Phonological evidence for morpho-syntactic structure in Athapaskan

Athapaskan verbal morphology appears to violate the Mirror Principle in multiple ways and, thus, the ordering of affixes in these languages has resisted a straightforward analysis. We adopt a new morphological tool of Iterative Root Prefixation, which allows for a more direct mapping from syntax to morphology in languages of this profile. Apparent violations of affix ordering that remain, namely the puzzling placement of the transitive and causative morphemes, are argued to be explained by overriding phonological constraints.

Pochhammer–Chree equation solver for dispersion correction of elastic waves in a (split) Hopkinson bar

A robust algorithm for solving the Bancroft version of the Pochhammer–Chree (PC) equation is developed based on the iterative root-finding process. The formulated solver not only obtains the conventional n-series solutions but also derives a new series of solutions, named m-series solutions. The n-series solutions are located on the PC function surface that relatively gradually varies in the vicinity of the roots, whereas the m-series solutions are located between two PC function surfaces with (nearly) positive and negative infinity values. The proposed solver obtains a series of sound speeds at exactly the frequencies necessary for dispersion correction, and the derived solutions are accurate to the ninth decimal place. The solver is capable of solving the PC equation up to n = 20 and m = 20 in the ranges of Poisson’s ratio ( ν) of 0.02 [Formula: see text] ν [Formula: see text] 0.48, normalised frequency ( F) of F [Formula: see text] 30, and normalised sound speed ( C) of C [Formula: see text] 300. The developed algorithm was implemented in MATLAB®, which is available in the Supplemental Material (accessible online).

Shooting method for linear inviscid bi-global stability analysis of non-axisymmetric jets

The shooting method is commonly used to solve the linear parallel-flow stability problem for axisymmetric jets, i.e., a flow having one inhomogeneous direction. The present extension to two inhomogeneous directions – i.e., a bi-global stability problem – is motivated by inviscid non-axisymmetric jets. The azimuthal direction is Fourier transformed to obtain a set of coupled one-dimensional shooting problems that are solved by two-way integration from both radial boundaries – centreline and far field. The overall problem is formulated as one of iterative root-finding to match the solutions from the two integrations. The approach is validated against results from the well-established matrix method that discretizes the domain to obtain a matrix eigenvalue problem. We demonstrate very good agreement in two jet problems – an offset dual-stream jet, and a jet exiting from a nozzle with chevrons. A disadvantage of the shooting method is its sensitivity to the initial guess of the solution; however, this becomes an advantage when the need arises to track an eigensolution in a sweep over a problem parameter – say with increasing offset in the dual-stream jet, or with downstream distance from the nozzle exit. We demonstrate the performance of the shooting method in such tracking tasks.

On Iteration of Bijective Functions with Discontinuities

We present three different types of bijective functions f : I → I on a compact interval I with finitely many discontinuities where certain iterates of these functions will be continuous. All these examples are strongly related to permutations, in particular to derangements in the first case, and permutations with a certain number of successions (or small ascents) in the second case. All functions of type III form a direct product of a symmetric group with a wreath product. It will be shown that any iterative root F : J → J of the identity of order k on a compact interval J with finitely many discontinuities is conjugate to a function f of type III, i.e., F = φ−1 ∘ f ∘ φ where φ is a continuous, bijective, and increasing mapping between J and [0, n] for some integer n.

A Newton method for harmonic mappings in the plane

We present an iterative root finding method for harmonic mappings in the complex plane, which is a generalization of Newton’s method for analytic functions. The complex formulation of the method allows an analysis in a complex variables spirit. For zeros close to poles of $f = h + \overline{g}$ we construct initial points for which the harmonic Newton iteration is guaranteed to converge. Moreover, we study the number of solutions of $f(z) = \eta $ close to the critical set of $f$ for certain $\eta \in \mathbb{C}$. We provide a MATLAB implementation of the method, and illustrate our results with several examples and numerical experiments, including phase plots and plots of the basins of attraction.

Embeddability of pairs of weighted quasi-arithmetic means into a semiflow

We determine the form of all semiflows of pairs of weighted quasi-arithmetic means, those over positive dyadic numbers as well as the continuous ones. Then the iterability of such pairs is characterized: necessary and sufficient conditions for a given pair of weighted quasi-arithmetic means to be embeddable into a continuous semiflow are given. In particular, it turns out that surprisingly the existence of a square iterative root in the class of such pairs implies the embeddability.

Hybrid Artificial Root Foraging Optimizer Based Multilevel Threshold for Image Segmentation

This paper proposes a new plant-inspired optimization algorithm for multilevel threshold image segmentation, namely, hybrid artificial root foraging optimizer (HARFO), which essentially mimics the iterative root foraging behaviors. In this algorithm the new growth operators of branching, regrowing, and shrinkage are initially designed to optimize continuous space search by combining root-to-root communication and coevolution mechanism. With the auxin-regulated scheme, various root growth operators are guided systematically. With root-to-root communication, individuals exchange information in different efficient topologies, which essentially improve the exploration ability. With coevolution mechanism, the hierarchical spatial population driven by evolutionary pressure of multiple subpopulations is structured, which ensure that the diversity of root population is well maintained. The comparative results on a suit of benchmarks show the superiority of the proposed algorithm. Finally, the proposed HARFO algorithm is applied to handle the complex image segmentation problem based on multilevel threshold. Computational results of this approach on a set of tested images show the outperformance of the proposed algorithm in terms of optimization accuracy computation efficiency.

New stopping criteria for iterative root finding

A set of simple stopping criteria is presented, which improve the efficiency of iterative root finding by terminating the iterations immediately when no further improvement of the roots is possible. The criteria use only the function evaluations already needed by the root finding procedure to which they are applied. The improved efficiency is achieved by formulating the stopping criteria in terms of fractional significant digits. Test results show that the new stopping criteria reduce the iteration work load by about one-third compared with the most efficient stopping criteria currently available. This is achieved without compromising the accuracy of the extracted roots.