The origins of Euler's early work on continued fractions

In this paper, I examine Euler's early work on the elementary properties of continued fractions in the 1730s, and investigate its possible links to previous writings on continued fractions by authors such as William Brouncker. By analysing the content of Euler's first paper on continued fractions, ‘De fractionibus continuis dissertatio’ (1737, published 1744) I conclude that, contrary to what one might expect, Euler's work on continued fractions initially arose not from earlier writings on continued fractions, but from a wish to solve the Riccati differential equation.     

The economic effect of interlocking directorates in Italy: new evidence using centrality measures

We use measures of vertex centrality to examine interlocking directorates and their economic effects in Italy. We employ centrality measures like degree, eigenvector centrality, betweenness, and flow betweenness, along with the clustering coefficient. We document the existence of a negative relationship between both degree and eigenvector centrality and firm value. Betweenness and flow betweenness, on the other hand, are not associated with lower firm valuations. We argue that these differences derive from the different properties of these measures: while degree and eigenvector centrality measures the influence and the power of the connections, betweenness and flow betweenness are proxies for the volume of information that passes between the nodes. This result is robust with respect to the use of both stock market and operating performance measures, as well as several controlling variables.     

Solvability of the Dirichlet Problem in W~（2,p ）for a Class of Elliptic Equations with Singular Data

We prove an existence and uniqueness result for the Dirichlet problem for a class of elliptic equations with singular data in weighted Sobolev spaces.     

Problem solving: a personal perspective from Brazil

In this paper, I do a historical review of the concept of Problem Solving, and make some considerations about the State of the Art nowadays. A very brief notice of the art of Problem Solving in Latin America is also presented. Finally, I present some reflections on the future of the Art of Problem Solving.     

Monomial-wise optimal separable underestimators for mixed-integer polynomial optimization

We introduce a new method for solving box-constrained mixed-integer polynomial problems to global optimality. The approach, a specialized branch-and-bound algorithm, is based on the computation of lower bounds provided by the minimization of separable underestimators of the polynomial objective function. The underestimators are the novelty of the approach because the standard approaches in global optimization are based on convex relaxations. Thanks to the fact that only simple bound constraints are present, minimizing the separable underestimator can be done very quickly. The underestimators are computed monomial-wise after the original polynomial has been shifted. We show that such valid underestimators exist and their degree can be bounded when the degree of the polynomial objective function is bounded, too. For the quartic case, all optimal monomial underestimators are determined analytically. We implemented and tested the branch-and-bound algorithm where these underestimators are hardcoded. The comparison against standard global optimization and polynomial optimization solvers clearly shows that our method outperforms the others, the only exception being the binary case where, though, it is still competitive. Moreover, our branch-and-bound approach suffers less in case of dense polynomial objective function, i.e., in case of polynomials having a large number of monomials. This paper is an extended and revised version of the preliminary paper [4].     

Multi-component, regio-selective aldol addition of β-ketoesters to aldehydes: scope and applications

Simple and effective multi-component one-pot aldol addition/protection reactions of β-ketoesters to a series of aldehydes in the presence Me(3)SiCl and i-Pr(2)EtN have been described. The analysis of the scope of the reaction revealed a dramatic dependence of the reactivity on the substrates used. Thus the effect of a catalytic amount of DMF and different reaction conditions was widely investigated. Further transformations of the aldol adducts were particularly useful to give valuable diols and compounds with quaternary stereocenters, while X-ray structural analysis gave also important stereochemical information about this challenging reaction.     

Stability of flows associated to gradient vector fields and convergence of iterated transport maps

In this paper we address the problem of stability of flows associated to a sequence of vector fields under minimal regularity requirements on the limit vector field, that is supposed to be a gradient. We apply this stability result to show the convergence of iterated compositions of optimal transport maps arising in the implicit time discretization (with respect to the Wasserstein distance) of nonlinear evolution equations of a diffusion type. Finally, we use these convergence results to study the gradient flow of a particular class of polyconvex functionals recently considered by Gangbo, Evans and Savin. We solve some open problems raised in their paper and obtain existence and uniqueness of solutions under weaker regularity requirements and with no upper bound on the jacobian determinant of the initial datum.This work was partially supported by grants of M.I.U.R. and of IMATI-CNR, Pavia, Italy.     

Measurement of elastic scattering in antiproton-proton collisions at 52.8 GeV centre-of-mass energy

We measured the differential cross section for p?p and pp elastic scattering in the momentum-transfer range 0.01 <|t| < 1.0 GeV² at the CERN Intersecting Storage Rings with center-of-mass energy $\text{s}\text{= 52.8}\text{GeV}$. Fitting the differential cross section with an exponential [Aexp (bt)], we found $\text{b}\text{p}\text{p = 13.92 ± 0.59}\text{GeV}{}^{\mathrm{?2}}$ for |t| < 0.05 GeV², whilst for |t| > 0.09 GeV², $\text{b}\text{p}\text{p = 10.68 ± 0.26}\text{GeV}{}^{\mathrm{?2}}$. Using the optical theorem, we obtained for the total cross section $\text{σ}{}_{\mathrm{<mtext>tot</mtext>}}\text{(}\text{p}\text{p)= 44.86 ± 0.78}\text{mb}$ and, by integrating the differential cross section, we obtained for the total elastic cross section $\text{σ}{}_{\mathrm{<mtext>el</mtext>}}\text{(}\text{p}\text{p) = 7.89 ± 0.28}\text{mb}$. Calculations of σ_tot combining elastic-rate and total-rate measurements are also given. All of these measurements were also performed for pp scattering at the same energy, and the results for both reactions are compared.