This thesis deals with specific features of the theory of holomorphic dynamics in dimension 2 and then sets out to study analogous questions in higher dimensions, e.g. dealing with normal forms for rigid germs, and examples of Kato 3-folds. The local dynamics of holomorphic maps around critical points is still not completely understood, in dimension 2 or higher, due to the richness of the geometry of the critical set for all iterates. In dimension 2, the study of the dynamics induced on a suitable functional space (the valuative tree) allows a classification of such maps up to birational conjugacy, reducing the problem to the special class of rigid germs, where the geometry of the critical set is simple. In some cases, from such dynamical data one can construct special compact complex surfaces, called Kato surfaces, related to some conjectures in complex geometry.

The first part of the book is devoted to the transport equation for a given vector field, exploiting the lagrangian structure of solutions. It also treats the regularity of solutions of some degenerate elliptic equations, which appear in the eulerian counterpart of some transport models with congestion. The second part of the book deals with the lagrangian structure of solutions of the Vlasov-Poisson system, which describes the evolution of a system of particles under the self-induced gravitational/electrostatic field, and the existence of solutions of the semigeostrophic system, used in meteorology to describe the motion of large-scale oceanic/atmospheric flows.​

Tropical geometry provides an explanation for the remarkable power of mirror symmetry to connect complex and symplectic geometry. The main theme of this book is the interplay between tropical geometry and mirror symmetry, culminating in a description of the recent work of Gross and Siebert using log geometry to understand how the tropical world relates the A- and B-models in mirror symmetry. The text starts with a detailed introduction to the notions of tropical curves and manifolds, and then gives a thorough description of both sides of mirror symmetry for projective space, bringing together material which so far can only be found scattered throughout the literature. Next follows an introduction to the log geometry of Fontaine-Illusie and Kato, as needed for Nishinou and Siebert's proof of Mikhalkin's tropical curve counting formulas. This latter proof is given in the fourth chapter. The fifth chapter considers the mirror, B-model side, giving recent results of the author showing how tropical geometry can be used to evaluate the oscillatory integrals appearing. The final chapter surveys reconstruction results of the author and Siebert for ``integral tropical manifolds.'' A complete version of the argument is given in two dimensions.

This volume is devoted to a beautiful object, called the valuative tree and designed as a powerful tool for the study of singularities in two complex dimensions. Its intricate yet manageable structure can be analyzed by both algebraic and geometric means. Many types of singularities, including those of curves, ideals, and plurisubharmonic functions, can be encoded in terms of positive measures on the valuative tree. The construction of these measures uses a natural tree Laplace operator of independent interest.

In medicine the understanding and interpretation of the complex reality of illness currently refers either to an organismic approach that focuses on the physical or to a 'holistic' approach that takes into account the patient's human sociocultural involvement. Yet as the papers of this collection show, the suffering human person refers ultimately to his/her existential sphere. Hence, praxis is supplemented by still other perspectives for valuation and interpretation: ethical, spiritual, and religious. Can medicine ignore these considerations or push them to the side as being subjective and arbitrary? Phenomenology/philosophy-of-life recognizes all of the above approaches to be essential facets of the Human Condition (Tymieniecka). This approach holds that all the facets of the Human Condition have equal objectivity and legitimacy. It completes the accepted medical outlook and points the way toward a new `medical humanism'.

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