Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies

About: Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies is a facility organization based out in Frankfurt am Main, Germany. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Baryon & Quark–gluon plasma. The organization has 798 authors who have published 2733 publications receiving 82799 citations. The organization is also known as: FIAS.

Measuring Information-Transfer Delays

Abstract: In complex networks such as gene networks, traffic systems or brain circuits it is important to understand how long it takes for the different parts of the network to effectively influence one another. In the brain, for example, axonal delays between brain areas can amount to several tens of milliseconds, adding an intrinsic component to any timing-based processing of information. Inferring neural interaction delays is thus needed to interpret the information transfer revealed by any analysis of directed interactions across brain structures. However, a robust estimation of interaction delays from neural activity faces several challenges if modeling assumptions on interaction mechanisms are wrong or cannot be made. Here, we propose a robust estimator for neuronal interaction delays rooted in an information-theoretic framework, which allows a model-free exploration of interactions. In particular, we extend transfer entropy to account for delayed source-target interactions, while crucially retaining the conditioning on the embedded target state at the immediately previous time step. We prove that this particular extension is indeed guaranteed to identify interaction delays between two coupled systems and is the only relevant option in keeping with Wiener’s principle of causality. We demonstrate the performance of our approach in detecting interaction delays on finite data by numerical simulations of stochastic and deterministic processes, as well as on local field potential recordings. We also show the ability of the extended transfer entropy to detect the presence of multiple delays, as well as feedback loops. While evaluated on neuroscience data, we expect the estimator to be useful in other fields dealing with network dynamics.

Atomic-resolution three-dimensional structure of amyloid β fibrils bearing the Osaka mutation.

Abstract: Despite its central importance for understanding the molecular basis of Alzheimer's disease (AD), high-resolution structural information on amyloid β-peptide (Aβ) fibrils, which are intimately linked with AD, is scarce. We report an atomic-resolution fibril structure of the Aβ1-40 peptide with the Osaka mutation (E22Δ), associated with early-onset AD. The structure, which differs substantially from all previously proposed models, is based on a large number of unambiguous intra- and intermolecular solid-state NMR distance restraints.

Maximum mass, moment of inertia and compactness of relativistic stars

Abstract: A number of recent works have highlighted that it is possible to express the properties of general-relativistic stellar equilibrium configurations in terms of functions that do not depend on the specific equation of state employed to describe matter at nuclear densities. These functions are normally referred to as "universal relations" and have been found to apply, within limits, both to static or stationary isolated stars, as well as to fully dynamical and merging binary systems. Further extending the idea that universal relations can be valid also away from stability, we show that a universal relation is exhibited also by equilibrium solutions that are not stable. In particular, the mass of rotating configurations on the turning-point line shows a universal behaviour when expressed in terms of the normalised Keplerian angular momentum. In turn, this allows us to compute the maximum mass allowed by uniform rotation, M_{max}, simply in terms of the maximum mass of the nonrotating configuration, M_{TOV}, finding that M_{max} ~ (1.203 +- 0.022) M_{TOV} for all the equations of state we have considered. We further show that a universal relation can be found between the dimensionless moment of inertia and the stellar compactness. Although this relation is not surprising as it involves two quantities that have been shown to exhibit universal behaviour with other stellar properties, our parameterisation represents a refinement over a similar relation by Lattimer and Schutz (2005), where a different normalisation was used, and could provide an accurate tool to constrain the equation of state of nuclear matter when measurements of the moment of inertia become available.