Branching - the scientific way

When a a biophysicist model a pattern in nature, and that includes the branching of plants, it is most often done by estimation a system of diferential equations. Like the Gierer-Meinhardt model system which models an activator-inhibitor process. The graph illustrates my modest first try out in the estimation of such a model. Incidentally I used SAS, to estimate the model, well now I have added PROC IML to my SAS knowledge.

Plant (3) - where do plants branch?

Often when I have a minute or two, maybe waiting for a train, I study the structure of plants - how they branch, how they grow. One thing that I have noticed is, that behind the apparent symmetric structure of a plant, looking carefully, a haphazard structure is found. A structure with a lot of false starts and runaway tries aiming nowhere.

Algorithmic trading

I have just listened to a very interesting podcast about algorithmic trading, an area of bespoken hardware, software and algorithms.

The most interesting, and something new to me, is notion of latency. That time passed in every step of the network matters. Because it is a race to retrieve data, analyze it, and place orders accordingly. It is done against multiple data-providers, asset classes and exchanges.

Particles in motion

Particles in motion is a very forceful metaphor for what happens near the thermodynamical limit. Where massive numbers of particles interact, brought into motion by some sort of energy. It is there emergence happens and complex structures organize.

Everywhere I look there is a lot of particles and they are all organized in some structure and the structure is always changing.

The challenge is to identify the particles at different levels. A particle can be an atom, a car, a human, a program and everything else. Every particle is a complex structure of other particles in motion. It is recursive and it goes on forever.