Zariski kk-plets via dessins d'enfants

We construct exponentially large collections of pairwise distinct equisingular deformation families of irreducible plane curves sharing the same sets of singularities. The fundamental groups of all curves constructed are abelian.Comment: Final version accepted for publicatio

Persistent memory in athermal systems in deformable energy landscapes

We show that memory can be encoded in a model amorphous solid subjected to athermal oscillatory shear deformations, and in an analogous spin model with disordered interactions, sharing the feature of a deformable energy landscape. When these systems are subjected to oscillatory shear deformation, they retain memory of the deformation amplitude imposed in the training phase, when the amplitude is below a "localization" threshold. Remarkably, multiple, persistent, memories can be stored using such an athermal, noise-free, protocol. The possibility of such memory is shown to be linked to the presence of plastic deformations and associated limit cycles traversed by the system, which exhibit avalanche statistics also seen in related contexts.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure

Infinite circumference limit of conformal field theory

We argue that an infinite circumference limit can be obtained in 2-dimensional conformal field theory by adopting $L_0-(L_1+L_{-1})/2$ as a Hamiltonian instead of $L_0$. The theory obtained has a circumference of infinite length and hence exhibits a continuous and heavily degenerated spectrum as well as the continuous Virasoro algebra. The choice of this Hamiltonian was inspired partly by the so-called sine-square deformation, which is found in the study of a certain class of quantum statistical systems. The enigmatic behavior of sine-square deformed systems such as the sharing of their vacuum states with the closed boundary systems can be understood by the appearance of an infinite circumference.Comment: 8 pages, 2 figure

A simple beam model for the shear failure of interfaces

We propose a novel model for the shear failure of a glued interface between two solid blocks. We model the interface as an array of elastic beams which experience stretching and bending under shear load and break if the two deformation modes exceed randomly distributed breaking thresholds. The two breaking modes can be independent or combined in the form of a von Mises type breaking criterion. Assuming global load sharing following the beam breaking, we obtain analytically the macroscopic constitutive behavior of the system and describe the microscopic process of the progressive failure of the interface. We work out an efficient simulation technique which allows for the study of large systems. The limiting case of very localized interaction of surface elements is explored by computer simulations.Comment: 11 pages, 13 figure

Damage process of a fiber bundle with a strain gradient

We study the damage process of fiber bundles in a wedge-shape geometry which ensures a constant strain gradient. To obtain the wedge geometry we consider the three-point bending of a bar, which is modelled as two rigid blocks glued together by a thin elastic interface. The interface is discretized by parallel fibers with random failure thresholds, which get elongated when the bar is bent. Analyzing the progressive damage of the system we show that the strain gradient results in a rich spectrum of novel behavior of fiber bundles. We find that for weak disorder an interface crack is formed as a continuous region of failed fibers. Ahead the crack a process zone develops which proved to shrink with increasing deformation making the crack tip sharper as the crack advances. For strong disorder, failure of the system occurs as a spatially random sequence of breakings. Damage of the fiber bundle proceeds in bursts whose size distribution shows a power law behavior with a crossover from an exponent 2.5 to 2.0 as the disorder is weakened. The size of the largest burst increases as a power law of the strength of disorder with an exponent 2/3 and saturates for strongly disordered bundles.Comment: 8 pages, 7 figures, accepted by PR

Dynamic critical behavior of failure and plastic deformation in the random fiber bundle model

The random fiber bundle (RFB) model, with the strength of the fibers distributed uniformly within a finite interval, is studied under the assumption of global load sharing among all unbroken fibers of the bundle. At any fixed value of the applied stress (load per fiber initially present in the bundle), the fraction of fibers that remain unbroken at successive time steps is shown to follow simple recurrence relations. The model is found to have stable fixed point for applied stress in the range 0 and 1; beyond which total failure of the bundle takes place discontinuously. The dynamic critical behavior near this failure point has been studied for this model analysing the recurrence relations. We also investigated the finite size scaling behavior. At the critical point one finds strict power law decay (with time t) of the fraction of unbroken fibers. The avalanche size distribution for this mean-field dynamics of failure has been studied. The elastic response of the RFB model has also been studied analytically for a specific probability distribution of fiber strengths, where the bundle shows plastic behavior before complete failure, following an initial linear response.Comment: 13 pages, 5 figures, extensively revised and accepted for publication in Phys. Rev.