Component-based Segmentation of words from handwritten Arabic text

Efficient preprocessing is very essential for automatic recognition of handwritten documents. In this paper, techniques on segmenting words in handwritten Arabic text are presented. Firstly, connected components (ccs) are extracted, and distances among different components are analyzed. The statistical distribution of this distance is then obtained to determine an optimal threshold for words segmentation. Meanwhile, an improved projection based method is also employed for baseline detection. The proposed method has been successfully tested on IFN/ENIT database consisting of 26459 Arabic words handwritten by 411 different writers, and the results were promising and very encouraging in more accurate detection of the baseline and segmentation of words for further recognition

The branch processes of vortex filaments and Hopf Invariant Constraint on Scroll Wave

In this paper, by making use of Duan's topological current theory, the evolution of the vortex filaments in excitable media is discussed in detail. The vortex filaments are found generating or annihilating at the limit points and encountering, splitting, or merging at the bifurcation points of a complex function $Z(\vec{x},t)$. It is also shown that the Hopf invariant of knotted scroll wave filaments is preserved in the branch processes (splitting, merging, or encountering) during the evolution of these knotted scroll wave filaments. Furthermore, it also revealed that the "exclusion principle" in some chemical media is just the special case of the Hopf invariant constraint, and during the branch processes the "exclusion principle" is also protected by topology.Comment: 9 pages, 5 figure

Solving Dirac equations on a 3D lattice with inverse Hamiltonian and spectral methods

A new method to solve the Dirac equation on a 3D lattice is proposed, in which the variational collapse problem is avoided by the inverse Hamiltonian method and the fermion doubling problem is avoided by performing spatial derivatives in momentum space with the help of the discrete Fourier transform, i.e., the spectral method. This method is demonstrated in solving the Dirac equation for a given spherical potential in 3D lattice space. In comparison with the results obtained by the shooting method, the differences in single particle energy are smaller than $10^{-4}$~MeV, and the densities are almost identical, which demonstrates the high accuracy of the present method. The results obtained by applying this method without any modification to solve the Dirac equations for an axial deformed, non-axial deformed, and octupole deformed potential are provided and discussed.Comment: 18 pages, 6 figure

Local and Nonlocal Contents in N-qubit generalized GHZ states

We investigate local contents in $N$-qubit generalized Greenberger, Horne, and Zeilinger (GHZ) states. We suggest a decomposition for correlations in the GHZ states into a nonlocal and fully local part, and find a lower and upper bound on the local content. Our lower bound reproduces the previous result for N=2 [Scarani, Phys. Rev. A. 77, 042112 (2008)] and decreases rapidly with $N$.Comment: 4 pages; 1 figure; figure regenerated; upper bound added; a few more clarification

Topological Properties of Spatial Coherence Function

Topology of the spatial coherence function is considered in details. The phase singularity (coherence vortices) structures of coherence function are classified by Hopf index and Brouwer degree in topology. The coherence flux quantization and the linking of the closed coherence vortices are also studied from the topological properties of the spatial coherence function.Comment: 9 page

Structure of the regulatory domain of the LysR family regulator NMB2055 (MetR-like protein) from Neisseria meningitidis

Copyright @ 2012 International Union of CrystallographyThe crystal structure of the regulatory domain of NMB2055, a putative MetR regulator from Neisseria meningitidis, is reported at 2.5 Å resolution. The structure revealed that there is a disulfide bond inside the predicted effector-binding pocket of the regulatory domain. Mutation of the cysteines (Cys103 and Cys106) that form the disulfide bond to serines resulted in significant changes to the structure of the effector pocket. Taken together with the high degree of conservation of these cysteine residues within MetR-related transcription factors, it is suggested that the Cys103 and Cys106 residues play an important role in the function of MetR regulators.This study is funded by the Medical Research Council, with additional finance from the Biotechnology and Biological Science Research Council

Octet baryon masses in next-to-next-to-next-to-leading order covariant baryon chiral perturbation theory

We study the ground-state octet baryon masses and sigma terms using the covariant baryon chiral perturbation theory (ChPT) with the extended-on-mass-shell (EOMS) renormalization scheme up to next-to-next-to-next-to-leading order (N$^3$LO). By adjusting the available 19 low-energy constants (LECs), a reasonable fit of the $n_f=2+1$ lattice quantum chromodynamics (LQCD) results from the PACS-CS, LHPC, HSC, QCDSF-UKQCD and NPLQCD collaborations is achieved. Finite-volume corrections to the lattice data are calculated self-consistently. Our study shows that N$^3$LO BChPT describes better the light quark mass evolution of the lattice data than the NNLO BChPT does and the various lattice simulations seem to be consistent with each other. We also predict the pion and strangeness sigma terms of the octet baryons using the LECs determined in the fit of their masses. The predicted pion- and strangeness-nucleon sigma terms are $\sigma_{\pi N}=43(1)(6)$ MeV and $\sigma_{s N}=126(24)(54)$ MeV, respectively.Comment: 28 pages, 6 figures, minor revisions, typos corrected, version to appear in JHE