title: The Complexity of Synchronizing Markov Decision Processes

abstract:
  We consider Markov decision processes (MDP) as generators of sequences of
probability distributions over states. A probability distribution is
p-synchronizing if the probability mass is at least p in a single state, or in
a given set of states. We consider four temporal synchronizing modes: a
sequence of probability distributions is always p-synchronizing, eventually
p-synchronizing, weakly p-synchronizing, or strongly p-synchronizing if,
respectively, all, some, infinitely many, or all but finitely many
distributions in the sequence are p-synchronizing.
  For each synchronizing mode, an MDP can be (i) sure winning if there is a
strategy that produces a 1-synchronizing sequence; (ii) almost-sure winning if
there is a strategy that produces a sequence that is, for all epsilon > 0, a
(1-epsilon)-synchronizing sequence; (iii) limit-sure winning if for all epsilon
> 0, there is a strategy that produces a (1-epsilon)-synchronizing sequence.
  We provide fundamental results on the expressiveness, decidability, and
complexity of synchronizing properties for MDPs. For each synchronizing mode,
we consider the problem of deciding whether an MDP is sure, almost-sure, or
limit-sure winning, and we establish matching upper and lower complexity bounds
of the problems: for all winning modes, we show that the problems are
PSPACE-complete for eventually and weakly synchronizing, and PTIME-complete for
always and strongly synchronizing. We establish the memory requirement for
winning strategies, and we show that all winning modes coincide for always
synchronizing, and that the almost-sure and limit-sure winning modes coincide
for weakly and strongly synchronizing.


title:
Brief wide-field photostimuli evoke and modulate oscillatory
  reverberating activity in cortical networks

abstract:
  Cell assemblies manipulation by optogenetics is pivotal to advance
neuroscience and neuroengineering. In in vivo applications, photostimulation
often broadly addresses a population of cells simultaneously, leading to
feed-forward and to reverberating responses in recurrent microcircuits. The
former arise from direct activation of targets downstream, and are
straightforward to interpret. The latter are consequence of feedback
connectivity and may reflect a variety of time-scales and complex dynamical
properties. We investigated wide-field photostimulation in cortical networks in
vitro, employing substrate-integrated microelectrode arrays and long-term
cultured neuronal networks. We characterized the effect of brief light pulses,
while restricting the expression of channelrhodopsin to principal neurons. We
evoked robust reverberating responses, oscillating in the physiological gamma
frequency range, and found that such a frequency could be reliably manipulated
varying the light pulse duration, not its intensity. By pharmacology,
mathematical modelling, and intracellular recordings, we conclude that gamma
oscillations likely emerge as in vivo from the excitatory-inhibitory interplay
and that, unexpectedly, the light stimuli transiently facilitate excitatory
synaptic transmission. Of relevance for in vitro models of (dys)functional
cortical microcircuitry and in vivo manipulations of cell assemblies, we give
for the first time evidence of network-level consequences of the alteration of
synaptic physiology by optogenetics


title:
Neutron star radii and crusts: uncertainties and unified equations of
  state

abstract:
  The uncertainties in neutron star (NS) radii and crust properties due to our
limited knowledge of the equation of state (EOS) are quantitatively analysed.
We first demonstrate the importance of a unified microscopic description for
the different baryonic densities of the star. If the pressure functional is
obtained matching a crust and a core EOS based on models with different
properties at nuclear matter saturation, the uncertainties can be as large as
$\sim 30\%$ for the crust thickness and $4\%$ for the radius. Necessary
conditions for causal and thermodynamically consistent matchings between the
core and the crust are formulated and their consequences examined. A large set
of unified EOS for purely nucleonic matter is obtained based on 24 Skyrme
interactions and 9 relativistic mean-field nuclear parametrizations. In
addition, for relativistic models 17 EOS including a transition to hyperonic
matter at high density are presented. All these EOS have in common the property
of describing a $2\;M_\odot$ star and of being causal within stable NS. A span
of $\sim 3$ km and $\sim 4$ km is obtained for the radius of, respectively,
$1.0\;M_\odot$ and $2.0\;M_\odot$ star. Applying a set of nine further
constraints from experiment and ab-initio calculations the uncertainty is
reduced to $\sim 1$ km and $2$ km, respectively. These residual uncertainties
reflect lack of constraints at large densities and insufficient information on
the density dependence of the EOS near the nuclear matter saturation point. The
most important parameter to be constrained is shown to be the symmetry energy
slope $L$ which exhibits a linear correlation with the stellar radius,
particularly for masses $\sim 1.0\;M_\odot$. Potential constraints on $L$, the
NS radius and the EOS from observations of thermal states of NS are also
discussed. [Abriged]


title: An ideal quantum clock and Principle of maximum force

abstract:
  We show that the space-time uncertainty relation for the quantum clock can be
derived from the maximum force principle.


title: Optimizing Performance of Recurrent Neural Networks on GPUs

abstract:
  As recurrent neural networks become larger and deeper, training times for
single networks are rising into weeks or even months. As such there is a
significant incentive to improve the performance and scalability of these
networks. While GPUs have become the hardware of choice for training and
deploying recurrent models, the implementations employed often make use of only
basic optimizations for these architectures. In this article we demonstrate
that by exposing parallelism between operations within the network, an order of
magnitude speedup across a range of network sizes can be achieved over a naive
implementation. We describe three stages of optimization that have been
incorporated into the fifth release of NVIDIA's cuDNN: firstly optimizing a
single cell, secondly a single layer, and thirdly the entire network.


title: Dual-frequency injection-locked continuous-wave near-infrared laser

abstract:
  We report a dual-frequency injection-locked continuous-wave near-infrared
laser. The entire system consists of a Ti:sapphire ring laser as a power
oscillator, two independent diode-lasers employed as seed lasers, and a master
cavity providing a frequency reference. Stable dual-frequency injection-locked
oscillation is achieved with a maximum output power of 2.8 W. As fundamental
performance features of this laser system, we show its single
longitudinal/transverse mode characteristics and practical power stability.
Furthermore, as advanced features, we demonstrate arbitrary selectivity of the
two frequencies and flexible control of their relative powers by simply
manipulating the seed lasers.


title: Higgs Phenomenology in the Minimal $SU(3)_L\times U(1)_X$ Model

abstract:
  We investigate the phenomenology of a model based on the $SU(3)_c\times
SU(3)_L\times U(1)_X$ gauge theory, the so-called 331 model. In particular, we
focus on the Higgs sector of the model which is composed of three $SU(3)_L$
triplet Higgs fields, and this corresponds to the minimal form to realize
phenomenologically acceptable scenario. After the spontaneous symmetry breaking
$SU(3)_L\times U(1)_X\to SU(2)_L\times U(1)_Y$, our Higgs sector effectively
becomes that with two $SU(2)_L$ doublet scalar fields, in which the first and
the second generation quarks couple to the different Higgs doublet from that
couples to the third generation quarks. This structure causes the flavour
changing neutral current mediated by Higgs bosons at the tree level. By taking
an alignment limit of the mass matrix for the CP-even Higgs bosons, which is
naturally realized in the case with the breaking scale of $SU(3)_L\times
U(1)_X$ to be much larger than that of $SU(2)_L\times U(1)_Y$, we can avoid
current constraints from flavour experiments such as the $B^0$-$\bar{B}^0$
mixing even for the Higgs bosons masses being ${\cal O}(100)$ GeV. In this
allowed parameter space, we clarify that a characteristic deviation in quark
Yukawa couplings of the standard model-like Higgs boson is predicted, which has
a different pattern from that seen in two Higgs doublet models with a
softly-broken $Z_2$ symmetry. We also find that the flavour violating decay
modes of the extra Higgs boson, e.g., $H/A \to tc$ and $H^\pm \to ts$ can be
dominant, and they yield the important signature to distinguish our model from
the two Higgs doublet models.


title: Remarks on the tensor product structure of no-signaling theories

abstract:
  In the quantum logic framework we show that the no-signaling box model is a
particular type of tensor product of the logics of single boxes. Such notion of
tensor product is too strong to apply in the category of logics of quantum
mechanical systems. Consequently, we show that the no-signaling box models
cannot be considered as generalizations of quantum mechanical models.


title:
Incentivizing Users of Data Centers Participate in The Demand Response
  Programs via Time-Varying Monetary Rewards

abstract:
  Demand response is widely employed by today's data centers to reduce energy
consumption in response to the increasing of electricity cost. To incentivize
users of data centers participate in the demand response programs, i.e.,
breaking the "split incentive" hurdle, some prior researches propose
market-based mechanisms such as dynamic pricing and static monetary rewards.
However, these mechanisms are either intrusive or unfair. In this paper, we use
time-varying rewards to incentivize users, who have flexible deadlines and are
willing to trading performance degradation for monetary rewards, grant
time-shifting of their requests. With a game-theoretic framework, we model the
game between a single data center and its users. Further, we extend our design
via integrating it with two other emerging practical demand response
strategies: server shutdown and local renewable energy generation. With
real-world data traces, we show that a DC with our design can effectively shed
its peak electricity load and overall electricity cost without reducing its
profit, when comparing it with the current practice where no incentive
mechanism is established.


title: Angular distributions in $J/\psi\to p\bar{p}\pi^{0}(\eta)$ decays

abstract:
  The differential decay rates of the processes $J/\psi\to p\bar{p}\pi^{0}$ and
$J/\psi\to p\bar{p}\eta$ close to the $p\bar{p}$ threshold are calculated with
the help of the $N\bar{N}$ optical potential. The same calculations are made
for the decays of $\psi(2S)$. We use the potential which has been suggested to
fit the cross sections of $N\bar{N}$ scattering together with $N\bar{N}$ and
six pion production in $e^{+}e^{-}$ annihilation close to the $p\bar{p}$
threshold. The $p\bar{p}$ invariant mass spectra is in agreement with the
available experimental data. The anisotropy of the angular distributions, which
appears due to the tensor forces in the $N\bar{N}$ interaction, is predicted
close to the $p\bar{p}$ threshold. This anisotropy is large enough to be
investigated experimentally. Such measurements would allow one to check the
accuracy of the model of $N\bar{N}$ interaction.


title: Deep Online Convex Optimization with Gated Games

abstract:
  Methods from convex optimization are widely used as building blocks for deep
learning algorithms. However, the reasons for their empirical success are
unclear, since modern convolutional networks (convnets), incorporating
rectifier units and max-pooling, are neither smooth nor convex. Standard
guarantees therefore do not apply. This paper provides the first convergence
rates for gradient descent on rectifier convnets. The proof utilizes the
particular structure of rectifier networks which consists in binary
active/inactive gates applied on top of an underlying linear network. The
approach generalizes to max-pooling, dropout and maxout. In other words, to
precisely the neural networks that perform best empirically. The key step is to
introduce gated games, an extension of convex games with similar convergence
properties that capture the gating function of rectifiers. The main result is
that rectifier convnets converge to a critical point at a rate controlled by
the gated-regret of the units in the network. Corollaries of the main result
include: (i) a game-theoretic description of the representations learned by a
neural network; (ii) a logarithmic-regret algorithm for training neural nets;
and (iii) a formal setting for analyzing conditional computation in neural nets
that can be applied to recently developed models of attention.


title:
Oscillatory instabilities of gap solitons in a repulsive Bose-Einstein
  condensate

abstract:
  The paper is devoted to numerical study of stability of nonlinear localized
modes ("gap solitons") for the spatially one-dimensional Gross-Pitaevskii
equation (1D GPE) with periodic potential and repulsive interparticle
interactions. We use the Evans function approach combined with the exterior
algebra formulation in order to detect and describe weak oscillatory
instabilities. We show that the simplest ("fundamental") gap solitons in the
first and in the second spectral gaps can undergo oscillatory instabilities for
certain values of the frequency parameter (i.e., the chemical potential). The
number of unstable eigenvalues and the associated instability rates are
described. Several stable and unstable more complex (non-fundamental) gap
solitons are also discussed. The results obtained from the Evans function
approach are independently confirmed using the direct numerical integration of
the GPE.


title: Degradability of Fermionic Gaussian Channels

abstract:
  We study the degradability of fermionic Gaussian channels. Fermionic quantum
channels are a central building block of quantum information processing with
fermions, and the family of Gaussian channels, in particular, is relevant in
the emerging field of electron quantum optics and its applications for quantum
information. Degradable channels are of particular interest since they have a
simple formula that characterizes their quantum capacity. We derive a simple
standard form for fermionic Gaussian channels. This allows us to fully
characterize all degradable $n$-mode fermionic Gaussian channels. In
particular, we show that the only degradable such channels correspond to the
attenuation or amplitude-damping channel for qubits.


title:
Monitoring Chinese Population Migration in Consecutive Weekly Basis from
  Intra-city scale to Inter-province scale by Didi's Bigdata

abstract:
  Population migration is valuable information which leads to proper decision
in urban-planning strategy, massive investment, and many other fields. For
instance, inter-city migration is a posterior evidence to see if the
government's constrain of population works, and inter-community immigration
might be a prior evidence of real estate price hike. With timely data, it is
also impossible to compare which city is more favorable for the people, suppose
the cities release different new regulations, we could also compare the
customers of different real estate development groups, where they come from,
where they probably will go. Unfortunately these data was not available.
  In this paper, leveraging the data generated by positioning team in Didi, we
propose a novel approach that timely monitoring population migration from
community scale to provincial scale. Migration can be detected as soon as in a
week. It could be faster, the setting of a week is for statistical purpose. A
monitoring system is developed, then applied nation wide in China, some
observations derived from the system will be presented in this paper.
  This new method of migration perception is origin from the insight that
nowadays people mostly moving with their personal Access Point (AP), also known
as WiFi hotspot. Assume that the ratio of AP moving to the migration of
population is constant, analysis of comparative population migration would be
feasible. More exact quantitative research would also be done with few sample
research and model regression.
  The procedures of processing data includes many steps: eliminating the impact
of pseudo-migration AP, for instance pocket WiFi, and second-hand traded
router; distinguishing moving of population with moving of companies;
identifying shifting of AP by the finger print clusters, etc..


title: The Formation of EL CVn-type Binaries

abstract:
  EL CVn-type binaries contain an A-type dwarf star and a very low mass ($\sim
0.2M_\odot$) helium white dwarf precursor (pre-He WD). Recent surveys and
observations have discovered dozens of them, and showed that some pre-He WDs
have multi-periodic pulsations, opening up the possibility of using
asteroseismology to study the interior structure of these stars. We have
studied the formation of EL CVn-type binaries to understand the physics of
their formation and give the properties and the space density of this
population of stars in the Galaxy. We use a simple analysis to show that EL CVn
binaries cannot be produced by rapid common envelope evolution because this
process leads to merging of the components when a giant has such a low-mass
core. We find that EL CVn-type binaries can be produced by long-term stable
mass transfer between low-mass stars in close binary systems. We have
comprehensively studied this formation channel and the characteristics of the
resulting population of EL CVn-type binaries from more than 65,000 runs of
binary evolution with primary star masses between 0.9 and $2.0M_\odot$ and
assuming composition appropriate for Population I stars. The theoretical
evolutionary tracks, mass ratios and the WD mass-period ($M_{\rm WD}-P$)
relation are generally in agreement with observations. We conclude that many
more EL CVn-type binaries remain to be discovered and that these binaries will
be predominantly low-mass systems in old stellar populations.


title: Energetics of the AK13 Semi-Local Kohn-Sham Exchange Energy Functional

abstract:
  The recent non-empirical semi-local exchange functional of Armiento and
K\"ummel, the AK13 [PRL 111, 036402 (2013)] incorporates a number of features
reproduced by higher-order theory. The AK13 potential behaves analogously with
the discontinuous jump associated with the derivative discontinuity at integer
particle numbers. Recent works have established that AK13 gives a qualitatively
improved orbital description compared to other semi-local methods, and
reproduces a band structure closer to higher-order theory. However, its
energies and energetics are inaccurate. The present work further investigates
the deficiency in energetics. In addition to AK13 results, we find that
applying the local-density approximation (LDA) non-self-consistently on the
converged AK13 density gives very reasonable energetics with equilibrium
lattice constants and bulk moduli well described across 14 systems. We also
confirm that the attractive orbital features of AK13 are retained even after
full structural relaxation. Hence, the deficient energetics cannot be a result
of the AK13 orbitals having adversely affected the quality of the electron
density compared to that of usual semi-local functionals; an improved orbital
description and good energetics are not in opposition. We also prove that the
non-self-consistent scheme is equivalent to using a single external-potential
dependent functional in an otherwise consistent KS-DFT scheme. Furthermore, our
results also demonstrate that, while an internally consistent KS functional is
presently missing, non-self-consistent LDA on AK13 orbitals works as a
practical non-empirical computational scheme to predict geometries, bulk
moduli, while retaining the band structure features of AK13 at the
computational cost of semi-local DFT.


title: Toric Difference Variety

abstract:
  In this paper, the concept of toric difference varieties is defined and four
equivalent descriptions for toric difference varieties are presented in terms
of difference rational parametrization, difference coordinate rings, toric
difference ideals, and group actions by difference tori. Connections between
toric difference varieties and affine N[x]-semimodules are established by
proving the correspondence between the irreducible invariant difference
subvarieties and the faces of the N[x]-submodules and the orbit-face
correspondence. Finally, an algorithm is given to decide whether a binomial
difference ideal represented by a Z[x]-lattice defines a toric difference
variety.


title:
General solutions of integrable cosmological models with non-minimal
  coupling

abstract:
  We study the integrable model with minimally and non-minimally coupled scalar
fields and the correspondence of their general solutions. Using the model with
a minimally coupled scalar field and a the constant potential as an example we
demonstrate the difference between the general solutions of the corresponding
models in the Jordan and the Einstein frames.


title:
Deterministic reshaping of single-photon spectra using cross-phase
  modulation

abstract:
  The frequency conversion of light has proved to be a crucial technology for
communication, spectroscopy, imaging, and signal processing. In the quantum
regime, it also offers great potential for realizing quantum networks
incorporating disparate physical systems and quantum-enhanced information
processing over a large computational space. The frequency conversion of
quantum light, such as single photons, has been extensively investigated for
the last two decades using all-optical frequency mixing, with the ultimate goal
of realizing lossless and noiseless conversion. I demonstrate another route to
this target using frequency conversion induced by cross-phase modulation in a
dispersion-managed photonic crystal fiber. Owing to the deterministic and
all-optical nature of the process, the lossless and low-noise spectral
reshaping of a single-photon wave packet in the telecommunication band has been
readily achieved with a modulation bandwidth as large as 0.4 THz. I further
demonstrate that the scheme is applicable to manipulations of a nonclassical
frequency correlation, wave packet interference, and entanglement between two
photons. This approach presents a new coherent frequency interface for photons
for quantum information processing.


title: Opportunities for nuclear reaction studies at future facilities

abstract:
  Opportunities for investigations of nuclear reactions at the future nuclear
physics facilities such as radioactive ion beam facilities and high-power laser
facilities are considered. Post-accelerated radioactive ion beams offer
possibilities for study of the role of isospin asymmetry in the reaction
mechanisms at various beam energies. Fission barrier heights of
neutron-deficient nuclei can be directly determined at low energies.
Post-accelerated radioactive ion beams, specifically at the future facilities
such as HIE-ISOLDE, SPIRAL-2 or RAON-RISP can be also considered as a candidate
for production of very neutron-rich nuclei via mechanism of multi-nucleon
transfer. High-power laser facilities such as ELI-NP offer possibilities for
nuclear reaction studies with beams of unprecedented properties. Specific cases
such as ternary reactions or even production of super-heavy elements are
considered.


title: Automatic Content-aware Non-Photorealistic Rendering of Images

abstract:
  Non-photorealistic rendering techniques work on image features and often
manipulate a set of characteristics such as edges and texture to achieve a
desired depiction of the scene. Most computational photography methods
decompose an image using edge preserving filters and work on the resulting base
and detail layers independently to achieve desired visual effects. We propose a
new approach for content-aware non-photorealistic rendering of images where we
manipulate the visually salient and the non-salient regions separately. We
propose a novel content-aware framework in order to render an image for
applications such as detail exaggeration, artificial blurring and image
abstraction. The processed regions of the image are blended seamlessly for all
these applications. We demonstrate that content awareness of the proposed
method leads to automatic generation of non-photorealistic rendering of the
same image for the different applications mentioned above.


title:
Constraining the equation of state of nuclear matter from competition of
  fusion and quasi-fission in the reactions leading to production of the
  superheavy elements

abstract:
  The mechanism of fusion hindrance, an effect preventing the synthesis of
superheavy elements in the reactions of cold and hot fusion, is investigated
using the Boltzmann-Uehling-Uhlenbeck equation, where Coulomb interaction is
introduced. A strong sensitivity is observed both to the modulus of
incompressibility of symmetric nuclear matter, controlling the competition of
surface tension and Coulomb repulsion, and to the stiffness of the
density-dependence of symmetry energy, influencing the formation of the neck
prior to scission. The experimental fusion probabilities were for the first
time used to derive constraints on the nuclear equation of state. A strict
constraint on the modulus of incompressibility of nuclear matter $K_0 = 240 -
260$ MeV is obtained while the stiff density-dependences of the symmetry energy
($\gamma>1.$) are rejected.


title:
Numerical adiabatic potentials of orthorhombic Jahn-Teller effects
  retrieved from ultrasound attenuation experiments. Application to the SrF2:Cr
  crystal

abstract:
  A methodology is worked out to retrieve the numerical values of all the main
parameters of the six-dimensional adiabatic potential energy surface (APES) of
a polyatomic system with a quadratic T-term Jahn-Teller effect (JTE) from
ultrasound experiments. The method is based on a verified assumption that
ultrasound attenuation and speed encounter anomalies when the direction of
propa- gation and polarization of its wave of strain coincides with the
characteristic directions of symmetry breaking in the JTE. For the SrF2:Cr
crystal, employed as a basic example, we observed anomaly peaks in the
temperature dependence of attenuation of ultrasound at frequencies of 50-160
MHz in the temperature interval of 40-60 K for the wave propagating along the
[110] direction, for both the longitudinal and shear modes, the latter with two
polarizations along the [001] and [110] axes, respectively. We show that these
anomalies are due to the ultrasound relaxation by the system of non-interacting
Cr2+ JT centers with orthorhombic local distortions. The interpretation of the
ex- perimental findings is based on the T2g (eg +t2g) JTE problem including the
linear and quadratic terms of vibronic interactions in the Hamiltonian and the
same-symmetry modes reduced to one interaction mode. Combining the experimental
results with a theoretical analysis we show that on the complicated
six-dimensional APES of this system with three tetragonal, four trigonal, and
six orthorhombic extrema points, the latter are global minima, while the former
are saddle points, and we estimate numerically all the main parameters of this
surface, including the linear and quadratic vibronic coupling constants, the
primary force constants, the coordinates of all the extrema points and their
energies, the energy barrier between the orthorhombic minima, and the tunneling
splitting of the ground vibrational states.


title: Norm-square localization for Hamiltonian $LG$-spaces

abstract:
  We prove a formula for twisted Duistermaat-Heckman distributions associated
to a Hamiltonian $LG$-space. The terms of the formula are localized at the
critical points of the norm-square of the moment map, and can be computed in
cross-sections. Our main tools are the theory of quasi-Hamiltonian $G$-spaces,
as well as the Hamiltonian cobordism approach to norm-square localization
introduced recently by Harada and Karshon.


title:
Analysis of photometric uncertainties in the OGLE-IV Galactic Bulge
  microlensing survey data

abstract:
  We present a statistical assessment of both, observed and reported,
photometric uncertainties in the OGLE-IV Galactic bulge microlensing survey
data. This dataset is widely used for the detection of variable stars,
transient objects, discovery of microlensing events, and characterization of
the exo-planetary systems. Large collections of RR Lyrae stars and Cepheids
discovered by the OGLE project toward the Galactic bulge provide light curves
based on this dataset. We describe the method of analysis, and provide the
procedure, which can be used to update preliminary photometric uncertainties,
provided with the light curves, to the ones reflecting the actual observed
scatter at a given magnitude and for a given CCD detector of the OGLE-IV
camera.This is of key importance for data modeling, in particular, for the
correct estimation of the goodness of fit.


title:
General theory of regular biorthogonal pairs and its physical
  applications

abstract:
  In this paper we introduce a general theory of regular biorthogonal sequences
and its physical applications. Biorthogonal sequences $\{ \phi_{n} \}$ and $\{
\psi_{n} \}$ in a Hilbert space ${\cal H}$ are said to be regular if $Span\; \{
\phi_{n} \}$ and $Span\; \{ \psi_{n} \}$ are dense in ${\cal H}$. The first
purpose is to show that there exists a non-singular positive self-adjoint
operator $T_{\mbox{$f$}}$ in ${\cal H}$ defined by an ONB $\mbox{$f$} \equiv \{
f_{n} \}$ in ${\cal H}$ such that $\phi_{n}=T_{\mbox{$f$}} f_{n}$ and
$\psi_{n}= T_{\mbox{$f$}}^{-1} f_{n}$, $n=0,1, \cdots$, and such an ONB
$\mbox{$f$}$ is unique. The second purpose is to define and study the lowering
operators $A_{\mbox{$f$}}$ and $B_{\mbox{$f$}}^{\dagger}$, the raising
operators $B_{\mbox{$f$}}$ and $A_{\mbox{$f$}}^{\dagger}$, the number operators
$N_{\mbox{$f$}}$ and $N_{\mbox{$f$}}^{\dagger}$ determined by the non-singular
positive self-adjoint operator $T_{\mbox{$f$}}$. These operators connect with
${\it quasi}$-${\it hermitian \; quantum \; mechanics}$ and its relatives. This
paper clarifies and simplifies the mathematical structure of this framework
minimized the required assumptions.


title: Invariant subspaces for $H^2$ spaces of $\sigma$-finite algebras

abstract:
  We show that a Beurling type theory of invariant subspaces of noncommutative
$H^2$ spaces holds true in the setting of subdiagonal subalgebras of
$\sigma$-finite von Neumann algebras. This extends earlier work of Blecher and
Labuschagne for finite algebras, and complements more recent contributions in
this regard by Bekjan, and Chen, Hadwin and Shen in the finite setting, and
Sager in the semifinite setting.
  We then also introduce the notion of an analytically conditioned algebra, and
go on to show that in the class of analytically conditioned algebras this
Beurling type theory is part of a list of properties which all turn out to be
equivalent to the maximal subdiagonality of the given algebra.


title:
Transfer Entropy and Directed Information in Gaussian diffusion
  processes

abstract:
  Transfer Entropy and Directed Information are information-theoretic measures
of the directional dependency between stochastic processes. Following the
definitions of Schreiber and Massey in discrete time, we define and evaluate
these measures for the components of multidimensional Gaussian diffusion
processes. When the components are jointly Markov, the Transfer Entropy and
Directed Information are both measures of influence according to a simple
physical principle. More generally, the effect of other components has to be
accounted for, and this can be achieved in more than one way. We propose two
definitions, one of which preserves the properties of influence of the jointly
Markov case. The Transfer Entropy and Directed Information are expressed in
terms of the solutions of matrix Riccati equations, and so are easy to compute.
The definition of continuous-time Directed Information we propose differs from
that previously appearing in the literature. We argue that the latter is not
strictly directional.

categories: math.PR cs.IT math-ph math.IT math.MP math.OC


title: Four generated 4-instantons

abstract:
  We show that there exist mathematical 4-instanton bundles F on the projective
3-space such that F(2) is globally generated (by four global sections). This is
equivalent to the existence of elliptic space curves of degree 8 defined by
quartic equations. There is a (possibly incomplete) intersection theoretic
argument for the existence of such curves in D'Almeida [Bull. Soc. Math. France
128 (2000), 577-584] and another argument, using results of Mori [Nagoya Math.
J. 96 (1984), 127-132], in Chiodera and Ellia [Rend. Istit. Univ. Trieste 44
(2012), 413-422]. Our argument is quite different. We prove directly the former
fact, using the method of Hartshorne and Hirschowitz [Ann. Scient. Ec. Norm.
Sup. (4) 15 (1982), 365-390] and the geometry of five lines in the projective
3-space.


title: Computational Efficiency Requires Simple Taxation

abstract:
  We characterize the communication complexity of truthful mechanisms. Our
departure point is the well known taxation principle. The taxation principle
asserts that every truthful mechanism can be interpreted as follows: every
player is presented with a menu that consists of a price for each bundle (the
prices depend only on the valuations of the other players). Each player is
allocated a bundle that maximizes his profit according to this menu. We define
the taxation complexity of a truthful mechanism to be the logarithm of the
maximum number of menus that may be presented to a player.
  Our main finding is that in general the taxation complexity essentially
equals the communication complexity. The proof consists of two main steps.
First, we prove that for rich enough domains the taxation complexity is at most
the communication complexity. We then show that the taxation complexity is much
smaller than the communication complexity only in "pathological" cases and
provide a formal description of these extreme cases.
  Next, we study mechanisms that access the valuations via value queries only.
In this setting we establish that the menu complexity -- a notion that was
already studied in several different contexts -- characterizes the number of
value queries that the mechanism makes in exactly the same way that the
taxation complexity characterizes the communication complexity.
  Our approach yields several applications, including strengthening the
solution concept with low communication overhead, fast computation of prices,
and hardness of approximation by computationally efficient truthful mechanisms.


title: An Adaptive Resample-Move Algorithm for Estimating Normalizing Constants

abstract:
  The estimation of normalizing constants is a fundamental step in
probabilistic model comparison. Sequential Monte Carlo methods may be used for
this task and have the advantage of being inherently parallelizable. However,
the standard choice of using a fixed number of particles at each iteration is
suboptimal because some steps will contribute disproportionately to the
variance of the estimate. We introduce an adaptive version of the Resample-Move
algorithm, in which the particle set is adaptively expanded whenever a better
approximation of an intermediate distribution is needed. The algorithm builds
on the expression for the optimal number of particles and the corresponding
minimum variance found under ideal conditions. Benchmark results on challenging
Gaussian Process Classification and Restricted Boltzmann Machine applications
show that Adaptive Resample-Move (ARM) estimates the normalizing constant with
a smaller variance, using less computational resources, than either
Resample-Move with a fixed number of particles or Annealed Importance Sampling.
A further advantage over Annealed Importance Sampling is that ARM is easier to
tune.


title: Tunable magneto-granular phononic crystals

abstract:
  This paper reports on the study of the dynamics of 1D magneto-granular
phononic crystals composed of a chain of spherical steel beads inside a
properly designed magnetic field. This field is induced by an array of
permanent magnets, located in a holder at a given distance from the chain. The
theoretical and experimental results of the band gap structure are displayed,
including all six degrees of freedom for the beads, i.e. three translations and
three rotations. Experimental evidence of transverse-rotational modes of
propagation is pre- sented; moreover, by changing the strength of the magnetic
field, the dynamic response of the granular chain is tuned. The combination of
non-contact tunability with the potentially strong nonlinear behavior of gran-
ular systems ensures the suitability of magneto-granular phononic crystals as
nonlinear, tunable mechanical metamaterials for use in controlling elastic wave
propagation.


title: Notes on Cubic and Quartic Light-Front Kinematics

abstract:
  The purpose of this short note is to collect a set of formulas pertaining to
momentum kinematics for higher spin light-front vertices. At least one of the
formulas seems to be previously unknown.


title: Do Small-mass Neutrinos participate in Gauge Transformations?

abstract:
  Neutrino oscillation experiments presently suggest that neutrinos have a
small but finite mass. If neutrinos are to have mass, there should be a Lorentz
frame in which they can be brought to rest. This paper discusses how Wigner's
little groups can be used to distinguish between massive and massless
particles. We derive a representation of the SL(2,c) group which separates out
the two sets of spinors contained therein. One set is gauge dependent. The
other set is gauge-invariant and represents polarized neutrinos. We show that a
similar calculation can be done for the Dirac equation. In the
large-momentum/zero-mass limit, the Dirac spinors can be separated into large
and small components. The large components are gauge invariant, while the small
components are not. These small components represent spin-$\frac{1}{2}$
non-zero mass particles. If we renormalize the large components, these gauge
invariant spinors again represent the polarization of neutrinos. Massive
neutrinos cannot be invariant under gauge transformations.


title: Planes in degenerate 3-manifolds

abstract:
  We study totally geodesic planes in hyperbolic 3-manifolds $M$ having
incompressible core and degenerate ends. We prove a Ratner-type phenomenon: a
closed minimal $PSL(2,R)-$invariant subset of $M$ is either an immersed totally
geodesic surface or all of $M$. We also show that for an arbitrary infinite
volume hyperbolic 3-manifold $M$ without parabolics and with finitely generated
fundamental group, the number of compact totally geodesic surfaces in $M$ is
finite.


title:
Asymptotic behavior of partial and false theta functions arising from
  Jacobi forms and regularized characters

abstract:
  We prove several asymptotic results for partial and false theta functions
arising from Jacobi forms, as the modular variable $\tau$ tends to $0$ along
the imaginary axis, and the elliptic variable $z$ is unrestricted in the
complex plane. We observe that these functions exhibit Stokes' phenomenon - the
asymptotic behavior of these functions sharply differs depending on where the
elliptic variable $z$ is located within the complex plane. We apply our results
to study the asymptotic expansions of regularized characters and quantum
dimensions of the $(1,p)$-singlet vertex operator algebra coming from conformal
field theory. This, in particular, recovers and extends several known results
pertaining to regularized quantum dimensions, which served as a main source of
motivation.


title: Penalization of Reflected SDEs and Neumann Problems of HJB Equations

abstract:
  In this paper we first study the penalization approximation of stochastic
differential equations reflected in a domain which satisfies conditions (A) and
(B) and prove that the sequence of solutions of the penalizing equations
converges in the uniform topology to the solution of the corresponding
reflected stochastic differential equation. Then by using this convergence
result, we consider partial differential equations with Neumann boundary
conditions in domains neither smooth nor convex and prove the existence and
comparison principle of viscosity solutions of such nonlinear PDEs. Also, by
applying the support of reflected diffusions established in \cite{ren-wuAP}, we
establish the maximum principle for the viscosity solutions of linear PDEs with
Neumann boundary conditions.


title: Quantum Yang-Mills theory: an overview of a programme

abstract:
  We present an overview of a programme to understand the low-energy physics of
quantum Yang-Mills theory from a quantum-information perspective. Our setting
is that of the hamiltonian formulation of pure Yang-Mills theory in the
temporal gauge on the lattice. Firstly, inspired by recent constructions for
$\mathbb{Z}/2\mathbb{Z}$ lattice gauge theory, in particular, Kitaev's toric
code, we describe the gauge-invariant sector of hilbert space by introducing a
primitive quantum gate: the quantum parallel transporter. We then develop a
nonabelian generalisation of laplace interpolation to present an ansatz for the
ground state of pure Yang-Mills theory which interpolates between the weak- and
strong-coupling RG fixed points. The resulting state acquires the structure of
a tensor network, namely, a multiscale entanglement renormalisation ansatz, and
allows for the efficient computation of local observables and Wilson loops.
Various refinements of the tensor network are discussed leading to several
generalisations. Finally, the continuum limit of our ansatz as the lattice
regulator is removed is then described. This paper is intended as an abstract
for an ongoing programme: there are still many open problems.


title: Sublabel-Accurate Convex Relaxation of Vectorial Multilabel Energies

abstract:
  Convex relaxations of nonconvex multilabel problems have been demonstrated to
produce superior (provably optimal or near-optimal) solutions to a variety of
classical computer vision problems. Yet, they are of limited practical use as
they require a fine discretization of the label space, entailing a huge demand
in memory and runtime. In this work, we propose the first sublabel accurate
convex relaxation for vectorial multilabel problems. The key idea is that we
approximate the dataterm of the vectorial labeling problem in a piecewise
convex (rather than piecewise linear) manner. As a result we have a more
faithful approximation of the original cost function that provides a meaningful
interpretation for the fractional solutions of the relaxed convex problem. In
numerous experiments on large-displacement optical flow estimation and on color
image denoising we demonstrate that the computed solutions have superior
quality while requiring much lower memory and runtime.


title: Analysis of higher order time delay systems using Lambert W function

abstract:
  In this note, analysis of time delay systems using Lambert W function
approach is reassessed. A common canonical form of time delay systems is
defined. We extended the recent results of [6] for second order into nth order
system. The eigenvalues of a time delay system are either real or complex
conjugate pairs and therefore, the whole eigenspectrum can be associated with
only two real branches of the Lambert W function. A new class of time delay
systems is characterized to extend the applicability of the above said method.
A state variable transformation is used to transform the proposed class of
systems into the common canonical form. Moreover, this approach has been
exploited to design a controller which places a subset of eigenvalues at
desired locations. Stability is analyesed by the help of Nyquist plot. The
approach is validated through an example.


title:
Electron transfer pathway analysis in bacterial photosynthetic reaction
  center

abstract:
  A new computational scheme to analyze electron transfer (ET) pathways in
large biomolecules is presented with applications to ETs in bacterial
photosynthetic reaction center. It consists of a linear combination of fragment
molecular orbitals and an electron tunneling current analysis, which enables an
efficient first-principles analysis of ET pathways in large biomolecules. The
scheme has been applied to the ET from menaquinone to ubiquinone via nonheme
iron complex in bacterial photosynthetic reaction center. It has revealed that
not only the central Fe$^{2+}$ ion but also particular histidine ligands are
involved in the ET pathways in such a way to mitigate perturbations that can be
caused by metal ion substitution and depletion, which elucidates the
experimentally observed insensitivity of the ET rate to these perturbations.


title: A Property of the Kullback--Leibler Divergence for Location-scale Models

abstract:
  In this paper, we discuss a property of the Kullback--Leibler divergence
measured between two models of the family of the location-scale distributions.
We show that, if model $M_1$ and model $M_2$ are represented by location-scale
distributions, then the minimum Kullback--Leibler divergence from $M_1$ to
$M_2$, with respect to the parameters of $M_2$, is independent from the value
of the parameters of $M_1$. Furthermore, we show that the property holds for
models that can be transformed into location-scale distributions. We illustrate
a possible application of the property in objective Bayesian model selection.


title:
Automated Selection of r for the r Largest Order Statistics Approach
  with Adjustment for Sequential Testing

abstract:
  The r largest order statistics approach is widely used in extreme value
analysis because it may use more information from the data than just the block
maxima. In practice, the choice of r is critical. If r is too large, bias can
occur; if too small, the variance of the estimator can be high. The limiting
distribution of the r largest order statistics, denoted by GEVr, extends that
of the block maxima. Two specification tests are proposed to select r
sequentially. The first is a score test for the GEVr distribution. Due to the
special characteristics of the GEVr distribution, the classical chi-square
asymptotics cannot be used. The simplest approach is to use the parametric
bootstrap, which is straightforward to implement but computationally expensive.
An alternative fast weighted bootstrap or multiplier procedure is developed for
computational efficiency. The second test uses the difference in estimated
entropy between the GEVr and GEV(r-1) models, applied to the r largest order
statistics and the r-1 largest order statistics, respectively. The asymptotic
distribution of the difference statistic is derived. In a large scale
simulation study, both tests held their size and had substantial power to
detect various misspecification schemes. A new approach to address the issue of
multiple, sequential hypotheses testing is adapted to this setting to control
the false discovery rate or familywise error rate. The utility of the
procedures is demonstrated with extreme sea level and precipitation data.


title: Analysis of Temporal Features for Interaction Quality Estimation

abstract:
  Many different approaches for estimating the Interaction Quality (IQ) of
Spoken Dialogue Systems have been investigated. While dialogues clearly have a
sequential nature, statistical classification approaches designed for
sequential problems do not seem to work better on automatic IQ estimation than
static approaches, i.e., regarding each turn as being independent of the
corresponding dialogue. Hence, we analyse this effect by investigating the
subset of temporal features used as input for statistical classification of IQ.
We extend the set of temporal features to contain the system and the user view.
We determine the contribution of each feature sub-group showing that temporal
features contribute most to the classification performance. Furthermore, for
the feature sub-group modeling the temporal effects with a window, we modify
the window size increasing the overall performance significantly by +15.69%.


title: Upper Limit on Star Formation and Metal Enrichment in Minihalos

abstract:
  An analysis of negative radiative feedback from resident stars in minihalos
is performed. It is found that the most effective mechanism to suppress star
formation is provided by infrared photons from resident stars via
photo-detachment of ${\rm H^-}$. It is shown that a stringent upper bound on
(total stellar mass, metallicity) of ($\sim 1000{\rm M_\odot}$, $-3.3\pm 0.2$)
in any newly minted atomic cooling halo can be placed, with the actual values
possibly significantly lower. This has both important physical ramifications on
formation of stars and supermassive black seeds in atomic cooling halos at high
redshift, pertaining to processes of low temperature metal cooling, dust
formation and fragmentation, and direct consequences on the faint end galaxy
luminosity function at high redshift and cosmological reionization. The
luminosity function of galaxies at the epoch of reionization may be
substantially affected due to the combined effect of a diminished role of
minihalos and an enhanced contribution from Pop III stars in atomic cooling
halos. Upcoming results on reionization optical depth from Planck
High-Frequency Instrument data may provide a significant constraint on and a
unique probe of this star formation physical process in minihalos. As a
numerical example, in the absence of significant contributions from minihalos
with virial masses below $1.5\times 10^{8}{\rm M_\odot}$ the reionization
optical depth is expected to be no greater than $0.065$, whereas allowing for
minihalos of masses as low as ($10^7{\rm M_\odot}$, $10^{6.5}{\rm M_\odot}$) to
form stars unconstrained by this self-regulation physical process, the
reionization optical depth is expected to exceed $(0.075,0.085)$, respectively.


title:
First detection in gamma-rays of a young radio galaxy: Fermi-LAT
  observations of the Compact Symmetric Object PKS 1718-649

abstract:
  We report the $\gamma$-ray detection of a young radio galaxy, PKS 1718$-$649,
belonging to the class of Compact Symmetric Objects (CSOs), with the Large Area
Telescope (LAT) on board the {\it Fermi} satellite. The third {\it Fermi}
Gamma-ray LAT catalog (3FGL) includes an unassociated $\gamma$-ray source, 3FGL
J1728.0$-$6446, located close to PKS 1718$-$649. Using the latest Pass 8
calibration, we confirm that the best fit $1 \sigma$ position of the
$\gamma$-ray source is compatible with the radio location of PKS 1718$-$649.
Cross-matching of the $\gamma$-ray source position with the positions of blazar
sources from several catalogs yields negative results. Thus, we conclude that
PKS 1718$-$649 is the most likely counterpart to the unassociated LAT source.
We obtain a detection test statistics TS$\sim 36$ ($>$5$\sigma$) with a best
fit photon spectral index $\Gamma=$2.9$\pm$0.3 and a 0.1-100 GeV photon flux
density $F_{\rm 0.1-100GeV}=$(11.5$\pm$0.3)$\times{\rm 10^{-9}}$ ph cm$^{-2}$
s$^{-1}$. We argue that the linear size ($\sim$2 pc), the kinematic age
($\sim$100 years), and the source distance ($z=0.014$) make PKS 1718$-$649 an
ideal candidate for $\gamma$-ray detection in the framework of the model
proposing that the most compact and the youngest CSOs can efficiently produce
GeV radiation via inverse-Compton scattering of the ambient photon fields by
the radio lobe non-thermal electrons. Thus, our detection of the source in
$\gamma$-rays establishes young radio galaxies as a distinct class of
extragalactic high-energy emitters, and yields an unique insight on the
physical conditions in compact radio lobes interacting with the interstellar
medium of the host galaxy.


title:
Extracting critical exponents for sequences of numerical data via series
  extrapolation techniques

abstract:
  We describe a generic scheme to extract critical exponents of quantum lattice
models from sequences of numerical data which is for example relevant for
non-perturbative linked-cluster expansions (NLCEs) or non-pertubative variants
of continuous unitary transformations (CUTs). The fundamental idea behind our
approach is a reformulation of the numerical data sequences as a series
expansion in a pseudo parameter. This allows to utilize standard series
expansion extrapolation techniques to extract critical properties like critical
points and critical exponents. The approach is illustrated for the
deconfinement transition of the antiferromagmetic spin 1/2 Heisenberg chain.


title:
Behavior of the Newtonian potential for ghost-free gravity and
  singularity-free gravity

abstract:
  In this paper we show that there is a universal prediction for the Newtonian
potential for an infinite derivative, ghost-free, quadratic curvature gravity.
We show that in order to make such a theory ghost-free at a perturbative level,
the Newtonian potential always falls-off as 1/r in the infrared limit, while at
short distances the potential becomes non-singular. We provide examples which
can potentially test the scale of gravitational non-locality up to 0.004 eV.


title: Practical Subtyping for System F with Sized (Co-)Induction

abstract:
  We present a rich type system with subtyping for an extension of System F.
Our type constructors include sum and product types, universal and existential
quantifiers, inductive and coinductive types. The latter two size annotations
allowing the preservation of size invariants. For example it is possible to
derive the termination of the quicksort by showing that partitioning a list
does not increase its size. The system deals with complex programs involving
mixed induction and coinduction, or even mixed (co-)induction and polymorphism
(as for Scott-encoded datatypes). One of the key ideas is to completely
separate the induction on sizes from the notion of recursive programs. We use
the size change principle to check that the proof is well-founded, not that the
program terminates. Termination is obtained by a strong normalization proof.
Another key idea is the use symbolic witnesses to handle quantifiers of all
sorts. To demonstrate the practicality of our system, we provide an
implementation that accepts all the examples discussed in the paper and much
more.


title: The Bogomolov-Prokhorov invariant of surfaces as equivariant cohomology

abstract:
  For a complex smooth projective surface $M$ with an action of a finite cyclic
group $G$ we give a uniform proof of the isomorphism between the invariant
$H^1(G, H^2(M, {\mathbb Z}))$ and the first cohomology of the divisors fixed by
the action, using $G$-equivariant cohomology. This generalizes the main result
of Bogomolov and Prokhorov "On stable conjugacy of finite subgroups of the
plane Cremona group, I".


title:
Adaptive non-parametric instrumental regression in the presence of
  dependence

abstract:
  We consider the estimation of a structural function which models a
non-parametric relationship between a response and an endogenous regressor
given an instrument in presence of dependence in the data generating process.
Assuming an independent and identically distributed (iid.) sample it has been
shown in Johannes and Schwarz (2010) that a least squares estimator based on
dimension reduction and thresholding can attain minimax-optimal rates of
convergence up to a constant. As this estimation procedure requires an optimal
choice of a dimension parameter with regard amongst others to certain
characteristics of the unknown structural function we investigate its fully
data-driven choice based on a combination of model selection and Lepski's
method inspired by Goldenshluger and Lepski (2011). For the resulting fully
data-driven thresholded least squares estimator a non-asymptotic oracle risk
bound is derived by considering either an iid. sample or by dismissing the
independence assumption. In both cases the derived risk bounds coincide up to a
constant assuming sufficiently weak dependence characterised by a fast decay of
the mixing coefficients. Employing the risk bounds the minimax optimality up to
constant of the estimator is established over a variety of classes of
structural functions.


title: Symmetric orthogonality and non-expansive projections in metric spaces

abstract:
  In this paper known results of symmetric orthogonality, as introduced by G.
Birkhoff, and non-expansive nearest point projections are extended from the
linear to the metric setting. If the space has non-positive curvature in the
sense Busemann then it is shown that those concepts are actually equivalent. In
the end it is shown that every space having non-positive curvature in the sense
of Busemann is a $CAT(0)$-space provided that its tangent cones are uniquely
geodesic and their nearest point projections onto convex are non-expansive.


title: Conceptual Design Studies for a CEPC Detector

abstract:
  The physics potential of the Circular Electron Positron Collider (CEPC) can
be significantly strengthened by two detectors with complementary designs. A
promising detector approach based on the Silicon Detector (SiD) designed for
the International Linear Collider (ILC) is presented. Several simplifications
of this detector for the lower energies expected at the CEPC are proposed. A
number of cost optimizations of this detector are illustrated using full
detector simulations. We show that the proposed changes will enable to reach
the physics goals at the CEPC.


title:
Transient phases and dynamical transitions in the post quench evolution
  of the generalized Bose-Anderson model

abstract:
  The exact description of the time evolution of open correlated quantum
systems remains one of the major challenges of the condensed matter theory,
specially for asymptotic long times where most numerical methods fail. Here,
the post-quench dynamics of the $N$-component Bose-Anderson impurity model is
studied in the $N\to\infty$ limit. The equilibrium phase diagram is similar to
that of the Bose-Hubbard model in that it contains local versions of the Mott
and Bose phases. Using a numerically exact procedure we are able to study the
real time evolution including asymptotic long time regimes. The formation of
long-lived transient phases is observed for quench paths crossing foreign
phases. For quenches inside the local Bose condensed phase, a dynamical phase
transition is reported, that separates the evolution towards a new equilibrium
state and a regime characterized at large times by a persistent phase rotation
of the order parameter. We explain how such non-decaying mode can exist in the
presence of a dissipative bath. We discuss the extension of our results to the
experimental relevant finite-$N$ case and their implication for the existence
of non-decaying modes in generic quantum systems in the presence of a bath.


title:
CopulaDTA: An R Package for Copula Based Bivariate Beta-Binomial Models
  for Diagnostic Test Accuracy Studies in a Bayesian Framework

abstract:
  The current statistical procedures implemented in statistical software
packages for pooling of diagnostic test accuracy data include hSROC regression
and the bivariate random-effects meta-analysis model (BRMA). However, these
models do not report the overall mean but rather the mean for a central study
with random-effect equal to zero and have difficulties estimating the
correlation between sensitivity and specificity when the number of studies in
the meta-analysis is small and/or when the between-study variance is relatively
large. This tutorial on advanced statistical methods for meta-analysis of
diagnostic accuracy studies discusses and demonstrates Bayesian modeling using
CopulaDTA package in R to fit different models to obtain the meta-analytic
parameter estimates. The focus is on the joint modelling of sensitivity and
specificity using copula based bivariate beta distribution. Essentially, we
extend the work of Nikoloulopoulos by: i) presenting the Bayesian approach
which offers flexibility and ability to perform complex statistical modelling
even with small data sets and ii) including covariate information, and iii)
providing an easy to use code. The statistical methods are illustrated by
re-analysing data of two published meta-analyses. Modelling sensitivity and
specificity using the bivariate beta distribution provides marginal as well as
study-specific parameter estimates as opposed to using bivariate normal
distribution (e.g., in BRMA) which only yields study-specific parameter
estimates. Moreover, copula based models offer greater flexibility in modelling
different correlation structures in contrast to the normal distribution which
allows for only one correlation structure.


title: Field-induced exciton condensation in LaCoO3

abstract:
  Motivated by recent observation of magnetic field induced transition in
LaCoO3 we study the effect of external field in systems close to instabilities
towards spin-state ordering and exciton condensation. We show that, while in
both cases the transition can be induced by an external field, temperature
dependencies of the critical field have opposite slopes. Based on this result
we argue that the experimental observations select the exciton condensation
scenario. We show that such condensation is possible due to high mobility of
the intermediate spin excitations. The estimated width of the corresponding
dispersion is large enough to overrule the order of atomic multiplets and to
make the intermediate spin excitation propagating with a specific wave vector
the lowest excitation of the system.


title: Toric Degeneration of Bott-Samelson-Demazure-Hansen varieties

abstract:
  In this paper we construct a degeneration of Bott-Samelson-Demazure-Hansen
varieties to toric varieties in an algebraic family and study the geometry of
the resulting toric varieties. We give a natural set of torus invariant curves
that generate the Chow group of $1$-cycles of the limiting toric variety and
express the ample cone of this toric variety as a sub-cone of the ample cone of
the corresponding Bott-Samelson-Demazure-Hansen variety. We also give a
description of Extremal and Mori rays and determine when this toric variety is
Fano.


title: Online Optimization of Smoothed Piecewise Constant Functions

abstract:
  We study online optimization of smoothed piecewise constant functions over
the domain [0, 1). This is motivated by the problem of adaptively picking
parameters of learning algorithms as in the recently introduced framework by
Gupta and Roughgarden (2016). Majority of the machine learning literature has
focused on Lipschitz-continuous functions or functions with bounded gradients.
1 This is with good reason---any learning algorithm suffers linear regret even
against piecewise constant functions that are chosen adversarially, arguably
the simplest of non-Lipschitz continuous functions. The smoothed setting we
consider is inspired by the seminal work of Spielman and Teng (2004) and the
recent work of Gupta and Roughgarden---in this setting, the sequence of
functions may be chosen by an adversary, however, with some uncertainty in the
location of discontinuities. We give algorithms that achieve sublinear regret
in the full information and bandit settings.


title: Construction and Test of MDT Chambers for the ATLAS Muon Spectrometer

abstract:
  The Monitored Drift Tube (MDT) chambers for the muon spectrometer of the AT-
LAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) consist of 3-4 layers of
pressurized drift tubes on either side of a space frame carrying an optical
monitoring system to correct for deformations. The full-scale prototype of a
large MDT chamber has been constructed with methods suitable for large-scale
production. X-ray measurements at CERN showed a positioning accuracy of the
sense wires in the chamber of better than the required 20 ?microns (rms). The
performance of the chamber was studied in a muon beam at CERN. Chamber
production for ATLAS now has started.


title:
Parameterized Relativistic Dynamical Formalism for Transitions between
  Three Flavor States

abstract:
  Parameterized relativistic dynamics (PRD) is a manifestly covariant quantum
theory with invariant evolution parameter. The theory has been applied to
neutrino flavor oscillations between two mass states. It is generalized here to
transitions between three mass states and applied to electron neutrino
oscillations.


title:
Global behaviour of bistable solutions for gradient systems in one
  unbounded spatial dimension

abstract:
  This paper is concerned with spatially extended gradient systems of the form
\[ u_t=-\nabla V (u) + u_{xx}\,, \] where spatial domain is the whole real
line, state-parameter $u$ is multidimensional, and the potential $V$ is
coercive at infinity. For such systems, under generic assumptions of the
potential, the asymptotic behaviour of every \emph{bistable solution} (that is,
every solution close at both ends of space to spatially homogeneous stable
equilibria) is described. Every such solutions approaches, far to the left in
space a stacked combination of bistable fronts travelling to the left, far to
the right in space a stacked combination of bistable fronts travelling to the
right, and in between a pattern of stationary solutions homoclinic or
heteroclinic to homogeneous equilibria. This result pushes one step further the
program initiated in the late seventies by Fife and MacLeod about the global
asymptotic behaviour of bistable solutions, by extending their results to the
case of systems. In the absence of maximum principle, the arguments are purely
variational, and call upon previous results obtained in companion papers.


title: Existence of blueshifts in quasi-spherical Szekeres spacetimes

abstract:
  In Lema\^{\i}tre -- Tolman (L--T) models, light rays emitted
\textit{radially} at the Big Bang (BB) at such radial coordinates $r$ where the
bang-time function $t_B(r)$ has $\dril {t_B} r \neq 0$ reach every observer
with \textit{infinite blueshift}, $z = -1$. Consequently, there exist rays,
emitted soon after the BB, that will reach later observers with finite
blueshift ($-1 < z < 0$). But in spacetimes without symmetry there are no
radial directions. The question thus arises whether blueshifts can exist at all
in the Szekeres models that contain L--T as a limit, but in general have no
symmetry. The aim of the present paper is to show that strong blueshifts can be
generated in quasi-spherical Szekeres (QSS) models. It is shown that in an
axially symmetric QSS model, infinite blueshift can appear only on axial rays,
which intersect every space orthogonal to the dust flow on the symmetry axis.
In an exemplary QSS model it is numerically shown that if such a ray is emitted
from the Big Bang where $\dril {t_B} r \neq 0$, then indeed observers see it
with $z \approx -1$. Rays emitted shortly after the BB and running close to the
symmetry axis will reach the observers with a strong blueshift, too. Then, in a
toy QSS model that has no symmetry, it was shown by numerical calculations that
two null lines exist such that rays in their vicinity have redshift profiles
similar to those in a vicinity of the axial rays in the axially symmetric case.
This indicates that rays generating infinite blueshifts exist in general QSS
spacetimes and are concentrated around two directions.


title:
First-principles analysis of the intermediate band in
  CuGa$_{1-x}$Fe$_x$S$_2$

abstract:
  We present a comprehensive study of the electronic, magnetic, and optical
properties of CuGa$_{1-x}$Fe$_x$S$_2$, as a promising candidate for
intermediate-band (IB) solar cells. We use hybrid exchange-correlation
functional within the density functional theory framework, and show that Fe
doping induces unoccupied states 1.6-1.9 eV above the valence band. The IBs
significantly enhance the optical absorption in lower energy part of the
spectrum. We find that at moderate $n$-type co-doping concentration, the added
charge occupies part of the IB in the gap, but large concentrations lower the
energy of the occupied IB toward the valence band. Moreover, we show that Fe
impurities tend to cluster within the compound and they choose
antiferromagnetic ordering. The findings can have a significant effect in
understanding this material and help to synthesize more efficient IB solar
cells.


title: MPP3D: Multi-Precision Pointing using the 3rd Dimension

abstract:
  Distant pointing is still not efficient, accurate or flexible enough for many
applications, although many researchers have focused on it. To improve upon
distant pointing, we propose MPP3D, which is especially suitable for
high-resolution displays. MPP3D uses two dimensions of hand positioning to move
a pointer, and it also uses the third dimension to adjust the precision of the
movement. Based on the idea of MPP3D, we propose four techniques which combine
two ways of mapping and two techniques for precision adjustment. We further
provide three types of mapping scheme and visual feedback for each technique.
The potential of the proposed techniques was investigated through
experimentation. The results show that these techniques were competent for
usual computer operations with a cursor, and the adjustment for pointing
precision was beneficial for both pointing efficiency and accuracy.


title: Accelerating Science: A Computing Research Agenda

abstract:
  The emergence of "big data" offers unprecedented opportunities for not only
accelerating scientific advances but also enabling new modes of discovery.
Scientific progress in many disciplines is increasingly enabled by our ability
to examine natural phenomena through the computational lens, i.e., using
algorithmic or information processing abstractions of the underlying processes;
and our ability to acquire, share, integrate and analyze disparate types of
data. However, there is a huge gap between our ability to acquire, store, and
process data and our ability to make effective use of the data to advance
discovery. Despite successful automation of routine aspects of data management
and analytics, most elements of the scientific process currently require
considerable human expertise and effort. Accelerating science to keep pace with
the rate of data acquisition and data processing calls for the development of
algorithmic or information processing abstractions, coupled with formal methods
and tools for modeling and simulation of natural processes as well as major
innovations in cognitive tools for scientists, i.e., computational tools that
leverage and extend the reach of human intellect, and partner with humans on a
broad range of tasks in scientific discovery (e.g., identifying, prioritizing
formulating questions, designing, prioritizing and executing experiments
designed to answer a chosen question, drawing inferences and evaluating the
results, and formulating new questions, in a closed-loop fashion). This calls
for concerted research agenda aimed at: Development, analysis, integration,
sharing, and simulation of algorithmic or information processing abstractions
of natural processes, coupled with formal methods and tools for their analyses
and simulation; Innovations in cognitive tools that augment and extend human
intellect and partner with humans in all aspects of science.


title: Asymptotic normality of linear statistics of zeros of random polynomials

abstract:
  In this note, we prove a central limit theorem for smooth linear statistics
of zeros of random polynomials which are linear combinations of orthogonal
polynomials with iid standard complex Gaussian coefficients. Along the way, we
obtain Bergman kernel asymptotics for weighted $L^2$-space of polynomials
endowed with varying measures of the form $e^{-2n\varphi_n(z)}dz$ under
suitable assumptions on the weight functions $\varphi_n$.


title:
Stability of Fluid Queuing Systems with Parallel Servers and Stochastic
  Capacities

abstract:
  This note introduces a piecewise-deterministic queueing (PDQ) model to study
the stability of traffic queues in parallel-link transportation systems facing
stochastic capacity fluctuations. The saturation rate (capacity) of the PDQ
model switches between a finite set of modes according to a Markov chain, and
link inflows are controlled by a state-feedback policy. A PDQ system is stable
only if a lower bound on the time-average link inflows does not exceed the
corresponding time-average saturation rate. Furthermore, a PDQ system is stable
if the following two conditions hold: the nominal mode's saturation rate is
high enough that all queues vanish in this mode, and a bilinear matrix
inequality (BMI) involving an underestimate of the discharge rates of the PDQ
in individual modes is feasible. The stability conditions can be strengthened
for two-mode PDQs. These results can be used for design of routing policies
that guarantee stability of traffic queues under stochastic capacity
fluctuations.


title: Magnetic geodesics on surfaces with singularities

abstract:
  We prove that, generically, magnetic geodesics on surfaces will turn away
from points with lightlike tangent planes, and we motivate our result with
numerical solutions for closed magnetic geodesics.


title: Residually finite rationally $p$ groups

abstract:
  In this article we develop the theory of residually finite rationally $p$
(RFR$p$) groups, where $p$ is a prime. We first prove a series of results about
the structure of finitely generated RFR$p$ groups (either for a single prime
$p$, or for infinitely many primes), including torsion-freeness, a Tits
alternative, and a restriction on the BNS invariant. Furthermore, we show that
many groups which occur naturally in group theory, algebraic geometry, and in
$3$-manifold topology enjoy this residual property. We then prove a combination
theorem for RFR$p$ groups, which we use to study the boundary manifolds of
algebraic curves $\mathbb{CP}^2$ and in $\mathbb{C}^2$. We show that boundary
manifolds of a large class of curves in $\mathbb{C}^2$ (which includes all line
arrangements) have RFR$p$ fundamental groups, whereas boundary manifolds of
curves in $\mathbb{CP}^2$ may fail to do so.


title: Generic appearance of objective results in quantum measurements

abstract:
  Measurement is of central interest in quantum mechanics as it provides the
link between the quantum world and the world of everyday experience. One of the
features of the latter is its robust, objective character, contrasting the
delicate nature of quantum systems. Here we analyze in a completely
model-independent way the celebrated von Neumann measurement process, using
recent techniques of information flow, studied in open quantum systems. We show
the generic appearance of objective results in quantum measurements, provided
we macroscopically coarse-grain the measuring apparatus and wait long enough.
To study genericity, we employ the widely-used Gaussian Unitary Ensemble of
random matrices and the Hoeffding inequality. We derive generic objectivization
timescales, given solely by the interaction strength and the systems'
dimensions. Our results are manifestly universal and are a generic property of
von Neumann measurements.


title: Poisson-Nijenhuis structures on quiver path algebras

abstract:
  We introduce a notion of noncommutative Poisson-Nijenhuis structure on the
path algebra of a quiver. In particular, we focus on the case when the Poisson
bracket arises from a noncommutative symplectic form. The formalism is then
applied to the study of the Calogero-Moser and Gibbons-Hermsen integrable
systems. In the former case, we give a new interpretation of the bihamiltonian
reduction performed in [3].


title: Keyboard Based Control of Four Dimensional Rotations

abstract:
  Aiming at applications to the scientific visualization of three dimensional
simulations with time evolution, a keyboard based control method to specify
rotations in four dimensions is proposed. It is known that four dimensional
rotations are generally so-called double rotations, and a double rotation is a
combination of simultaneously applied two simple rotations. The proposed method
can specify both the simple and double rotations by single key typings of the
keyboard. The method is tested in visualizations of a regular pentachoron in
four dimensional space by a hyperplane slicing.


title:
On the boundedness of non-integer dimension Calder\'on-Zygmund Operators
  with antisymmetric kernels

abstract:
  We characterize the non-atomic measures $\mu$ for which all
Calder\'{o}n-Zygmund operators with antisymmetric kernels of a fixed
non-integer dimension $s$ are bounded in $L^2(\mu)$ in terms of a positive
quantity, the Wolff energy.


title: Iterated crossed products for groupoid fibrations

abstract:
  We define and study fibrations of topological groupoids. We interpret a
groupoid fibration L->H with fibre G as an action of H on G by groupoid
equivalences. Our main result shows that a crossed product for an action of L
is isomorphic to an iterated crossed product first by G and then by H. Here
groupoid action means a Fell bundle over the groupoid, and crossed product
means the section C*-algebra.


title: Generic character sheaves on reductive groups over a finite ring

abstract:
  In this paper we propose a construction of generic character sheaves on
reductive groups over finite local rings at even levels, whose characteristic
functions are higher Deligne--Lusztig characters when the parameters are
generic. We formulate a conjecture on the simple perversity of these complexes,
and we prove it in the level two case (thus generalised a result of Lusztig
from the function field case). We then discuss the induction and restriction
functors, as well as the Frobenius reciprocity, based on the perversity.


title:
Renormalization Group Study of the Minimal Majoronic Dark Radiation and
  Dark Matter Model

abstract:
  We study the 1-loop renormalization group equation running in the simplest
singlet Majoron model constructed by us earlier to accommodate the dark
radiation and dark matter content in the universe. A comprehensive numerical
study was performed to explore the whole model parameter space. A smaller
effective number of neutrinos $\triangle N_{eff}\sim 0.05$, or a Majoron
decoupling temperature higher than the charm quark mass, is preferred. We found
that a heavy scalar dark matter, $\rho$, of mass $1.5-4$ TeV is required by the
stability of the scalar potential and an operational type-I see-saw mechanism
for neutrino masses. A neutral scalar, $S$, of mass in the $10-100$ GeV range
and its mixing with the standard model Higgs as large as $0.1$ is also
predicted. The dominant decay modes are $S$ into $b\bar{b}$ and/or
$\omega\omega$. A sensitive search will come from rare $Z$ decays via the chain
$Z\rightarrow S+ f\bar{f}$, where $f$ is a Standard Model fermion, followed by
$S$ into a pair of Majoron and/or b-quarks. The interesting consequences of
dark matter bound state due to the sizable $S\rho \rho$-coupling are discussed
as well. In particular, shower-like events with an apparent neutrino energy at
$M_\rho$ could contribute to the observed effective neutrino flux in
underground neutrino detectors such as IceCube.


title: ANOVA model for network meta-analysis of diagnostic test accuracy data

abstract:
  Network meta-analysis (NMA) allow combining efficacy information from
multiple comparisons from trials assessing different therapeutic interventions
for a given disease and to estimate unobserved comparisons from a network of
observed comparisons. Applying NMA on diagnostic accuracy studies is a
statistical challenge given the inherent correlation of sensitivity and
specificity. A conceptually simple and novel hierarchical arm-based (AB) model
which expresses the logit transformed sensitivity and specificity as sum of
fixed effects for test, correlated study-effects and a random error associated
with various tests evaluated in given study is proposed. We apply the model to
previously published meta-analyses assessing the accuracy of diverse
cytological and molecular tests used to triage women with minor cervical
lesions to detect cervical precancer and the results compared with those from
the contrast-based (CB) model which expresses the linear predictor as a
contrast to a comparator test. The proposed AB model is more appealing than the
CB model in that it yields the marginal means which are easily interpreted and
makes use of all available data and easily accommodates more general
variance-covariance matrix structures.


title: Lower bounds for Maass forms on semisimple groups

abstract:
  Let $G$ be an anisotropic semisimple group over a totally real number field
$F$. Suppose that $G$ is compact at all but one infinite place $v_0$. In
addition, suppose that $G_{v_0}$ is $\mathbb{R}$-almost simple, not split, and
has a Cartan involution defined over $F$. If $Y$ is a congruence arithmetic
manifold of non-positive curvature associated to $G$, we prove that there
exists a sequence of Laplace eigenfunctions on $Y$ whose sup norms grow like a
power of the eigenvalue.


title: Some aspects of epitaxial thin film growth

abstract:
  The article consists of four sections all dealing with the computational
modeling of the sputtering process. The first section deals with the difference
in Bismuth atomic layer deposition at different polar angle and ion flounce. In
the second section, atomic layer deposition was studied as a function of
incident Argon ion energy at different pressure conditions. A curve analogous
to Bragg curve was obtained .In the third section TiOx films was developed by
simulations. The sputtering parameters were varied to get different atomic
layers. The variation of coverage with sticking coefficient was shown. The last
section deals with sputter based deposition of TiN films. The rate of change of
partial sputtering yield with coverage was considered. The deposition pressure
and time were varied to get films of different thickness. All the sections are
stored separately


title: The physics of spreading processes in multilayer networks

abstract:
  The study of networks plays a crucial role in investigating the structure,
dynamics, and function of a wide variety of complex systems in myriad
disciplines. Despite the success of traditional network analysis, standard
networks provide a limited representation of complex systems, which often
include different types of relationships (i.e., "multiplexity") among their
constituent components and/or multiple interacting subsystems. Such structural
complexity has a significant effect on both dynamics and function. Throwing
away or aggregating available structural information can generate misleading
results and be a major obstacle towards attempts to understand complex systems.
  The recent "multilayer" approach for modeling networked systems explicitly
allows the incorporation of multiplexity and other features of realistic
systems. On one hand, it allows one to couple different structural
relationships by encoding them in a convenient mathematical object. On the
other hand, it also allows one to couple different dynamical processes on top
of such interconnected structures. The resulting framework plays a crucial role
in helping achieve a thorough, accurate understanding of complex systems. The
study of multilayer networks has also revealed new physical phenomena that
remain hidden when using ordinary graphs, the traditional network
representation. Here we survey progress towards attaining a deeper
understanding of spreading processes on multilayer networks, and we highlight
some of the physical phenomena related to spreading processes that emerge from
multilayer structure.

categories: physics.soc-ph cond-mat.dis-nn cs.SI nlin.AO


title: Positivity of anti-canonical divisors and $F$-purity of fibers

abstract:
  In this paper, we prove that given a flat generically smooth morphism between
smooth projective varieties with $F$-pure closed fibers, if the source space is
Fano, weak Fano or a variety with the nef anti-canonical divisor, then so is
the target space. We also show that relative anti-canonical divisors of
generically smooth surjective nonconstant morphisms are not nef and big in
arbitrary characteristic.


title:
When strong correlations become weak: Consistent merging of $GW$ and
  DMFT

abstract:
  The cubic perovskite SrVO$_3$ is generally considered to be a prototype
strongly correlated metal with a characteristic three-peak structure of the
$d$-electron spectral function, featuring a renormalized quasiparticle band in
between pronounced Hubbard sidebands. Here we show that this interpretation,
which has been supported by numerous "ab-initio" simulations, has to be
reconsidered. Using a fully self-consistent $GW$+extended dynamical mean-field
theory calculation we find that the screening from nonlocal Coulomb
interactions substantially reduces the effective local Coulomb repulsion, and
at the same time leads to strong plasmonic effects. The resulting effective
local interactions are too weak to produce pronounced Hubbard bands in the
local spectral function, while prominent plasmon satellites appear at energies
which agree with those of the experimentally observed sidebands. Our results
demonstrate the important role of nonlocal interactions and dynamical screening
in determining the effective interaction strength of correlated compounds.


title:
Automated Threshold Selection for Extreme Value Analysis via
  Goodness-of-Fit Tests with Application to Batched Return Level Mapping

abstract:
  Threshold selection is a critical issue for extreme value analysis with
threshold-based approaches. Under suitable conditions, exceedances over a high
threshold have been shown to follow the generalized Pareto distribution (GPD)
asymptotically. In practice, however, the threshold must be chosen. If the
chosen threshold is too low, the GPD approximation may not hold and bias can
occur. If the threshold is chosen too high, reduced sample size increases the
variance of parameter estimates. To process batch analyses, commonly used
selection methods such as graphical diagnosis are subjective and cannot be
automated, while computational methods may not be feasible. We propose to test
a set of thresholds through the goodness-of-fit of the GPD for the exceedances,
and select the lowest one, above which the data provides adequate fit to the
GPD. Previous attempts in this setting are not valid due to the special feature
that the multiple tests are done in an ordered fashion. We apply two recently
available stopping rules that control the false discovery rate or familywise
error rate to ordered goodness-of-fit tests to automate threshold selection.
Various model specification tests such as the Cramer-von Mises,
Anderson-Darling, Moran's, and a score test are investigated. The performance
of the method is assessed in a large scale simulation study that mimics
practical return level estimation. This procedure was repeated at hundreds of
sites in the western US to generate return level maps of extreme precipitation.


title:
Nonlinear light behaviors near phase transition in
  non-parity-time-symmetric complex waveguides

abstract:
  Many classes of non-parity-time (PT) symmetric waveguides with arbitrary gain
and loss distributions still possess all-real linear spectrum or exhibit phase
transition. In this article, nonlinear light behaviors in these complex
waveguides are probed analytically near a phase transition. Using multi-scale
perturbation methods, a nonlinear ordinary differential equation (ODE) is
derived for the light's amplitude evolution. This ODE predicts that the first
class of these non-PT-symmetric waveguides support continuous families of
solitons and robust amplitude-oscillating solutions both above and below phase
transition, in close analogy with PT-symmetric systems. For the other classes
of waveguides, the light's intensity always amplifies under the effect of
nonlinearity even if the waveguide is below phase transition. These analytical
predictions are confirmed by direct computations of the full system.


title: Persistent Spin Textures in Semiconductor Nanostructures

abstract:
  Device concepts in semiconductor spintronics make long spin lifetimes
desirable, and the requirements put on spin control by schemes of quantum
information processing are even more demanding. Unfortunately, due to
spin-orbit coupling electron spins in semiconductors are generically subject to
rather fast decoherence. In two-dimensional quantum wells made of zinc-blende
semiconductors, however, the spin-orbit interaction can be engineered in such a
way that persistent spin structures with extraordinarily long spin lifetimes
arise even in the presence of disorder and imperfections. We review
experimental and theoretical developments on this subject both for $n$-doped
and $p$-doped structures, and we discuss possible device applications.


title: Combinatorial Topic Models using Small-Variance Asymptotics

abstract:
  Topic models have emerged as fundamental tools in unsupervised machine
learning. Most modern topic modeling algorithms take a probabilistic view and
derive inference algorithms based on Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) or its
variants. In contrast, we study topic modeling as a combinatorial optimization
problem, and propose a new objective function derived from LDA by passing to
the small-variance limit. We minimize the derived objective by using ideas from
combinatorial optimization, which results in a new, fast, and high-quality
topic modeling algorithm. In particular, we show that our results are
competitive with popular LDA-based topic modeling approaches, and also discuss
the (dis)similarities between our approach and its probabilistic counterparts.


title: Smart Communities Internet of Things

abstract:
  Today's cities face many challenges due to population growth, aging
population, pedestrian and vehicular traffic congestion, water usage increase,
increased electricity demands, crumbling physical infrastructure of buildings,
roads, water sewage, power grid, and declining health care services. Moreover,
major trends indicate the global urbanization of society, and the associated
pressures it brings, will continue to accelerate. One of the approaches to
assist in solving some of the challenges is to deploy extensive IT technology.
It has been recognized that cyber-technology plays a key role in improving
quality of people's lives, strengthening business and helping government
agencies serve citizens better. In this white paper, we discuss the benefits
and challenges of cyber-technologies within "Smart Cities", especially the IoT
(Internet of Things) for smart communities, which means considering the
benefits and challenges of IoT cyber-technologies on smart cities physical
infrastructures and their human stakeholders. To point out the IoT challenges,
we will first present the framework within which IoT lives, and then proceed
with the challenges, conclusions and recommendations.


title: Deciphering the CP nature of the 750 GeV resonance

abstract:
  The recently observed excess in diphoton events at around 750\,GeV can be
satisfactorily described in terms of a new spin-0 real singlet with effective
interactions to the gauge bosons. In this letter we first review the current
constraints on this setup. We further explore the production in association
with a gauge boson. We show the potential of this channel to unravel current
flat directions in the allowed parameter space. We then study the potential of
two different asymmetries for disentangling the CP nature of such a singlet in
both gluon fusion and vector-boson fusion. For this matter, we perform an
estimation of the efficiency for selecting signal and background events in
eight different decay modes, namely $4\ell, 2j\, 2\ell,
2j\ell\,E_T^\text{miss}, 2\gamma\,2j, 4\ell\,2j, 2\ell\,\gamma\,2j, 4j\,2\ell$
and $4j\,\ell\,E_T^\text{miss}$. We emphasize that the very different couplings
of this new singlet to the Standard Model particles as well as the larger mass
provide a distinctive phenomenology with respect to Higgs searches. We finally
show that a large region of the parameter space region could be tested within
the current LHC run, the dominant channel being $2\gamma\, 2j$.


title: Edge Detection Based Shape Identification

abstract:
  Image recognition is the need of the hour. In order to be able to recognize
an image, it is of immense importance that the image should be distinguishable
from the background. In the present work, an approach is presented for
automatic detection and recognition of regular 2D shapes in low noise
environments. The work has a large number of direct applications in the real
world. The algorithm proposed is based on locating the edges and thus, in turn
calculating the area of the object helps in identification of a specified
shape. The results were simulated using MATLAB tool are encouraging and
validate the proposed algorithm.
  Index Terms: Edge Detection, Area Calculation, Shape Detection, Object
Recognition


title:
A unified framework for deterministic and probabilistic D-stability
  analysis of uncertain polynomial matrices

abstract:
  Many problems in systems and control theory can be formulated in terms of
robust D-stability analysis, which aims at verifying if all the eigenvalues of
an uncertain matrix lie in a given region D of the complex plane. Robust
D-stability analysis is an NP-hard problem and many polynomial-time algorithms
providing either sufficient or necessary conditions for an uncertain matrix to
be robustly D-stable have been developed in the past decades. Despite the vast
literature on the subject, most of the contributions consider specific families
of uncertain matrices, mainly with interval or polytopic uncertainty. In this
work, we present a novel approach providing sufficient conditions to verify if
a family of matrices, whose entries depend polynomially on some uncertain
parameters, is robustly D-stable. The only assumption on the stability region D
is that its complement is a semialgebraic set described by polynomial
constraints, which comprises the main important cases in stability analysis.
Furthermore, the D-stability analysis problem is formulated in a probabilistic
framework. In this context, the uncertain parameters characterizing the
considered family of matrices are described by a set of non a priori specified
probability measures. Only the support and some of the moments (e.g., expected
values) are assumed to be known and, among all possible probability measures,
we seek the one which provides the minimum probability of D-stability. The
robust and the probabilistic D-stability analysis problems are formulated in a
unified framework, and relaxations based on the theory of moments are used to
solve the D-stability analysis problem through convex optimization. Application
to robustness and probabilistic analysis of dynamical systems is discussed.


title:
3-D Hand Pose Estimation from Kinect's Point Cloud Using Appearance
  Matching

abstract:
  We present a novel appearance-based approach for pose estimation of a human
hand using the point clouds provided by the low-cost Microsoft Kinect sensor.
Both the free-hand case, in which the hand is isolated from the surrounding
environment, and the hand-object case, in which the different types of
interactions are classified, have been considered. The hand-object case is
clearly the most challenging task having to deal with multiple tracks. The
approach proposed here belongs to the class of partial pose estimation where
the estimated pose in a frame is used for the initialization of the next one.
The pose estimation is obtained by applying a modified version of the Iterative
Closest Point (ICP) algorithm to synthetic models to obtain the rigid
transformation that aligns each model with respect to the input data. The
proposed framework uses a "pure" point cloud as provided by the Kinect sensor
without any other information such as RGB values or normal vector components.
For this reason, the proposed method can also be applied to data obtained from
other types of depth sensor, or RGB-D camera.


title: A remark on a converse theorem of Cogdell and Piatetski-Shapiro

abstract:
  In this paper, we reprove a global converse theorem of Cogdell and
Piatetski-Shapiro using purely global methods.


title: Chandrasekhar's Dynamical Friction and non-extensive statistics

abstract:
  The motion of a point like object of mass $M$ passing through the background
potential of massive collisionless particles ($m << M$) suffers a steady
deceleration named dynamical friction. In his classical work, Chandrasekhar
assumed a Maxwellian velocity distribution in the halo and neglected the self
gravity of the wake induced by the gravitational focusing of the mass $M$. In
this paper, by relaxing the validity of the Maxwellian distribution due to the
presence of long range forces, we derive an analytical formula for the
dynamical friction in the context of the $q$-nonextensive kinetic theory. In
the extensive limiting case ($q = 1$), the classical Gaussian Chandrasekhar
result is recovered. As an application, the dynamical friction timescale for
Globular Clusters spiraling to the galactic center is explicitly obtained. Our
results suggest that the problem concerning the large timescale as derived by
numerical $N$-body simulations or semi-analytical models can be understood as a
departure from the standard extensive Maxwellian regime as measured by the
Tsallis nonextensive $q$-parameter.


title: Lossy Data Compression Using Logarithm

abstract:
  Lossy compression algorithms take advantage of the inherent limitations of
the human eye and discard information that cannot be seen. In the present
paper, a technique termed as Lossy Data Compression using Logarithm (LDCL) is
proposed to compress incoming binary data in the form of a resultant matrix
containing the logarithmic values of different chosen numeric sets. The
proposed method is able to achieve compression ratio up to 60 in many major
cases.
  Keywords: LDCL, Lossy Data Compression, Binary Reduction, Logarithmic
Approach