CLEC-2-dependent activation of mouse platelets is weakly inhibited by cAMP but not by cGMP

The present results demonstrate that platelet adhesion and activation on CLEC-2 ligands or LECs is maintained in the presence of PGI2 and NO.

A multifractal zeta function for Gibbs measures supported on cookie-cutter sets

Starting with the work of Lapidus and van Frankenhuysen a number of papers have introduced zeta functions as a way of capturing multifractal information. In this paper we propose a new multifractal zeta function and show that under certain conditions the abscissa of convergence yields the Hausdorff multifractal spectrum for a class of measures.

On univoque points for self-similar sets

Let K⊆R be the unique attractor of an iterated function system. We consider the case where K is an interval and study those elements of K with a unique coding. We prove under mild conditions that the set of points with a unique coding can be identified with a subshift of finite type. As a consequence, we can show that the set of points with a unique coding is a graph-directed self-similar set in the sense of Mauldin and Williams (1988). The theory of Mauldin and Williams then provides a method by which we can explicitly calculate the Hausdorff dimension of this set. Our algorithm can be applied generically, and our result generalises the work of Daróczy, Kátai, Kallós, Komornik and de Vries.

Arnold v. Britton: a ratio and two sets of obiter dicta

Arnold v Britton marks the final stage of the longstanding dispute as to the correct interpretation of a number of 99-year leases of chalets on a leisure park at Oxwich, in the Gower peninsula, near Swansea. The aspect of the case which has attracted most discussion has, understandably, been its main ratio: the proper way to construe a provision of a lease which arguably has an absurd result. This will be considered in this case-note. The judgment of the Supreme Court – particularly the judgment of Lord Neuberger PSC – does, however contain some observations on the possible reform of the law on service charges which are of interest to those engaged in this field. It also contains some obiter comments on ‘letting schemes’ which are – in the view of the present author – highly unorthodox. These three rather disparate issues which are raised by this case will be considered in turn. As they have little in common with each other, they will be considered as separate sections.

Moral uncertainty and permissibility: evaluating option sets

In this essay, we explore an issue of moral uncertainty: what we are permitted to do when we are unsure about which moral principles are correct. We develop a novel approach to this issue that incorporates important insights from previous work on moral uncertainty, while avoiding some of the difficulties that beset existing alternative approaches. Our approach is based on evaluating and choosing between option sets rather than particular conduct options. We show how our approach is particularly well-suited to address this issue of moral uncertainty with respect to agents that have credence in moral theories that are not fully consequentialist.

Inter-comparison of stratospheric mean-meridional circulation and eddy mixing among six reanalysis data sets

The stratospheric mean-meridional circulation (MMC) and eddy mixing are compared among six meteorological reanalysis data sets: NCEP-NCAR, NCEP-CFSR, ERA-40, ERA-Interim, JRA-25, and JRA-55 for the period 1979–2012. The reanalysis data sets produced using advanced systems (i.e., NCEP-CFSR, ERA-Interim, and JRA-55) generally reveal a weaker MMC in the Northern Hemisphere (NH) compared with those produced using older systems (i.e., NCEP/NCAR, ERA-40, and JRA-25). The mean mixing strength differs largely among the data products. In the NH lower stratosphere, the contribution of planetary-scale mixing is larger in the new data sets than in the old data sets, whereas that of small-scale mixing is weaker in the new data sets. Conventional data assimilation techniques introduce analysis increments without maintaining physical balance, which may have caused an overly strong MMC and spurious small-scale eddies in the old data sets. At the NH mid-latitudes, only ERA-Interim reveals a weakening MMC trend in the deep branch of the Brewer–Dobson circulation (BDC). The relative importance of the eddy mixing compared with the mean-meridional transport in the subtropical lower stratosphere shows increasing trends in ERA-Interim and JRA-55; this together with the weakened MMC in the deep branch may imply an increasing age-of-air (AoA) in the NH middle stratosphere in ERA-Interim. Overall, discrepancies between the different variables and trends therein as derived from the different reanalyses are still relatively large, suggesting that more investments in these products are needed in order to obtain a consolidated picture of observed changes in the BDC and the mechanisms that drive them.

Intragroup diffuse light in compact groups of galaxies - II. HCG 15, 35 and 51

This continuing study of intragroup light in compact groups of galaxies aims to establish new constraints to models of formation and evolution of galaxy groups, specially of compact groups, which are a key part in the evolution of larger structures, such as clusters. In this paper we present three additional groups (HCG 15, 35 and 51) using deep wide-field B- and R-band images observed with the LAICA camera at the 3.5-m telescope at the Calar Alto observatory (CAHA). This instrument provides us with very stable flat-fielding, a mandatory condition for reliably measuring intragroup diffuse light. The images were analysed with the OV_WAV package, a wavelet technique that allows us to uncover the intragroup component in an unprecedented way. We have detected that 19, 15 and 26 per cent of the total light of HCG 15, 35 and 51, respectively, are in the diffuse component, with colours that are compatible with old stellar populations and with mean surface brightness that can be its low as 28.4 B mag arcsec(-2). Dynamical masses, crossing times and mass-to-light ratios were recalculated using the new group parameters. Also tidal features were analysed using the wavelet technique.

The genus Coleodactylus (Sphaerodactylinae, Gekkota) revisited: A molecular phylogenetic perspective

Nucleotide sequence data from a mitochondrial gene (16S) and two nuclear genes (c-mos, RAG-1) were used to evaluate the monophyly of the genus Coleodactylus, to provide the first phylogenetic hypothesis of relationships among its species in a cladistic framework, and to estimate the relative timing, of species divergences. Maximum Parsimony, Maximum Likelihood and Bayesian analyses of the combined data sets retrieved Coleodactylus as a monophyletic genus, although weakly Supported. Species were recovered as two genetically and morphological distinct clades, with C. amazonicus populations forming the sister taxon to the meridionalis group (C. brachystoma, C. meridionalis, C. natalensis, and C. septentrionalis). Within this group, C. septentrionalis was placed as the sister taxon to a clade comprising the rest of the species, C. meridionalis was recovered as the sister species to C. brachystoma, and C natalensis was found nested within C. meridionalis. Divergence time estimates based on penalized likelihood and Bayesian dating methods do not Support the previous hypothesis based on the Quaternary rain forest fragmentation model proposed to explain the diversification of the genus. The basal cladogenic event between major lineages of Coleodactylus was estimated to have occurred in the late Cretaceous (72.6 +/- 1.77 Mya), approximately at the same point in time than the other genera of Sphaerodactylinae diverged from each other. Within the meridionalis group, the split between C. septentrionalis and C. brachystoma + C. meridionalis was placed in the Eocene (46.4 +/- 4.22 Mya), and the divergence between C. brachystoma and C. meridionalis was estimated to have occurred in the Oligocene (29.3 +/- 4.33 Mya). Most intraspecific cladogenesis occurred through Miocene to Pliocene, and only for two conspecific samples and for C. natalensis could a Quaternary differentiation be assumed (1.9 +/- 1.3 Mya). (C) 2008 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

An incremental space to visualize dynamic data sets

In Information Visualization, adding and removing data elements can strongly impact the underlying visual space. We have developed an inherently incremental technique (incBoard) that maintains a coherent disposition of elements from a dynamic multidimensional data set on a 2D grid as the set changes. Here, we introduce a novel layout that uses pairwise similarity from grid neighbors, as defined in incBoard, to reposition elements on the visual space, free from constraints imposed by the grid. The board continues to be updated and can be displayed alongside the new space. As similar items are placed together, while dissimilar neighbors are moved apart, it supports users in the identification of clusters and subsets of related elements. Densely populated areas identified in the incSpace can be efficiently explored with the corresponding incBoard visualization, which is not susceptible to occlusion. The solution remains inherently incremental and maintains a coherent disposition of elements, even for fully renewed sets. The algorithm considers relative positions for the initial placement of elements, and raw dissimilarity to fine tune the visualization. It has low computational cost, with complexity depending only on the size of the currently viewed subset, V. Thus, a data set of size N can be sequentially displayed in O(N) time, reaching O(N (2)) only if the complete set is simultaneously displayed.

Existence of pullback attractors for pullback asymptotically compact processes

This paper is concerned with the existence of pullback attractors for evolution processes. Our aim is to provide results that extend the following results for autonomous evolution processes (semigroups) (i) An autonomous evolution process which is bounded, dissipative and asymptotically compact has a global attractor. (ii) An autonomous evolution process which is bounded, point dissipative and asymptotically compact has a global attractor. The extension of such results requires the introduction of new concepts and brings up some important differences between the asymptotic properties of autonomous and non-autonomous evolution processes. An application to damped wave problem with non-autonomous damping is considered. (C) 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Stability of gradient semigroups under perturbations

In this paper we prove that gradient-like semigroups (in the sense of Carvalho and Langa (2009 J. Diff. Eqns 246 2646-68)) are gradient semigroups (possess a Lyapunov function). This is primarily done to provide conditions under which gradient semigroups, in a general metric space, are stable under perturbation exploiting the known fact (see Carvalho and Langa (2009 J. Diff. Eqns 246 2646-68)) that gradient-like semigroups are stable under perturbation. The results presented here were motivated by the work carried out in Conley (1978 Isolated Invariant Sets and the Morse Index (CBMS Regional Conference Series in Mathematics vol 38) (RI: American Mathematical Society Providence)) for groups in compact metric spaces (see also Rybakowski (1987 The Homotopy Index and Partial Differential Equations (Universitext) (Berlin: Springer)) for the Morse decomposition of an invariant set for a semigroup on a compact metric space).

Two-Phase Mapping for Projecting Massive Data Sets

Most multidimensional projection techniques rely on distance (dissimilarity) information between data instances to embed high-dimensional data into a visual space. When data are endowed with Cartesian coordinates, an extra computational effort is necessary to compute the needed distances, making multidimensional projection prohibitive in applications dealing with interactivity and massive data. The novel multidimensional projection technique proposed in this work, called Part-Linear Multidimensional Projection (PLMP), has been tailored to handle multivariate data represented in Cartesian high-dimensional spaces, requiring only distance information between pairs of representative samples. This characteristic renders PLMP faster than previous methods when processing large data sets while still being competitive in terms of precision. Moreover, knowing the range of variation for data instances in the high-dimensional space, we can make PLMP a truly streaming data projection technique, a trait absent in previous methods.

Limit sets and the Poincare-Bendixson Theorem in impulsive semidynamical systems

We consider semidynamical systems with impulse effects at variable times and we discuss some properties of the limit sets of orbits of these systems such as invariancy, compactness and connectedness. As a consequence we obtain a version of the Poincare-Bendixson Theorem for impulsive semidynamical systems. (C) 2008 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Parametric analysis of discrepant sets of data

In this paper a new parametric method to deal with discrepant experimental results is developed. The method is based on the fit of a probability density function to the data. This paper also compares the characteristics of different methods used to deduce recommended values and uncertainties from a discrepant set of experimental data. The methods are applied to the (137)Cs and (90)Sr published half-lives and special emphasis is given to the deduced confidence intervals. The obtained results are analyzed considering two fundamental properties expected from an experimental result: the probability content of confidence intervals and the statistical consistency between different recommended values. The recommended values and uncertainties for the (137)Cs and (90)Sr half-lives are 10,984 (24) days and 10,523 (70) days, respectively. (C) 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

FUSION ENHANCEMENT/SUPPRESSION AND IRREVERSIBILITY IN REACTIONS INDUCED BY WEAKLY BOUND NUCLEI

We show that halo effects enhance fusion cross sections of weakly bound systems, comparing with the situation when there is no-halo. We introduce dimensionless fusion functions and energy variable quantity to investigate systematical trends in the fusion cross sections of weakly bound nuclei at near-barrier energies. We observe very clearly complete fusion suppression at energies above the barrier due to dynamic effects of the breakup on fusion. We explain this suppression in terms of the repulsive polarization potential produced by the breakup.