Graduate School in Nonlinear Science

Sponsored by the Danish Research Academy





MIDIT                               OFD                           CATS
Modelling, Nonlinear Dynamics       Optics and Fluid Dynamics     Chaos and Turbulence Studies
and Irreversible Thermodynamics     Risø National Laboratory      Niels Bohr Institute and 
Technical University of Denmark     Building 128                  Department of Chemistry
Building 321                        P.O. Box 49                   University of Copenhagen 
DK-2800 Lyngby                      DK-4000 Roskilde              DK-2100 Copenhagen Ø
Denmark                             Denmark                       Denmark


STOCHASTIC RESONANCE: FROM THE ICE AGES TO THE INNER EAR




by Kurt Wiesenfel
School of Physics
Georgia Tech, Atlanta, USA

MIDIT-seminar 442

Thursday February 18, 1999, 15.00 h
at MIDIT, IMM Building 305, room 027




Abstract: Stochastic Resonance is a phenomenon where the ability of a system to detect weak signals can improve as the environmental noise level increases. This effect is now firmly established in a wide variety of physical and, more recently, biological systems. I will give a broad introduction to the subject, starting with its beginnings as an explanation of the periodic occurrence of ice ages on Earth, up to recent ideas how stochastic resonance might be usefully exploited.