All issues

Numerical simulation of moving sportsman external flow is presented. The unique method is developed for obtaining integral aerodynamic characteristics, which were the function of the flow regime (i.e. angle of attack, flow speed) and body position. Individual anthropometric characteristics and moving boundaries of sportsman (or sports equipment) during the race are taken into consideration.

Numerical simulation is realized using FlowVision CFD. The software is based on the finite volume method, high-performance numerical methods and reliable mathematical models of physical processes. A Cartesian computational grid is used by FlowVision, the grid generation is a completely automated process. Local grid adaptation is used for solving high-pressure gradient and object complex shape. Flow simulation process performed by solutions systems of equations describing movement of fluid and/or gas in the computational domain, including: mass, moment and energy conservation equations; state equations; turbulence model equations. FlowVision permits flow simulation near moving bodies by means of computational domain transformation according to the athlete shape changes in the motion. Ski jumper aerodynamic characteristics are studied during all phases: take-off performance in motion, in-run and flight. Projected investigation defined simulation method, which includes: inverted statement of sportsman external flow development (velocity of the motion is equal to air flow velocity, object is immobile); changes boundary of the body technology defining; multiple calculations with the national team member data projecting. The research results are identification of the main factors affected to jumping performance: aerodynamic forces, rotating moments etc. Developed method was tested with active sportsmen. Ski jumpers used this method during preparations for Sochi Olympic Games 2014. A comparison of the predicted characteristics and experimental data shows a good agreement. Method versatility is underlined by performing swimmer and skater flow simulation. Designed technology is applicable for sorts of natural and technical objects.

A new method of statistical analysis of texts is suggested. The frequency distribution of the first significant digits in numerals of English-language texts is considered. We have taken into account cardinal as well as ordinal numerals expressed both in figures, and verbally. To identify the author’s use of numerals, we previously deleted from the text all idiomatic expressions and set phrases accidentally containing numerals, as well as itemizations and page numbers, etc. Benford’s law is found to hold approximately for the frequencies of various first significant digits of compound literary texts by different authors; a marked predominance of the digit 1 is observed. In coherent authorial texts, characteristic deviations from Benford’s law arise which are statistically stable significant author peculiarities that allow, under certain conditions, to consider the problem of authorship and distinguish between texts by different authors. The text should be large enough (at least about 200 kB). At the end of $\{1, 2, \ldots, 9\}$ digits row, the frequency distribution is subject to strong fluctuations and thus unrepresentative for our purpose. The aim of the theoretical explanation of the observed empirical regularity is not intended, which, however, does not preclude the applicability of the proposed methodology for text attribution. The approach suggested and the conclusions are backed by the examples of the computer analysis of works by W.M. Thackeray, M. Twain, R. L. Stevenson, J. Joyce, sisters Bront¨e, and J.Austen. On the basis of technique suggested, we examined the authorship of a text earlier ascribed to L. F. Baum (the result agrees with that obtained by different means). We have shown that the authorship of Harper Lee’s “To Kill a Mockingbird” pertains to her, whereas the primary draft, “Go Set a Watchman”, seems to have been written in collaboration with Truman Capote. All results are confirmed on the basis of parametric Pearson’s chi-squared test as well as non-parametric Mann –Whitney U test and Kruskal –Wallis test.

In many social groups, for example, in technical committees for standardization, at the international, regional and national levels, in European communities, managers of ecovillages, social movements (occupy), international organizations, decision-making is based on the consensus of the group members. Instead of voting, where the majority wins over the minority, consensus allows for a solution that each member of the group supports, or at least considers acceptable. This approach ensures that all group members’ opinions, ideas and needs are taken into account. At the same time, it is noted that reaching consensus takes a long time, since it is necessary to ensure agreement within the group, regardless of its size. It was shown that in some situations the number of iterations (agreements, negotiations) is very significant. Moreover, in the decision-making process, there is always a risk of blocking the decision by the minority in the group, which not only delays the decisionmaking time, but makes it impossible. Typically, such a minority is one or two odious people in the group. At the same time, such a member of the group tries to dominate in the discussion, always remaining in his opinion, ignoring the position of other colleagues. This leads to a delay in the decision-making process, on the one hand, and a deterioration in the quality of consensus, on the other, since only the opinion of the dominant member of the group has to be taken into account. To overcome the crisis in this situation, it was proposed to make a decision on the principle of «consensus minus one» or «consensus minus two», that is, do not take into account the opinion of one or two odious members of the group.

The article, based on modeling consensus using the model of regular Markov chains, examines the question of how much the decision-making time according to the «consensus minus one» rule is reduced, when the position of the dominant member of the group is not taken into account.

The general conclusion that follows from the simulation results is that the rule of thumb for making decisions on the principle of «consensus minus one» has a corresponding mathematical justification. The simulation results showed that the application of the «consensus minus one» rule can reduce the time to reach consensus in the group by 76–95%, which is important for practice.

The average number of agreements hyperbolically depends on the average authoritarianism of the group members (excluding the authoritarian one), which means the possibility of delaying the agreement process at high values of the authoritarianism of the group members.

Numerical modeling of shear-induced platelet activation in haemodialysis arteriovenous fistulas was carried out in this work. The goal was to investigate the mechanisms of threshold shear-induced platelet activation in fistulas. For shear-induced platelet activation to take place, shear stress accumulated by platelets along corresponding trajectories in blood flow had to exceed a definite threshold value. The threshold value of cumulative shear stress was supposed to depend on the multimer size of von Willebrand factor macromolecules acting as hydrodynamic sensors for platelets. The effect of arteriovenous fistulas parameters, such as the anastomotic angle, blood flow rate, and the multimer size of von Willebrand factor macromolecules, on platelet activation risk was studied. Parametric diagrams have been constructed that make it possible to distinguish the areas of parameters corresponding to the presence or absence of shear-induced platelet activation. Scaling relations that approximate critical curves on parametric diagrams were obtained. Analysis showed that threshold fistula flow rate is higher for obtuse anastomotic angle than for sharp ones. This means that a fistula with obtuse angle can be used in wider flow rate range without risk of platelet activation. In addition, a study of different anastomosis configurations of arteriovenous fistulas showed that the configuration “end of vein to end of artery” is among the safest. For all the investigated anastomosis configurations, the critical curves on the parametric diagrams were monotonically decreasing functions of von Willebrand factor multimer size. It was shown that fistula flow rate should have a significant impact on the probability of thrombus formation initiation, while the direction of flow through the distal artery did not affect platelet activation. The obtained results allowed to determine the safest fistula configurations with respect to thrombus formation triggering. The authors believe that the results of the work may be of interest to doctors performing surgical operations for creation of arteriovenous fistulas for haemodialysis. In the final section of the work, possible clinical applications of the obtained results by means of mathematical modeling are discussed.

The spatiotemporal dynamics of a three-component model for food web is considered. The model describes the interactions among resource, prey and predator that consumes both species. In a previous work, the author analyzed the model without taking into account spatial heterogeneity. This study continues the model study of the community considering the diffusion of individuals, as well as directed movements of the predator. It is assumed that the predator responds to the spatial change in the resource and prey density by occupying areas where species density is higher or avoiding them. Directed predator movement is described by the advection term, where velocity is proportional to the gradient of resource and prey density. The system is considered on a one-dimensional domain with zero-flux conditions as boundary ones. The spatiotemporal dynamics produced by model is determined by the system stability in the vicinity of stationary homogeneous state with respect to small inhomogeneous perturbations. The paper analyzes the possibility of wave instability leading to the emergence of autowaves and Turing instability, as a result of which stationary patterns are formed. Sufficient conditions for the existence of both types of instability are obtained. The influence of local kinetic parameters on the spatial structure formation was analyzed. It was shown that only Turing instability is possible when taxis on the resource is positive, but with a negative taxis, both types of instability are possible. The numerical solution of the system was found by using method of lines (MOL) with the numerical integration of ODE system by means of splitting techniques. The spatiotemporal dynamics of the system is presented in several variants, realizing one of the instability types. In the case of a positive taxis on the prey, both autowave and stationary structures are formed in smaller regions, with an increase in the region size, Turing structures are not formed. For negative taxis on the prey, stationary patterns is observed in both regions, while periodic structures appear only in larger areas.

The gas-dynamics approach to the calculation of the aerodynamic characteristics of modern aircraft makes it necessary to consider the complex and extensive set of tasks requiring the development of new methods for their solution. Drag coefficient for two bodies in subsonic and transonic flow regimes was calculated using ANSYS Fluent software. Numeric solution and results of the experiment are in good agreement; calculation error does not exceed 3 %.

We consider a portfolio with call option and the corresponding underlying asset under the standard assumption that stock-market price represents a random variable with lognormal distribution. Minimizing the variance hedging risk of the portfolio on the date of maturity of the call option we find a fraction of the asset per unit call option. As a direct consequence we derive the statistically fair lookback call option price in explicit form. In contrast to the famous Black–Scholes theory, any portfolio cannot be regarded as  risk-free because no additional transactions are supposed to be conducted over the life of the contract, but the sequence of independent portfolios will reduce risk to zero asymptotically. This property is illustrated in the experimental section using a dataset of daily stock prices of 37 leading US-based companies for the period from April 2006 to January 2013.

Classical Chanter–Thornley model of mushroom growth has been modified and implemented in AnyLogic simulation environment by means of system dynamics, discrete-event and agent-based approaches. A numerical case study of the model is presented and the problem of optimum age at harvest, providing the maximum integral yield for all fruiting “waves” is solved.

A simple statistical model is developed for the dynamics of the mean global annual temperature. The model combines the logarithmic effect of carbon dioxide concentration increase and the input by climatic cycles. Model parameters are determined from data of instrumental observations for 1850–2010. The model confirms the presence of climatic cycles with the period of 10.5 and 68.8 years in the global temperature dynamics. The trajectories of the global temperature changes for the XXI century are obtained under the scenarios of carbon dioxide concentration changes from the 5^th IPCC Assessment Report. The comparison revealed that the global temperature trajectories from the Report are 0.9–1.8 °C above those obtained in the model.

The paper outlines the approaches to mathematical modeling correlation adaptometry techniques widely used in biology and medicine. The analysis is based on models employed in descriptions of structured biological systems. It is assumed that the distribution density of the biological population numbers satisfies the equation of Kolmogorov-Fokker-Planck. Using this technique evaluated the effectiveness of treatment of patients with obesity. All patients depending on the obesity degree and the comorbidity nature were divided into three groups. Shows a decrease in weight of the correlation graph computed from the measured in the patients of the indicators that characterizes the effectiveness of the treatment for all studied groups. This technique was also used to assess the intensity of the training loads in academic rowing three age groups. It was shown that with the highest voltage worked with athletes for youth group. Also, using the technique of correlation adaptometry evaluated the effectiveness of the treatment of hormone replacement therapy in women. All the patients depending on the assigned drug were divided into four groups. In the standard analysis of the dynamics of mean values of indicators, it was shown that in the course of the treatment were observed normalization of the averages for all groups of patients. However, using the technique of correlation adaptometry it was found that during the first six months the weight of the correlation graph was decreasing and during the second six months the weight increased for all study groups. This indicates the excessive length of the annual course of hormone replacement therapy and the practicality of transition to a semiannual rate.