The Bonhoeffer Van der Pol system is a planar autonomous nonlinear system of differential equations which has been invoked as a qualitative model of physiological states in a nerve membrane. It contains three independent parameters and previous work has only studied a small portion of the parameter space, that part which is thought to be of physiological relevance. Here we give a complete study of the full parameter space, using both theoretical results and numerical solutions.

This note introduces quasi-local-balance for discrete-time Markov chains with absorbing states. From quasi-local-balance product-form quasi-stationary distributions are derived by analogy with product-form stationary distributions for Markov chains that satisfy local balance.

Finding critical phenomena in two-dimensional combustion is normally done numerically. By using a centre-manifold reduction, we can find a reduced equation in one dimension. Once we have found the reduced equation, it is simpler to find critical phenomena. We consider two different problems. One is spontaneous ignition. We compare our results with known critical parameters to give some validity to our reduction technique. We also look at a combustion model with three equilibrium states. For this model, the possible transitions can occur as travelling waves between the unstable to either of the stable equilibrium or from one stable to the other stable state. For the latter transition, the direction of the transition tells us whether we have an extinction or ignition wave. We find the critical parameters when the direction of the wave changes.

The allometric hypothesis which relates the shape (y) of biological organs to the size of the plant or animal (x), as a function of the relative growth rates, is ubiquitous in biology. This concept has been especially useful in studies of carcass composition of farm animals, and is the basis for the definition of maintenance requirements in animal nutrition.

When the size variable is random the differential equation describing the relative growth rates of organs becomes a stochastic differential equation, with a solution different from that of the deterministic equation normally used to describe allometry. This is important in studies of carcass composition where animals are slaughtered in different sizes and ages, introducing variance between animals into the size variable.

This paper derives an equation that relates values of the shape variable to the expected values of the size variable at any point. This is the most easily interpreted relationship in many applications of the allometric hypothesis such as the study of the development of carcass composition in domestic animals by serial slaughter. The change in the estimates of the coefficients of the allometric equation found through the usual deterministc equation is demonstrated under additive and multiplicative errors. The inclusion of a factor based on the reciprocal of the size variable to the usual log - log regression equation is shown to produce unbiased estimates of the parameters when the errors can be assumed to be multiplicative.

The consequences of stochastic size variables in the study of carcass composition are discussed.

In the present paper questions related to stability and boundedness with respect to manifolds of solutions of impulsive differential-difference equations are considered. The investigations are carried out by means of piecewise-continuous functions which are analogues of the classical Lyapunov's functions. By means of a vectorial comparison equation and differential inequalities for piecewise-continuous functions, theorems are proved on stability and boundedness with respect to manifolds of solutions of impulsive differential-difference equations with impulse effect at fixed moments.

A spectral method is used to consider the porous medium combustion in an infinite slab. The infinite system of ordinary differential equations for the amplitude functions is truncated and comparisons are made for different numbers of modes included in the numerical computation. It is shown that the qualitative behaviour of the solution is captured by the first eigenmode. Dependence of the solution on initial data and a parameter is also considered.

Members of an hierarchy of integrable nonlinear evolution equations, related to the well-known linearizable diffusion equation which has the diffusivity form as the reciprocal of the square of the concentration, are adapted to derive a new integrable nonlinear equation which models the surface evolution of an arbitrarily-oriented theoretical anisotropic material by the concomitant action of evaporation-condensation and surface diffusion. The constitutive relations are explicitly formulated and these show that the theoretical anisotropic material behaves like a liquid crystal. The integrable nonlinear equation may be used to advantage as test cases for numerical schemes. Its form has many attributes of the nonlinear governing equation for an isotropic material. Closed-form solutions are constructed for the evolution of a ramped surface by concomitant evaporation-condensation and surface diffusion.

In this paper, we discuss MDP-the moment optimal problem for the first-passage model. A policy improvement iteration algorithm is given for finding the k-moment optimal stationary policy.

Long periodic waves propagating in a closed channel are considered. The fluid consists of two layers of constant densities separated by a layer in which the density varies continuously. The numerical results of Vanden-Broeck and Turner [8] are extended. It is shown that their solutions are particular members of a family of solutions. Solutions are selected by requiring that the streamfunction takes values on the upper and lower walls which are consistent with a uniform stream far upstream. The new solutions are qualitatively similar to those of Vanden-Broeck and Turner [8]. In particular, there are periodic waves characterized by a train of ripples at their troughs. It is shown numerically that these waves approach solitary waves with oscillatory tails as their wavelength increases. Moreover special solutions for which the amplitude of the ripples is almost zero are identified. Such solutions without ripples were previously found for solitary waves with surface tension.

In this paper we have proved that the generalized incomplete gamma functions and their extensions are mutually related through integral and differential representations.