1,075 research outputs found
A multistage linear array assignment problem
The implementation of certain algorithms on parallel processing computing architectures can involve partitioning contiguous elements into a fixed number of groups, each of which is to be handled by a single processor. It is desired to find an assignment of elements to processors that minimizes the sum of the maximum workloads experienced at each stage. This problem can be viewed as a multi-objective network optimization problem. Polynomially-bounded algorithms are developed for the case of two stages, whereas the associated decision problem (for an arbitrary number of stages) is shown to be NP-complete. Heuristic procedures are therefore proposed and analyzed for the general problem. Computational experience with one of the exact problems, incorporating certain pruning rules, is presented with one of the exact problems. Empirical results also demonstrate that one of the heuristic procedures is especially effective in practice
Aerospace applications on integer and combinatorial optimization
Research supported by NASA Langley Research Center includes many applications of aerospace design optimization and is conducted by teams of applied mathematicians and aerospace engineers. This paper investigates the benefits from this combined expertise in formulating and solving integer and combinatorial optimization problems. Applications range from the design of large space antennas to interior noise control. A typical problem. for example, seeks the optimal locations for vibration-damping devices on an orbiting platform and is expressed as a mixed/integer linear programming problem with more than 1500 design variables
Multi-domain active sound control and noise shielding
This paper describes an active sound control methodology based on difference potentials. The main feature of this methodology is its ability to automatically preserve “wanted” sound within a domain while canceling “unwanted” noise from outside the domain. This method of preservation of the wanted sounds by active shielding control is demonstrated with various broadband and realistic sound sources such as human voice and music in multiple domains in a one-dimensional enclosure. Unlike many other conventional active control methods, the proposed approach does not require the explicit characterization of the wanted sound to be preserved. The controls are designed based on the measurements of the total field on the boundaries of the shielded domain only, which is allowed to be multiply connected. The method is tested in a variety of experimental cases. The typical attenuation of the unwanted noise is found to be about 20 dB over a large area of the shielded domain and the original wanted sound field is preserved with errors of around 1 dB and below through a broad frequency range up to 1 kHz.
© 2011 Acoustical Society of Americ
Phase transitions in social sciences: two-populations mean field theory
A new mean field statistical mechanics model of two interacting groups of
spins is introduced and the phase transition studied in terms of their relative
size. A jump of the average magnetization is found for large values of the
mutual interaction when the relative percentage of the two populations crosses
a critical threshold. It is shown how the critical percentage depends on
internal interactions and on the initial magnetizations. The model is
interpreted as a prototype of resident-immigrant cultural interaction and
conclusions from the social sciences perspectives are drawn
Studies on optimizing potential energy functions for maximal intrinsic hyperpolarizability
We use numerical optimization to study the properties of (1) the class of
one-dimensional potential energy functions and (2) systems of point charges in
two-dimensions that yield the largest hyperpolarizabilities, which we find to
be within 30% of the fundamental limit. We investigate the character of the
potential energy functions and resulting wavefunctions and find that a broad
range of potentials yield the same intrinsic hyperpolarizability ceiling of
0.709.Comment: 9 pages, 9 figure
Stable Propagation of a Burst Through a One-Dimensional Homogeneous Excitatory Chain Model of Songbird Nucleus HVC
We demonstrate numerically that a brief burst consisting of two to six spikes
can propagate in a stable manner through a one-dimensional homogeneous
feedforward chain of non-bursting neurons with excitatory synaptic connections.
Our results are obtained for two kinds of neuronal models, leaky
integrate-and-fire (LIF) neurons and Hodgkin-Huxley (HH) neurons with five
conductances. Over a range of parameters such as the maximum synaptic
conductance, both kinds of chains are found to have multiple attractors of
propagating bursts, with each attractor being distinguished by the number of
spikes and total duration of the propagating burst. These results make
plausible the hypothesis that sparse precisely-timed sequential bursts observed
in projection neurons of nucleus HVC of a singing zebra finch are intrinsic and
causally related.Comment: 13 pages, 6 figure
Metastable liquid-liquid phase transition in a single-component system with only one crystal phase and no density anomaly
We investigate the phase behavior of a single-component system in 3
dimensions with spherically-symmetric, pairwise-additive, soft-core
interactions with an attractive well at a long distance, a repulsive soft-core
shoulder at an intermediate distance, and a hard-core repulsion at a short
distance, similar to potentials used to describe liquid systems such as
colloids, protein solutions, or liquid metals. We showed [Nature {\bf 409}, 692
(2001)] that, even with no evidences of the density anomaly, the phase diagram
has two first-order fluid-fluid phase transitions, one ending in a
gas--low-density liquid (LDL) critical point, and the other in a
gas--high-density liquid (HDL) critical point, with a LDL-HDL phase transition
at low temperatures. Here we use integral equation calculations to explore the
3-parameter space of the soft-core potential and we perform molecular dynamics
simulations in the interesting region of parameters. For the equilibrium phase
diagram we analyze the structure of the crystal phase and find that, within the
considered range of densities, the structure is independent of the density.
Then, we analyze in detail the fluid metastable phases and, by explicit
thermodynamic calculation in the supercooled phase, we show the absence of the
density anomaly. We suggest that this absence is related to the presence of
only one stable crystal structure.Comment: 15 pages, 21 figure
Folding transitions of the triangular lattice with defects
A recently introduced model describing the folding of the triangular lattice
is generalized allowing for defects in the lattice and written as an Ising
model with nearest-neighbor and plaquette interactions on the honeycomb
lattice. Its phase diagram is determined in the hexagon approximation of the
cluster variation method and the crossover from the pure Ising to the pure
folding model is investigated, obtaining a quite rich structure with several
multicritical points. Our results are in very good agreement with the available
exact ones and extend a previous transfer matrix study.Comment: 16 pages, latex, 5 postscript figure
- …