Applications of Approximation Theory to thermographic images in earthquake engineering

In this paper we show some new applications of the approximation theory, by means of the multivariate sampling Kantorovich operators, to thermographic images in seismic engineering. (© 2015 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)     

On some combinatorial formulae coming from Hessian Topology

We prove that the fields of asymptotic lines of a real hyperbolic homogeneous polynomial are isotopic to the corresponding fields of its hyperbolic homogeneous part. We also show some combinatorial identities which are related to such isotopy.     

The Gross–Pitaevskii equation: Bäcklund transformations and admitted solutions

Bäcklund transformations are applied to study the Gross–Pitaevskii equation. Supported by previous results, a class of Bäcklund transformations admitted by this equation are constructed. Schwarzian derivative as well as its invariance properties turn out to represent a key tool in the present investigation. Examples and explicit solutions of the Gross–Pitaevskii equation are obtained.

     

Avoiding unfairness of Owen allocations in linear production processes

This paper deals with cooperation situations in linear production problems in which a set of goods are to be produced from a set of resources so that a certain benefit function is maximized, assuming that resources not used in the production plan have no value by themselves. The Owen set is a well-known solution rule for the class of linear production processes. Despite their stability properties, Owen allocations might give null payoff to players that are necessary for optimal production plans. This paper shows that, in general, the aforementioned drawback cannot be avoided allowing only allocations within the core of the cooperative game associated to the original linear production process, and therefore a new solution set named EOwen is introduced. For any player whose resources are needed in at least one optimal production plan, the EOwen set contains at least one allocation that assigns a strictly positive payoff to such player.     

Intelligent variable orderings and re-orderings in DAC-based solvers for WCSP

Weighted constraint satisfaction problems (WCSPs) is a well-known framework for combinatorial optimization problems with several domains of application. In the last few years, several local consistencies for WCSPs have been proposed. Their main use is to embed them into a systematic search, in order to detect and prune unfeasible values as well as to anticipate the detection of deadends. Some of these consistencies rely on an order among variables but nothing is known about which orders are best. Therefore, current implementations use the lexicographic order by default. In this paper we analyze the effect of heuristic orders at three levels of increasing overhead: i) compute the order prior to search and keep it fixed during the whole solving process (we call this a static order), ii) compute the order at every search node using current subproblem information (we call this a dynamic order) and iii) compute a sequence of different orders at every search node and sequentially enforce the local consistency for each one (we call this dynamic re-ordering). We performed experiments in three different problems: Max-SAT, Max-CSP and warehouse location problems. We did not find an alternative better than the rest for all the instances. However, we found that inverse degree (static order), sum of unary weights (dynamic order) and re-ordering with the sum of unary weights are good heuristics which are always better than a random order. This research is supported by the MEC through project TIC-2002-04470-C03.     

Limit Consistent Solutions in Noncooperative Games

Strong and limit consistency in finite noncooperative games are studied. A solution is called strongly consistent if it is both consistent and conversely consistent (Ref. 1). We provide sufficient conditions on one-person behavior such that a strongly consistent solution is nonempty. We introduce limit consistency for normal form games and extensive form games. Roughly, this means that the solution can be approximated by strongly consistent solutions. We then show that the perfect and proper equilibrium correspondences in normal form games, as well as the weakly perfect and sequential equilibrium correspondences for extensive form games, are limit consistent.     

Lines of curvature near umbilical points on surfaces immersed in R4

LetM be a compact orientable surface,I:M R⁴ an immersion of classC ^r and a normal unitary smooth vector field. We prove that in the space of pairs (I, ) the family of pairs all whose umbilical points are Darbouxian is generic.     

Player splitting in extensive form games

By a player splitting we mean a mechanism that distributes the information sets of a player among so-called agents. A player splitting is called independent if each path in the game tree contains at most one agent of every player. Following Mertens (1989), a solution is said to have the player splitting property if, roughly speaking, the solution of an extensive form game does not change by applying independent player splittings. We show that Nash equilibria, perfect equilibria, Kohlberg-Mertens stable sets and Mertens stable sets have the player splitting property. An example is given to show that the proper equilibrium concept does not satisfy the player splitting property. Next, we give a definition of invariance under (general) player splittings which is an extension of the player splitting property to the situation where we also allow for dependent player splittings. We come to the conclusion that, for any given dependent player splitting, each of the above solutions is not invariant under this player splitting. The results are used to give several characterizations of the class of independent player splittings and the class of single appearance structures by means of invariance of solution concepts under player splittings. Received: December 1996/Revised Version: January 2000     

Foliations with persistent singularities

Let ω be a differential q-form defining a foliation of codimension q in a projective variety. In this article we study the singular locus of ω in various settings. We relate a certain type of singularities, which we name persistent, with the unfoldings of ω, generalizing previous work done on foliations of codimension 1 in projective space. We also relate the absence of persistent singularities with the existence of a connection in the sheaf of 1-forms defining the foliation.     

Dynamics of ions produced by laser ablation of ceramic Al<Subscript>2</Subscript>O<Subscript>3</Subscript> and Al at 193 nm

We study the dynamics of ions produced upon ablation of Al and ceramic Al₂O₃ targets using nanosecond laser pulses at 193 nm (6.4 eV) as a function of the laser fluence from threshold up to 12 J cm⁻². An electrical (Langmuir) probe located at 40 mm from the target surface has been used for determining the ion yield and calculating the kinetic energy distributions. The results for both targets show the existence of a significant amount of ions having kinetic energies >200 eV (≈20% around threshold fluence), and kinetic energies are up to >1.5 keV. The results are related with the existence of direct photonionization processes caused by the photon energy of the laser being higher than the ionization potential of Al (5.98 eV). Comparison of the ion yield when ablating the two types of targets for fluences above threshold to data reported in the literature suggests that the magnitude of the yield and its threshold are parameters depending on the thermal properties of the target rather than on the laser wavelength. Around threshold, the different behavior of ion yield when ablating Al and Al₂O₃ targets suggests that the threshold for neutral aluminium and ion species in the case of ablation of the Al₂O₃ target must be similar.