2,080 research outputs found
Sleep targets highly connected global and local nodes to aid consolidation of learned graph networks
Much of our long-term knowledge is organised in complex networks. Sleep is thought to be critical for abstracting knowledge and enhancing important item memory for long-term retention. Thus, sleep should aid the development of memory for networks and the abstraction of their structure for efficient storage. However, this remains unknown because past sleep studies have focused on discrete items. Here we explored the impact of sleep (night-sleep/day-wake within-subject paradigm with 25 male participants) on memory for graph-networks where some items were important due to dense local connections (degree centrality) or, independently, important due to greater global connections (closeness/betweenness centrality). A network of 27 planets (nodes) sparsely interconnected by 36 teleporters (edges) was learned via discrete associations without explicit indication of any network structure. Despite equivalent exposure to all connections in the network, we found that memory for the links between items with high local connectivity or high global connectivity were better retained after sleep. These results highlight that sleep has the capacity for strengthening both global and local structure from the world and abstracting over multiple experiences to efficiently form internal networks of knowledge
Utilization of activated carbon produced from Sago hampas (Metroxylon sagu) to reduce ammonia loss from urea.
Surface-applied urea contributes to NH3 loss of N through ammonia volatilization, especially in warm
and humid regions. Ammonia loss has been a major problem confronting farmers because additional
urea is applied to compensate for the loss which increases cost of fertilization. Activated carbon (AC)
produced from Sago hampas (SH) could be capable of absorbing N in the form of NH4+ to minimize
ammonia volatilization. The objective of this study was to determine if AC produced from SH could be
used to retain ammonium as well as minimizing ammonia loss from urea. Activated carbon was produced from SH by using concentrated H2SO4 and (NH4)2S2O8. There were three types of AC produced using different volumes of H2SO4 (AC30, AC40 and AC50). The charred product was used as a treatment
together with the raw material in order to observe the reduction of ammonia loss using closed-dynamic
air flow system for 7 days. The daily loss of NH3was observed and the NH4+ and NO3- retention in the soil
were determined using standard procedures. Activated carbon produced from SH had a higher CEC and
it increased from AC30 to AC50. The treatments did not contribute to the reduction of ammonia loss;
however, there was a significant increase in the retention of NH4+ in the soil compared to urea alone.
The AC was observed to be a better absorbent than SH. AC50 was a better absorbent compared to other
treatments due to high acidity and CEC. However, the treatment did not contribute to reduction of
ammonia loss, but there was a significant increase of NH4
+ retention in the soil
Quantum Sine(h)-Gordon Model and Classical Integrable Equations
We study a family of classical solutions of modified sinh-Gordon equation,
$\partial_z\partial_{{\bar z}} \eta-\re^{2\eta}+p(z)\,p({\bar z})\
\re^{-2\eta}=0p(z)=z^{2\alpha}-s^{2\alpha}Q(\alpha>0)(\alpha<-1)$ models.Comment: 35 pages, 3 figure
Nonlinear Models of Convergence
A sufficient issue in studies of economic development is whether economies (countries, regions of a country, etc.) converge to one another in terms of per capita income. In this paper, nonlinear asymptotically subsiding trends of income gap in a pair of economies model the convergence process. A few specific forms of such trends are proposed: log-exponential trend, exponential trend, and fractional trend. A pair of economies is deemed converging if time series of their income gap is stationary about any of these trends. To test for stationarity, standard unit root tests are applied with non-standard test statistics that are estimated for each kind of the trends
Are firms exporting to China and India different from other exporters?
This chapter asks if and why advanced countries differ in their ability to export to China and India. To this end we exploit a newly collected, comparable cross-country dataset (EFIGE) obtained from a survey of 15,000 manufacturing firms in Austria, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom. The EFIGE dataset contains detailed information on firms’ international activities as well as firm characteristics such as size and productivity, governance and management structure, workforce, innovation and research activity. We study both the extensive and intensive margins of exports and identify firm characteristics that are positively or negatively correlated wiThexporting activity tout court and wiThexporting to China and India conditional on being an exporter. We confirm previous rich evidence and show that larger, more productive, and more innovative firms are more likely to become exporters and export more. We also provide some new evidence on the role of governance and management: while there does not seem to be a strong negative effect of family ownership, we find that a higher percentage of family management reduces a firm’s export propensity and export volumes. When we turn to exports to China and India, we find that firms exporting there must be on average larger, more productive, and more innovative than firms exporting elsewhere
Electrostatically gated membrane permeability in inorganic protocells
Although several strategies are now available to produce functional microcompartments analogous to primitive cell-like structures, little progress has been made in generating protocell constructs with self-controlled membrane permeability. Here we describe the preparation of water-dispersible colloidosomes based on silica nanoparticles and delineated by a continuous semipermeable inorganic membrane capable of self-activated, electrostatically gated permeability. We use crosslinking and covalent grafting of a pH-responsive copolymer to generate an ultrathin elastic membrane that exhibits selective release and uptake of small molecules. This behaviour, which depends on the charge of the copolymer coronal layer, serves to trigger enzymatic dephosphorylation reactions specifically within the protocell aqueous interior. This system represents a step towards the design and construction of alternative types of artificial chemical cells and protocell models based on spontaneous processes of inorganic self-organization
Determining matrix elements and resonance widths from finite volume: the dangerous mu-terms
The standard numerical approach to determining matrix elements of local
operators and width of resonances uses the finite volume dependence of energy
levels and matrix elements. Finite size corrections that decay exponentially in
the volume are usually neglected or taken into account using perturbation
expansion in effective field theory. Using two-dimensional sine-Gordon field
theory as "toy model" it is shown that some exponential finite size effects
could be much larger than previously thought, potentially spoiling the
determination of matrix elements in frameworks such as lattice QCD. The
particular class of finite size corrections considered here are mu-terms
arising from bound state poles in the scattering amplitudes. In sine-Gordon
model, these can be explicitly evaluated and shown to explain the observed
discrepancies to high precision. It is argued that the effects observed are not
special to the two-dimensional setting, but rather depend on general field
theoretic features that are common with models relevant for particle physics.
It is important to understand these finite size corrections as they present a
potentially dangerous source of systematic errors for the determination of
matrix elements and resonance widths.Comment: 26 pages, 13 eps figures, LaTeX2e fil
Entropy flow in near-critical quantum circuits
Near-critical quantum circuits are ideal physical systems for asymptotically
large-scale quantum computers, because their low energy collective excitations
evolve reversibly, effectively isolated from the environment. The design of
reversible computers is constrained by the laws governing entropy flow within
the computer. In near-critical quantum circuits, entropy flows as a locally
conserved quantum current, obeying circuit laws analogous to the electric
circuit laws. The quantum entropy current is just the energy current divided by
the temperature. A quantum circuit made from a near-critical system (of
conventional type) is described by a relativistic 1+1 dimensional relativistic
quantum field theory on the circuit. The universal properties of the
energy-momentum tensor constrain the entropy flow characteristics of the
circuit components: the entropic conductivity of the quantum wires and the
entropic admittance of the quantum circuit junctions. For example,
near-critical quantum wires are always resistanceless inductors for entropy. A
universal formula is derived for the entropic conductivity:
\sigma_S(\omega)=iv^{2}S/\omega T, where \omega is the frequency, T the
temperature, S the equilibrium entropy density and v the velocity of `light'.
The thermal conductivity is Real(T\sigma_S(\omega))=\pi v^{2}S\delta(\omega).
The thermal Drude weight is, universally, v^{2}S. This gives a way to measure
the entropy density directly.Comment: 2005 paper published 2017 in Kadanoff memorial issue of J Stat Phys
with revisions for clarity following referee's suggestions, arguments and
results unchanged, cross-posting now to quant-ph, 27 page
Business cycles, international trade and capital flows: Evidence from Latin America
This paper adopts a flexible framework to assess both short- and long-run business cycle linkages between six Latin American (LA) countries and the four largest economies in the world (namely the US, the Euro area, Japan and China) over the period 1980:I-2011:IV. The result indicate that within the LA region there are considerable differences between countries, success stories coexisting with extremely vulnerable economies. They also show that the LA region as a whole is largely dependent on external developments, especially in the years after the great recession of 2008 and 2009. The trade channel appears to be the most important source of business cycle comovement, whilst capital flows are found to have a limited role, especially in the very short run
Wall Crossing and Instantons in Compactified Gauge Theory
We calculate the leading weak-coupling instanton contribution to the
moduli-space metric of N=2 supersymmetric Yang-Mills theory with gauge group
SU(2) compactified on R^3 x S^1. The results are in precise agreement with the
semiclassical expansion of the exact metric recently conjectured by Gaiotto,
Moore and Neitzke based on considerations related to wall-crossing in the
corresponding four-dimensional theory.Comment: 24 pages, no figure
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