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The University of the Philippines Open University has been at the forefront of providing Massive Open Online Courses to address knowledge and skill gaps, aiming to make education accessible and contributing to societal goals. Recognising challenges in student engagement and completion rates within Massive Open Online Courses, the authors conducted a study by incorporating gamification into one of the University of the Philippines Open University's Massive Open Online Courses to assess its impact on these aspects. Gamification involves integrating game elements to motivate and engage users. This study explored the incorporation of Moodle elements such as badges, leaderboards, and progress bars. Using Moodle analytics, the study also tracked student engagement, views, and posts throughout the course, offering valuable insights into the influence of gamification on user behaviour. Furthermore, the study delved into participant feedback gathered through post-evaluation surveys, providing a comprehensive understanding of their experiences with the gamified course design. With a 28.86% completion rate and positive participant reception, the study concluded that gamification can enhance learner motivation, participation, and overall satisfaction. This research contributes to the ongoing discourse on innovative educational methods, positioning gamification as a promising avenue for creating interactive and impactful online learning experiences in the Philippines and beyond.

In this work, we study flavor-violating scalars (flavons) in a range of large masses that have not been explored previously. We model the interactions with an effective field theory formulation where the flavon is heavier than the top quark. In addition, we assume that the flavon only couples to fermions of the Standard Model in a flavor-changing way. As the flavon couples strongly to top quarks, same-sign and opposite-sign top quark pair signals can be explored in the search for those particles. Using parametrized neural networks, we show that it is possible to probe flavons with masses in the 200-1600 GeV range through their interactions with a top quark plus up and charm quarks for effective couplings of order 10^-2 TeV^-1 at the 14 TeV High-Luminosity LHC., Comment: 15 pages, 6 figures

In 1935, Einstein, Podolsky, and Rosen argued that quantum mechanics is incomplete, based on the assumption that local actions cannot influence elements of reality at a distant location (local realism). In this work, using a recently defined quantum reality quantifier, we show that Alice's local quantum operations can be correlated with the erasure of the reality of observables in Bob's causally disconnected laboratory. To this end, we implement a modified optical quantum eraser experiment, ensuring that Alice's and Bob's measurements remain causally disconnected. Using an entangled pair of photons and quantum state tomography, we experimentally verify that, even with the total absence of any form of classical communication, the choice of quantum operation applied by Alice on her photon is correlated with the erasure of a spatial element of reality of Bob's photon. In this case, it is shown that Bob's photon can entangle two extra non-interacting degrees of freedom, thus confirming that Bob's photon path is not an element of physical reality.

Bohr's complementarity principle has long been a fundamental concept in quantum mechanics, positing that, within a given experimental setup, a quantum system (or quanton) can exhibit either its wave-like character, denoted as $W$, or its particle-like character, denoted as $P$, but not both simultaneously. Modern interpretations of Bohr's complementarity principle acknowledge the coexistence of these aspects in the same experiment while introducing the constraint $W + P \le \alpha$. Notably, estimations of $W$ or $P$ frequently rely on indirect retrodiction methods, a practice that has led to the claim of the violation of Bohr's complementarity principle. By taking a different route, recent advancements demonstrate that quantum complementarity relations can be rigorously derived from the axioms of quantum mechanics. To reconcile these observations and eliminate potential paradoxes or violations, we propose an updated formulation for the quantum complementarity principle, which is stated as follows: \textit{For a given quantum state preparation $\rho_t$ at a specific instant of time $t$, the wave and particle behaviors of a quanton are constrained by a complementarity relation $\mathfrak{W}(\rho_t) + \mathfrak{P}(\rho_t) \le \alpha(d)$, which is derived directly from the axioms of quantum mechanics.}, Comment: Accepted version in the Proceedings of the Royal Society A (RSPA)

In [Phys. Rev. A 107, 012427 (2023)], A. J. Baldwin and J. A. Jones proved that Uhlmann-Jozsa's fidelity between two quantum states $\rho$ and $\sigma$, i.e., $F(\rho,\sigma)~:=~(Tr\sqrt{\sqrt{\rho}\sigma\sqrt{\rho}})^2$, can be written in a simplified form as $F(\rho,\sigma) = (Tr\sqrt{\rho\sigma})^2$. In this article, we give an alternative proof of this result, using a function power series expansion and the properties of the trace function. Our approach not only reinforces the validity of the simplified expression but also facilitates the exploration of novel dissimilarity functions for quantum states and more complex trace functions of a density operator.

Rural communities in remote areas often encounter significant challenges when it comes to accessing emergency healthcare services and essential supplies due to a lack of adequate transportation infrastructure. The situation is further exacerbated by poorly maintained, damaged, or flooded roads, making it arduous for rural residents to obtain the necessary aid in critical situations. Limited budgets and technological constraints pose additional obstacles, hindering the prompt response of local rescue teams during emergencies. The transportation of crucial resources, such as medical supplies and food, plays a vital role in saving lives in these situations. In light of these obstacles, our objective is to improve accessibility and alleviate the suffering of vulnerable populations by automating transportation tasks using low-cost robotic systems. We propose a low-cost, easy-to-build blimp robot (UAVs), that can significantly enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of local emergency responses., Comment: IEEE Global Humanitarian Technology Conference (GHTC 2023)

We present an aerial vehicle composed of a custom quadrotor with tilted rotors and a helium balloon, called SBlimp. We propose a novel control strategy that takes advantage of the natural stable attitude of the blimp to control translational motion. Different from cascade controllers in the literature that controls attitude to achieve desired translational motion, our approach directly controls the linear velocity regardless of the heading orientation of the vehicle. As a result, the vehicle swings during the translational motion. We provide a planar analysis of the dynamic model, demonstrating stability for our controller. Our design is evaluated in numerical simulations with different physical factors and validated with experiments using a real-world prototype, showing that the SBlimp is able to achieve stable translation regardless of its orientation.

Building on the 1935 Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen (EPR) assertion: ``{\it If, without in any way disrupting a system, we can predict with certainty (i.e., with a probability of one) the value of a physical quantity, then an element of physical reality corresponds to this physical quantity.}''; and employing a novel operational framework for measuring realism within quantum systems, we show that the elements of reality in one laboratory can be correlated with causally disconnected choices. EPR further stated that ``{\it ...$\,$physical reality cannot be determined by \emph{a priori} philosophical considerations, but must be found by$\,$...$\,$experiments and measurements.}'' In this direction, we provide empirical evidence supporting our theoretical predictions. This is achieved by using an optical configuration as a guide, referred to as the Reality Quantum Correlator (RQC), and leveraging IBM's quantum computers to obtain the experimental results. So, complementing the assertions of EPR, we show that a detailed and clear definition is essential to fully understand observables' reality in quantum systems.

We explore single and double flavor-violating scalar (flavon) production at the 13 and 14 TeV LHC in an effective field theory formulation where flavons always change the flavor of the Standard Model fermions. When those scalars couple to mass, their flavor-changing couplings to top quarks and tau leptons are favored. Focusing on the mass region below the top-quark mass, we find couplings that fit the muon $(g-2)$ discrepancy and avoid several current experimental constraints. We determine the potential of the LHC to exclude or discover such a new physics scenario with clean signatures consisting of same-sign tau leptons and the simultaneous observation of resonances in the tau plus electron or muon invariant mass. We found that in the double production mode, effective couplings down to order $10^{-2}$ TeV$^{-1}$ can be probed for flavon masses in the 10--170 GeV range at the 14 TeV HL-LHC, but couplings down to 0.1 TeV$^{-1}$ can already be excluded at 95\% confidence level with data collected from the 13 TeV LHC in the same mass interval. We also explore the impact of sizeable diagonal flavon couplings on the prospects of LHC for the signals we propose., Comment: 33 pages, 13 figures, 2 tables. Accepted for publication on PRD

We propose a model to forecast large realized covariance matrices of returns, applying it to the constituents of the S\&P 500 daily. To address the curse of dimensionality, we decompose the return covariance matrix using standard firm-level factors (e.g., size, value, and profitability) and use sectoral restrictions in the residual covariance matrix. This restricted model is then estimated using vector heterogeneous autoregressive (VHAR) models with the least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (LASSO). Our methodology improves forecasting precision relative to standard benchmarks and leads to better estimates of minimum variance portfolios.

The use of cables for aerial manipulation has shown to be a lightweight and versatile way to interact with objects. However, fastening objects using cables is still a challenge and human is required. In this work, we propose a novel way to secure objects using hitches. The hitch can be formed and morphed in midair using a team of aerial robots with cables. The hitch's shape is modeled as a convex polygon, making it versatile and adaptable to a wide variety of objects. We propose an algorithm to form the hitch systematically. The steps can run in parallel, allowing hitches with a large number of robots to be formed in constant time. We develop a set of actions that include different actions to change the shape of the hitch. We demonstrate our methods using a team of aerial robots via simulation and actual experiments., Comment: Paper accepted to be published in ICRA 2023

We utilize IBM's quantum computers to perform a full quantum simulation of the optical quantum eraser (QE) utilizing a Mach-Zehnder interferometer with a variable partially-polarizing beam splitter (VPPBS) at the input. The use of the VPPBS motivates us to introduce the entangled quantum eraser, for which the path information is erased using a Bell-basis measurement. We also investigate the behavior of the wave aspect, i.e., the quantum coherence, as well as the particle character, represented by the predictability and entanglement, as delineated in complete complementarity relations (CCRs). As we show in this article, the utilization of the VPPBS uncover interesting aspects of the QE and CCRs. For instance, we can recover the full wave-behavior by the erasure procedure even when we have only partial knowledge about the path through entanglement.

From ancient times, humans have been using cables and ropes to tie, carry, and manipulate objects by folding knots. However, automating knot folding is challenging because it requires dexterity to move a cable over and under itself. In this paper, we propose a method to fold knots in midair using a team of aerial vehicles. We take advantage of the fact that vehicles are able to fly in between cable segments without any re-grasping. So the team grasps the cable from the floor, and releases it once the knot is folded. Based on a composition of catenary curves, we simplify the complexity of dealing with an infinite-dimensional configuration space of the cable, and formally propose a new knot representation. Such representation allows us to design a trajectory that can be used to fold knots using a leader-follower approach. We show that our method works for different types of knots in simulations. Additionally, we show that our solution is also computationally efficient and can be executed in real-time., Comment: International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems, IROS 2022, Kyoto, Japan, Oct 23 - Oct. 27, 2022

We give a new approach to prove the existence of a weak solution of \[dx_t = f(t,x_t)dt + g(t)dB^H_t\] where $B^H_t$ is a fractional Brownian motion with values in a separable Hilbert space for suitable functions $f$ and $g$. Our idea is to use the implicit function theorem and the scaling property of the fractional Brownian motion in order to obtain a weak solution for this equation., Comment: 10pages