Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Visualizing The Phonon Wave Function, Scott C. Johnson, Thomas D. Gutierrez

Physics

A phonon often is described as ‘‘a quantum of lattice vibration,’’ but this description can be difficult to reconcile with the wave functions explored in a typical undergraduate quantum mechanics class. A phonon wave function is similar to the harmonic oscillator wave functions studied in introductory quantum mechanics, except that it is many-dimensional. We suggest a way to visualize the probability density for this very high-dimensional wave function. The resulting pictures are especially clear and intuitive for a coherent state, which is both a good approximation to a sound wave and a discrete analog to laser light. These pictures can …

Variable Stars In The Field Of Open Cluster Ngc 6819, R. A. Street, Keith Horne, T. A. Lister, A. Penny, Y. Tsapras, A. Quirrenbach, N. Safizadeh, J. Cooke, David Mitchell, A. Collier Cameron

Physics

We report on the discovery of 25 variable stars plus 13 suspected variables found in the field of the open cluster NGC 6819. The stars were identified from time-series photometric data obtained on the Isaac Newton Telescope, La Palma, during two observing runs covering the 19 nights between 1999 June 22–30 and 1999 July 22–31. The variables found include 12 eclipsing binaries with an additional three suspected, nine BY Draconis systems, plus four variables of other types, including one star believed to be a Cepheid. Three of the 15 eclipsing binaries are believed to be cluster members. Details of a …

Ontology-Based Semantic Classification Of Unstructured Documents, Ching Kang Cheng, Xiao Shan Pan, Franz J. Kurfess

Computer Science and Software Engineering

As more and more knowledge and information becomes available through computers, a critical capability of systems supporting knowledge management is the classification of documents into categories that are meaningful to the user. In a step beyond the use of keywords, we developed a system that analyzes the sentences contained in unstructured or semi-structured documents, and utilizes an ontology reflecting the domain knowledge for a semantic classification of the documents. An experimental system has been implemented for the analysis of small documents in combination with a limited ontology; an extension to larger sets of documents and extended ontologies, together with an …

Plant Establishment With Rainfall Simulators For Erosion Control, Brent Hallock, Steve Rein, Misty Scharff, Michael Curto

Earth and Soil Sciences

Hydroseeding failures on disturbed sites are usually attributable to combinations of improper species selection, seeding at inappropriate times, and/or improper seed mixes, fiber, and tackifier. To investigate these factors, California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo, in conjunction with the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) and California State University, Sacramento, conducted a study of these factors’ affect on vegetation establishment.

The goal was to identify initially fast growing vegetation that demonstrates long-term erosion control effectiveness. Native plant species common to District 5, along the California Central Coast, were used. Treatments were conducted in 0.6 by 2 m by 30 cm …

A Gis To Select Plant Species For Erosion Control Along California Highways, Michael Curto, Brent Hallock, Misty Scharff

Earth and Soil Sciences

Through road construction and maintenance activities, the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) actively manages roadside rights-of-way that transect California's 41 million hectares (101 million acres), spanning over 3,000 meters of elevational change from seashore to subalpine. State and federal highways are grouped into 12 districts, each encompassing from one to 11 of the state's 58 counties. District personnel are typically responsible for implementing site-specific adaptations of general statewide guidelines for shortto long-term erosion control following construction or storm damage. Many erosion control projects involve reestablishing vegetation through seeding where the precarious life stages of germination and establishment are controlled by …

Integrating Symbol-Oriented And Sub-Symbolic Reasoning Methods Into Hybrid Systems, Franz J. Kurfess

Computer Science and Software Engineering

Knowledge representation and reasoning methods in artificial intelligence almost exclusively rely on symbol-oriented methods: Statements describing aspects and objects of the system to be modeled are represented through symbols (mostly text strings), and these symbols are stored in a computer, and manipulated according to the inference rules prescribed by the reasoning method. This works reasonably well in situations where knowledge is available in explicit form, typically through experts or written documents. In situations where knowledge is only available implicitly, e.g. in large data sets, other methods, often based on statistical approaches, have been used more successfully. Many of these methods …

Sheaf Cohomology Of Conscious Entity, Goro Kato

Mathematics

Awareness of a conscious entity can exist without elements; therefore, the general notion of an object of a category is employed. One of the characterization of understanding is: for a given local infonnation (awareness) there exists a global information whose restriction is the given information. For such mental activities, category and sheaf theories are employed to formulate consciousness. We will show that the cohomology (more general precohomology) object, a subquotient object, better represents the essence of a conscious entity than an object itself. We will also give a definition of an observation to fonnulate the collapse of the wave and …

Category Theory And Consciousness, Goro Kato, Daniele C. Struppa

Mathematics

No abstract provided.

Orbifold Homeomorphism And Diffeomorphism Groups, Joseph E. Borzellino, Victor Brunsden

Mathematics

In this paper we outline results on orbifold diffeomorphism groups that were presented at the International Conference on Infinite Dimensional Lie Groups in Geometry and Representation Theory at Howard University, Washington DC on August 17-21, 2000. Specifically, we define the notion of reduced and unreduced orbifold diffeomorphism groups. For the reduced orbifold diffeomorphism group we state and sketch the proof of the following recognition result: Let O1 and O2 be two compact, locally smooth orbifolds. Fix r ≥ 0. Suppose that Φ : Diffr (O1) → Diffr (O2) is a group isomorphism. Then Φ is induced by redred a (topological) …

Levy-Like Continuity Theorems For Convergence In Distribution, Theodore P. Hill, Ulrich Krengel

Research Scholars in Residence

Levy’s classical continuity theorem states that if the pointwise limit of a sequence of characteristic functions exists, then the limit function itself is a characteristic function if and only if the limit function satisfies a single universal limit condition (in his case, the limit at zero is one), in which case the underlying measures converge weakly to the probability measure represented by the limit function. It is the purpose of this article to give a number of direct analogs of L´evy’s theorem for other probability-representing functions including moment sequences, maximal moment sequences, mean-residual-life functions, Hardy-Littlewood maximal functions, and failure-rate functions. …

Human-Robot Interaction: Final Report For Darpa/Nsf Study On Human-Robot Interaction, Erika Rogers, Robin R. Murphy

Computer Science and Software Engineering

No abstract provided.

Calorimetric Study Of Block-Copolymers Of Poly(N-Butyl Acrylate) And Gradient Poly(N-Butyl Acrylate-Co-Methyl Methacrylate), A I. Buzin, M Pyda, P Costanzo, K Matyjaszewski, B Wunderlich

Chemistry and Biochemistry

The nanophase separation in diblock and triblock copolymers consisting of immiscible poly(n-butyl acrylate) (block A) and gradient copolymers of methyl methacrylate (MMA) and n-butyl acrylate (n BA) (block M/A) were investigated by means of their heat capacity, C_p, as a function of the composition of the blocks M/A and temperature. In all copolymers studied, both blocks are represented by their C_p and glass transition temperature, T_g, as well as the broadening of the transition-temperature range. The low-temperature transition of the blocks A is always close to that of the …

Random Probability Measures With Given Mean And Variance Running Title: Random Probability Measures, Lisa Bloomer, Theodore P. Hill

Research Scholars in Residence

This article describes several natural methods of constructing random probability measures with prescribed mean and variance, and focuses mainly on a technique which constructs a sequence of simple (purely discrete, finite number of atoms) distributions with the prescribed mean and with variances which increase to the desired variance. Basic properties of the construction are established, including conditions guaranteeing full support of the generated measures, and conditions guaranteeing that the final measure is discrete. Finally, applications of the construction method to optimization problems such as Plackett’s Problem are mentioned, and to experimental determination of average-optimal solutions of certain control problems.