362 research outputs found
Numerical analysis of a mechanotransduction dynamical model reveals homoclinic bifurcations of extracellular matrix mediated oscillations of the mesenchymal stem cell fate
We perform one and two-parameter numerical bifurcation analysis of a
mechanotransduction model approximating the dynamics of mesenchymal stem cell
differentiation into neurons, adipocytes, myocytes and osteoblasts. For our
analysis, we use as bifurcation parameters the stiffness of the extracellular
matrix and parameters linked with the positive feedback mechanisms that
up-regulate the production of the YAP/TAZ transcriptional regulators (TRs) and
the cell adhesion area. Our analysis reveals a rich nonlinear behaviour of the
cell differentiation including regimes of hysteresis and multistability, stable
oscillations of the effective adhesion area, the YAP/TAZ TRs and the
PPAR receptors associated with the adipogenic fate, as well as
homoclinic bifurcations that interrupt relatively high-amplitude oscillations
abruptly. The two-parameter bifurcation analysis of the Andronov-Hopf points
that give birth to the oscillating patterns predicts their existence for soft
extracellular substrates (), a regime that favours the neurogenic and
the adipogenic cell fate. Furthermore, in these regimes, the analysis reveals
the presence of homoclinic bifurcations that result in the sudden loss of the
stable oscillations of the cell-substrate adhesion towards weaker adhesion and
high expression levels of the gene encoding Tubulin beta-3 chain, thus
favouring the phase transition from the adipogenic to the neurogenic fate
Construction of embedded fMRI resting state functional connectivity networks using manifold learning
We construct embedded functional connectivity networks (FCN) from benchmark
resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (rsfMRI) data acquired from
patients with schizophrenia and healthy controls based on linear and nonlinear
manifold learning algorithms, namely, Multidimensional Scaling (MDS), Isometric
Feature Mapping (ISOMAP) and Diffusion Maps. Furthermore, based on key global
graph-theoretical properties of the embedded FCN, we compare their
classification potential using machine learning techniques. We also assess the
performance of two metrics that are widely used for the construction of FCN
from fMRI, namely the Euclidean distance and the lagged cross-correlation
metric. We show that the FCN constructed with Diffusion Maps and the lagged
cross-correlation metric outperform the other combinations
Reducing wildland fire hazard exploiting complex network theory. A case study analysis
We discuss a new systematic methodology to mitigate wildland fire hazard by appropriately distributing fuel breaks in space. In particular, motivated by the concept of information flow in complex networks we create a hierarchical allocation of the landscape patches that facilitate the fire propagation based on the Bonacich centrality. Reducing the fuel load in these critical patches results to lower levels of fire hazard. For illustration purposes we apply the proposed strategy to a real case of wildland fire. In particular we focus on the wildland fire that occurred in Spetses Island, Greece in 1990 and burned the one third of the forest. The efficiency of the proposed strategy is compared against the benchmark of random distribution of fuel breaks for a wide range of fuel breaks densities
Tuning the average path length of complex networks and its influence to the emergent dynamics of the majority-rule model
We show how appropriate rewiring with the aid of Metropolis Monte Carlo
computational experiments can be exploited to create network topologies
possessing prescribed values of the average path length (APL) while keeping the
same connectivity degree and clustering coefficient distributions. Using the
proposed rewiring rules we illustrate how the emergent dynamics of the
celebrated majority-rule model are shaped by the distinct impact of the APL
attesting the need for developing efficient algorithms for tuning such network
characteristics.Comment: 10 figure
Can social microblogging be used to forecast intraday exchange rates?
The Efficient Market Hypothesis (EMH) is widely accepted to hold true under
certain assumptions. One of its implications is that the prediction of stock
prices at least in the short run cannot outperform the random walk model. Yet,
recently many studies stressing the psychological and social dimension of
financial behavior have challenged the validity of the EMH. Towards this aim,
over the last few years, internet-based communication platforms and search
engines have been used to extract early indicators of social and economic
trends. Here, we used Twitter's social networking platform to model and
forecast the EUR/USD exchange rate in a high-frequency intradaily trading
scale. Using time series and trading simulations analysis, we provide some
evidence that the information provided in social microblogging platforms such
as Twitter can in certain cases enhance the forecasting efficiency regarding
the very short (intradaily) forex.Comment: This is a prior version of the paper published at NETNOMICS. The
final publication is available at
http://www.springer.com/economics/economic+theory/journal/1106
Focusing Revisited: an MN-dynamics Approach
The nonlinear Schr{\"o}dinger (NLS) equation is a ubiquitous example of an
envelope wave equation for conservative, dispersive systems. We revisit here
the problem of self-similar focusing of waves in the case of the focusing NLS
equation through the prism of a dynamic renormalization technique (MN dynamics)
that factors out self-similarity and yields a bifurcation view of the onset of
focusing. As a result, identifying the focusing self-similar solution becomes a
steady state problem. The discretized steady states are subsequently obtained
and their linear stability is numerically examined. The calculations are
performed in the setting of variable index of refraction, in which the onset of
focusing appears as a supercritical bifurcation of a novel type of mixed
Hamiltonian-dissipative dynamical system (reminiscent, to some extent, of a
pitchfork bifurcation).Comment: 6 pages, 2 figure
Complex network statistics to the design of fire breaks for the control of fire spreading
A computational approach for identifying efficient fuel breaks partitions for the containment of fire incidents in forests is proposed. The approach is based on the complex networks statistics, namely the centrality measures and cellular automata modeling. The efficiency of various centrality statistics, such as betweenness, closeness, Bonacich and eigenvalue centrality to select fuel breaks partitions vs. the random-based distribution is demonstrated. Two examples of increasing complexity are considered: (a) an artificial forest of randomly distributed density of vegetation, and (b) a patch from the area of Vesuvio, National Park of Campania, Italy. Both cases assume flat terrain and single type of vegetation. Simulation results over an ensemble of lattice realizations and runs show that the proposed approach appears very promising as it produces statistically significant better outcomes when compared to the random distribution approach
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