Quasiregular concentric waves in heterogeneous lattices of coupled oscillators

We study the pattern formation in a lattice of locally coupled phase oscillators with quenched disorder. In the synchronized regime quasiregular concentric waves can arise which are induced by the disorder of the system. Maximal regularity is found at the edge of the synchronization regime. The emergence of the concentric waves is related to the symmetry breaking of the interaction function. An explanation of the numerically observed phenomena is given in a one-dimensional chain of coupled phase oscillators. Scaling properties, describing the target patterns are obtained.     

On the effects of dephasing due to local gradients in diffusion tensor imaging experiments: relevance for diffusion tensor imaging fiber phantoms

The effect of susceptibility differences between fluid and fibers on the properties of DTI fiber phantoms was investigated. Thereto, machine-made, easily producible and inexpensive DTI fiber phantoms were constructed by winding polyamide fibers of 15 microm diameter around a circular acrylic glass spindle. The achieved fractional anisotropy was 0.78+/-0.02. It is shown by phantom measurements and Monte Carlo simulations that the transversal relaxation time T(2) strongly depends on the angle between the fibers and the B(0) field if the susceptibilities of the fibers and fluid are not identical. In the phantoms, the measured T(2) time at 3 T decreased by 60% for fibers running perpendicular to B(0). Monte Carlo simulations confirmed this result and revealed that the exact relaxation time depends strongly on the exact packing of the fibers. In the phantoms, the measured diffusion was independent of fiber orientation. Monte Carlo simulations revealed that the measured diffusion strongly depends on the exact fiber packing and that field strength and -orientation dependencies of measured diffusion may be minimal for hexagonal packing while the diffusion can be underestimated by more than 50% for cubic packing at 3 T. To overcome these effects, the susceptibilities of fibers and fluid were matched using an aqueous sodium chloride solution (83 g NaCl per kilogram of water). This enables an orientation independent and reliable use of DTI phantoms for evaluation purposes.     

Antiviral activity of Engystol<Superscript>®</Superscript> and Gripp-Heel<Superscript>®</Superscript>: an in-vitro assessment

Background  

Infections with respiratory viruses can activate the innate immune response - an important host defence mechanism in the early stage of viral infection. Interferon (IFN) release, triggered by virus infection, is an important factor in establishing an antiviral state, where IFN activation occurs prior to the onset of the adaptive immune response.     

40 GHz Mode-Locked Semiconductor Lasers: Theory, Simulations and Experiment

We study both theoretically and experimentally typical operation regimes of 40 GHz monolithic mode-locked lasers. The underlying Traveling Wave Equation model reveals quantitative agreement for characteristics of the fundamental mode-locking as pulse width and repetition frequency tuning, as well as qualitative agreement with the experiments for other dynamic regimes. Especially the appearance of stable harmonic mode-locking at 80 GHz has been predicted theoretically and confirmed by measurements. Furthermore, we derive and apply a simplified Delay-Differential-Equation model which guides us to a qualitative analysis of bifurcations responsible for the appearance and the breakup of different mode-locking regimes. Higher harmonics of mode-locking are predicted by this model as well.     

Renormalization group treatment of phase transitions in ferromagnetic superconductors

We investigate the nature of the phase transition from the superconducting to the uniformly ordered magnetic phase in ferromagnetic superconductors by renormalization group methods. For this purpose Halperin, Lubensky, Ma's application of the-expansion to pure superconductors is extended to include the influence of magnetic order as well. Our treatment shows that in the vicinity of the ferromagnetic to superconducting phase-boundary critical fluctuations of the magnetization are absorbed into fluctuations of the magnetic field. As a consequence the transition always is first order. An additional indication to the dominance of electromagnetic effects is the irrelevance of the coupling corresponding to spin flip scattering.     

What is the Rees algebra of a module?

In this paper we show that the Rees algebra can be made into a functor on modules over a ring in a way that extends its classical definition for ideals. The Rees algebra of a module may be computed in terms of a ``maximal' map from to a free module as the image of the map induced by on symmetric algebras. We show that the analytic spread and reductions of can be determined from any embedding of into a free module, and in characteristic 0--but not in positive characteristic!--the Rees algebra itself can be computed from any such embedding.

     

A cyclographic approach to the vertices of plane curves

For a closed plane curve the centers of distance functions are considered satisfying the condition that the function attains at least two absolute minima along. From the topology of the closure of this set some information on specific vertices of the curve can be obtained. If a simply closed curve has a finite number of vertices only, then the structure of this set is given by a tree, composed from regular arcs, such that the end points of this tree belong to minimal osculating circles of, which entirely are located in the interior of. Furthermore, the curve can be reconstructed from this set as the envelope of a suitable family of circles. These relations are used to give alternative proofs and extensions of several known vertex theorems for closed curves.Dedicated to N. Stephanidis on occasion of his 65. birthday     

The job-shop problem and immediate selection

The job-shop problem is one of the most difficult NP-hard scheduling problems. A 10×10-problem published in 1963 has been solved only recently by Carlier and Pinson using a branch and bound method. Other branch and bound algorithms have been developed recently. The efficiency of all these branch and bound methods relies on the concept of immediate selection which allows to introduce order relations on the setI of all operations to be processed on the same machine before branching. We present new algorithms for immediate selection. Among them are

1. anO(max {n logn,f})-algorithm for fixing all disjunctions induced by cliques;
2. anO(n ²)-algorithm based on concepts which are different from those used by Carlier and Pinson.

Here,n is the number of operations inI andf is the number of induced order relations.     

Ground States of the 2D Sticky Disc Model: Fine Properties and N 3/4 Law for the Deviation from the Asymptotic Wulff Shape

We investigate ground state configurations for a general finite number N of particles of the Heitmann-Radin sticky disc pair potential model in two dimensions. Exact energy minimizers are shown to exhibit large microscopic fluctuations about the asymptotic Wulff shape which is a regular hexagon: There are arbitrarily large N with ground state configurations deviating from the nearest regular hexagon by a number of ～N ^3/4 particles. We also prove that for any N and any ground state configuration this deviation is bounded above by ～N ^3/4. As a consequence we obtain an exact scaling law for the fluctuations about the asymptotic Wulff shape. In particular, our results give a sharp rate of convergence to the limiting Wulff shape.