Recent Additions: New and Updated Entries in the Past 60 Days
Displaying entries 16 through 30 of 70 found.

West, Bruce, et al. Relating Size and Functionality in Human Social Networks through Complexity. PNAS. 117/31, 2022. We cite this entry by University of North Texas systems theorists along with Robin Dunbar, Oxford University in a major journal to show how much the pervasive presence of optimum critically organized phenomena everywhere is being perceived as a prime generative feature. In this instance, its dynamic self-organization is seen to structure and arrange our public affairs in accord with Dunbar’s popular scale (search) from a nominal five to as high as 150 members.

(Robin) Dunbar hypothesized, on the basis of empirical evidence, that a typical individual can have a stable relation with at most 150 other people. We establish that this results from the internal dynamics of a complex network. We study network models having phase transitions with criticality generates intermittent events, with time interval scales between successive events being independent. The scaling index depends on network size and direct calculations show a maximum for networks of 150 size and for information exchange efficiency. (Significance)

Extensive empirical evidence suggests that there is a maximal number of people with whom an individual can maintain social relationships. We argue that this arises as a consequence of a natural phase transition in the dynamic self-organization among individuals within a social system. We present the calculated size dependence of the scaling properties of complex social network models to argue that this collective behavior is an enhanced form of collective intelligence. (Abstract)

In keeping with the criticality hypothesis, it is reasonable to associate functionality and size with the emergence of complexity. This step is achieved by critical dynamics and events. Complexity is manifest in the collective behavior of nonlinear dynamic networks by way of the concept of collective intelligence (18356).

Zhou, Zheng, et al. Fractal Quantum Phase Transitions: Critical Phenomena Beyond Renormalization. arXiv:2105.05851. We note this entry by Fudan University, Chongqing University, Technical University of Munich and Princeton University physicists as they proceed to find one more instance of nature’s dynamic preference even way down in this long arcane, foundational realm.

Quantum critical points connecting different phases have broad implications in modern many-body physics. Their universal features are determined using the renormalization group (RG) theory, since salient properties at the phase transition point can be discerned by coarse-graining the local fluctuations and focusing on the physics at the long wavelength limit. Based on this observation, a wide class of universal phenomena can be revealed by symmetry, locality, and dimensionality. Here we investigate a special type fractal symmetry. (1)

Zimatore, Giovanna, et al. Self-organization of Whole-Gene Expression through Coordinated Chromatin Structural Transition. Biophysics Reviews. September, 2021. Five geneticists posted in Italy, Japan, and Poland including Masa Tsuchiya provide still another, significant genomic example of nature’s persistence to reach and reside at an optimum reciprocal poise.

The human DNA molecule is a long polymer collapsed into the micrometer space of the cell nucleus. This simple consideration leads to gene-by-gene regulation which better contrasts with the physical reality in the presence of cell state transitions that involvef thousands of genes. This state of affairs invites a statistical mechanics approach where specificity arises from a selective unfolding of chromatin driving the rewiring of gene expression patterns. The arising of “expression waves” marking state transitions can be related to chromatin reorganization through self-organized critical control of whole-genome. (Excerpt)

Our Planatural Edition: A 21st Century PhiloSophia, Earthropo Ecosmic PediaVersion

Evans, Constantine, et al. Pattern Recognition in the Nucleation Kinetics of Non-Equilibrium Self-Assembly. arXiv:2207.06399. This intricate, frontier posting by Cal Tech and University of Chicago computational biologists including Erik Winfree is able to graphically describe an expansive, self-similar consistency from molecules all the way to minds. Its deep neural net operations are found to well apply across these domains to an extent life’s spatial and temporal developmental panorama and self-observation well appears as a procreative genesis.

Inspired by biology's best computer, the brain, neural networks achieve a profound reformulation of computational principles. Analogous high-dimensional, interconnected architectures also arise within information-processing molecular systems inside living cells,. Might neuromorphic collective modes be thus found broadly in other physical and chemical processes such as protein synthesis, metabolism, or structural self-assembly? Here we examine nucleation of animate structures to show that complex patterns can be classified similar to neural network computation. Specifically, we design a set of 917 DNA tiles that can self-assemble in three alternative ways such that competitive nucleation depends on the co-localization of tiles within the three structures. This success suggests that ubiquitous physical phenomena, such as nucleation, may hold powerful information processing capabilities when scaled up to more intricate systems. (Abstract excerpt)

Lewton, Thomas. She Turns Fluids into “Black Holes” and “Inflating Universes.”. Quanta. December 12, 2022. A science writer profiles the British physicist Silke Weinfurtner about her frontier research conceptions that a deep intrinsic similarity distinguishes an infinite affinity across expansive natural and social domains. In specific regard, the same equations that describe flowing water on Earth necessarily hold for cosmic fluid dynamics. The common feature is seen as akin to “analogous gravity” theories of William Unruh from the 1970s, which have now have gained a valid credibility.

In regard, for example see The Next Generation of Analogue Gravity Experiments by Silke Weinfurtner, et al at arXiv:2005.04027 and a later entry Primary Thermalization of the Early Universe from Faraday-wave Scattering on Liquid Intergaces at 2207.02199. For another version see Analogue Gravity and the Hawking Effect by Carla Almeida and Maxime Jacquet at 2218.08838.

For two decades, Silke Weinfurtner, a physicist at the University of Nottingham in the United Kingdom, has been designing “analogue gravity” experiments using fluids that mimic systems like black holes and the early universe. For example, she has detected sound waves in fluids that resemble Hawking radiation — the subtle heat emitted by black holes that holds deep implications for what happens to information in the universe. Another fluid effect she studies mimics how the seeds of cosmic structure were sown in the first moments after the Big Bang.

(Q) So this rests on the idea of universality, that there is common behavior over and above the microscopic details of the system. (A) I’m not interested in probing the microphysics of these fluid systems, I’m interested in the macroscopic emergent behavior. Why are the macroscopic behaviors of two very different systems — field theories on curved space-time and excitations in fluids and superfluids — the same? I don’t know. Physics has this remarkable feature that it repeats itself.

Webb, Richard, ed. Consciousness. New Scientist Essential Guide. Volume 12, 2022. The British science writer achieves a wide-ranging, update survey and synthesis as an Earthuman acumen presently traces and fills in a long continuity from an ecosmic realm to our nascent awakenings. Six sections - What is Consciousness, Conscious Minds, Your Conscious Self, Sleep and Dreaming, Altered States, and Consciousness and Reality – span vital aspects that they involve. A deeply physical rooting for knowing sentience is braced by vignettes of and essays by leading players such as David Chalmers, Christof Koch, Anil Seth, David Bor (Consciousness is About Combining Information) and others.

Throughout my quest (Christof Koch) to understand consciousness, have never lost sense of living in a magical universe. I do believe that some deep and organizing principle created the universe and set it in motion with a purpose. A pioneering generation of stars had to die in a spectacular supernova to seed space with the heavier elements needed for the rise of self-replicating chemicals on a rocky planet orbiting a young star at just the right distance. The competitive pressures of natural selection led to the accession of creatures with nervous systems. As their complexity grew to huge proportions, some of the entities evolved the ability to reflect on themselves, and to contemplate their beautiful but cruel world. But I do believe that the laws of physics favored the emergence of consciousness, and that these laws will lead us to a complete knowledge of it.

wood, Charlie. Starfish Whisperer Develops a Physical Language of Life. Quanta. January 11, 2023. A science writer provides a cogent profile of Nikta Fakhri, an award-winning Iranian-American MIT biophysicist, as she adapts and extends a conceptual physics basis as a deeper rooting to better describe how tiny active biological components proceed to give rise to living organisms. A MIT press release notes that her findings reveal “’Starfish embryos to swim in formation like a “living crystal.” Some collegial papers by Fakhri are A Hierarchy of Protein Patterns Robustly Decodes Cell Shape Information by Manon Wigbers, et al in Nature Physics (17/578, 2021) and Odd Dynamics of Living Chiral Crystals by Tan, Tzer Han Tan, et al in Nature (607/287, 2022).

In her work to learn how biological phenomena produces the hugely complex business of living, Fakhri turned to physics — a field that’s adept at linking microscopic and macroscopic phases. Physicists have learned that temperature emerges from the motions of molecules, magnetism from the orientations of atoms, and superconductivity from paired electrons. Perhaps life, too, can be elegantly described as a property that can emerge under the right circumstances. From starfish embryos, she notes that, like other states of matter, life “breaks symmetry” — the growth of an embryo from its past to its future.

Biology is a field that’s much defined by its molecules. Physics takes a somewhat different view and tries to explain things across various scales, from the very small to the very large, using a sort of universal language. In the case of life, we would like to know: How do you go from energy dissipation at a single-particle level all the way up to a flock of birds? In the past, physics has shown that this approach of trying to understand a unit as more than the sum of its parts is at the heart of many complex phenomena. I am optimistic that physical rules may allow us to understand what might be the ultimate complexity in the world.

Pedia Sapiens: A Planetary Progeny Comes to Her/His Own Actual Factual Knowledge

Liu, Jiazhen, et al. Correlated Impact Dynamics in Science. arXiv:2303.03646. University of Miami physicists including Chaoming Song move on to discern how an intrinsic presence of complex network structures can serve to organize and advance worldwide research studies as they now ascend and advance to a worldwise pursuit.

Science progresses by building upon previous discoveries. It is commonly believed that the impact of scientific papers, as measured by citations, is positively correlated with the impact of past discoveries built upon. However, analyzing over 30 million papers and nearly a billion citations across multiple disciplines, we find that there is a long-term positive citation correlation, but a negative short-term correlation. We demonstrate that the key to resolving this paradox lies in a new concept, called "capacity", which captures the amount of originality remaining for a paper. We find there is an intimate link between capacity and impact dynamics that appears universal across the diverse fields we studied. The uncovered capacity measure not only explains the correlated impact dynamics across the sciences but also improves our understanding and predictions of high-impact discoveries. (Abstract)

Tenachi, Wassim, et al. Deep symbolic regression for physics guided by units constraints: Toward the automated discovery of physical laws. arXiv:2303.03192. Into these 2020s as scientific collaborations from infinite, infinitesimal and viable complexity realms are engaged in an emergent passage to global endeavors which then begin to proceed on their own, University of Strasbourg and CISRO, Australia astrophysicists describe intelligent methods so to guide and empower this epic transition. In regard, this entry is an instance of the collective planatural intelligence as it rises to an Earthropic era. Its contents will then be composed of such subject articles.

Symbolic Regression is the study of algorithms that automate the search for analytic expressions to fit myriad results. While recent advances in deep learning have made progress, they have not been focused on physics data. Here we present Φ-SO, a Physical Symbolic Optimization framework for recovering analytical symbolic expressions using deep reinforcement learning techniques. Our system is built, from the ground up, to propose solutions where the physical units are consistent by construction. This algorithm can apply to noiseless data when attempting to derive an analytical property of a physical condition. (Excerpt)

Duarte, Denise, et al. Representing Collective Thinking through Cognitive Networks. Journal of Complex Networks. 10/6, 2022. We cite this December article by University of Sao Paulo scholars (see bio’s below for global postings) as an example of this actual “thinking like a planet” emergent expansion of Wuman-Earth cognizance. Another indication is a proper advent of this novel 2022/2023 section, and CI journal,

This article presents a novel quantitative approach using network features to represent community collective thinking. We propose a new function, called the cognitive affinity coefficient that maps individual cognitive links within a graph structure. This function transforms the data generated by the words chosen for an individual regarding a specific subject into an appropriate relational object for analysing cognitive networks. We apply our methodology to novel data on evocations about river floods, which allowed us to find communities inside the network according to their thinking about this subject and identify the most active individuals inside each one and, therefore, explicit their collective thinking. (Abstract)

Denise Helena Silva Duarte: I am a Full Professor at the School of Architecture and Urbanism, and Head of the Graduate Programme and Environment and Energy Studies Lab at the University of Sao Paulo, Brazil.

Gilvan Guedes: I am a Demographer at the Federal University of Minas Gerais in health issues, and spatial population distribution. I mostly use statistical methods (simulation, regression based methods and network analysis) coupled with formal demography (life table models and decomposition studies).

Wesley Pereira: I have a D.Sc. in Computational Modeling (2019) from the National Laboratory of Scientific Computation, Brazil. I am presently a Research Associate in Mathematical and Statistical Sciences at the University of Colorado, Denver which involves Applied Mathematics, Scientific Software Development, and Large-Scale Numerical Algorithms.

Rodrigo Ribeiro, Ph.D: I am a Brazilian guy who enjoys to spend his time with his wife, friends and family. I have relatives and friends over the globe which makes me feel safe wherever I go. I am now a visiting assistant professor at University of Colorado Boulder in to research mathematics and probability.

Ecosmos: A Revolutionary Fertile, Habitable, Solar-Bioplanet Incubator Lifescape

Ianeselli, Alan, et al. Physical Non-Equilibria for Prebiotic Nucleic Acid Chemistry. Nature Reviews Physics. January, 2023. As the Abstract says, seven Ludwig Maximilians University biophysicists including Dieter Braun proceed with research studies to an extent that it well appears our ecosmos environs seems to be innately graced with a robust life-bearing fertility. By this view, its evolutionary emergence is just now reaching its planetary phase of our intelligent retrospective. The second quote is from Braun’s website, which provides an apt context.

The prebiotic replication of DNA and RNA is a complex interplay between chemistry and the environment. Factors that have effects include temperature, monovalent and bivalent ions, the pH of water, ultraviolet irradiation and gaseous CO2. We discuss primordial conditions for the replicative reactions on the early Earth, such as heated rock pores, hydrothermal vents, evaporating ponds, icy regimes, and ultraviolet irradiation. Our expectation is that the nonlinear autonomous evolution dynamics provided by microfluidic non-equilibria make the origin of life understandable and experimentally testable. (Abstract)

In our LMU systems biophysics lab, we reconstruct the early cycles of Darwinian evolution. by a focus on initial replication, emergence of a phenotype and selection in our understanding of the origins of life. It has become clearer how the first molecules of life could have arisen. The next step is to learn how genetic molecules can polymerize to long oligonucleotides and trigger replication cycles. Our conceptual guide is that life persists far from equilibrium by way of a vital supply of negentropy for replication and selection. (D. Braun web page)

Song, Chaoming. Zero Curvature Condition for Quantum Criticality. arXiv:2303.09591.. A University of Miami physicist (search) enters still another way to perceive and quantify this so pervasive natural tendency to seek and exhibit the best state.

Quantum criticality typically lies outside the bounds of the conventional Landau paradigm and there is no generic way to replace it for quantum phase transitions. In this paper, we present a new theory of quantum criticality based on a novel geometric approach which centers on the competition of commuting operators. We find that the quantum phase transition occurs precisely at the zero-curvature point on this boundary, which implies operators are at the critical point. (Excerpt)

Center for the Physics of Biological Function.. biophysics.princeton.edu. This is a joint effort between The CUNY Graduate Center and Princeton University and one of eleven Physics Frontier Centers established by the Physics Division of the National Science Foundation Directorate for Mathematical and Physical Sciences. We are a collection of scientists working at the interface of physics and biology with the goal of creating a physicist’s understanding of living systems: a physics of biological function that connects the myriad details of life, across all scales, to fundamental and universal physical principles. Our center focuses on new scientific opportunities and educational programs, integrating theory and experiment, research and education. Its director and long time mentor is Professor William Bialek (search).

Sandora, McCullen, et al. Multiverse Predictions for Habitability: Planetary Characteristics.. arXiv:2302.12376. With this entry we cite four new papers which are a collegial update to Dr. Sandora’s prior 2019 postings across a multiversal scenario (search). In regard, three more senior cosmologists, Vladimir Airapetian, NASA Goddard, Luke Barnes, Western Sydney University, and Geraint Lewis, University of Sydney, expand, embellish and advance these awesome contributions. Along with the above topic, they are Element Abundances (2302.10919), Stellar and Atmospheric Habitability (2303.03119), and Origin of Life Scenarios (2303.02678). We next post Abstract excerpts for a flavorable sense of their content.

In more regard, from any planatural philosophy vista, we ought to register how fantastic it is that our infinitesimal Earthuman collective beingness can yet be able to evolve, emerge, explore, quantify and evaluate such infinite celestial reaches. Who really are we, what precestral, innate function and role are we intended to serve in and of a participatory ecosmic genesis. One could go on, a grand, salutary realization seems to awaits for our pediaverse asking and seeing.

Recent detections of potentially habitable exoplanets around sunlike stars invite further exploration of the physical conditions that can sustain life. Insight into these conditions, we contend, can be aided by the multiverse hypothesis whereof the probability of living in our universe depends on assumptions that affect relative habitability. Here, we show that a multiverse scenario does induce strong preferences among them. For example, we consider proposed mechanisms for water delivery to the early Earth both during giant planet formation and a grand tack, from comets, and oxidation of a primary atmosphere by a magma ocean. (Planetary Characteristics)

If the origin of life is rare and sensitive to the local conditions at the site of its emergence using the principle of mediocrity within a multiverse framework, we may expect to find ourselves in a universe that is better than usual at creating these necessary conditions. We use this reasoning to investigate several origins of life including the prebiotic soup, hydrothermal vents, prebiotic material from impacts, and panspermia. We find that most induce a preference toward weaker-gravity universes, and solar radiation or large impacts as a disequilibrium source are disfavored. (Origin of Life)

Stellar activity and planetary atmospheres can strongly influence habitability. To date, neither have been adequately studied in the multiverse context, so there has not been as assessment of how these effects impact our fundamental constants. Here, we consider the effects of solar wind, mass loss, and extreme ultra-violet flux on atmospheres and how they scale with physical parameters. We consider whether planetary magnetic fields are necessary for habitability, and find five boundaries in parameter space where magnetic fields are precluded. (Stellar and Atmospheric Habitability)

We investigate the dependence of elemental abundances on physical constants, and the implications this has for the distribution of complex life for various habitability criteria. We consider three main sources of variation: differing supernova rates, alpha burning in massive stars, and isotopic stability, and their effect on metal-to-rock ratio and the abundances of carbon, oxygen, nitrogen, phosphorus, sulfur, silicon, magnesium, and iron. Our results indicate that carbon-rich or carbon-poor planets are uninhabitable, slightly magnesium-rich planets are habitable, and life does not depend on nitrogen levels too sensitively. If any of these predictions are found to be wrong, the multiverse scenario would predict that the majority of observers are born in universes substantially different from ours, and so can be ruled out, to varying degrees of statistical significance. (Element Abundances)

Lewton, Thomas. Black Holes will Eventually Destroy All Quantum States, Researchers Argue. Quanta. March 7, 2023. A science writer describes the novel physicist theories of Daine Danielson and Robert Wald, University of Chicago, and Gautom Satishchandran, Princeton University, which are seen to accord with John Wheeler’s 1970’s participatory model, who was then Wald’s doctoral advisor back then, see quote below. The main reference in the latest verbiage is Killing Horizon Decohere Quantum Superpositions by the authors at arXiv:2301.00026.

At Princeton University in the early 1970s the physicist John Wheeler would draw a big “U” at seminars. The letter’s left tip represented the beginning of the universe, where everything was uncertain with quantum possibilities. The letter’s right tip, sometimes adorned with an eye, depicted an observer looking backward, so as to bring the left side of the U into existence. In this “participatory universe,” as he called it, the cosmos expanded and cooled around the U, forming structures and eventually creating human-like witnesses with measuring apparatus. He would say things like “No phenomenon is a true phenomenon until it’s observed.’”

Into these 2020s as we study how quantum theory behaves on the horizon of a black hole, Wald and his collaborators have calculated a new effect that is suggestive of a participatory universe. The mere presence of a black hole, they’ve found, is enough to turn a particle’s hazy “superposition” being in multiple potential states into a well-defined reality. When Wheeler first drew the “big U” in the 1970s, Wald said that the idea struck me as not that solidly grounded.” And now? “A lot of the stuff he did was enthusiasm which later turned out to be really on the mark.” “He saw himself as holding out a lamp light to illuminate possible paths for other people to follow.” (Lewton, et al)

Previous   1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5  Next