Competing interactions of spin and lattice in the Kondo lattice model

The magnetic properties of a system of coexisting localized spins and conduction electrons are investigated within an extended version of the one dimensional Kondo lattice model in which effects stemming from the electron-lattice and on-site Coulomb interactions are explicitly included. After bosonizing the conduction electrons, is it observed that intrinsic inhomogeneities with the statistical scaling properties of a Griffiths phase appear, and determine the spin structure of the localized impurities. The appearance of the inhomogeneities is enhanced by appropriate phonons and acts destructively on the spin ordering. The inhomogeneities appear on well defined length scales, can be compared to the formation of intrinsic mesoscopic metastable patterns which are found in two-fluid systems.Comment: 9 pages, to appear in Jour. Superconductivit

Resonances, Unstable Systems and Irreversibility: Matter Meets Mind

The fundamental time-reversal invariance of dynamical systems can be broken in various ways. One way is based on the presence of resonances and their interactions giving rise to unstable dynamical systems, leading to well-defined time arrows. Associated with these time arrows are semigroups bearing time orientations. Usually, when time symmetry is broken, two time-oriented semigroups result, one directed toward the future and one directed toward the past. If time-reversed states and evolutions are excluded due to resonances, then the status of these states and their associated backwards-in-time oriented semigroups is open to question. One possible role for these latter states and semigroups is as an abstract representation of mental systems as opposed to material systems. The beginnings of this interpretation will be sketched.Comment: 9 pages. Presented at the CFIF Workshop on TimeAsymmetric Quantum Theory: The Theory of Resonances, 23-26 July 2003, Instituto Superior Tecnico, Lisbon, Portugal; and at the Quantum Structures Association Meeting, 7-22 July 2004, University of Denver. Accepted for publication in the Internation Journal of Theoretical Physic

Pairing mechanism in Fe pnictide superconductors

By applying an exact unitary transformation to a two-band hamiltonian which also includes the effects due to large pnictogen polarizabilities, we show that an attractive spin-mediated Hubbard term appears in the $d_{xz}$, $d_{yz}$ nearest-neighbour channel. This pairing mechanism implies a singlet superconducting order parameter in iron pnictides.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure

Nonintegrable Schrodinger Discrete Breathers

In an extensive numerical investigation of nonintegrable translational motion of discrete breathers in nonlinear Schrodinger lattices, we have used a regularized Newton algorithm to continue these solutions from the limit of the integrable Ablowitz-Ladik lattice. These solutions are shown to be a superposition of a localized moving core and an excited extended state (background) to which the localized moving pulse is spatially asymptotic. The background is a linear combination of small amplitude nonlinear resonant plane waves and it plays an essential role in the energy balance governing the translational motion of the localized core. Perturbative collective variable theory predictions are critically analyzed in the light of the numerical results.Comment: 42 pages, 28 figures. to be published in CHAOS (December 2004

Spectral signatures of the Luttinger liquid to charge-density-wave transition

Electron- and phonon spectral functions of the one-dimensional, spinless-fermion Holstein model at half filling are calculated in the four distinct regimes of the phase diagram, corresponding to an attractive or repulsive Luttinger liquid at weak electron-phonon coupling, and a band- or polaronic insulator at strong coupling. The results obtained by means of kernel polynomial and systematic cluster approaches reveal substantially different physics in these regimes and further indicate that the size of the phonon frequency significantly affects the nature of the quantum Peierls phase transition.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures; final version, accepted for publication in Physical Review

Assessment and diagnosis of Developmental Language Disorder: The experiences of speech and language therapists

© The Author(s) 2019. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 License (http://www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits non-commercial use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access pages (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage).Background: For many years research and practice have noted the impact of the heterogeneous nature of Developmental Language Disorder (also known as language impairment or specific language impairment) on diagnosis and assessment. Recent research suggests the disorder is not restricted to the language domain and against this background, the challenge for the practitioner is to provide accurate assessment and effective therapy. The language practitioner aims to support the child and their carers to achieve the best outcomes. However, little is known about the experiences of the language practitioner in the assessment process, in contrast to other childhood disorders, yet their expertise is central in the assessment and diagnosis of children with language disorder. Aims: This study aimed to provide a detailed qualitative description of the experiences of speech and language therapists involved in the assessment and diagnosis of children with Developmental Language Disorder. Methods & Procedures: The qualitative study included three focus groups to provide a credible and rich description of the experiences of speech and language therapists involved in the assessment of Developmental Language Disorder. The speech and language therapists who participated in the study were recruited from three NHS Trusts across the UK and all were directly involved in the assessment and diagnosis procedures. The lengths of practitioner experience ranged from 2 years to 38 years. The data was analysed using a thematic analysis in accordance with the principles set out by Braun & Clarke (2006). Outcomes & Results: The data showed a number of key themes concerning the experiences of speech and language therapists in assessing children with Developmental Language Disorder (DLD). These themes ranged from the participants’ experiences of the barriers to early referral, challenges for assessment and the concerns over continued future support. Conclusions & Implications: This study provides first-hand evidence from speech and language therapists in the assessment of children with Developmental Language Disorder, drawing together experiences from language practitioners from different regions. The findings provide insight to the barriers to referral, the potential variations in the assessment process, the role of practitioner expertise and the challenges faced them. The importance of early intervention, useful assessment tools and future support were expressed. Taken together, the results relate to some issues to be addressed on a practical level and a continuing need for initiatives to raise awareness of DLD in the public domain.Peer reviewe

Demixing can occur in binary hard-sphere mixtures with negative non-additivity

A binary fluid mixture of non-additive hard spheres characterized by a size ratio $\gamma=\sigma_2/\sigma_1<1$ and a non-additivity parameter $\Delta=2\sigma_{12}/(\sigma_1+\sigma_2)-1$ is considered in infinitely many dimensions. From the equation of state in the second virial approximation (which is exact in the limit $d\to\infty$) a demixing transition with a critical consolute point at a packing fraction scaling as $\eta\sim d 2^{-d}$ is found, even for slightly negative non-additivity, if $\Delta>-{1/8}(\ln\gamma)^2$. Arguments concerning the stability of the demixing with respect to freezing are provided.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures; title changed; final paragraph added; to be published in PRE as a Rapid Communicatio

Dynamic Poisson Factorization

Models for recommender systems use latent factors to explain the preferences and behaviors of users with respect to a set of items (e.g., movies, books, academic papers). Typically, the latent factors are assumed to be static and, given these factors, the observed preferences and behaviors of users are assumed to be generated without order. These assumptions limit the explorative and predictive capabilities of such models, since users' interests and item popularity may evolve over time. To address this, we propose dPF, a dynamic matrix factorization model based on the recent Poisson factorization model for recommendations. dPF models the time evolving latent factors with a Kalman filter and the actions with Poisson distributions. We derive a scalable variational inference algorithm to infer the latent factors. Finally, we demonstrate dPF on 10 years of user click data from arXiv.org, one of the largest repository of scientific papers and a formidable source of information about the behavior of scientists. Empirically we show performance improvement over both static and, more recently proposed, dynamic recommendation models. We also provide a thorough exploration of the inferred posteriors over the latent variables.Comment: RecSys 201

Firewood, food and niche construction : the potential role of Mesolithic hunter-gatherers in actively structuring Scotland's woodlands.

Over the past few decades the potential role of Mesolithic hunter–gatherers in actively constructing their own niches, through the management of wild plants, has frequently been discussed. It is probable that Mesolithic hunter–gatherers systematically exploited specific woodland resources for food and fuel and influenced the ‘natural’ abundance or distribution of particular species within Mesolithic environments. Though there has been considerable discussion of the pollen evidence for potential small-scale human-woodland manipulation in Mesolithic Scotland, the archaeobotanical evidence for anthropogenic firewood and food selection has not been discussed in this context. This paper assesses the evidence for the active role of Mesolithic hunter–gatherer communities in systematically exploiting and managing woodlands for food and fuel in Scotland. While taphonomic factors may have impacted on the frequency of specific species in archaeobotanical assemblages, it is suggested that hunter–gatherers in Mesolithic Scotland were systematically using woodland plants, and in particular hazel and oak, for food and fuel. It is argued that the pollen evidence for woodland management is equivocal, but hints at the role of hunter–gatherers in shaping the structure of their environments, through the maintenance or creation of woodland clearings for settlement or as part of vegetation management strategies. It is proposed that Mesolithic hunter–gatherers may have actively contributed to niche construction and that the systematic use of hazel and oak as a fuel may reflect the deliberate pruning of hazel trees to increase nut-yields and the inadvertent – or perhaps deliberate – coppicing of hazel and oak during greenwood collection