Many stochastic time series can be described by a Langevin equation composed of a deterministic and a stochastic dynamical part. Such a stochastic process can be reconstructed by means of a recently introduced nonparametric method, thus increasing th
e predictability, i.e. knowledge of the macroscopic drift and the microscopic diffusion functions. If the measurement of a stochastic process is affected by additional strong measurement noise, the reconstruction process cannot be applied. Here, we present a method for the reconstruction of stochastic processes in the presence of strong measurement noise, based on a suitably parametrized ansatz. At the core of the process is the minimization of the functional distance between terms containing the conditional moments taken from measurement data, and the corresponding ansatz functions. It is shown that a minimization of the distance by means of a simulated annealing procedure yields better results than a previously used Levenberg-Marquardt algorithm, which permits a rapid and reliable reconstruction of the stochastic process.
We study the influence of particle shape anisotropy on the occurrence of avalanches in sheared granular media. We use molecular dynamic simulations to calculate the relative movement of two tectonic plates. % with transform boundaries. Our model cons
iders irregular polygonal particles constituting the material within the shear zone. We find that the magnitude of the avalanches is approximately independent on particle shape and in good agreement with the Gutenberg-Richter law, but the aftershock sequences are strongly influenced by the particle anisotropy yielding variations on the exponent characterizing the empirical Omoris law. Our findings enable one to identify the presence of anisotropic particles at the macro-mechanical level only by observing the avalanche sequences of real faults. In addition, we calculate the probability of occurrence of an avalanche for given values of stiffness or frictional strength and observe also a significant influence of the particle anisotropy.
We introduce two improvements in the numerical scheme to simulate collision and slow shearing of irregular particles. First, we propose an alternative approach based on simple relations to compute the frictional contact forces. The approach improves
efficiency and accuracy of the Discrete Element Method (DEM) when modeling the dynamics of the granular packing. We determine the proper upper limit for the integration step in the standard numerical scheme using a wide range of material parameters. To this end, we study the kinetic energy decay in a stress controlled test between two particles. Second, we show that the usual way of defining the contact plane between two polygonal particles is, in general, not unique which leads to discontinuities in the direction of the contact plane while particles move. To solve this drawback, we introduce an accurate definition for the contact plane based on the shape of the overlap area between touching particles, which evolves continuously in time.
What is a complex network? How do we characterize complex networks? Which systems can be studied from a network approach? In this text, we motivate the use of complex networks to study and understand a broad panoply of systems, ranging from physics a
nd biology to economy and sociology. Using basic tools from statistical physics, we will characterize the main types of networks found in nature. Moreover, the most recent trends in network research will be briefly discussed.
We generalize the recent study of random space-filling bearings to a more realistic situation, where the spacing offset varies randomly during the space-filling procedure, and show that it reproduces well the size-distributions observed in recent stu
dies of real fault gouges. In particular, we show that the fractal dimensions of random polydisperse bearings sweep predominantly the low range of values in the spectrum of fractal dimensions observed along real faults, which strengthen the evidence that polydisperse bearings may explain the occurrence of seismic gaps in nature. In addition, the influence of different distributions for the offset is studied and we find that the uniform distribution is the best choice for reproducing the size-distribution of fault gouges.
