Smectic blue phases: layered systems with high intrinsic curvature

We report on a construction for smectic blue phases, which have quasi-long range smectic translational order as well as three dimensional crystalline order. Our proposed structures fill space by adding layers on top of a minimal surface, introducing either curvature or edge defects as necessary. We find that for the right range of material parameters, the favorable saddle-splay energy of these structures can stabilize them against uniform layered structures. We also consider the nature of curvature frustration between mean curvature and saddle-splay.Comment: 15 pages, 11 figure

Supersymmetry Changing Bubbles in String Theory

We give examples of string compactifications to 4d Minkowski space with different amounts of supersymmetry that can be connected by spherical domain walls. The tension of these domain walls is tunably lower than the 4d Planck scale. The ``stringy'' description of these walls is known in terms of certain configurations of wrapped Dirichlet and NS branes. This construction allows us to connect a variety of vacua with 4d N=4,3,2,1 supersymmetry.Comment: 11 pages, harvmac, no figures, reference added, minor correction

Subset feedback vertex set is fixed parameter tractable

The classical Feedback Vertex Set problem asks, for a given undirected graph G and an integer k, to find a set of at most k vertices that hits all the cycles in the graph G. Feedback Vertex Set has attracted a large amount of research in the parameterized setting, and subsequent kernelization and fixed-parameter algorithms have been a rich source of ideas in the field. In this paper we consider a more general and difficult version of the problem, named Subset Feedback Vertex Set (SUBSET-FVS in short) where an instance comes additionally with a set S ? V of vertices, and we ask for a set of at most k vertices that hits all simple cycles passing through S. Because of its applications in circuit testing and genetic linkage analysis SUBSET-FVS was studied from the approximation algorithms perspective by Even et al. [SICOMP'00, SIDMA'00]. The question whether the SUBSET-FVS problem is fixed-parameter tractable was posed independently by Kawarabayashi and Saurabh in 2009. We answer this question affirmatively. We begin by showing that this problem is fixed-parameter tractable when parametrized by |S|. Next we present an algorithm which reduces the given instance to 2^k n^O(1) instances with the size of S bounded by O(k^3), using kernelization techniques such as the 2-Expansion Lemma, Menger's theorem and Gallai's theorem. These two facts allow us to give a 2^O(k log k) n^O(1) time algorithm solving the Subset Feedback Vertex Set problem, proving that it is indeed fixed-parameter tractable.Comment: full version of a paper presented at ICALP'1

Heterotic Standard Model Moduli

In previous papers, we introduced a heterotic standard model and discussed its basic properties. The Calabi-Yau threefold has, generically, three Kahler and three complex structure moduli. The observable sector of this vacuum has the spectrum of the MSSM with one additional pair of Higgs-Higgs conjugate fields. The hidden sector has no charged matter in the strongly coupled string and only minimal matter for weak coupling. Additionally, the spectrum of both sectors will contain vector bundle moduli. The exact number of such moduli was conjectured to be small, but was not explicitly computed. In this paper, we rectify this and present a formalism for computing the number of vector bundle moduli. Using this formalism, the number of moduli in both the observable and strongly coupled hidden sectors is explicitly calculated.Comment: 28 pages, LaTeX; v2: typos corrected, references added; v3: clarifications, references adde

Estimation of Fiber Orientations Using Neighborhood Information

Data from diffusion magnetic resonance imaging (dMRI) can be used to reconstruct fiber tracts, for example, in muscle and white matter. Estimation of fiber orientations (FOs) is a crucial step in the reconstruction process and these estimates can be corrupted by noise. In this paper, a new method called Fiber Orientation Reconstruction using Neighborhood Information (FORNI) is described and shown to reduce the effects of noise and improve FO estimation performance by incorporating spatial consistency. FORNI uses a fixed tensor basis to model the diffusion weighted signals, which has the advantage of providing an explicit relationship between the basis vectors and the FOs. FO spatial coherence is encouraged using weighted l1-norm regularization terms, which contain the interaction of directional information between neighbor voxels. Data fidelity is encouraged using a squared error between the observed and reconstructed diffusion weighted signals. After appropriate weighting of these competing objectives, the resulting objective function is minimized using a block coordinate descent algorithm, and a straightforward parallelization strategy is used to speed up processing. Experiments were performed on a digital crossing phantom, ex vivo tongue dMRI data, and in vivo brain dMRI data for both qualitative and quantitative evaluation. The results demonstrate that FORNI improves the quality of FO estimation over other state of the art algorithms.Comment: Journal paper accepted in Medical Image Analysis. 35 pages and 16 figure

Developing Antidote Controlled Antiplatelet Therapies By Targeting The Vwf ‐ Gp Ib‐Ix‐V Interaction

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/106054/1/jth02400.pd

Vacuum Stability in Heterotic M-Theory

The problem of the stabilization of moduli is discussed within the context of compactified strongly coupled heterotic string theory. It is shown that all geometric, vector bundle and five-brane moduli are completely fixed, within a phenomenologically acceptable range, by non-perturbative physics. This result requires, in addition to the full space of moduli, non-vanishing Neveu-Schwarz flux, gaugino condensation with threshold corrections and the explicit form of the Pfaffians in string instanton superpotentials. The stable vacuum presented here has a negative cosmological constant. The possibility of ``lifting'' this to a metastable vacuum with positive cosmological constant is briefly discussed.Comment: 39 pages, minor correction

Constraining Scale-Dependent Non-Gaussianity with Future Large-Scale Structure and the CMB

We forecast combined future constraints from the cosmic microwave background and large-scale structure on the models of primordial non-Gaussianity. We study the generalized local model of non-Gaussianity, where the parameter f_NL is promoted to a function of scale, and present the principal component analysis applicable to an arbitrary form of f_NL(k). We emphasize the complementarity between the CMB and LSS by using Planck, DES and BigBOSS surveys as examples, forecast constraints on the power-law f_NL(k) model, and introduce the figure of merit for measurements of scale-dependent non-Gaussianity.Comment: 28 pages, 8 figures, 2 tables; v2: references update

N=3 Warped Compactifications

Orientifolds with three-form flux provide some of the simplest string examples of warped compactification. In this paper we show that some models of this type have the unusual feature of D=4, N=3 spacetime supersymmetry. We discuss their construction and low energy physics. Although the local form of the moduli space is fully determined by supersymmetry, to find its global form requires a careful study of the BPS spectrum.Comment: 27 pages, v2: 32pp., RevTeX4, fixed factors, slightly improved sections 3D and 4B, v3: added referenc

Scale Dependence of the Halo Bias in General Local-Type Non-Gaussian Models I: Analytical Predictions and Consistency Relations

We investigate the clustering of halos in cosmological models starting with general local-type non-Gaussian primordial fluctuations. We employ multiple Gaussian fields and add local-type non-Gaussian corrections at arbitrary order to cover a class of models described by frequently-discussed f_nl, g_nl and \tau_nl parameterization. We derive a general formula for the halo power spectrum based on the peak-background split formalism. The resultant spectrum is characterized by only two parameters responsible for the scale-dependent bias at large scale arising from the primordial non-Gaussianities in addition to the Gaussian bias factor. We introduce a new inequality for testing non-Gaussianities originating from multi fields, which is directly accessible from the observed power spectrum. We show that this inequality is a generalization of the Suyama-Yamaguchi inequality between f_nl and \tau_nl to the primordial non-Gaussianities at arbitrary order. We also show that the amplitude of the scale-dependent bias is useful to distinguish the simplest quadratic non-Gaussianities (i.e., f_nl-type) from higher-order ones (g_nl and higher), if one measures it from multiple species of galaxies or clusters of galaxies. We discuss the validity and limitations of our analytic results by comparison with numerical simulations in an accompanying paper.Comment: 25 pages, 3 figures, typo corrected, Appendix C updated, submitted to JCA