Computed microtomography visualization and quantification of mouse ischemic brain lesion by nonionic radio contrast agents.

AIM: To explore the possibility of brain imaging by microcomputed tomography (microCT) using x-ray contrasting methods to visualize mouse brain ischemic lesions after middle cerebral artery occlusion (MCAO). ----- METHODS: Isolated brains were immersed in ionic or nonionic radio contrast agent (RCA) for 5 days and subsequently scanned using microCT scanner. To verify whether ex-vivo microCT brain images can be used to characterize ischemic lesions, they were compared to Nissl stained serial histological sections of the same brains. To verify if brains immersed in RCA may be used afterwards for other methods, subsequent immunofluorescent labeling with anti-NeuN was performed. ----- RESULTS: Nonionic RCA showed better gray to white matter contrast in the brain, and therefore was selected for further studies. MicroCT measurement of ischemic lesion size and cerebral edema significantly correlated with the values determined by Nissl staining (ischemic lesion size: P=0.0005; cerebral edema: P=0.0002). Brain immersion in nonionic RCA did not affect subsequent immunofluorescent analysis and NeuN immunoreactivity. ----- CONCLUSION: MicroCT method was proven to be suitable for delineation of the ischemic lesion from the non-infarcted tissue, and quantification of lesion volume and cerebral edema

On the Hybrid Extension of CTL and CTL+

The paper studies the expressivity, relative succinctness and complexity of satisfiability for hybrid extensions of the branching-time logics CTL and CTL+ by variables. Previous complexity results show that only fragments with one variable do have elementary complexity. It is shown that H1CTL+ and H1CTL, the hybrid extensions with one variable of CTL+ and CTL, respectively, are expressively equivalent but H1CTL+ is exponentially more succinct than H1CTL. On the other hand, HCTL+, the hybrid extension of CTL with arbitrarily many variables does not capture CTL*, as it even cannot express the simple CTL* property EGFp. The satisfiability problem for H1CTL+ is complete for triply exponential time, this remains true for quite weak fragments and quite strong extensions of the logic

Efficient Symmetry Reduction and the Use of State Symmetries for Symbolic Model Checking

One technique to reduce the state-space explosion problem in temporal logic model checking is symmetry reduction. The combination of symmetry reduction and symbolic model checking by using BDDs suffered a long time from the prohibitively large BDD for the orbit relation. Dynamic symmetry reduction calculates representatives of equivalence classes of states dynamically and thus avoids the construction of the orbit relation. In this paper, we present a new efficient model checking algorithm based on dynamic symmetry reduction. Our experiments show that the algorithm is very fast and allows the verification of larger systems. We additionally implemented the use of state symmetries for symbolic symmetry reduction. To our knowledge we are the first who investigated state symmetries in combination with BDD based symbolic model checking

Singularities in the Kerr-Newman and charged δ=2\delta=2 Tomimatsu-Sato spacetimes endowed with negative mass

The Kerr-Newman solution with negative mass is shown to develop a massless ring singularity off the symmetry axis. The singularity is located inside the region with closed timelike curves which has topology of a torus and lies outside the ergoregion. These characteristics are also shared by the charged Tomimatsu-Sato delta=2 solution with negative total mass to which in particular a simple form in terms of four polynomials is provided.Comment: 10 pages, 7 figures; hyperextreme case included, one reference adde

Using Flow Specifications of Parameterized Cache Coherence Protocols for Verifying Deadlock Freedom

We consider the problem of verifying deadlock freedom for symmetric cache coherence protocols. In particular, we focus on a specific form of deadlock which is useful for the cache coherence protocol domain and consistent with the internal definition of deadlock in the Murphi model checker: we refer to this deadlock as a system- wide deadlock (s-deadlock). In s-deadlock, the entire system gets blocked and is unable to make any transition. Cache coherence protocols consist of N symmetric cache agents, where N is an unbounded parameter; thus the verification of s-deadlock freedom is naturally a parameterized verification problem. Parametrized verification techniques work by using sound abstractions to reduce the unbounded model to a bounded model. Efficient abstractions which work well for industrial scale protocols typically bound the model by replacing the state of most of the agents by an abstract environment, while keeping just one or two agents as is. However, leveraging such efficient abstractions becomes a challenge for s-deadlock: a violation of s-deadlock is a state in which the transitions of all of the unbounded number of agents cannot occur and so a simple abstraction like the one above will not preserve this violation. In this work we address this challenge by presenting a technique which leverages high-level information about the protocols, in the form of message sequence dia- grams referred to as flows, for constructing invariants that are collectively stronger than s-deadlock. Efficient abstractions can be constructed to verify these invariants. We successfully verify the German and Flash protocols using our technique

Deciding Full Branching Time Logic by Program Transformation

We present a method based on logic program transformation, for verifying Computation Tree Logic (CTL*) properties of finite state reactive systems. The finite state systems and the CTL* properties we want to verify, are encoded as logic programs on infinite lists. Our verification method consists of two steps. In the first step we transform the logic program that encodes the given system and the given property, into a monadic ω -program, that is, a stratified program defining nullary or unary predicates on infinite lists. This transformation is performed by applying unfold/fold rules that preserve the perfect model of the initial program. In the second step we verify the property of interest by using a proof method for monadic ω-program

Inheritance of Temporal Logic Properties

Abstract. Inheritance is one of the key features for the success of object-oriented languages. Inheritance (or specialisation) supports incremental design and re-use of already written specifications or programs. In a for-mal approach to system design the interest does not only lie in re-use of class definitions but also in re-use of correctness proofs. If a provably correct class is specialised we like to know those correctness properties which are preserved in the subclass. This can avoid re-verification of already proven properties and may thus substantially reduce the verifi-cation effort. In this paper we study the question of inheritance of correctness prop-erties in the context of state-based formalisms, using a temporal logic (CTL) to formalise requirements on classes. Given a superclass and its specialised subclass we develop a technique for computing the set of for-mulas which are preserved in the subclass. For specialisation we allow addition of attributes, modification of existing as well as extension with new methods.

Extracting winning strategies in update games

This paper investigates algorithms for extracting winning strategies in two-player games played on nite graphs. We focus on a special class of games called update games. We present a procedure for extracting winning strategies in update games by constructing strategies explicitly. This is based on an algorithm that solves update games in quadratic time. We also show that solving update games with a bounded number of nondeterministic nodes takes linear time

Automatic Verification of Parameterized Data Structures

Abstract. Verifying correctness of programs operating on data structures has become an integral part of software verification. A method is a program that acts on an input data structure (modeled as a graph) and produces an output data structure. The parameterized correctness problem for such methods can be defined as follows: Given a method and a property of the input graphs, we wish to verify that for all input graphs, parameterized by their size, the output graphs also satisfy the property. We present an automated approach to verify that a given method preserves a given property for a large class of methods. Examples include reversals of linked lists, insertion, deletion and iterative modification of nodes in directed graphs. Our approach draws on machinery from automata theory and temporal logic. For a useful class of data structures and properties, our solution is polynomial in the size of the method and size of the property specification

B\"uchi Complementation and Size-Change Termination

We compare tools for complementing nondeterministic B\"uchi automata with a recent termination-analysis algorithm. Complementation of B\"uchi automata is a key step in program verification. Early constructions using a Ramsey-based argument have been supplanted by rank-based constructions with exponentially better bounds. In 2001 Lee et al. presented the size-change termination (SCT) problem, along with both a reduction to B\"uchi automata and a Ramsey-based algorithm. The Ramsey-based algorithm was presented as a more practical alternative to the automata-theoretic approach, but strongly resembles the initial complementation constructions for B\"uchi automata. We prove that the SCT algorithm is a specialized realization of the Ramsey-based complementation construction. To do so, we extend the Ramsey-based complementation construction to provide a containment-testing algorithm. Surprisingly, empirical analysis suggests that despite the massive gap in worst-case complexity, Ramsey-based approaches are superior over the domain of SCT problems. Upon further analysis we discover an interesting property of the problem space that both explains this result and provides a chance to improve rank-based tools. With these improvements, we show that theoretical gains in efficiency of the rank-based approach are mirrored in empirical performance