Quark Lagrangian diagonalization versus non-diagonal kinetic terms

Loop corrections induce a dependence on the momentum squared of the coefficients of the Standard Model Lagrangian, making highly non-trivial (or even impossible) the diagonalization of its quadratic part. Fortunately, the introduction of appropriate counterterms solves this puzzle.Comment: 2 pages, 1 figur

Mixing angles of quarks and leptons in Quantum Field Theory

45 pages, 6 figuresInternational audienceArguments coming from Quantum Field Theory are supplemented with a 1-loop perturbative calculation to settle the non-unitarity of mixing matrices linking renormalized mass eigenstates to bare flavor states for non-degenerate coupled fermions. We simultaneously diagonalize the kinetic and mass terms and counterterms in the renormalized Lagrangian. SU(2)_L gauge invariance constrains the mixing matrix in charged currents of renormalized mass states, for example the Cabibbo matrix, to stay unitary. Leaving aside CP violation, we observe that the mixing angles exhibit, within experimental uncertainty, a very simple breaking pattern of SU(2)_f horizontal symmetry linked to the algebra of weak neutral currents, the origin of which presumably lies beyond the Standard Model. It concerns: on one hand, the three quark mixing angles; on the other hand, a neutrino-like pattern in which theta_{23} is maximal and tan(2 theta_{12})=2. The Cabibbo angle fulfills the condition tan (2 theta_c)=1/2 and theta_{12} for neutrinos satisfies accordingly the ``quark-lepton complementarity condition ''theta_c + theta_{12}= \pi/4. theta_{13} = +- 5.7 10^{-3} are the only values obtained for the third neutrino mixing angle that lie within present experimental bounds. Flavor symmetries, their breaking by a non-degenerate mass spectrum, and their entanglement with the gauge symmetry, are scrutinized; the special role of flavor rotations as a very mildly brokensymmetry of the Standard Model is outlined

Wide range and tunable linear TMR sensor using two exchange pinned electrodes

A magnetic tunnel junction sensor is proposed, with both the detection and the reference layers pinned by IrMn. Using the differences in the blocking temperatures of the IrMn films with different thicknesses, crossed anisotropies can be induced between the detection and the reference electrodes. The pinning of the sensing electrode ensures a linear and reversible output. It also allows tuning both the sensitivity and the linear range of the sensor. The authors show that the sensitivity varies linearly with the ferromagnetic thickness of the detection electrode. It is demonstrated that an increased thickness leads to a rise of sensitivity and a reduction of the operating range

Cultural selection drives the evolution of human communication systems

Human communication systems evolve culturally, but the evolutionary mechanisms that drive this evolution are not well understood. Against a baseline that communication variants spread in a population following neutral evolutionary dynamics (also known as drift models), we tested the role of two cultural selection models: coordination- and content-biased. We constructed a parametrized mixed probabilistic model of the spread of communicative variants in four 8-person laboratory micro-societies engaged in a simple communication game. We found that selectionist models, working in combination, explain the majority of the empirical data. The best-fitting parameter setting includes an egocentric bias and a content bias, suggesting that participants retained their own previously used communicative variants unless they encountered a superior (content-biased) variant, in which case it was adopted. This novel pattern of results suggests that (i) a theory of the cultural evolution of human communication systems must integrate selectionist models and (ii) human communication systems are functionally adaptive complex systems

Conversion of Lignocellulosic Biomass in Biobutanol by a Novel Thermal Process

This work aims at demonstrating the possibility of producing 2-butanol from lignocellulosic biomass through a new thermochemical approach. The production of biobutanol was carried out using different lignocellulosic feedstock through a 3-step process: first the whole lignocellulosic biomass is hydrolyzed under acid catalyst to produce levulinates, then the levulinates go through decarboxylation to produce 2-butanone which is, in a final step, reduced to produce of 2-butanol. The experimental conditions for the first two steps of the process were optimized using the response surface methodology (RSM). The latter could represent an opportunity for the production of economical second-generation butanol without having to go through the classical pathway requiring the production of sugar prior to microbial conversion.The authors are grateful for the financial support to MITACS (Grant number ITO3931) and for the grant to the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC, Grant number EGP 487206-15)

From LTL and Limit-Deterministic B\"uchi Automata to Deterministic Parity Automata

Controller synthesis for general linear temporal logic (LTL) objectives is a challenging task. The standard approach involves translating the LTL objective into a deterministic parity automaton (DPA) by means of the Safra-Piterman construction. One of the challenges is the size of the DPA, which often grows very fast in practice, and can reach double exponential size in the length of the LTL formula. In this paper we describe a single exponential translation from limit-deterministic B\"uchi automata (LDBA) to DPA, and show that it can be concatenated with a recent efficient translation from LTL to LDBA to yield a double exponential, \enquote{Safraless} LTL-to-DPA construction. We also report on an implementation, a comparison with the SPOT library, and performance on several sets of formulas, including instances from the 2016 SyntComp competition

The Role of GC-Biased Gene Conversion in Shaping the Fastest Evolving Regions of the Human Genome

GC-biased gene conversion (gBGC) is a recombination-associated evolutionary process that accelerates the fixation of guanine or cytosine alleles, regardless of their effects on fitness. gBGC can increase the overall rate of substitutions, a hallmark of positive selection. Many fast-evolving genes and noncoding sequences in the human genome have GC-biased substitution patterns, suggesting that gBGC—in contrast to adaptive processes—may have driven the human changes in these sequences. To investigate this hypothesis, we developed a substitution model for DNA sequence evolution that quantifies the nonlinear interacting effects of selection and gBGC on substitution rates and patterns. Based on this model, we used a series of lineage-specific likelihood ratio tests to evaluate sequence alignments for evidence of changes in mode of selection, action of gBGC, or both. With a false positive rate of less than 5% for individual tests, we found that the majority (76%) of previously identified human accelerated regions are best explained without gBGC, whereas a substantial minority (19%) are best explained by the action of gBGC alone. Further, more than half (55%) have substitution rates that significantly exceed local estimates of the neutral rate, suggesting that these regions may have been shaped by positive selection rather than by relaxation of constraint. By distinguishing the effects of gBGC, relaxation of constraint, and positive selection we provide an integrated analysis of the evolutionary forces that shaped the fastest evolving regions of the human genome, which facilitates the design of targeted functional studies of adaptation in humans

Is there a best Büchi automaton for explicit model checking?

LTL to Büchi automata (BA) translators are traditionally optimized to produce automata with a small number of states or a small number of non-deterministic states. In this paper, we search for properties of Büchi automata that really influence the performance of explicit model checkers. We do that by manual analysis of several automata and by experiments with common LTL-to-BA translators and realistic verification tasks. As a result of these experiences, we gain a better insight into the characteristics of automata that work well with Spin.Překladače LTL na Büchiho automaty jsou obvykle optimalizovány tak, aby produkovaly automaty s co nejmenším počtem stavů, či s co nejmenším počtem nedeterministických stavů. V této publikaci hledáme vlastnosti Büchiho automatů, které skutečně ovlivňují výkon nástrojů pro explicitní metodu ověřování modelu (model checking). A to pomocí manuální analýzy několika automatů a experimenty s běžnými překladače LTL na automaty a realistickými verifikačními úlohami. Výsledkem těchto experimentů je lepší porozumění charakteristik automatů, které jsou dobré pro model checker Spin