12,239 research outputs found
Damping of Growth Oscillations in Molecular Beam Epitaxy: A Renormalization Group Approach
The conserved Sine-Gordon Equation with nonconserved shot noise is used to
model homoepitaxial crystal growth. With increasing coverage the renormalized
pinning potential changes from strong to weak. This is interpreted as a
transition from layer-by-layer to rough growth. The associated length and time
scales are identified, and found to agree with recent scaling arguments. A
heuristically postulated nonlinear term is created
under renormalization.Comment: 17 Pages Late
Density Functional Simulation of Spontaneous Formation of Vesicle in Block Copolymer Solutions
We carry out numerical simulations of vesicle formation based on the density
functional theory for block copolymer solutions. It is shown by solving the
time evolution equations for concentrations that a polymer vesicle is
spontaneously formed from the homogeneous state. The vesicle formation
mechanism obtained by our simulation agree with the results of other
simulations based on the particle models as well as experiments. By changing
parameters such as the volume fraction of polymers or the Flory-Huggins
interaction parameter between the hydrophobic subchains and solvents, we can
obtain the spherical micelles, cylindrical micelles or bilayer structures, too.
We also show that the morphological transition dynamics of the micellar
structures can be reproduced by controlling the Flory-Huggins interaction
parameter.Comment: 29 pages, 11 figures, to appear in J. Chem. Phy
Morphology and scaling in the noisy Burgers equation: Soliton approach to the strong coupling fixed point
The morphology and scaling properties of the noisy Burgers equation in one
dimension are treated by means of a nonlinear soliton approach based on the
Martin-Siggia-Rose technique. In a canonical formulation the strong coupling
fixed point is accessed by means of a principle of least action in the
asymptotic nonperturbative weak noise limit. The strong coupling scaling
behaviour and the growth morphology are described by a gas of nonlinear soliton
modes with a gapless dispersion law and a superposed gas of linear diffusive
modes with a gap. The dynamic exponent is determined by the gapless soliton
dispersion law, whereas the roughness exponent and a heuristic expression for
the scaling function are given by the form factor in a spectral representation
of the interface slope correlation function. The scaling function has the form
of a Levy flight distribution.Comment: 5 pages, Revtex file, submitted to Phys. Rev. Let
Nonequilibrium dynamics of a growing interface
A growing interface subject to noise is described by the Kardar-Parisi-Zhang
equation or, equivalently, the noisy Burgers equation. In one dimension this
equation is analyzed by means of a weak noise canonical phase space approach
applied to the associated Fokker-Planck equation. The growth morphology is
characterized by a gas of nonlinear soliton modes with superimposed linear
diffusive modes. We also discuss the ensuing scaling properties.Comment: 14 pages, 11 figures, conference proceeding; a few corrections have
been adde
Scalable Co-Optimization of Morphology and Control in Embodied Machines
Evolution sculpts both the body plans and nervous systems of agents together
over time. In contrast, in AI and robotics, a robot's body plan is usually
designed by hand, and control policies are then optimized for that fixed
design. The task of simultaneously co-optimizing the morphology and controller
of an embodied robot has remained a challenge. In psychology, the theory of
embodied cognition posits that behavior arises from a close coupling between
body plan and sensorimotor control, which suggests why co-optimizing these two
subsystems is so difficult: most evolutionary changes to morphology tend to
adversely impact sensorimotor control, leading to an overall decrease in
behavioral performance. Here, we further examine this hypothesis and
demonstrate a technique for "morphological innovation protection", which
temporarily reduces selection pressure on recently morphologically-changed
individuals, thus enabling evolution some time to "readapt" to the new
morphology with subsequent control policy mutations. We show the potential for
this method to avoid local optima and converge to similar highly fit
morphologies across widely varying initial conditions, while sustaining fitness
improvements further into optimization. While this technique is admittedly only
the first of many steps that must be taken to achieve scalable optimization of
embodied machines, we hope that theoretical insight into the cause of
evolutionary stagnation in current methods will help to enable the automation
of robot design and behavioral training -- while simultaneously providing a
testbed to investigate the theory of embodied cognition
Extremal-point Densities of Interface Fluctuations
We introduce and investigate the stochastic dynamics of the density of local
extrema (minima and maxima) of non-equilibrium surface fluctuations. We give a
number of exact, analytic results for interface fluctuations described by
linear Langevin equations, and for on-lattice, solid-on-solid surface growth
models. We show that in spite of the non-universal character of the quantities
studied, their behavior against the variation of the microscopic length scales
can present generic features, characteristic to the macroscopic observables of
the system. The quantities investigated here present us with tools that give an
entirely un-orthodox approach to the dynamics of surface morphologies: a
statistical analysis from the short wavelength end of the Fourier decomposition
spectrum. In addition to surface growth applications, our results can be used
to solve the asymptotic scalability problem of massively parallel algorithms
for discrete event simulations, which are extensively used in Monte-Carlo type
simulations on parallel architectures.Comment: 30 pages, 5 ps figure
Digital implementation of the cellular sensor-computers
Two different kinds of cellular sensor-processor architectures are used nowadays in various
applications. The first is the traditional sensor-processor architecture, where the sensor and the
processor arrays are mapped into each other. The second is the foveal architecture, in which a
small active fovea is navigating in a large sensor array. This second architecture is introduced
and compared here. Both of these architectures can be implemented with analog and digital
processor arrays. The efficiency of the different implementation types, depending on the used
CMOS technology, is analyzed. It turned out, that the finer the technology is, the better to use
digital implementation rather than analog
Self-consistent field predictions for quenched spherical biocompatible triblock copolymer micelles
We have used the Scheutjens-Fleer self-consistent field (SF-SCF) method to
predict the self-assembly of triblock copolymers with a solvophilic middle
block and sufficiently long solvophobic outer blocks. We model copolymers
consisting of polyethylene oxide (PEO) as solvophilic block and
poly(lactic-co-glycolic) acid (PLGA) or poly({\ko}-caprolactone) (PCL) as
solvophobic block. These copolymers form structurally quenched spherical
micelles provided the solvophilic block is long enough. Predictions are
calibrated on experimental data for micelles composed of PCL-PEO-PCL and
PLGA-PEO-PLGA triblock copolymers prepared via the nanoprecipitation method. We
establish effective interaction parameters that enable us to predict various
micelle properties such as the hydrodynamic size, the aggregation number and
the loading capacity of the micelles for hydrophobic species that are
consistent with experimental finding.Comment: accepted for publication in Soft Matte
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