14,500 research outputs found
Weighted Mean Curvature
In image processing tasks, spatial priors are essential for robust
computations, regularization, algorithmic design and Bayesian inference. In
this paper, we introduce weighted mean curvature (WMC) as a novel image prior
and present an efficient computation scheme for its discretization in practical
image processing applications. We first demonstrate the favorable properties of
WMC, such as sampling invariance, scale invariance, and contrast invariance
with Gaussian noise model; and we show the relation of WMC to area
regularization. We further propose an efficient computation scheme for
discretized WMC, which is demonstrated herein to process over 33.2
giga-pixels/second on GPU. This scheme yields itself to a convolutional neural
network representation. Finally, WMC is evaluated on synthetic and real images,
showing its superiority quantitatively to total-variation and mean curvature.Comment: 12 page
Viscous regularization and r-adaptive remeshing for finite element analysis of lipid membrane mechanics
As two-dimensional fluid shells, lipid bilayer membranes resist bending and
stretching but are unable to sustain shear stresses. This property gives
membranes the ability to adopt dramatic shape changes. In this paper, a finite
element model is developed to study static equilibrium mechanics of membranes.
In particular, a viscous regularization method is proposed to stabilize
tangential mesh deformations and improve the convergence rate of nonlinear
solvers. The Augmented Lagrangian method is used to enforce global constraints
on area and volume during membrane deformations. As a validation of the method,
equilibrium shapes for a shape-phase diagram of lipid bilayer vesicle are
calculated. These numerical techniques are also shown to be useful for
simulations of three-dimensional large-deformation problems: the formation of
tethers (long tube-like exetensions); and Ginzburg-Landau phase separation of a
two-lipid-component vesicle. To deal with the large mesh distortions of the
two-phase model, modification of vicous regularization is explored to achieve
r-adaptive mesh optimization
Thermal Fields, Entropy, and Black Holes
In this review we describe statistical mechanics of quantum systems in the
presence of a Killing horizon and compare statistical-mechanical and one-loop
contributions to black hole entropy. Studying these questions was motivated by
attempts to explain the entropy of black holes as a statistical-mechanical
entropy of quantum fields propagating near the black hole horizon. We provide
an introduction to this field of research and review its results. In
particular, we discuss the relation between the statistical-mechanical entropy
of quantum fields and the Bekenstein-Hawking entropy in the standard scheme
with renormalization of gravitational coupling constants and in the theories of
induced gravity.Comment: 44 pages, LaTeX fil
Quantum Effective Action in Spacetimes with Branes and Boundaries
We construct quantum effective action in spacetime with branes/boundaries.
This construction is based on the reduction of the underlying Neumann type
boundary value problem for the propagator of the theory to that of the much
more manageable Dirichlet problem. In its turn, this reduction follows from the
recently suggested Neumann-Dirichlet duality which we extend beyond the tree
level approximation. In the one-loop approximation this duality suggests that
the functional determinant of the differential operator subject to Neumann
boundary conditions in the bulk factorizes into the product of its Dirichlet
counterpart and the functional determinant of a special operator on the brane
-- the inverse of the brane-to-brane propagator. As a byproduct of this
relation we suggest a new method for surface terms of the heat kernel
expansion. This method allows one to circumvent well-known difficulties in heat
kernel theory on manifolds with boundaries for a wide class of generalized
Neumann boundary conditions. In particular, we easily recover several lowest
order surface terms in the case of Robin and oblique boundary conditions. We
briefly discuss multi-loop applications of the suggested Dirichlet reduction
and the prospects of constructing the universal background field method for
systems with branes/boundaries, analogous to the Schwinger-DeWitt technique.Comment: LaTeX, 25 pages, final version, to appear in Phys. Rev.
A Total Fractional-Order Variation Model for Image Restoration with Non-homogeneous Boundary Conditions and its Numerical Solution
To overcome the weakness of a total variation based model for image
restoration, various high order (typically second order) regularization models
have been proposed and studied recently. In this paper we analyze and test a
fractional-order derivative based total -order variation model, which
can outperform the currently popular high order regularization models. There
exist several previous works using total -order variations for image
restoration; however first no analysis is done yet and second all tested
formulations, differing from each other, utilize the zero Dirichlet boundary
conditions which are not realistic (while non-zero boundary conditions violate
definitions of fractional-order derivatives). This paper first reviews some
results of fractional-order derivatives and then analyzes the theoretical
properties of the proposed total -order variational model rigorously.
It then develops four algorithms for solving the variational problem, one based
on the variational Split-Bregman idea and three based on direct solution of the
discretise-optimization problem. Numerical experiments show that, in terms of
restoration quality and solution efficiency, the proposed model can produce
highly competitive results, for smooth images, to two established high order
models: the mean curvature and the total generalized variation.Comment: 26 page
Comments on the Sign and Other Aspects of Semiclassical Casimir Energies
The Casimir energy of a massless scalar field is semiclassically given by
contributions due to classical periodic rays. The required subtractions in the
spectral density are determined explicitly. The so defined semiclassical
Casimir energy coincides with that obtained using zeta function regularization
in the cases studied. Poles in the analytic continuation of zeta function
regularization are related to non-universal subtractions in the spectral
density. The sign of the Casimir energy of a scalar field on a smooth manifold
is estimated by the sign of the contribution due to the shortest periodic rays
only. Demanding continuity of the Casimir energy under small deformations of
the manifold, the method is extended to integrable systems. The Casimir energy
of a massless scalar field on a manifold with boundaries includes contributions
due to periodic rays that lie entirely within the boundaries. These
contributions in general depend on the boundary conditions. Although the
Casimir energy due to a massless scalar field may be sensitive to the physical
dimensions of manifolds with boundary, its sign can in favorable cases be
inferred without explicit calculation of the Casimir energy.Comment: 39 pages, no figures, references added, some correction
- …