Neural Discrete Representation Learning

Learning useful representations without supervision remains a key challenge in machine learning. In this paper, we propose a simple yet powerful generative model that learns such discrete representations. Our model, the Vector Quantised-Variational AutoEncoder (VQ-VAE), differs from VAEs in two key ways: the encoder network outputs discrete, rather than continuous, codes; and the prior is learnt rather than static. In order to learn a discrete latent representation, we incorporate ideas from vector quantisation (VQ). Using the VQ method allows the model to circumvent issues of "posterior collapse" -- where the latents are ignored when they are paired with a powerful autoregressive decoder -- typically observed in the VAE framework. Pairing these representations with an autoregressive prior, the model can generate high quality images, videos, and speech as well as doing high quality speaker conversion and unsupervised learning of phonemes, providing further evidence of the utility of the learnt representations

E1E_1-degeneration and d′d′′d'd''-lemma

For a double complex $(A, d', d'')$, we show that if it satisfies the $d'd''$-lemma and the spectral sequence $\{E^{p, q}_r\}$ induced by $A$ does not degenerate at $E_0$, then it degenerates at $E_1$. We apply this result to prove the degeneration at $E_1$ of a Hodge-de Rham spectral sequence on compact bi-generalized Hermitian manifolds that satisfy a version of $d'd''$-lemma

Model of Transformation Toughening in Brittle Materials

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/65876/1/j.1151-2916.1991.tb06800.x.pd

Quantum criticality in a Mott pn-junction in an armchair carbon nanotube

In an armchair carbon nanotube pn junction the p- and n- regions are separated by a region of a Mott insulator, which can backscatter electrons only in pairs. We predict a quantum-critical behavior in such a pn junction. Depending on the junction's built-in electric field E, its conductance G scales either to zero or to the ideal value G=4e^2/h as the temperature T is lowered. The two types of the G(T) dependence indicate the existence, at some special value of E, of an intermediate quantum critical point with a finite conductance G<4e^2/h. This makes the pn junction drastically different from a simple barrier in a Luttinger liquid.Comment: 5 pages, 1 figur