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The adaptive voter model is a paradigmatic model in the study of opinion formation. Here we propose an extension for this model, in which conflicts are resolved by obtaining another opinion, and analytically study the time required for consensus to emerge. Our results shed light on the rich phenomenology of both the original and extended adaptive voter models, including a dynamical phase transition in the scaling behavior of the mean time to consensus. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Some subtleties and apparent difficulties associated with the notion of spontaneous breaking of time-translation symmetry in quantum mechanics are identified and resolved. A model exhibiting that phenomenon is displayed. The possibility and significance of breaking of imaginary time-translation symmetry is discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pusey, Barrett, and Rudolph introduce a new no-go theorem for hidden-variables models of quantum theory. We make precise the class of models targeted and construct equivalent models that evade the theorem. The theorem requires assumptions for models of composite systems, which we examine, determining compactness as the weakest assumption needed. On that basis, we demonstrate results of the Bell-Kochen-Specker theorem. Given compactness and the relevant class of models, the theorem can be seen as showing that some measurements on composite systems must have built-in inefficiencies, complicating its testing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We demonstrate numerically bidirectional sorting of flocking particles interacting with an array of V-shaped asymmetric barriers. Each particle aligns with the average swimming direction of its neighbors according to the Vicsek model and experiences additional steric interactions as well as repulsion from the fixed barriers. We show that particles preferentially localize to one side of the barrier array over time and that the direction of this rectification can be reversed by adjusting the particle-particle exclusion radius or the noise term in the equations of motion. These results provide a conceptual basis for isolation and sorting of single-cell and multicellular organisms that move collectively according to flocking-type interaction rules. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Elements of networks interact in many ways, so modeling them with graphs requires multiple types of edges (or network layers). Here we show that such multiplex networks are generically more vulnerable to global cascades than simplex networks. We generalize the threshold cascade model [Watts, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sei. USA 99, 5766 (2002)] to multiplex networks, in which a node activates if a sufficiently large fraction of neighbors in any layer are active. We show that both combining layers (i.e., realizing other interactions play a role) and splitting a network into layers (i.e., recognizing distinct kinds of interactions) facilitate cascades. Notably, layers unsusceptible to global cascades can cooperatively achieve them if coupled. On one hand, this suggests fundamental limitations on predicting cascades without full knowledge of a system's multiplexity; on the other hand, it offers feasible means to control cascades by introducing or removing sparse layers in an existing network. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article employs symmetries or other model assignments to show that phenomenological consequences of residual symmetries ℤS2 (k) and ℤS2 (k) can be readily established, predicting not only θ x to be large, fitting the T2K, MINOS, and Double Chooz data, but also ( ) nearly maximal in good agreement with the latest global fits. A distribution for the leptonic Jarlskog invariant Jv is also given.

In an asymmetric Szilard engine model of Maxwell's demon, we show the equivalence between information theoretical and thermodynamic entropies when the demon erases information optimally. The work gain by the engine can be exactly canceled out by the work necessary to reset the demon's memory after optimal data compression in the manner of Shannon before the erasure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Methods for computing Hashin-Shtrikman bounds and related self-consistent estimates of elastic constants for polycrystals composed of crystals having orthorhombic symmetry have been known for about three decades. However, these methods are underutilized, perhaps because of some perceived difficulties with implementing the necessary computational procedures. Several simplifications of these techniques are introduced, thereby reducing the overall computational burden, as well as the complications inherent in mapping out the Hashin-Shtrikman bounding curves. The self-consistent estimates of the effective elastic constants are very robust, involving a quickly converging iteration procedure. Once these self-consistent values are known, they may then be used to speed up the computations of the Hashin-Shtrikman bounds themselves. It is shown furthermore that the resulting orthorhombic polycrystal code can be used as well to compute both bounds and self-consistent estimates for polycrystals of higher-symmetry tetragonal, hexagonal, and cubic (but not trigonal) materials. The self-consistent results found this way are shown to be the same as those obtained using the earlier methods, specifically those methods designed specially for each individual symmetry type. But the Hashin-Shtrikman bounds found using the orthorhombic code are either the same or (more typically) tighter than those found previously for these special cases (i.e., tetragonal, hexagonal, and cubic). The improvement in the Hashin-Shtrikman bounds is presumably due to the additional degrees of freedom introduced into the available search space. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Simulations of diffusion in solids often produce poor statistics of diffusion events. We present an analytical expression for the statistical error in ion conductivity obtained in such simulations. The error expression is not restricted to any computational method in particular, but valid in the context of simulation of Poisson processes in general. This analytical error expression is verified numerically for the case of Gd-doped ceria by running a large number of kinetic Monte Carlo calculations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We investigate the spin-stripe mechanism responsible for the peculiar nanometer modulation of the incommensurate magnetic order that emerges between the vector-chiral and the spin-density-wave phase in the frustrated zigzag spin-1/2 chain compound β-TeVO4. A combination of magnetic-torque, neutron-diffraction, and spherical-neutron-polarimetry measurements is employed to determine the complex magnetic structures of all three ordered phases. Based on these results, we develop a simple phenomenological model, which exposes the exchange anisotropy as the key ingredient for the spin-stripe formation in frustrated spin systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]