Cultural Resources Intensive Survey for the Proposed Cypress Creek Hike and Bike Trail for Timber Lane Utility District, Harris County, Texas

The Timber Lane Utility District plans to construct a hike and bike trail adjacent to and across Cypress Creek in the unincorporated town of Spring, Harris County, Texas. The project would begin north of Cypress Creek with connection to the existing Timber Lane Park paved trail system and would terminate south of Cypress Creek near Werrington subdivision. The area of potential effect (APE) includes the construction limits and all areas subject to temporary disturbance during construction. The width of the proposed paved trail varies from 10 feet to 20 feet, with a 14 to 24-foot wide cleared trail corridor, and an assumed depth of 3 ft including signage, landscaping, lighting, and drainage features. Total project length is approximately 13,935 linear feet, located between Timber Lane Park and Werrington subdivision (7.76 acres). Approximately 9,500 feet of existing trail and maintained right of way (ROW) will be improved as part of the project (5.25 acres). Approximately 4,435 feet of trail would be constructed within undeveloped property (2.51 acres). Nine trail heads, five of which are at existing locations, are proposed for the project. The five existing trail heads are located at Timber Lane Park and along Rambling Brook Drive. The four new trail heads would be located at Rambling Brook Drive, Millhouse Road, the Mercer Arboretum, and at Sago Island Drive. Proposed trail head features will include benches, a drinking fountain, and a kiosk presenting a trail map and information. The trail will span across Cypress Creek via three 14-foot wide weathered steel truss bridges, including abutments. The assumed depth of impact will be 12 ft below the surface. The trail will also span a tributary of Cypress Creek, located north of Briarcreek Boulevard, via a similar truss bridge. A retaining wall is also proposed for a portion of the trail located near an unnamed intermittent stream. However, the trail will avoid impacts to stream features and other waterbodies and wetlands located along the project area. The total project cost has been approved by the Metropolitan Planning Organization of which the federal share is 80 percent. Timber Lane Utility District would be responsible for the remaining 20 percent and for all non-federal or non-state participation costs associated with the proposed project. A cultural resources survey The APE was assessed in accordance to guidelines set forth in the Antiquities Code of Texas (Section 191.0525) and those in Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act (36 CFR Part 800). From March 5 through March 8, 2013, Paul M. Matchen (Principal Investigator) and Trisha Gonzales (Archeological Field Technician) from the Cultural Resources Department of TRC’s Austin office conducted an intensive archeological survey within the project APE. This work involved a 100 percent pedestrian survey and selective shovel testing (N = 28) across the 3.3-mile long tract. Twenty-eight shovel tests and two deep backhoe trenches were excavated. These subsurface investigations found no significant cultural deposits. In addition, no standing historic structures or cemeteries were observed within the APE during this survey. For these reasons, no eligibility considerations were made for nomination to the National Register of Historic Places (36 CFR 800) or for nomination as a State Archeological Landmark (Chapter 191). Archeological clearance is recommended for this proposed undertaking by the Timber Lane Utility District within the proposed APE. No further cultural resources investigations are recommended. However, in the event that any human remains are encountered during the undertaking all work should cease immediately and Timber Lane Utility District should notify local law enforcement, who in turn will notify the local medical examiner’s office. If these remains are not recent, the Texas Historical Commission should be notified

Dynamics of apparent horizons in quantum gravitational collapse

We study the gravitational collapse of a massless scalar field within the effective scenario of loop quantum gravity. Classical singularity is avoided and replaced by a quantum bounce in this model. It is shown that, quantum gravity effects predict a threshold scale below which no horizon can form as the collapse evolves towards the bounce.Comment: Contribution to the Spanish Relativity Meeting in Portugal 2012 (ERE2012), Guimaraes, Portuga

A subarcsecond near-infrared view of massive galaxies at z > 1 with Gemini Multiconjugate Adaptive Optics

We present images taken using the Gemini South Adaptive Optics Imager (GSAOI) with the Gemini Multiconjugate Adaptive Optics System (GeMS) in three 2 arcmin$^2$ fields in the Spitzer Extragalactic Representative Volume Survey. These GeMS/GSAOI observations are among the first $\approx 0.1^{''}$ resolution data in the near-infrared spanning extragalactic fields exceeding $1.5^{\prime}$ in size. We use these data to estimate galaxy sizes, obtaining results similar to those from studies with the Hubble Space Telescope, though we find a higher fraction of compact star forming galaxies at $z>2$. To disentangle the star-forming galaxies from active galactic nuclei (AGN), we use multiwavelength data from surveys in the optical and infrared, including far-infrared data from Herschel, as well as new radio continuum data from the Australia Telescope Compact Array and Very Large Array. We identify ultraluminous infrared galaxies (ULIRGs) at $z \sim 1-3$, which consist of a combination of pure starburst galaxies and Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN)/starburst composites. The ULIRGs show signs of recent merger activity, such as highly disturbed morphologies and include a rare candidate triple AGN. We find that AGN tend to reside in hosts with smaller scale sizes than purely star-forming galaxies of similar infrared luminosity. Our observations demonstrate the potential for MCAO to complement the deeper galaxy surveys to be made with the James Webb Space Telescope.Comment: 20 pages, AJ, in pres

From M-ary Query to Bit Query: a new strategy for efficient large-scale RFID identification

The tag collision avoidance has been viewed as one of the most important research problems in RFID communications and bit tracking technology has been widely embedded in query tree (QT) based algorithms to tackle such challenge. Existing solutions show further opportunity to greatly improve the reading performance because collision queries and empty queries are not fully explored. In this paper, a bit query (BQ) strategy based Mary query tree protocol (BQMT) is presented, which can not only eliminate idle queries but also separate collided tags into many small subsets and make full use of the collided bits. To further optimize the reading performance, a modified dual prefixes matching (MDPM) mechanism is presented to allow multiple tags to respond in the same slot and thus significantly reduce the number of queries. Theoretical analysis and simulations are supplemented to validate the effectiveness of the proposed BQMT and MDPM, which outperform the existing QT-based algorithms. Also, the BQMT and MDPM can be combined to BQMDPM to improve the reading performance in system efficiency, total identification time, communication complexity and average energy cost

On the algebraic invariant curves of plane polynomial differential systems

We consider a plane polynomial vector field $P(x,y)dx+Q(x,y)dy$ of degree $m>1$. To each algebraic invariant curve of such a field we associate a compact Riemann surface with the meromorphic differential $\omega=dx/P=dy/Q$. The asymptotic estimate of the degree of an arbitrary algebraic invariant curve is found. In the smooth case this estimate was already found by D. Cerveau and A. Lins Neto [Ann. Inst. Fourier Grenoble 41, 883-903] in a different way.Comment: 10 pages, Latex, to appear in J.Phys.A:Math.Ge

Magnetic and superconducting instabilities of the Hubbard model at the van Hove filling

We use a novel temperature-flow renormalization group technique to analyze magnetic and superconducting instabilities in the two-dimensional t-t' Hubbard model for particle densities close to the van Hove filling as a function of the next-nearest neighbor hopping t'. In the one-loop flow at the van Hove filling, the characteristic temperature for the flow to strong coupling is suppressed drastically around t'_c approx. -0.33t, suggesting a quantum critical point between d-wave pairing at moderate t'>t'_c and ferromagnetism for t'<t'_c. Upon increasing the particle density in the latter regime the leading instability occurs in the triplet pairing channel.Comment: 4 pages, to appear in Physical Review Letter

A Rigourous Treatment of the Lattice Renormalization Problem of F_B

The $B$-meson decay constant can be measured on the lattice using a $1/m_b$ expansion. To relate the physical quantity to Monte Carlo data one has to know the renormalization coefficient, $Z$, between the lattice operators and their continuum counterparts. We come back to this computation to resolve discrepancies found in previous calculations. We define and discuss in detail the renormalization procedure that allows the (perturbative) computation of $Z$. Comparing the one-loop calculations in the effective Lagrangian approach with the direct two-loop calculation of the two-point $B$-meson correlator in the limit of large $b$-quark mass, we prove that the two schemes give consistent results to order $\alpha_s$. We show that there is, however, a renormalization prescription ambiguity that can have sizeable numerical consequences. This ambiguity can be resolved in the framework of an $O(a)$ improved calculation, and we describe the correct prescription in that case. Finally we give the numerical values of $Z$ that correspond to the different types of lattice approximations discussed in the paper.Comment: 27 pages, 2 figures (Plain TeX, figures in an appended postscript file

Exact Histogram Specification Optimized for Structural Similarity

An exact histogram specification (EHS) method modifies its input image to have a specified histogram. Applications of EHS include image (contrast) enhancement (e.g., by histogram equalization) and histogram watermarking. Performing EHS on an image, however, reduces its visual quality. Starting from the output of a generic EHS method, we maximize the structural similarity index (SSIM) between the original image (before EHS) and the result of EHS iteratively. Essential in this process is the computationally simple and accurate formula we derive for SSIM gradient. As it is based on gradient ascent, the proposed EHS always converges. Experimental results confirm that while obtaining the histogram exactly as specified, the proposed method invariably outperforms the existing methods in terms of visual quality of the result. The computational complexity of the proposed method is shown to be of the same order as that of the existing methods. Index terms: histogram modification, histogram equalization, optimization for perceptual visual quality, structural similarity gradient ascent, histogram watermarking, contrast enhancement

Chaplygin gas with non-adiabatic pressure perturbations

Perturbations in a Chaplygin gas, characterized by an equation of state $p = -A/\rho$, may acquire non-adiabatic contributions if spatial variations of the parameter $A$ are admitted. This feature is shown to be related to a specific internal structure of the Chaplygin gas. We investigate how perturbations of this type modify the adiabatic sound speed and influence the time dependence of the gravitational potential which gives rise to the Integrated Sachs-Wolfe effect in the anisotropy spectrum of the cosmic microwave background.Comment: 16 pages, comments and references added, accepted for publication in Class.Quantum Gra