Applied Mathematics Commons^™

Multiphoton Response Of Retinal Rod Photoreceptors, Vasilios Alexiades, Harihar Khanal

Publications

Phototransduction is the process by which light is converted into an electrical response in retinal photoreceptors. Rod photoreceptors contain a stack of (about 1000) disc membranes packed with photopigment rhodopsin molecules, which absorb the photons. We present computational experiments which show the profound effect on the response of the distances (how many discs apart) photons happen to be absorbed at. This photon-distribution effect alone can account for much of the observed variability in response.

Oscillation Criteria For First-Order Forced Nonlinear Difference Equations, Ravi P. Agarwal, Said R. Grace, Tim Smith

Publications

Some new criteria for the oscillation of first-order forced nonlinear difference equations are established.

Traveling Wavetrains In The Complex Cubic-Quintic Ginzburg-Laundau Equation, S.C. Mancas, S. Roy Choudhury

Publications

In this paper we use a traveling wave reduction or a so–called spatial approximation to comprehensively investigate the periodic solutions of the complex cubic–quintic Ginzburg–Landau equation. The primary tools used here are Hopf bifurcation theory and perturbation theory. Explicit results are obtained for the post–bifurcation periodic orbits and their stability. Generalized and degenerate Hopf bifurcations are also briefly considered to track the emergence of global structure such as homoclinic orbits.

Bifurcations And Competing Coherent Structures In The Cubic-Quintic Ginzburg-Landau Equation I: Plane Wave (Cw) Solutions, S.C. Mancas, S. Roy Choudhury

Publications

Singularity Theory is used to comprehensively investigate the bifurcations of the steady-states of the traveling wave ODEs of the cubic-quintic Ginzburg-Landau equa- tion (CGLE). These correspond to plane waves of the PDE. In addition to the most general situation, we also derive the degeneracy conditions on the eight coefficients of the CGLE under which the equation for the steady states assumes each of the possible quartic (the quartic fold and an unnamed form), cubic (the pitchfork and the winged cusp), and quadratic (four possible cases) normal forms for singularities of codimension up to three. Since the actual governing equations are …

Numerical Simulation Of Nonlinear Elastic Wave Propagation In Piecewise Homogeneous Media, Arkadi Berezovski, Mihhail Berezovski, Juri Engelbrecht

Publications

Systematic experimental work [S. Zhuang, G. Ravichandran, D. Grady, J. Mech. Phys. Solids 51 (2003) 245–265] on laminated composites subjected to high velocity impact loading exhibits the dispersed wave field and the oscillatory behavior of waves with respect to a mean value. Such a behavior is absent in homogeneous solids. An approximate solution to the plate impact in layered heterogeneous solids has been developed in [X. Chen, N. Chandra, A.M. Rajendran, Int. J. Solids Struct. 41 (2004) 4635–4659]. The influence of the particle velocity on many process characteristics was demonstrated. Based on earlier results [A. Berezovski, J. Engelbrecht, G.A. Maugin, …

On Doubly Periodic Solutions Of Quasilinear Hyperbolic Equations Of The Fourth Order, T. Kiguradze, T. Smith

Publications

The problem on doubly periodic solutions is considered for a class of quasilinear hyperbolic equations. Effective sufficient conditions of solvability and unique solvability of this problem are established.

Transient Non-Linear Heat Conduction Solution By A Dual Reciprocity Boundary Element Method With An Effective Posteriori Error Estimator, Eduardo Divo, Alain J. Kassab

Publications

A Dual Reciprocity Boundary Element Method is formulated to solve non-linear heat conduction problems. The approach is based on using the Kirchhoff transform along with lagging of the effective non-linear thermal diffusivity. A posteriori error estimate is used to provide effective estimates of the temporal and spatial error. A numerical example is used to demonstrate the approach.

Interacting Near-Solutions Of A Hamiltonian System, Gregory S. Spradlin

Publications

A Hamiltonian system with a superquadratic potential is examined. The system is asymptotic to an autonomous system. The difference between the Hamiltonian system and the “problem at infinity,” the autonomous system, may be large, but decays exponientially. The existence of a nontrivial solution homoclinic to zero is proven. Many results of this type rely on a monotonicity condition on the nonlinearity, not assumed here, which makes the problem resemble in some sense the special case of homogeneous (power) nonlinearity. The proof employs variational, minimax arguments. In some similar results requiring the monotonicity condition, solutions inhabit a manifold homeomorphic to the …

Response Of Dark-Adapted Retinal Rod Photoreceptors, H. Khanal, V. Alexiades, E. Dibenedetto

Publications

The process of phototransduction, whereby light is converted into an electrical response, in rod and cone photoreceptors in the retina, involves as a key setp, the diffusion of the cytoplasmic, signaling molecules cGMP (cyclic guanosime monophosphate) and Ca²+ diffuse in the cytoplasm (the fluid surrounding the discs). the complex geometry of the rod creates computational difficulties. We present spatio-temporal compuational models for interacctions and diffusion of cGMP and Ca²+ in the cytoplasm of vertebrate rod photoreceptors, as well as numerical simulations fo the response to light of dark-adapted Salamander rods.

Computational Models For Diffusion Of Second Messengers In Visual Transduction, Harihar Khanal

Publications

The process of phototransduction, whereby light is converted into an electrical response in retinal rod and cone photoreceptors, involves, as a crucial step, the diffusion of cytoplasmic signaling molecules, termed second messengers. A barrier to mathematical and computational modeling is the complex geometry of the rod outer segment which contains about 1000 thin discs. Most current investigations on the subject assume a well-stirred bulk aqueous environment thereby avoiding such geometrical complexity. We present theoretical and computational spatio-temporal models for phototransduction in vertebrate rod photoreceptors, which are pointwise in nature and thus take into account the complex geometry of the …

Simulation Of Engineering Systems Described By High-Index Dae And Discontinuous Ode Using Single Step Methods, Marc Compere

Publications

This dissertation presents numerical methods for solving two classes of or-dinary diferential equations (ODE) based on single-step integration meth-ods. The first class of equations addressed describes the mechanical dynamics of constrained multibody systems. These equations are ordinary differential equations (ODE) subject to algebraic constraints. Accordinly they are called differential-algebraic equations (DAE).

Specific contributions made in this area include an explicit transforma-tion between the Hessenberg index-3 form for constrained mechanical systems to a canonical state-space form used in the nonlinear control communities. A hybrid solution method was developed that incorporates both sliding-mode control (SMC) from the controls literature and post-stabilization from …

Two Photon Absorption In Chromophore Doped Solid Matrices, S.C. Mancas, Michael Canva, Yves Levy, Kathleen A. Richardson, Giselle Roger

Publications

Over the past decades organic materials have shown an important potential for applications in the field of nonlinear optics. Two-photon absorbing materials can be optically addressed in three dimensions of space, which make them unique for many new applications, including 3D displays, optical memories, bio-sensors, etc. Fluorescent organic chromophores can be synthesized with structures especially optimized for this nonlinear optical property. Yet, for some applications, they have to be incorporated in solid state matrices. We especially investigate hybrid organic/inorganic doped matrices synthesized by solgel process. However , the linear transmission for such molecules is often significantly less than unity. Two-photon …

A Perturbation Of A Periodic Hamiltonian System, Gregory S. Spradlin

Publications

No abstract provided.

An Elliptic Partial Differential Equation With A Symmetrical Almost Periodic Term, Gregory S. Spradlin

Publications

In [STT], a Hamiltonian system of the form (1.0)− u′′+ u= h (t)∇ F (u) was studied, where h is an almost periodic (defined in a moment) function, and F: RN→ R a “superquadratic” potential. That is, F (q) behaves like q to a power greater than 2, with F (q)/| q| 2→ 0 as| q|→ 0 and F (q)/| q| 2→∞ as| q|→∞. For example, F (q)=| q| p− 1q with p> 1 would qualify. The authors found that (1.0) must have a nonzero solution homoclinic to zero. Since this result, many papers (see [CMN],[R1], and [ACM], for example) …

A Singularly Perturbed Elliptic Partial Differential Equation With An Almost Periodic Term, Gregory S. Spradlin

Publications

In [STT], a Hamiltonian system of the form (1. 0)− u+ u= h (t)∇ F (u) was studied, where h is an almost periodic (defined in a moment) function, and F: Rn→ R a “superquadratic” potential. That is, F (q) behaves like q to a power greater than 2, with F (q)/| q| 2→ 0 as| q|→ 0 and F (q)/| q| 2→∞ as| q|→∞. For example, F (q)=| q| p− 1q with p> 1 would qualify. The authors found that (1.0) must have a nonzero solution homoclinic to zero. Since this result, many papers (see [CMN],[R1], and [ACM], for …