Continuous Limits of Classical Repeated Interaction Systems

We consider the physical model of a classical mechanical system (called “small system”) undergoing repeated interactions with a chain of identical small pieces (called “environment”). This physical setup constitutes an advantageous way of implementing dissipation for classical systems; it is at the same time Hamiltonian and Markovian. This kind of model has already been studied in the context of quantum mechanical systems, where it was shown to give rise to quantum Langevin equations in the limit of continuous time interactions (Attal and Pautrat in Ann Henri Poincaré 7:59–104, 2006), but it has never been considered for classical mechanical systems yet. The aim of this article is to compute the continuous limit of repeated interactions for classical systems and to prove that they give rise to particular stochastic differential equations (SDEs) in the limit. In particular, we recover the usual Langevin equations associated with the action of heat baths. In order to obtain these results, we consider the discrete-time dynamical system induced by Hamilton’s equations and the repeated interactions. We embed it into a continuous-time dynamical system and compute the limit when the time step goes to 0. This way, we obtain a discrete-time approximation of SDE, considered as a deterministic dynamical system on the Wiener space, which is not exactly of the usual Euler scheme type. We prove the L ^p and almost sure convergence of this scheme. We end up with applications to concrete physical examples such as a charged particle in a uniform electric field or a harmonic interaction. We obtain the usual Langevin equation for the action of a heat bath when considering a damped harmonic oscillator as the small system.     

Beta Variables as Times Spent in [0, {infty}[ by Certain Perturbed Brownian Motions

The paper shows that the times spent in [0, +) by certain processesY which are defined by perturbations of Brownian motion involvingreflection at maxima and minima are beta distributed. This resultrelies heavily on Ray–Knight theorems for such perturbedBrownian motions.     

Unstable attractors induce perpetual synchronization and desynchronization

Common experience suggests that attracting invariant sets in nonlinear dynamical systems are generally stable. Contrary to this intuition, we present a dynamical system, a network of pulse-coupled oscillators, in which unstable attractors arise naturally. From random initial conditions, groups of synchronized oscillators (clusters) are formed that send pulses alternately, resulting in a periodic dynamics of the network. Under the influence of arbitrarily weak noise, this synchronization is followed by a desynchronization of clusters, a phenomenon induced by attractors that are unstable. Perpetual synchronization and desynchronization lead to a switching among attractors. This is explained by the geometrical fact, that these unstable attractors are surrounded by basins of attraction of other attractors, whereas the full measure of their own basin is located remote from the attractor. Unstable attractors do not only exist in these systems, but moreover dominate the dynamics for large networks and a wide range of parameters.     

On realistic terrains

We study worst-case complexities of visibility and distance structures on terrains under realistic assumptions on edge length ratios and the angles of the triangles, and a more general low-density assumption. We show that the visibility map of a point for a realistic terrain with n triangles has complexity . We also prove that the shortest path between two points p and q on a realistic terrain passes through triangles, and that the bisector of p and q has complexity . We use these results to show that the shortest path map for any point on a realistic terrain has complexity , and that the Voronoi diagram for any set of m points on a realistic terrain has complexity and . Our results immediately imply more efficient algorithms for computing the various structures on realistic terrains.     

Lifetime maximization in wireless directional sensor network

This paper addresses two versions of a lifetime maximization problem for target coverage with wireless directional sensor networks. The sensors used in these networks have a maximum sensing range and a limited sensing angle. In the first problem version, predefined sensing directions are assumed to be given, whereas sensing directions can be freely devised in the second problem version. In that case, a polynomial-time algorithm is provided for building sensing directions that allow to maximize the network lifetime. A column generation algorithm is proposed for both problem versions, the subproblem being addressed with a hybrid approach based on a genetic algorithm, and an integer linear programming formulation. Numerical results show that addressing the second problem version allows for significant improvements in terms of network lifetime while the computational effort is comparable for both problem versions.     

Pencils on separating (M-2)-curves

A separating ( \(M-2\) )-curve is a smooth geometrically irreducible real projective curve \(X\) such that \(X(\mathbb{R })\) has \(g-1\) connected components and \(X(\mathbb{C })\setminus X(\mathbb{R })\) is disconnected. Let \(T_g\) be a Teichmüller space of separating ( \(M-2\) )-curves of genus g. We consider two partitions of \(T_g\) , one by means of a concept of special type, the other one by means of the separating gonality. We show that those two partitions are very closely related to each other. As an application, we obtain the existence of real curves having isolated real linear systems \(g^1_{g-1}\) for all \(g\ge 4\) .     

Examples of scalar-flat hypersurfaces in $${\mathbb{R}^{n+1}}$$

Given a hypersurface M of null scalar curvature in the unit sphere , n ≥ 4, such that its second fundamental form has rank greater than 2, we construct a singular scalar-flat hypersurface in as a normal graph over a truncated cone generated by M. Furthermore, this graph is 1-stable if the cone is strictly 1-stable.     

Existence of non-trivial harmonic functions on Cartan–Hadamard manifolds of unbounded curvature

The Liouville property of a complete Riemannian manifold M (i.e., the question whether there exist non-trivial bounded harmonic functions on M) attracted a lot of attention. For Cartan–Hadamard manifolds the role of lower curvature bounds is still an open problem. We discuss examples of Cartan–Hadamard manifolds of unbounded curvature where the limiting angle of Brownian motion degenerates to a single point on the sphere at infinity, but where nevertheless the space of bounded harmonic functions is as rich as in the non-degenerate case. To see the full boundary the point at infinity has to be blown up in a non-trivial way. Such examples indicate that the situation concerning the famous conjecture of Greene and Wu about existence of non-trivial bounded harmonic functions on Cartan–Hadamard manifolds is much more complicated than one might have expected.      

Glauber Dynamics for the Quantum Ising Model in a Transverse Field on a Regular Tree

Motivated by a recent use of Glauber dynamics for Monte Carlo simulations of path integral representation of quantum spin models (Krzakala et al. in Phys. Rev. B 78(13):134428, 2008), we analyse a natural Glauber dynamics for the quantum Ising model with a transverse field on a finite graph G. We establish strict monotonicity properties of the equilibrium distribution and we extend (and improve) the censoring inequality of Peres and Winkler to the quantum setting. Then we consider the case when G is a regular b-ary tree and prove the same fast mixing results established in Martinelli et al. (Commun. Math. Phys. 250(2):301–334, 2004) for the classical Ising model. Our main tool is an inductive relation between conditional marginals (known as the “cavity equation”) together with sharp bounds on the operator norm of the derivative at the stable fixed point. It is here that the main difference between the quantum and the classical case appear, as the cavity equation is formulated here in an infinite dimensional vector space, whereas in the classical case marginals belong to a one-dimensional space.