Entropy Stable Finite Volume Approximations for Ideal Magnetohydrodynamics

This article serves as a summary outlining the mathematical entropy analysis of the ideal magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) equations. We select the ideal MHD equations as they are particularly useful for mathematically modeling a wide variety of magnetized fluids. In order to be self-contained we first motivate the physical properties of a magnetic fluid and how it should behave under the laws of thermodynamics. Next, we introduce a mathematical model built from hyperbolic partial differential equations (PDEs) that translate physical laws into mathematical equations. After an overview of the continuous analysis, we thoroughly describe the derivation of a numerical approximation of the ideal MHD system that remains consistent to the continuous thermodynamic principles. The derivation of the method and the theorems contained within serve as the bulk of the review article. We demonstrate that the derived numerical approximation retains the correct entropic properties of the continuous model and show its applicability to a variety of standard numerical test cases for MHD schemes. We close with our conclusions and a brief discussion on future work in the area of entropy consistent numerical methods and the modeling of plasmas

Parameterized complexity of machine scheduling: 15 open problems

Machine scheduling problems are a long-time key domain of algorithms and complexity research. A novel approach to machine scheduling problems are fixed-parameter algorithms. To stimulate this thriving research direction, we propose 15 open questions in this area whose resolution we expect to lead to the discovery of new approaches and techniques both in scheduling and parameterized complexity theory.Comment: Version accepted to Computers & Operations Researc

Combinatorics and Geometry of Transportation Polytopes: An Update

A transportation polytope consists of all multidimensional arrays or tables of non-negative real numbers that satisfy certain sum conditions on subsets of the entries. They arise naturally in optimization and statistics, and also have interest for discrete mathematics because permutation matrices, latin squares, and magic squares appear naturally as lattice points of these polytopes. In this paper we survey advances on the understanding of the combinatorics and geometry of these polyhedra and include some recent unpublished results on the diameter of graphs of these polytopes. In particular, this is a thirty-year update on the status of a list of open questions last visited in the 1984 book by Yemelichev, Kovalev and Kravtsov and the 1986 survey paper of Vlach.Comment: 35 pages, 13 figure