Date :

 07-10,December 2007

Place :

 07, 10 December 2007: The auditorium on 1st floor, Institute of Physics of Academia Sinica, Taipei

 08-09 December 2007: Room B03 of Science Building, Chung-Yuan Christian University, Chungli

 National Center for Theoretical Sciences (Critical Phenomena and Complex Systems Focus Group)

 Department of Physics, Chung-Yuan Christian University, Chungli

 Institute of Physics of Academia Sinica (Taipei)

    Welcome to attend "2007 NCTS December Workshop on Critical Phenomena and Complex Systems" at Institute of Physics of Academia Sinica on 7 and 10 December 2007 and Chung-Yuan Christian University (CYCU) on 8 and 9 December 2007.  If you will attend the workshop and/or you need a hotel room at  Academia Sinica (for the nights of 6 and 7 December) or CYCU (for the night of 8 December), please send a message and your contact information to Miss Shumin Yang 楊淑閔 (E-mail: shumin@phys.sinica.edu.tw, phone: 02-27822467, 0921-990-461) on or before 5 December 2007.
   At 8:20 on 8 December 2007, a minibus will park in the front of Academic Activity Center of Academia Sinica. The bus will leave for National Palace Museum at 8:30 on 8 December 2007. A free guided tour of National Palace Museum will take place from 9:20 to 11:10. The bus will leave National Palace Museum for Chung-Yuan Christian University at 11:20. The talks at CYCU will begin at 14:00 on 8 December in room B03 (in basement) of Science Building (Building 30 in the map http://www.cycu.edu.tw/cycu/newcycu/main/campus.html). If you will attend the workshop at CYCU and will take the minibus, please send a message to Miss Shumin Yang on or before 5 December 2007. If you will not attend the workshop at CYCU, please do not take the mini-bus.
   After the workshop on 9 December at CYCU, the minibus will take the participants back to Taipei.

 Miss Chia-Chi Liu (Secretary, Physics Division, NCTS)
 Tel:(886)-2-33665566; Fax:(886)-2-33665565; E-mail: ccliu@phys.ntu.edu.tw

 Miss Shu-Min Yang (Assistant of LSCP, Institute of Physics, Academia Sinica)

 Tel: (886)-2-2782-2467, or (886)-2-27880058 ext. 6012; FAX: (886)-2-2782-2467; E-mail: shumin@phys.sinica.edu.tw

Speakers :

Prof. Chia-Fu Chou
Institute of Physics, Academia Sinica, TAIWAN

E-mail: cfchou@phys.sinica.edu.tw

Single Molecule Analysis in Nanofluidic Channels-How Far Can We Go?
    Nanoscale fluidic channels have been constructed for molecular stretching using reverse nanoimprinting and a newly developed room-temperature composite sealing process for channels below 10 nm. The stretching of single DNA has been demonstrated in these nano-confined environments with channel diameters comparable to the persistence length of DNA. This approach opens up new opportunities for the study of DNA statics and dynamics, direct mapping of transcriptional factors or protein binding along DNA, and even single molecule sequencing. We will review the current status and challenges of performing molecular analysis using nanofluidic channels.
　

Prof. Chia-Ju Liu
Graduate Institute of Science Education, Kaohsiung Normal University, TAIWAN
E-mail: chiajuju@ms26.hinet.net

Applying Nonlinear Measurements to Analyze EEG Signals

Dr. N.Sh. Izmailian
Yerevan Physics Institute, ARMENIA
E-mail: izmailan@phys.sinica.edu.tw

Universal Amplitude Ratios in the Ising Model: Effect of Boundary Conditions

    Influence of the boundary conditions on the finite-size scaling properties of the one-dimensional quantum Ising model is analyzed by exact calculations and perturbation theoretic arguments. We  present exact results for a new set of universal amplitude ratios in the finite-size correction terms for the one-dimensional quantum Ising model on a finite width strip with free and antiperiodic boundary conditions.

Prof. Hawoong Jeong
Dept. of Physics, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, KOREA
E-mail: hjeong@kaist.ac.kr

Structure and Dynamics of Complex Networks (Part I & II)

    Complex systems as diverse as the Internet or the cell can be described by networks with complex topology. Traditionally it has been assumed that these networks are random. However, recent studies indicate that such complex systems emerge as a result of self-organizing processes governed by simple but generic laws, resulting in inhomogeneous scale-free topologies strikingly different from those predicted by random networks. Such studies also lead to a paradigm shift regarding our approach to complex systems, allowing us to view them as dynamical systems rather than static graphs. I will review historical development of complex network studies, and discuss the applications of these findings on many diverse areas. Also recent research activities especially on dynamical aspect of complex network will be presented, including large-scale data analysis of social networking service (SNS) and price of anarchy of transportation networks, and understanding robustness of metabolic networks.

Dr. Pradeep Kumar

Center for Studies in Physics and Biology, The Rockefeller University, USA

E-mail: pradeep.kumar@rockefeller.edu

1. Anomalies of Liquid Water

    Water exhibits many unusual thermodynamic and dynamic behaviors compared to other liquids-- also known as water anomalies.  I will talk about some of these and how these anomalies can be explained by the hypothesis of a first order liquid-liquid phase transition in water at low temperatures and high pressures.  This phase transition can not be seen in experiments on bulk water as it is hypothesized to occur below the homogeneous nucleation temperature of water, where bulk water freezes spontaneously. I will give a brief overview of the recent progress made using computer simulations and experiments on water in nano confinements.

2. Hydration Water and Protein-Glass Transition

    A puzzling feature in the behavior of a wide range of proteins, is namely a phenomenon usually called a ``protein glass transition'', which occurs at low temperatures (~200-220K) , below which the protein is too rigid to function.  Some have thought that there is an intrinsic ``glass transition'' in the protein, while others have speculated that the this transition has something to do with the thin ``skin'' of water (usually called ``hydration water'') surrounding each protein. I will talk about the role of water (hydration) and how the thermodynamic, dynamic and structural changes in water can drive the dynamic crossover seen in many proteins at low temperatures.

Prof. Piotr E. Marszalek

Department of Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science, Duke University, USA

E-mail: pemar@duke.edu

1. Mechanical Unfolding and Refolding Reactions of Proteins by Single-Molecule Force Spectroscopy

    Many modular proteins such as titin, fibronectin, tenascin, spectrin or ankyrin play important roles in regulating molecular elasticity of the structures that they support, such as muscle, extracellular matrix, cytoskeleton, membranes and membrane channels. In this talk I will review my past and most recent research on the nanomechanics of single proteins, which I investigate with the atomic force microscope (AFM). Because AFM can apply both small and large forces to proteins, it can be used to measure their elasticity and also to examine in detail their mechanical unraveling. I will compare the elastic and mechanical unfolding/refolding properties of two important proteins: titin, which is composed of independently folded domains that regulate the passive elasticity of muscle, and ankyrin, which is composed of tightly packed amino acid repeats forming an extended superhelical tertiary structure, which is responsible for mediating protein-protein interactions and mechanotransduction.

2. Nanoscale DNA Diagnostics by AFM

    DNA damage is the first step in the initiation of cancer.  Detecting DNA damage is very laborious and present methods lack both sensitivity and specificity. In this talk I will review our current work aimed at combining Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM) and single molecule force spectroscopy, with DNA enzymology to develop new assays for DNA damage detection and for elucidating the mechanism of DNA mismatch repair (MMR).

3. Investigating Novel Conformations of Sugars by Single-Molecule Force Spectroscopy and Computational Methods

    Polysaccharides are biopolymers composed of sugar rings. They are fundamental structural elements of the cell wall in plants and in higher organisms they are used to store energy and serve as lubricants, provide support to cellular elements of tissues and also participate in numerous molecular recognition and adhesive interactions. They are frequently subjected to mechanical forces in vivo. In this talk I will review my past and most recent research on the nanomechanics of single polysaccharides, which I investigate with the atomic force microscope (AFM). Because AFM can apply significant mechanical forces to polysaccharides it can induce their transitions to new conformations, which are typically not sampled in equilibrium. Thus, AFM methodologies can provide unique data about polysaccharides’ properties in high energy conformations, which are not accessible to conventional methods of measurements such as NMR spectroscopy and X-ray crystallography.  To aid the interpretation of my single-molecule mechanical measurements with the AFM, I also model the elastic properties and conformations of sugars using quantum mechanical and molecular dynamics methodologies. These experimental and numerical studies of polysaccharides under various mechanical loads expand the new field of single molecule mechanochemistry.

Prof. Chung-Yuan Mou

Department of Chemistry, National Taiwan University, TAIWAN

E-mail: Cymou@ccms.ntu.edu.tw

Experimental Studies on Deeply Cooled Water

    By confining water in nanopores, so narrow that the liquid cannot freeze, it is possible to explore its properties well below its homogeneous nucleation temperature 235 K. In particular, the dynamical parameters of water can be measured down to 180 K. Mesoporous silica possesses uniform and tunable pore size between 12 and 100 Å. Water confined in the nanopores of mesoporous silica, MCM-41-S shift their melting temperature downward to a large extent. The melting temperature could be as low as –63 oC. for a sample of 18 Å diameter. Melting transition temperatures were measured as a function of pore sizes of mesoporous silica and carbon and compared with the predictions of Gibbs-Thomson equation. Melting transition disappears for pore size below 18 Å. Thus liquid water can be studied at deeply supercooled region.

    In a series of experiments, by using both neutron scattering and NMR spectroscopies, we found a fragile-to-strong dynamic crossover (FSC) at 225 K where it marks a transition from a Vogel-Fulcher-Tamman (VFT) to an Arrhenius behaviour in dynamical parameters such as the average translational relaxation time and the inverse self-diffusion coefficient.  

    More recently, we used small angle neutron scattering (SANS) to measure density of water contained in 1-D cylindrical pore of silica material MCM-41-S-14, with the pore diameter of 15±1 Å.  The analysis of SANS data allows us to determine the density of D2O as a function of temperature. For the first time, we observed a density minimum at 210±5 K with a value of 1.041±0.003 g/cm3. We compared with the results of molecular dynamic (MD) simulations.

[1] Y. L. Yeh, C. Y. Mou, J. Phys. Chem. B. 103, 3699. (1999) 

[2] L. Liu., S.-H. Chen, A. Faraone, C. W. Yen, C. Y. Mou, Phys. Rev. Lett. 95, 117802 (2005).

[3] F. Mallamace, M. Broccio, C. Corsaro, A. Faraone, U. Wanderlingh, L. Liu, C. Y. Mou, S. H. Chen, J. Chem. Phys. 124, 161102 (2006).

[4] S.-H. Chen , F, Mallamace , C. Y. Mou, M. Broccio , C. Corsaro , A. Faraone, L. Liu,  Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci., 103, 12974 (2006)

[5] L. M. Xu, P. Kumar, S. V. Buldyrev, S. H. Chen , P. H. Poole, F. Sciortino, H. E. Stanley, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci., 102, 16558 (2005)

[6] F. Mallamace, M. Broccio, C. Corsaro, A. Faraone, D. Majolino, V. Venuti, L. Liu, C. Y. Mou, S. H. Chen, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci., 104, 424 (2007)

[7] Dazhi Liu, Yang Zhang, Chia-Cheng Chen, Chung-Yuan Mou, Peter H Poole, Sow-Hsin Chen, Proc. Natl Acad Sci, 104, 9570 (2007)

Dr. D. B. Saakian

Yerevan Physics Institute, ARMENIA

E-mail: saakian@mail.yerphi.am

Solution of the Evolution Model with Deletions and Insertions for the Case of General Fitness

    We consider the evolution model with base substitutions, insertions and deletions in case of general fitness landscape.  The model could not be solved  by traditional methods of evolution theory. The results could be  applied to bacteria evolution.
　

Prof. Chi-Tin Shih

Department of Physics, Tunghai University, TAIWAN
E-mail: ctshih@thu.edu.tw

    We report on a theoretical study of point mutations effects on charge transfer properties in the DNA sequence of the tumor-suppressor p53 gene. On the basis of effective tight-binding models which simulate hole propagation along the DNA, a statistical analysis of mutation-induced charge transfer modifications is performed. In contrast to non-cancerous mutations, mutation hotspots tend to result in significantly weaker changes of transmission properties. This suggests that charge transport could play a significant role for DNA-repairing deficiency yielding carcinogenesis.

Prof. Zbigniew Struzik

Graduate School of Education, The University of Tokyo, JAPAN

E-mail: zbigniew.struzik (a) gmail.com

Criticality Singnatures in Human Behavioral Organization

    The domain of individual human behavior appears to be excluded from treatment by physics, since actions are subject to the individual's constant conscious deliberation and psyche, resulting in a continuously changing type and level of activity, arising from interaction with dynamically changing environmental demands.  Yet, in the talk I will demonstrate that individual motor activity covering the majority of behavioral dynamics, follows strictly physical, universal behavior which can be generalized across individuals[1]. It is particularly striking, that the statistical law which we observe for the resting periods between instances of activity (bursts) belongs to the same universality class as that of the critical branching of avalanche propagation experimentally determined in living neural networks [2] and considered theoretically in a critical branching process [3] as a model of neural avalanches. Therefore, the same critical branching paradigm as found in neural activity may constitute the underlying mechanism of the universality we observe in the motor activity of humans. Furthermore, deviation from the critical scaling law has been observed for depression patients, associated with more episodes of slowing down of movement.  These findings put in a different perspective and shed light on the underlying mechanism of the recently observed phenomenon of universality in human communication dynamics [4]. This universality is of the same class as that in resting periods in human behavior and in
neural activity dynamics.

[1] T. Nakamura, K. Kiyono, K. Yoshiuchi, R. Nakahara, Z.R. Struzik, Y. Yamamoto. Universal Scaling Law in Human Behavioural Organization, Phys. Rev. Lett., 99, p 138103 (2007).
[2] J.M. Beggs, D. Plenz, "Neuronal Avalanches in Neocortical Circuits", J. Neurosci., 23, pp 11167-11177, (2003).
[3] S. Zapperi, K.B. Lauritsen, H.E. Stanley, "Self-Organized Branching Processes: Mean-Field Theory for Avalanches", Phys. Rev. Lett., 75, pp 4071-4074, (1995).
[4] A.-L. Barabasi, "The origin of bursts and heavy tails in human dynamics", Nature, 435, pp 207-211, (2005).

Increased Complexity of Heart Rate in Fatal Heart Failure

    Over the past decade, human heart rate research has attracted considerable interest in the physical and biomedical science communities. Especially since the discovery of 1/f noise in human heart rate more than two decades ago, it has become one of the "benchmarks" for studies of biological complexity.  Specifically, reduced variability and complexity of human heart rate in severe heart disease, including congestive heart failure (CHF), has become one of the key yardsticks by which new complexity measures are validated. Consideration of reduced variability in severe heart disease has become one of the recommendations for the interpretation of heart rate variability (HRV) by the influential standardizing work [1], now registering 1,500 citations. Indeed, there is an emergent belief that the lower variability and lower complexity of heart rate observed in CHF are associated with a higher risk of mortality, yet the focus of attention of the past research on HRV complexity in CHF has been limited to CHF diagnosis from HRV.  In the talk I will counter this belief, showing on carefully prepared, high-quality data that not a decrease but an increase in complex fluctuations of heart rate predicts mortality of patients suffering from CHF [2,3]. The increased variability and complexity of heart rate is reflected in the intermittent large deviations, forming non-Gaussian "fat" tails in the probability density function of heart rate increments and breaking the critical scale invariance observed in
healthy heart rate [4,5].
　

[1] Task Force of the European Society of Cardiology the North American Society of Pacing Electrophysiology, Circulation 93, pp1043, 1996.
[2] K. Kiyono, J. Hayano, E. Watanabe, Z.R. Struzik, I. Kodama, Y. Yamamoto, Non-Gaussian Heart Rate as an Independent Predictor of Mortality in Chronic Heart Failure Patients, Heart Rhythm, to appear.
[3] Z.R. Struzik, K. Kiyono, J. Hayano, E. Watanabe, Y. Yamamoto, Increased Intermittency of Heart Rate in Fatal Heart Failure, submitted, 2007.
[4] K. Kiyono, Z.R. Struzik, N. Aoyagi, S. Sakata, J. Hayano, Y. Yamamoto, Critical Scale Invariance in a Healthy Human Heart Rate, Phys. Rev. Lett., 93, pp178103, 2004.
[5] K. Kiyono, Z.R. Struzik, N. Aoyagi, F. Togo, Y. Yamamoto, Phase Transition in a Healthy Human Heart Rate, Phys. Rev. Lett., 95, pp058101, 2005.

Beyond Multifractals and Multiplicative Cascades
    In order to characterize certain classes of complex behavior, e.g., in turbulence and finance, a cascade paradigm has been introduced, superseding the multifractal description.  Our recent results suggest that there exist systems in which cascade properties are time dependent. In particular, we demonstrate that the validity of the cascade model is questionable in the critical regime, where an analogy with critical phenomena is more adequate.  This suggests that the cascading paradigm has limited applicability to the complex system we investigate, and a model is needed which would explain this behavior. To the best of our knowledge, such a model does not exist. The applicability of such a model, if it existed, would likely not be restricted to the specific system we investigate [1]. It is likely that other systems display time dependent characteristics of the type we discuss. For example we have been investigating this phenomenon in the context of heart rate dynamics [2].  Our recent findings [3] are a demonstration that future theoretical effort is required to provide a generic formalism, both capable of explaining system invariance at criticality and entailing models of intermittent behavior, to date offered as mutually exclusive means of addressing the dynamics of complexity.
[1] K. Kiyono, Z.R. Struzik, Y. Yamamoto, Phase Transition in a Healthy Human Heart Rate, Phys. Rev. Lett., 96, pp068701, 2006.
[2] K. Kiyono, Z.R. Struzik, N. Aoyagi, F. Togo, Y. Yamamoto, Phase Transition in a Healthy Human Heart Rate, Phys. Rev. Lett., 95, pp058101, 2005.
[3] Z.R. Struzik, K. Kiyono, J. Hayano, E. Watanabe, Y. Yamamoto, Increased Intermittency of Heart Rate in Fatal Heart Failure, submitted, 2007.

Prof. C.-L. Wu

Department of Physics, Chung-Yuan Christian University, TAIWAN; Department of Physics, Xiamen University, CHINA

E-mail: cwuhan@hotmail.com

Fermi Arcs in Cuprate Pseudogap States --- The Recent Development in the SU(4) Model of High-Temperature Superconductivity