The main result concerning the stability of an inviscid liquid column, which is at rest, is due to Rayleigh [1], who showed that, taking account of capillarity at the surface, the column will be unstable to small axisymmetric disturbances whose wavelengths in the axial direction are greater than the circumference of the cross-section. The reason for such instabilities is simply that disturbances of these wavelengths decrease the surface area of the column and hence make available excess surface energy which goes into building up the disturbance. The effects of rotation on the stability of a column having a free surface do not appear to have been studied and this note establishes some simple results concerning the effect of plane two-dimensional disturbances on a rotating column. With regard to the stability of rotating fluids in general there is another result due to Rayleigh [2] stating that the fluid will be unstable if the numerical value of the circulation decreases with the radius at any point. But this result is again for axisymmetric disturbances, and hence does not necessarily bear any relationship to the results for plane disturbances which, in the case of an incompressible liquid as is assumed here, cannot be axisymmetric. A result more closely related to this work is that of Kelvin [3] who considered the stability of a column of uniform vorticity in a fluid otherwise free of vorticity. Such a column is stable to two-dimensional and to three-dimensional disturbances.

In this note those quotient groups of the absolute class group of number fields are to be studied which can be described in terms of absolutely Abelian fields. This investigation will be based on a suitable generalization of the classical concepts of the principal genus, the genus group and the genus field. One possible description of the genus group in a cyclic field is that as the maximal quotient group of the absolute class group which is characterized by rational congruence conditions, i.e. in terms of rational residue characters. From this point of view, however, the restriction to cyclic—or Abelian—fields is quite artificial; the given description can thus be taken as the definition of the genus group in any finite number field. In general the genus field will then no longer be absolutely Abelian; it can now be described as the maximal non-ramified extension obtained by composing the given field with absolutely Abelian fields.

Let R be a simple ring. If R contains at least one minimal nonzero one-sided ideal, then R has zero-divisors, unless R is a division ring. However, simple rings exist which are not division rings and have no zero-divisors. Our present object is to prove the following embedding theorem:

Theorem 1. Every ring R without zero-divisors may be embedded in a simple ring R* without zero-divisors. If there is a non-zero element ƒ in R satisfying ƒ2 = nƒ, where n is an integer, then R* necessarily has a unit-element; otherwise R* may be chosen to have no unit-element.

Extreme value problems and particularly those arising in the combinatorial field have a peculiar interest and challenge in that an exact solution is rarely possible. We discuss here four combinatorial extreme value problems each concerned with the distribution of the largest (or smallest) of a set of mutually dependent variables. These problems, widely different in character possess three points in common. First the probability distribution functions of the variables considered cannot be obtained explicitly, nor secondly can the moments of the variable, and thirdly the probability distribution functions are difficult to evaluate even for moderate sized samples. We shall treat the situation where the variables, or functions of them, have probability distribution functions which tend to an exponential limit, analogous to the well-known limit for extreme values in the case of independent events. The p.d.f.'s for the upper tails of the distributions which we consider are found to be very closely contained within a pair of inequalities (Bonferroni Inequalities), especially in the regions of statistical significance.

Multiplications on spheres are studied in [11], [12] from the standpoint of homotopy theory. These multiplications are products with a unit element. The present paper deals with products in general. The investigation involves proving some results on the toric construction and the Whitehead product. These results also lead to theorems about the Stiefel manifold of unit tangent vectors to a sphere, originally proved by M. G. Barratt, which clear up some points in the homotopy theory of sphere bundles over spheres (see [15], [16]). They also enable us to prove that certain of the classical Lie groups are not homotopy-commutative.

In the present paper a general solution of the equations of elasticity in complete aeolotropy is found under the assumption that the stresses and therefore the strains are linear in the third cartesian coordinate. This solution is applied to the elastic equilibrium of a completely aeolotropic cylinder, under a distribution of tractions on the lateral surface and resultant forces and couples on the end sections of the cylinder. The problem of extension of a completely aeolotropic cylinder by longitudinal lateral loading and end forces is solved with an application to the elliptic cylinder. The writer hopes to present in later communications applications of this general solution to the following problems: (i) Bending of a completely aeolotropic cylinder by longitudinal lateral loading and end bending couples, (ii) Torsion of a completely aeolotropic cylinder by transverse lateral loading and end twisting couples, (iii) Flexure with shear of a completely aeolotropic cylinder with free lateral surface. Particular cases of (ii) and (iii) were considered by Luxenberg [1] and Lechnitzky [2, 3].

In its simplest form, the theorem of Ascoli with which we are concerned is an extension of the Bolzano-Weierstrass theorem: it states that, if X and Y are bounded closed sets, of real or complex numbers, andis a sequence of equicontinuous functions mapping X into Y, thenhas a uniformly convergent subsequence. As is well known, this result has played a fundamental part in the development of several theories; it has also been widely generalized, by processes of abstraction and localization, and a very useful version of the theorem runs as follows (cf. [4], 233–234):

(A) Suppose that X is a locally compact regular space, and that Y is a Hausdorff space whose topology is determined by a uniform structure. Let YX be the space of all functions that map X into Y, with the topology of locally uniform convergence with respect to. Then a closed setin YX is compact if, at each point x of X, (i) the set(x) is relatively compact, in Y, and, (ii) is equicontinuous with respect to.

The commutative and entropic congruence relations determine a homomorphism on the free logarithmetic , the arithmetic of the indices of powers of the generating element of a free cyclic groupoid. A necessary and sufficient condition that two indices should be concordant (i.e. congruent in the free commutative entropic logarithmetic) is that the bifurcating trees corresponding to these indices should have the same number of free ends at each altitude. It follows that the free commutative entropic logarithmetic can be represented faithfully by index ψ-polynomials (or θ-polynomials) in one indeterminate.

In the concluding section enumeration formulæ are obtained for the number of non-concordant indices of a given altitude and for the number of indices concordant to a given index.

The distribution of xn, the number of occurrences of a given one of k possible states of a non-homogeneous Markov chain {Pj} in n successive trials, is considered. It is shown that if Pn → P, a positive-regular stochastic matrix, as n → ∞ then the distribution about its mean of xn/n½ tends to normality, and that the variance tends to that of the corresponding distribution associated with the homogeneous chain {P}.

The presence of a non-uniform distribution of temperature in an elastic solid gives rise to an additional term in the generalized Hooke's Law connecting the stress and strain tensors and to a term involving the time rate of change of the dilatation in the equation governing the conduction of heat in the solid. The present paper is concerned with the effects produced by these additional terms in two simple situations. In the first, the elastic solid is regarded as being of infinite extent and the distribution of temperature in the solid is produced by heat sources whose strength may vary with time. In the second, the solid is supposed to be semi-infinite and to be deformed by prescribed variations in the temperature of the bounding plane and by heat sources within itself.

If the temperature in an elastic rod is not uniform and if it varies with time, dynamic thermal stresses are set up in the rod. This paper is concerned with the calculation of the distribution of temperature and stress in an elastic rod when its ends are subjected to mechanical or thermal disturbances. Simple waves in an infinite rod are first discussed and then boundary value problems for semi-infinite rods and rods of finite length. The paper concludes with an account of an approximate method of solving the equations of thermoelasticity.

The roots of the equation zez = a are of importance in several theories. Various authors have studied certain of their properties over more than a century. Here we solve the equation, in the sense that we define the sequence {Zn} of roots and, except for a small, finite number of values of n, find a rapidly convergent series for Zn. The terms in this series are alternately real and purely imaginary and so the series is very convenient for calculation. For the few remaining roots, we give practicable methods of numerical calculation and supply an auxiliary table.

The main results of this article have been announced without proof or details in Wright 1959.

Let Q(x1 …, xn) be an indefinite quadratic form in n variables with real coefficients. Suppose that when Q is expressed as a sum of squares of real linear forms, with positive and negative signs, there are r positive signs and n—r negative signs. It was proved recently by Birch and Davenport that, if

then for any ε > 0 the inequality

is soluble in integers x1, …, xn, not all 0.

Let λ(n) be Liouville's function denned by

where v is the number of prime factors of n, repeated factors being counted according to their multiplicity. Alternatively, λ(n) may be denned by the relation

where ζ(s) is the zeta function of Riemann.

Let Q be a complete local ring which has the same characteristic as its residue field P, and, for the present, let us denote by A the image of a subset A of Q under the natural homomorphism of Q onto P. Then a subfield F of Q is called a coefficient field if = P. It has been shown in [2] and in [3] that a complete equicharacteristic local ring, such as the above, always possesses at least one coefficient field; this is the embedding theorem for the equicharacteristic case.

Given a series we define , by the relations

The series is said to be summable (C, k), where k > - 1, to the sum s if

to be summable (C, - 1) to s if it converges to s and nan = o(l); to be absolutely summable (C, k), or summable | C, k, to s if it is summable (C, k) to s and

and to be strongly Cesàro summable to s with order k > 0 and index p or summable [C; k, p] to s, if

In a recent paper [1], the author divided the semi-special permutations on [n] that are not linear into two classes. The first class consists of the semi-special permutations which, for all possible values of s, have s as a principal number and which induce modulo s the identity permutation. The second class consists of all the semi-special permutations, with principal number s, which induce modulo s linear permutations other than the identity, where again s takes all its possible values.