156 research outputs found
Controlling domain patterns far from equilibrium
A high degree of control over the structure and dynamics of domain patterns
in nonequilibrium systems can be achieved by applying nonuniform external
fields near parity breaking front bifurcations. An external field with a linear
spatial profile stabilizes a propagating front at a fixed position or induces
oscillations with frequency that scales like the square root of the field
gradient. Nonmonotonic profiles produce a variety of patterns with controllable
wavelengths, domain sizes, and frequencies and phases of oscillations.Comment: Published version, 4 pages, RevTeX. More at
http://t7.lanl.gov/People/Aric
Dynamics of lattice spins as a model of arrhythmia
We consider evolution of initial disturbances in spatially extended systems
with autonomous rhythmic activity, such as the heart. We consider the case when
the activity is stable with respect to very smooth (changing little across the
medium) disturbances and construct lattice models for description of
not-so-smooth disturbances, in particular, topological defects; these models
are modifications of the diffusive XY model. We find that when the activity on
each lattice site is very rigid in maintaining its form, the topological
defects - vortices or spirals - nucleate a transition to a disordered,
turbulent state.Comment: 17 pages, revtex, 3 figure
Diffusion-induced vortex filament instability in 3-dimensional excitable media
We studied the stability of linear vortex filaments in 3-dimensional (3D)
excitable media, using both analytical and numerical methods. We found an
intrinsic 3D instability of vortex filaments that is diffusion-induced, and is
due to the slower diffusion of the inhibitor. This instability can result
either in a single helical filament or in chaotic scroll breakup, depending on
the specific kinetic model. When the 2-dimensional dynamics were in the chaotic
regime, filament instability occurred via on-off intermittency, a failure of
chaos synchronization in the third dimension.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figures, to appear in PRL (September, 1999
Theory of spiral wave dynamics in weakly excitable media: asymptotic reduction to a kinematic model and applications
In a weakly excitable medium, characterized by a large threshold stimulus,
the free end of an isolated broken plane wave (wave tip) can either rotate
(steadily or unsteadily) around a large excitable core, thereby producing a
spiral pattern, or retract causing the wave to vanish at boundaries. An
asymptotic analysis of spiral motion and retraction is carried out in this
weakly excitable large core regime starting from the free-boundary limit of the
reaction-diffusion models, valid when the excited region is delimited by a thin
interface. The wave description is shown to naturally split between the tip
region and a far region that are smoothly matched on an intermediate scale.
This separation allows us to rigorously derive an equation of motion for the
wave tip, with the large scale motion of the spiral wavefront slaved to the
tip. This kinematic description provides both a physical picture and exact
predictions for a wide range of wave behavior, including: (i) steady rotation
(frequency and core radius), (ii) exact treatment of the meandering instability
in the free-boundary limit with the prediction that the frequency of unstable
motion is half the primary steady frequency (iii) drift under external actions
(external field with application to axisymmetric scroll ring motion in
three-dimensions, and spatial or/and time-dependent variation of excitability),
and (iv) the dynamics of multi-armed spiral waves with the new prediction that
steadily rotating waves with two or more arms are linearly unstable. Numerical
simulations of FitzHug-Nagumo kinetics are used to test several aspects of our
results. In addition, we discuss the semi-quantitative extension of this theory
to finite cores and pinpoint mathematical subtleties related to the thin
interface limit of singly diffusive reaction-diffusion models
Genetic Aspects of Pathogenesis of Congenital Spastic Cerebral Paralysis
Congenital spastic cerebral palsy (СР) is a large group of non-progressive disorders of the nervous system. The basis of the pathogenesis of these conditions is considered the impact of many factors. The clinical diversity of the disease and the syndromic principle of classification determine the existing uncertainties in the diagnosis of these diseases. The multifactorial nature of the underlying brain lesions is obvious and beyond doubt. The volume of information accumulated to date does not allow one to exclude the role and significance of the direct effect of acute asphyxiation in childbirth on a fetus normally formed during pregnancy, the role of infectious brain lesions, and disorders of neuronal migration. It is impossible to ignore the dependence of the clinical picture of the disease on what stage of ontogenesis the impact of the damaging agent occurs. As one of the pathogenetic factors, the genetic determinism of the phenotype of the clinical picture of a disease is fairly considered. This review focuses on the genetic aspects of the pathogenesis of this pathology. The information on monogenic mechanisms of inheritance is analyzed in detail. Such genetically determined mechanisms of pathogenesis as the inheritance of prerequisites for brain trauma in the perinatal period are considered separately. The new clinically significant variants of chromosomal mutations found in patients with CРare reviewed in detail, the evidence of the influence of genetic factors on the development of cerebral palsy in the absence of a pronounced monogenic cause of the disease, obtained through twin studies, is reviewed. Lit search of polymorphisms markers of predisposition to the development of cerebral palsy genes of the folate cycle, genes of glutamate receptors, the gene of apolipoprotein and of the gene for the transcription factor of oligodendrocytes (OLIG2) in Detail the role of epigenetic effects on the activity of genes coding for mitochondrial proteins
Theory of Spike Spiral Waves in a Reaction-Diffusion System
We discovered a new type of spiral wave solutions in reaction-diffusion
systems --- spike spiral wave, which significantly differs from spiral waves
observed in FitzHugh-Nagumo-type models. We present an asymptotic theory of
these waves in Gray-Scott model. We derive the kinematic relations describing
the shape of this spiral and find the dependence of its main parameters on the
control parameters. The theory does not rely on the specific features of
Gray-Scott model and thus is expected to be applicable to a broad range of
reaction-diffusion systems.Comment: 4 pages (REVTeX), 2 figures (postscript), submitted to Phys. Rev.
Let
The Saffman-Taylor problem on a sphere
The Saffman-Taylor problem addresses the morphological instability of an
interface separating two immiscible, viscous fluids when they move in a narrow
gap between two flat parallel plates (Hele-Shaw cell). In this work, we extend
the classic Saffman-Taylor situation, by considering the flow between two
curved, closely spaced, concentric spheres (spherical Hele-Shaw cell). We
derive the mode-coupling differential equation for the interface perturbation
amplitudes and study both linear and nonlinear flow regimes. The effect of the
spherical cell (positive) spatial curvature on the shape of the interfacial
patterns is investigated. We show that stability properties of the fluid-fluid
interface are sensitive to the curvature of the surface. In particular, it is
found that positive spatial curvature inhibits finger tip-splitting. Hele-Shaw
flow on weakly negative, curved surfaces is briefly discussed.Comment: 26 pages, 4 figures, RevTex, accepted for publication in Phys. Rev.
Spiral anchoring in anisotropic media with multiple inhomogeneities: a dynamical system approach
Various PDE models have been suggested in order to explain and predict the
dynamics of spiral waves in excitable media. In two landmark papers, Barkley
noticed that some of the behaviour could be explained by the inherent Euclidean
symmetry of these models. LeBlanc and Wulff then introduced forced Euclidean
symmetry-breaking (FESB) to the analysis, in the form of individual
translational symmetry-breaking (TSB) perturbations and rotational
symmetry-breaking (RSB) perturbations; in either case, it is shown that spiral
anchoring is a direct consequence of the FESB.
In this article, we provide a characterization of spiral anchoring when two
perturbations, a TSB term and a RSB term, are combined, where the TSB term is
centered at the origin and the RSB term preserves rotations by multiples of
, where is an integer. When
(such as in a modified bidomain model), it is shown that spirals
anchor at the origin, but when (such as in a planar
reaction-diffusion-advection system), spirals generically anchor away from the
origin.Comment: Revised versio
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