title: About Exobiology: The Case for Dwarf K Stars

abstract:
  One of the most fundamental topics of exobiology concerns the identification
of stars with environments consistent with life. Although it is believed that
most types of main-sequence stars might be able to support life, particularly
extremophiles, special requirements appear to be necessary for the development
and sustainability of advanced life forms. From our study, orange main-sequence
stars, ranging from spectral type late-G to mid-K (with a maximum at early-K),
are most promising. Our analysis considers a variety of aspects, including (1)
the frequency of the various types of stars, (2) the speed of stellar evolution
their lifetimes, (3) the size of the stellar climatological habitable zones
(CLI-HZs), (4) the strengths and persistence of their magnetic dynamo generated
X-ray - UV emissions, and (5) the frequency and severity of flares, including
superflares; both (4) and (5) greatly reduce the suitability of red dwarfs to
host life-bearing planets. The various phenomena show pronounced dependencies
on the stellar key parameters such as effective temperature and mass,
permitting the assessment of the astrobiological significance of various types
of stars. Thus, we developed a "Habitable-Planetary-Real-Estate Parameter"
(HabPREP) that provides a measure for stars that are most suitable for planets
with life. Early K stars are found to have the highest HabPREP values,
indicating they may be "Goldilocks" stars for life-hosting planets. Red dwarfs
are numerous, having long lifetimes, but their narrow CLI-HZs and hazards from
magnetic activity make them less suitable for hosting exolife. Moreover, we
provide X-ray - FUV irradiances for G0 V - M5 V stars over a wide range of
ages.


title:
Performance Based Evaluation of Various Machine Learning Classification
  Techniques for Chronic Kidney Disease Diagnosis

abstract:
  Areas where Artificial Intelligence (AI) & related fields are finding their
applications are increasing day by day, moving from core areas of computer
science they are finding their applications in various other domains.In recent
times Machine Learning i.e. a sub-domain of AI has been widely used in order to
assist medical experts and doctors in the prediction, diagnosis and prognosis
of various diseases and other medical disorders. In this manuscript the authors
applied various machine learning algorithms to a problem in the domain of
medical diagnosis and analyzed their efficiency in predicting the results. The
problem selected for the study is the diagnosis of the Chronic Kidney
Disease.The dataset used for the study consists of 400 instances and 24
attributes. The authors evaluated 12 classification techniques by applying them
to the Chronic Kidney Disease data. In order to calculate efficiency, results
of the prediction by candidate methods were compared with the actual medical
results of the subject.The various metrics used for performance evaluation are
predictive accuracy, precision, sensitivity and specificity. The results
indicate that decision-tree performed best with nearly the accuracy of 98.6%,
sensitivity of 0.9720, precision of 1 and specificity of 1.


title: Metal-Insulator Transition and the Role of Electron Correlation in FeO2

abstract:
  Iron oxide is a key compound to understand the state of the deep Earth. It
has been believed that previously known oxides such as FeO and Fe2O3 will be
dominant at the mantle conditions. However, recent observation of FeO2 shed
another light to the composition of the deep lower mantle (DLM) and thus
understanding of the physical properties of FeO2 will be critical to model DLM.
Here, we report the electronic structure and structural properties of FeO2 by
using density functional theory (DFT) and dynamic mean field theory (DMFT). The
crystal structure of FeO2 is composed of Fe2+ and O2 2- dimers, where the Fe
ions are surround by the octahedral O atoms. We found that the bond length of
O2 dimer, which is very sensitive to the change of the Coulomb interaction U of
Fe 3d orbital, plays an important role in determining the electronic
structures. The band structures of DFT+DMFT show that the metal-insulator
transition is driven by the change of U and pressure. We suggest that the
correlation effect should be considered to correctly describe the physical
properties of FeO2 compound.


title:
Existence of Global Weak Solutions to a Hybrid Vlasov-MHD Model for
  Magnetized Plasmas

abstract:
  We prove the global-in-time existence of large-data finite-energy weak
solutions to an incompressible hybrid Vlasov-magnetohydrodynamic model in three
space dimensions. The model couples three essential ingredients of magnetized
plasmas: a transport equation for the probability density function, which
models energetic rarefied particles of one species; the incompressible
Navier--Stokes system for the bulk fluid; and a parabolic evolution equation,
involving magnetic diffusivity, for the magnetic field. The physical derivation
of our model is given. It is also shown that the weak solution, whose existence
is established, has nonincreasing total energy, and that it satisfies a number
of physically relevant properties, including conservation of the total
momentum, conservation of the total mass, and nonnegativity of the probability
density function for the energetic particles. The proof is based on a one-level
approximation scheme, which is carefully devised to avoid increase of the total
energy for the sequence of approximating solutions, in conjunction with a weak
compactness argument for the sequence of approximating solutions. The key
technical challenges in the analysis of the mathematical model are the
nondissipative nature of the Vlasov-type particle equation and passage to the
weak limits in the multilinear coupling terms.


title: Simulated Effects of 1/f Noise on an SKA Intensity Mapping Survey

abstract:
  It has been proposed recently that the SKA1-MID could be used to conduct an
HI intensity mapping survey that could rival upcoming Stage IV dark energy
surveys. However, measuring the weak HI signal is expected to be very
challenging due to contaminations such as residual Galactic emission, RFI, and
instrumental 1/f noise. Modelling the effects of these contaminants on the
cosmological HI signal requires numerical end-to-end simulations. Here we
present how 1/f noise within the receiver can double the effective uncertainty
of an SKA-like survey to HI on large angular scales (l < 50).


title: Hierarchical animal movement models for population-level inference

abstract:
  New methods for modeling animal movement based on telemetry data are
developed regularly. With advances in telemetry capabilities, animal movement
models are becoming increasingly sophisticated. Despite a need for
population-level inference, animal movement models are still predominantly
developed for individual-level inference. Most efforts to upscale the inference
to the population-level are either post hoc or complicated enough that only the
developer can implement the model. Hierarchical Bayesian models provide an
ideal platform for the development of population-level animal movement models
but can be challenging to fit due to computational limitations or extensive
tuning required. We propose a two-stage procedure for fitting hierarchical
animal movement models to telemetry data. The two-stage approach is
statistically rigorous and allows one to fit individual-level movement models
separately, then resample them using a secondary MCMC algorithm. The primary
advantages of the two-stage approach are that the first stage is easily
parallelizable and the second stage is completely unsupervised, allowing for a
completely automated fitting procedure in many cases. We demonstrate the
two-stage procedure with two applications of animal movement models. The first
application involves a spatial point process approach to modeling telemetry
data and the second involves a more complicated continuous-time discrete-space
animal movement model. We fit these models to simulated data and real telemetry
data arising from a population of monitored Canada lynx in Colorado, USA.


title:
The CHARA Array resolves the long-period Wolf-Rayet binaries WR 137 and
  WR 138

abstract:
  We report on interferometric observations with the CHARA Array of two
classical Wolf-Rayet stars in suspected binary systems, namely WR 137 and WR
138. In both cases, we resolve the component stars to be separated by a few
milliarcseconds. The data were collected in the H-band, and provide a measure
of the fractional flux for both stars in each system. We find that the WR star
is the dominant H-band light source in both systems ($f_{\rm WR, 137} =
0.59\pm0.04$; $f_{\rm WR, 138} = 0.67\pm0.01$), which is confirmed through both
comparisons with estimated fundamental parameters for WR stars and O dwarfs, as
well as through spectral modeling of each system. Our spectral modeling also
provides fundamental parameters for the stars and winds in these systems. The
results on WR 138 provide evidence that it is a binary system which may have
gone through a previous mass-transfer episode to create the WR star. The
separation and position of the stars in the WR 137 system together with
previous results from the IOTA interferometer provides evidence that the binary
is seen nearly edge-on. The possible edge-on orbit of WR 137 aligns well with
the dust production site imaged by the Hubble Space Telescope during a previous
periastron passage, showing that the dust production may be concentrated in the
orbital plane.


title: Hadronic EDM and New physics beyond standard model

abstract:
  The nuclear electric dipole moment is a very sensitive probe of CP violation
beyond the standard model, and for light nuclei, it can be evaluated accurately
using the few-body calculational methods. In this talk, we present the result
of the evaluation of the electric dipole moment of 3-body and 4-body systems
using the Gaussian expansion method in the ab initio approach and in the
cluster model. We also give the future prospects for the discovery of new
physics beyond it within the sensitivity of prepared experiments.


title: A random walk on the symmetric group generated by random involutions

abstract:
  The involution walk is the random walk on $S_n$ generated by involutions with
a binomially distributed with parameter $1-p$ number of $2$-cycles. This is a
parallelization of the transposition walk. The involution walk is shown in this
paper to mix for $\frac{1}{2} \leq p \leq 1$ fixed, $n$ sufficiently large in
between $\log_{1/p}(n)$ steps and $\log_{2/(1+p)}(n)$ steps. The paper
introduces a new technique for finding eigenvalues of random walks on the
symmetric group generated by many conjugacy classes using the character
polynomial for the characters of the representations of the symmetric group.
Monotonicity relations used in the bound also give after sufficient time the
likelihood order, the asymptotic order from most likely to least likely
permutation. The walk was introduced to study a conjecture about a random walk
on the unitary group from the information theory of black holes.


title:
The Changing Locus of Health Data Production and Use: Patient-Generated
  Health Data, Observations of Daily Living, and Personal Health Information
  Management

abstract:
  Despite the growing attention of researcher, healthcare managers and policy
makers, data gathering and information management practices are largely
untheorized areas. In this work are presented and discussed some early-stage
conceptualizations: Patient-Generated Health Data (PGHD), Observations of Daily
Living (ODLs) and Personal Health Information Management (PHIM). As I shall try
to demonstrate, these labels are not neutral rather they underpin quite
different perspectives with respect to health, patient-doctor relationship, and
the status of data.


title:
On the Equivalence of Experimental B(E2) Values Determined by Various
  Techniques

abstract:
  We establish the equivalence of the various techniques for measuring B(E2)
values using a statistical analysis. Data used in this work come from the re-
cent compilation by B. Pritychenko et al., At. Data Nucl. Data Tables 107
(2016). We consider only those nuclei for which the B(E2) values were measured
by at least two different methods, with each method being independently
performed at least twice. Our results indicate that most prevalent methods of
measuring B(E2) values are equivalent, with some weak evidence that
Doppler-shift attenuation method (DSAM) measurements may differ from Coulomb
excitation (CE) and nuclear resonance fuorescence (NRF) measurements. However,
such an evidence appears to arise from discrepant DSAM measurements of the
lifetimes for 60Ni and some Sn nuclei rather than a systematic deviation in the
method itself.


title:
Viability of exact tri-bimaximal, golden-ratio and bimaximal mixing
  patterns and renormalization-group running effects

abstract:
  In light of the latest neutrino oscillation data, we examine whether the
leptonic flavor mixing matrix can take on an exact form of tri-bimaximal (TBM),
golden-ratio (GR) or bimaximal (BM) mixing pattern at a superhigh-energy scale,
where such a mixing pattern could be realized by a flavor symmetry, and become
compatible with experimental data at the low-energy scale. Within the framework
of the Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model (MSSM), the only hope for
realizing such a possibility is to count on the corrections from the
renomalization-group (RG) running. In this work we focus on these radiative
corrections, and fully explore the allowed parameter space for each of these
mixing patterns. We find that when the upper bound on the sum of neutrino
masses $\Sigma^{}_\nu \equiv m^{}_1 + m^{}_2 + m^{}_3 < 0.23~\text{eV}$ at the
$95\%$ confidence level from Planck 2015 is taken into account, none of these
mixing patterns can be identified as the leptonic mixing matrix below the
seesaw threshold. If this cosmological upper bound on the sum of neutrino
masses were relaxed, the TBM and GR mixing patterns would still be compatible
with the latest neutrino oscillation data at the $3\sigma$ level, but not at
the $1\sigma$ level. Even in this case, no such a possibility exists for the BM
mixing.


title: Features in the Standard Model diphoton background

abstract:
  We argue that electromagnetic decays of energetic unflavoured neutral mesons,
notably $\eta$, mis-identified as single photons due to granularity of the
electromagnetic calorimeter might create bump-like features in the diphoton
invariant mass spectrum at different energies, including 750 GeV. We discuss
what kind of additional analysis can exclude or confirm this hypothesis.


title: Unitarity and positivity constraints for CFT at large central charge

abstract:
  We consider the four-point correlator of the stress tensor multiplet in
${\cal N}=4$ SYM in the limit of large central charge $c \sim N^2$. For finite
values of $g^2N$ single-trace intermediate operators arise at order $1/c$ and
this leads to specific poles in the Mellin representation of the correlator.
The sign of the residue at these poles is fixed by unitarity. We consider
solutions consistent with crossing symmetry and this pole structure. We show
that in a certain regime all solutions result in a negative contribution to the
anomalous dimension of twist four operators. The reason behind this is a
positivity property of Mack polynomials that leads to a positivity condition
for the Mellin amplitude. This positivity condition can also be proven by
assuming the correct Regge behaviour for the Mellin amplitude. For large $g^2N$
we recover a tower of solutions in one to one correspondence with local
interactions in a effective field theory in the $AdS$ bulk, with the
appropriate suppression factors, and with definite overall signs. These signs
agree with the signs that would follow from causality constraints on the
effective field theory. The positivity constraints arising from CFT for the
Mellin amplitude take a very similar form to the causality constraint for the
forward limit of the S-matrix.


title: Contextual Symmetries in Probabilistic Graphical Models

abstract:
  An important approach for efficient inference in probabilistic graphical
models exploits symmetries among objects in the domain. Symmetric variables
(states) are collapsed into meta-variables (meta-states) and inference
algorithms are run over the lifted graphical model instead of the flat one. Our
paper extends existing definitions of symmetry by introducing the novel notion
of contextual symmetry. Two states that are not globally symmetric, can be
contextually symmetric under some specific assignment to a subset of variables,
referred to as the context variables. Contextual symmetry subsumes previous
symmetry definitions and can rep resent a large class of symmetries not
representable earlier. We show how to compute contextual symmetries by reducing
it to the problem of graph isomorphism. We extend previous work on exploiting
symmetries in the MCMC framework to the case of contextual symmetries. Our
experiments on several domains of interest demonstrate that exploiting
contextual symmetries can result in significant computational gains.


title: Spiral versus modulated collinear phases in the quantum ANNNH model

abstract:
  Motivated by the discovery of spiral and modulated collinear phases in
several magnetic materials, we investigate the magnetic properties of
Heisenberg spin S=1/2 antiferromagnets in 2 and 3 dimensions, with frustration
arising from 2nd-neighbor couplings in one axial direction (the ANNNH model).
Our results clearly demonstrate the presence of an incommensurate spiral phase
at T=0 in 2 dimensions, extending to finite temperatures in 3 dimensions. The
crossover between N\'eel and spiral order occurs at a value of the frustration
parameter considerably above the classical value 0.25, a sign of substantial
quantum fluctuations. We also investigate a possible modulated collinear phase
with a wavelength of 4 lattice spacings, and find that it has substantially
higher energy and hence is not realized in the model.


title:
Minimizing the Total Movement for Movement to Independence Problem on a
  Line

abstract:
  Given a positive real value $\delta$, a set $P$ of points along a line and a
distance function $d$, in the movement to independence problem, we wish to move
the points to new positions on the line such that for every two points
$p_{i},p_{j} \in P$, we have $d(p_{i},p_{j}) \geq \delta$ while minimizing the
sum of movements of all points. This measure of the cost for moving the points
was previously unsolved in this setting. However for different cost measures
there are algorithms of $O(n \log(n))$ or of $O(n)$. We present an $O(n
\log(n))$ algorithm for the points on a line and thus conclude the setting in
one dimension.


title: $\pi$-formulas and Gray code

abstract:
  In previous papers we introduced a class of polynomials which follow the same
recursive formula as the Lucas-Lehmer numbers, studying the distribution of
their zeros and remarking that this distribution follows a sequence related to
the binary Gray code. It allowed us to give an order for all the zeros of every
polynomial $L_n$. In this paper, the zeros, expressed in terms of nested
radicals, are used to obtain two formulas for $\pi$: the first can be seen as a
generalization of the known formula $$\pi=\lim_{n\rightarrow \infty}
2^{n+1}\cdot \sqrt{2-\underbrace{\sqrt{2+\sqrt{2+\sqrt{2+...+\sqrt{2}}}}}_{n}}
\ ,$$ related to the smallest positive zero of $L_n$; the second is an exact
formula for $\pi$ achieved thanks to some identities valid for $L_n$.


title:
Photon Added Coherent States: Nondeterministic, Noiseless Amplification
  in Quantum Metrology

abstract:
  Probabilistic amplification through photon addition, at the output of an
Mach-Zehnder interferometer is discussed for a coherent input state. When a
metric of signal to noise ratio is considered, nondeterministic, noiseless
amplification of a coherent state shows improvement over a standard coherent
state, for the general addition of $m$ photons. The efficiency of realizable
implementation of photon addition is also considered and shows how the
collected statistics of a post selected state, depend on this efficiency. We
also consider the effects of photon loss and inefficient detectors.


title:
Spin texture on top of vortex avalanches in Nb/Al_2O_3/Co thin film
  heterostructures

abstract:
  We report on magneto-optical imaging, magnetization, Hall effect and
magneto-resistance experiments in Nb/Al_2O_3/Co thin film heterostructures. The
magnetic field is applied perpendicularly to the plane of the film and gives
rise to abrupt flux penetration of dendritic form. A magnetization texture is
imprinted in the Co layer in perfect coincidence with these ramifications. The
spin domains that mimic the vortex dendrites are stable upon the field removal.
Moreover, the imprinted spin structure remains visible up to room temperature.
Complementary magnetization, Hall effect and magneto-resistance experiments
were performed in a similar sample where electrical contacts were placed on the
Co layer. In the region of the field - temperature diagram where flux
instabilities are known to occur in Nb films, irregular jumps are observed in
the magnetic hysteresis and large amplitude noise is detected in the
magneto-resistance and Hall resistivity data when measured as a function of the
field.


title:
Exploring Prediction Uncertainty in Machine Translation Quality
  Estimation

abstract:
  Machine Translation Quality Estimation is a notoriously difficult task, which
lessens its usefulness in real-world translation environments. Such scenarios
can be improved if quality predictions are accompanied by a measure of
uncertainty. However, models in this task are traditionally evaluated only in
terms of point estimate metrics, which do not take prediction uncertainty into
account. We investigate probabilistic methods for Quality Estimation that can
provide well-calibrated uncertainty estimates and evaluate them in terms of
their full posterior predictive distributions. We also show how this posterior
information can be useful in an asymmetric risk scenario, which aims to capture
typical situations in translation workflows.


title: Dynamics of Soliton Cascades in Fiber Amplifiers

abstract:
  We study numerically the formation of cascading solitons when femtosecond
optical pulses are launched into a fiber amplifier with less energy than
required to form a soliton of equal duration. As the pulse is amplified,
cascaded fundamental solitons are created at different distances, without
soliton fission, as each fundamental soliton moves outside the gain bandwidth
through the Raman-induced spectral shifts. As a result, each input pulse
creates multiple, temporally separated, ultrashort pulses of different
wavelengths at the amplifier output. The number of pulses depends not only on
the total gain of the amplifier but also on the width of input pulses.


title: Baryons as relativistic three-quark bound states

abstract:
  We review the spectrum and electromagnetic properties of baryons described as
relativistic three-quark bound states within QCD. The composite nature of
baryons results in a rich excitation spectrum, whilst leading to highly
non-trivial structural properties explored by the coupling to external
(electromagnetic and other) currents. Both present many unsolved problems
despite decades of experimental and theoretical research. We discuss the
progress in these fields from a theoretical perspective, focusing on
nonperturbative QCD as encoded in the functional approach via Dyson-Schwinger
and Bethe-Salpeter equations. We give a systematic overview as to how results
are obtained in this framework and explain technical connections to lattice
QCD. We also discuss the mutual relations to the quark model, which still
serves as a reference to distinguish 'expected' from 'unexpected' physics. We
confront recent results on the spectrum of non-strange and strange baryons,
their form factors and the issues of two-photon processes and Compton
scattering determined in the Dyson-Schwinger framework with those of lattice
QCD and the available experimental data. The general aim is to identify the
underlying physical mechanisms behind the plethora of observable phenomena in
terms of the underlying quark and gluon degrees of freedom.


title:
Investigating nonclassicality of many qutrits by symmetric two-qubit
  operators

abstract:
  We introduce a new method of investigating qutrit nonclassicality by
translating qutrit operators to symmetric two-qubit operators. We show that
this procedure partially resolves the discrepancy between maximal qutrit
entanglement and maximal nonclassicality of qutrit correlations. Namely we
express Bell operators corresponding to qutrit Bell inequalities in terms of
symmetric two-qubit operators, and analyze the maximal quantum violation of a
given Bell inequality from the qubit perspective. As an example we show that
the two-qutrit CGLMP(Collins-Gisin-Linden-Massar-Popescu) Bell inequality can
be seen as a combination of Mermin's and CHSH (Clauser-Horne-Shimony-Holt)
qubit Bell inequalities, and therefore the optimal state violating this
combination differs from the one which corresponds to the maximally entangled
state of two qutrits. In addition, we discuss the same problem for a three
qutrit inequality. We also demonstrate that the maximal quantum violation of
the CGLMP inequality follows from complementarity of correlations.


title:
SnapToGrid: From Statistical to Interpretable Models for Biomedical
  Information Extraction

abstract:
  We propose an approach for biomedical information extraction that marries the
advantages of machine learning models, e.g., learning directly from data, with
the benefits of rule-based approaches, e.g., interpretability. Our approach
starts by training a feature-based statistical model, then converts this model
to a rule-based variant by converting its features to rules, and "snapping to
grid" the feature weights to discrete votes. In doing so, our proposal takes
advantage of the large body of work in machine learning, but it produces an
interpretable model, which can be directly edited by experts. We evaluate our
approach on the BioNLP 2009 event extraction task. Our results show that there
is a small performance penalty when converting the statistical model to rules,
but the gain in interpretability compensates for that: with minimal effort,
human experts improve this model to have similar performance to the statistical
model that served as starting point.


title: LocationSafe: Granular Location Privacy for IoT Devices

abstract:
  Today, mobile data owners lack consent and control over the release and
utilization of their location data. Third party applications continuously
process and access location data without data owners granular control and
without knowledge of how location data is being used. The proliferation of IoT
devices will lead to larger scale abuses of trust.
  In this paper we present the first design and implementation of a privacy
module built into the GPSD daemon. The GPSD daemon is a low-level GPS interface
that runs on GPS enabled devices. The integration of the privacy module ensures
that data owners have granular control over the release of their GPS location.
We describe the design of our privacy module and then evaluate the performance
of private GPS release and demonstrate that strong privacy guarantees can be
built into the GPSD daemon itself with minimal to no overhead.


title: Super-group field cosmology in Batalin-Vilkovisky formulation

abstract:
  In this paper, we study the third quantized super-group field cosmology, a
model in multiverse scenario, in Batalin-Vilkovisky (BV) formulation. Further,
we propose the superfield/super-antifield dependent BRST symmetry
transformations. Within this formulation, we establish connection between the
two different solutions of the quantum master equation within the BV
formulation.


title:
Variants of Kinetically Modified Non-Minimal Higgs Inflation in
  Supergravity

abstract:
  We consider models of chaotic inflation driven by the real parts of a
conjugate pair of Higgs superfields involved in the spontaneous breaking of a
grand unification symmetry at a scale assuming its Supersymmetric value.
Employing Kaehler potentials with a prominent shift-symmetric part proportional
to c- and a tiny violation, proportional to c+, included in a logarithm we show
that the inflationary observables provide an excellent match to the recent
Planck and Bicep2/Keck Array results setting, e.g., 0.0064<= c+/c-<1/N where
N=2 or 3 is the prefactor of the logarithm. Deviations of these prefactors from
their integer values above are also explored and a region where hilltop
inflation occurs is localized. Moreover, we analyze two distinct possible
stabilization mechanisms for the non-inflaton accompanying superfield, one tied
to higher order terms and one with just quadratic terms within the argument of
a logarithm with positive prefactor Ns<6. In all cases, inflation can be
attained for subplanckian inflaton values with the corresponding effective
theories retaining the perturbative unitarity up to the Planck scale.


title:
From geometric to function-theoretic Langlands (or how to invent
  shtukas)

abstract:
  This is an informal note that explains that the classical Langlands theory
over function fields can be obtained from the geometric one by taking the trace
of Frobenius. The operation of taking the trace of Frobenius takes place at the
categorical level, and this we deduce that the space of automorphic functions
is the trace of the Frobenius on the category of automorphic sheaves.


title:
The thermodynamics and transport properties of transition metals in
  critical point

abstract:
  A new method for calculating the critical point parameters (density,
temperature, pressure and electrical conductivity) and binodal of vapor-liquid
(dielectric-metal) phase transition is proposed. It is based on the assumption
that cohesion, which determines the main properties of solid state, also
determines the properties in the vicinity of the critical point. Comparison
with experimental and theoretical data available for transition metals is made.


title:
A Crowdsourcing Approach To Collecting Tutorial Videos -- Toward
  Personalized Learning-at-Scale

abstract:
  We investigated the feasibility of crowdsourcing full-fledged tutorial videos
from ordinary people on the Web on how to solve math problems related to
logarithms. This kind of approach (a form of learnersourcing) to efficiently
collecting tutorial videos and other learning resources could be useful for
realizing personalized learning-at-scale, whereby students receive specific
learning resources -- drawn from a large and diverse set -- that are tailored
to their individual and time-varying needs. Results of our study, in which we
collected 399 videos from 66 unique "teachers" on Mechanical Turk, suggest that
(1) approximately 100 videos -- over $80\%$ of which are mathematically fully
correct -- can be crowdsourced per week for \$5/video; (2) the crowdsourced
videos exhibit significant diversity in terms of language style, presentation
media, and pedagogical approach; (3) the average learning gains (posttest minus
pretest score) associated with watching the videos was stat.~sig.~higher than
for a control video ($0.105$ versus $0.045$); and (4) the average learning
gains ($0.1416$) from watching the best tested crowdsourced videos was
comparable to the learning gains ($0.1506$) from watching a popular Khan
Academy video on logarithms.


title: Quantized chiral magnetic current from reconnections of magnetic flux

abstract:
  We introduce a new mechanism for the chiral magnetic effect that does not
require an initial chirality imbalance. The chiral magnetic current is
generated by reconnections of magnetic flux that change the magnetic helicity
of the system. The resulting current is entirely determined by the change of
magnetic helicity, and it is quantized.


title:
An algorithm (CoDeFi) for overcoming the curse of dimensionality in
  mathematical finance

abstract:
  We present an algorithm (CoDeFi) which overcomes the curse of dimensionality
(CoD) in scientific computations and, especially, in mathematical finance (Fi).
Our method applies a broad class of partial differential equations such as
Kolmogorov-type equations and, for instance, the Black and Scholes equation. As
a main feature, our algorithm allows one to solve partial differential
equations in large dimensions and provides a general framework for stochastic
problems. In insurance or finance applications, the number of dimensions
corresponds to the number of risk sources and it is crucial to have a numerical
method that remains robust and reliable in large dimensions.


title:
Molecular fingerprint-region spectroscopy from 5-12 \mu m using an
  orientation-patterned gallium phosphide optical parametric oscillator

abstract:
  We report a femtosecond optical parametric oscillator (OPO) based on the new
semiconductor gain material orientation patterned gallium phosphide (OP-GaP),
which enables the production of high-repetition-rate femtosecond pulses
spanning 5-12 \mu m with average powers in the few to tens of milliwatts range.
This is the first example of a broadband OPO operating across the molecular
fingerprint region, and we demonstrate its potential by conducting broadband
Fourier-transform spectroscopy using water vapor and a polystyrene reference
standard.


title:
Slave Boson Theory of Orbital Differentiation with Crystal Field
  Effects: Application to UO$_2$

abstract:
  We derive an exact operatorial reformulation of the rotational invariant
slave boson method and we apply it to describe the orbital differentiation in
strongly correlated electron systems starting from first principles. The
approach enables us to treat strong electron correlations, spin-orbit coupling
and crystal field splittings on the same footing by exploiting the gauge
invariance of the mean-field equations. We apply our theory to the archetypical
nuclear fuel UO$_2$, and show that the ground state of this system displays a
pronounced orbital differention within the $5f$ manifold, with Mott localized
$\Gamma_8$ and extended $\Gamma_7$ electrons.


title:
The Herschel-ATLAS Data Release 1 Paper I: Maps, Catalogues and Number
  Counts

abstract:
  We present the first major data release of the largest single key-project in
area carried out in open time with the Herschel Space Observatory. The Herschel
Astrophysical Terahertz Large Area Survey (H-ATLAS) is a survey of 600 deg^2 in
five photometric bands - 100, 160, 250, 350 and 500 um - with the PACS and
SPIRE cameras. In this paper and a companion paper (Bourne et al. 2016) we
present the survey of three fields on the celestial equator, covering a total
area of 161.6 deg^2 and previously observed in the Galaxy and Mass Assembly
(GAMA) spectroscopic survey. This paper describes the Herschel images and
catalogues of the sources detected on the SPIRE 250 um images. The 1-sigma
noise for source detection, including both confusion and instrumental noise, is
7.4, 9.4 and 10.2 mJy at 250, 350 and 500 um. Our catalogue includes 120230
sources in total, with 113995, 46209 and 11011 sources detected at >4-sigma at
250, 350 and 500 um. The catalogue contains detections at >3-sigma at 100 and
160 um for 4650 and 5685 sources, and the typical noise at these wavelengths is
44 and 49 mJy. We include estimates of the completeness of the survey and of
the effects of flux bias and also describe a novel method for determining the
true source counts. The H-ATLAS source counts are very similar to the source
counts from the deeper HerMES survey at 250 and 350 um, with a small difference
at 500 um. Appendix A provides a quick start in using the released datasets,
including instructions and cautions on how to use them.


title: New Relations for Einstein-Yang-Mills Amplitudes

abstract:
  We obtain new relations between Einstein-Yang-Mills (EYM) amplitudes
involving N gauge bosons plus a single graviton and pure Yang-Mills amplitudes
involving N gauge bosons plus one additional vector boson inserted in a way
typical for a gauge boson of a "spectator" group commuting with the group
associated to original N gauge bosons. We show that such EYM amplitudes satisfy
U(1) decoupling relations similar to Kleiss-Kuijf relations for Yang-Mills
amplitudes. We consider a D-brane embedding of EYM amplitudes in the framework
of disk amplitudes involving open and closed strings. A new set of monodromy
relations is derived for mixed open-closed amplitudes with one closed string
inserted on the disk world-sheet and a number of open strings at the boundary.
These relations allow expressing the latter in terms of pure open string
amplitudes and, in the field-theory limit, they yield the U(1) decoupling
relations for EYM amplitudes.


title: Hard Photodisintegration of 3He into pd pair

abstract:
  The recent measurements of high energy photodisintegration of the $^3He$
nucleus to the $pd$ pair at $90^0$ center of mass demonstrated an energy
scaling consistent with the quark counting rule with unprecedentedly large
exponent of $s^{-17}$. To understand the underlying mechanism of this process
we extended the theoretical formalism of hard rescattering mechanism to
calculate the $\gamma ^3He\rightarrow pd$ reaction. In HRM the incoming high
energy photon strikes a quark from one of the nucleons in the target which
subsequently undergoes hard rescattering with the quarks from the other
nucleons generating hard two-body system in the final state of the reaction.
Within the HRM we derived the parameter free expression for the differential
cross section of the reaction, which is expressed through the $^3He\rightarrow
pd$ transition spectral function, cross section of hard $pd\rightarrow pd$
scattering and the effective charge of the quarks being interchanged during the
hard rescattering process. The numerical estimates of all these factors
resulted in the magnitude of the cross section which is surprisingly in a good
agreement with the data.


title:
Diophantine and tropical geometry, and uniformity of rational points on
  curves

abstract:
  We describe recent work connecting combinatorics and tropical/non-Archimedean
geometry to Diophantine geometry, particularly the uniformity conjectures for
rational points on curves and for torsion packets of curves. The method of
Chabauty--Coleman lies at the heart of this connection, and we emphasize the
clarification that tropical geometry affords throughout the theory of $p$-adic
integration, especially to the comparison of analytic continuations of $p$-adic
integrals and to the analysis of zeros of integrals on domains admitting
monodromy.


title:
Results of the deepest all-sky survey for continuous gravitational waves
  on LIGO S6 data running on the Einstein@Home volunteer distributed computing
  project

abstract:
  We report results of a deep all-sky search for periodic gravitational waves
from isolated neutron stars in data from the S6 LIGO science run. The search
was possible thanks to the computing power provided by the volunteers of the
Einstein@Home distributed computing project. We find no significant signal
candidate and set the most stringent upper limits to date on the amplitude of
gravitational wave signals from the target population. At the frequency of best
strain sensitivity, between $170.5$ and $171$ Hz we set a 90% confidence upper
limit of ${5.5}^{-25}$, while at the high end of our frequency range, around
505 Hz, we achieve upper limits $\simeq {10}^{-24}$. At $230$ Hz we can exclude
sources with ellipticities greater than $10^{-6}$ within 100 pc of Earth with
fiducial value of the principal moment of inertia of $10^{38} \textrm{kg m}^2$.
If we assume a higher (lower) gravitational wave spindown we constrain farther
(closer) objects to higher (lower) ellipticities.


title:
Eigenvalue inequalities and absence of threshold resonances for
  waveguide junctions

abstract:
  Let $\Lambda\subset \mathbb{R}^d$ be a domain consisting of several cylinders
attached to a bounded center. One says that $\Lambda$ admits a threshold
resonance if there exists a non-trivial bounded function $u$ solving $-\Delta
u=\nu u$ in $\Lambda$ and vanishing at the boundary, where $\nu$ is the bottom
of the essential spectrum of the Dirichlet Laplacian in $\Lambda$. We derive a
sufficient condition for the absence of threshold resonances in terms of the
Laplacian eigenvalues on the center. The proof is elementary and is based on
the min-max principle. Some two- and three-dimensional examples and
applications to the study of Laplacians on thin networks are discussed.


title: Light quark Yukawa couplings from Higgs kinematics

abstract:
  We show that the normalized Higgs production $p_T$ and $y_h$ distributions
are sensitive probes of Higgs couplings to light quarks. For up and/or down
quark Yukawa couplings comparable to the SM $b$ quark Yukawa the $\bar u u$ or
$\bar d d$ fusion production of the Higgs could lead to appreciable softer
$p_T$ distribution than in the SM. The rapidity distribution, on the other
hand, becomes more forward. We find that, owing partially to a downward
fluctuation, one can derive competitive bounds on the two couplings using ATLAS
measurements of normalized $p_T$ distribution at 8\,TeV. With 300 fb${}^{-1}$
at 13\,TeV LHC one could establish flavor non-universality of the Yukawa
couplings in the down sector.


title:
Ptychographic reconstruction algorithm for frequency resolved optical
  gating: super-resolution and supreme robustness

abstract:
  Frequency-resolved optical gating (FROG) is probably the most popular
technique for complete characterization of ultrashort laser pulses. In FROG, a
reconstruction algorithm retrieves the pulse from a measured spectrogram, yet
current FROG reconstruction algorithms require and exhibit several restricting
features that weaken FROG performances. For example, the delay step must
correspond to the spectral bandwidth measured with large enough SNR a condition
that limits the temporal resolution of the reconstructed pulse, obscures
measurements of weak broadband pulses, and makes measurement of broadband
mid-IR pulses hard and slow because the spectrograms become huge. We develop a
new approach for FROG reconstruction, based on ptychography (a scanning
coherent diffraction imaging technique), that removes many of the algorithmic
restrictions. The ptychographic reconstruction algorithm is significantly
faster and more robust to noise than current FROG algorithms, which are based
on generalized projections (GP). We demonstrate, numerically and
experimentally, that ptychographic reconstruction works well with very partial
spectrograms, e. g. spectrograms with reduced number of measured delays and
spectrograms that have been substantially spectrally filtered. In addition, we
implement the ptychogrpahic approach to blind second harmonic generation (SHG)
FROG and demonstrate robust and complete characterization of two unknown pulses
from a single measured spectrogram and power spectrum of only one of the
pulses. We believe that the ptychograpy-based approach will become the standard
reconstruction procedure in FROG and related diagnostics methods, allowing
successful reconstructions from so far unreconstructable spectrograms.


title:
Unification, refinements and companions of generalisations of Schur's
  theorem

abstract:
  We prove a general theorem on overpartitions with difference conditions that
unifies generalisations of Schur's theorem due to Alladi-Gordon, Andrews,
Corteel-Lovejoy and the author. This theorem also allows one to give companions
and refinements of the generalisations of Andrews' theorems to overpartitions.
The proof relies on the method of weighted words of Alladi and Gordon and
$q$-difference equation techniques introduced recently by the author.


title: Influence of the Gould Belt on Interstellar Extinction

abstract:
  A new analytical 3D model of interstellar extinction within 500 pc of the Sun
as a function of the Galactic spherical coordinates is suggested. This model is
physically more justified than the widely used Arenou model, since it takes
into account the presence of absorbing matter both in the layer along the
equatorial Galactic plane and in the Gould Belt. The extinction in the
equatorial layer varies as the sine of the Galactic longitude and in the Gould
Belt as the sine of twice the longitude in the Belt plane. The extinction
across the layers varies according to a barometric law. It has been found that
the absorbing layers intersect at an angle of 17 deg and that the Sun is
located near the axial plane of the absorbing layer of the Gould Belt and is
probably several parsecs below the axial plane of the equatorial absorbing
layer but above the Galactic plane. The model has been tested using the
extinction of real stars from three catalogs.


title: Conjugacy classes of commuting nilpotents

abstract:
  We consider the space $\mathcal M_{q,n}$ of regular $q$-tuples of commuting
nilpotent endomorphisms of $k^n$ modulo simultaneous conjugation. We show that
$\mathcal M_{q,n}$ admits a natural homogeneous space structure, and that it is
an affine space bundle over $\mathbb P^{q-1}$. A closer look at the homogeneous
structure reveals that, over $\mathbb C$ and with respect to the complex
topology, $\mathcal M_{q,n}$ is a smooth vector bundle over $\mathbb P^{q-1}$.
We prove that, in this case, $\mathcal M_{q,n}$ is diffeomorphic to a direct
sum of twisted tangent bundles. We also prove that $\mathcal M_{q,n}$ possesses
a universal property and represents a functor of ideals, and use it to identify
$\mathcal M_{q,n}$ with an open subscheme of a punctual Hilbert scheme. By
using a result of A. Iarrobino, we show that $\mathcal M_{q,n} \to \mathbb
P^{q-1}$ is not a vector bundle, hence giving a family of affine space bundles
that are not vector bundles.


title:
Several solutions of the Klein-Gordon equation in Kerr-Newman spacetime
  and the BSW effect

abstract:
  We investigate the radial part of the charged massive Klein-Gordon equation
in Kerr-Newman spacetime, and in several specific situations, obtain exact
solutions by means of essentially hypergeometric functions or their confluent
types. Using these global solutions and generally obtained local solutions, we
calculate a sort of intensity of the collision of two field excitations, which
is a slight generalization of the trace of the stress tensor. We find that when
the black hole is nonextremal, the intensity of the collision of two ingoing
modes is bounded. However, in the extremal limit, more precisely $\hbar
\kappa_H \rightarrow 0$, the upper bound grows so that when the frequency of
one of the two modes satisfies the critical relation, the intensity of the
collision at the horizon becomes unboundedly large. Furthermore, the intensity
of the collision of ingoing and outgoing modes is always unbounded, as well as
in the classical particle theory. Our results suggest that the BSW effect is
inherited by the quantum theory.


title: A case against an X-shaped structure in the Milky Way young bulge

abstract:
  CONTEXT. A number of recent papers have claimed the discovery of an X-shape
structure in the bulge of our Galaxy in the population of the red clumps.
  AIMS. We endeavor to analyze the stellar density of bulge stars in the same
regions using a different stellar population that is characteristic of the
young bulge ($\lesssim 5$ Gyr). Particularly, we use F0-F5 main-sequence stars
with distances derived through photometric parallax.
  METHODS. We extract these stars from extinction-corrected color-magnitude
diagrams in the near-infrared of VISTA-VVV data in some bulge regions and
calculate the densities along the line of sight. We take the uncertaintity in
the photometric parallax and the contamination of other sources into account,
and we see that these errors do not avoid the detection of a possible double
peak along some lines of sight as expected for a X-shape bulge if it existed.
  RESULTS. Only a single peak in the density distribution along the line of
sight is observed, so apparently there is no X-shape structure for this
population of stars. Nonetheless, the effects of the dispersion of absolute
magnitudes in the selected population might be an alternative explanation,
although in principle these effects are insufficient to explain this lack of
double peak according to our calculations.
  CONCLUSIONS. The results of the present paper do not demonstrate that
previous claims of X-shaped bulge using only red clump stars are incorrect, but
there are apparently some puzzling questions if we want to maintain the
validity of both the red-clump results and the results of this paper.


title: Tensionless Superstrings: View from the Worldsheet

abstract:
  In this brief note, we show that the residual symmetries that arise in the
analysis of the tensionless superstrings in the equivalent of the conformal
gauge is (a trivial extension of) the recently discovered 3d Super
Bondi-Metzner-Sachs algebra, discussed in the context of asymptotic symmetries
of 3d Supergravity in flat-spacetimes. This helps us uncover a limiting
approach to the construction of the tensionless superstring from the point of
view of the worldsheet, analogous to the one we had adopted earlier for the
closed tensionless bosonic string.


title: A non-commutative Julia Inequality

abstract:
  We prove a Julia inequality for bounded non-commutative functions on
polynomial polyhedra. We use this to deduce a Julia inequality for holomorphic
functions on classical domains in $\mathbb{C}^d$. We look at differentiability
at a boundary point for functions that have a certain regularity there.


title:
Collapse of Resilience Patterns in Generalized Lotka-Volterra Dynamics
  and Beyond

abstract:
  Recently, a theoretical framework aimed at separating the roles of dynamics
and topology in multi-dimensional systems has been developed (Gao et al,
\textit{Nature}, Vol 530:307 (2016)). The validity of their method is assumed
to hold depending on two main hypothesis: $(i)$ The network determined by the
the interaction between pairs of nodes has negligible degree correlations;
$(ii)$ The node activities are uniform across nodes on both the drift and
pair-wise interaction functions. Moreover, the authors consider only positive
(mutualistic) interactions. Here we show the conditions proposed by Gao and
collaborators are neither sufficient nor necessary to guarantee that their
method works in general, and validity of their results are not independent of
the model chosen within the class of dynamics they considered. Indeed we find
that a new condition poses effective limitations to their framework and we
provide quantitative predictions of the quality of the one dimensional collapse
as a function of the properties of interaction networks and stable dynamics
using results from random matrix theory. We also find that multi-dimensional
reduction may work also for interaction matrix with a mixture of positive and
negative signs, opening up application of the framework to food-webs, neuronal
networks and social/economic interactions.


title: Refined broccoli invariants

abstract:
  We introduce a tropical enumerative invariant depending on a variable y which
generalizes the tropical refined Severi degree. We show that this refined
broccoli invariant is indeed independent of the point configuration, and that
it specializes to a tropical descendant Gromov-Witten invariant for y=1 and to
the corresponding broccoli invariant for y=-1. Furthermore, we define tropical
refined descendant Gromov-Witten invariants which equal the corresponding
refined broccoli invariants giving a new insight to the nature of broccoli
invariants. We discuss various possible generalizations, e.g. to refinements of
bridge curves and Welschinger curves.


title:
A Permutation-based Model for Crowd Labeling: Optimal Estimation and
  Robustness

abstract:
  The task of aggregating and denoising crowd-labeled data has gained increased
significance with the advent of crowdsourcing platforms and massive datasets.
We propose a permutation-based model for crowd labeled data that is a
significant generalization of the classical Dawid-Skene model, and introduce a
new error metric by which to compare different estimators. We derive global
minimax rates for the permutation-based model that are sharp up to logarithmic
factors, and match the minimax lower bounds derived under the simpler
Dawid-Skene model. We then design two computationally-efficient estimators: the
WAN estimator for the setting where the ordering of workers in terms of their
abilities is approximately known, and the OBI-WAN estimator where that is not
known. For each of these estimators, we provide non-asymptotic bounds on their
performance. We conduct synthetic simulations and experiments on real-world
crowdsourcing data, and the experimental results corroborate our theoretical
findings.


title:
Dynamics of a family of polynomial automorphisms of $\mathbb{C}^3$, a
  phase transition

abstract:
  The polynomial automorphisms of the affine plane have been studied a lot: if
$f$ is such an automorphism, then either $f$ preserves a rational fibration,
has an uncountable centralizer and its first dynamical degree equals $1$, or
$f$ preserves no rational curves, has a countable centralizer and its first
dynamical degree is $>1$. In higher dimensions there is no such description. In
this article we study a family $(\Psi_\alpha)_\alpha$ of polynomial
automorphisms of $\mathbb{C}^3$. We show that the first dynamical degree of
$\Psi_\alpha$ is $>1$, that $\Psi_\alpha$ preserves a unique rational fibration
and has an uncountable centralizer. We then describe the dynamics of the family
$(\Psi_\alpha)_\alpha$, in particular the speed of points escaping to infinity.
We also observe different behaviors according to the value of the parameter
$\alpha$.


title:
Probing the interstellar medium and star formation of the Most Luminous
  Quasar at z=6.3

abstract:
  We report new IRAM/PdBI, JCMT/SCUBA-2, and VLA observations of the
ultraluminous quasar SDSSJ010013.02+280225.8 (hereafter, J0100+2802) at z=6.3,
which hosts the most massive supermassive black hole (SMBH) of 1.24x10^10 Msun
known at z>6. We detect the [C II] 158 $\mu$m fine structure line and molecular
CO(6-5) line and continuum emission at 353 GHz, 260 GHz, and 3 GHz from this
quasar. The CO(2-1) line and the underlying continuum at 32 GHz are also
marginally detected. The [C II] and CO detections suggest active star formation
and highly excited molecular gas in the quasar host galaxy. The redshift
determined with the [C II] and CO lines shows a velocity offset of ~1000 km/s
from that measured with the quasar Mg II line. The CO (2-1) line luminosity
provides direct constraint on the molecular gas mass which is about
(1.0+/-0.3)x10^10 Msun. We estimate the FIR luminosity to be (3.5+/-0.7)x10^12
Lsun, and the UV-to-FIR spectral energy distribution of J0100+2802 is
consistent with the templates of the local optically luminous quasars. The
derived [C II]-to-FIR luminosity ratio of J0100+2802 is 0.0010+/-0.0002, which
is slightly higher than the values of the most FIR luminous quasars at z~6. We
investigate the constraint on the host galaxy dynamical mass of J0100+2802
based on the [C II] line spectrum. It is likely that this ultraluminous quasar
lies above the local SMBH-galaxy mass relationship, unless we are viewing the
system at a small inclination angle.


title:
On spurious solutions in finite element approximations of resonances in
  open systems

abstract:
  In this paper, we discuss problems arising when computing resonances with a
finite element method. In the pre-asymptotic regime, we detect for the one
dimensional case, spurious solutions in finite element computations of
resonances when the computational domain is truncated with a perfectly matched
layer (PML) as well as with a Dirichlet-to-Neumann map (DtN). The new test is
based on the Lippmann-Schwinger equation and we use computations of the
pseudospectrum to show that this is a suitable choice. Numerical simulations
indicate that the presented test can distinguish between spurious eigenvalues
and true eigenvalues also in difficult cases. Keywords: scattering resonances,
Lippmann-Schwinger equation, nonlinear eigenvalue problems, acoustic resonator,
dielectric resonator, Bragg resonator


title: Representation of texts as complex networks: a mesoscopic approach

abstract:
  Statistical techniques that analyze texts, referred to as text analytics,
have departed from the use of simple word count statistics towards a new
paradigm. Text mining now hinges on a more sophisticated set of methods,
including the representations in terms of complex networks. While
well-established word-adjacency (co-occurrence) methods successfully grasp
syntactical features of written texts, they are unable to represent important
aspects of textual data, such as its topical structure, i.e. the sequence of
subjects developing at a mesoscopic level along the text. Such aspects are
often overlooked by current methodologies. In order to grasp the mesoscopic
characteristics of semantical content in written texts, we devised a network
model which is able to analyze documents in a multi-scale fashion. In the
proposed model, a limited amount of adjacent paragraphs are represented as
nodes, which are connected whenever they share a minimum semantical content. To
illustrate the capabilities of our model, we present, as a case example, a
qualitative analysis of "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland". We show that the
mesoscopic structure of a document, modeled as a network, reveals many semantic
traits of texts. Such an approach paves the way to a myriad of semantic-based
applications. In addition, our approach is illustrated in a machine learning
context, in which texts are classified among real texts and randomized
instances.


title: Lifted Region-Based Belief Propagation

abstract:
  Due to the intractable nature of exact lifted inference, research has
recently focused on the discovery of accurate and efficient approximate
inference algorithms in Statistical Relational Models (SRMs), such as Lifted
First-Order Belief Propagation. FOBP simulates propositional factor graph
belief propagation without constructing the ground factor graph by identifying
and lifting over redundant message computations. In this work, we propose a
generalization of FOBP called Lifted Generalized Belief Propagation, in which
both the region structure and the message structure can be lifted. This
approach allows more of the inference to be performed intra-region (in the
exact inference step of BP), thereby allowing simulation of propagation on a
graph structure with larger region scopes and fewer edges, while still
maintaining tractability. We demonstrate that the resulting algorithm converges
in fewer iterations to more accurate results on a variety of SRMs.


title: Computational Higher Type Theory II: Dependent Cubical Realizability

abstract:
  This is the second in a series of papers extending Martin-L\"{o}f's meaning
explanation of dependent type theory to account for higher-dimensional types.
We build on the cubical realizability framework for simple types developed in
Part I, and extend it to a meaning explanation of dependent higher-dimensional
type theory. This extension requires generalizing the computational Kan
condition given in Part I, and considering the action of type families on
paths. We define identification types, which classify identifications (paths)
in a type, and dependent function and pair types. The main result is a
canonicity theorem, which states that a closed term of boolean type evaluates
to either true or false. This result establishes the first computational
interpretation of higher dependent type theory by giving a deterministic
operational semantics for its programs, including operations that realize the
Kan condition.


title:
Gapped spin liquid with $\mathbb{Z}_2$-topological order for kagome
  Heisenberg model

abstract:
  We apply symmetric tensor network state (TNS) to study the nearest neighbor
spin-1/2 antiferromagnetic Heisenberg model on Kagome lattice. Our method keeps
track of the global and gauge symmetries in TNS update procedure and in tensor
renormalization group (TRG) calculation. We also introduce a very sensitive
probe for the gap of the ground state -- the modular matrices, which can also
determine the topological order if the ground state is gapped. We find that the
ground state of Heisenberg model on Kagome lattice is a gapped spin liquid with
the $\mathbb{Z}_2$-topological order (or toric code type), which has a long
correlation length $\xi\sim 10$ unit cell length. We justify that the TRG
method can handle very large systems with over thousands of spins. Such a long
$\xi$ explains the gapless behaviors observed in simulations on smaller systems
with less than 300 spins or shorter than 10 unit cell length. We also discuss
experimental implications of the topological excitations encoded in our
symmetric tensors.


title:
The weights of simple modules in Category $\mathscr{O}$ for Kac-Moody
  algebras

abstract:
  We give the first positive formulas for the weights of every simple highest
weight module $L(\lambda)$ over an arbitrary Kac-Moody algebra. Under a mild
condition on the highest weight, we also express the weights of $L(\lambda)$ as
an alternating sum similar to the Weyl-Kac character formula.
  To obtain these results, we show the following data attached to a highest
weight module are equivalent: (i) its integrability, (ii) the convex hull of
its weights, (iii) the Weyl group symmetry of its character, and (iv) when a
localization theorem is available, its behavior on certain codimension one
Schubert cells. We further determine precisely when the above datum determines
the weights themselves. Moreover, we use condition (iv) to relate localizations
of the convex hull of the weights with the introduction of poles of the
corresponding $D$-module on certain divisors, which answers a question of
Brion.
  Many of these results are new even in finite type. We prove similar
assertions for highest weight modules over a symmetrizable quantum group.


title: Information Dynamics at a Phase Transition

abstract:
  We propose a new way of investigating phase transitions in the context of
information theory. We use an information-entropic measure of spatial
complexity known as configurational entropy (CE) to quantify both the storage
and exchange of information in a lattice simulation of a Ginzburg-Landau model
with a scalar order parameter coupled to a heat bath. The CE is built from the
Fourier spectrum of fluctuations around the mean-field and reaches a minimum at
criticality. In particular, we investigate the behavior of CE near and at
criticality, exploring the relation between information and the emergence of
ordered domains. We show that as the temperature is increased from below, the
CE displays three essential scaling regimes at different spatial scales: scale
free, turbulent, and critical. Together, they offer an information-entropic
characterization of critical behavior where the storage and processing of
information is maximized at criticality.

categories: cond-mat.stat-mech cs.IT math.IT nlin.PS physics.comp-ph physics.data-an


title:
Improved Constraints on Dark Matter Annihilation to a Line using
  Fermi-LAT observations of Galaxy Clusters

abstract:
  Galaxy clusters are dominated by dark matter, and may have a larger
proportion of surviving substructure than, e.g, field galaxies. Due to the
presence of galaxy clusters in relative proximity and their high dark matter
content, they are promising targets for the indirect detection of dark matter
via Gamma-rays. Indeed, dedicated studies of sets of up to 100 clusters have
been made previously, so far with no clear indication of a dark matter signal.
Here we report on Gamma-ray observations of some 26,000 galaxy clusters based
on Pass-7 Fermi Large Area Telescope (LAT) data, with clusters selected from
the Tully 2MASS Groups catalog. None of these clusters is significantly
detected in Gamma-rays, and we present Gamma-ray flux upper limits between 20
GeV and 500 GeV.
  We estimate the dark matter content of each of the clusters in these
catalogs, and constrain the dark matter annihilation cross section, by
analyzing Fermi-LAT data from the directions of the clusters. We set some of
the tightest cluster-based constraints to date on the annihilation of dark
matter particles with masses between 20 GeV and 500 GeV for annihilation to a
gamma-ray line. Our cluster based constraints are not yet as strong as bounds
placed using the Galactic Center, although an uncertainty still exists
regarding the "boost factor" from cluster substructure, where we have chosen a
rather conservative value. Our analysis, given this choice of possible boost,
is not yet sensitive enough to fully rule out typical realistic DM candidates,
especially if the gamma-ray line is not a dominant annihilation mode.


title: Permutrees

abstract:
  We introduce permutrees, a unified model for permutations, binary trees,
Cambrian trees and binary sequences. On the combinatorial side, we study the
rotation lattices on permutrees and their lattice homomorphisms, unifying the
weak order, Tamari, Cambrian and boolean lattices and the classical maps
between them. On the geometric side, we provide both the vertex and facet
descriptions of a polytope realizing the rotation lattice, specializing to the
permutahedron, the associahedra, and certain graphical zonotopes. On the
algebraic side, we construct a Hopf algebra on permutrees containing the known
Hopf algebraic structures on permutations, binary trees, Cambrian trees, and
binary sequences.


title:
Forced Fluid Dynamics from Blackfolds in General Supergravity
  Backgrounds

abstract:
  We present a general treatment of the leading order dynamics of the
collective modes of charged dilatonic $p$-brane solutions of (super)gravity
theories in arbitrary backgrounds. To this end we employ the general strategy
of the blackfold approach which is based on a long-wavelength derivative
expansion around an exact or approximate solution of the (super)gravity
equations of motion. The resulting collective mode equations are formulated as
forced hydrodynamic equations on dynamically embedded hypersurfaces. We derive
them in full generality (including all possible asymptotic fluxes and dilaton
profiles) in a far-zone analysis of the (super)gravity equations and in
representative examples in a near-zone analysis. An independent treatment based
on the study of external couplings in hydrostatic partition functions is also
presented. Special emphasis is given to the forced collective mode equations
that arise in type IIA/B and eleven-dimensional supergravities, where besides
the standard Lorentz force couplings our analysis reveals additional couplings
to the background, including terms that arise from Chern-Simons interactions.
We also present a general overview of the blackfold approach and some of the
key conceptual issues that arise when applied to arbitrary backgrounds.


title:
Stability of Emergent Kinetics in Optical Lattices with Artificial
  Spin-Orbit Coupling

abstract:
  Artificial spin-orbit coupling in optical lattices can be engineered to tune
band structure into extreme regimes where the single-particle band flattens
leaving only inter-particle interactions to define many-body states of matter.
Lin et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett 112, 110404 (2014)] showed that under such
conditions interactions lead to a Wigner crystal of fermionic atoms under
approximate conditions: no bandwidth or band mixing. The excitations were shown
to possess emergent kinetics with fractionalized charge derived entirely from
interactions. In this work we use numerical exact diagonalization to study a
more realistic model with non-zero bandwidth and band mixing. We map out the
stability phase diagram of the Wigner crystal. We find that emergent properties
of the Wigner crystal excitations remain stable for realistic experimental
parameters. Our results validate the approximations made by Lin et al. and
define parameter regimes where strong interaction effects generate emergent
kinetics in optical lattices.


title: The dimensionless age of the Universe: a riddle for our time

abstract:
  We present the interesting coincidence of cosmology and astrophysics that
points toward a dimensionless age of the universe H_0*t_0 that is close to one.
Despite cosmic deceleration for 9 Gyr and acceleration since then, we find
H_0t*_0 = 0.96 +/- 0.01 for the LCDM model that fits SN Ia data from
Pan-STARRS, CMB power spectra, and baryon acoustic oscillations. Similarly,
astrophysical measures of stellar ages and the Hubble constant derived from
redshifts and distances point to H_0*t ~ 1.0 +/- 0.1$. The wide range of
possible values for H_0*t_0 realized during comic evolution means that we live
at what appears to be a special time. This "synchronicity problem" is not
precisely the same as the usual Coincidence problem because there are
combinations of Omega_Matter and Omega_Lambda for which the usual coincidence
problem holds but for which H_0*t_0 is not close to 1.


title: The large-mass limit of cloudy black holes

abstract:
  The interplay between black holes and fundamental fields has attracted much
attention over the years from both physicists and mathematicians. In this paper
we study {\it analytically} a physical system which is composed of massive
scalar fields linearly coupled to a rapidly-rotating Kerr black hole. Using
simple arguments, we first show that the coupled black-hole-scalar-field system
may possess stationary bound-state resonances (stationary scalar `clouds') in
the bounded regime $1<\mu/m\Omega_{\text{H}}<\sqrt{2}$, where $\mu$ and $m$ are
respectively the mass and azimuthal harmonic index of the field, and
$\Omega_{\text{H}}$ is the angular velocity of the black-hole horizon. We then
show explicitly that these two bounds on the dimensionless ratio
$\mu/m\Omega_{\text{H}}$ can be saturated in the asymptotic $m\to\infty$ limit.
In particular, we derive a remarkably simple analytical formula for the
resonance mass spectrum of the stationary bound-state scalar clouds in the
regime $M\mu\gg1$ of large field masses: $\mu_n = \sqrt{2}m \Omega_{\text{H}}
\big[1-{{\pi({\cal R}+n)} \over {m|\ln\tau|}}\big]$, where $\tau$ is the
dimensionless temperature of the rapidly-rotating (near-extremal) black hole,
${\cal R}<1$ is a constant, and $n=0,1,2,...$ is the resonance parameter. In
addition, it is shown that, contrary to the flat-space intuition, the effective
lengths of the scalar field configurations in the curved black-hole spacetime
approach a {\it finite} asymptotic value in the large mass $M\mu\gg1$ limit. In
particular, we prove that in the large mass limit, the characteristic length
scale of the scalar clouds scales linearly with the black-hole temperature.


title: Light Higgsino Dark Matter from Non-thermal Cosmology

abstract:
  We study the scenario of higgsino dark matter in the context of a
non-standard cosmology with a period of matter-domination prior to Big-Bang
nucleosynthesis. Matter-domination changes the dark matter relic abundance if
it ends via reheating to a temperature below the higgsino thermal freeze-out
temperature. We perform a model independent analysis of the higgsino dark
matter production in such scenario. We show that light higgsino-type dark
matter is possible for reheating temperatures close to 1 GeV. We study the
impact of dark matter indirect detection and collider physics in this context.
We show that Fermi-LAT data rules out non-thermal higgsinos with masses below
300 GeV. Future indirect dark matter searches from Fermi-LAT and CTA would be
able to cover essentially the full parameter space. Contrary to the thermal
case, collider signals from a 100 TeV collider could fully test the non-thermal
higgsino. In the second part of the paper we discuss the motivation of such
non-thermal cosmology from the perspective of string theory with late-time
decaying moduli for both KKLT and LVS moduli stabilization mechanisms. We
describe the impact of embedding dark matter higgsino in these scenarios.


title: The magnetic field and dust filaments in the Polaris Flare

abstract:
  In diffuse molecular clouds, possible precursors of star-forming clouds, the
effect of the magnetic field is unclear. In this work we compare the
orientations of filamentary structures in the Polaris Flare, as seen through
dust emission by Herschel, to the plane-of-the-sky magnetic field orientation
($\rm B_{pos}$) as revealed by stellar optical polarimetry with RoboPol. Dust
structures in this translucent cloud show a strong preference for alignment
with $\rm B_{pos}$. 70 % of field orientations are consistent with those of the
filaments (within 30$^\circ$). We explore the spatial variation of the relative
orientations and find it to be uncorrelated with the dust emission intensity
and correlated to the dispersion of polarization angles. Concentrating in the
area around the highest column density filament, and in the region with the
most uniform field, we infer the $\rm B_{pos}$ strength to be 24 $-$ 120
$\mu$G. Assuming that the magnetic field can be decomposed into a turbulent and
an ordered component, we find a turbulent-to-ordered ratio of 0.2 $-$ 0.8,
implying that the magnetic field is dynamically important, at least in these
two areas. We discuss implications on the 3D field properties, as well as on
the distance estimate of the cloud.


title:
HATS-31b Through HATS-35b: Five Transiting Hot Jupiters Discovered by
  the HATSouth Survey

abstract:
  We report the discovery of five new transiting hot Jupiter planets discovered
by the HATSouth survey: HATS-31b through HATS-35b. These planets orbit
moderately bright stars with V magnitudes within the range 11.9-14.4mag while
the planets span a range of masses 0.88-1.22MJ, and have somewhat inflated
radii between 1.23-1.64RJ.These planets can be classified as typical hot
Jupiters, with HATS-31b and HATS-35b being moderately inflated gas giant
planets with radii of $1.64 \pm 0.22$ RJ and 1.464+0.069-0.044RJ, respectively,
that can be used to constrain inflation mechanisms. All five systems present a
higher Bayesian evidence for a fixed circular orbit model than for an eccentric
orbit. The orbital periods range from $1.8209993 \pm 0.0000016$ day for
HATS-35b) to $3.377960 \pm 0.000012$ day for HATS-31b. Additionally, HATS-35b
orbits a relatively young F star with an age of $2.13 \pm 0.51$ Gyr. We discuss
the analysis to derive the properties of these systems and compare them in the
context of the sample of well characterized transiting hot Jupiters known to
date.


title: Three Temperate Neptunes Orbiting Nearby Stars

abstract:
  We present the discovery of three modestly-irradiated, roughly Neptune-mass
planets orbiting three nearby Solar-type stars. HD 42618 b has a minimum mass
of $15.4 \pm 2.4$ M$_{\oplus}$, a semi-major axis of 0.55 AU, an equilibrium
temperature of 337 K, and is the first planet discovered to orbit the solar
analogue host star, HD 42618. We also discover new planets orbiting the known
exoplanet host stars HD 164922 and HD 143761 ($\rho$ CrB). The new planet
orbiting HD 164922 has a minimum mass of $12.9 \pm 1.6$ M$_{\oplus}$ and orbits
interior to the previously known Jovian mass planet orbiting at 2.1 AU. HD
164922 c has a semi-major axis of 0.34 AU and an equilibrium temperature of 418
K. HD 143761 c orbits with a semi-major axis of 0.44 AU, has a minimum mass of
$25 \pm 2$ M$_{\oplus}$, and is the warmest of the three new planets with an
equilibrium temperature of 445 K. It orbits exterior to the previously known
warm Jupiter in the system. A transit search using space-based CoRoT data and
ground-based photometry from the Automated Photometric Telescopes (APTs) at
Fairborn Observatory failed to detect any transits, but the precise,
high-cadence APT photometry helped to disentangle planetary-reflex motion from
stellar activity. These planets were discovered as part of an ongoing radial
velocity survey of bright, nearby, chromospherically-inactive stars using the
Automated Planet Finder (APF) telescope at Lick Observatory. The high-cadence
APF data combined with nearly two decades of radial velocity data from Keck
Observatory and gives unprecedented sensitivity to both short-period low-mass,
and long-period intermediate-mass planets.


title:
Cosmological parameters, shear maps and power spectra from CFHTLenS
  using Bayesian hierarchical inference

abstract:
  We apply two Bayesian hierarchical inference schemes to infer shear power
spectra, shear maps and cosmological parameters from the CFHTLenS weak lensing
survey - the first application of this method to data. In the first approach,
we sample the joint posterior distribution of the shear maps and power spectra
by Gibbs sampling, with minimal model assumptions. In the second approach, we
sample the joint posterior of the shear maps and cosmological parameters,
providing a new, accurate and principled approach to cosmological parameter
inference from cosmic shear data. As a first demonstration on data we perform a
2-bin tomographic analysis to constrain cosmological parameters and investigate
the possibility of photometric redshift bias in the CFHTLenS data. Under the
baseline $\Lambda$CDM model we constrain $S_8 =
\sigma_8(\Omega_\mathrm{m}/0.3)^{0.5} = 0.67 ^{\scriptscriptstyle+ 0.03
}_{\scriptscriptstyle- 0.03 }$ $(68\%)$, consistent with previous CFHTLenS
analysis but in tension with Planck. Adding neutrino mass as a free parameter
we are able to constrain $\sum m_\nu < 4.6\mathrm{eV}$ (95%) using CFHTLenS
data alone. Including a linear redshift dependent photo-$z$ bias $\Delta z =
p_2(z - p_1)$, we find $p_1=-0.25 ^{\scriptscriptstyle+ 0.53
}_{\scriptscriptstyle- 0.60 }$ and $p_2 = -0.15 ^{\scriptscriptstyle+ 0.17
}_{\scriptscriptstyle- 0.15 }$, and tension with Planck is only alleviated
under very conservative prior assumptions. Neither the non-minimal neutrino
mass or photo-$z$ bias models are significantly preferred by the CFHTLenS
(2-bin tomography) data.


title:
Black Hole Horizon Fluffs: Near Horizon Soft Hairs as Microstates of
  Three Dimensional Black Holes

abstract:
  We provide the first explicit proposal for all microstates of generic black
holes in three dimensions (of Banados-Teitelboim-Zanelli-type): black hole
microstates, termed "horizon fluffs", are a particular class of near horizon
soft hairs which have zero energy as measured by the horizon observer and
cannot be distinguished by observers at finite distance from the horizon. These
states are arranged in orbits of the two-dimensional conformal algebra
associated with the asymptotic black hole geometry. We count these microstates
using the Hardy-Ramanujan formula for the number of partitions of a given
integer into non-negative integers, recovering the Bekenstein-Hawking entropy.
We discuss possible extensions of our black hole microstate construction to
astrophysical Kerr-type black holes.


title: AGN feedback in the nucleus of M51

abstract:
  AGN feedback is invoked as one of the most relevant mechanisms that shape the
evolution of galaxies. Our goal is to understand the interplay between AGN
feedback and the interstellar medium in M51, a nearby spiral galaxy with a
modest AGN and a kpc-scale radio jet expanding through the disc of the galaxy.
For that purpose, we combine molecular gas observations in the CO(1-0) and
HCN(1-0) lines from the Plateau de Bure interferometer with archival radio,
X-ray, and optical data. We show that there is a significant scarcity of CO
emission in the ionisation cone, while molecular gas emission tends to
accumulate towards the edges of the cone. The distribution and kinematics of CO
and HCN line emission reveal AGN feedback effects out to r~500pc, covering the
whole extent of the radio jet, with complex kinematics in the molecular gas
which displays strong local variations. We propose that this is the result of
the almost coplanar jet pushing on molecular gas in different directions as it
expands; the effects are more pronounced in HCN than in CO emission, probably
as the result of radiative shocks. Following previous interpretation of the
redshifted molecular line in the central 5" as caused by a molecular outflow,
we estimate the outflow rates to be Mdot_H2~0.9Msun/yr and
Mdot_dense~0.6Msun/yr, which are comparable to the molecular inflow rates
(~1Msun/yr); gas inflow and AGN feedback could be mutually regulated processes.
The agreement with findings in other nearby radio galaxies suggests that this
is not an isolated case, and probably the paradigm of AGN feedback through
radio jets, at least for galaxies hosting low-luminosity active nuclei.


title:
First Constraints on the Complete Neutrino Mixing Matrix with a Sterile
  Neutrino

abstract:
  Neutrino oscillation models involving one extra mass eigenstate beyond the
standard three ($3+1$) are fit to global short baseline experimental data and
the recent IceCube $\nu_\mu+\bar\nu_\mu$ disappearance search result. We find a
best fit of $\Delta m^2_{41} = 1.75\; \text{eV}^2$ with $\Delta
\chi^2_{null-min}$ (dof) of 50.61 (4). We find that the combined IceCube and
short baseline data constrain $\theta_{34}$ to $< 80^\circ (< 6^\circ) $ at
90\% C.L. for $\Delta m^2_{41} \approx 2 (6)~\text{eV}^2$, which is improved
over present limits. Incorporating the IceCube information provides the first
constraints on all entries of the 3+1 mixing matrix.


title:
The slow spin of the young sub-stellar companion GQ Lupi b and its
  orbital configuration

abstract:
  The spin of a planet or brown dwarf is related to the accretion process, and
therefore studying spin can help promote our understanding of the formation of
such objects. We present the projected rotational velocity of the young
sub-stellar companion GQ Lupi b, along with its barycentric radial velocity.
The directly imaged exoplanet or brown dwarf companion joins a small but
growing ensemble of wide-orbit sub-stellar companions with a spin measurement.
The GQ Lupi system was observed at high spectral resolution (R ~ 100000), and
in the analysis we made use of both spectral and spatial filtering to separate
the signal of the companion from that of the host star. We detect both CO
(S/N=11.6) and H2O (S/N=7.7) in the atmosphere of GQ Lupi b by
cross-correlating with model spectra, and we find it to be a slow rotator with
a projected rotational velocity of $5.3^{+0.9}_{-1.0}$ km/s. The slow rotation
is most likely due to its young age of < 5 Myr, as it is still in the process
of accreting material and angular momentum. We measure the barycentric radial
velocity of GQ Lupi b to be $2.0 \pm 0.4$ km/s, and discuss the allowed orbital
configurations and their implications for formation scenarios for GQ Lupi b.


title:
ZFIRE: A KECK/MOSFIRE Spectroscopic Survey of Galaxies in Rich
  Environments at z~2

abstract:
  We present an overview and the first data release of ZFIRE, a spectroscopic
redshift survey of star-forming galaxies that utilizes the MOSFIRE instrument
on Keck-I to study galaxy properties in rich environments at $1.5<z<2.5$. ZFIRE
measures accurate spectroscopic redshifts and basic galaxy properties derived
from multiple emission lines. The galaxies are selected from a stellar mass
limited sample based on deep near infra-red imaging ($\mathrm{K_{AB}<25}$) and
precise photometric redshifts from the ZFOURGE and UKIDSS surveys as well as
grism redshifts from 3DHST. Between 2013--2015 ZFIRE has observed the COSMOS
and UDS legacy fields over 13 nights and has obtained 211 galaxy redshifts over
$1.57<z<2.66$ from a combination of nebular emission lines (such as \Halpha,
\NII, \Hbeta, \OII, \OIII, \SII) observed at 1--2\micron. Based on our
medium-band NIR photometry, we are able to spectrophotometrically flux
calibrate our spectra to \around10\% accuracy. ZFIRE reaches $5\sigma$ emission
line flux limits of \around$\mathrm{3\times10^{-18}~erg/s/cm^2}$ with a
resolving power of $R=3500$ and reaches masses down to \around10$^{9}$\msol. We
confirm that the primary input survey, ZFOURGE, has produced photometric
redshifts for star-forming galaxies (including highly attenuated ones) accurate
to $\Delta z/(1+z\mathrm{_{spec})}=0.015$ with $0.7\%$ outliers. We measure a
slight redshift bias of $<0.001$, and we note that the redshift bias tends to
be larger at higher masses. We also examine the role of redshift on the
derivation of rest-frame colours and stellar population parameters from SED
fitting techniques. The ZFIRE survey extends spectroscopically-confirmed $z\sim
2$ samples across a richer range of environments, here we make available the
first public release of the data for use by the
community.\footnote{\url{http://zfire.swinburne.edu.au}}


title:
Cold-Mode Accretion: Driving the Fundamental Mass-Metallicity Relation
  at z~2

abstract:
  We investigate the star formation rate (SFR) dependence on the stellar mass
and gas-phase metallicity relation at z=2 with MOSFIRE/Keck as part of the
ZFIRE survey. We have identified 117 galaxies (1.98 < z < 2.56), with
$8.9\leq$log(M/M$_{\odot}$)$\leq11.0$, for which we can measure gas-phase
metallicities. For the first time, we show discernible difference between the
mass-metallicity relation, using individual galaxies, when deviding the sample
by low ($<10$~M$_{\odot}$yr$^{-1}$) and high ($>10$~M$_{\odot}$yr$^{-1}$) SFRs.
At fixed mass, low star-forming galaxies tend to have higher metallicity than
high star-forming galaxies. Using a few basic assumptions, we further show that
the gas masses and metallicities required to produce the fundamental
mass--metallicity relation, and its intrinsic scatter, are consistent with
cold-mode accretion predictions obtained from the OWLS hydrodynamical
simulations. Our results from both simulations and observations are suggestive
that cold-mode accretion is responsible for the fundamental mass-metallicity
relation at $z=2$ and demonstrates the direct relationship between cosmological
accretion and the fundamental properties of galaxies.


title:
Self-similarity in the chemical evolution of galaxies and the delay time
  distribution of SNe Ia

abstract:
  Recent improvements in the age dating of stellar populations and single stars
allow us to study the ages and abundance of stars and galaxies with
unprecedented accuracy. We here compare the relation between age and
\alpha-element abundances for stars in the solar neighborhood to that of local,
early-type galaxies. We find both relations to be very similar. Both fall into
two regimes with a flat slope for ages younger than ~9 Gyr and a steeper slope
for ages older than that value. This quantitative similarity seems surprising,
given the different types of galaxies and scales involved. For the sample of
early-type galaxies we also show that the data are inconsistent with literature
delay time distributions of either single or double Gaussian shape. The data
are consistent with a power law delay time distribution. We thus confirm that
the delay time distribution inferred for the Milky Way from chemical evolution
arguments also must apply to massive early-type galaxies. We also offer a
tentative explanation for the seeming universality of the age-[\alpha/Fe]
relation as the manifestation of averaging of different stellar populations
with varying chemical evolution histories.


title:
The Circumgalactic Medium of Submillimeter Galaxies. I. First Results
  from a Radio-Identified Sample

abstract:
  We present the first results from an on-going survey to characterize the
circumgalactic medium (CGM) of the massive high-redshift galaxies detected as
submillimeter galaxies (SMGs). We constructed a parent sample of 163 SMG-QSO
pairs with separations less than $\sim$36 arcsec by cross-matching
far-infrared-selected galaxies from Herschel with spectroscopically confirmed
QSOs. The Herschel sources were selected to match the properties of SMGs. We
determined the sub-arcsecond positions of six Herschel sources with the Very
Large Array and obtained secure redshift identification for three of those with
near-infrared spectroscopy. The QSO sightlines probe transverse proper
distances of 112, 157, and 198 kpc at foreground redshifts of 2.043, 2.515, and
2.184, respectively, which are comparable to the virial radius of the
$\sim10^{13}$ Msun halos expected to host SMGs. High-quality absorption-line
spectroscopy of the QSOs reveals systematically strong HI Lyman-alpha
absorption around all three SMGs, with rest-frame equivalent widths of
$\sim2-3$ \AA. However, none of the three absorbers exhibits compelling
evidence for optically thick HI gas or metal absorption, in contrast to the
dominance of strong neutral absorbers in the CGM of luminous $z \sim 2$ QSOs.
The low covering factor of optically thick HI gas around SMGs tentatively
indicates that SMGs may not have as prominent cool gas reservoirs in their
halos as the co-eval QSOs and that they may inhabit less massive halos than
previously thought.


title: H0LiCOW I. $H_0$ Lenses in COSMOGRAIL's Wellspring: Program Overview

abstract:
  Strong gravitational lens systems with time delays between the multiple
images allow measurements of time-delay distances, which are primarily
sensitive to the Hubble constant that is key to probing dark energy, neutrino
physics, and the spatial curvature of the Universe, as well as discovering new
physics. We present H0LiCOW ($H_0$ Lenses in COSMOGRAIL's Wellspring), a
program that aims to measure $H_0$ with $<3.5\%$ uncertainty from five lens
systems (B1608+656, RXJ1131-1231, HE0435-1223, WFI2033-4723 and HE1104-1805).
We have been acquiring (1) time delays through COSMOGRAIL and Very Large Array
monitoring, (2) high-resolution Hubble Space Telescope imaging for the lens
mass modeling, (3) wide-field imaging and spectroscopy to characterize the lens
environment, and (4) moderate-resolution spectroscopy to obtain the stellar
velocity dispersion of the lenses for mass modeling. In cosmological models
with one-parameter extension to flat $\Lambda$CDM, we expect to measure $H_0$
to $<3.5\%$ in most models, spatial curvature $\Omega_{\rm k}$ to 0.004, $w$ to
0.14, and the effective number of neutrino species to 0.2 (1$\sigma$
uncertainties) when combined with current CMB experiments. These are,
respectively, a factor of $\sim15$, $\sim2$, and $\sim1.5$ tighter than CMB
alone. Our data set will further enable us to study the stellar initial mass
function of the lens galaxies, and the co-evolution of supermassive black holes
and their host galaxies. This program will provide a foundation for extracting
cosmological distances from the hundreds of time-delay lenses that are expected
to be discovered in current and future surveys.


title: Shining Light on Quantum Gravity with Pulsar-Black Hole Binaries

abstract:
  Pulsars are some of the most accurate clocks found in nature, while black
holes offer a unique arena for the study of quantum gravity. As such,
pulsar-black hole (PSR-BH) binaries provide ideal astrophysical systems for
detecting the effects of quantum gravity. With the success of aLIGO and the
advent of instruments like the SKA and eLISA, the prospects for the discovery
of such PSR-BH binaries are very promising. We argue that PSR-BH binaries can
serve as ready-made testing grounds for proposed resolutions to the black hole
information paradox. We propose using timing signals from a pulsar beam passing
through the region near a black hole event horizon as a probe of quantum
gravitational effects. In particular, we demonstrate that fluctuations of the
geometry outside a black hole lead to an increase in the measured root mean
square deviation of the arrival times of pulsar pulses traveling near the
horizon. This allows for a clear observational test of the nonviolent
nonlocality proposal for black hole information escape. For a series of pulses
traversing the near-horizon region, this model predicts an rms in pulse arrival
times of $\sim30\ \mu$s for a $3 M_\odot$ black hole, $\sim0.3\, $ms for a $30
M_\odot$ black hole, and $\sim40\, $s for Sgr A*. The current precision of
pulse time-of-arrival measurements is sufficient to discern these rms
fluctuations. This work is intended to motivate observational searches for
PSR-BH systems as a means of testing models of quantum gravity.


title:
Cosmological hydrodynamical simulations of galaxy clusters: X-ray
  scaling relations and their evolution

abstract:
  We analyse cosmological hydrodynamical simulations of galaxy clusters to
study the X-ray scaling relations between total masses and observable
quantities such as X-ray luminosity, gas mass, X-ray temperature, and $Y_{X}$.
Three sets of simulations are performed with an improved version of the
smoothed particle hydrodynamics GADGET-3 code. These consider the following:
non-radiative gas, star formation and stellar feedback, and the addition of
feedback by active galactic nuclei (AGN). We select clusters with $M_{500} >
10^{14} M_{\odot} E(z)^{-1}$, mimicking the typical selection of
Sunyaev-Zeldovich samples. This permits to have a mass range large enough to
enable robust fitting of the relations even at $z \sim 2$. The results of the
analysis show a general agreement with observations. The values of the slope of
the mass-gas mass and mass-temperature relations at $z=2$ are 10 per cent lower
with respect to $z=0$ due to the applied mass selection, in the former case,
and to the effect of early merger in the latter. We investigate the impact of
the slope variation on the study of the evolution of the normalization. We
conclude that cosmological studies through scaling relations should be limited
to the redshift range $z=0-1$, where we find that the slope, the scatter, and
the covariance matrix of the relations are stable. The scaling between mass and
$Y_X$ is confirmed to be the most robust relation, being almost independent of
the gas physics. At higher redshifts, the scaling relations are sensitive to
the inclusion of AGNs which influences low-mass systems. The detailed study of
these objects will be crucial to evaluate the AGN effect on the ICM.


title:
Twisted modules and co-invariants for commutative vertex algebras of jet
  schemes

abstract:
  Let $Z \subset \mathbb{A}^k$ be an affine scheme over $\C$ and $\J Z$ its jet
scheme. It is well-known that $\mathbb{C}[\J Z]$, the coordinate ring of $\J
Z$, has the structure of a commutative vertex algebra. This paper develops the
orbifold theory for $\mathbb{C}[\J Z]$. A finite-order linear automorphism $g$
of $Z$ acts by vertex algebra automorphisms on $\mathbb{C}[\J Z]$. We show that
$\mathbb{C}[\J^g Z]$, where $\J^g Z$ is the scheme of $g$--twisted jets has the
structure of a $g$-twisted $\mathbb{C}[\J Z]$ module. We consider spaces of
orbifold coinvariants valued in the modules $\mathbb{C}[\J^g Z]$ on orbicurves
$[Y/G]$, with $Y$ a smooth projective curve and $G$ a finite group, and show
that these are isomorphic to $\mathbb{C}[Z^G]$.


title: The Simulator: An Engine to Streamline Simulations

abstract:
  The simulator is an R package that streamlines the process of performing
simulations by creating a common infrastructure that can be easily used and
reused across projects. Methodological statisticians routinely write
simulations to compare their methods to preexisting ones. While developing
ideas, there is a temptation to write "quick and dirty" simulations to try out
ideas. This approach of rapid prototyping is useful but can sometimes backfire
if bugs are introduced. Using the simulator allows one to remove the "dirty"
without sacrificing the "quick." Coding is quick because the statistician
focuses exclusively on those aspects of the simulation that are specific to the
particular paper being written. Code written with the simulator is succinct,
highly readable, and easily shared with others. The modular nature of
simulations written with the simulator promotes code reusability, which saves
time and facilitates reproducibility. The syntax of the simulator leads to
simulation code that is easily human-readable. Other benefits of using the
simulator include the ability to "step in" to a simulation and change one
aspect without having to rerun the entire simulation from scratch, the
straightforward integration of parallel computing into simulations, and the
ability to rapidly generate plots, tables, and reports with minimal effort.


title: Modeling confirmation bias and polarization

abstract:
  Online users tend to select claims that adhere to their system of beliefs and
to ignore dissenting information. Confirmation bias, indeed, plays a pivotal
role in viral phenomena. Furthermore, the wide availability of content on the
web fosters the aggregation of likeminded people where debates tend to enforce
group polarization. Such a configuration might alter the public debate and thus
the formation of the public opinion. In this paper we provide a mathematical
model to study online social debates and the related polarization dynamics. We
assume the basic updating rule of the Bounded Confidence Model (BCM) and we
develop two variations a) the Rewire with Bounded Confidence Model (RBCM), in
which discordant links are broken until convergence is reached; and b) the
Unbounded Confidence Model, under which the interaction among discordant pairs
of users is allowed even with a negative feedback, either with the rewiring
step (RUCM) or without it (UCM). From numerical simulations we find that the
new models (UCM and RUCM), unlike the BCM, are able to explain the coexistence
of two stable final opinions, often observed in reality. Lastly, we present a
mean field approximation of the newly introduced models.


title: Stripline kicker for integrable optics test accelerator

abstract:
  We present a design of a stripline kicker for Integrable Optics Test
Accelerator (IOTA). For its experimental program IOTA needs two full-aperture
kickers, capable to create an arbitrary controllable kick in 2D. For that
reason their strengths are variable in a wide range of amplitudes up to 16
mrad, and the pulse length 100 ns is less than a revolution period for
electrons. In addition, the kicker should have a physical aperture of 40 mm for
a proposed operation with proton beam, and an outer size of 70 mm to fit inside
existing quadrupole magnets to save space in the ring. Computer simulations
using CST Microwave Studio show high field uniformity and wave impedance close
to 50 {\Omega}.