360 research outputs found
Analytical Investigation of Innovation Dynamics Considering Stochasticity in the Evaluation of Fitness
We investigate a selection-mutation model for the dynamics of technological
innovation,a special case of reaction-diffusion equations. Although mutations
are assumed to increase the variety of technologies, not their average success
("fitness"), they are an essential prerequisite for innovation. Together with a
selection of above-average technologies due to imitation behavior, they are the
"driving force" for the continuous increase in fitness. We will give analytical
solutions for the probability distribution of technologies for special cases
and in the limit of large times.
The selection dynamics is modelled by a "proportional imitation" of better
technologies. However, the assessment of a technology's fitness may be
imperfect and, therefore, vary stochastically. We will derive conditions, under
which wrong assessment of fitness can accelerate the innovation dynamics, as it
has been found in some surprising numerical investigations.Comment: For related work see http://www.helbing.or
Bunching Transitions on Vicinal Surfaces and Quantum N-mers
We study vicinal crystal surfaces with the terrace-step-kink model on a
discrete lattice. Including both a short-ranged attractive interaction and a
long-ranged repulsive interaction arising from elastic forces, we discover a
series of phases in which steps coalesce into bunches of n steps each. The
value of n varies with temperature and the ratio of short to long range
interaction strengths. We propose that the bunch phases have been observed in
very recent experiments on Si surfaces. Within the context of a mapping of the
model to a system of bosons on a 1D lattice, the bunch phases appear as quantum
n-mers.Comment: 5 pages, RevTex; to appear in Phys. Rev. Let
Reductions in negative automatic thoughts in students attending mindfulness tutorials predicts increased life satisfaction
University education confronts students with stressful developmental challenges that can lead to mental health problems. Innovative programs must address an increasing prevalence of these problems but are impeded by the high costs involved. In this study, thirty-nine undergraduate students attended weekly one hour mindfulness meditation tutorials during a single (14 week) semester. Tutorials involved 40 minutes of guided meditation, followed by open-ended discussions on mindfulness and related scientific research. Multiple regression analysis tested associations between self-reported changes in mindfulness, in negative automatic thoughts and in satisfaction with life.Reductions in automatic thoughts accounted for a significant proportion of variance in life satisfaction and decreases in automatic thoughts were associated with an increased life satisfaction. This finding suggests guided meditation tutorials merit consideration in promoting student mental health on university campuses.Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC
Adsorption in non interconnected pores open at one or at both ends: A reconsideration of the origin of the hysteresis phenomenon
We report on an experimental study of adsorption isotherme of nitrogen onto
porous silicon with non interconnected pores open at one or at both ends in
order to check for the first time the old (1938) but always current idea based
on Cohan's description which suggests that the adsorption of gaz should occur
reversibly in the first case and irreversibly in the second one. Hysteresis
loops, the shape of which is usually associated to interconnections in porous
media, are observed whether the pores are open at one or at both ends in
contradiction with Cohan's model.Comment: 5 pages, 4 EPS figure
Surface Region of Superfluid Helium as an Inhomogeneous Bose-Condensed Gas
We present arguments that the low density surface region of self-bounded
superfluid He systems is an inhomogeneous dilute Bose gas, with almost all
of the atoms occupying the same single-particle state at . Numerical
evidence for this complete Bose-Einstein condensation was first given by the
many-body variational calculations of He droplets by Lewart, Pandharipande
and Pieper in 1988. We show that the low density surface region can be treated
rigorously using a generalized Gross-Pitaevskii equation for the Bose order
parameter.Comment: 4 pages, 1 Postscript figur
Osmotic pressure of matter and vacuum energy
The walls of the box which contains matter represent a membrane that allows
the relativistic quantum vacuum to pass but not matter. That is why the
pressure of matter in the box may be considered as the analog of the osmotic
pressure. However, we demonstrate that the osmotic pressure of matter is
modified due to interaction of matter with vacuum. This interaction induces the
nonzero negative vacuum pressure inside the box, as a result the measured
osmotic pressure becomes smaller than the matter pressure. As distinct from the
Casimir effect, this induced vacuum pressure is the bulk effect and does not
depend on the size of the box. This effect dominates in the thermodynamic limit
of the infinite volume of the box. Analog of this effect has been observed in
the dilute solution of 3He in liquid 4He, where the superfluid 4He plays the
role of the non-relativistic quantum vacuum, and 3He atoms play the role of
matter.Comment: 5 pages, 1 figure, JETP Lett. style, version accepted in JETP Letter
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