323 research outputs found
Kondo effect of non-magnetic impurities and the co-existing charge order in the cuprate superconductors
We present a theory of Kondo effect caused by an induced magnetic moment near
non-magnetic impurities such as Zn and Li in the cuprate superconductors. Based
on the co-existence of charge order and superconductivity, a natural
description of the induced moment and the resulting Kondo effect is obtained in
the framework of bond-operator theory of microscopic t-J-V Hamiltonian. The
local density of state near impurities is computed in a self-consistent
Bogoliubov-de Gennes theory which shows a low-energy peak in the middle of
superconducting gap. Our theory also suggests that the charge order can be
enhanced near impuries.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure
Effect of bilayer coupling on tunneling conductance of double-layer high T_c cuprates
Physical effects of bilayer coupling on the tunneling spectroscopy of high
T cuprates are investigated. The bilayer coupling separates the bonding
and antibonding bands and leads to a splitting of the coherence peaks in the
tunneling differential conductance. However, the coherence peak of the bonding
band is strongly suppressed and broadened by the particle-hole asymmetry in the
density of states and finite quasiparticle life-time, and is difficult to
resolve by experiments. This gives a qualitative account why the bilayer
splitting of the coherence peaks was not clearly observed in tunneling
measurements of double-layer high-T oxides.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures, to be published in PR
Forward-in-Time, Spatially Explicit Modeling Software to Simulate Genetic Lineages Under Selection
SELECTOR is a software package for studying the evolution of multiallelic genes under balancing or positive selection while simulating complex evolutionary scenarios that integrate demographic growth and migration in a spatially explicit population framework. Parameters can be varied both in space and time to account for geographical, environmental, and cultural heterogeneity. SELECTOR can be used within an approximate Bayesian computation estimation framework. We first describe the principles of SELECTOR and validate the algorithms by comparing its outputs for simple models with theoretical expectations. Then, we show how it can be used to investigate genetic differentiation of loci under balancing selection in interconnected demes with spatially heterogeneous gene flow. We identify situations in which balancing selection reduces genetic differentiation between population groups compared with neutrality and explain conflicting outcomes observed for human leukocyte antigen loci. These results and three previously published applications demonstrate that SELECTOR is efficient and robust for building insight into human settlement history and evolution
An Extreme Solar Event of 20 January 2005: Properties of the Flare and the Origin of Energetic Particles
The extreme solar and SEP event of 20 January 2005 is analyzed from two
perspectives. Firstly, we study features of the main phase of the flare, when
the strongest emissions from microwaves up to 200 MeV gamma-rays were observed.
Secondly, we relate our results to a long-standing controversy on the origin of
SEPs arriving at Earth, i.e., acceleration in flares, or shocks ahead of CMEs.
All emissions from microwaves up to 2.22 MeV line gamma-rays during the main
flare phase originated within a compact structure located just above sunspot
umbrae. A huge radio burst with a frequency maximum at 30 GHz was observed,
indicating the presence of a large number of energetic electrons in strong
magnetic fields. Thus, protons and electrons responsible for flare emissions
during its main phase were accelerated within the magnetic field of the active
region. The leading, impulsive parts of the GLE, and highest-energy gamma-rays
identified with pi^0-decay emission, are similar and correspond in time. The
origin of the pi^0-decay gamma-rays is argued to be the same as that of lower
energy emissions. We estimate the sky-plane speed of the CME to be 2000-2600
km/s, i.e., high, but of the same order as preceding non-GLE-related CMEs from
the same active region. Hence, the flare itself rather than the CME appears to
determine the extreme nature of this event. We conclude that the acceleration,
at least, to sub-relativistic energies, of electrons and protons, responsible
for both the flare emissions and the leading spike of SEP/GLE by 07 UT, are
likely to have occurred simultaneously within the flare region. We do not rule
out a probable contribution from particles accelerated in the CME-driven shock
for the leading GLE spike, which seemed to dominate later on.Comment: 34 pages, 14 Postscript figures. Solar Physics, accepted. A typo
corrected. The original publication is available at
http://www.springerlink.co
Low Complexity Regularization of Linear Inverse Problems
Inverse problems and regularization theory is a central theme in contemporary
signal processing, where the goal is to reconstruct an unknown signal from
partial indirect, and possibly noisy, measurements of it. A now standard method
for recovering the unknown signal is to solve a convex optimization problem
that enforces some prior knowledge about its structure. This has proved
efficient in many problems routinely encountered in imaging sciences,
statistics and machine learning. This chapter delivers a review of recent
advances in the field where the regularization prior promotes solutions
conforming to some notion of simplicity/low-complexity. These priors encompass
as popular examples sparsity and group sparsity (to capture the compressibility
of natural signals and images), total variation and analysis sparsity (to
promote piecewise regularity), and low-rank (as natural extension of sparsity
to matrix-valued data). Our aim is to provide a unified treatment of all these
regularizations under a single umbrella, namely the theory of partial
smoothness. This framework is very general and accommodates all low-complexity
regularizers just mentioned, as well as many others. Partial smoothness turns
out to be the canonical way to encode low-dimensional models that can be linear
spaces or more general smooth manifolds. This review is intended to serve as a
one stop shop toward the understanding of the theoretical properties of the
so-regularized solutions. It covers a large spectrum including: (i) recovery
guarantees and stability to noise, both in terms of -stability and
model (manifold) identification; (ii) sensitivity analysis to perturbations of
the parameters involved (in particular the observations), with applications to
unbiased risk estimation ; (iii) convergence properties of the forward-backward
proximal splitting scheme, that is particularly well suited to solve the
corresponding large-scale regularized optimization problem
Keeping the herds healthy and alert: implications of predator control for infectious disease
Predator control programmes are generally implemented in an attempt to increase prey population sizes. However, predator removal could prove harmful to prey populations that are regulated primarily by parasitic infections rather than by predation. We develop models for microparasitic and macroparasitic infection that specify the conditions where predator removal will (a) increase the incidence of parasitic infection, (b) reduce the number of healthy individuals in the prey population and (c) decrease the overall size of the prey population. In general, predator removal is more likely to be harmful when the parasite is highly virulent, macroparasites are highly aggregated in their prey, hosts are long-lived and the predators select infected prey
The elusive role of soil quality in nutrient cycling: a review
peer-reviewedCycling of nutrients, including nitrogen and phosphorus, is one of the ecosystem services we expect
agricultural soils to deliver. Nutrient cycling incorporates the reuse of agricultural, industrial and
municipal organic residues that, misleadingly, are often referred to as ‘wastes’. The present review
disentangles the processes underlying the cycling of nutrients to better understand which soil
properties determine the performance of that function. Four processes are identified (i) the capacity to
receive nutrients, (ii) the capacity to make and keep nutrients available to crops, (iii) the capacity to
support the uptake of nutrients by crops and (iv) the capacity to support their successful removal in
harvested crop. Soil properties matter but it is imperative that, as constituents of ‘soil quality’, they
should be evaluated in the context of management options and climate and not as ends in their own
right. The effect of a soil property may vary depending on the prevailing climatic and hydrologic
conditions and on other soil properties. We recognize that individual soil properties may be enhancing
one of the processes underlying the cycling of nutrients but simultaneously weakening others.
Competing demands on soil properties are even more obvious when considering other soil functions
such as primary production, purification and flow regulation of water, climate modification and
habitat provision, as shown by examples. Consequently, evaluations of soil properties and
management actions need to be site-specific, taking account of local aspects of their suitability and
potential challenges.Horizon 202
Image Registration and Fusion for Interventional MRI Guided Thermal Ablation of the Prostate Cancer
Abstract. We are investigating interventional MRI (iMRI) guided thermal ablation treatment of the prostate cancer. Functional images such as SPECT can detect and localize tumor in the prostate not reliably seen in MRI. We intend to combine the advantages of SPECT with iMRI-guided treatments. Our concept is to first register the low-resolution SPECT with a high resolution MRI volume. Then by registering the high-resolution MR image with iMRI acquisitions, we can, in turn, map the functional data and high-resolution anatomic information to iMRI images for improved tumor targeting. For the first step, we used a mutual information registration method. For the latter, we developed a robust slice to volume (SV) registration algorithm. Image data were acquired from patients and volunteers. Compared to our volume-to-volume registration that was previously evaluated to be quite accurate, the SV registration accuracy is about 0.5 mm for transverse images covering the prostate. With our image registration and fusion software, simulation experiments show that it is feasible to incorporate SPECT and high resolution MRI into the iMRI-guided treatment.
Palaeoenvironmental control on distribution of crinoids in the Bathonian (Middle Jurassic) of England and France
Bulk sampling of a number of different marine and marginal marine lithofacies in the British Bathonian has allowed us to assess the palaeoenvironmental distribution of crinoids for the first time. Although remains are largely fragmentary, many species have been identified by comparison with articulated specimens from elsewhere, whilst the large and unbiased sample sizes allowed assessment of relative proportions of different taxa. Results indicate that distribution of crinoids well corresponds to particular facies. Ossicles of Chariocrinus and Balanocrinus dominate in deeper-water and lower-energy facies,with the former extending further into shallower-water facies than the latter. Isocrinus dominates in shallower water carbonate facies, accompanied by rarer comatulids, and was also present in the more marine parts of lagoons. Pentacrinites remains are abundant in very high-energy oolite shoal lithofacies. The presence of millericrinids within one, partly allochthonous lithofacies suggests the presence of an otherwise unknown hard substrate from which they have been transported. These results are compared to crinoid assemblages from other Mesozoic localities, and it is evident that the same morphological ad-aptations are present within crinoids from similar lithofacies throughout the Jurassic and Early Cretaceous
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