2,920 research outputs found
The influence of persuasion in opinion formation and polarization
We present a model that explores the influence of persuasion in a population
of agents with positive and negative opinion orientations. The opinion of each
agent is represented by an integer number that expresses its level of
agreement on a given issue, from totally against to totally in favor
. Same-orientation agents persuade each other with probability ,
becoming more extreme, while opposite-orientation agents become more moderate
as they reach a compromise with probability . The population initially
evolves to (a) a polarized state for , where opinions' distribution is
peaked at the extreme values , or (b) a centralized state for ,
with most opinions around . When , polarization lasts for a
time that diverges as , where is the population's size. Finally,
an extremist consensus ( or ) is reached in a time that scales as
for
Social distancing strategies against disease spreading
The recurrent infectious diseases and their increasing impact on the society
has promoted the study of strategies to slow down the epidemic spreading. In
this review we outline the applications of percolation theory to describe
strategies against epidemic spreading on complex networks. We give a general
outlook of the relation between link percolation and the
susceptible-infected-recovered model, and introduce the node void percolation
process to describe the dilution of the network composed by healthy individual,
, the network that sustain the functionality of a society. Then, we survey
two strategies: the quenched disorder strategy where an heterogeneous
distribution of contact intensities is induced in society, and the intermittent
social distancing strategy where health individuals are persuaded to avoid
contact with their neighbors for intermittent periods of time. Using
percolation tools, we show that both strategies may halt the epidemic
spreading. Finally, we discuss the role of the transmissibility, , the
effective probability to transmit a disease, on the performance of the
strategies to slow down the epidemic spreading.Comment: to be published in "Perspectives and Challenges in Statistical
Physics and Complex Systems for the Next Decade", Word Scientific Pres
Photoemissive Determination of Barrier Shape in Tunnel Junctions
Tunnel junctions have been characterized
in terms of three parameters, the barrier
heights φ_1, and φ_2, and the width S, which generally
are determined by a fit of experimental
current-voltage characteristic curves with theory.
In metal-semiconductor systems barrier
heights have been determined independently
of other parameters from measurement of the
spectral dependence of photoresponse. We
wish to report the first results of the application
of this technique to the measurement of
the barrier heights in Al-Al_2O_3-A1 and Al-A1_20_3—Au tunnel junctions where the Al_2O_3 thickness
is in the range of 20 to 40 Å
Optical implementation of continuous-variable quantum cloning machines
We propose an optical implementation of the Gaussian continuous-variable
quantum cloning machines. We construct a symmetric N -> M cloner which
optimally clones coherent states and we also provide an explicit design of an
asymmetric 1 -> 2 cloning machine. All proposed cloning devices can be built
from just a single non-degenerate optical parametric amplifier and several beam
splitters.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures, REVTe
Strong quantitative benchmarking of quantum optical devices
Quantum communication devices, such as quantum repeaters, quantum memories,
or quantum channels, are unavoidably exposed to imperfections. However, the
presence of imperfections can be tolerated, as long as we can verify such
devices retain their quantum advantages. Benchmarks based on witnessing
entanglement have proven useful for verifying the true quantum nature of these
devices. The next challenge is to characterize how strongly a device is within
the quantum domain. We present a method, based on entanglement measures and
rigorous state truncation, which allows us to characterize the degree of
quantumness of optical devices. This method serves as a quantitative extension
to a large class of previously-known quantum benchmarks, requiring no
additional information beyond what is already used for the non-quantitative
benchmarks.Comment: 11 pages, 7 figures. Comments are welcome. ver 2: Improved figures,
no changes to main tex
Directed percolation depinning models: Evolution equations
We present the microscopic equation for the growing interface with quenched
noise for the model first presented by Buldyrev et al. [Phys. Rev. A 45, R8313
(1992)]. The evolution equation for the height, the mean height, and the
roughness are reached in a simple way. The microscopic equation allows us to
express these equations in two contributions: the contact and the local one. We
compare this two contributions with the ones obtained for the Tang and
Leschhorn model [Phys. Rev A 45, R8309 (1992)] by Braunstein et al. [Physica A
266, 308 (1999)]. Even when the microscopic mechanisms are quiet different in
both model, the two contribution are qualitatively similar. An interesting
result is that the diffusion contribution, in the Tang and Leschhorn model, and
the contact one, in the Buldyrev model, leads to an increase of the roughness
near the criticality.Comment: 10 pages and 4 figures. To be published in Phys. Rev.
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