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For a family of second-order parabolic systems in divergence form with rapidly oscillating periodic and time-dependent coefficients. We establish the pointwise estimates of the Green's matrices. We investigate uniform boundary Lipschitz estimates and boundary Holder estimates as well as non-tangential maximum function estimates in C 1 , η or C 1 cylinders. Consequently, we also obtain the Agmon-Miranda maximum principle.

The spaceborne Global Navigation Satellite System-Reflectometry (GNSS-R) delay-Doppler map (DDM) data collected over ocean carry typical feature information about the ocean surface, which may be covered by open water, mixed water/ice, complete ice, etc. A new method based on Doppler spread analysis is proposed to remotely sense sea ice using the spaceborne GNSS-R data collected over the Northern and Southern Hemispheres. In order to extract useful information from DDM, three delay waveforms are defined and utilized. The delay waveform without Doppler shift is defined as central delay waveform (CDW), while the integration of delay waveforms of 20 different Doppler shift values is defined as integrated delay waveform (IDW). The differential waveform between normalized CDW (NCDW) and normalized IDW (NIDW) is defined as differential delay waveform (DDW), which is a new observable used to describe the difference between NCDW and NIDW, which have different Doppler spread characteristics. The difference is mainly caused by the roughness of reflected surface. First, a new data quality control method is proposed based on the standard deviation and root-mean-square error (RMSE) of the first 48 bins of DDW. Then, several different observables derived from NCDW, NIDW, and DDW are applied to distinguish sea ice from water based on their probability density function. Through validating against sea ice edge data from the Ocean and Sea Ice Satellite Application Facility, the trailing edge waveform summation of DDW achieves the best results, and its probabilities of successful detection are 98.22% and 96.65%, respectively, in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres.

In statistical mechanics, the formation free energy of an i-mer can be understood as the Gibbs free energy change in a system consisting of pure monomers after and prior to the formation of the i-mer. For molecules interacting via Lennard-Jones potential, we have computed the formation free energy of a Stillinger i-mer [F. H. Stillinger, J. Chem. Phys. 38, 1486 (1963)] and a ten Wolde-Frenkel (tWF) [P. R. ten Wolde and D. Frenkel, J. Chem. Phys. 109, 9901 (1998)] i-mer at spinodal at reduced temperatures from 0.7 to 1.2. It turns out that the size of a critical Stillinger i-mer remains finite and its formation free energy is on the order of kBT, and the size of a critical tWF i-mer remains finite and its formation free energy is even higher. This can be explained by Binder's theory [K. Binder, Phys. Rev. A 29, 341 (1984)] that for a system, when approaching spinodal, if the Ginzburg criterion is not satisfied, a gradual transition will take place from nucleation to spinodal decomposition, where the free-energy barrier height is on the order of kBT.

The distribution of forest tree species provides crucial data for regional forest management and ecological research. Although medium-high spatial resolution remote sensing images are widely used for dynamic monitoring of forest vegetation phenology and species identification, the use of multiresolution images for similar applications remains highly uncertain. Moreover, it is necessary to explore to what extent spectral variation is responsible for the discrepancies in the estimation of forest phenology and classification of various tree species when using up-scaled images. To clarify this situation, we studied the forest area in Harqin Banner in northeast China by using year-round multiple-resolution time-series images (at four spatial resolutions: 4, 10, 16, and 30 m) and eight phenological metrics of four deciduous forest tree species in 2018, to explore potential impacts of relevant results caused by various resolutions. We also investigated the effect of using up-scaled time-series images by comparing the corresponding results that use pixel-aggregation algorithms with the four spatial resolutions. The results indicate that both phenology and classification accuracy of the dominant forest tree species are markedly affected by the spatial resolution of time-series remote sensing data (p < 0.05): the spring phenology of four deciduous forest tree species first rises and then falls as the image resolution varies from 4 to 30 m; similarly, the accuracy of tree species classification increases as the image resolution varies from 4 to 10 m, and then decreases as the image resolution gradually falls to 30 m (p < 0.05). Therefore, there remains a profound discrepancy between the results obtained by up-scaled and actual remote sensing data at the given spatial resolutions (p < 0.05). The results also suggest that combining phenological metrics and time-series NDVI data can be applied to identify the regional dominant tree species across different spatial resolutions, which would help advance the use of multiscale time-series satellite data for forest resource management.

There are some similarities between bursts of repeating fast radio bursts (FRBs) and giant pulses (GPs) of pulsars. To explore possible relations between them, we study the cumulative energy distributions of these two phenomena using the observations of repeating FRB 121102 and the GPs of Crab pulsar. We find that the power-law slope of GPs (with fluence ≥130 Jy·ms) is 2.85±0.10. The energy distribution of FRB 121102 can be well fitted by a smooth broken power-law function. For the bursts of FRB 121102 above the break energy (1.22 · 1037 erg), the best-fitting slope is 2.90 −0.44 +0.55 , similar to the index of GPs at the same observing frequency (

A fast radio burst (FRB) was recently detected to be associated with a hard X-ray burst from the Galactic magnetar SGR 1935+2154. Scenarios involving magnetars for FRBs are hence highly favored. In this work, we suggest that the impact between an asteroid and a magnetar could explain such a detection. According to our calculations, an asteroid of mass $10^{20}$ g will be disrupted at a distance of $7 \times 10^9$ cm when approaching the magnetar. The accreted material will flow along the magnetic field lines from the Alfv\'en radius $\sim 10^7$ cm. After falling onto the magnetar's surface, an instant accretion column will be formed, producing a Comptonized X-ray burst and an FRB in the magnetosphere. We show that all the observational features of FRB 200428 could be interpreted self-consistently in this scenario. We predict quasi-periodic oscillations in this specific X-ray burst, which can serve as an independent observational test., Comment: 5 pages, 1 figure. References updated, accepted by ApJL

The thermal physiological performance of invasive species may play a crucial role in determining their invasion success. In this study, we acclimated two cohorts of hatchlings of freshwater turtles (native Mauremys reevesii and invasive Trachemys scripta elegans) from low and high-latitude collection sites, respectively, to different thermal conditions (20 and 30 °C) for 4 weeks, and then compared their thermal tolerance and locomotor performance. T. scripta elegans hatchlings could swim faster (but righted themselves more slowly), and tolerate a higher temperature and wider temperature range than M. reevesii hatchlings. Similarly, T. scripta elegans hatchlings had a greater maximal performance (Pmax) value for swimming speed (but a lower Pmax value for righting time) than M. reevesii hatchlings. Temperature acclimation had a significant impact on the thermal tolerance and locomotor ability of turtles, but the acclimation effect did not differ between the two species. T. scripta elegans hatchlings seemed to have a greater thermal plasticity than M. reevesii hatchlings. High-latitude individuals showed a greater low-temperature tolerance, but lower locomotor ability (longer righting time) than low-latitude ones. However, the thermal plasticity did not differ between latitudinal cohorts. Our results indicated that T. scripta elegans performed better than M. reevesii, which might contribute to its range expansion and invasive success.

In this study, the effects of surfactants on the hydrodynamic characteristics of bubbles in shear-thinning fluids at low Reynolds number (Re

As one of the most important environmental factors, oxygen is particularly important for synthesis of n-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids (n-3 PUFA) in microalgae. In general, a higher oxygen supply is beneficial for cell growth but obstructs PUFA synthesis. The generation of reactive oxygen species (ROS) under aerobic conditions, which leads to the peroxidation of lipids and especially PUFA, is an inevitable aspect of life, but is often ignored in fermentation processes. Irritability, microalgal cells are able to activate a number of anti-oxidative defenses, and the lipid profile of many species is reported to be altered under oxidative stress. In this review, the effects of oxygen on the PUFA synthesis, sources of oxidative damage, and anti-oxidative defense systems of microalgae were summarized and discussed. Moreover, this review summarizes the published reports on microalgal biotechnology involving direct/indirect oxygen regulation and new bioreactor designs that enable the improved production of PUFA.

The primary purpose of this paper is to investigate a family of elliptic systems of linear elasticity with rapidly oscillating periodic coefficients, arising in the theory of homogenization in Lipschitz domains. As a consequence, for d ≥ 4 , we prove that the L p Neumann and L p Dirichlet boundary value problems for systems of second order linear elasticity are uniquely solvable for 2 ( d − 1 ) d + 1 − δ p 2 + δ and 2 − δ p 2 ( d − 1 ) d − 3 + δ respectively.

In this paper, we show that the consistent Hoare powerdomain H c (P) H c ( P ) over a dcpo P exists and is isomorphic to a special Scott closed subset of Γ(P) Γ ( P ) relative to the Scott topology σ(Γ(P)) σ ( Γ ( P ) ) , where Γ(P) Γ ( P ) is the collection of all nonempty Scott closed subsets of P ordered by the set-theoretic inclusion relation.

We consider a family of second-order elliptic operators {Le} in divergence form with rapidly oscillating and periodic coefficients in Lipschitz and convex domains in ℝn. We are able to show that the uniform W1,p estimate of second order elliptic systems holds for $$\frac{{2n}}{{n + 1}} - \delta < p < \frac{{2n}}{{n - 1}} + \delta $$ where δ > 0 is independent of e and the ranges are sharp for n = 2, 3. And for elliptic equations in Lipschitz domains, the W1,p estimate is true for $$\frac{3}{2} - \delta < p < 3 + \delta $$ if n ≥ 4, similar estimate was extended to convex domains for 1 < p < ∞.

Geometric-optical (GO) model suitable for forest plantation (GOFP) is a GO model for forest plantations at the stand level developed in this study based on a four-scale GO model a Geometric-Optical Model for Sloping Terrains-II (GOST2), which simulates the bidirectional reflectance distribution function (BRDF) for natural forest canopies. In most previous GO models, tree distributions are often assumed to meet the Poisson or Neyman model in a forest; therefore, these models are suitable for simulating BRDF for natural forest canopies. However, in forest plantations, tree distributions are proven to meet the hypergeometric model rather than the Poisson or Neyman model at the stand level. GOFP, in which the tree distributions are described using the hypergeometric model, is proposed to simulate the bidirectional reflectance factor (BRF) of forest plantations at the stand level. The area ratios of the four scene components (sunlit foliage, sunlit ground, shaded foliage, and shaded ground) of GOFP compare well with those simulated by a 3-D canopy visualization technique. A comparison is also made against discrete anisotropic radiative transfer, showing that GOFP has the ability to simulate BRF of forest plantations. Another comparison is made against operational land imager and Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer surface reflectance, showing that GOFP with the hypergeometric model outperforms GOST2 with the Poisson and Neyman models. The results further show that the differences in BRFs between GOFP and GOST2 pronouncedly increase with the difference between the reflectance of sunlit foliage ( $R_{T}$ ) and the reflectance of sunlit ground ( $R_{G}$ ), as well as the distances among trees and the number of crowns in a forest plantation, suggesting that GOFP significantly outperforms GOST2 for simulating BRF of forest plantations.

LiODFB electrolyte’s compatibility with LiNi0.5Mn1.5O4 high-voltage cathode material was studied by cyclic voltammetry, charge-discharge test and AC impedance. The results show that at 25 and 60 °C, the LiODFB-based electrolyte has better electrochemical stability than LiPF6. AC impedance plots show that the LiODFB battery has a lower charge-transfer resistance than LiPF6 battery at 60 °C, which indicates that LiODFB battery has excellent cycling performance at high temperature. At 25 and 60 °C, the LiNi0.5Mn1.5O4/Li half cells with LiODFB or LiPF6 as electrolyte all have simple redox peak, showing that each of them has an excellent reversibility. LiODFB battery has better cycle performance than LiPF6 battery at 25 °C and 60 °C. At 25 °C, their 0.5C initial discharge specific capacities are 126.3 and 131.6 mA·h/g, and their capacity retention ratios of the 100th cycle are 97.1% and 94.7%, respectively. At 60 °C, their 0.5C initial discharge specific capacities are 132.6 and 129.1 mA·h/g, and their capacity retention ratios of the 100th cycle are 94.1% and 81.7%, respectively.

For a family of second-order parabolic systems with rapidly oscillating and time-dependent periodic coefficients, we investigate the asymptotic behavior of fundamental solutions and establish sharp estimates for the remainders., Comment: 26 pages

Since the true ground state of the hadrons may be strange quark matter (SQM), pulsars may actually be strange stars rather than neutron stars. According to this SQM hypothesis, strange planets can also stably exist. The density of normal matter planets can hardly be higher than 30 g cm$^{-3}$. As a result, they will be tidally disrupted when its orbital radius is less than $\sim 5.6\times10^{10} \rm \, cm $, or when the orbital period ($P_{\rm orb}$) is less than $ \sim \rm 6100\, s $. On the contrary, a strange planet can safely survive even when it is very close to the host, due to its high density. The feature can help us identify SQM objects. In this study, we have tried to search for SQM objects among close-in exoplanets orbiting around pulsars. Encouragingly, it is found that four pulsar planets (XTE J1807-294 b, XTE J1751-305 b, PSR 0636 b, PSR J1807-2459A b) completely meet the criteria of $P_{\rm orb} < \rm 6100\, s $, and are thus good candidates for SQM planets. The orbital periods of two other planets (PSR J1719+14 b and PSR J2051-0827 b) are only slightly higher than the criteria. They could be regarded as potential candidates. Additionally, we find that the periods of five white dwarf planets (GP Com b, V396 Hya b, J1433 b, WD 0137-349 b, and SDSS J1411+2009 b) are less than 0.1 days. We argue that they might also be SQM planets. It is further found that the persistent gravitational wave emissions from at least three of these close-in planetary systems are detectable to LISA. More encouragingly, the advanced LIGO and Einstein Telescope are able to detect the gravitational wave bursts produced by the merger events of such SQM planetary systems, which will provide a unique test for the SQM hypothesis., 13 pages, 5 figures, 4 tables, comments and suggestions are welcome

This paper is concerned with quantitative homogenization of second-order parabolic systems with periodic coefficients varying rapidly in space and time, in different scales. We obtain large-scale interior and boundary Lipschitz estimates as well as interior $C^{1, \alpha}$ and $C^{2, \alpha}$ estimates by utilizing higher-order correctors. We also investigate the problem of convergence rates for initial-boundary value problems., Comment: 40 pages

Lightweight and nanoporous composite materials with excellent thermal insulation and strong mechanical property are urgently required to address prominent issues that pertain to application. The main challenge of synthesizing such materials is to reduce the thermal conductivity and improve its rigid-flexible combined property as well as its heat resistance. Here, we propose to prepare a completely lightweight 3D bulk composites by vacuum impregnation and gel polymerization processing with a needled quartz fiber felt (NQF) as the reinforcement and phenolic resin aerogel (PR) as the matrix. The nanoporous PR is facilely synthesized by polymerization-induced phase separation with phenolic resin, and the resultant nanoporous PR is uniformly filled and distributed in NQF without macroscopic cracking and agglomeration. The as-prepared NQF/PR nanocomposites possessed enhanced mechanical property with compressive strength (1.76–2.84 MPa) and Young's modulus (26.71–39.60 MPa) in the xy direction. Importantly, the NQF/PR nanocomposite was not damaged as the strain reached 50% in z direction. Compared to most organic-based aerogel and aerogel-like materials, the present NQF/PR nanocomposite aerogels exhibited excellent flame resistances with 1000 °C fire duration time exceeding 30 min and excellent thermal insulation properties with low thermal conductivities that varied from 0.017 W/m ⋅ K to 0.031 W/m ⋅ K. This experimental results show that the synthesized NQF/PR nanocomposites by this method are very suitable to heat high-performance lightweight insulation materials for industrial compatibly and production.

As a widely used ground-based optical instrument, the LAI-2000 or LAI-2200 plant canopy analyzer (PCA) (Li-Cor, Inc., Lincoln, NE) is designed to measure the plant effective leaf area index (Le) by measuring the canopy gap fraction at several limited or discrete view zenith angles (VZAs) (usually five VZAs: 7, 23, 38, 53, and 68°) based on Miller’s equation. Miller’s equation requires the probability of radiative transmission through the canopy to be measured over the hemisphere, i.e., VZAs in the range from 0 to 90°. However, the PCA view angle ranges are confined to several limited ranges or discrete sectors. The magnitude of the error produced by the discretization of VZAs in the leaf area index measurements remains difficult to determine. In this study, a theoretical deduction was first presented to definitely prove why the limited or discrete VZAs or ranges can affect the Le measured with the PCA, and the specific error caused by the limited or discrete VZAs was described quantitatively. The results show that: (1) the weight coefficient of the last PCA ring is the main cause of the error; (2) the error is closely related to the leaf inclination angles (IAs)—the Le measured with the PCA can be significantly overestimated for canopies with planophile IAs, whereas it can be underestimated for erectophile IAs; and (3) the error can be enhanced with the increment of the discrete degree of PCA rings or VZAs, such as using four or three PCA rings. Two corrections for the error are presented and validated in three crop canopies. Interestingly, although the leaf IA type cannot influence the Le calculated by Miller’s equation in the hemispheric space, it affects the Le measured with the PCA using the discrete form of Miller’s equation for several discrete VZAs.

Spectrum sensing is a key technology enabling the cognitive radio system. In this paper, the problem of how to quickly and accurately find an unoccupied channel from a large amount of potential channels is considered. The cognitive radio system under consideration is equipped with a narrow band sensor, hence it can only sense those potential channels in a sequential manner. In this scenario, we propose a novel two-stage mixed-observation sensing strategy. In the first stage, which is named as scanning stage, the sensor observes a linear combination of the signals from a pair of channels. The purpose of the scanning stage is to quickly identify a pair of channels such that at least one of them is highly likely to be unoccupied. In the second stage, which is called refinement stage, the sensor only observers the signal from one of those two channels identified from the first stage, and selects one of them as the unoccupied channel. The problem under this setup is an ordered two concatenated Markov stopping time problem. The optimal solution is solved using the tools from the multiple stopping time theory. It turns out that the optimal solution has a rather complex structure, hence a low complexity algorithm is proposed to facilitate the implementation. In the proposed low complexity algorithm, the cumulative sum test is adopted in the scanning stage and the sequential probability ratio test is adopted in the refinement stage. The performance of this low complexity algorithm is analyzed when the presence of unoccupied channels is rare. Numerical simulation results show that the proposed sensing strategy can significantly reduce the sensing time when the majority of potential channels are occupied.

A hypergeometric model is proposed explicitly instead of two previous stochastic models (the Poisson model and Neyman-A model) to describe the topological relationship of trees and the influence of the exclusion distance on gap fraction and clumping index of forest plantation canopies. Gap fraction (GF) and clumping index (CI) play key roles in plant light interception, and therefore they have strong impacts on plant growth and canopy radiative transfer processes. Trees are usually assumed to be randomly distributed in natural forests in many previous studies. However, few studies have shown how trees are distributed in forest plantations and how these distribution patterns affect GF and CI in these forests. In this paper, a simple and general distance factor defined as relative allowable shortest distance between centers of two adjacent crowns divided by the mean diameter of the crowns (RASD) is proposed to describe quantitatively the degree of mutual exclusion among trees in forest plantations of various tree distribution patterns. A hypergeometric model is proposed instead of two previous stochastic tree distribution models (the Poisson model and Neyman-A model) to describe the topological relationship of trees and the influences of the exclusion distance on the GF and CI of the forest plantation canopies. The results show that: (1) the hypergeometric model is more suitable than the Poisson model and Neyman-A model for describing the topological relationship of trees in forest plantations; (2) the exclusion distance has strong impacts on GF and CI: there are significant differences between the results of the hypergeometric model and the Poisson model. Larger RASD causes lower GF and larger CI. The simulations are verified by field measurements in four forest plantation stands. Similarly, impacts of RASD on GF and CI are also found for other two crown shapes (prolate and oblate ellipsoids).

An efficient plant regeneration protocol was established for castor bean ( Ricinus communis L.), in which 0.3 mg L −1 thidiazuron (TDZ) induced shoot clusters and increased the number of adventitious shoots from hypocotyl tissue. Our results showed that treatment under dark conditions significantly promoted the average number of shoots per explant to 37.36±4.54 (with a 6-d treatment). Modified 1/2 Murashige and Skoog (MS) basal medium supplemented with 440 mg L −1 Ca 2+ , 0.2 mg L −1 gibberellic acid and 0.1 mg L −1 TDZ significantly increased shoot elongation rates and lowered vitrification rates. Furthermore, 1/2 MS media supplemented with 0.2 mg L −1 1-naphthaleneacetic acid induced a higher rooting rate compared with other culture conditions.

The broadband afterglow of GW170817/GRB 170817A is believed to be from an off-axis structured jet. The central engine of a gamma-ray burst usually launches a pair of outflows that move oppositely, it is reasonable to consider the emission from a double-sided structured jets, with a near-jet moving toward us and a counter-jet moving away from us. Assuming that the two branches of the jet have the same physical parameters, we have calculated their radio emission. It is found that the counter-jet component will emerge in the radio light curves $\sim$ 2500 days post-merger.It typically leads to a plateau in the light curve, thus could be hopefully revealed by high accuracy radio observations. We have also considered the possibilities that both branches have different parameters, and found that if some of the physical parameters of the counter-jet are evaluated more favorably than those of the near-jet, then the counter-jet emission will be enhanced and will clearly show up as an obvious plateau or even a rebrightening. For example, when the circum-burst medium encountered by the counter-jet is assumed to be 100 times denser than that of the near-jet, a remarkable radio plateau will appear at $\sim$ 600 days. However, in X-ray bands, the counter-jet component is generally too faint to be discerned. It is argued that the late radio observations of GW170817/GRB 170817A can help determine the key parameters and diagnose the environment of the event., 7 pages, 3 figures, accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journal (ApJ)

We perform a series of relativistic magnetohydrodynamics simulations to investigate how a hot magnetic jet propagates within the dynamical ejecta of a binary neutron star merger, with the focus on how the jet structure depends on the delay time of jet launching with respect to the merger time, $\Delta t_{\rm jet}$. We find that regardless of the jet launching delay time, a structured jet with an angle-dependent luminosity and Lorentz factor is always formed after the jet breaks out the ejecta. On the other hand, the jet launching delay time has an impact on the jet structure. If the jet launching delay time is relatively long, e.g., $\ge 0.5$ s, the line-of-sight material has a dominant contribution from the cocoon. On the other hand, for a relatively short jet launching delay time, the jet penetrates through the ejecta early on and develops an angular structure afterward. The line-of-sight ejecta is dominated by the structured jet itself. We discuss the case of GW170817/GRB 170817A within the framework of both long and short $\Delta t_{\rm jet}$. Future more observations of GW/GRB associations can help to differentiate between these two scenarios., Comment: 6 pages, 4 figures, 1 table, accepted by ApJL

In this paper, we consider a best action identification problem in the stochastic linear bandit setup with a fixed confident constraint. In the considered best action identification problem, instead of minimizing the accumulative regret as done in existing works, the learner aims to obtain an accurate estimate of the underlying parameter based on his action and reward sequences. To improve the estimation efficiency, the learner is allowed to select his action based his historical information; hence the whole procedure is designed in a sequential adaptive manner. We first show that the existing algorithms designed to minimize the accumulative regret is not a consistent estimator and hence is not a good policy for our problem. We then characterize a lower bound on the estimation error for any policy. We further design a simple policy and show that the estimation error of the designed policy achieves the same scaling order as that of the derived lower bound., 8 pages, 2 figures. Submitted to Asilomar 2018

In this paper, we use the recent updated source properties of GW170817 to constrain the hybrid equation of state (EOS) constructed by a three-window modeling between the hadronic EOS and quark EOS. Specifically, the hadronic EOS is described by the $\mathrm{NL}3\ensuremath{\omega}\ensuremath{\rho}$ model whose corresponding pure neutron star (NS) is already excluded by the constraint of tidal deformability (TD) from GW170817, and the quark EOS is calculated with the $2+1$ flavors Nambu-Jona-Lasinio (NJL) model. We also consider four other constraints on the hybrid EOS. As a result, we find the parameter set (${B}^{\frac{1}{4}},\stackrel{\texttildelow{}}{\ensuremath{\mu}},\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Gamma}}$) can be well constrained, indicating the possible existence of the hybrid star (HS) with a crossover inside. The type of the two stars in the binary system for nine representative hybrid EOSs is shown in this paper too. Furthermore, the HSs restricted by five constraints do not suggest a pure quark core but a mixed phase in the center.

Fast radio bursts (FRBs) are transient radio sources at cosmological distances. No counterparts in other bands have been observed for { non-repeating FRBs}. Here we suggest the collapse of strange star crusts as a possible origin for FRBs. Strange stars, which are composed of almost equal numbers of u, d, and s quarks, may be encapsulated by a thin crust of normal hadronic matter. When a strange star accretes matter from its environment, the crust becomes heavier and heavier. It may finally collapse, leading to the release of a large amount of magnetic energy and plenty of electron/positron pairs on a very short timescale. Electron/positron pairs in the polar cap region of the strange star can be accelerated to relativistic velocities, streaming along the magnetic field lines to form a thin shell. FRBs are produced by coherent emission from these electrons when the shell is expanding. Basic characteristics of observed FRBs can be explained in our model., 9 pages, 3 figures, accepted by ApJ

The problem of quickly detecting the occurrence of an unusual event that happens on one of multiple independent data streams is considered. In the considered problem, all data streams at the initial are under normal state and are generated by probability distribution $P_{0}$ . At some unknown time, an unusual event happens and the distribution of one data stream is modified to $P_{1}$ while the distributions of the rest remain unchange. The observer can only observe one data stream at one time. With his sequential observations, the observer wants to design an online stopping rule and a data stream switching rule to minimize the detection delay, namely the time difference between the occurrence of the unusual event and the time of raising an alarm, while keeping the false alarm rate under control. We model the problem under non-Bayesian quickest detection framework, and propose a detection procedure based on the CUSUM statistic. We show that this proposed detection procedure is asymptotically optimal.

Recently, GRB 170817A was confirmed to be associated with GW 170817, which was produced by a neutron star - neutron star merger. It indicates that at least some short gamma-ray bursts come from binary neutron star mergers. Theoretically, it is widely accepted that short gamma-ray bursts can be produced by two distinctly different mechanisms, binary neutron star mergers and neutron star - black hole mergers. These two kinds of bursts should be different observationally due to their different trigger mechanisms. Motivated by this idea, we collect a universal data set constituted of 51 short gamma-ray bursts observed by $Swift$/BAT, among which 14 events have extended emission component. We study the observational features of these 51 events statistically. It is found that our samples are consisted of two distinct groups. They clearly show a bimodal distribution when their peak photon fluxes at 15-150 keV band are plotted against the corresponding fluences. Most interestingly, all the 14 short bursts with extended emission lie in a particular region. When the fluences are plotted against the burst durations, short bursts with extended emission again tend to concentrate in the long duration segment. These features strongly indicate that short gamma-ray bursts really may come from two distinct types of progenitors. We argue that those short gamma-ray bursts with extended emission come from the coalescence of neutron stars, while the short gamma-ray bursts without extended emission come from neutron star - black hole mergers., 12 pages, 2 figures, 1 table, accepted by New Astronomy

Recent follow-up observations of the binary neutron star (NS) merging event GW170817/SGRB 170817A reveal that its X-ray/optical/radio emissions are brightening continuously up to $\sim 100$ days post-merger. This late-time brightening is unexpected from the kilonova model or the off-axis top-hat jet model for gamma-ray burst afterglows. In this paper, by assuming that the merger remnant is a long-lived NS, we propose that the interaction between an electron-positron-pair ($e^+e^-$) wind from the central NS and the jet could produce a long-lived reverse shock, from which a new emission component would rise and can interpret current observations well. The magnetic-field-induced ellipticity of the NS is taken to be $4 \times 10^{-5}$ in our modeling, so that the braking of the NS is mainly through the gravitational wave (GW) radiation rather than the magnetic dipole radiation, and the emission luminosity at early times would not exceed the observational limits. In our scenario, since the peak time of the brightening is roughly equal to the spin-down time scale of the NS, the accurate peak time may help constrain the ellipticity of the remnant NS. We suggest that radio polarization observations of the brightening would help to distinguish our scenario from other scenarios. Future observations on a large sample of short gamma-ray burst afterglows or detections of GW signals from merger remnants would test our scenario., 7 pages, 1 figure, accepted by ApJL, submitted on January 25, 2018

One major bottleneck in the design of large scale distributed machine learning algorithms is the communication cost. In this paper, we propose and analyze a distributed learning scheme for reducing the amount of communication in distributed learning problems under the feature partition scenario. The motivating observation of our scheme is that, in the existing schemes for the feature partition scenario, large amount of data exchange is needed for calculating gradients. In our proposed scheme, instead of calculating the exact gradient at each iteration, we only calculate the exact gradient sporadically. We provide precise conditions to determine when to perform the exact update, and characterize the convergence rate and bounds for total iterations and communication iterations. We further test our algorithm on real data sets and show that the proposed scheme can substantially reduce the amount of data transferred between distributed nodes.

The brightness of the multi-wavelength afterglow of GRB 170817A is increasing unexpectedly even $\sim$ 160 days after the associated gravitational burst. Here we suggest that the brightening can be caused by a late-time energy injection process. We use an empirical expression to mimic the evolution of the injection luminosity, which is consisted of a power-law rising phase and a power-law decreasing phase. It is found that the power-law indices of the two phases are $0.92$ and $-2.8$, respectively, with the peak time of the injection being $\sim 110$ days. The energy injection could be due to some kind of accretion, with the total accreted mass being $\sim 0.006 M_\odot$. However, normal fall-back accretion, which usually lasts for a much shorter period, cannot provide a natural explanation. Our best-fit decaying index of $-2.8$ is also at odds with the expected value of $-5/3$ for normal fall-back accretion. Noting that the expansion velocities of the kilonova components associated with GW170817 is $0.1-0.3\,c$, we argue that there should also be some ejecta with correspondingly lower velocities during the coalescence of the double neutron star system. They are bound by the gravitational well of the remnant central compact object and might be accreted at a timescale of about 100 days, providing a reasonable explanation for the energy injection. Detailed studies on the long-lasting brightening of GRB 170817A thus may provide useful information on the matter ejection during the merger process of binary neutron stars., 7 pages, 3 figures, accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal Letter

X-ray flares, lasting for $\sim 100 - 1000$ s in the X-ray band, are often observed following gamma-ray bursts (GRBs). The physical origin of X-ray flares is still unknown merely with the temporal/spectral information. On the other hand, some polarimeters are expected to be launched within several years thanks to the increasing interest on astronomical X-ray polarimetry. Here, by assuming that X-ray flares are synchrotron radiation from relativistic spherical shells, we show that the linear polarization degree during the rising phase of an X-ray flare is much higher for the emitting region with toroidal magnetic fields than that with random magnetic fields. In the decay phase of the flare, the evolution of the polarization degree is determined by the curvature effect of the emitting shell, which is a natural feature of jet scenarios for flares. Therefore, the measurement of the polarization of X-ray flares would provide a useful tool to probe the configuration of magnetic fields in the emission region, and may even help to test the curvature effect. The information on the magnetic configuration can further help us to understand the properties of GRB jets., Comment: 9 pages, 5 figures, accepted by The Astrophysical Journal

Fast radio bursts (FRBs) are bright radio pulses from the sky with millisecond durations and Jansky-level flux densities. Their origins are still largely uncertain. Here we suggest a new model for FRBs. We argue that the collision of a white dwarf with a black hole can give birth to a transient accretion disk, from which powerful episodic magnetic blobs will be launched. The collision between two consecutive magnetic blobs can result in a catastrophic magnetic reconnection, which releases a large amount of free magnetic energy and forms a forward shock. The shock propagates through the cold magnetized plasma within the blob in the collision region, radiating through synchrotron maser mechanism, which is responsible for a non-repeating FRB signal. Our calculations show that the theoretical energetics, radiation frequency, duration timescale, and event rate can be well consistent with the observational characteristic of FRBs., Comment: 8 pages, 1 figure, final version, RAA (Research in Astronomy and Astrophysics), 2018, 18, 61

The low-energy spectra of gamma-ray bursts' (GRBs) prompt emission are closely related to the energy distribution of electrons, which is further regulated by their cooling processes. We develop a numerical code to calculate the evolution of the electron distribution with given initial parameters, in which three cooling processes (i.e., adiabatic, synchrotron and inverse Compton cooling) and the effect of decaying magnetic field are coherently considered. A sequence of results are presented by exploring the plausible parameter space for both the fireball and the Poynting-flux-dominated regime. Different cooling patterns for the electrons can be identified and they are featured by a specific dominant cooling mechanism. Our results show that the hardening of the low-energy spectra can be attributed to the dominance of synchrotron self-Compton cooling within the internal shock model, or to decaying synchrotron cooling within the Poynting-flux-dominated jet scenario. These two mechanisms can be distinguished by observing the hard low-energy spectra of isolated short pulses in some GRBs. The dominance of adiabatic cooling can also lead to hard low-energy spectra when the ejecta is moving at an extreme relativistic speed. The information from the time-resolved low-energy spectra can help to probe the physical characteristics of the GRB ejecta via our numerical results., 39 pages, 26 figures, accepted by The Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series

When an emitting spherical shell with a constant Lorentz factor turns off emission abruptly at some radius, its high-latitude emission would obey the relation of $\hat{\alpha}$ (the temporal index) = $2 + \hat{\beta}$ (the spectral index). However, this relation is violated by the X-ray fares in some gamma-ray bursts (GRBs), whose $\hat{\alpha}$ is much more steeper. We show that the synchrotron radiation should be anisotropic when the angular distribution of accelerated electrons has preferable orientation, and this anisotropy would naturally lead to the steeper decay for the high-latitude emission if the the intrinsic emission is limb-brightened. We use our simple toy model to reproduce the temporal and the spectral evolution of the X-ray flares. We show that our model can well interpret the steep decay of the X-ray flares in the three GRBs selected as example. Recent simulations on particle acceleration may support the specific anisotropic distribution of the electrons adopted in our work. Reversely, confirmation of the anisotropy in the radiation would give meaningful clues to the details of electron acceleration in the emitting region., Comment: 12 pages, 1 figure, ApJL accepted

In this paper, the problem of identifying correlated components in a high-dimensional Gaussian vector is considered. In the setup considered, instead of having to take a full-vector observation at each time index, the observer is allowed to observe any subset or full set of components in the vector, and he has the freedom to design his sampling strategies over time. The observer aims to find an optimal sampling strategy and a decision rule to maximize the error exponent (per sample). We focus on sequential strategies, in which the sampling actions depend on the observations taken so far. We first derive performance bounds of any sequential sampling strategy. We then design a low complexity procedure called sequential diagonal procedure. We show that this low complexity sequential procedure substantially outperforms the optimal non-adaptive strategy when the strength of the signal is strong.

A plateau phase in the X-ray afterglow is observed in a significant fraction of gamma-ray bursts (GRBs). Previously, it has been found that there exists a correlation among three key parameters concerning the plateau phase, i.e., the end time of the plateau phase in the GRB rest frame ($T_{a}$), the corresponding X-ray luminosity at the end time ($L_{X}$) and the isotropic energy of the prompt GRB ($E_{\gamma,\rm{iso}}$). In this study, we systematically search through all the \emph{Swift} GRBs with a plateau phase that occurred between 2005 May and 2018 August. We collect 174 GRBs, with redshifts available for all of them. For the whole sample, the correlation between $L_{X}$, $T_{a}$ and $E_{\gamma,\rm{iso}}$ is confirmed, with the best fit relation being $L_{X}\propto T_{a}^{-1.01}E_{\gamma,\rm{iso}}^{0.84}$. Such an updated three-parameter correlation still supports that the central leftover after GRBs is probably a millisecond magnetar. It is interesting to note that short GRBs with duration less than 2 s in our sample also follow the same correlation, which hints that the merger production of two neutron stars could be a high mass magnetar, but not necessarily a black hole. Moreover, GRBs having an "internal" plateau (i.e., with a following decay index being generally smaller than -3) also obey this correlation. It further strengthens the idea that the internal plateau is due to the delayed collapse of a high mass neutron star into a black hole. The updated three-parameter correlation indicates that GRBs with a plateau phase may act as a standard candle for cosmology study., Comment: 35 pages, 8 figures, 3 tables, accepted by AAS Journal

The Helmholtz free energy of a constrained supersaturated vapor with a cluster size distribution consisting of clusters of various sizes is modeled as a mixture of hard spheres of various sizes attracting each other. This model naturally takes into account monomer-monomer and monomer-cluster interactions, so it implicitly pertains to nonideal gases, unlike prior work. Based on this model, the expressions for the equilibrium concentration and the formation free energies of clusters in a metastable supersaturated vapor have been derived. These results indicate that the widely used formula, ni = n1exp(-βΔGi), that computes the formation free energy of a cluster does not work at high supersaturations. As an example, the formation free energies of clusters with Stillinger's physical cluster definition in metastable, highly supersaturated vapors interacting via Lennard-Jones potential are studied using these expressions. Noticeable differences have been found for both the formation free energies of clusters and sizes of the critical clusters computed from our proposed expressions vs those from the formula ni = n1exp(-βΔGi).

The Lambertian surface has been a very important assumption in constructing the thermal radiance transfer equation for remote sensing of ground surface temperature. Crops are often planted in a row structure, and complex row architectures may lead to differences in terms of sunlight. Study of the radiation difference caused by observation directions for cropland is important for crop research by remote sensing technology. In this study, we studied the Lambertian property of cropland surfaces in the thermal infrared region through rigorous experiments in the field. Because a Lambertian surface has a homogeneous intensity of thermal emissions in hemispherical directions for a specific ground surface under specific kinetic temperature and emission conditions, we set up a series of field experiments to demonstrate the properties of the cropland. Three typical ground surfaces were selected for the experiments to observe thermal emissions: paddy field, bare soil and grass. Radiance thermometry was used to observe the ground emissions from 7 directions: 30°, 45°, 60°, 90°, 120°, 135° and 150°. The solar zenith angle was considered for the observation of ground emissions. Experiments were conducted at three different sites, both in daytime and nighttime, in Nanjing, China. Down-welling atmospheric emissions were considered for correction of the observed radiance to compute the ground surface radiance in the experiments. To determine whether different observation angles have significantly different effects on radiance, statistical analyses (ANOVA and Friedman test) were carried out. Post hoc multiple comparison tests and pairwise multiple comparisons were also conducted to inspect the various pairings of observation angles and to discover the radiance difference between them. According to the experiments and analysis of results, it can be concluded that the cropland does not have Lambertian characteristics in the thermal infrared region for thermal remote sensing. This means that both the thick vegetative canopy and the smooth bare soil have non-Lambertian properties. The results also indicated that 1) the radiance difference among the seven observation angles were larger in the daytime than at nighttime, and 2) the paddy field, bare soil and grass had their own characteristic differences in radiance among the different observation angles.

Optical re-brightenings in the afterglows of some gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) are unexpected within the framework of the simple external shock model. While it has been suggested that the central engines of some GRBs are newly born magnetars, we aim to relate the behaviors of magnetars to the optical re-brightenings. A newly born magnetar will lose its rotational energy in the form of Poynting-flux, which may be converted into a wind of electron-positron pairs through some magnetic dissipation processes. As proposed by Dai (2004), this wind will catch up with the GRB outflow and a long-lasting reverse shock would form. By applying this scenario to GRB afterglows, we find that the reverse shock propagating back into the electron-positron wind can lead to an observable optical re-brightening and a simultaneous X-ray plateau (or X-ray shallow decay). In our study, we select four GRBs, i.e., GRB 080413B, GRB 090426, GRB 091029, and GRB 100814A, of which the optical afterglows are well observed and show clear re-brightenings. We find that they can be well interpreted. In our scenario, the spin-down timescale of the magnetar should be slightly smaller than the peak time of the re-brightening, which can provide a clue to the characteristics of the magnetar., 31 pages, 8 figures, ApJ accepted

For a family of second-order parabolic systems with bounded measurable, rapidly oscillating and time-dependent periodic coefficients, we investigate the sharp convergence rates of weak solutions in L-2. Both initial-Dirichlet and initial-Neumann problems are studied. (C) 2016 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

In this paper, Bayesian quickest change-point detection problem with incomplete post-change information is considered. In particular, the observer knows that the post-change distribution belongs to a parametric distribution family, but he does not know the true value of the post-change parameter. Two problem formulations are considered in this paper. In the first formulation, we assume no additional prior information about the post-change parameter. In this case, the observer aims to design a detection algorithm to minimize the average (over the change-point) detection delay for all possible post-change parameters simultaneously subject to a worst case false alarm constraint. In the second formulation, we assume that there is a prior distribution on the possible value of the unknown parameter. For this case, we propose another formulation that minimizes the average (over both the change-point and the post-change parameter) detection delay subject to an average false alarm constraint. We propose a noval algorithm, which is termed as M-Shiryaev procedure, and show that the proposed algorithm is first order asymptotically optimal for both formulations considered in this paper.

In this paper, we consider the problem of quickly detecting an abrupt change of linear coefficients in linear regression models. In particular, the observer sequentially observes a sequence of observations {(xn, yn)}∞n=1, which is assumed to obey a linear regression model at each time slot n. Some of the coefficients in the linear model change at a fixed but unknown time t. The post-change linear coefficients are unknown to the observer. The observer aims to design an online algorithm to detect the model change based on his sequential observations. Two performance metrics, namely the worst case detection delay (WADD) and the average run length to false alarm (ARL2FA), are adopted to evaluate the performance of detection algorithms. We design a low complexity algorithm, termed as parallel sum algorithm, for the detection purpose. An asymptotic upper bound on WADD is provided under any given ARL2FA constraint.

Let { L e } be a family of elliptic systems of linear elasticity with rapidly oscillating periodic coefficients. We obtain the uniform W 1 , p estimate ‖ ∇ u e ‖ p ⩽ C ‖ f ‖ p in a Lipschitz domain Ω in R n for solutions to the Dirichlet problem: L e ( u e ) = div ( f ) in Ω and u e = 0 on ∂Ω, where | 1 p − 1 2 | 1 2 n + δ and C, δ > 0 are constants independent of e > 0 . The ranges are sharp for n = 2 or 3.

This paper concerns with a family of elliptic systems of linear elasticity with rapidly oscillating periodic coefficients, arising in the theory of homogenization. We establish uniform optimal regularity estimates for solutions of Neumann problems in a bounded Lipschitz domain with $L^2$ boundary data. The proof relies on a boundary Korn inequality for solutions of systems of linear elasticity and uses a large-scale Rellich estimate obtained in \cite{Shen-2016}., Comment: 32 pages

Lambertian surfaces represent an important assumption when constructing thermal radiance transfer equations for remote sensing observations of ground surface temperatures. We identify the properties of ground surfaces in thermal infrared regions as Lambertian surfaces via field experiments. Because Lambertian surfaces present homogeneous thermal emissions levels in hemispheric directions for a specific ground surface under specific kinetic temperatures and emissions, we conducted a series of field experiments to illustrate the properties of such ground surfaces. Four typical ground surfaces were selected for the experiments to observe thermal emissions: bare soil, grass, water, and concrete. Radiance thermometers were used to observe ground emissions from seven directions: 30°, 45°, 60°, 90°, 120°, 135°, and 150°. Solar zenith angles were considered for the observation of ground emissions. Experiments were conducted in five different regions of China (Beijing, Nanjing, Xilinguole, Yongzhou, and Jiangmen) during both daytime and nighttime. To determine whether different observation angles have significantly different effects on radiance, statistical analyses (ANOVA and Friedman test) were conducted. Post hoc multiple comparison tests and pairwise multiple comparisons were also conducted to examine the various pairings of observation angles and to measure the radiance differences. Roughly half of the radiance groups of all observed sites were tested via an ANOVA, and the remaining groups with unequal variances were subjected to the Friedman test. The results indicate that statistically significant differences in the radiance levels occurred among the seven angles for almost all of the sites (39 of the 40 groups). The results of our experiments indicate that the selected ground surfaces, especially the grass and the bare soil, may not behave with Lambertian properties in the thermal infrared region. This is probably attributed to the roughness of the selected surface, because we found that roughness is an important factor affecting the observed magnitude of thermal emission from different directions of the ground surface under study. Therefore, whether or not a terrestrial surface can be assumed to be a Lambertian surface should be based on their geometric structure. When the surface is relatively smooth, we can say that it is close to the Lambertian property in thermal emission.

Preparation of a series of 3-cyano-2-(1H-indol-3-yl)pyridine derivatives through the one-pot multicomponent coupling of aromatic aldehydes, aromatic ketones, 3-(cyanoacetyl)indole and ammonium acetate is studied in the present article. All these compounds were obtained in good yield and their structures were confirmed by 1H NMR, IR and elementary analysis.

The prompt emission of gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) is characterized by rapid variabilities, which may be a direct reflection of the unsteady central engine. We perform a series of axisymmetric 2.5-dimensional simulations to study the propagation of relativistic, hydrodynamic, intermittent jets through the envelope of a GRB progenitor star. A realistic rapidly rotating star is incorporated as the background of jet propagation, and the star is allowed to collapse due to the gravity of the central black hole. By modeling the intermittent jets with constant-luminosity pulses with equal on and off durations, we investigate how the half-period, $T$, affects the jet dynamics. For relatively small $T$ values (e.g. 0.2 s), the jet breakout time $t_{\rm bo}$ depends on the opening angle of the jet, with narrower jets more penetrating and reaching the surface at shorter times. For $T \leq 1$ s, the reverse shock crosses each pulse before the jet penetrates through the stellar envelope. As a result, after the breakout of the first group of pulses at $t_{\rm bo}$, several subsequent pulses vanish before penetrating the star, causing a quiescent gap. For larger half-periods ($T=2.0, 4.0$ s), all the pulses can successfully penetrate through the envelope, since each pulse can propagate through the star before the reverse shock crosses the shell. Our results may interpret the existence of a weak precursor in many long GRBs, given that the GRB central engine injects intermittent pulses with half-period $T \leq 1$ s. The observational data seem to be consistent with such a possibility., Comment: 19 pages, 15 figures, ApJ accepted

A 3.56-hour white dwarf (WD) - M dwarf (MD) close binary system, AR Scorpii, was recently reported to show pulsating emission in radio, IR, optical, and UV, with a 1.97-minute period, which suggests the existence of a WD with a rotation period of 1.95 minutes. We propose a model to explain the temporal and spectral characteristics of the system. The WD is a nearly perpendicular rotator, with both open field line beams sweeping the MD stellar wind periodically. A bow shock propagating into the stellar wind accelerates electrons in the wind. Synchrotron radiation of these shocked electrons can naturally account for the broad-band (from radio to X-rays) spectral energy distribution of the system., Comment: 6 pages, 2 figures, ApJL accepted