Comment on "Critique and correction of the currently accepted solution of the infinite spherical well in quantum mechanics" by Huang Young-Sea and Thomann Hans-Rudolph

We comment on the paper "Critique and correction of the currently accepted solution of the infinite spherical well in quantum mechanics" by Huang Young-Sea and Thomann Hans-Rudolph, EPL 115, 60001 (2016) .Comment: 2 pages; Submitted to the Comments Section of EP

Understanding the dependence on the pulling speed of the unfolding pathway of proteins

The dependence of the unfolding pathway of proteins on the pulling speed is investigated. This is done by introducing a simple one-dimensional chain comprising $N$ units, with different characteristic bistable free energies. These units represent either each of the modules in a modular protein or each of the intermediate "unfoldons" in a protein domain, which can be either folded or unfolded. The system is pulled by applying a force to the last unit of the chain, and the units unravel following a preferred sequence. We show that the unfolding sequence strongly depends on the pulling velocity $v_{p}$. In the simplest situation, there appears a critical pulling speed $v_{c}$: for pulling speeds $v_{p}v_{c}$ it is the pulled unit that unfolds first. By means of a perturbative expansion, we find quite an accurate expression for this critical velocity.Comment: accepted for publication in JSTA

Deep semi-supervised segmentation with weight-averaged consistency targets

Recently proposed techniques for semi-supervised learning such as Temporal Ensembling and Mean Teacher have achieved state-of-the-art results in many important classification benchmarks. In this work, we expand the Mean Teacher approach to segmentation tasks and show that it can bring important improvements in a realistic small data regime using a publicly available multi-center dataset from the Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) domain. We also devise a method to solve the problems that arise when using traditional data augmentation strategies for segmentation tasks on our new training scheme.Comment: 8 pages, 1 figure, accepted for DLMIA/MICCA

Analytical solution of a one-dimensional Ising model with zero temperature dynamics

The one-dimensional Ising model with nearest neighbour interactions and the zero-temperature dynamics recently considered by Lefevre and Dean -J. Phys. A: Math. Gen. {\bf 34}, L213 (2001)- is investigated. By introducing a particle-hole description, in which the holes are associated to the domain walls of the Ising model, an analytical solution is obtained. The result for the asymptotic energy agrees with that found in the mean field approximation.Comment: 6 pages, no figures; accepted in J. Phys. A: Math. Gen. (Letter to the Editor

Scaling and aging in the homogeneous cooling state of a granular fluid of hard particles

The presence of the aging phenomenon in the homogeneous cooling state (HCS) of a granular fluid composed of inelastic hard spheres or disks is investigated. As a consequence of the scaling property of the $N$-particle distribution function, it is obtained that the decay of the normalized two-time correlation functions slows down as the time elapsed since the beginning of the measurement increases. This result is confirmed by molecular dynamics simulations for the particular case of the total energy of the system. The agreement is also quantitative in the low density limit, for which an explicit analytical form of the time correlation function has been derived. The reported results also provide support for the existence of the HCS as a solution of the N-particle Liouville equation.Comment: 17 pages, 3 figures; v3 revised version (minor changes, corrected typos, v2=v1 due to a submission error)accepted for publication in J. Phys. A: Math. Theo

Dependence of exchange anisotropy and coercivity on the Fe–oxide structure in oxygen-passivated Fe nanoparticles

Ultrafine Fe particles have been prepared by the inert gas condensation method and subsequently oxygen passivated. The as-obtained particles consist in an Fe core surrounded by an amorphous Fe-oxide surface layer. The antiferromagnetic character of the Fe-oxide surface induces an exchange anisotropy in the ferromagnetic Fe core when the system is field cooled. Samples have been heat treated in vacuum at different temperatures. Structural changes of the Fe–O layer have been monitored by x-ray diffraction and transmission electron microscopy. Magnetic properties as coercivity, hysteresis loop shift, and evolution of magnetization with temperature have been analyzed for different oxide crystallization stages. A decrease of the exchange anisotropy strength is reported as the structural disorder of the surface oxide layer is decreased with thermal treatment

Temperature dependence of the magnetization processes in Co/Al oxide/Permalloy trilayers

The magnetization process of Co/Al oxide/Py trilayers and its evolution with the temperature have been analyzed. The particular behavior of the Co layers, including the shift of the hysteresis loops and a coercivity increase with the decrease of temperature, is related with the apparition of a CoO layer at the Co/Al-oxide interface

Dependence of exchange anisotropy and coercivity on the Fe–oxide structure in oxygen-passivated Fe nanoparticles

Ultrafine Fe particles have been prepared by the inert gas condensation method and subsequently oxygen passivated. The as-obtained particles consist in an Fe core surrounded by an amorphous Fe-oxide surface layer. The antiferromagnetic character of the Fe-oxide surface induces an exchange anisotropy in the ferromagnetic Fe core when the system is field cooled. Samples have been heat treated in vacuum at different temperatures. Structural changes of the Fe–O layer have been monitored by x-ray diffraction and transmission electron microscopy. Magnetic properties as coercivity, hysteresis loop shift, and evolution of magnetization with temperature have been analyzed for different oxide crystallization stages. A decrease of the exchange anisotropy strength is reported as the structural disorder of the surface oxide layer is decreased with thermal treatment

War, pandemics, and modern economic growth in Europe

This paper contributes to the debate on Europe's modern economic growth using the statistical concept of long-range dependence. Different regimes, defined as periods between two successive endogenously estimated structural shocks, matched episodes of pandemics and war. The most persistent shocks occurred at the time of the Black Death and the twentieth century's world wars. Our findings confirm that the Black Death often resulted in higher income levels but reject the view of a uniform long-term response to the Plague. In fact, we find a negative impact on incomes in non-Malthusian economies. In the North Sea Area (Britain and the Netherlands), the Plague was followed by positive trend growth in output per capita and population, heralding the onset of modern economic growth and the Great Divergence in Eurasia