Optimal Design of Viscoelastic Structures under Forced Steady-State Vibration

ABSTRACT

ABSTRACT With minimum dynamic response as the design criterion, we derive by means of variational analysis a general set of equations governing optimal design of one-dimensional, viscoelastic structures acted on by harmonically varying external loading. The equations are specialized to problems of minimizing transverse vibrational response of beams by attaching optimal, nonuniform cover layers made of a solid, viscoelastic material on the beams. Several numerical solutions to such problems are presented.     

Mössbauer study of nanocrystalline Co60Fe30Ni10 and Co50Fe35Ni15 alloys obtained during mechanical synthesis

The mechanical alloying method was used to prepare Co₆₀Fe₃₀Ni₁₀ and Co₅₀Fe₃₅Ni₁₅ alloys from the elemental powders. As X-ray diffraction studies proved the final products of milling were the solid solutions with b.c.c. lattice and the average grain size of about 60 nm. After heating of the alloys up to 993 K, the mixtures of two solid solutions with a b.c.c. and f.c.c. lattices were formed. Annealing of the alloys at 1173 K for 1 h resulted in the formation of solid solutions with an f.c.c. lattice. Mössbauer spectroscopy revealed hyperfine magnetic field distributions which reflected the different surroundings of ⁵⁷Fe isotopes by Co, Fe and Ni atoms, depending on the chemical composition of the alloy. The most probable atomic configurations were determined on the basis of a local environment model. The results of the macroscopic magnetic measurements testified that Co₆₀Fe₃₀Ni₁₀ and Co₅₀Fe₃₅Ni₁₅ alloys exhibited relatively good soft magnetic properties.     

American Options under Proportional Transaction Costs: Pricing, Hedging and Stopping Algorithms for Long and Short Positions

American options are studied in a general discrete market in the presence of proportional transaction costs, modelled as bid-ask spreads. Pricing algorithms and constructions of hedging strategies, stopping times and martingale representations are presented for short (seller’s) and long (buyer’s) positions in an American option with an arbitrary payoff. This general approach extends the special cases considered in the literature concerned primarily with computing the prices of American puts under transaction costs by relaxing any restrictions on the form of the payoff, the magnitude of the transaction costs or the discrete market model itself. The largely unexplored case of pricing, hedging and stopping for the American option buyer under transaction costs is also covered. The pricing algorithms are computationally efficient, growing only polynomially with the number of time steps in a recombinant tree model. The stopping times realising the ask (seller’s) and bid (buyer’s) option prices can differ from one another. The former is generally a so-called mixed (randomised) stopping time, whereas the latter is always a pure (ordinary) stopping time.     

Tail asymptotics for a Lévy-driven tandem queue with an intermediate input

We consider a Lévy-driven tandem queue with an intermediate input assuming that its buffer content process obtained by a reflection mapping has the stationary distribution. For this queue, no closed form formula is known, not only for its distribution but also for the corresponding transform. In this paper, we consider only light-tailed inputs. For the Brownian input case, we derive exact tail asymptotics for the marginal stationary distribution of the second buffer content, while weaker asymptotic results are obtained for the general Lévy input case. The results generalize those of Lieshout and Mandjes from the recent papers (Lieshout and Mandjes in Math. Methods Oper. Res. 66:275–298, 2007 and Queueing Syst. 60:203–226, 2008) for the corresponding tandem queue without an intermediate input.     

Minimal Spaces with Cyclic Group of Homeomorphisms

There are two main subjects in this paper. (1) For a topological dynamical system \((X,T)\) we study the topological entropy of its “functional envelopes” (the action of \(T\) by left composition on the space of all continuous self-maps or on the space of all self-homeomorphisms of \(X\)). In particular we prove that for zero-dimensional spaces \(X\) both entropies are infinite except when \(T\) is equicontinuous (then both equal zero). (2) We call Slovak space any compact metric space whose homeomorphism group is cyclic and generated by a minimal homeomorphism. Using Slovak spaces we provide examples of (minimal) systems \((X,T)\) with positive entropy, yet, whose functional envelope on homeomorphisms has entropy zero (answering a question posed by Kolyada and Semikina). Finally, also using Slovak spaces, we resolve a long standing open problem whether the circle is a unique non-degenerate continuum admitting minimal continuous transformations but only invertible: No, some Slovak spaces are such, as well.     

Approximate homomorphisms on lattices

We prove two results concerning an Ulam-type stability problem for homomorphisms between lattices. One of them involves estimates by quite general error functions; the other deals with approximate (join) homomorphisms in terms of certain systems of lattice neighborhoods. As a corollary, we obtain a stability result for approximately monotone functions.     

Conservation of energy for the Euler–Korteweg equations

In this article we study the principle of energy conservation for the Euler–Korteweg system. We formulate an Onsager-type sufficient regularity condition for weak solutions of the Euler–Korteweg system to conserve the total energy. The result applies to the system of Quantum Hydrodynamics.     

Topological dynamics and the complexity of strong types

We develop topological dynamics for the group of automorphisms of a monster model of any given theory. In particular, we find strong relationships between objects from topological dynamics (such as the generalized Bohr compactification introduced by Glasner) and various Galois groups of the theory in question, obtaining essentially new information about them, e.g., we present the closure of the identity in the Lascar Galois group of the theory as the quotient of a compact, Hausdorff group by a dense subgroup.We apply this to describe the complexity of bounded, invariant equivalence relations, obtaining comprehensive results, subsuming and extending the existing results and answering some open questions from earlier papers. We show that, in a countable theory, any such relation restricted to the set of realizations of a complete type over Ø is type-definable if and only if it is smooth. Then we show a counterpart of this result for theories in an arbitrary (not necessarily countable) language, obtaining also new information involving relative definability of the relation in question. As a final conclusion we get the following trichotomy. Let \(\mathfrak{C}\) be a monster model of a countable theory, p ∈ S(Ø), and E be a bounded, (invariant) Borel (or, more generally, analytic) equivalence relation on p(\(\mathfrak{C}\)). Then, exactly one of the following holds: (1) E is relatively definable (on p(\(\mathfrak{C}\))), smooth, and has finitely many classes, (2) E is not relatively definable, but it is type-definable, smooth, and has 2^?0 classes, (3) E is not type definable and not smooth, and has 2^?0 classes. All the results which we obtain for bounded, invariant equivalence relations carry over to the case of bounded index, invariant subgroups of definable groups.     

Variations of the total mixed scalar curvature of a distribution

We examine the total mixed scalar curvature of a smooth manifold endowed with a distribution as a functional of a pseudo-Riemannian metric. We develop variational formulas for quantities of extrinsic geometry of the distribution and use this key and technical result to find the critical points of this action. Together with the arbitrary variations of the metric, we consider also variations that preserve the volume of the manifold or partially preserve the metric (e.g., on the distribution). For each of those cases, we obtain the Euler–Lagrange equation and its several solutions. Examples of critical metrics that we find are related to various fields of geometry such as contact and 3-Sasakian manifolds, geodesic Riemannian flows, codimension-one foliations, and distributions of interesting geometric properties (e.g., totally umbilical and minimal).