible to the observed strong enhancement in the most
central Au+Au collisions at 7.7 GeV measured by the STAR experiment at RHIC.


title:
Aggregation Architecture for Data Reduction and Privacy in Advanced
  Metering Infrastructure

abstract:
  Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI) have rapidly become a topic of
international interest as governments have sponsored their deployment for the
purposes of utility service reliability and efficiency, e.g., water and
electricity conservation. Two problems plague such deployments. First is the
protection of consumer privacy. Second is the problem of huge amounts of data
from such deployments. A new architecture is proposed to address these problems
through the use of Aggregators, which incorporate temporary data buffering and
the modularization of utility grid analysis. These Aggregators are used to
deliver anonymized summary data to the central utility while preserving billing
and automated connection services.


title: Pseudomagnitude Distances: Application to the Pleiades cluster

abstract:
  The concept of pseudomagnitude was recently introduced by Chelli et al.
(2016), to estimate apparent stellar diameters using a strictly observational
methodology. Pseudomagnitudes are distance indicators, which have the
remarkable property of being reddening free. In this study, we use Hipparcos
parallax measurements to compute the mean absolute pseudomagnitudes of solar
neighbourhood dwarf stars as a function of their spectral type. To illustrate
the use of absolute pseudomagnitudes, we derive the distance moduli of $360$
Pleiades stars and find that the centroid of their distribution is
$5.715\pm0.018$, corresponding to a distance of $139.0\pm1.2$\,pc. We locate
the subset of $\sim 50$ Pleiades stars observed by Hipparcos at a mean distance
of $135.5\pm3.7$\,pc, thus confirming the frequently reported anomaly in the
Hipparcos measurements of these stars.


title: On triviality of S-matrix in conformal higher spin theory

abstract:
  We consider the conformal higher spin (CHS) theory in d=4 that contains the
s=1 Maxwell vector, s=2 Weyl graviton and their higher spin s=3,4,...
counterparts with higher-derivative \box^s kinetic terms. The interacting
action for such theory can be found as the coefficient of the logarithmically
divergent part in the induced action for sources coupled to higher spin
currents in a free complex scalar field model. We explicitly determine some
cubic and quartic interaction vertices in the CHS action from scalar loop
integrals. We then compute the simplest tree-level 4-particle scattering
amplitudes 11 -> 11, 22 -> 22 and 11 -> 22 and find that after summing up all
the intermediate CHS exchanges they vanish. This generalises the vanishing of
the scattering amplitude for external conformal scalars interacting via the
exchange of all CHS fields found earlier in arXiv:1512.08896. This vanishing
should generalise to all scattering amplitudes in the CHS theory and as in the
conformal scalar scattering case should be a consequence of the underlying
infinite dimensional higher spin symmetry that extends the standard conformal
symmetry.


title: Convolved Fibonacci Numbers and their applications

abstract:
  In this paper, we present a new approach to the convolved Fibonacci numbers
arising from the generating function of them and give some new and explicit
identities for the convolved Fibonacci numbers.


title: Small systems and regulator dependence in relativistic hydrodynamics

abstract:
  Consistent theories of hydrodynamics necessarily include nonhydrodynamic
modes, which can be viewed as a regulator necessary to ensure causality. Under
many circumstances the choice of regulator is not relevant, but this is not
always the case. In particular, for sufficiently small systems (such as those
arising in pA or pp collisions) such dependence may be inevitable. We address
this issue in the context of the modern version of M\"uller-Israel-Stewart
theory of relativistic hydrodynamics. In this case, by demanding that the
nonhydrodynamic modes be subdominant, we find that regulator dependence becomes
inevitable only for multiplicities $dN/dY$ of the order of a few. This
conclusion supports earlier studies based on hydrodynamic simulations of small
systems, at the same time providing a simple physical picture of how
hydrodynamics can be reliable even in such seemingly extreme conditions.


title:
Fully Differential Higgs Pair Production in Association With a $W$ Boson
  at Next-to-Next-to-Leading Order in QCD

abstract:
  To clarify the electroweak symmetry breaking mechanism, we need to probe the
Higgs self-couplings, which can be measured in Higgs pair productions. The
associated production with a vector boson is special due to a clear tag in the
final state. We perform a fully differential next-to-next-to-leading-order
calculation of the Higgs pair production in association with a $W$ boson at
hadron colliders, and present numerical results at the 14 TeV LHC and a future
100 TeV hadron collider.


title:
Interplay of coupling and common noise at the transition to synchrony in
  oscillator populations

abstract:
  We consider a population of globally coupled oscillators driven by common
noise. By applying the Ott-Antonsen ansatz and by averaging over the fast
oscillations, we obtain analytically tractable equations for the noisy
evolution of the order parameter. While noise always tends to synchronize the
oscillators, the coupling can act against synchrony if it is repulsive. For
identical oscillators, the fully synchronous state remains stable for small
enough repulsive coupling; moreover it is an absorbing state which always wins
over the asynchronous regime. For oscillators with a distribution of natural
frequencies, we report on a counter-intuitive effect of dispersion of the
oscillators frequencies at synchrony.


title: Rate-distance tradeoff for codes above graph capacity

abstract:
  The capacity of a graph is defined as the rate of exponential growth of
independent sets in the strong powers of the graph. In the strong power an edge
connects two sequences if at each position their letters are equal or adjacent.
We consider a variation of the problem where edges in the power graphs are
removed between sequences which differ in more than a fraction $\delta$ of
coordinates. The proposed generalization can be interpreted as the problem of
determining the highest rate of zero undetected-error communication over a link
with adversarial noise, where only a fraction $\delta$ of symbols can be
perturbed and only some substitutions are allowed.
  We derive lower bounds on achievable rates by combining graph homomorphisms
with a graph-theoretic generalization of the Gilbert-Varshamov bound. We then
give an upper bound, based on Delsarte's linear programming approach, which
combines Lov\'asz' theta function with the construction used by McEliece et al.
for bounding the minimum distance of codes in Hamming spaces.


title: Local injection of pure spin current generates electric current vortices

abstract:
  We show that local injection of pure spin current into an electrically
disconnected ferromagnetic - normal-metal sandwich induces electric currents,
that run along closed loops inside the device, and are powered by the source of
the spin injection. Such electric currents may significantly modify voltage
distribution in spin-injection devices and induce long-range tails of spin
accumulation.


title:
Projected equations of motion approach to hybrid quantum/classical
  dynamics in dielectric-metal composites

abstract:
  We introduce a hybrid method for dielectric-metal composites that describes
the dynamics of the metallic system classically whilst retaining a quantum
description of the dielectric. The time-dependent dipole moment of the
classical system is mimicked by the introduction of projected equations of
motion (PEOM) and the coupling between the two systems is achieved through an
effective dipole-dipole interaction. To benchmark this method, we model a test
system (semiconducting quantum dot-metal nanoparticle hybrid). We begin by
examining the energy absorption rate, showing agreement between the PEOM method
and the analytical rotating wave approximation (RWA) solution. We then
investigate population inversion and show that the PEOM method provides an
accurate model for the interaction under ultrashort pulse excitation where the
traditional RWA breaks down.


title:
Effect of the Shafranov shift and the gradient of $\beta$ on intrinsic
  momentum transport in up-down asymmetric tokamaks

abstract:
  Tokamaks with up-down asymmetric poloidal cross-sections spontaneously rotate
due to turbulent transport of momentum. In this work, we investigate the effect
of the Shafranov shift on this intrinsic rotation, primarily by analyzing
tokamaks with tilted elliptical flux surfaces. By expanding the Grad-Shafranov
equation in the large aspect ratio limit we calculate the magnitude and
direction of the Shafranov shift in tilted elliptical tokamaks. The results
show that, while the Shafranov shift becomes up-down asymmetric and depends
strongly on the tilt angle of the flux surfaces, it is insensitive to the shape
of the current and pressure profiles (when the geometry, total plasma current,
and average pressure gradient are kept fixed). Next, local nonlinear
gyrokinetic simulations of these MHD equilibria are performed with GS2, which
reveal that the Shafranov shift can significantly enhance the momentum
transport. However, to be consistent, the effect of $\beta'$ (i.e. the radial
gradient of $\beta$) on the magnetic equilibrium was also included, which was
found to significantly reduce momentum transport. Including these two competing
effects broadens the rotation profile, but leaves the on-axis value of the
rotation roughly unchanged. Consequently, the shape of the $\beta$ profile has
a significant effect on the rotation profile of an up-down asymmetric tokamak.


title: Embedding 3-manifolds in spin 4-manifolds

abstract:
  An invariant of orientable 3-manifolds is defined by taking the minimum $n$
such that a given 3-manifold embeds in the connected sum of $n$ copies of $S^2
\times S^2$, and we call this $n$ the embedding number of the 3-manifold. We
give some general properties of this invariant, and make calculations for
families of lens spaces and Brieskorn spheres. We show how to construct
rational and integral homology spheres whose embedding numbers grow arbitrarily
large, and which can be calculated exactly if we assume the 11/8-Conjecture. In
a different direction we show that any simply connected 4-manifold can be split
along a rational homology sphere into a positive definite piece and a negative
definite piece.


title: Cosmological future singularities in interacting dark energy models

abstract:
  The existence of interactions between dark matter and dark energy has been
widely studied, since they can fit well the observational data and may provide
new physics through such an interaction. In this work we analyze these models
and investigate their potential relation with future cosmological
singularities. We find that every future singularity found in the literature
can be mapped into a singularity of the interaction term, that we call
$Q$-singularity, where the energy flow between the dark components diverges.
Furthermore, this framework allows to identify a new type of future singularity
induced by the divergence of the first derivative of the dark energy equation
of state parameter.


title:
Estimating the GeV Emission of Millisecond Pulsars in Dwarf Spheroidal
  Galaxies

abstract:
  We estimate the conventional astrophysical emission from dwarf spheroidal
satellite galaxies (dSphs) of the Milky Way, focusing on millisecond pulsars
(MSPs), and evaluate the potential for confusion with dark matter (DM)
annihilation signatures at GeV energies. In low-density stellar environments,
such as dSphs, the abundance of MSPs is expected to be proportional to stellar
mass. Accordingly, we construct the $\gamma$-ray luminosity function of MSPs in
the Milky Way disk, where $>90$ individual MSPs have been detected with the
$\textit{Fermi}$ Large Area Telescope (LAT), and scale this luminosity function
to the stellar masses of 30 dSphs to estimate the cumulative emission from
their MSP populations. We predict that MSPs within the highest stellar mass
dSphs, Fornax and Sculptor, produce a $\gamma$-ray flux $>500$~MeV of
$\sim10^{-11}$~ph~cm$^{-2}$~s$^{-1}$, which is a factor $\sim10$ below the
current LAT sensitivity at high Galactic latitudes. The MSP emission in
ultra-faint dSphs, including targets with the largest J-factors, is typically
several orders of magnitude lower, suggesting that these targets will remain
clean targets for indirect DM searches in the foreseeable future. For a DM
particle of mass 25~GeV annihilating to $b$ quarks at the thermal relic cross
section (consistent with DM interpretations of the Galactic Center excess), we
find that the expected $\gamma$-ray emission due to DM exceeds that of MSPs in
all of the target dSphs. Using the same Milky Way MSP population model, we also
estimate the Galactic foreground MSP coincidence probability along the same
sightlines to the dSphs.


title: Shock evolution in non-radiative supernova remnants

abstract:
  We present a new analytical approach to derive approximate solutions
describing the shock evolution in non-radiative supernova remnants (SNRs). We
focus on the study of the forward shock and contact discontinuity while
application to the reverse shock is only discussed briefly. The spherical shock
evolution of a SNR in both the interstellar medium with a constant density
profile and a circumstellar medium with a wind density profile is investigated.
We compared our new analytical solution with numerical simulations and found
that a few percent accuracy is achieved. For the evolution of the forward
shock, we also compared our new solution to previous analytical models. In a
uniform ambient medium, the accuracy of our analytical approximation is
comparable to that in Truelove&McKee (1999). In a wind density profile medium,
our solution performs better than that in Micelotta et al. (2016), especially
when the ejecta envelope has a steep density profile. The new solution is
significantly simplified compared to previous analytical models, as it only
depends on the asymptotic behaviors of the remnant during its evolution.


title: The derived category of a non generic cubic fourfold containing a plane

abstract:
  We describe an Azumaya algebra on the resolution of singularities of the
double cover of a plane ramified along a nodal sextic associated to a non
generic cubic fourfold containing a plane. We show that the derived category of
such a resolution, twisted by the Azumaya algebra, is equivalent to the
Kuznetsov component in the semiorthogonal decomposition of the derived category
of the cubic fourfold.


title: On two problems in Ramsey-Tur\'an theory

abstract:
  Alon, Balogh, Keevash and Sudakov proved that the $(k-1)$-partite Tur\'an
graph maximizes the number of distinct $r$-edge-colorings with no monochromatic
$K_k$ for all fixed $k$ and $r=2,3$, among all $n$-vertex graphs. In this
paper, we determine this function asymptotically for $r=2$ among $n$-vertex
graphs with sub-linear independence number. Somewhat surprisingly, unlike
Alon-Balogh-Keevash-Sudakov's result, the extremal construction from
Ramsey-Tur\'an theory, as a natural candidate, does not maximize the number of
distinct edge-colorings with no monochromatic cliques among all graphs with
sub-linear independence number, even in the 2-colored case.
  In the second problem, we determine the maximum number of triangles
asymptotically in an $n$-vertex $K_k$-free graph $G$ with $\alpha(G)=o(n)$. The
extremal graphs have similar structure to the extremal graphs for the classical
Ramsey-Tur\'an problem, i.e.~when the number of edges is maximized.


title: Outbursts in ultracompact X-ray binaries

abstract:
  Very faint X-ray binaries appear to be transient in many cases with peak
luminosities much fainter than that of usual soft X-ray transients, but their
nature still remains elusive. We investigate the possibility that this
transient behaviour is due to the same thermal/viscous instability which is
responsible for outbursts of bright soft X-ray transients, occurring in
ultracompact binaries for adequately low mass-transfer rates. More generally,
we investigate the observational consequences of this instability when it
occurs in ultracompact binaries. We use our code for modelling the
thermal-viscous instability of the accretion disc, assumed here to be hydrogen
poor. We also take into account the effects of disc X-ray irradiation, and
consider the impact of the mass-transfer rate on the outburst brightness. We
find that one can reproduce the observed properties of both the very faint and
the brighter short transients (peak luminosity, duration, recurrence times),
provided that the viscosity parameter in quiescence is slightly smaller
(typically a factor of between two and four) than in bright soft X-ray
transients and normal dwarf nova outbursts, the viscosity in outburst being
unchanged. This possibly reflects the impact of chemical composition on
non-ideal MHD effects affecting magnetically driven turbulence in poorly
ionized discs.


title: On the Farrell-Jones Conjecture for Waldhausen's $A$-theory

abstract:
  We prove the Farrell-Jones Conjecture for (non-connective) $A$-theory with
coefficients and finite wreath products for hyperbolic groups, CAT(0)-groups,
cocompact lattices in almost connected Lie groups and fundamental groups of
manifolds of dimension less or equal to three. Moreover, we prove inheritance
properties such as passing to subgroups, colimits of direct systems of groups,
finite direct products and finite free products. These results hold also for
Whitehead spectra and spectra of stable pseudo-isotopies in the topological,
piecewise linear and smooth category.


title:
SUSY-QCD corrections for the direct detection of neutralino dark matter
  and correlations with the relic density

abstract:
  In this paper, we perform a full next-to-leading order (NLO) QCD calculation
of neutralino scattering on protons or neutrons in the MSSM. We match the
results of the NLO QCD calculation to the scalar and axial-vector operators in
the effective field theory approach. These govern the spin-independent and
spin-dependent detection rates, respectively. The calculations have been
performed for general bino, wino and higgsino decompositions of neutralino dark
matter and required a novel tensor reduction method of loop integrals with
vanishing relative velocities and Gram determinants. Numerically, the NLO QCD
effects are shown to be of at least of similar size and sometimes larger than
the currently estimated nuclear uncertainties. We also demonstrate the
interplay of the direct detection rate with the relic density when consistently
analyzed with the program $\mathtt{DM@NLO}$.


title: Measurements of gondola motion on a stratospheric balloon flight

abstract:
  Balloon experiments are an economically feasible method of conducting
observations in astronomy that are not possible from the ground. The
astronomical payload may include a telescope, a detector, and a
pointing/stabilization system. Determining the attitude of the payload is of
primary importance in such applications, to accurately point the
detector/telescope to the desired direction. This is especially important in
generally unstable lightweight balloon flights. However, the conditions at
float altitudes, which can be reached by zero pressure balloons, could be more
stable, enabling accurate pointings. We have used the Inertial Measurement Unit
(IMU), placed on a stratospheric zero pressure balloon, to observe 3-axis
motion of a balloon payload over a fight time of 4.5 hours, from launch to the
float altitude of 31.2 km. The balloon was launched under nominal atmospheric
conditions on May 8th 2016, from a Tata Institute of Fundamental Research
Balloon Facility, Hyderabad.


title:
Positronium and Muonium 1S-2S Laser Spectroscopy as a Probe for the
  Standard-Model Extension

abstract:
  We present the status and the prospects of the ongoing efforts to improve the
measurements of the 1S-2S transition in positronium and muonium. These purely
leptonic systems represent ideal objects to test bound-state QED to high
precision and the Standard-Model Extension.


title:
Collapse of ferromagnetism and Fermi surface instability near reentrant
  superconductivity of URhGe

abstract:
  We present thermoelectric power and resistivity measurements in the
ferromagnetic superconductor URhGe for magnetic field applied along the hard
magnetization b axis of the orthorhombic crystal. Reentrant superconductivity
is observed near the the spin reorientation transition at $H_{R}$=12.75 T,
where a first order transition from the ferromagnetic to the polarized
paramagnetic state occurs. Special focus is given to the longitudinal
configuration, where both electric and heat current are parallel to the applied
field. The validity of the Fermi-liquid $T^2$ dependence of the resistivity
through $H_R$ demonstrates clearly that no quantum critical point occurs at
$H_R$. Thus the ferromagnetic transition line at $H_R$ becomes first order
implying the existence of a tricritical point at finite temperature. The
enhancement of magnetic fluctuations in the vicinity of the tricritical point
stimulates the reentrance of superconductivity. The abrupt sign change observed
in the thermoelectric power with the thermal gradient applied along the b axis
together with the strong anomalies in the other directions is a definitive
macroscopic evidence that in addition a significant change of the Fermi surface
appears through $H_R$.


title: Apodized vortex coronagraph designs for segmented aperture telescopes

abstract:
  Current state-of-the-art high contrast imaging instruments take advantage of
a number of elegant coronagraph designs to suppress starlight and image nearby
faint objects, such as exoplanets and circumstellar disks. The ideal
performance and complexity of the optical systems depends strongly on the shape
of the telescope aperture. Unfortunately, large primary mirrors tend to be
segmented and have various obstructions, which limit the performance of most
conventional coronagraph designs. We present a new family of vortex
coronagraphs with numerically-optimized gray-scale apodizers that provide the
sensitivity needed to directly image faint exoplanets with large, segmented
aperture telescopes, including the Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) as well as
potential next-generation space telescopes.


title:
Phase Noise Influence in Long-range Coherent Optical OFDM Systems with
  Delay Detection, IFFT Multiplexing and FFT Demodulation

abstract:
  We present a study of the influence of dispersion induced phase noise for
CO-OFDM systems using FFT multiplexing/IFFT demultiplexing techniques (software
based). The software based system provides a method for a rigorous evaluation
of the phase noise variance caused by Common Phase Error (CPE) and
Inter-Carrier Interference (ICI) including - for the first time to our
knowledge - in explicit form the effect of equalization enhanced phase noise
(EEPN). This, in turns, leads to an analytic BER specification. Numerical
results focus on a CO-OFDM system with 10-25 GS/s QPSK channel modulation. A
worst case constellation configuration is identified for the phase noise
influence and the resulting BER is compared to the BER of a conventional single
channel QPSK system with the same capacity as the CO-OFDM implementation.
Results are evaluated as a function of transmission distance. For both types of
systems, the phase noise variance increases significantly with increasing
transmission distance. For a total capacity of 400 (1000) Gbit/s, the
transmission distance to have the BER < 10^-2 for the worst case CO-OFDM design
is less than 800 and 460 km, respectively, whereas for a single channel QPSK
system it is less than 1400 and 560 km.


title: Characterizing Smartphone Power Management in the Wild

abstract:
  For better reliability and prolonged battery life, it is important that users
and vendors understand the quality of charging and the performance of
smartphone batteries. Considering the diverse set of devices and user behavior
it is a challenge. In this work, we analyze a large collection of battery
analytics dataset collected from 30K devices of 1.5K unique smartphone models.
We analyze their battery properties and state of charge while charging, and
reveal the characteristics of different components of their power management
systems: charging mechanisms, state of charge estimation techniques, and their
battery properties. We explore diverse charging behavior of devices and their
users.


title: Correlation-enhanced control of wave focusing in disordered media

abstract:
  A fundamental challenge in physics is controlling the propagation of waves in
disordered media despite strong scattering from inhomogeneities. Spatial light
modulators enable one to synthesize (shape) the incident wavefront, optimizing
the multipath interference to achieve a specific behavior such as focusing
light to a target region. However, the extent of achievable control was not
known when the target region is much larger than the wavelength and contains
many speckles. Here we show that for targets containing more than $g$ speckles,
where $g$ is the dimensionless conductance, the extent of transmission control
is substantially enhanced by the long-range mesoscopic correlations among the
speckles. Using a filtered random matrix ensemble appropriate for coherent
diffusion in open geometries, we predict the full distributions of transmission
eigenvalues as well as universal scaling laws for statistical properties, in
excellent agreement with our experiment. This work provides a general framework
for describing wavefront-shaping experiments in disordered systems.


title: Energy Continuity in Degenerate Density Functional Perturbation Theory

abstract:
  Fractional occupation numbers can produce open-shell degeneracy in density
functional theory. We develop the corresponding perturbation theory by
requiring that a differentiable map connects the initial and perturbed states.
The degenerate state connects to a single perturbed state which extremizes, but
does not necessarily minimize or maximize, the energy with respect to
occupation numbers. Using a system of three electrons in a harmonic oscillator
potential, we relate the counterintuitive sign of first-order occupation
numbers to eigenvalues of the electron-electron interaction Hessian.


title:
Effect of annealing on the interfacial Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction
  in Ta/CoFeB/MgO trilayers

abstract:
  The interfacial Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction (DMI) has been shown to
stabilize homochiral N\'eel-type domain walls in thin films with perpendicular
magnetic anisotropy and as a result permit them to be propagated by a spin Hall
torque. In this study, we demonstrate that in Ta/Co$_{20}$Fe$_{60}$B$_{20}$/MgO
the DMI may be influenced by annealing. We find that the DMI peaks at
$D=0.057\pm0.003$ mJ/m$^{2}$ at an annealing temperature of 230 $^{\circ}$C.
DMI fields were measured using a purely field-driven creep regime domain
expansion technique. The DMI field and the anisotropy field follow a similar
trend as a function of annealing temperature. We infer that the behavior of the
DMI and the anisotropy are related to interfacial crystal ordering and B
expulsion out of the CoFeB layer as the annealing temperature is increased.


title:
Quasi-probabilities in Conditioned Quantum Measurement and a
  Geometric/Statistical Interpretation of Aharonov's Weak Value

abstract:
  We show that the joint behaviour of an arbitrary pair of quantum observables
can be described by quasi-probabilities, which are extensions of the standard
probabilities used for describing the behaviour of a single observable. The
physical situations that require these quasi-probabilities arise when one
considers quantum measurement of an observable conditioned by some other
variable, with the notable example being the weak measurement employed to
obtain Aharonov's weak value. Specifically, we present a general prescription
for the construction of quasi-joint-probability (QJP) distributions associated
with a given pair of observables. These QJP distributions are introduced in two
complementary approaches: one from a bottom-up, strictly operational
construction realised by examining the mathematical framework of the
conditioned measurement scheme, and the other from a top-down viewpoint
realised by applying the results of spectral theorem for normal operators and
its Fourier transforms. It is then revealed that, for a pair of simultaneously
measurable observables, the QJP distribution reduces to their unique standard
joint-probability distribution, whereas for a non-commuting pair there exists
an inherent indefiniteness in the choice, admitting a multitude of candidates
that may equally be used for describing their joint behaviour. In the course of
our argument, we find that the QJP distributions furnish the space of operators
with their characteristic geometric structures such that the orthogonal
projections and inner products of observables can, respectively, be given
statistical interpretations as `conditionings' and `correlations'. The weak
value $A_{w}$ for an observable $A$ is then given a geometric/statistical
interpretation as either the orthogonal projection of $A$ onto the subspace
generated by another observable $B$, or equivalently, as the conditioning of
$A$ given $B$.


title: Small-Variance Nonparametric Clustering on the Hypersphere

abstract:
  Structural regularities in man-made environments reflect in the distribution
of their surface normals. Describing these surface normal distributions is
important in many computer vision applications, such as scene understanding,
plane segmentation, and regularization of 3D reconstructions. Based on the
small-variance limit of Bayesian nonparametric von-Mises-Fisher (vMF) mixture
distributions, we propose two new flexible and efficient k-means-like
clustering algorithms for directional data such as surface normals. The first,
DP-vMF-means, is a batch clustering algorithm derived from the Dirichlet
process (DP) vMF mixture. Recognizing the sequential nature of data collection
in many applications, we extend this algorithm to DDP-vMF-means, which infers
temporally evolving cluster structure from streaming data. Both algorithms
naturally respect the geometry of directional data, which lies on the unit
sphere. We demonstrate their performance on synthetic directional data and real
3D surface normals from RGB-D sensors. While our experiments focus on 3D data,
both algorithms generalize to high dimensional directional data such as protein
backbone configurations and semantic word vectors.


title:
Multi-Camera Action Dataset for Cross-Camera Action Recognition
  Benchmarking

abstract:
  Action recognition has received increasing attention from the computer vision
and machine learning communities in the last decade. To enable the study of
this problem, there exist a vast number of action datasets, which are recorded
under controlled laboratory settings, real-world surveillance environments, or
crawled from the Internet. Apart from the "in-the-wild" datasets, the training
and test split of conventional datasets often possess similar environments
conditions, which leads to close to perfect performance on constrained
datasets. In this paper, we introduce a new dataset, namely Multi-Camera Action
Dataset (MCAD), which is designed to evaluate the open view classification
problem under the surveillance environment. In total, MCAD contains 14,298
action samples from 18 action categories, which are performed by 20 subjects
and independently recorded with 5 cameras. Inspired by the well received
evaluation approach on the LFW dataset, we designed a standard evaluation
protocol and benchmarked MCAD under several scenarios. The benchmark shows that
while an average of 85% accuracy is achieved under the closed-view scenario,
the performance suffers from a significant drop under the cross-view scenario.
In the worst case scenario, the performance of 10-fold cross validation drops
from 87.0% to 47.4%.


title:
Inference for Multivariate Regression Model based on synthetic data
  generated under Fixed-Posterior Predictive Sampling: comparison with Plug-in
  Sampling

abstract:
  The authors derive likelihood-based exact inference methods for the
multivariate regression model, for singly imputed synthetic data generated via
Posterior Predictive Sampling (PPS) and for multiply imputed synthetic data
generated via a newly proposed sampling method, which the authors call
Fixed-Posterior Predictive Sampling (FPPS). In the single imputation case, our
proposed FPPS method concurs with the usual Posterior Predictive Sampling (PPS)
method, thus filling the gap in the existing literature where inferential
methods are only available for multiple imputation. Simulation studies compare
the results obtained with those for the exact test procedures under the Plug-in
Sampling method, obtained by the same authors. Measures of privacy are
discussed and compared with the measures derived for the Plug-in Sampling
method. An application using U.S.\ 2000 Current Population Survey data is
discussed.


title: A new 2D monolayer BiXene, M2C (M=Mo, Tc, Os)

abstract:
  Note this is a rather coarse version of our manuscript since uploading tex
files are necessary (we are not willing to upload all tex files).
  The existence of BiXenes, a new family of 2D monolayers is here predicted.
Theoretically, BiXenes have 1H symmetry (P-6m2) and can be formed from the
4d/5d binary carbides. As the name suggests, they are close relatives of
MXenes, which instead have 1T symmetry (P-3m1). The newly found BiXenes, as
well as some new MXenes, are shown to have formation energies close to that of
germanene, which suggests that these materials should be possible to be
synthesised. Among them, we illustrate that 1H-Tc2C and 1T-Mo2C are dynamically
stable at 0 K, while 1H-Mo2C, 1TTc2C, 1H-Tc2C, and 1T-Rh2C are likely to be
stabilised via strain or temperature. In addition, the nature of the chemical
bonding is analysed, emphasizing that the covalency between the transition
metal ions and carbon is much stronger in BiXenes than in MXenes. The emergence
of BiXenes can not only open up a new era of conducting 2D monolayers, but also
provide good candidates for carrier materials aimed at energy storage and
spintronic devices that have already been unveiled in MXenes.


title: Invariant polynomials on truncated multicurrent algebras

abstract:
  We construct invariant polynomials on truncated multicurrent algebras, which
are Lie algebras of the form $\mathfrak{g} \otimes_\mathbb{F}
\mathbb{F}[t_1,\dotsc,t_\ell]/I$, where $\mathfrak{g}$ is a finite-dimensional
Lie algebra over a field $\mathbb{F}$ of characteristic zero, and $I$ is a
finite-codimensional ideal of $\mathbb{F}[t_1,\dotsc,t_\ell]$ generated by
monomials. In particular, when $\mathfrak{g}$ is semisimple and $\mathbb{F}$ is
algebraically closed, we construct a set of algebraically independent
generators for the algebra of invariant polynomials. In addition, we describe a
transversal slice to the space of regular orbits in $\mathfrak{g}
\otimes_\mathbb{F} \mathbb{F}[t_1,\dotsc,t_\ell]/I$. As an application of our
main result, we show that the center of the universal enveloping algebra of
$\mathfrak{g} \otimes_\mathbb{F} \mathbb{F}[t_1,\dotsc,t_\ell]/I$ acts
trivially on all irreducible finite-dimensional representations provided $I$
has codimension at least two.


title: A Critical Reexamination of the Electrostatic Aharonov-Bohm Effect

abstract:
  This paper undertakes a critical reexamination of the electrostatic version
of the Aharonov-Bohm ("AB") effect. The conclusions are as follows: 1. Aharonov
and Bohm's 1959 exposition is invalid because it does not consider the
wavefunction of the entire system, including the source of electrostatic
potential. 2. As originally proposed, the electrostatic AB effect does not
exist. Perhaps surprisingly, this conclusion holds despite the relativistic
covariance of the electromagnetic four-potential combined with the
well-established magnetic AB effect. 3. Although the authors attempted, in a
1961 paper, to demonstrate that consideration of the entire system would not
change their result, they inadvertently assumed the desired outcome in their
analysis. 4. Claimed observations of the electrostatic AB effect or an analogue
thereof are shown to be mistaken.


title: A cubical model of homotopy type theory

abstract:
  We construct an algebraic weak factorization system $(L, R)$ on the cartesian
cubical sets, in which the canonical path object factorization $A \to A^I \to
A\times A$ induced by the 1-cube $I$ is an $L$-$R$ factorization for any
$R$-object $A$.


title: Dualities in ABJM Matrix Model from Closed String Viewpoint

abstract:
  We propose a new formalism to study the ABJM matrix model. Contrary to
expressing the fractional brane background with the Wilson loops in the open
string formalism, we formulate the Wilson loop expectation value from the
viewpoint of the closed string background. With this new formalism, we can
prove some duality relations in the matrix model.


title: A New Line Defect in NdTiO3 Perovskite

abstract:
  Perovskite oxides form an eclectic class of materials owing to their
structural flexibility in accommodating cations of different sizes and
valences. They host well known point and planar defects, but so far no line
defect has been identified other than dislocations. Using analytical scanning
transmission electron microscopy (STEM) and ab initio calculations we have
detected and characterized the atomic and electronic structures of a novel line
defect in NdTiO3 perovskite. It appears in STEM images as a perovskite cell
rotated by 45 degrees. It consists of self-organized Ti-O vacancy lines
replaced by Nd columns surrounding a central Ti-O octahedral chain containing
Ti4+ ions, as opposed to Ti3+ in the host. The distinct Ti valence in this line
defect introduces the possibility of engineering exotic conducting properties
in a single preferred direction and tailoring novel desirable functionalities
in this Mott insulator.


title: Hierarchical Attention Network for Action Recognition in Videos

abstract:
  Understanding human actions in wild videos is an important task with a broad
range of applications. In this paper we propose a novel approach named
Hierarchical Attention Network (HAN), which enables to incorporate static
spatial information, short-term motion information and long-term video temporal
structures for complex human action understanding. Compared to recent
convolutional neural network based approaches, HAN has following advantages (1)
HAN can efficiently capture video temporal structures in a longer range; (2)
HAN is able to reveal temporal transitions between frame chunks with different
time steps, i.e. it explicitly models the temporal transitions between frames
as well as video segments and (3) with a multiple step spatial temporal
attention mechanism, HAN automatically learns important regions in video frames
and temporal segments in the video. The proposed model is trained and evaluated
on the standard video action benchmarks, i.e., UCF-101 and HMDB-51, and it
significantly outperforms the state-of-the arts


title:
On the Exploitation of Admittance Measurements for Wired Network
  Topology Derivation

abstract:
  The knowledge of the topology of a wired network is often of fundamental
importance. For instance, in the context of Power Line Communications (PLC)
networks it is helpful to implement data routing strategies, while in power
distribution networks and Smart Micro Grids (SMG) it is required for grid
monitoring and for power flow management. In this paper, we use the
transmission line theory to shed new light and to show how the topological
properties of a wired network can be found exploiting admittance measurements
at the nodes. An analytic proof is reported to show that the derivation of the
topology can be done in complex networks under certain assumptions. We also
analyze the effect of the network background noise on admittance measurements.
In this respect, we propose a topology derivation algorithm that works in the
presence of noise. We finally analyze the performance of the algorithm using
values that are typical of power line distribution networks.