Blue phases are liquid crystals made up by networks of defects, or disclination lines. While existing phase diagrams show a striking variety of competing metastable topologies for these networks, very little is known as to how to kinetically reach a target structure, or how to switch from one to the other, which is of paramount importance for devices. We theoretically identify two confined blue phase I systems in which by applying an appropriate series of electric field it is possible to select one of two bistable defect patterns.

We consider the Dirichlet eigenvalue problem, (the eigenfunction) and ? > 0 (the eigen value), ? is an arbitrary domain in RN with finite measure, 1 < p < ?, 1 < q < p*, p* = Np/(N - p) if 1 < p < N and p* = ? if p >= N. We study several existence and uniqueness results as well as some properties of the solutions. Moreover, we indicate how to extend to the general case some proofs known in the classical case p = q. © 2010 Texas State University - San Marcos.

FORUM (Far-infrared Outgoing Radiation Understanding and Monitoring) is a Fourier Transform Spectrometer (FTS) that will fly as the 9th ESA's Earth Explorer mission. FORUM will sound the atmosphere in the 100-1600 cm-1 region, covering the Far Infrared (FIR) and part of the Middle Infrared (MIR), accounting for more than 95% of the outgoing longwave flux lost by our planet. We review the constrains for the emissivity retrieval.

Background Diagnosis and treatment of 22q11.2 deletion syndrome (22q11.2DS) have led to improved life expectancy and achievement of adulthood. Limited data on long-term outcomes reported an increased risk of premature death for cardiovascular causes, even without congenital heart disease (CHD).

We give a simple convexity-based proof of the following fact: the only eigenfunction of the p-Laplacian that does not change sign is the first one. The method of proof covers also more general nonlinear eigenvalue problems. © 2012 Springer Basel.

Mass currents in astrophysics generate gravitomagnetic fields of enormous complexity. Gravitomagnetic helicity, in direct analogy with magnetic helicity, is a measure of entwining of the gravitomagnetic field lines. We discuss gravitomagnetic helicity within the gravitoelectromagnetic (GEM) framework of linearized general relativity. Furthermore, we employ the spacetime curvature approach to GEM in order to determine the gravitomagnetic helicity for static observers in Kerr spacetime.

Given an open set ?, we consider the problem of providing sharp lower bounds for ? (?), i.e. its second Dirichlet eigenvalue of the p-Laplace operator. After presenting the nonlinear analogue of the Hong-Krahn-Szego inequality, asserting that the disjoint unions of two equal balls minimize ? among open sets of given measure, we improve this spectral inequality by means of a quantitative stability estimate. The extremal cases p = 1 and p = ? are considered as well. © 2012 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.

In this paper, we numerically investigate the breakup dynamics of droplets in an emulsion flowing in a tapered microchannel with a narrow constriction. The mesoscale approach for multicomponent fluids with near contact interactions is shown to capture the deformation and breakup dynamics of droplets interacting within the constriction, in agreement with experimental evidence. In addition, it permits us to investigate in detail the hydrodynamic phenomena occurring during breakup stages.