262 research outputs found
Loading rates in California inferred from aftershocks
International audienceWe estimate the loading rate in southern California and the change in stress induced by a transient slip event across the San Andreas fault (SAF) system in central California, using a model of static fatigue. We analyze temporal properties of aftershocks in order to determine the time delay before the onset of the power law aftershock decay rate. In creep-slip and stick-slip zones, we show that the rate of change of this delay is related to seismic and aseismic deformation across the SAF system. Furthermore, we show that this rate of change is proportional to the deficit of slip rate along the SAF. This new relationship between geodetic and seismological data is in good agreement with predictions from a Limited Power Law model in which the evolution of the duration of a linear aftershock decay rate over short time results from variations in the load of the brittle upper crust
Detection of trend changes in time series using Bayesian inference
Change points in time series are perceived as isolated singularities where
two regular trends of a given signal do not match. The detection of such
transitions is of fundamental interest for the understanding of the system's
internal dynamics. In practice observational noise makes it difficult to detect
such change points in time series. In this work we elaborate a Bayesian method
to estimate the location of the singularities and to produce some confidence
intervals. We validate the ability and sensitivity of our inference method by
estimating change points of synthetic data sets. As an application we use our
algorithm to analyze the annual flow volume of the Nile River at Aswan from
1871 to 1970, where we confirm a well-established significant transition point
within the time series.Comment: 9 pages, 12 figures, submitte
Dissipation at the core-mantle boundary on a small-scale topography
International audienceThe parameters of the nutations are now known with a good accuracy, and the theory accounts for most of their values. Dissipative friction at the core-mantle boundary (CMB) and at the inner core boundary is an important ingredient of the theory. Up to now, viscous coupling at a smooth interface and electromagnetic coupling have been considered. In some cases they appear hardly strong enough to account for the observations. We advocate here that the CMB has a small-scale roughness and estimate the dissipation resulting from the interaction of the fluid core motion with this topography. We conclude that it might be significant
Modeling cell crawling strategies with a bistable model: From amoeboid to fan-shaped cell motion
Eukaryotic cell motility involves a complex network of interactions between
biochemical components and mechanical processes. The cell employs this network
to polarize and induce shape changes that give rise to membrane protrusions and
retractions, ultimately leading to locomotion of the entire cell body. The
combination of a nonlinear reaction-diffusion model of cell polarization, noisy
bistable kinetics, and a dynamic phase field for the cell shape permits us to
capture the key features of this complex system to investigate several motility
scenarios, including amoeboid and fan-shaped forms as well as intermediate
states with distinct displacement mechanisms. We compare the numerical
simulations of our model to live cell imaging experiments of motile {\it
Dictyostelium discoideum} cells under different developmental conditions. The
dominant parameters of the mathematical model that determine the different
motility regimes are identified and discussed
Analysis of protrusion dynamics in amoeboid cell motility by means of regularized contour flows
Amoeboid cell motility is essential for a wide range of biological processes including wound healing, embryonic morphogenesis, and cancer metastasis. It relies on complex dynamical patterns of cell shape changes that pose long-standing challenges to mathematical modeling and raise a need for automated and reproducible approaches to extract quantitative morphological features from image sequences. Here, we introduce a theoretical framework and a computational method for obtaining smooth representations of the spatiotemporal contour dynamics from stacks of segmented microscopy images. Based on a Gaussian process regression we propose a one-parameter family of regularized contour flows that allows us to continuously track reference points (virtual markers) between successive cell contours. We use this approach to define a coordinate system on the moving cell boundary and to represent different local geometric quantities in this frame of reference. In particular, we introduce the local marker dispersion as a measure to identify localized membrane expansions and provide a fully automated way to extract the properties of such expansions, including their area and growth time. The methods are available as an open-source software package called AmoePy, a Python-based toolbox for analyzing amoeboid cell motility (based on time-lapse microscopy data), including a graphical user interface and detailed documentation. Due to the mathematical rigor of our framework, we envision it to be of use for the development of novel cell motility models. We mainly use experimental data of the social amoeba Dictyostelium discoideum to illustrate and validate our approach
Spontaneous transitions between amoeboid and keratocyte-like modes of migration
The motility of adherent eukaryotic cells is driven by the dynamics of the
actin cytoskeleton. Despite the common force-generating actin machinery,
different cell types often show diverse modes of locomotion that differ in
their shape dynamics, speed, and persistence of motion. Recently, experiments
in Dictyostelium discoideum have revealed that different motility modes can be
induced in this model organism, depending on genetic modifications,
developmental conditions, and synthetic changes of intracellular signaling.
Here, we report experimental evidence that in a mutated D. discoideum cell line
with increased Ras activity, switches between two distinct migratory modes, the
amoeboid and fan-shaped type of locomotion, can even spontaneously occur within
the same cell. We observed and characterized repeated and reversible switchings
between the two modes of locomotion, suggesting that they are distinct
behavioral traits that coexist within the same cell. We adapted an established
phenomenological motility model that combines a reaction-diffusion system for
the intracellular dynamics with a dynamic phase field to account for our
experimental findings.Comment: Some references pointing at figures in the supplement and therefore
are not correctly displayed. The supplement is available at zenodo.or
Multiscale theory of turbulence in wavelet representation
We present a multiscale description of hydrodynamic turbulence in
incompressible fluid based on a continuous wavelet transform (CWT) and a
stochastic hydrodynamics formalism. Defining the stirring random force by the
correlation function of its wavelet components, we achieve the cancellation of
loop divergences in the stochastic perturbation expansion. An extra
contribution to the energy transfer from large to smaller scales is considered.
It is shown that the Kolmogorov hypotheses are naturally reformulated in
multiscale formalism. The multiscale perturbation theory and statistical
closures based on the wavelet decomposition are constructed.Comment: LaTeX, 27 pages, 3 eps figure
Sampling Theorem and Discrete Fourier Transform on the Riemann Sphere
Using coherent-state techniques, we prove a sampling theorem for Majorana's
(holomorphic) functions on the Riemann sphere and we provide an exact
reconstruction formula as a convolution product of samples and a given
reconstruction kernel (a sinc-type function). We also discuss the effect of
over- and under-sampling. Sample points are roots of unity, a fact which allows
explicit inversion formulas for resolution and overlapping kernel operators
through the theory of Circulant Matrices and Rectangular Fourier Matrices. The
case of band-limited functions on the Riemann sphere, with spins up to , is
also considered. The connection with the standard Euler angle picture, in terms
of spherical harmonics, is established through a discrete Bargmann transform.Comment: 26 latex pages. Final version published in J. Fourier Anal. App
What determines the spreading of a wave packet?
The multifractal dimensions D2^mu and D2^psi of the energy spectrum and
eigenfunctions, resp., are shown to determine the asymptotic scaling of the
width of a spreading wave packet. For systems where the shape of the wave
packet is preserved the k-th moment increases as t^(k*beta) with
beta=D2^mu/D2^psi, while in general t^(k*beta) is an optimal lower bound.
Furthermore, we show that in d dimensions asymptotically in time the center of
any wave packet decreases spatially as a power law with exponent D_2^psi - d
and present numerical support for these results.Comment: Physical Review Letters to appear, 4 pages postscript with figure
Holder exponents of irregular signals and local fractional derivatives
It has been recognized recently that fractional calculus is useful for
handling scaling structures and processes. We begin this survey by pointing out
the relevance of the subject to physical situations. Then the essential
definitions and formulae from fractional calculus are summarized and their
immediate use in the study of scaling in physical systems is given. This is
followed by a brief summary of classical results. The main theme of the review
rests on the notion of local fractional derivatives. There is a direct
connection between local fractional differentiability properties and the
dimensions/ local Holder exponents of nowhere differentiable functions. It is
argued that local fractional derivatives provide a powerful tool to analyse the
pointwise behaviour of irregular signals and functions.Comment: 20 pages, Late
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