Inverse problems for scattering by periodic structures

Suppose the 3-dimensional space is filled with three materials having dielectric constants ? ₁ above S ₁={x ₂=f ₁(x ₁), x ₃ arbitrary}, ? ₂ below S ₂ = {x ₂ =f ₂(x ₁), x ₃ arbitrary} and ? _o in {f ₂(x ₁) <x ₂ 1(x ₁), x ₃ arbitrary} where f ₁ f ₂ are periodic functions. Suppose for a plane wave incident on S ₁ from above we can measure the reflected and transmitted waves of the corresponding time-harmonic solution of the Maxwell equations, say at x ₂=±b,b large. To what extent can we infer from these measurements the location of the pair (S ₁, S ₂ ? In this paper, we establish a local stability: If ( $\tilde S_1 ,\tilde S_2$ ) is another pair of periodic curves “close” to (S ₁, S₂), then, for any δ>0, if the measurements for the two pairs are δ-close, then $\tilde S_1$ and $\tilde S_2$ are 0(δ)-close to S ₁ and S ₂, respectively.     

Electron attachment to propargyl chloride, 305-540 K

Electron attachment to propargyl chloride (HC≡C-CH(2)Cl) was studied in a flowing-afterglow Langmuir-probe apparatus from 305 to 540 K. The sole ion product in this temperature range is Cl(-). Electron attachment is very inefficient, requiring correction for a competing process of electron recombination with molecular cations produced in reaction between Ar(+) and propargyl chloride and subsequent ion-molecule reactions. The electron attachment rate coefficient was measured to be 1.6×10(-10)cm(3)?s(-1) at 305 K and increased to 1.1×10(-9)cm(3)?s(-1) at 540 K.     

Rank-into-rank hypotheses and the failure of GCH

In this paper we are concerned about the ways GCH can fail in relation to rank-into-rank hypotheses, i.e., very large cardinals usually denoted by I3, I2, I1 and I0. The main results are a satisfactory analysis of the way the power function can vary on regular cardinals in the presence of rank-into-rank hypotheses and the consistency under I0 of the existence of ${j : V_{\lambda+1} {\prec} V_{\lambda+1}}$ with the failure of GCH at ${\lambda}$ .     

Memoryless near-collisions via coding theory

We investigate generic methods to find near-collisions in cryptographic hash functions. We introduce a new generic approach based on methods to find cycles in the space of codewords of a code with low covering radius. We give an analysis of our approach and demonstrate it on the SHA-3 candidate TIB3.     

Cup and cap products in intersection (co)homology

We construct cup and cap products in intersection (co)homology with field coefficients. The existence of the cap product allows us to give a new proof of Poincaré duality in intersection (co)homology which is similar in spirit to the usual proof for ordinary (co)homology of manifolds.     

Improving motion estimation by accounting for local image distortion

Cardiac elastography is a useful diagnostic technique for detection of heart function abnormalities, based on analysis of echocardiograms. The analysis of the regional heart motion allows assessing the extent of myocardial ischemia and infarction. In this paper, a new two-stage algorithm for cardiac motion estimation is proposed, where the data is taken from a sequence of 2D echocardiograms. The method combines the advantages of block-matching and optical flow techniques. The first stage employs a standard block-matching algorithm (sum of absolute differences) to provide a displacement estimate with accuracy of up to one pixel. At the second stage, this estimate is corrected by estimating the parameters of a local image transform within a test window. The parameters of the image transform are estimated in the least-square sense. In order to account for typical heart motions, like contraction/expansion, translation and rotation, a local affine model is assumed within the test window. The accuracy of the new algorithm is evaluated using a sequence of 500 grayscale B-mode images, which are generated as distorted, but known copies of an original ROI, taken from a real echocardiogram. The accuracy of the motion estimation is expressed in terms of errors: maximum absolute error, root-mean-square error, average error and standard deviation. The errors of the proposed algorithm are compared with these of the known block-matching technique with cross-correlation and interpolation in the sub-pixel space. Statistical analysis of the errors shows that the proposed algorithm provides more accurate estimates of the heart motion than the cross-correlation technique with interpolation in the sub-pixel space.