Several complex variables are better than just one

In this popular expository article, we discuss some important ways in which complex analysis in more than one variable is different from complex analysis in one variable. Analytic continuation in several variables is contrasted with that in one variable, and the notion of psuedoconvexity is defined. Hartogs phenomenon and the Levi problem are also discussed in an informal way.     

M K Chandrashekaran (1937–2009)

Maroli Krishnayya Chandrashekaran, Editor of Journal of Biosciences (from 1991 to 1997) and Resonance (from 2003 to 2005), was a biologist who stood out from his peers as much on account of the quality of his contributions as because of his style. He made major contributions to our understanding of the interplay between time and the living world (which also became the title of a book he wrote). This article aims to bring together aspects of his life and work.     

States of matter

All of us have read about solid, liquid and gaseous states of matter in school. Are these the only states of matter? What distinguishes different states of matter from each other?     

Intergenerational transmission of adaptive functioning: a test of the interactionist model of SES and human development

The interactionist model (IM) of human development (R. D. Conger & M. B. Donellan, 2007) proposes that the association between socioeconomic status (SES) and human development involves a dynamic interplay that includes both social causation (SES influences human development) and social selection (individual characteristics affect SES). Using a multigenerational data set involving 271 families, the current study finds empirical support for the IM. Adolescent personality characteristics indicative of social competence, goal-setting, hard work, and emotional stability predicted later SES, parenting, and family characteristics that were related to the positive development of a third-generation child. Processes of both social selection and social causation appear to account for the association between SES and dimensions of human development indicative of healthy functioning across multiple generations.