title:
A Holistic Approach for Predicting Links in Coevolving Multilayer
  Networks

abstract:
  Networks extracted from social media platforms frequently include multiple
types of links that dynamically change over time; these links can be used to
represent dyadic interactions such as economic transactions, communications,
and shared activities. Organizing this data into a dynamic multiplex network,
where each layer is composed of a single edge type linking the same underlying
vertices, can reveal interesting cross-layer interaction patterns. In
coevolving networks, links in one layer result in an increased probability of
other types of links forming between the same node pair. Hence we believe that
a holistic approach in which all the layers are simultaneously considered can
outperform a factored approach in which link prediction is performed separately
in each layer. This paper introduces a comprehensive framework, MLP (Multilayer
Link Prediction), in which link existence likelihoods for the target layer are
learned from the other network layers. These likelihoods are used to reweight
the output of a single layer link prediction method that uses rank aggregation
to combine a set of topological metrics. Our experiments show that our
reweighting procedure outperforms other methods for fusing information across
network layers.


title:
Associating Grasp Configurations with Hierarchical Features in
  Convolutional Neural Networks

abstract:
  In this work, we provide a solution for posturing the anthropomorphic
Robonaut-2 hand and arm for grasping based on visual information. A mapping
from visual features extracted from a convolutional neural network (CNN) to
grasp points is learned. We demonstrate that a CNN pre-trained for image
classification can be applied to a grasping task based on a small set of
grasping examples. Our approach takes advantage of the hierarchical nature of
the CNN by identifying features that capture the hierarchical support relations
between filters in different CNN layers and locating their 3D positions by
tracing activations backwards in the CNN. When this backward trace terminates
in the RGB-D image, important manipulable structures are thereby localized.
These features that reside in different layers of the CNN are then associated
with controllers that engage different kinematic subchains in the hand/arm
system for grasping. A grasping dataset is collected using demonstrated
hand/object relationships for Robonaut-2 to evaluate the proposed approach in
terms of the precision of the resulting preshape postures. We demonstrate that
this approach outperforms baseline approaches in cluttered scenarios on the
grasping dataset and a point cloud based approach on a grasping task using
Robonaut-2.


title:
Method to Assess the Temporal Persistence of Potential Biometric
  Features: Application to Oculomotor, and Gait-Related Databases

abstract:
  Although temporal persistence, or permanence, is a well understood
requirement for optimal biometric features, there is no general agreement on
how to assess temporal persistence. We suggest that the best way to assess
temporal persistence is to perform a test-retest study, and assess test-retest
reliability. For ratio-scale features that are normally distributed, this is
best done using the Intraclass Correlation Coefficient (ICC). For 10 distinct
data sets (8 eye-movement related, and 2 gait related), we calculated the
test-retest reliability ('Temporal persistence') of each feature, and compared
biometric performance of high-ICC features to lower ICC features, and to the
set of all features. We demonstrate that using a subset of only high-ICC
features produced superior Rank-1-Identification Rate (Rank-1-IR) performance
in 9 of 10 databases (p = 0.01, one-tailed). For Equal Error Rate (EER), using
a subset of only high-ICC features produced superior performance in 8 of 10
databases (p = 0.055, one-tailed). In general, then, prescreening potential
biometric features, and choosing only highly reliable features will yield
better performance than lower ICC features or than the set of all features
combined. We hypothesize that this would likely be the case for any biometric
modality where the features can be expressed as quantitative values on an
interval or ratio scale, assuming an adequate number of relatively independent
features.


title: Template iterations of quadratic maps and hybrid Mandelbrot sets

abstract:
  As a particular problem within the field of non-autonomous discrete systems,
we consider iterations of two quadratic maps $f_{c_0}=z^2+c_0$ and
$f_{c_1}=z^2+c_1$, according to a prescribed binary sequence, which we call a
\emph{template}. We study the asymptotic behavior of the critical orbits, and
define the Mandelbrot set in this case as the locus for which these orbits are
bounded. However, unlike in the case of single maps, this concept can be
understood in several ways. For a fixed template, one may consider this locus
as a subset of the parameter space in $(c_0,c_1) \in \mathbb{C}^2$; for fixed
quadratic parameters, one may consider the set of templates which produce a
bounded critical orbit. In this paper, we consider both situations, as well as
\emph{hybrid} combinations of them, we study basic topological properties of
these sets and interpret them in light of potential applications.


title: The verbal width of acylindrically hyperbolic groups is infinite

abstract:
  We show that the verbal width is infinite for acylindrically hyperbolic
groups, which include hyperbolic groups, mapping class groups and Out(Fn).


title: Architecture and Co-Evolution of Allosteric Materials

abstract:
  We introduce a numerical scheme to evolve functional materials that can
accomplish a specified mechanical task. In this scheme, the number of
solutions, their spatial architectures and the correlations among them can be
computed. As an example, we consider an "allosteric" task, which requires the
material to respond specifically to a stimulus at a distant active site. We
find that functioning materials evolve a less-constrained trumpet-shaped region
connecting the stimulus and active sites and that the amplitude of the elastic
response varies non-monotonically along the trumpet. As previously shown for
some proteins, we find that correlations appearing during evolution alone are
sufficient to identify key aspects of this design. Finally, we show that the
success of this architecture stems from the emergence of soft edge modes
recently found to appear near the surface of marginally connected materials.
Overall, our in silico evolution experiment offers a new window to study the
relationship between structure, function, and correlations emerging during
evolution.


title: Pointed $p^3$-dimensional Hopf algebras in positive characteristic

abstract:
  We classify pointed $p^3$-dimensional Hopf algebras $H$ over any
algebraically closed field $k$ of prime characteristic $p>0$. In particular, we
focus on the cases when the group $G(H)$ of group-like elements is of order $p$
or $p^2$, that is, when $H$ is pointed but is not connected nor a group
algebra. This work provides many new examples of (parametrized) non-commutative
and non-cocommutative finite-dimensional Hopf algebras in positive
characteristic.


title: Canonical Lifts of Cycle Classes of Sections

abstract:
  We present the construction of canonical lifts of $\ell$-adic cycle classes
of sections of $p$-adic projective anabelian curves to the cohomology of
arbitrary proper, regular, flat models. This answers a question of Esnault and
Wittenberg.


title: On the controller-stopper problems with controlled jumps

abstract:
  We analyze the continuous time zero-sum and cooperative controller-stopper
games of Karatzas and Sudderth [Annals of Probability, 2001], Karatzas and
Zamfirescu [Annals of Probability, 2008] and Karatzas and Zamfirescu [Applied
Mathematics and Optimization, 2005] when the volatility of the state process is
controlled as in Bayraktar and Huang [SIAM Journal on Control and Optimization,
2013] but additionally when the state process has controlled jumps. We perform
this analysis by first resolving the stochastic target problems (of Soner and
Touzi [SIAM Journal on Control and Optimization, 2002; Journal of European
Mathematical Society, 2002]) with a cooperative or a non-cooperative stopper
and then embedding the original problem into the latter set-up. Unlike in
Bayraktar and Huang [SIAM Journal on Control and Optimization, 2013] our
analysis relies crucially on the Stochastic Perron method of Bayraktar and
Sirbu [SIAM Journal on Control and Optimization, 2013] but not the dynamic
programming principle, which is difficult to prove directly for games.


title:
Mixed QCD-EW corrections for Higgs boson production at $e^+e^-$
  colliders

abstract:
  Since the discovery of the Higgs boson at the Large Hadron Collider, a future
electron-position collider has been proposed for precisely studying its
properties. We investigate the production of the Higgs boson at such an
$e^+e^-$ collider associated with a $Z$ boson, and calculate for the first time
the mixed QCD-electroweak corrections to the total cross sections. We provide
an approximate analytic formula for the cross section and show that it
reproduces the exact numeric results rather well for collider energies up to
350 GeV. We also provide numeric results for $\sqrt{s}=500$ GeV, where the
approximate formula is no longer valid. We find that the
$\mathcal{O}(\alpha\alpha_s)$ corrections amount to a 1.3% increase of the
cross section for a center-of-mass energy around 240 GeV. This is significantly
larger than the expected experimental accuracy and has to be included for
extracting the properties of the Higgs boson from the measurements of the cross
sections in the future.


title: Some observational tests of a minimal galaxy formation model

abstract:
  Dark matter simulations can serve as a basis for creating galaxy histories
via the galaxy-dark matter connection. Here, one such model by Becker (2015) is
implemented with several variations on three different dark matter simulations.
Stellar mass and star formation rates are assigned to all simulation subhalos
at all times, using subhalo mass gain to determine stellar mass gain. The
observational properties of the resulting galaxy distributions are compared to
each other and observations for a range of redshifts from 0-2. Although many of
the galaxy distributions seem reasonable, there are noticeable differences as
simulations, subhalo mass gain definitions, or subhalo mass definitions are
altered, suggesting that the model should change as these properties are
varied. Agreement with observations may improve by including redshift
dependence in the added-by-hand random contribution to star formation rate.
There appears to be an excess of faint quiescent galaxies as well (perhaps due
in part to differing definitions of quiescence). The ensemble of galaxy
formation histories for these models tend to have more scatter around their
average histories (for a fixed final stellar mass) than the two more predictive
and elaborate semi-analytic models of Guo et al (2013) and Henriques et al
(2015), and require more basis fluctuations (using PCA) to capture 90 percent
of the scatter around their average histories.
  The codes to plot model predictions (in some cases alongside observational
data) are publicly available to test other mock catalogues at
https://github.com/jdcphysics/validation . Information on how to use these
codes is in the appendix.


title:
Curvaton reheating in non-minimal derivative coupling to gravity: NO
  models

abstract:
  The curvaton reheating mechanism in a non-minimal derivative coupling to
gravity for any non-oscillating (NO) model is studied. In this framework, we
analyze the energy density during the kinetic epoch and we find that this
energy has a complicated dependencies of the scale factor. Considering this
mechanism, we study the decay of the curvaton in two different scenarios and
also we determine the reheating temperatures. As an example the NO model, we
consider an exponential potential and we obtain the reheating temperature
indirectly from the inflation through of the number of e-folds.


title: Noisy Inductive Matrix Completion Under Sparse Factor Models

abstract:
  Inductive Matrix Completion (IMC) is an important class of matrix completion
problems that allows direct inclusion of available features to enhance
estimation capabilities. These models have found applications in personalized
recommendation systems, multilabel learning, dictionary learning, etc. This
paper examines a general class of noisy matrix completion tasks where the
underlying matrix is following an IMC model i.e., it is formed by a mixing
matrix (a priori unknown) sandwiched between two known feature matrices. The
mixing matrix here is assumed to be well approximated by the product of two
sparse matrices---referred here to as "sparse factor models." We leverage the
main theorem of Soni:2016:NMC and extend it to provide theoretical error bounds
for the sparsity-regularized maximum likelihood estimators for the class of
problems discussed in this paper. The main result is general in the sense that
it can be used to derive error bounds for various noise models. In this paper,
we instantiate our main result for the case of Gaussian noise and provide
corresponding error bounds in terms of squared loss.


title: Jackson's type estimate of nearly coconvex approximation

abstract:
  Suppose that a continuous on the real axis $2\pi$-periodic function $f$
changes its convexity at $2s,\ s\in\Bbb N,$ points $y_i$ on each period:
$-\pi\le y_{2s}<y_{2s-1}<...<y_1<\pi,$ and for the rest $i\in\Bbb Z,$ the
points $y_i$ are defined periodically. In the paper, for each $n\ge N,$ a
trigonometric polynomial $P_n$ of order $cn$ is found such that: $P_n$ has the
same convexity as $f,$ everywhere except, perhaps, the small neighborhoods of
the $y_i:$ $$ (y_i-\pi/n,y_i+\pi/n) $$ and $$ \|f-P_n\|\le
c(s)\,\omega_4(f,\pi/n), $$ where $N$ is a constant depending only on
$\min\limits_{i=1,...,2s}\{y_i-y_{i+1}\},\ c$ and $c(s)$ are constants
depending only on $s,\ \omega_4(f,\cdot)$ is the modulus of continuity of the
$4$-th order of the function $f,$ and $\|\cdot\|$ is the max-norm.


title: Self-Sustaining Iterated Learning

abstract:
  An important result from psycholinguistics (Griffiths & Kalish, 2005) states
that no language can be learned iteratively by rational agents in a
self-sustaining manner. We show how to modify the learning process slightly in
order to achieve self-sustainability. Our work is in two parts. First, we
characterize iterated learnability in geometric terms and show how a slight,
steady increase in the lengths of the training sessions ensures
self-sustainability for any discrete language class. In the second part, we
tackle the nondiscrete case and investigate self-sustainability for iterated
linear regression. We discuss the implications of our findings to issues of
non-equilibrium dynamics in natural algorithms.


title:
Fast Algorithms for Distributed Optimization and Hypothesis Testing: A
  Tutorial

abstract:
  We consider several problems in the field of distributed optimization and
hypothesis testing. We show how to obtain convergence times for these problems
that scale linearly with the total number of nodes in the network by using a
recent linear-time algorithm for the average consensus problem.


title:
Noise-induced phase transition in the model of human virtual stick
  balancing

abstract:
  Humans face the task of balancing dynamic systems near an unstable
equilibrium repeatedly throughout their lives. Much research has been aimed at
understanding the mechanisms of intermittent control in the context of human
balance control. The present paper deals with one of the recent developments in
the theory of human intermittent control, namely, the double-well model of
noise-driven control activation. We demonstrate that the double-well model can
reproduce the whole range of experimentally observed distributions under
different conditions. Moreover, we show that a slight change in the noise
intensity parameter leads to a sudden shift of the action point distribution
shape, that is, a phase transition is observed.


title: High-Fidelity VLA Imaging of the Radio Structure of 3C273

abstract:
  3C273, the nearest bright quasar, comprises a strong nuclear core and a
bright, one-sided jet extending ~ 23 arcseconds to the SW. The source has been
the subject of imaging campaigns in all wavebands. Extensive observations of
this source have been made with the Very Large Array and other telescopes as
part of a campaign to understand the jet emission mechanisms. Partial results
from the VLA radio campaign have been published, but to date, the complete set
of VLA imaging results has not been made available. We have utilized the VLA to
determine the radio structure of 3C273 in Stokes I, Q, and U, over the widest
possible frequency and resolution range. The VLA observed the source in all
four of its configurations, and with all eight of its frequency bands, spanning
73.8 MHz to 43 GHz. The data were taken in a pseudo-spectral line mode to
minimize the VLA's correlator errors, and were fully calibrated with subsequent
self-calibration techniques to maximise image fidelity. Images in Stokes
parameters I, Q, and U, spanning a resolution range from 6 arcseconds to 88
milliarcseconds are presented. Spectral index images, showing the evolution of
the jet component are shown. Polarimetry demonstrates the direction of the
magnetic fields responsible for the emission, and rotation measure maps show
the RM to be very small with no discernible trend along or across the jet. This
paper presents a small subset of these images to demonstrate the major
characteristics of the source emission. A library of all ~500 images has been
made available for open, free access by interested parties.


title: Tiling n X m rectangles with 1 X 1 and s X s squares

abstract:
  We consider tilings of a rectangle which is n units wide and m units long by
non-overlapping 1 X 1 squares and s X s squares. Bivariate generating functions
are computed with the Transfer Matrix Method for moderately large but fixed
widths n as a function of the parameter m and of the number of s X s squares in
the rectangle.


title:
A continuum mechanics-based musculo-mechanical model for esophageal
  transport

abstract:
  In this work, we extend our previous esophageal transport model using an
immersed boundary (IB) method with discrete fiber-based structures, to one
using a continuum mechanics-based model that is approximated based on finite
elements (IB-FE). To deal with the leakage of flow when the Lagrangian mesh
becomes coarser than the fluid mesh, we employ adaptive interaction quadrature
points for Lagrangian-Eulerian interaction equations based on a previous work.
In particular, we introduce a new anisotropic adaptive interaction quadrature
rule. The new rule permits us to vary the interaction quadrature points not
only at each time-step and element but also at different orientations per
element. For the material model, we extend our previous fiber-based model to a
continuum-based model. We first study a case in which a three-dimensional short
tube is dilated. Results match very well with those from the implicit FE
method. We remark that in our IB-FE case, the three-dimensional tube undergoes
a very large deformation and the Lagrangian mesh-size becomes about 6 times of
Eulerian mesh-size. To validate the method in handling fiber-matrix material
models, we perform a second study on dilating a long fiber-reinforced tube.
Errors are small when we compare numerical solutions with analytical solutions.
The technique is then applied to the problem of esophageal transport. We
present three cases that differ in the material model and muscle fiber
architecture. The overall transport features are consistent with those from the
previous model. We remark that the continuum-based model can handle more
realistic and complicated material behavior. This is demonstrated in our third
case with spatially varying fiber architecture. We find this unique muscle
fiber architecture could generate a so-called pressure transition zone. This
suggests an important role of muscle fiber architecture in esophageal
transport.


title: Vortex dynamics in coherently coupled Bose-Einstein condensates

abstract:
  In classical hydrodynamics with uniform density, vortices move with the local
fluid velocity. This description is rewritten in terms of forces arising from
the interaction with other vortices. Two such positive straight vortices
experience a repulsive interaction and precess in a positive (anticlockwise)
sense around their common centroid. A similar picture applies to vortices in a
two-component two-dimensional uniform Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) coherently
coupled through rf Rabi fields. Unlike the classical case, however, the rf Rabi
coupling induces an attractive interaction and two such vortices with positive
signs now rotate in the negative (clockwise) sense. Pairs of counter-rotating
vortices are instead found to translate with uniform velocity perpendicular to
the line joining their cores. This picture is extended to a single vortex in a
two-component trapped BEC. Although two uniform vortex-free components
experience familiar Rabi oscillations of particle-number difference, such
behavior is absent for a vortex in one component because of the nonuniform
vortex phase. Instead the coherent Rabi coupling induces a periodic vorticity
transfer between the two components.


title: Boundary crisis for degenerate singular cycles

abstract:
  The term boundary crisis refers to the destruction or creation of a chaotic
attractor when parameters vary. The locus of a boundary crisis may contain
regions of positive Lebesgue measure marking the transition from regular
dynamics to the chaotic regime. This article investigates the dynamics
occurring near a heteroclinic cycle involving a hyperbolic equilibrium point E
and a hyperbolic periodic solution P, such that the connection from E to P is
of codimension one and the connection from P to E occurs at a quadratic
tangency (also of codimension one). We study these cycles as organizing centers
of two-parameter bifurcation scenarios and, depending on properties of the
transition maps, we find different types of shift dynamics that appear near the
cycle. Breaking one or both of the connections we further explore the
bifurcation diagrams previously begun by other authors. In particular, we
identify the region of crisis near the cycle, by giving information on
multipulse homoclinic solutions to E and P as well as multipulse heteroclinic
tangencies from P to E, and bifurcating periodic solutions, giving partial
answers to the problems (Q1)-(Q3) of E. Knobloch (2008), Spatially localised
structures in dissipative systems: open problems, Nonlinearity, 21, 45-60.
Throughout our analysis, we focus on the case where E has real eigenvalues and
P has positive Floquet multipliers.


title:
Probability of coincidental similarity among the orbits of small bodies
  - I. Pairing

abstract:
  Probability of coincidental clustering among the orbits of comets, asteroids
and meteoroids depends on many factors like: the size of the orbital sample
searched for clusters or the size of the identified group, it is different for
groups of 2,3,4, ... members. Probability of coincidental clustering is
assessed by the numerical simulation, therefore, it depends also on the method
used for the synthetic orbits generation.
  We tested the impact of some of these factors. For a given size of the
orbital sample we have assessed probability of random pairing among several
orbital populations of different sizes. We have found how these probabilities
vary with the size of the orbital samples.
  Finally, keeping fixed size of the orbital sample we have shown that the
probability of random pairing can be significantly different for the orbital
samples obtained by different observation techniques. Also for the user
convenience we have obtained several formulae which, for given size of the
orbital sample, one can use to calculate the similarity threshold corresponding
to the small value of the probability of coincidental similarity among two
orbits.


title:
Large-scale magnetic field in the accretion discs of young stars: the
  influence of magnetic diffusion, buoyancy and Hall effect

abstract:
  We investigate the fossil magnetic field in the accretion and protoplanetary
discs using the Shakura and Sunyaev approach. The distinguishing feature of
this study is the accurate solution of the ionization balance equations and the
induction equation with Ohmic diffusion, magnetic ambipolar diffusion, buoyancy
and the Hall effect. We consider the ionization by cosmic rays, X-rays and
radionuclides, radiative recombinations, recombinations onto dust grains, and
also thermal ionization. The buoyancy appears as the additional mechanism of
magnetic flux escape in the steady-state solution of the induction equation.
Calculations show that Ohmic diffusion and magnetic ambipolar diffusion
constraint the generation of the magnetic field inside the `dead' zones. The
magnetic field in these regions is quasi-vertical. The buoyancy constraints the
toroidal magnetic field strength close to the disc inner edge. As a result, the
toroidal and vertical magnetic fields become comparable. The Hall effect is
important in the regions close to the borders of the `dead' zones because
electrons are magnetized there. The magnetic field in these regions is
quasi-radial. We calculate the magnetic field strength and geometry for the
discs with accretion rates $(10^{-8}-10^{-6})\,\rm{M}_{\odot}\,\rm{yr}^{-1}$.
The fossil magnetic field geometry does not change significantly during the
disc evolution while the accretion rate decreases. We construct the synthetic
maps of dust emission polarized due to the dust grain alignment by the magnetic
field. In the polarization maps, the `dead' zones appear as the regions with
the reduced values of polarization degree in comparison to those in the
adjacent regions.


title:
Multivariate normal approximation of the maximum likelihood estimator
  via the delta method

abstract:
  We use the delta method and Stein's method to derive, under regularity
conditions, explicit upper bounds for the distributional distance between the
distribution of the maximum likelihood estimator (MLE) of a $d$-dimensional
parameter and its asymptotic multivariate normal distribution. Our bounds apply
in situations in which the MLE can be written as a function of a sum of i.i.d.
$t$-dimensional random vectors. We apply our general bound to establish a bound
for the multivariate normal approximation of the MLE of the normal distribution
with unknown mean and variance.


title: Feynman Machine: The Universal Dynamical Systems Computer

abstract:
  Efforts at understanding the computational processes in the brain have met
with limited success, despite their importance and potential uses in building
intelligent machines. We propose a simple new model which draws on recent
findings in Neuroscience and the Applied Mathematics of interacting Dynamical
Systems. The Feynman Machine is a Universal Computer for Dynamical Systems,
analogous to the Turing Machine for symbolic computing, but with several
important differences. We demonstrate that networks and hierarchies of simple
interacting Dynamical Systems, each adaptively learning to forecast its
evolution, are capable of automatically building sensorimotor models of the
external and internal world. We identify such networks in mammalian neocortex,
and show how existing theories of cortical computation combine with our model
to explain the power and flexibility of mammalian intelligence. These findings
lead directly to new architectures for machine intelligence. A suite of
software implementations has been built based on these principles, and applied
to a number of spatiotemporal learning tasks.


title:
Dipole spin polarizabilities and gyrations of spin-1 particles in the
  Duffin-Kemmer-Petiau formalism

abstract:
  In this paper relativistic-invariant phenomenological Lagrangians of
interaction between spin-1 particles and electromagnetic field were obtained in
the Duffin-Kemmer-Petiau formalism on the basis of the covariant model that
takes into account both spin polarizabilities and gyrations of the
above-mentioned particles. It was shown that in the suggested covariant model
with regard to the crossing symmetry, spatial parity and gauge invariance
conservation laws, definite spin polarizabilities and gyrations of spin-1
particles contribute to the expansion of Compton scattering amplitude, starting
from the corresponding orders on energy of pfotons that is in the agreement
with low-energy theorems for that process.


title: Do dark matter halos explain lensing peaks?

abstract:
  We have investigated a recently proposed halo-based model, Camelus, for
predicting weak-lensing peak counts, and compared its results over a collection
of 162 cosmologies with those from N-body simulations. While counts from both
models agree for peaks with $\mathcal{S/N}>1$ (where $\mathcal{S/N}$ is the
ratio of the peak height to the r.m.s. shape noise), we find $\approx 50\%$
fewer counts for peaks near $\mathcal{S/N}=0$ and significantly higher counts
in the negative $\mathcal{S/N}$ tail. Adding shape noise reduces the
differences to within $20\%$ for all cosmologies. We also found larger
covariances that are more sensitive to cosmological parameters. As a result,
credibility regions in the $\{\Omega_m, \sigma_8\}$ are $\approx 30\%$ larger.
Even though the credible contours are commensurate, each model draws its
predictive power from different types of peaks. Low peaks, especially those
with $2<\mathcal{S/N}<3$, convey important cosmological information in N-body
data, as shown in \cite{DietrichHartlap, Kratochvil2010}, but \textsc{Camelus}
constrains cosmology almost exclusively from high significance peaks
$(\mathcal{S/N}>3)$. Our results confirm the importance of using a
cosmology-dependent covariance with at least a 14\% improvement in parameter
constraints. We identified the covariance estimation as the main driver behind
differences in inference, and suggest possible ways to make Camelus even more
useful as a highly accurate peak count emulator.


title: Local convergence and stability of tight bridge-addable graph classes

abstract:
  A class of graphs is bridge-addable if given a graph $G$ in the class, any
graph obtained by adding an edge between two connected components of $G$ is
also in the class. The authors recently proved a conjecture of McDiarmid,
Steger, and Welsh stating that if $\mathcal{G}$ is bridge-addable and $G_n$ is
a uniform $n$-vertex graph from $\mathcal{G}$, then $G_n$ is connected with
probability at least $(1+o_n(1))e^{-1/2}$. The constant $e^{-1/2}$ is best
possible since it is reached for the class of all forests.
  In this paper we prove a form of uniqueness in this statement: if
$\mathcal{G}$ is a bridge-addable class and the random graph $G_n$ is connected
with probability close to $e^{-1/2}$, then $G_n$ is asymptotically close to a
uniform $n$-vertex random forest in some local sense. For example, if the
probability converges to $e^{-1/2}$, then $G_n$ converges in the sense of
Benjamini-Schramm to the uniform infinite random forest $F_\infty$. This result
is reminiscent of so-called "stability results" in extremal graph theory, with
the difference that here the stable extremum is not a graph but a graph class.


title:
van der Waals Interactions in Hadron Resonance Gas: From Nuclear Matter
  to Lattice QCD

abstract:
  An extension of the ideal hadron resonance gas (HRG) model is constructed
which includes the attractive and repulsive van der Waals (VDW) interactions
between baryons. This VDW-HRG model yields the nuclear liquid-gas transition at
low temperatures and high baryon densities. The VDW parameters $a$ and $b$ are
fixed by the ground state properties of nuclear matter, and the temperature
dependence of various thermodynamic observables at zero chemical potential are
calculated within VDW-HRG model. Compared to the ideal HRG model, the inclusion
of VDW interactions between baryons leads to a qualitatively different behavior
of second and higher moments of fluctuations of conserved charges, in
particular in the so-called crossover region $T\sim 140 - 190$ MeV. For many
observables this behavior resembles closely the results obtained from lattice
QCD simulations. This hadronic model also predicts nontrivial behavior of
net-baryon fluctuations in the region of phase diagram probed by heavy-ion
collision experiments. These results imply that VDW interactions play a crucial
role in thermodynamics of hadron gas. Thus, the commonly performed comparisons
of the ideal HRG model with the lattice and heavy-ion data may lead to
misconceptions and misleading conclusions.


title: Multimodal Attention for Neural Machine Translation

abstract:
  The attention mechanism is an important part of the neural machine
translation (NMT) where it was reported to produce richer source representation
compared to fixed-length encoding sequence-to-sequence models. Recently, the
effectiveness of attention has also been explored in the context of image
captioning. In this work, we assess the feasibility of a multimodal attention
mechanism that simultaneously focus over an image and its natural language
description for generating a description in another language. We train several
variants of our proposed attention mechanism on the Multi30k multilingual image
captioning dataset. We show that a dedicated attention for each modality
achieves up to 1.6 points in BLEU and METEOR compared to a textual NMT
baseline.


title: Scaling limit for the ant in high-dimensional labyrinths

abstract:
  We study here a detailed conjecture regarding one of the most important cases
of anomalous diffusion, i.e the behavior of the "ant in the labyrinth". It is
natural to conjecture (see [16] and [8]) that the scaling limit for random
walks on large critical random graphs exists in high dimensions, and is
universal. This scaling limit is simply the natural Brownian Motion on the
Integrated Super-Brownian Excursion. We give here a set of four natural
sufficient conditions on the critical graphs and prove that this set of
assumptions ensures the validity of this conjecture. The remaining future task
is to prove that these sufficient conditions hold for the various classical
cases of critical random structures, like the usual Bernoulli bond percolation,
oriented percolation, spread-out percolation in high enough dimension. In the
companion paper [10], we do precisely that in a first case, the random walk on
the trace of a large critical branching random walk. We verify the validity of
these sufficient conditions and thus obtain the scaling limit mentioned above,
in dimensions larger than 14.


title:
Probing helicity and the topological origins of helicity via non-local
  Hanbury-Brown and Twiss correlations

abstract:
  Quantum Hall edge modes are chiral while quantum spin Hall edge modes are
helical. However, unlike chiral edge modes which always occur in topological
systems, quasi-helical edge modes may arise in a trivial insulator too. These
trivial quasi-helical edge modes are not topologically protected and therefore
need to be distinguished from helical edge modes arising due to topological
reasons. Earlier conductance measurements were used to identify these helical
states, in this work we report on the advantage of using the non local shot
noise as a probe for the helical nature of these states as also their
topological or otherwise origin and compare them with chiral quantum Hall
states. We see that in similar set-ups affected by same degree of disorder and
inelastic scattering, non local shot noise "HBT" correlations can be positive
for helical edge modes but are always negative for the chiral quantum Hall edge
modes. Further, while trivial quasi-helical edge modes exhibit negative
non-local "HBT" charge correlations, topological helical edge modes can show
positive non-local "HBT" charge correlation. We also study the non-local spin
correlations and Fano factor for clues as regards both the distinction between
chirality/helicity as well as the topological/trivial dichotomy for helical
edge modes.


title: Spheres as Frobenius objects

abstract:
  Following the pattern of the Frobenius structure usually assigned to the
1-dimensional sphere, we investigate the Frobenius structures of spheres in all
other dimensions. Starting from dimension $d=1$, all the spheres are
commutative Frobenius objects in categories whose arrows are
${(d+1)}$-dimensional cobordisms. With respect to the language of Frobenius
objects, there is no distinction between these spheres---they are all free of
additional equations formulated in this language. The corresponding structure
makes out of the 0-dimensional sphere not a commutative but a symmetric
Frobenius object. This sphere is mapped to a matrix Frobenius algebra by a
1-dimensional topological quantum field theory, which corresponds to the
representation of a class of diagrammatic algebras given by Richard Brauer.


title: Scaling limit for the ant in a simple labyrinth

abstract:
  We prove that, after suitable rescaling, the simple random walk on the trace
of a large critical branching random walk converges to the Brownian motion on
the integrated super-Brownian excursion.


title: On Prym varieties for the coverings of some singular plane curves

abstract:
  Let $k$ be a field of characteristic zero containing a primitive $n$-th root
of unity. Let $C^0_n$ be a singular plane curve of degree $n$ over $k$
admitting an order $n$ automorphism, $n$ nodes as the singularities, and $C_n$
be its normalization.
  In this paper we study the factors of Prym variety
$\mbox{Prym}(\widetilde{C}_n/C_n)$ associated to the double cover
$\widetilde{C}_n$ of $C_n$ exactly ramified at the points obtained by the
blow-up of the singularities. We provide explicit models of some algebraic
curves related to the construction of $\mbox{Prym}(\widetilde{C}_n/C_n)$ as a
Prym variety and determine the interesting simple factors other than elliptic
curves or hyperelliptic curves with small genus which come up in $J_n$ so that
the endomorphism rings contains the totally real field
$\mathbb{Q}(\zeta_n+\zeta^{-1}_n)$.


title: Quantum-gravity-induced dual lensing and IceCube neutrinos

abstract:
  Momentum-space curvature, which is expected in some approaches to the
quantum-gravity problem, can produce dual redshift, a feature which introduces
energy dependence of the travel times of ultrarelativistic particles, and dual
lensing, a feature which mainly affects the direction of observation of
particles. In our recent arXiv:1605.00496 we explored the possibility that dual
redshift might be relevant in the analysis of IceCube neutrinos, obtaining
results which are preliminarily encouraging. Here we explore the possibility
that also dual lensing might play a role in the analysis of IceCube neutrinos.
In doing so we also investigate issues which are of broader interest, such as
the possibility of estimating the contribution by background neutrinos and some
noteworthy differences between candidate "early neutrinos" and candidate "late
neutrinos".


title: Enhancing interfacial magnetization with a ferroelectric

abstract:
  Ferroelectric control of interfacial magnetism has attracted much attention.
However, the coupling of these two functionalities has not been understood well
at the atomic scale. The lack of scientific progress is mainly due to the
limited characterization methods by which the interface's magnetic properties
can be probed at an atomic level. Here, we use polarized neutron reflectometry
(PNR) to probe the evolution of the magnetic moment at interfaces in
ferroelectric/strongly correlated oxide [PbZr0.2Ti0.8O3/La0.8Sr0.2MnO3
(PZT/LSMO)] heterostructures. We find that there is always suppressed
magnetization at the surface and interface of LSMO and such magnetic
deterioration can be strongly improved by interfacing with a strongly polar PZT
film. The magnetoelectric coupling of magnetism and ferroelectric polarization
occurs within a couple of nanometers of the interface as demonstrated by the
enhanced interfacial magnetization beyond the bulk value by 5% depending on the
polarization of PZT. The latter value is 70% higher than the surface
magnetization of a LSMO film without interfacing with a ferroelectric layer.
These compelling results not only probe the presence of nanoscale magnetic
suppression and its control by ferroelectrics, but also emphasize the
importance of utilizing probing techniques that can distinguish between bulk
and interfacial phenomena.


title:
Structure of Optimal Solutions to Periodic-Review Total-Cost Inventory
  Control Models with Convex Costs and Backorders for all Values of Discount
  Factors

abstract:
  This paper describes the structure of optimal policies for discounted
periodic-review single-commodity total-cost inventory control problems with
fixed ordering costs for finite and infinite horizons. There are known
conditions in the literature for optimality of $(s_t,S_t)$ policies for
finite-horizon problems and the optimality of $(s,S)$ policies for
infinite-horizon problems. The results of this paper cover the situation, when
such assumption may not hold. This paper describes a parameter, which, together
with the value of the discount factor and the horizon length, defines the
structure of an optimal policy. For the infinite horizon, depending on the
values of this parameter and the discount factor, an optimal policy either is
an $(s,S)$ policy or never orders inventory. For a finite horizon, depending on
the values of this parameter, the discount factor, and the horizon length,
there are three possible structures of an optimal policy: (i) it is an
$(s_t,S_t)$ policy, (ii) it is an $(s_t,S_t)$ policy at earlier stages and then
does not order inventory, or (iii) it never orders inventory. The paper also
establishes continuity of optimal value functions and describes alternative
optimal actions at states $s_t$ and $s.$


title:
Octet Baryon Magnetic Moments from Lattice QCD: Approaching Experiment
  from a Three-Flavor Symmetric Point

abstract:
  Lattice QCD calculations with background magnetic fields are used to
determine the magnetic moments of the octet baryons. Computations are performed
at the physical value of the strange quark mass, and two values of the light
quark mass, one corresponding to the three-flavor symmetric point, where the
pion mass is 800 MeV, and the other corresponding to a pion mass of 450 MeV.
The moments are found to exhibit only mild pion-mass dependence when expressed
in terms of appropriately chosen magneton units- the natural baryon magneton. A
curious pattern is revealed among the anomalous baryon magnetic moments which
is linked to the constituent quark model, however, careful scrutiny exposes
additional features. Relations expected to hold in the large-Nc limit of QCD
are studied; and, in one case, a clear preference for the quark model over the
large-Nc prediction is found. The magnetically coupled Lambda-Sigma system is
treated in detail at the three-flavor symmetric point, with the lattice QCD
results comparing favorably with predictions based on SU(3)F symmetry. This
analysis enables the first extraction of the isovector transition magnetic
polarizability. The possibility that large magnetic fields stabilize strange
matter is explored, but such a scenario is found to be unlikely.


title: The CUDA LATCH Binary Descriptor: Because Sometimes Faster Means Better

abstract:
  Accuracy, descriptor size, and the time required for extraction and matching
are all important factors when selecting local image descriptors. To optimize
over all these requirements, this paper presents a CUDA port for the recent
Learned Arrangement of Three Patches (LATCH) binary descriptors to the GPU
platform. The design of LATCH makes it well suited for GPU processing. Owing to
its small size and binary nature, the GPU can further be used to efficiently
match LATCH features. Taken together, this leads to breakneck descriptor
extraction and matching speeds. We evaluate the trade off between these speeds
and the quality of results in a feature matching intensive application. To this
end, we use our proposed CUDA LATCH (CLATCH) to recover structure from motion
(SfM), comparing 3D reconstructions and speed using different representations.
Our results show that CLATCH provides high quality 3D reconstructions at
fractions of the time required by other representations, with little, if any,
loss of reconstruction quality.


title: Extremal Signatures

abstract:
  Let $E= A - iB$ be a Hermite-Biehler entire function of exponential type
$\tau/2$ where $A$ and $B$ are real entire, and consider $d\mu(x) =
dx/|E(x)|^2$. We show that the sign of the product $A B$ is an extremal
signature for the space of functions of exponential type $\tau$ with respect to
the norm of $L^1(\mu)$. This allows us to find best approximations by entire
functions of exponential type $\tau$ in $L^1(\mu)$-norm to certain special
functions (e.g., the Gaussian and the Poisson kernel).


title: Tuning Yu-Shiba-Rusinov States in a Quantum Dot

abstract:
  We present transport spectroscopy of sub-gap states in a bottom gated InAs
nanowire coupled to a normal lead and a superconducting aluminium lead. The
device shows clearly resolved sub-gap states which we can track as the coupling
parameters of the system are tuned and as the gap is closed by means of a
magnetic field. We systematically extract system parameters by using numerical
renormalization group theory fits as a level of the quantum dot is tuned
through a quantum phase transition electrostatically and magnetically. We also
give an intuitive description of sub-gap excitations.


title: The Brezis-Nirenberg problem for the curl-curl operator

abstract:
  We look for solutions $E:\Omega\to\mathbb{R}^3$ of the problem $$ \left\{
\begin{aligned} &\nabla\times(\nabla\times E) +\lambda E = |E|^{p-2}E &&\quad
\text{in }\Omega &\nu\times E = 0 &&\quad \text{on }\partial\Omega
\end{aligned} \right. $$ on a bounded Lipschitz domain
$\Omega\subset\mathbb{R}^3$, where $\nabla\times$ denotes the curl operator in
$\mathbb{R}^3$. The equation describes the propagation of the time-harmonic
electric field $\Re\{E(x)e^{i\omega t}\}$ in a nonlinear isotropic material
$\Omega$ with $\lambda=-\mu \varepsilon \omega^2\leq 0$, where $\mu$ and
$\varepsilon$ stand for the permeability and the linear part of the
permittivity of the material. The nonlinear term $|E|^{p-2}E$ with $p>2$ is
responsible for the nonlinear polarisation of $\Omega$ and the boundary
conditions are those for $\Omega$ surrounded by a perfect conductor. The
problem has a variational structure and we deal with the critical values $p$,
for instance, in convex domains $\Omega$ or in domains with $\mathcal{C}^{1,1}$
boundary $p=6=2^*$ is the Sobolev critical exponent and we get the quintic
nonlinearity in the equation. We show that there exist a cylindrically
symmetric ground state solution and a finite number of cylindrically symmetric
bound states depending on $\lambda\leq 0$. We develop a new critical point
theory which allows to solve the problem, and which enables us to treat more
general anisotropic media as well as other variational problems.


title:
Continuity of Equilibria for Two-Person Zero-Sum Games with Noncompact
  Action Sets and Unbounded Payoffs

abstract:
  This paper extends Berge's maximum theorem for possibly noncompact action
sets and unbounded cost functions to minimax problems and studies applications
of these extensions to two-player zero-sum games with possibly noncompact
action sets and unbounded payoffs. For games with perfect information, also
known under the name of turn-based games, this paper establishes continuity
properties of value functions and solution multifunctions. For games with
simultaneous moves, it provides results on the existence of lopsided values
(the values in the asymmetric form) and solutions. This paper also establishes
continuity properties of the lopsided values and solution multifunctions.


title: Entwinement in discretely gauged theories

abstract:
  We develop the notion of entwinement to characterize the amount of quantum
entanglement between internal, discretely gauged degrees of freedom in a
quantum field theory. This concept originated in the program of reconstructing
spacetime from entanglement in holographic duality. We define entwinement
formally in terms of a novel replica method which uses twist operators charged
in a representation of the discrete gauge group. In terms of these twist
operators we define a non-local, gauge-invariant object whose expectation value
computes entwinement in a standard replica limit. We apply our method to the
computation of entwinement in symmetric orbifold conformal field theories in
1+1 dimensions, which have an $S_N$ gauging. Such a theory appears in the weak
coupling limit of the D1-D5 string theory which is dual to AdS$_3$ at strong
coupling. In this context, we show how certain kinds of entwinement measure the
lengths, in units of the AdS scale, of non-minimal geodesics present in certain
excited states of the system which are gravitationally described as conical
defects and the $M=0$ BTZ black hole. The possible types of entwinement that
can be computed define a very large new class of quantities characterizing the
fine structure of quantum wavefunctions.


title: Classification of planar rational cuspidal curves. I. C**-fibrations

abstract:
  To classify complex rational cuspidal curves $E\subseteq \mathbb{P}^2$ it
remains to classify the ones with complement of log general type, i.e. the ones
for which $\kappa(K_X+D)=2$, where $(X,D)$ is a log resolution of
$(\mathbb{P}^2,E)$. It is conjectured that $\kappa(K_X+\frac{1}{2}D)=-\infty$
and hence $\mathbb{P}^2\setminus E$ is $\mathbb{C}^{**}$-fibered, where
$\mathbb{C}^{**}=\mathbb{C}^1\setminus\{0,1\}$, or $-(K_X+\frac{1}{2}D)$ is
ample on some minimal model of $(X,\frac{1}{2}D)$. Here we classify, up to a
projective equivalence, those rational cuspidal curves for which the complement
is $\mathbb{C}^{**}$-fibered. From the rich list of known examples only very
few are not of this type. We also discover a new infinite family of bicuspidal
curves with unusual properties.


title:
A Generic Bet-and-run Strategy for Speeding Up Traveling Salesperson and
  Minimum Vertex Cover

abstract:
  A common strategy for improving optimization algorithms is to restart the
algorithm when it is believed to be trapped in an inferior part of the search
space. However, while specific restart strategies have been developed for
specific problems (and specific algorithms), restarts are typically not
regarded as a general tool to speed up an optimization algorithm. In fact, many
optimization algorithms do not employ restarts at all.
  Recently, "bet-and-run" was introduced in the context of mixed-integer
programming, where first a number of short runs with randomized initial
conditions is made, and then the most promising run of these is continued. In
this article, we consider two classical NP-complete combinatorial optimization
problems, traveling salesperson and minimum vertex cover, and study the
effectiveness of different bet-and-run strategies. In particular, our restart
strategies do not take any problem knowledge into account, nor are tailored to
the optimization algorithm. Therefore, they can be used off-the-shelf. We
observe that state-of-the-art solvers for these problems can benefit
significantly from restarts on standard benchmark instances.


title: Fundamental limitation on quantum broadcast networks

abstract:
  The ability to distribute entanglement over complex quantum networks is an
important step towards a quantum internet. Recently, there has been significant
theoretical effort, mainly focusing on the distribution of bipartite
entanglement via a simple quantum network composed only of bipartite quantum
channels. There are, however, a number of quantum information processing
protocols based on multipartite rather than bipartite entanglement. Whereas
multipartite entanglement can be distributed by means of a network of bipartite
channels, a more natural way is to use a more general network, that is, a
quantum broadcast network including quantum broadcast channels. In this work,
we present a general frame- work for deriving upper bounds on the rates at
which GHZ states or multipartite private states can be distributed among a
number of different parties over an arbitrary quantum broadcast network. Our
upper bounds are written in terms of the multipartite squashed entanglement,
corresponding to a generalisation of recently derived bounds [K. Azuma et al.,
Nat. Commun. 7, 13523 (2016)]. We also discuss how lower bounds can be obtained
by combining a generalisation of an aggregated quantum repeater protocol with
graph theoretic concepts.


title: Mixed electroweak-QCD corrections to $e^+e^-\to HZ$ at Higgs factory

abstract:
  The prospective Higgs factories, exemplified by ILC, FCC-ee and CEPC, plan to
conduct the precision Higgs measurements at the $e^+e^-$ center-of-mass energy
around 250 GeV. The cross sections for the dominant Higgs production channel,
the Higgsstrahlung process, can be measured to a (sub-) percent accuracy.
Merely incorporating the well-known next-to-leading order (NLO) electroweak
corrections appears far from sufficient to match the unprecedented experimental
precision. In this work, we make an important advancement toward this direction
by investigating the mixed electroweak-QCD corrections to $e^+e^-\to HZ$ at
next-to-next-to-leading order (NNLO) for both unpolarized and polarized $Z$
boson. The corrections turn out to reach one percent level of the Born-order
results, thereby must be incorporated in the future confrontation with the
data.


title: SEAL's operating manual: a Spatially-bounded Economic Agent-based Lab

abstract:
  This text reports in detail how SEAL, a modeling framework for the economy
based on individual agents and firms, works. Thus, it aims to be an usage
manual for those wishing to use SEAL or SEAL's results. As a reference work,
theoretical and research studies are only cited. SEAL is thought as a Lab that
enables the simulation of the economy with spatially bounded
microeconomic-based computational agents. Part of the novelty of SEAL comes
from the possibility of simulating the economy in space and the instantiation
of different public offices, i.e. government institutions, with embedded
markets and actual data. SEAL is designed for Public Policy analysis,
specifically those related to Public Finance, Taxes and Real Estate.


title: Calibrating Cluster Number Counts with CMB lensing

abstract:
  CMB Stage-4 experiments will reduce the uncertainties on the gravitational
lensing potential by an order of magnitude compared to current measurements,
and will also produce a Sunyaev-Zel'dovich (SZ) cluster catalog containing
$\sim10^{5}$ objects, two orders of magnitudes higher than what is currently
available. In this paper we propose to combine these two observables and show
that it is possible to calibrate the masses of the full Stage-4 cluster catalog
internally owing to the high signal to noise measurement of the CMB lensing
convergence field. We find that a CMB Stage-4 experiment will constrain the
hydrostatic bias parameter to sub-percent accuracy. We also show constraints on
a non parametric $Y-M$ relationship which could be used to study its evolution
with mass and redshift. Finally we present a joint likelihood for thermal SZ
(tSZ) flux and mass measurements, and show that it could lead to a
$\sim5\sigma$ detection of the lower limit on the sum of the neutrino masses in
the normal hierarchy ($\sum m_{\nu}=60 \textrm{meV}$) once combined with
measurements of the primordial CMB and CMB lensing power spectra.


title: Finite Size Scaling of Topological Entanglement Entropy

abstract:
  We consider scaling of the entanglement entropy across a topological quantum
phase transition in one dimension. The change of the topology manifests itself
in a sub-leading term, which scales as $L^{-1/\alpha}$ with the size of the
subsystem $L$, here $\alpha$ is the R\'{e}nyi index. This term reveals the
universal scaling function $h_\alpha(L/\xi)$, where $\xi$ is the correlation
length, which is sensitive to the topological index.


title:
Stability and busy periods in a multiclass queue with state-dependent
  arrival rates

abstract:
  We introduce a multiclass single-server queueing system in which the arrival
rates depend on the current job in service. The system is characterized by a
matrix of arrival rates in lieu of a vector of arrival rates. Our proposed
model departs from existing state-dependent queueing models in which the
parameters depend primarily on the number of jobs in the system rather than on
the job in service. We formulate the queueing model and its corresponding fluid
model and proceed to obtain the necessary and sufficient conditions for
stability via fluid models. Utilizing the natural connection with the multitype
Galton-Watson processes, the Laplace-Stieltjes transform of busy periods in the
system is given. We conclude with tail asymptotics for the busy period for
heavy-tailed service time distributions for the regularly varying case.


title:
A light induced metastable magnetic texture uncovered by in-situ Lorentz
  microscopy

abstract:
  Magnetic topological defects, including vortices and Skyrmions, can be
stabilized as equilibrium structures by tuning intrinsic magnetic interactions
and stray field geometries. Here, employing rapid quench conditions, we report
the observation of a light-induced metastable magnetic texture, which consists
of a dense nanoscale network of vortices and antivortices and exhibits
glass-like properties. Our results highlight the emergence of complex ordering
regimes in optically driven magnetic systems, opening up new pathways to
harness ultrafast far-from-equilibrium relaxation processes.


title: A noncommutative version of Farber's topological complexity

abstract:
  Topological complexity for spaces was introduced by M. Farber as a minimal
number of continuity domains for motion planning algorithms. It turns out that
this notion can be extended to the case of not necessarily commutative
C*-algebras. Topological complexity for spaces is closely related to the
Lusternik--Schnirelmann category, for which we do not know any noncommutative
extension, so there is no hope to generalize the known estimation methods, but
we are able to evaluate the topological complexity for some very simple
examples of noncommutative C*-algebras.


title: Generalised divisor sums of binary forms over number fields

abstract:
  Estimating averages of Dirichlet convolutions $1 \ast \chi$, for some real
Dirichlet character $\chi$ of fixed modulus, over the sparse set of values of
binary forms defined over $\mathbb{Z}$ has been the focus of extensive
investigations in recent years, with spectacular applications to Manin's
conjecture for Ch\^atelet surfaces. We introduce a far-reaching generalization
of this problem, in particular replacing $\chi$ by Jacobi symbols with both
arguments having varying size, possibly tending to infinity. The main results
of this paper provide asymptotic estimates and lower bounds of the expected
order of magnitude for the corresponding averages. All of this is performed
over arbitrary number fields by adapting a technique of Daniel specific to
$1\ast 1$. This is the first time that divisor sums over values of binary forms
are asymptotically evaluated over any number field other than $\mathbb{Q}$. Our
work is a key step in the proof, given in subsequent work, of the lower bound
predicted by Manin's conjecture for all del Pezzo surfaces over all number
fields, under mild assumptions on the Picard number.


title: Interlayer electronic transport in CaMnBi$_{2}$ antiferromagnet

abstract:
  We report interlayer electronic transport in CaMnBi$_{2}$ single crystals.
Quantum oscillations and angular magnetoresistance suggest coherent electronic
conduction and valley polarized conduction of Dirac states. Small cyclotron
mass, large mobility of carriers and nontrivial Berry's phase are consistent
with the presence of Dirac fermions on the side wall of the warped cylindrical
Fermi surface. Similar to SrMnBi$_{2}$ that features an anisotropic Dirac cone,
our results suggest that magnetic field-induced changes in the interlayer
conduction are also present in layered bismuth-based materials with zero-energy
line in momentum space created by the staggered alkaline earth atoms.


title: Hund's rule-driven Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction at 3d-5d interfaces

abstract:
  Using relativistic first-principles calculations, we show that the chemical
trend of Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction (DMI) in 3d-5d ultrathin films
follows Hund's first rule with a tendency similar to their magnetic moments in
either the unsupported 3d monolayers or 3d-5d interfaces. We demonstrate that,
besides the spin-orbit coupling (SOC) effect in inversion asymmetric
noncollinear magnetic systems, the driving force is the 3d orbital occupation
and their spin flip/mixing processes with the spin-orbit active 5d states
control directly the sign and magnitude of the DMI. The magnetic chirality
changes are discussed in the light of the interplay between SOC, Hund's first
rule, and the crystal field splitting of d orbitals.


title: On the class of perfectly null sets and its transitive version

abstract:
  We introduce two new classes of special subsets of the real line: the class
of perfectly null sets and the class of sets which are perfectly null in the
transitive sense. These classes may play the role of duals to the corresponding
classes on the category side. We investigate their properties and, in
particular, we prove that every strongly null set is perfectly null in the
transitive sense, and that it is consistent with ZFC that there exists a
universally null set which is not perfectly null in the transitive sense.
Finally, we state some open questions concerning the above classes. Although
the main problem of whether the classes of perfectly null sets and universally
null sets are consistently different remains open, we prove some results
related to this question.


title:
The Camassa-Holm equation as an incompressible Euler equation: a
  geometric point of view

abstract:
  The group of diffeomorphisms of a compact manifold endowed with the L^2
metric acting on the space of probability densities gives a unifying framework
for the incompressible Euler equation and the theory of optimal mass transport.
Recently, several authors have extended optimal transport to the space of
positive Radon measures where the Wasserstein-Fisher-Rao distance is a natural
extension of the classical L^2-Wasserstein distance. In this paper, we show a
similar relation between this unbalanced optimal transport problem and the Hdiv
right-invariant metric on the group of diffeomorphisms, which corresponds to
the Camassa-Holm (CH) equation in one dimension. On the optimal transport side,
we prove a polar factorization theorem on the automorphism group of
half-densities.Geometrically, our point of view provides an isometric embedding
of the group of diffeomorphisms endowed with this right-invariant metric in the
automorphisms group of the fiber bundle of half densities endowed with an L^2
type of cone metric. This leads to a new formulation of the (generalized) CH
equation as a geodesic equation on an isotropy subgroup of this automorphisms
group; On S1, solutions to the standard CH thus give particular solutions of
the incompressible Euler equation on a group of homeomorphisms of R^2 which
preserve a radial density that has a singularity at 0. An other application
consists in proving that smooth solutions of the Euler-Arnold equation for the
Hdiv right-invariant metric are length minimizing geodesics for sufficiently
short times.


title:
Sets of FCS experiments to quantify free diffusion coefficients in
  reaction-diffusion systems. The case of Ca2+ and its dyes

abstract:
  Many cell signaling pathways involve the diffusion of messengers that
bind/unbind to intracellular components. Quantifying their net transport rate
under different conditions, then requires having separate estimates of their
free diffusion coefficient and binding/unbinding rates. In this paper, we show
how performing sets of Fluorescence Correlation Spectroscopy (FCS) experiments
under different conditions, it is possible to quantify free diffusion
coefficients and on and off rates of reaction-diffusion systems. We develop the
theory and present a practical implementation for the case of the universal
second messenger, calcium (Ca$^{2+}$) and single-wavelength dyes that increase
their fluorescence upon Ca$^{2+}$ binding. We validate the approach with
experiments performed in aqueous solutions containing Ca$^{2+}$ and Fluo4
dextran (both in its High and Low Affinity versions). Performing FCS
experiments with tetramethylrhodamine-dextran in Xenopus laevis oocytes, we
infer the corresponding free diffusion coefficients in the cytosol of these
cells. Our approach can be extended to other physiologically relevant
reaction-diffusion systems to quantify biophysical parameters that determine
the dynamics of various variables of interest.


title:
PSR B0329+54: Substructure in the scatter-broadened image discovered
  with RadioAstron on baselines up to 330,000 km

abstract:
  We have resolved the scatter-broadened image of PSR B0329+54 and detected
substructure within it. These results are not influenced by any extended
structure of a source but instead are directly attributed to the interstellar
medium. We obtained these results at 324 MHz with the ground-space
interferometer RadioAstron which included the space radio telescope (SRT),
ground-based Westerbork Synthesis Radio Telescope and 64-m Kalyazin Radio
Telescope on baseline projections up to 330,000 km in 2013 November 22 and 2014
January 1 to 2. At short 15,000 to 35,000 km ground-space baseline projections
the visibility amplitude decreases with baseline length providing a direct
measurement of the size of the scattering disk of 4.8$\pm$0.8 mas. At longer
baselines no visibility detections from the scattering disk would be expected.
However, significant detections were obtained with visibility amplitudes of 3
to 5% of the maximum scattered around a mean and approximately constant up to
330,000 km. These visibilities reflect substructure from scattering in the
interstellar medium and offer a new probe of ionized interstellar material. The
size of the diffraction spot near Earth is 17,000$\pm$3,000 km. With the
assumption of turbulent irregularities in the plasma of the interstellar
medium, we estimate that the effective scattering screen is located 0.6$\pm$0.1
of the distance from Earth toward the pulsar.


title: The macroscopic pancake bounce

abstract:
  We demonstrate that the so-called pancake bounce of millimetric water
droplets on surfaces patterned with hydrophobic posts [Nat. Phys. 10, 515
(2014)] can be reproduced on larger scales. In our experiment, a bed of nails
plays the role of the structured surface and a water balloon models the water
droplet. The macroscopic version largely reproduces the features of the
microscopic experiment, including the Weber number dependence and the reduced
contact time for pancake bouncing. The scalability of the experiment confirms
the mechanisms of pancake bouncing, and allows us to measure the force exerted
on the surface during the bounce. The experiment is simple and inexpensive and
is an example where front-line research is accessible to student projects.


title:
Constraining the Frequency of Free-Floating Planets from a Synthesis of
  Microlensing, Radial Velocity, and Direct Imaging Survey Results

abstract:
  A microlensing survey by Sumi et al. (2011) exhibits an overabundance of
short-timescale events (STEs; t_E<2 days) relative to what is expected from
known stellar populations and a smooth power-law extrapolation down to the
brown dwarf regime. This excess has been interpreted as a population of
~Jupiter-mass objects that outnumber main-sequence stars by nearly twofold;
however the microlensing data alone cannot distinguish between events due to
wide-separation (a>~10 AU) and free-floating planets. Assuming these STEs are
indeed due to planetary-mass objects, we aim to constrain the fraction of these
events that can be explained by bound but wide-separation planets. We fit the
observed timescale distribution with a lens mass function comprised of brown
dwarfs, main-sequence stars, and stellar remnants, finding and thus
corroborating the initial identification of an excess of STEs. We then include
a population of bound planets that are expected not to show signatures of the
primary lens (host) in their microlensing light curves and that are also
consistent with results from representative microlensing, radial velocity, and
direct imaging surveys. We find that bound planets alone cannot explain the
entire STE excess without violating the constraints from the surveys we
consider and thus some fraction of these events must be due to free-floating
planets, if our model for bound planets holds. We estimate a median fraction of
STEs due to free-floating planets to be f=0.67 (0.23-0.85 at 95% confidence)
when assuming "hot-start" planet evolutionary models and f=0.58 (0.14-0.83 at
95% confidence) for "cold-start" models. Assuming a delta-function distribution
of free-floating planets of mass m_p=2 M_Jup yields a number of free-floating
planets per main-sequence star of N=1.4 (0.48-1.8 at 95% confidence) in the
"hot-start" case and N=1.2 (0.29-1.8 at 95% confidence) in the "cold-start"
case.


title:
The Analytic Structure of Non-Global Logarithms: Convergence of the
  Dressed Gluon Expansion

abstract:
  Non-global logarithms (NGLs) are the leading manifestation of correlations
between distinct phase space regions in QCD and gauge theories and have proven
a challenge to understand using traditional resummation techniques. Recently,
the dressed gluon expansion was introduced that enables an expansion of the NGL
series in terms of a "dressed gluon" building block, defined by an all-orders
factorization theorem. Here, we clarify the nature of the dressed gluon
expansion, and prove that it has an infinite radius of convergence as a
solution to the leading logarithmic and large-$N_c$ master equation for NGLs,
the Banfi-Marchesini-Smye (BMS) equation. The dressed gluon expansion therefore
provides an expansion of the NGL series that can be truncated at any order,
with reliable uncertainty estimates. In contrast, manifest in the results of
the fixed-order expansion of the BMS equation up to 12-loops is a breakdown of
convergence at a finite value of $\alpha_s$log. We explain this finite radius
of convergence using the dressed gluon expansion, showing how the dynamics of
the buffer region, a region of phase space near the boundary of the jet that
was identified in early studies of NGLs, leads to large contributions to the
fixed order expansion. We also use the dressed gluon expansion to discuss the
convergence of the next-to-leading NGL series, and the role of collinear
logarithms that appear at this order. Finally, we show how an understanding of
the analytic behavior obtained from the dressed gluon expansion allows us to
improve the fixed order NGL series using conformal transformations to extend
the domain of analyticity. This allows us to calculate the NGL distribution for
all values of $\alpha_s$log from the coefficients of the fixed order expansion.


title: More Abelian Dualities in 2+1 Dimensions

abstract:
  We expand on the recent derivation of 3d dualities using bosonization. We
present in some detail a general class of Abelian duals.


title: Constraints on the symmetry noninheriting scalar black hole hair

abstract:
  Any recipe to grow black hole hair has to circumvent no-hair theorems by
violating some of their assumptions. Recently discovered hairy black hole
solutions exist due to the fact that their scalar fields don't inherit the
symmetries of the spacetime metric. We present here a general analysis of the
constraints which limit the possible forms of such a hair, for both the real
and the complex scalar fields. These results can be taken as a novel piece of
the black hole uniqueness theorems or simply as a symmetry noninheriting
Ans\"atze guide. In addition we introduce new classification of the
gravitational field equations which might prove useful for various
generalizations of the theorems about spacetimes with symmetries.


title:
A New Approach to the Internal Calibration of Reverberation Mapping
  Spectra

abstract:
  We present a new procedure for the internal (night-to-night) calibration of
time series spectra, with specific applications to optical AGN reverberation
mapping data. The traditional calibration technique assumes that the narrow
[OIII]$\lambda$5007 emission line profile is constant in time; given a
reference [OIII]$\lambda$5007 line profile, nightly spectra are aligned by
fitting for a wavelength shift, a flux rescaling factor, and a change in the
spectroscopic resolution. We propose the following modifications to this
procedure: 1) we stipulate a constant spectral resolution for the final
calibrated spectra, 2) we employ a more flexible model for changes in the
spectral resolution, and 3) we use a Bayesian modeling framework to assess
uncertainties in the calibration. In a test case using data for MCG+08-11-011,
these modifications result in a calibration precision of $\sim\! 1$
millimagnitude, which is approximately a factor of five improvement over the
traditional technique. At this level, other systematic issues (e.g., the
nightly sensitivity functions and FeII contamination) limit the final precision
of the observed light curves. We implement this procedure as a {\tt python}
package ({\tt mapspec}), which we make available to the community.


title:
Late-Time VLA Reobservations Rule Out ULIRG-Like Host Galaxies For Most
  Pre-Swift Long-Duration Gamma-Ray Bursts

abstract:
  We present new Jansky Very Large Array observations of five pre-Swift
gamma-ray bursts for which an ultraluminous (SFR > 100 M_sun/yr) dusty host
galaxy had previously been inferred from radio or submillimetre observations
taken within a few years after the burst. In four of the five cases we no
longer detect any source at the host location to limits much fainter than the
original observations, ruling out the existence of an ultraluminous galaxy
hosting any of these GRBs. We continue to detect a source at the position of
GRB 980703, but it is much fainter than it was a decade ago and the inferred
radio star-formation rate (~80 M_sun) is relatively modest. The radio
flattening at 200-1000 days observed in the light curve of this GRB may have
been caused by a decelerating counterjet oriented 180 degrees away from the
viewer, although an unjetted wind model can also explain the data. Our results
eliminate all well-established pre-Swift ULIRG hosts, and all cases for which
an unobscured GRB was found in a galaxy dominated by heavily-obscured
star-formation. When GRBs do occur in ULIRGs the afterglow is almost always
observed to be heavily obscured, consistent with the large dust opacities and
high dust covering fractions characteristic of these systems.


title:
A Revised Host Galaxy Association for GRB 020819B: A High-Redshift Dusty
  Starburst, Not a Low-Redshift Gas-Poor Spiral

abstract:
  The purported spiral host galaxy of GRB 020819B at z=0.41 has been seminal in
establishing our view of the diversity of long-duration gamma-ray burst
environments: optical spectroscopy of this host provided evidence that GRBs can
form even at high metallicities, while millimetric observations suggested that
GRBs may preferentially form in regions with minimal molecular gas. We report
new observations from VLT (MUSE and X-shooter) which demonstrate that the
purported host is an unrelated foreground galaxy. The probable radio afterglow
is coincident with a compact, highly star-forming, dusty galaxy at z=1.9621.
The revised redshift naturally explains the apparent nondetection of CO(3-2)
line emission at the afterglow site from ALMA. There is no evidence that
molecular gas properties in GRB host galaxies are unusual, and limited evidence
that GRBs can form readily at super-Solar metallicity.


title:
Discovery of a new subparsec counterjet in NGC 1275: the inclination
  angle and the environment

abstract:
  We report the detection of a new feature at the centre of NGC 1275 in the
Perseus cluster, hosting the radio source 3C 84. This feature emerges ~ 2 mas
(~ 0.8 pc) north of the central core in recent 15 and 43 GHz VLBA images, and
seems to be the counterjet to a known radio jet expanding to the south of the
core. Apparently, the two jets were born through an outburst around 2005. From
the ratio of the apparent lengths of the two jets from the core, we found that
the jet angle to the line of sight is \theta=65^\circ\pm 16^\circ, which is not
much different from the angle of the outer jets generated by an activity around
1959 and constrains theories on gamma-ray emission from jets. The new northern
jet has a strongly inverted spectrum in contrast with the southern jet. This
suggests that the central black hole is surrounded by a subparsec-scale
accretion disk with the density of >~ 10^5 cm^-3. The brightness of the
counterjet suggests that the disk is highly inhomogeneous. The ambient gas
density in the direction of the jet is ~ 8 cm^-3 if the current jet activity is
similar to the past average.


title:
The Origin of Double-peaked Narrow Lines in Active Galactic Nuclei II:
  Kinematic Classifications for the Population at z < 0.1

abstract:
  We present optical longslit observations of the complete sample of 71 Type 2
active galactic nuclei (AGNs) with double-peaked narrow emission lines at $z <
0.1$ in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. Double-peaked emission lines are produced
by a variety of mechanisms including disk rotation, kpc-scale dual AGNs, and
NLR kinematics (outflows or inflows). We develop a novel kinematic
classification technique to determine the nature of these objects using
longslit spectroscopy alone. We determine that 86% of the double-peaked
profiles are produced by moderate luminosity AGN outflows, 6% are produced by
rotation, and 8% are ambiguous. While we are unable to directly identify dual
AGNs with longslit data alone, we explore their potential kinematic
classifications with this method. We also find a positive correlation between
the narrow-line region (NLR) size and luminosity of the AGN NLRs
(R$_{\mathrm{NLR}}\propto \; {\mathrm{L}_{\mathrm{[OIII]}}}^{0.21 \pm 0.05}$),
indicating a clumpy two-zone ionization model for the NLR.


title:
Single Molecule Fluorescence Imaging as a Technique for Barium Tagging
  in Neutrinoless Double Beta Decay

abstract:
  Background rejection is key to success for future neutrinoless double beta
decay experiments. To achieve sensitivity to effective Majorana lifetimes of
$\sim10^{28}$ years, backgrounds must be controlled to better than 0.1 count
per ton per year, beyond the reach of any present technology. In this paper we
propose a new method to identify the birth of the barium daughter ion in the
neutrinoless double beta decay of $^{136}$Xe. The method adapts Single Molecule
Fluorescent Imaging, a technique from biochemistry research with demonstrated
single ion sensitivity. We explore possible SMFI dyes suitable for the problem
of barium ion detection in high pressure xenon gas, and develop a fiber-coupled
sensing system with which we can detect the presence of bulk Ba$^{++}$ ions
remotely. We show that our sensor produces signal-to-background ratios as high
as 85 in response to Ba$^{++}$ ions when operated in aqueous solution. We then
describe the next stage of this R\&D program, which will be to demonstrate
chelation and fluorescence in xenon gas. If a successful barium ion tag can be
developed using SMFI adapted for high pressure xenon gas detectors, the first
essentially zero background, ton-scale neutrinoless double beta decay
technology could be realized.


title: Detection of HI in Emission in the Lyman Alpha Emitting Galaxy Haro 11

abstract:
  We present the first robust detection of HI 21 cm emission in the blue
compact galaxy Haro 11 using the 100m Robert C. Byrd Green Bank Telescope
(GBT). Haro 11 is a luminous blue compact galaxy with emission in both Lyman
Alpha and the Lyman continuum. We detect (5.1 $\pm$ 0.7 $\times$10$^8$)
M$_{\odot}$ of HI gas at an assumed distance of 88 Mpc, making this galaxy HI
deficient compared to other local galaxies with similar optical properties.
Given this small HI mass, Haro 11 has an elevated M$_{H2}$/M$_{HI}$ ratio and a
very low gas fraction compared to most local galaxies, and contains twice as
much mass in ionized hydrogen as in neutral hydrogen. The HI emission has a
linewidth of 71 kms$^{-1}$ and is offset 60 kms$^{-1}$ redward of the optical
line center. It is undergoing a starburst after a recent merger which has
elevated the star formation rate, and will deplete the gas supply in $<$ 0.2
Gyr. Although this starburst has elevated the SFR compared to galaxies with
similar HI masses and linewidths, Haro 11 matches a trend of lower gas
fractions toward higher star formation rates and is below the general trend of
increasing HI mass with increasing luminosity. Taken together, our results
paint Haro 11 as a standard low-mass galaxy that is undergoing an unusually
efficient star formation episode.


title:
Discovery of an Enormous Ly$\alpha$ nebula in a massive galaxy
  overdensity at $z=2.3$

abstract:
  Enormous Ly$\alpha$ Nebulae (ELANe), unique tracers of galaxy density peaks,
are predicted to lie at the nodes and intersections of cosmic filamentary
structures. Previous successful searches for ELANe have focused on wide-field
narrowband surveys, or have targeted known sources such as ultraluminous
quasi-stellar-objects (QSOs) or radio galaxies. Utilizing groups of coherently
strong Ly$\alpha$ absorptions (CoSLAs), we have developed a new method to
identify high-redshift galaxy overdensities and have identified an extremely
massive overdensity, BOSS1441, at $z=2-3$ (Cai et al. 2016a). In its density
peak, we discover an ELAN that is associated with a relatively faint continuum.
To date, this object has the highest diffuse Ly$\alpha$ nebular luminosity of
$L_{\rm{nebula}}=5.1\pm0.1\times10^{44}$ erg s$^{-1}$. Above the 2$\sigma$
surface brightness limit of SB$_{\rm{Ly\alpha}}= 4.8\times10^{-18}$ erg
s$^{-1}$ cm$^{-2}$ arcsec$^{-2}$, this nebula has an end-to-end spatial extent
of 442 kpc. This radio-quiet source also has extended \civ\ $\lambda1549$ and
\heii\ $\lambda1640$ emission on $\gtrsim30$ kpc scales. Note that the
Ly$\alpha$, \heii\ and \civ\ emission all have double-peaked line profiles.
Each velocity component has a full-width-half-maximum (FWHM) of $\approx700 -
1000$ km s$^{-1}$. We argue that this Ly$\alpha$ nebula could be powered by
shocks due to an AGN-driven outflow or/and photoionization by a strongly
obscured source.


title: Cosmology with Peculiar Velocities: Observational Effects

abstract:
  In this paper we investigate how observational effects could possibly bias
cosmological inferences from peculiar velocity measurements. Specifically, we
look at how bulk flow measurements are compared with theoretical predictions.
Usually bulk flow calculations try to approximate the flow that would occur in
a sphere around the observer. Using the Horizon Run 2 simulation we show that
the traditional methods for bulk flow estimation can overestimate the magnitude
of the bulk flow for two reasons: when the survey geometry is not spherical
(the data do not cover the whole sky), and when the observations undersample
the velocity distributions. Our results may explain why several bulk flow
measurements found bulk flow velocities that seem larger than those expected in
standard {\Lambda}CDM cosmologies. We recommend a different approach when
comparing bulk flows to cosmological models, in which the theoretical
prediction for each bulk flow measurement is calculated specifically for the
geometry and sampling rate of that survey. This means that bulk flow values
will not be comparable between surveys, but instead they are comparable with
cosmological models, which is the more important measure.


title:
Filling-enforced Kondo semimetals in two-dimensional non-symmorphic
  crystals

abstract:
  We study the competition between Kondo screening and frustrated magnetism on
the non-symmorphic Shastry-Sutherland Kondo lattice at a filling of two
conduction electrons per unit cell. A previous analysis of this model
identified a set of gapless partially Kondo screened phases intermediate
between the Kondo-destroyed paramagnet and the heavy Fermi liquid. Based on
crystal symmetries, we argue that (i)~both the paramagnet and the heavy Fermi
liquid are {\it semimetals} protected by a glide symmetry; and (ii)~partial
Kondo screening breaks the symmetry, removing this protection and allowing the
partially-Kondo-screened phase to be deformed into a Kondo insulator via a
Lifshitz transition. We confirm these results using large-$N$ mean field theory
and then use non-perturbative arguments to derive a generalized Luttinger sum
rule constraining the phase structure of 2D non-symmorphic Kondo lattices
beyond the mean-field limit.


title: Probing the gamma-ray variability in 3C279 using broadband observations

abstract:
  We present the results of a broadband radio-to-GeV observing campaign
organized to get a better understanding of the radiation processes responsible
for the $\gamma$-ray flares observed in 3C 279. The total intensity and
polarization observations of the source were carried out between December 28,
2013 and January 03, 2014 using the Fermi-LAT, Swift-XRT, Swift-UVOT, and KVN
telescopes. A prominent flare observed in the optical/near-UV passbands was
found to be correlated with a concurrent $\gamma$-ray flare at a confidence
level $>$95$\%$, which suggests a co-spatial origin of the two. Moreover, the
flaring activity in the two regimes was accompanied by no significant spectral
variations. A peak in the X-ray light curve coincides with the peaks of the
fractional polarization curves at 43 and 86 GHz radio bands. No prominent
variation was noticed for the total intensity and the electric vector position
angle (EVPA) observations at radio bands during this period. We noticed a
possible hint of steepening of the radio spectrum with an increase in
percentage polarization, which suggests that the radio polarization variations
could be simply due to a spectral change. In a simple scenario, the correlated
optical/$\gamma$-ray flares could be caused by the same population of emitting
particles. The coincidence of the increase in radio polarization with the X-ray
flux supports the picture that X-rays are produced via inverse-Compton
scattering of radio photons. The observed fractional variability for the
$\gamma$-ray flare $\sim$0.23 does not exceed that in the optical regime, which
is inconsistent with what we usually observe for 3C 279; it could be due to
different dependencies of the magnetic field and the external radiation field
energy density profiles along the jet.


title: Higgsed Chromo-Natural Inflation

abstract:
  We demonstrate that Chromo-Natural Inflation can be made consistent with
observational data if the SU(2) gauge symmetry is spontaneously broken. Working
in the Stueckelberg limit, we show that isocurvature is negligible, and the
resulting adiabatic fluctuations can match current observational constraints.
Observable levels of chirally-polarized gravitational radiation ($r\sim
10^{-3}$) can be produced while the evolution of all background fields is
sub-Planckian. The gravitational wave spectrum is amplified via linear mixing
with the gauge field fluctuations, and its amplitude is not simply set by the
Hubble rate during inflation. This allows observable gravitational waves to be
produced for an inflationary energy scale below the GUT scale. The tilt of the
resulting gravitational wave spectrum can be either blue or red.


title:
Explaining Dark Matter and $B$ Decay Anomalies with an $L_\mu - L_\tau$
  Model

abstract:
  We present a dark sector model based on gauging the $L_\mu - L_\tau$ symmetry
that addresses anomalies in $b \rightarrow s \mu^+ \mu^-$ decays and that
features a particle dark matter candidate. The dark matter particle candidate
is a vector-like Dirac fermion coupled to the $Z^\prime$ gauge boson of the
$L_{\mu}-L_{\tau}$ symmetry. We compute the dark matter thermal relic density,
its pair-annihilation cross section, and the loop-suppressed dark
matter-nucleon scattering cross section, and compare our predictions with
current and future experimental results. We demonstrate that after taking into
account bounds from $B_s$ meson oscillations, dark matter direct detection, and
the CMB, the model is highly predictive: $B$ physics anomalies and a viable
particle dark matter candidate, with a mass of $\sim (5-23)$~GeV, can be
accommodated only in a tightly-constrained region of parameter space, with
sharp predictions for future experimental tests. The viable region of parameter
space expands if the dark matter is allowed to have $L_\mu-L_\tau$ charges that
are smaller than those of the SM leptons.


title:
Direct detection of scattered light gaps in the transitional disk around
  HD 97048 with VLT/SPHERE

abstract:
  We studied the well known circumstellar disk around the Herbig Ae/Be star HD
97048 with high angular resolution to reveal undetected structures in the disk,
which may be indicative of disk evolutionary processes such as planet
formation. We used the IRDIS near-IR subsystem of the extreme adaptive optics
imager SPHERE at the ESO/VLT to study the scattered light from the
circumstellar disk via high resolution polarimetry and angular differential
imaging. We imaged the disk in unprecedented detail and revealed four ring-like
brightness enhancements and corresponding gaps in the scattered light from the
disk surface with radii between 39 au and 341 au. We derived the inclination
and position angle as well as the height of the scattering surface of the disk
from our observational data. We found that the surface height profile can be
described by a single power law up to a separation ~270 au. Using the surface
height profile we measured the scattering phase function of the disk and found
that it is well consistent with theoretical models of compact dust aggregates.
We discuss the origin of the detected features and find that low mass (< 1
M_Jup) nascent planets are a possible explanation.


title: Conformal loop quantum gravity coupled to the Standard Model

abstract:
  We argue that a conformally invariant extension of general relativity coupled
to the Standard Model is the fundamental theory that needs to be quantized. We
show that it can be treated by loop quantum gravity techniques. Through a gauge
fixing and a modified Higgs mechanism particles acquire mass and one recovers
general relativity coupled to the Standard Model. The theory suggests new views
with respect to the definition of the Hamiltonian constraint in loop quantum
gravity, the semi-classical limit and the issue of finite renormalization in
quantum field theory in quantum space-time. It also gives hints about the
elimination of ambiguities that arise in quantum field theory in quantum
space-time in the calculation of back-reaction.


title: A Cubic-Time 2-Approximation Algorithm for rSPR Distance

abstract:
  Due to hybridization events in evolution, studying two different genes of a
set of species may yield two related but different phylogenetic trees for the
set of species. In this case, we want to measure the dissimilarity of the two
trees. The rooted subtree prune and regraft (rSPR) distance of the two trees
has been used for this purpose. The problem of computing the rSPR distance of
two given trees has many applications but is unfortunately NP-hard. The
previously best approximation algorithm for rSPR distance achieves a ratio of
2.5 and it was open whether a better approximation algorithm for rSPR distance
exists. In this paper, we answer this question in the affirmative by presenting
a cubic-time approximation algorithm for rSPR distance that achieves a ratio of
2. Our algorithm is based on the new notion of key and a number of new
structural lemmas. The algorithm is fairly simple and the proof of its
correctness is intuitively understandable albeit complicated.


title:
Magnetic fields induced by a mechanical singularity in a magnetoelastic
  half plane and their applications to the seismicities in the crust of the
  Chinese continent

abstract:
  The interaction between the magnetic field and the elastic deformation field
in the crust is studied in a simplified way. The magnetic fields generated by
the line singularities in a magnetized elastic half-plane are investigated.
Using the general solution and Fourier transform technique, the exact solutions
for the generated magnetic inductions due to various cases are obtained in a
closed form. The results show that the line concentrated force will induced a
perturbed magnetic field; The induced magnetic field will indicate the line
concentrated force in reverse. The distribution of the vertical component of
the magnetic induction caused by the line mechanical singularities is simpler
than that of the horizontal component, and it is zero at the origin when the
applied magnetic field and the line concentrated force satisfies some
conditions. This result is applied to locate the epicenters of the earthquakes
and historical earthquakes occurred in the Chinese continental crust. Results
show that more than 80\% epicenters are at or near the zero-contours of the
vertical component of the magnetic induction observed from satellite. These
regions of zero-contours, especially those in active tectonic zones, could be
the possible seismogenic zones in the future. The zero-contours of the vertical
component of the magnetic induction from satellite could be as geophysical
constraints to the risk information on the shallow seismicities, or they can be
used as an early monitor for the shallow seismicities in the continental crust,
or an auxiliary sign in the determination of the great historical earthquake.


title: Exploring the magnetic field configuration in BL Lac using GMVA

abstract:
  The high radio frequency polarization imaging of non-thermal emission from
active galactic nuclei (AGN) is a direct way to probe the magnetic field
strength and structure in the immediate vicinity of supermassive black holes
(SMBHs) and is crucial in testing the jet-launching scenario. To explore the
the magnetic field configuration at the base of jets in blazars, we took
advantage of the full polarization capabilities of the Global Millimeter VLBI
Array (GMVA). With an angular resolution of $\sim$50 micro-arcseconds ($\mu$as)
at 86 GHz, one could resolve scales up to $\sim$450 gravitational radii (for a
10$^9$ solar mass black hole at a redshift of 0.1). We present here the
preliminary results of our study on the blazar BL~Lac. Our results suggest that
on sub-mas scales the core and the central jet of BL Lac are significantly
polarized with two distinct regions of polarized intensity. We also noted a
great morphological similarity between the 7mm/3mm VLBI images at very similar
angular resolution.


title: Photometric and astrometric vagaries of the enigma star KIC 8462852

abstract:
  We apply a PCA-based pre-whitening method to the entire collection of main
Kepler mission long-cadence data for KIC 8462852 spanning four years. This
technique removes the correlated variations of instrumental origin in both the
detected light curves and astrometry, resolving intrinsic changes in flux and
image position of less than 100 ppm and 1 mas, respectively. Beside the major
dips in the light curve during mission quarters 8 and 16, when the flux dropped
by up to 20%, we confirm multiple smaller dips across the time span of
observation with amplitudes ranging from 0.1% to 7%. A variation of flux with a
period of 0.88 d and a half-amplitude of approximately 90 ppm is confirmed in
the PCA-cleaned data. We find that the phase of the wave is steady over the
entire 15-month interval. We confidently detect a weak variability-induced
motion (VIM) effect in the cleaned astrometric trajectories, when the
moment-based centroids shift synchronously with the flux dips by up to 0.0008
pixels on the detector. The inconsistent magnitude and direction of VIM effects
within the same quarter point at more than one source of photometric
variability in the blended image. The 0.88 d periodicity comes from a different
source, not from the target star KIC 8462852. We discuss a possible
interpretation of the bizarre properties of the source as a swarm of
interstellar junk (comets and planetoids) crossing the line of sight to the
star and its optical companions at approximately 7 mas per year.


title: On Human Consciousness

abstract:
  We consider the implications of the mathematical analysis of
neurone-to-neurone dynamical complex networks. We show how the dynamical
behaviour of small scale strongly connected networks lead naturally to
non-binary information processing and thus multiple hypothesis decision making,
even at the very lowest level of the brain's architecture. In turn we build on
these ideas to address the hard problem of consciousness. We discuss how a
proposed "dual hierarchy model", made up form of both external perceived,
physical, elements of increasing complexity, and internal mental elements
(experiences), may support a leaning and evolving consciousness. We discuss the
idea that a human brain ought to be able to re-conjure subjective mental
feelings at will and thus these cannot depend on internal nose (chatter) or
internal instability-driven activity. An immediate consequence of this model,
grounded in dynamical systems and non-binary information processing, is that
finite human brains must always be learning or forgetteing and that any
possible subjective internal feeling that may be idealised with a countable
infinity of facets, can never be learned by zombies or automata: though it can
be experienced more and more fully by an evolving brain (yet never in totality,
not even in a lifetime).