Heegaard diagrams and surgery descriptions for twisted face-pairing 3-manifolds

The twisted face-pairing construction of our earlier papers gives an efficient way of generating, mechanically and with little effort, myriads of relatively simple face-pairing descriptions of interesting closed 3-manifolds. The corresponding description in terms of surgery, or Dehn-filling, reveals the twist construction as a carefully organized surgery on a link. In this paper, we work out the relationship between the twisted face-pairing description of closed 3-manifolds and the more common descriptions by surgery and Heegaard diagrams. We show that all Heegaard diagrams have a natural decomposition into subdiagrams called Heegaard cylinders, each of which has a natural shape given by the ratio of two positive integers. We characterize the Heegaard diagrams arising naturally from a twisted face-pairing description as those whose Heegaard cylinders all have integral shape. This characterization allows us to use the Kirby calculus and standard tools of Heegaard theory to attack the problem of finding which closed, orientable 3-manifolds have a twisted face-pairing description.Comment: Published by Algebraic and Geometric Topology at http://www.maths.warwick.ac.uk/agt/AGTVol3/agt-3-10.abs.htm

Droplet shapes on structured substrates and conformal invariance

We consider the finite-size scaling of equilibrium droplet shapes for fluid adsorption (at bulk two-phase co-existence) on heterogeneous substrates and also in wedge geometries in which only a finite domain $\Lambda_{A}$ of the substrate is completely wet. For three-dimensional systems with short-ranged forces we use renormalization group ideas to establish that both the shape of the droplet height and the height-height correlations can be understood from the conformal invariance of an appropriate operator. This allows us to predict the explicit scaling form of the droplet height for a number of different domain shapes. For systems with long-ranged forces, conformal invariance is not obeyed but the droplet shape is still shown to exhibit strong scaling behaviour. We argue that droplet formation in heterogeneous wedge geometries also shows a number of different scaling regimes depending on the range of the forces. The conformal invariance of the wedge droplet shape for short-ranged forces is shown explicitly.Comment: 20 pages, 7 figures. (Submitted to J.Phys.:Cond.Mat.

Primitive roles for inhibitory interneurons in developing frog spinal cord

Understanding the neuronal networks in the mammal spinal cord is hampered by the diversity of neurons and their connections. The simpler networks in developing lower vertebrates may offer insights into basic organization. To investigate the function of spinal inhibitory interneurons in Xenopus tadpoles, paired whole-cell recordings were used. We show directly that one class of interneuron, with distinctive anatomy, produces glycinergic, negative feedback inhibition that can limit firing in motoneurons and interneurons of the central pattern generator during swimming. These same neurons also produce inhibitory gating of sensory pathways during swimming. This discovery raises the possibility that some classes of interneuron, with distinct functions later in development, may differentiate from an earlier class in which these functions are shared. Preliminary evidence suggests that these inhibitory interneurons express the transcription factor engrailed, supporting a probable homology with interneurons in developing zebrafish that also express engrailed and have very similar anatomy and functions