3,055 research outputs found
Multi-scale spatio-temporal patchiness of macrozoobenthos in the Sacca di Goro lagoon (Po River Delta, Italy)
1 - In this study, the macrobenthos from different habitats in the Sacca di Goro lagoon (Po River Delta, Italy) is analysed by following a multi-scale spatio-temporal approach, with the aim of evaluating the spatial patchiness and stability of macroinvertebrate assemblages in the lagoon. The scale similarity is examined by using a taxonomic metrics based on the Kullback-Leibler divergence and a related index of similarity.2 - Data were collected monthly during one year in four dominant habitat types, which were classified on the basis of main physiognomic traits (type of vegetation and anthropogenic impact). Three of the selected habitats were natural (macroalgal beds, bare sediment and Phragmitetum) and one anthropogenically modified (the licensed area for Manila clam farming). Each habitat was sampled in a variable number of stations representative of specific microhabitats, with three replicates each.3 - Of the 47 taxa identified, only few species were found exclusively in one habitat type, with low densities. No taxon was dominant in all the considered habitats.4 - The results show that, in spite of the large overlapping of species, the spatio-temporal dissimilarity within each habitat type was higher than expected on the basis of the common physiognomic traits. This suggests that local factors (mainly hydrodynamism, quality and quantity of vegetal matter) play a significant role in determining the structure of the macroinvertebrate assemblages.5 - The dissimilarity between habitats was significant and maintained all over the seasonal progression, indicating that the macroinvertebrate assemblages were steadily different. Each habitat allowed some specific taxa to maintain a significant population size, which is a prerequisite for preserving biodiversity.6 - The variety of vegetation types and hydrodynamic conditions in the lagoon emerges as crucial for sustaining biodiversity and capacity to recover from disturbances
Efficient and Effective Query Auto-Completion
Query Auto-Completion (QAC) is an ubiquitous feature of modern textual search
systems, suggesting possible ways of completing the query being typed by the
user. Efficiency is crucial to make the system have a real-time responsiveness
when operating in the million-scale search space. Prior work has extensively
advocated the use of a trie data structure for fast prefix-search operations in
compact space. However, searching by prefix has little discovery power in that
only completions that are prefixed by the query are returned. This may impact
negatively the effectiveness of the QAC system, with a consequent monetary loss
for real applications like Web Search Engines and eCommerce. In this work we
describe the implementation that empowers a new QAC system at eBay, and discuss
its efficiency/effectiveness in relation to other approaches at the
state-of-the-art. The solution is based on the combination of an inverted index
with succinct data structures, a much less explored direction in the
literature. This system is replacing the previous implementation based on
Apache SOLR that was not always able to meet the required
service-level-agreement.Comment: Published in SIGIR 202
Wave scattering by discrete breathers
We present a theoretical study of linear wave scattering in one-dimensional
nonlinear lattices by intrinsic spatially localized dynamic excitations or
discrete breathers. These states appear in various nonlinear systems and
present a time-periodic localized scattering potential for plane waves. We
consider the case of elastic one-channel scattering, when the frequencies of
incoming and transmitted waves coincide, but the breather provides with
additional spatially localized ac channels whose presence may lead to various
interference patterns. The dependence of the transmission coefficient on the
wave number q and the breather frequency Omega_b is studied for different types
of breathers: acoustic and optical breathers, and rotobreathers. We identify
several typical scattering setups where the internal time dependence of the
breather is of crucial importance for the observed transmission properties.Comment: 17 pages, 19 figures, submitted to CHAOS (Focus Issue
Entanglement, Mixedness, and Spin-Flip Symmetry in Multiple-Qubit Systems
A relationship between a recently introduced multipartite entanglement
measure, state mixedness, and spin-flip symmetry is established for any finite
number of qubits. It is also shown that, within those classes of states
invariant under the spin-flip transformation, there is a complementarity
relation between multipartite entanglement and mixedness. A number of example
classes of multiple-qubit systems are studied in light of this relationship.Comment: To appear in Physical Review A; submitted 14 May 200
Relations between environmental gradients and diversity indices of benthic invertebrates in lotic systems of northern Italy
Abstract. The relations between environmental gradients, as measured by 19 independent variables, and traditional diversity indices (taxonomic richness, diversity and evenness) of benthic macroinvertebrate communities in the lotic systems of northern Italy were analyzed. Redundancy analysis (RDA) was used to describe the response of taxa to environmental gradients. Diversity indices were analyzed using generalized linear models (GLMs) with explanatory variables the first two major RDA axes. The results from RDA showed that taxa variance is mostly explained by altitude/latitude and combined pollution gradients. Taxonomic richness and diversity was higher in the low polluted upland sites (LPUs) in comparison to high polluted lowland sites (HPLs), suggesting that headwater streams have higher taxonomic richness than downstream reaches. On the other hand, evenness was lower in LPUs, probably due to the dominance of some taxa (e.g., Plecoptera) that are more tolerant of colder conditions
Precise Variational Calculation For The Doubly Excited State (2p^2)^3P^e of Helium
Highly precise variational calculations of non-relativistic energies of the
(2p^2)^3P^e state of Helium atom are presented.We get an upper bound energy
E=-0.71050015565678 a.u.,the lowest yet obtained.Comment: 5 pages, 1 tabl
Kondo effect in transport through molecules adsorbed on metal surfaces: from Fano dips to Kondo peaks
The Kondo effect observed in recent STM experiments on transport through CoPc
and TBrPP-Co molecules adsorbed on Au(111) and Cu(111) surfaces, respectively,
is discussed within the framework of a simple model (Phys. Rev. Lett. {\bf 97},
076806 (2006)). It is shown that, in the Kondo regime and by varying the
adequate model parameters, it is possible to produce a crossover from a
conductance Kondo peak (CoPc) to a conductance Fano dip (TBrPP-Co). In the case
of TBrPP-Co/Cu(111) we show that the model reproduces the changes in the shape
of the Fano dip, the raising of the Kondo temperature and shifting to higher
energies of the dip minimum when the number of nearest neighbors molecules is
lowered. These features are in line with experimental observations indicating
that our simple model contains the essential physics underlying the transport
properties of such complex molecules.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures, submitted to PR
Identification of the Beutler-Fano formula in eigenphase shifts and eigentime delays near a resonance
Eigenphase shifts and eigentime delays near a resonance for a system of one
discrete state and two continua are shown to be functionals of the Beutler-
Fano formulas using appropriate dimensionless energy units and line profile
indices. Parameters responsible for the avoided crossing of eigenphase shifts
and eigentime delays are identified. Similarly, parameters responsible for the
eigentime delays due to a frame change are identified. With the help of new
parameters, an analogy with the spin model is pursued for the S matrix and time
delay matrix. The time delay matrix is shown to comprise three terms, one due
to resonance, one due to a avoided crossing interaction, and one due to a frame
change. It is found that the squared sum of time delays due to the avoided
crossing interaction and frame change is unity.Comment: 17 pages, 3 figures, RevTe
Alternative Fourier Expansions for Inverse Square Law Forces
Few-body problems involving Coulomb or gravitational interactions between
pairs of particles, whether in classical or quantum physics, are generally
handled through a standard multipole expansion of the two-body potentials. We
discuss an alternative based on a compact, cylindrical Green's function
expansion that should have wide applicability throughout physics. Two-electron
"direct" and "exchange" integrals in many-electron quantum systems are
evaluated to illustrate the procedure which is more compact than the standard
one using Wigner coefficients and Slater integrals.Comment: 10 pages, latex/Revtex4, 1 figure
Geometry and symmetries of multi-particle systems
The quantum dynamical evolution of atomic and molecular aggregates, from
their compact to their fragmented states, is parametrized by a single
collective radial parameter. Treating all the remaining particle coordinates in
d dimensions democratically, as a set of angles orthogonal to this collective
radius or by equivalent variables, bypasses all independent-particle
approximations. The invariance of the total kinetic energy under arbitrary
d-dimensional transformations which preserve the radial parameter gives rise to
novel quantum numbers and ladder operators interconnecting its eigenstates at
each value of the radial parameter.
We develop the systematics and technology of this approach, introducing the
relevant mathematics tutorially, by analogy to the familiar theory of angular
momentum in three dimensions. The angular basis functions so obtained are
treated in a manifestly coordinate-free manner, thus serving as a flexible
generalized basis for carrying out detailed studies of wavefunction evolution
in multi-particle systems.Comment: 37 pages, 2 eps figure
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