Small orders of Hadamard matrices and base sequences

We update the list of odd integers n<10000 for which an Hadamard matrix of order 4n is known to exist. We also exhibit the first example of base sequences BS(40,39). Consequently, there exist T-sequences TS(n) of length n=79. The first undecided case has the length n=97.Comment: 7 page

Scampi: a robust approximate message-passing framework for compressive imaging

Reconstruction of images from noisy linear measurements is a core problem in image processing, for which convex optimization methods based on total variation (TV) minimization have been the long-standing state-of-the-art. We present an alternative probabilistic reconstruction procedure based on approximate message-passing, Scampi, which operates in the compressive regime, where the inverse imaging problem is underdetermined. While the proposed method is related to the recently proposed GrAMPA algorithm of Borgerding, Schniter, and Rangan, we further develop the probabilistic approach to compressive imaging by introducing an expectation-maximizaiton learning of model parameters, making the Scampi robust to model uncertainties. Additionally, our numerical experiments indicate that Scampi can provide reconstruction performance superior to both GrAMPA as well as convex approaches to TV reconstruction. Finally, through exhaustive best-case experiments, we show that in many cases the maximal performance of both Scampi and convex TV can be quite close, even though the approaches are a prori distinct. The theoretical reasons for this correspondence remain an open question. Nevertheless, the proposed algorithm remains more practical, as it requires far less parameter tuning to perform optimally.Comment: Presented at the 2015 International Meeting on High-Dimensional Data Driven Science, Kyoto, Japa

Implementing Hadamard Matrices in SageMath

Hadamard matrices are $(-1, +1)$ square matrices with mutually orthogonal rows. The Hadamard conjecture states that Hadamard matrices of order $n$ exist whenever $n$ is $1$, $2$, or a multiple of $4$. However, no construction is known that works for all values of $n$, and for some orders no Hadamard matrix has yet been found. Given the many practical applications of these matrices, it would be useful to have a way to easily check if a construction for a Hadamard matrix of order $n$ exists, and in case to create it. This project aimed to address this, by implementing constructions of Hadamard and skew Hadamard matrices to cover all known orders less than or equal to $1000$ in SageMath, an open-source mathematical software. Furthermore, we implemented some additional mathematical objects, such as complementary difference sets and T-sequences, which were not present in SageMath but are needed to construct Hadamard matrices. This also allows to verify the correctness of the results given in the literature; within the $n\leq 1000$ range, just one order, $292$, of a skew Hadamard matrix claimed to have a known construction, required a fix.Comment: pdflatex+biber, 32 page

Almost-Fisher families

A classic theorem in combinatorial design theory is Fisher's inequality, which states that a family $\mathcal F$ of subsets of $[n]$ with all pairwise intersections of size $\lambda$ can have at most $n$ non-empty sets. One may weaken the condition by requiring that for every set in $\mathcal F$, all but at most $k$ of its pairwise intersections have size $\lambda$. We call such families $k$-almost $\lambda$-Fisher. Vu was the first to study the maximum size of such families, proving that for $k=1$ the largest family has $2n-2$ sets, and characterising when equality is attained. We substantially refine his result, showing how the size of the maximum family depends on $\lambda$. In particular we prove that for small $\lambda$ one essentially recovers Fisher's bound. We also solve the next open case of $k=2$ and obtain the first non-trivial upper bound for general $k$.Comment: 27 pages (incluiding one appendix

On the ground states of the Bernasconi model

The ground states of the Bernasconi model are binary +1/-1 sequences of length N with low autocorrelations. We introduce the notion of perfect sequences, binary sequences with one-valued off-peak correlations of minimum amount. If they exist, they are ground states. Using results from the mathematical theory of cyclic difference sets, we specify all values of N for which perfect sequences do exist and how to construct them. For other values of N, we investigate almost perfect sequences, i.e. sequences with two-valued off-peak correlations of minimum amount. Numerical and analytical results support the conjecture that almost perfect sequences do exist for all values of N, but that they are not always ground states. We present a construction for low-energy configurations that works if N is the product of two odd primes.Comment: 12 pages, LaTeX2e; extended content, added references; submitted to J.Phys.