739 research outputs found
Navigability is a Robust Property
The Small World phenomenon has inspired researchers across a number of
fields. A breakthrough in its understanding was made by Kleinberg who
introduced Rank Based Augmentation (RBA): add to each vertex independently an
arc to a random destination selected from a carefully crafted probability
distribution. Kleinberg proved that RBA makes many networks navigable, i.e., it
allows greedy routing to successfully deliver messages between any two vertices
in a polylogarithmic number of steps. We prove that navigability is an inherent
property of many random networks, arising without coordination, or even
independence assumptions
Quantifying phase transformation during the manufacturing process of AISI 430 ferritic stainless steel
The effect of ferrite to austenite transformation phenomenon on microstructure and annealing performance of AISI 430 (EN 1.4016) ferritic stainless steel 16%Cr-0.04%C and 17%Cr-0.02%C was studied by electron backscatter diffraction and X-ray diffraction. Hot-rolled and annealed specimens of each ferritic stainless steel were collected from manufacturing route, where different states were analysed. Chemical composition shift of AISI 430 is correlated to microstructural behaviour of each material, while annealing temperature impact over grain growth phenomena is discussed
From Relational Data to Graphs: Inferring Significant Links using Generalized Hypergeometric Ensembles
The inference of network topologies from relational data is an important
problem in data analysis. Exemplary applications include the reconstruction of
social ties from data on human interactions, the inference of gene
co-expression networks from DNA microarray data, or the learning of semantic
relationships based on co-occurrences of words in documents. Solving these
problems requires techniques to infer significant links in noisy relational
data. In this short paper, we propose a new statistical modeling framework to
address this challenge. It builds on generalized hypergeometric ensembles, a
class of generative stochastic models that give rise to analytically tractable
probability spaces of directed, multi-edge graphs. We show how this framework
can be used to assess the significance of links in noisy relational data. We
illustrate our method in two data sets capturing spatio-temporal proximity
relations between actors in a social system. The results show that our
analytical framework provides a new approach to infer significant links from
relational data, with interesting perspectives for the mining of data on social
systems.Comment: 10 pages, 8 figures, accepted at SocInfo201
A reaction-diffusion model for the growth of avascular tumor
A nutrient-limited model for avascular cancer growth including cell
proliferation, motility and death is presented. The model qualitatively
reproduces commonly observed morphologies for primary tumors, and the simulated
patterns are characterized by its gyration radius, total number of cancer
cells, and number of cells on tumor periphery. These very distinct
morphological patterns follow Gompertz growth curves, but exhibit different
scaling laws for their surfaces. Also, the simulated tumors incorporate a
spatial structure composed of a central necrotic core, an inner rim of
quiescent cells and a narrow outer shell of proliferating cells in agreement
with biological data. Finally, our results indicate that the competition for
nutrients among normal and cancer cells may be a determinant factor in
generating papillary tumor morphology.Comment: 9 pages, 6 figures, to appear in PR
Evolutionary Games with Affine Fitness Functions: Applications to Cancer
We analyze the dynamics of evolutionary games in which fitness is defined as
an affine function of the expected payoff and a constant contribution. The
resulting inhomogeneous replicator equation has an homogeneous equivalent with
modified payoffs. The affine terms also influence the stochastic dynamics of a
two-strategy Moran model of a finite population. We then apply the affine
fitness function in a model for tumor-normal cell interactions to determine
which are the most successful tumor strategies. In order to analyze the
dynamics of concurrent strategies within a tumor population, we extend the
model to a three-strategy game involving distinct tumor cell types as well as
normal cells. In this model, interaction with normal cells, in combination with
an increased constant fitness, is the most effective way of establishing a
population of tumor cells in normal tissue.Comment: The final publication is available at http://www.springerlink.com,
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s13235-011-0029-
Organism-sediment interactions govern post-hypoxia recovery of ecosystem functioning
Hypoxia represents one of the major causes of biodiversity and ecosystem functioning loss for coastal waters. Since eutrophication-induced hypoxic events are becoming increasingly frequent and intense, understanding the response of ecosystems to hypoxia is of primary importance to understand and predict the stability of ecosystem functioning. Such ecological stability may greatly depend on the recovery patterns of communities and the return time of the system properties associated to these patterns. Here, we have examined how the reassembly of a benthic community contributed to the recovery of ecosystem functioning following experimentally-induced hypoxia in a tidal flat. We demonstrate that organism-sediment interactions that depend on organism size and relate to mobility traits and sediment reworking capacities are generally more important than recovering species richness to set the return time of the measured sediment processes and properties. Specifically, increasing macrofauna bioturbation potential during community reassembly significantly contributed to the recovery of sediment processes and properties such as denitrification, bedload sediment transport, primary production and deep pore water ammonium concentration. Such bioturbation potential was due to the replacement of the small-sized organisms that recolonised at early stages by large-sized bioturbating organisms, which had a disproportionately stronger influence on sediment. This study suggests that the complete recovery of organism-sediment interactions is a necessary condition for ecosystem functioning recovery, and that such process requires long periods after disturbance due to the slow growth of juveniles into adult stages involved in these interactions. Consequently, repeated episodes of disturbance at intervals smaller than the time needed for the system to fully recover organism-sediment interactions may greatly impair the resilience of ecosystem functioning.
Women and Illegal Activities: Gender Differences and Women's Willingness to Comply Over Time
In recent years the topics of illegal activities such as corruption or tax evasion have attracted a great deal of attention. However, there is still a lack of substantial empirical evidence about the determinants of compliance. The aim of this paper is to investigate empirically whether women are more willing to be compliant than men and whether we observe (among women and in general) differences in attitudes among similar age groups in different time periods (cohort effect) or changing attitudes of the same cohorts over time (age effect) using data from eight Western European countries from the World Values Survey and the European Values Survey that span the period from 1981 to 1999. The results reveal higher willingness to comply among women and an age rather than a cohort effect. Working Paper 06-5
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