A particular solution to the biharmonic equation is described which represents a slow viscous flow near a sharp edge. It shows separation streamlines which are tangential to the plate at the edge, when the dominant behaviour there is a combination of the flow around the edge (which provides zero vorticity on the plate) plus a simple linear shear.

A relationship between a new and an old graph invariant is established. The first invariant is connected to the ‘sandglass conjecture’ of [1]. The second one is graph entropy, an information theoretic functional, which is already known to be relevant in several combinatorial contexts.

In this paper we carry out a linear stability analysis within the Stokes layer that, under suitable conditions, forms at the surface of a circular cylinder in periodic orbital motion. The analysis is related to that performed by Seminara [1,2] in the Stokes layer on a torsionally oscillating cylinder and by Hall [3] in the Stokes layer at the surface of a cylinder in purely oscillatory motion. In all cases we find that the minimum critical Taylor number is located where the flow at the edge of the Stokes layer has maximum speed in each period of the motion.

It is known that if A and B are nontriangular 2 × 2 non-negative integral matrices similar over the integers and –tr A ≤det A, then A and B are strongly shift equivalent. Suppose that A and B are 2 × 2 non-negative integral matrices similar over the integers. In this article it is shown that if –2 tr A≤det A <– tr A and if | det A | is not a prime, then A and B are strongly shift equivalent.

Let G=(V, E) be a simple connected graph of order [mid ]V[mid ]=n[ges ]2 and minimum degree δ, and let 2[les ]s[les ]n. We define two parameters, the s-average distance μs(G) and the s-average nearest neighbour distance Λs(G), with respect to each of which V contains an extremal subset X of order s with vertices ‘as spread out as possible’ in G. We compute the exact values of both parameters when G is the cycle Cn, and show how to obtain the corresponding optimal arrangements of X. Sharp upper and lower bounds are then established for Λs(G), as functions of s, n and δ, and the extremal graphs described.

Let W denote a positive, increasing and continuous function on [1, ∞]. We write to denote the Dirichlettype space of functions f that are holomorphic in the unit disc and for which

Where If W(x) = x for all x, then is the classicial Dirichlet space for which Note also that for every so, by Fatu's theoreum, every function in . ha finite radial(and angular) limits a.e. on the boundary of U. The question of the existence a.e. on ∂U of certain tangential limits for functions in has been considered in [6,11], but we shall be concerned here with the radial variation

i.e., the length of the image of the ray from 0 to eiθ under the mapping w = f(z), and, in particular, with the size of the set of values of θ for which Lf(θ) can be infinite when

Many elastodynamic solutions exist for wave interactions with defects upon or within an elastic half space bounded above by a vacuum. The aim of this paper is to significantly widen the scope of these solutions by showing that they can be directly utilized, when the vacuum is replaced by a fluid, to find the leading order acoustic (or elastic) responses in the light fluid-loading limit. Using the procedure developed here one can take virtually any elastodynamic solution and use it to generate the leading-order solution for a fluid-loaded elastic solid.

We present two new models describing the dynamic behavior of an automotive thermostat, involving delay-differential equations with hysteresis. Existence, uniqueness, and regularity of the solutions for both models are obtained by a continuation argument. We establish sufficient conditions for the models to exhibit intrinsic oscillations. We also present an algorithm for numerical approximations of the solutions and give some representative numerical simulations. These reveal a rather interesting dynamical behavior of the solutions.

We prove that the thin film equation ht+div (hn grad (Δh))=0 in dimension d[ges ]2 has a unique C1 source-type radial self-similar non-negative solution if 0<n<3 and has no solution of this type if n[ges ]3. When 0<n3 the solution h has finite speed of propagation and we obtain the first order asymptotic behaviour of h at the interface or free boundary separating the regions where h>0 and h=0. (The case d=1 was already known [1]).

In this paper we deal with the one-dimensional Stefan problem

ut−uxx=s˙(t)δ(x−s(t)) in ℝ ;× ℝ+, u(x, 0)=u0(x)

with kinetic condition s˙(t)=f(u) on the free boundary F={(x, t), x=s(t)}, where δ(x) is the Dirac function. We proved in [1] that if [mid ]f(u)[mid ][les ]Meγ[mid ]u[mid ] for some M>0 and γ∈(0, 1/4), then there exists a global solution to the above problem; and the solution may blow up in finite time if f(u)[ges ]Ceγ1[mid ]u[mid ] for some γ1 large. In this paper we obtain the optimal exponent, which turns out to be √2πe. That is, the above problem has a global solution if [mid ]f(u)[mid ][les ]Meγ[mid ]u[mid ] for some γ∈(0, √2πe), and the solution may blow up in finite time if f(u)[ges ]Ce√2πe[mid ]u[mid ].

The onset of shear-banding in a deforming elastoplastic solid has been linked to change of type of the governing partial differential equations. If uniform material properties are assumed, then (i) deformations prior to shear-banding are uniform, and (ii) the onset of shear-banding occurs simultaneously at all points in the sample. In this paper we study, in the context of a model for anti-plane shearing of a granular material, the effect of a small variation in material properties (e.g. in yield strength) within the sample. Using matched asymptotic expansions, we find that (i) the deformation is extremely non-uniform in a short time period immediately preceding the formation of shear-bands; and (ii) generically, a shear-band forms at a single location in the sample.

In this note we give a probabilistic proof of the existence of an n-vertex graph Gn, n=1, 2, [ctdot ], such that, for some constant c>0, the edges of Gn cannot be covered by n−c log n complete bipartite subgraphs of Gn. This result improves a previous bound due to F. R. K. Chung and is the best possible up to a constant.

We determine lower bounds for the number of random binary vectors, chosen uniformly from vectors of weight k, needed to obtain a dependent set.

We show that an old but not well-known lower bound for the crossing number of a graph yields short proofs for a number of bounds in discrete plane geometry which were considered hard before: the number of incidences among points and lines, the maximum number of unit distances among n points, the minimum number of distinct distances among n points.

Suppose that [Cscr]={cij[ratio ]i, j[ges ]1} is a collection of i.i.d. nonnegative continuous random variables and suppose T is a rooted, directed tree on vertices labelled 1,2,[ctdot ],n. Then the ‘cost’ of T is defined to be c(T)=[sum ](i,j)∈Tcij, where (i, j) denotes the directed edge from i to j in the tree T. Let Tn denote the ‘optimal’ tree, i.e. c(Tn)=min{c(T)[ratio ]T is a directed, rooted tree in with n vertices}. We establish general conditions on the asymptotic behaviour of the moments of the order statistics of the variables c11, c12, [ctdot ], cin which guarantee the existence of sequences {an}, {bn}, and {dn} such that b−1n(c(Tn)−an)→N(0, 1) in distribution, d−1nc(Tn)→1 in probability, and d−1nE(c(Tn))→1 as n→∞, and we explicitly determine these sequences. The proofs of the main results rely upon the properties of general random mappings of the set {1, 2, [ctdot ], n} into itself. Our results complement and extend those obtained by McDiarmid [9] for optimal branchings in a complete directed graph.

For a graph G=(V, E) on n vertices, where 3 divides n, a triangle factor is a subgraph of G, consisting of n/3 vertex disjoint triangles (complete graphs on three vertices). We discuss the problem of determining the minimal probability p=p(n), for which a random graph G∈[Gscr](n, p) contains almost surely a triangle factor. This problem (in a more general setting) has been studied by Alon and Yuster and by Ruciński, their approach implies p=O((log n/n)1/2). Our main result is that p=O(n)−3/5) already suffices. The proof is based on a multiple use of the Janson inequality. Our approach can be extended to improve known results about the threshold for the existence of an H-factor in [Gscr](n, p) for various graphs H.

Let Q be a stochastic matrix and I be the identity matrix. We show by a direct combinatorial approach that the coefficients of the characteristic polynomial of the matrix I−Q are log-concave. We use this fact to prove a new bound for the second-largest eigenvalue of Q.

Thomassen [6] conjectured that if I is a set of k−1 arcs in a k-strong tournament T, then T−I has a Hamiltonian cycle. This conjecture was proved by Fraisse and Thomassen [3]. We prove the following stronger result. Let T=(V, A) be a k-strong tournament on n vertices and let X1, X2, [ctdot ], Xl be a partition of the vertex set V of T such that [mid ]X1[mid ][les ][mid ]X2[mid ][les ][ctdot ][les ][mid ]Xl[mid ]. If k[ges ][sum ]l−1i=1[lfloor][mid ]Xi[mid ]/2[rfloor]+[mid ]Xl[mid ], then T−∪li=1{xy∈A[ratio ]x, y∈Xi} has a Hamiltonian cycle. The bound on k is sharp.

Let D1 and D2 be two dice with k and l integer faces, respectively, where k and l are two positive integers. The game Gn consists of tossing each die n times and summing the resulting faces. The die with the higher total wins the game. We examine the question of which die wins game Gn more often, for large values of n. We also give an example of a set of three dice which is non-transitive in game Gn for infinitely many values of n.

We show that there are almost surely only finitely many times at which there are at least four ‘tied’ favourite edges for a simple random walk. This (partially) answers a question of Erdős and Révész.