6,786 research outputs found
The complex network of global cargo ship movements
Transportation networks play a crucial role in human mobility, the exchange
of goods, and the spread of invasive species. With 90% of world trade carried
by sea, the global network of merchant ships provides one of the most important
modes of transportation. Here we use information about the itineraries of
16,363 cargo ships during the year 2007 to construct a network of links between
ports. We show that the network has several features which set it apart from
other transportation networks. In particular, most ships can be classified in
three categories: bulk dry carriers, container ships and oil tankers. These
three categories do not only differ in the ships' physical characteristics, but
also in their mobility patterns and networks. Container ships follow regularly
repeating paths whereas bulk dry carriers and oil tankers move less predictably
between ports. The network of all ship movements possesses a heavy-tailed
distribution for the connectivity of ports and for the loads transported on the
links with systematic differences between ship types. The data analyzed in this
paper improve current assumptions based on gravity models of ship movements, an
important step towards understanding patterns of global trade and bioinvasion.Comment: 7 figures Accepted for publication by Journal of the Royal Society
Interface (2010) For supplementary information, see
http://www.icbm.de/~blasius/publications.htm
Two-Stream Instability of Counter-Rotating Galaxies
The present study of the two-stream instability in stellar disks with
counter-rotating components of stars and/or gas is stimulated by recently
discovered counter-rotating spiral and S0 galaxies. Strong linear two-stream
instability of tightly-wrapped spiral waves is found for one and two-armed
waves with the pattern angular speed of the unstable waves always intermediate
between the angular speed of the co-rotating matter () and that of the
counter-rotating matter (). The instability arises from the
interaction of positive and negative energy modes in the co- and
counter-rotating components. The unstable waves are in general convective -
they move in radius and radial wavenumber space - with the result that
amplification of the advected wave is more important than the local growth
rate. For a galaxy of co-rotating stars and counter-rotating stars of
mass-fraction , or of counter-rotating gas of mass-fraction
, the largest amplification is usually for the one-armed
leading waves (with respect to the co-rotating stars). For the case of both
counter-rotating stars and gas, the largest amplifications are for , also for one-armed leading waves. The two-armed trailing
waves usually have smaller amplifications. The growth rates and amplifications
all decrease as the velocity spreads of the stars and/or gas increase. It is
suggested that the spiral waves can provide an effective viscosity for the gas
causing its accretion.Comment: 14 pages, submitted to ApJ. One table and 17 figures can be obtained
by sending address to R. Lovelace at [email protected]
Actors that Unify Threads and Events
There is an impedance mismatch between message-passing concurrency and virtual machines, such as the JVM. VMs usually map their threads to heavyweight OS processes. Without a lightweight process abstraction, users are often forced to write parts of concurrent applications in an event-driven style which obscures control flow, and increases the burden on the programmer. In this paper we show how thread-based and event-based programming can be unified under a single actor abstraction. Using advanced abstraction mechanisms of the Scala programming language, we implemented our approach on unmodified JVMs. Our programming model integrates well with the threading model of the underlying VM
Completeness and confusion in the identification of Lyman-break galaxies
We have carried out a study to simulate distant clusters of galaxies in deep ground-based optical images. We find that when model galaxies are added to deep images obtained with the William Herschel Telescope, there is considerable scatter of the recovered galaxy colours away from the model values; this scatter is larger than that expected from photometric errors and is significantly affected by confusion, due to ground-based seeing, between objects in the field. In typical conditions of 1-arcsec seeing, the combination of confusion and incompleteness causes a considerable underestimation of the true surface density of galaxies. We argue that the actual surface density of galaxies may be several times greater than that estimated by previous ground-based studies, consistent with the surface density of such objects found in the HDF
AGC 226067: A possible interacting low-mass system
We present Arecibo, GBT, VLA and WIYN/pODI observations of the ALFALFA source
AGC 226067. Originally identified as an ultra-compact high velocity cloud and
candidate Local Group galaxy, AGC 226067 is spatially and kinematically
coincident with the Virgo cluster, and the identification by multiple groups of
an optical counterpart with no resolved stars supports the interpretation that
this systems lies at the Virgo distance (D=17 Mpc). The combined observations
reveal that the system consists of multiple components: a central HI source
associated with the optical counterpart (AGC 226067), a smaller HI-only
component (AGC 229490), a second optical component (AGC 229491), and extended
low surface brightness HI. Only ~1/4 of the single-dish HI emission is
associated with AGC 226067; as a result, we find M_HI/L_g ~ 6 Msun/Lsun, which
is lower than previous work. At D=17 Mpc, AGC 226067 has an HI mass of 1.5 x
10^7 Msun and L_g = 2.4 x 10^6 Lsun, AGC 229490 (the HI-only component) has
M_HI = 3.6 x 10^6 Msun, and AGC 229491 (the second optical component) has L_g =
3.6 x 10^5 Lsun. The nature of this system of three sources is uncertain: AGC
226067 and AGC 229490 may be connected by an HI bridge, and AGC 229490 and AGC
229491 are separated by only 0.5'. The current data do not resolve the HI in
AGC 229490 and its origin is unclear. We discuss possible scenarios for this
system of objects: an interacting system of dwarf galaxies, accretion of
material onto AGC 226067, or stripping of material from AGC 226067.Comment: Accepted for publication in A&A. 6 pages, 4 figure
Autonomous Legged Hill and Stairwell Ascent
This paper documents near-autonomous negotiation of synthetic and natural climbing terrain by a rugged legged robot, achieved through sequential composition of appropriate perceptually triggered locomotion primitives. The first, simple composition achieves autonomous uphill climbs in unstructured outdoor terrain while avoiding surrounding obstacles such as trees and bushes. The second, slightly more complex composition achieves autonomous stairwell climbing in a variety of different buildings. In both cases, the intrinsic motor competence of the legged platform requires only small amounts of sensory information to yield near-complete autonomy. Both of these behaviors were developed using X-RHex, a new revision of RHex that is a laboratory on legs, allowing a style of rapid development of sensorimotor tasks with a convenience near to that of conducting experiments on a lab bench. Applications of this work include urban search and rescue as well as reconnaissance operations in which robust yet simple-to-implement autonomy allows a robot access to difficult environments with little burden to a human operator
Tropical Dominating Sets in Vertex-Coloured Graphs
Given a vertex-coloured graph, a dominating set is said to be tropical if
every colour of the graph appears at least once in the set. Here, we study
minimum tropical dominating sets from structural and algorithmic points of
view. First, we prove that the tropical dominating set problem is NP-complete
even when restricted to a simple path. Then, we establish upper bounds related
to various parameters of the graph such as minimum degree and number of edges.
We also give upper bounds for random graphs. Last, we give approximability and
inapproximability results for general and restricted classes of graphs, and
establish a FPT algorithm for interval graphs.Comment: 19 pages, 4 figure
Electrostatic considerations affecting the calculated HOMO-LUMO gap in protein molecules.
A detailed study of energy differences between the highest occupied and
lowest unoccupied molecular orbitals (HOMO-LUMO gaps) in protein systems and
water clusters is presented. Recent work questioning the applicability of
Kohn-Sham density-functional theory to proteins and large water clusters (E.
Rudberg, J. Phys.: Condens. Mat. 2012, 24, 072202) has demonstrated vanishing
HOMO-LUMO gaps for these systems, which is generally attributed to the
treatment of exchange in the functional used. The present work shows that the
vanishing gap is, in fact, an electrostatic artefact of the method used to
prepare the system. Practical solutions for ensuring the gap is maintained when
the system size is increased are demonstrated. This work has important
implications for the use of large-scale density-functional theory in
biomolecular systems, particularly in the simulation of photoemission, optical
absorption and electronic transport, all of which depend critically on
differences between energies of molecular orbitals.Comment: 13 pages, 4 figure
Circinus X-1: survivor of a highly asymmetric supernova
We have analyzed the kinematical parameters of Cir X-1 to constrain the
nature of its companion star, the eccentricity of the binary and the
pre-supernova parameter space. We argue that the companion is most likely to be
a low-mass (< 2.0 M_sun) unevolved star and that the eccentricity of the orbit
is 0.94 +/- 0.04. We have evaluated the dynamical effects of the supernova
explosion and we find it must have been asymmetric. On average, we find that a
kick of 740 km/s is needed to account for the recently measured radial velocity
of +430 km/s (Johnston, Fender & Wu) for this extreme system. The corresponding
minimum kick velocity is 500 km/s. This is the largest kick needed to explain
the motion of any observed binary system. If Cir X-1 is associated with the
supernova remnant G321.9-0.3 then we find a limiting minimum age of this
remnant of 60000 yr. Furthermore, we predict that the companion star has lost
10% of its mass as a result of stripping and ablation from the impact of the
supernova shell shortly after the explosion.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figues, 2 tables, accepted for publication in MNRA
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