Anyons and the double copy

We examine the double copy structure of anyons in gauge theory and gravity. Using on-shell amplitude techniques, we construct little group covariant spinor-helicity variables describing massive particles with spin, which together with locality and unitarity enables us to derive the long-range tree-level scattering amplitudes involving anyons. We discover that classical gauge theory anyon solutions double copy to their gravitational counterparts in a non-trivial manner. Interestingly, we show that the massless double copy captures the topological structure of curved spacetime in three dimensions by introducing a non-trivial mixing of the topological graviton and the dilaton. Finally, we show that the celebrated Aharonov-Bohm phase can be derived directly from the constructed on-shell amplitude, and that it too enjoys a simple double copy to its gravitational counterpart.

Distribution of Panama’s narrow-range trees: are there hot-spots?

Background Tree species with narrow ranges are a conservation concern because heightened extinction risk accompanies their small populations. Assessing risks for these species is challenging, however, especially in tropical flora where their sparse populations seldom appear in traditional plots and inventories. Here, we utilize instead large scale databases that combine tree records from many sources to test whether the narrow-range tree species of Panama are concentrated at certain elevations or in certain provinces. Past investigations have suggested that the Choco region of eastern Panama and the high mountains of western Panama may be potential hotspots of narrow-range tree species. Methods All individual records were collected from public databases, and the range size of each tree species found in Panama was estimated as a polygon enclosing all its locations. Species with ranges <20,000 km2 were defined as narrow endemics. We divided Panama into geographic regions and elevation zones and counted the number of individual records and the species richness in each, separating narrow-range species from all other species. Results The proportion of narrow endemics peaked at elevations above 2000 m, reaching 17.2% of the species recorded. At elevation <1500 m across the country, the proportion was 6-11%, except in the dry Pacific region, where it was 1.5%. Wet forests of the Caribbean coast had 8.4% narrow-range species, slightly higher than other regions. The total number of narrow endemics, however, peaked at mid-elevation, not high elevation, because total species richness was highest at mid-elevation. Conclusions High elevation forests of west Panama had higher proportions of narrow endemic trees than low-elevation regions, supporting their hot-spot status, while dry lowland forests had the lowest proportion. This supports the notion that montane forests of Central America should be a conservation focus. However, given generally higher diversity at low- to mid-elevation, lowlands are also important habitats for narrow-range tree species, though conservation efforts here may not protect narrow-range tree species as efficiently.

Performance and host association of spotted lanternfly (Lycorma delicatula) among common woody ornamentals

Lycorma delicatula (spotted lanternfly) has a broad host range with a strong preference for the invasive host plant from its native range, tree of heaven (Ailanthus altissima); it had long been speculated that L. delicatula could not develop or reproduce without access to tree of heaven. In 2019, we found that this assumption was incorrect, but fitness was reduced in the absence of A. altissima in that the number of egg masses laid was dramatically fewer for insects reared on suitable non-A. altissima host plants that had recently been established. We hypothesized that longer established, larger trees (of the same species) would improve the fitness of L. delicatula in the absence of tree of heaven. In spring 2020, we examined insect performance with and without access to A. altissima by tracking development, survival, host tree association and oviposition in large enclosures with trees planted two years prior to the study. Each enclosure included one each of Juglans nigra, Salix babylonica and Acer saccharinum along with either one A. altissima or one Betula nigra; these trees had twice the diameter of the same trees the previous year. We reared nymphs with and without access to A. altissima, released them into the corresponding large enclosures as third instars, and monitored them from early July 2020 through November 2020. We also determined whether lack of access to A. altissima by parents of L. delicatula have any fitness effects on offspring performance. To ensure adequate adult populations for comparing fecundity between treatments, third instars were released into the multi-tree enclosures due to high mortality in earlier instars that occurred in a similar study in 2019. Insect survival was higher and development faster with access to A. altissima. Third and fourth instar nymphs were most frequently observed on A. altissima when it was present, while adults were equally associated with A. saccharinum and A. altissima. In the absence of A. altissima, nymphs were most frequently found on S. babylonica, while adults were most often on A. saccharinum. Females with access to A. altissima deposited nearly 7-fold more egg masses than those without access to A. altissima, which is consistent with the difference in egg mass numbers between the two treatments the previous year; thus, our hypothesis was rejected. The offspring of parents that had been reared without access to A. altissima showed similar survival and development time from egg to adult as offspring from parents that never had access to A. altissima. These findings suggest that managers need to be aware that even in the absence of A. altissima in the landscape, several hardwood host trees can be utilized by L. delicatula to develop and reproduce, but fitness without A. altissima is likely to still be reduced.

Privacy-Preserving Efficient Data Retrieval in IoMT Based on Low-Cost Fog Computing

The rapid development of Internet of Medical Things (IoMT) is remarkable. However, IoMT faces many problems including privacy disclosure, long delay of service orders, low retrieval efficiency of medical data, and high energy cost of fog computing. For these, this paper proposes a data privacy protection and efficient retrieval scheme for IoMT based on low-cost fog computing. First, a fog computing system is located between a cloud server and medical workers, for processing data retrieval requests of medical workers and orders for controlling medical devices. Simultaneously, it preprocesses physiological data of patients uploaded by IoMT, collates them into various data sets, and transmits them to medical institutions in this way. It makes the entire execution process of low latency and efficient. Second, multidimensional physiological data are of great value, and we use ciphertext retrieval to protect privacy of patient data in this paper. In addition, this paper uses range tree to build an index for storing physiological data vectors, and meanwhile a range retrieval method is also proposed to improve data search efficiency. Finally, bat algorithm (BA) is designed to allocate cost on a fog server group for significant energy cost reduction. Extensive experiments are conducted to demonstrate the efficiency of the proposed scheme.

Distribution of Panama’s narrow-range trees: are there hot-spots?

BackgroundTree species with narrow ranges are a conservation concern because heightened extinction risk accompanies their small populations. Assessing risks for these species is challenging, however, especially in tropical flora where their sparse populations seldom appear in traditional plots and inventories. Here, we utilize instead large scale databases that combine tree records from many sources to test hypotheses about where the narrow-range tree species of Panama are concentrated.MethodsAll individual records were collected from public databases, and the range size of each tree species found in Panama was estimated as a polygon around all its locations. Rare species were defined as those with ranges < 20,000 km2. We divided Panama into geographic regions and elevation zones and counted the number of individual records and the species richness in each, separating rare species from all other species.ResultsThe proportion of rare species peaked at elevations above 2000 m, reaching 17.3% of the species recorded. At lower elevation across the country, the proportion was 6-11%, except in the dry Pacific region, where it was 1.5%. Wet forests of the Caribbean coast had 8.4% rare species, slightly higher than other regions. The total number of rare species, however, peaked at mid-elevation, not high elevation, because total species richness was highest there.ConclusionsHigh elevation forests of west Panama have higher endemicity of trees than all low-elevation regions. Dry forests had the lowest endemicity. This supports the notion that montane forests of Central America should be a conservation focus, however, given generally higher diversity at low- to mid-elevation, lowlands are also important habitats for rare species.

Variability of volatiles in Pinus cembra L. within and between trees from a stand in the Salzburg Alps (Austria) as assessed by essential oil and SPME analysis

Pinus cembra L. is a coniferous European mountain range tree rich in oleoresins and essential oils. Twig tips with needles are the most common tree parts used to obtain essential oils. As the whole tree contains volatiles, the essential oil composition from different parts was studied, including twig tips with needles from the bottom, the top and the cone bearing branches, cones, twigs without needles from the lower and upper part of the crown as well as wood and bark from the trunk. The variability in essential oil composition between these plant parts and between individual trees has been studied using multivariate statistical analyses. α-Pinene was present in all samples, being highest in cones (49.3%) and lowest in sapwood (0.7%). Twig tips with needles from different parts of the crown had similar essential oil composition with α-pinene (43.9–48.3%), β-phellandrene (13.1–17.2%), β-pinene (6.6–9.3%), germacrene D (5.1–6.8%) and limonene (4.1–6.1%) as main compounds. Twig essential oils had usually more β-phellandrene (23.9–29.8%) than α-pinene (23.3–24.3%) and also appreciable amounts of β-pinene (13.5–15.1%) and limonene (11.9–17.9%). Cone essential oils contained mainly α-pinene, β-pinene (20.1%) and limonene (13.9%). The essential oils from wood and bark were rich in diterpenes as cembratrienol (4.9–21.4%), cembrene (4.8–14.3%) and methyl daniellate (2.7–6.8%). Sapwood distillates contained also notable amounts of alkane derivatives. Finally, the solvent free SPME technique has been employed to analyse the volatiles in the plant parts. For needles and cones the observed patterns were in good accordance with the compositions of the respective essential oils.

Integrating tree-ring and wine data from the Palatinate (Germany)

&lt;p&gt;Tree-ring growth of conifer trees originating from central European low mountain ranges often reveal indistinct growth-climate relationships. Temperature variations can play a crucial role, whereas water availability can also control the annual growth and become the main dominating factor. The low mountain range Pf&amp;#228;lzerwald in the Palatinate region represents the largest contiguous forested area in Germany and features at its most eastern limitation a unique ecological setting due to its sandy soils and reduced water availability. In addition, its north-south orientation and associated lee-effects due to predominating westerlies together with altitudinal differences of more than 300 m lead to higher temperatures, lower precipitation amounts, and, as a forest management consequence, to a proportion of up to 80 % of pine trees. Despite these exceptional ecological and climatological prerequisites, calibrating tree-ring width data from 487 Pinus sylvestris core samples against regional meteorological stations (1950-2011) and gridded data (1901-2011) confirm alternating climate control mechanisms. Comparison with drought-related indices (scPDSI), combining precipitation and temperature, unfolds highest correlations with May-July conditions (r&lt;sub&gt;1901-2011&lt;/sub&gt;=0.34, p&lt;0.05), however, lacking temporal robustness in the early 20&lt;sup&gt;th&lt;/sup&gt; century.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;The vegetation outside the forested areas in the plain can be characterized as agricultural croplands with vineyards, representing one of the largest wine-growing regions in Germany. We collected and analyzed a 24 datasets of 57 consecutive years (1959-2015) of must sugar content, acidity, alcohol content, and sugar-free extracts in Riesling, Pinot Gris, Pinot Blanc, and Silvaner wines, originating from 15 wineries adjoining the forested area into the plain. Correlation of Riesling must sugar content against regional April-August temperature data reveals a highly significant signal (r&lt;sub&gt;1981-2015&lt;/sub&gt;=0.73, p&lt;0.01; high-pass filtered r=0.49, p&lt;0.01). Sugar-free extract variations of Pinot Gris are significantly controlled by March-September precipitation (r&lt;sub&gt;2004-2014&lt;/sub&gt;=0.76, p&lt;0.01; high-pass filtered r=0.77, p&lt;0.01).&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;In this low mountain range, tree-ring growth from conifers is not solely controlled by one climatic variable, though it is that combining tree-rings with must sugar content and sugar-free extract data from Riesling and Pinot Gris wine can further elucidate our understanding of longer-term climate variability in the Palatinate region.&lt;/p&gt;

Efficient query processing in distributed database systems

Στο πλαίσιο της παρούσας Διδακτορικής Διατριβής χρησιμοποιήθηκε εκτενώς η Κατανεμημένη Δομή ART (Autonomous Range Tree) η οποία αποτέλεσε την βάση για την υλοποίηση μίας σειράς αποδοτικών συστημάτων κατανεμημένης διαχείρισης δεδομένων σε ποικίλα πεδία εφαρμογών, όπως: εξομοιωτές μέτρησης της απόδοσης διαφορετικών αλγορίθμων κατανεμημένης δόμησης (P2P Infrastructures or overlays), διαχείριση ψηφιακών δικαιωμάτων σε υποδομές ανταλλαγής προστατευμένου ψηφιακού υλικού, διαχείριση δεδομένων που αναπαριστούν επίπεδα ενέργειας σε δίκτυα αισθητήρων και διαχείριση χώρο-χρονικών δεδομένων που αναπαριστούν τροχιές κινούμενων αντικειμένων στο επίπεδο.