bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Paleogene sedimentation and Eurekan deformation in the Stenkul Fiord area of southeastern Ellesmere Island (Canadian Arctic): Evidence for a polyphase history
Authors: von Gosen* W. , Reinhardt* L. , Piepjohn* K. , Schmitz* M.D.
Published: October 2019

Field studies and interpretative mapping of the area southeast of Stenkul Fiord (Ellesmere Island) revealed that the Margaret Formation clastic deposits consist of at least four sedimentary units (Units 1–4) separated by unconformities. Several centimeter-thick volcanic ash layers, identified within coal layers and preserved as crandallite group minerals (Ca-bearing goyazite), suggest an intense volcanic ash fall activity. Based on new U-Pb zircon dating (ID-TIMS) of three ash samples from one layer, this activity took place at 53.7 Ma in the early Eocene, i.e., within the period of the Eocene Thermal Maximum 2 hyperthermal. This age further suggests that the lowermost Unit 1 can be assigned to the late Paleocene–earliest Eocene, Unit 2 to the early Eocene, whereas Units 3 and 4 might be early to middle Eocene in age.

Sedimentation was followed and partly accompanied by compressive Eurekan deformation after ~53.7 Ma, which led to the formation of fold and fault structures. Several pulses of deformation caused uplift and erosion and were followed by sedimentation of the next unit above an unconformity. Deformation presumably ended before the middle Eocene. An earlier phase of probably extensional Eurekan deformation in Unit 1 can be assigned to the latest Paleocene–earliest Eocene. These results show that Paleocene/Eocene sedimentation and Eurekan deformation represent a protracted history comprising several phases of ongoing clastic sedimentation, deformation, uplift, and erosion. This suggests that the Eurekan deformation on Ellesmere Island cannot be assigned to a single fixed time in the Paleogene only.
The Whale Mountain allochthon: A relic of the Iapetus Ocean preserved in the northeastern Brooks Range of Alaska and Yukon
Authors: Johnson Benjamin G. , Strauss Justin V. , Taylor John F. , Ward William P. , Colpron Maurice , McClelland William C. , Toro Jaime
Published: October 2019

The Whale Mountain allochthon is a structural complex composed of lower Paleozoic mafic volcanic and marine sedimentary rocks that are exposed within three fault-bounded, east–west-trending belts in the northeastern Brooks Range of Alaska and Yukon. Each belt is characterized by a unique structural and stratigraphic architecture. Trace-element systematics from the volcanic rocks define distinctive suites that are geographically restricted to each belt. The volcanic rocks of the southern belt (the Marsh Fork volcanic rocks) have a tholeiitic character and rare earth element trends that resemble modern mid-ocean-ridge basalt. The volcanic rocks of the central belt (the Whale Mountain volcanic rocks) and northern belt (Ekaluakat formation; new name) both have an alkaline character, but the northern belt rocks are significantly more enriched in the incompatible trace elements. New zircon U-Pb data from two volcaniclastic rock units, one from the southern belt and another from central belt, yield unimodal age populations that range from ca. 567 to 474 Ma, with weighted averages of 504 ± 11 and 512 ± 1.4 Ma for each sample. In the central and southern belts of the allochthon, basalt flows are interbedded with discontinuous limestone and dolostone units that contain trilobites and agnostoid arthropods. Three distinct trilobite faunas of late Cambrian (Furongian) age were recovered from widely separated localities. The scarcity of uniquely Laurentian genera, coupled with an abundance of distinctive species that could not be assigned to any established Furongian genus, argues against models that invoke extrusion of these volcanic rocks onto the autochthonous Laurentian shelf or slope. It is thus proposed that the Whale Mountain allochthon formed in a peri-Laurentian setting, possibly as disparate fragments of the northern Iapetus Ocean that were assembled in an ancient accretionary wedge and subsequently accreted to the northern margin of Laurentia during the early Paleozoic.
Paleontology of the “Ashley Phosphate Beds” of Charleston: Insights from Northbridge Park, Charleston, South Carolina
Authors: Boessenecker Robert W. , Boessenecker Sarah J.
Published: October 2019

A man-made deposit at Northbridge Park near Charleston, South Carolina, consists of phosphatic nodules, fossils, and mud dredged from the bottom of the Ashley River; nodules and fossils lay strewn across the banks of the river. This artificial deposit is likely representative of deposits mined extensively in the late nineteenth century and widely referred to as the “Ashley Phosphate Beds.” Many of the taxa discovered at Northbridge Park were historically reported from the phosphate beds, and include sharks, rays, bony fish, sea turtles, giant birds, whales, dolphins, sea cows, and land mammals. Some of these bear adhering matrix indicating origin from the Oligocene Ashley Formation. Others lack matrix but have short geochronologic ranges and are derived from the Ashley Formation, Lower Miocene Marks Head Formation, Lower Pliocene Goose Creek Limestone, and Pleistocene Wando Formation.
The Lomfjorden Fault Zone in eastern Spitsbergen (Svalbard)
Authors: Piepjohn* Karsten , Dallmann* Winfried K. , Elvevold* Synnøve
Published: October 2019

The Lomfjorden Fault Zone in the eastern part of Spitsbergen is one of the prominent structures in Svalbard oriented parallel to the continental margin of the Barents Shelf. It consists of a network of three N–S-striking major faults (Veteranen, Lomfjorden, and Agardhbukta faults), two N–S-striking reverse faults (Lomfjella and Bjørnfjellet reverse faults), and a number of NE–SW- and NNW–SSE-striking normal, reverse, and strike-slip faults. Structural data collected during fieldwork in the northern and central segments of the fault zone, in combination with published data from the southernmost segment, indicate that N–S-striking reverse faults in the Lomfjorden Fault Zone were caused by convergence transferred from the West Spitsbergen Fold-and-Thrust Belt eastward along detachments during an initial phase of the Eurekan deformation in the early Eocene. The W–E contraction was followed by sinistral and dextral strike-slip tectonics along the Lomfjorden Fault Zone during a later phase of the Eurekan deformation in the late Eocene. The NNW–SSE-striking reverse and normal faults are oriented obliquely between the N–S-striking, en-échelon Lomfjorden and Agardhbukta faults. Shortening and extension across these, respectively, can be explained by left-stepping contractional overstep or left-stepping wrench faults in an overall dextral and left-stepping extensional overstep or left-stepping wrench faults in an overall sinistral, N–S-trending strike-slip system. It was not possible to determine if the sinistral phase pre-dated the dextral one or vice versa. The presence of a large granite massif, the Newtontoppen Granite, is suspected to influence or even control the course of the faults and their transfer systems. The involvement and reactivation of preexisting Carboniferous and even older structures and the superimposition of convergent and lateral movements along the Lomfjorden Fault Zone is similar to large fault zones in North Greenland and on Ellesmere Island, indicating that it represents an important element of the Eurekan Orogeny during the final break-up of Laurasia.
A record of the micrometeorite flux during an enigmatic extraterrestrial 3He anomaly in the Turonian (Late Cretaceous)
Authors: Martin* Ellinor , Schmitz Birger , Montanari Alessandro
Published: October 2019

We reconstructed a record of the micrometeorite flux in the Late Cretaceous using the distribution of extraterrestrial spinel grains across an ~2 m.y. interval of elevated 3He in the Turonian Stage (ca. 92–90 Ma). From ~30 m of the limestone succession in the Bottaccione section, Italy, a total of 979 kg of rock from levels below and within the 3He excursion yielded 603 spinel grains (32–355 μm size). Of those, 115 represent equilibrated ordinary chondritic chromite (EC). Within the 3He excursion, there is no change in the number of EC grains per kilogram of sediment, but H-chondritic grains dominate over L and LL grains (70%, 27%, and 3%), contrary to the interval before the excursion, where the relation between the three groups (50%, 44%, and 6%) is similar to today and to the Early Cretaceous. Intriguingly, within the 3He anomaly, there is also a factor-of-five increase of vanadium-rich chrome spinels likely originating from achondritic and unequilibrated ordinary chondritic meteorites. The 3He anomaly has an unusually spiky and temporal progression not readily explained by present models for delivery of extraterrestrial dust to Earth. Previous suggestions of a relation to a comet or asteroid shower possibly associated with dust-producing lunar impacts are not supported by our data. Instead, the spinel data preliminary indicate a more general disturbance of the asteroid belt, where different parent bodies or source regions of micrometeorites were affected at the same time. More spinel grains need to be recovered and more oxygen isotopic analyses of grains are required to resolve the origin of the 3He anomaly.
Off-label application of intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIG) for treatment of Cogan’s syndrome during pregnancy
Authors: Scherg Felix , Haag Friedrich , Krieger Thorsten
Published: October 2019

We report the case of a woman with Cogan’s syndrome concomitant with the wish to have children. After three major flares of the disease that led to unilateral deafness, immunosuppressive therapy with prednisolone and azathioprine was started. Because of the severe side effects, an off-label therapy with intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIG) was initiated, under which our patient has since given birth to three healthy children. To our knowledge this is the first report to describe Cogan’s syndrome with multiple successful pregnancies under IVIG treatment.
Clinical approach to the diagnosis and successful management of anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis when antibody testing is not possible
Authors: Ramlackhansingh Anil Frank , King Alexi Christopher , Maharaj Shamera , King David Joseph
Published: October 2019

Anti-N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptor encephalitis is a multistage illness that progresses from psychosis, memory deficits, seizures and language disintegration to a state of unresponsiveness with catatonic features often associated with abnormal movements, and autonomic and breathing instability. While the disorder predominantly affects children and young adults, and occurs with or without tumour association, the presence of a tumour (usually an ovarian teratoma) is dependent on the age, sex and ethnicity.Teratomas present more frequently in women older than 18 years, and are more predominant in black women than Caucasians. Here we present the case of a patient with probable anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis. She was subsequently found to have a mature teratoma of the ovary (dermoid cyst). Despite immune-modulated therapy, surgery was eventually performed to remove the cyst. This was met with a good clinical recovery.
Concurrent validity of a patient self-administered examination and a clinical examination for femoroacetabular impingement syndrome
Authors: Owusu-Akyaw Kwadwo Adu , Hutyra Carolyn A , Evanson Richard J , Cook Chad E , Reiman Mike , Mather Richard C
Published: October 2019

Objective

Telehealth has been established as a viable option for improved access and timeliness of care. Physician-guided patient self-evaluation may improve the viability of telehealth evaluation; however, there are little data evaluating the efficacy of self-administered examination (SAE). This study aims to compare the diagnostic accuracy of a patient SAE to a traditional standardised clinical examination (SCE) for evaluation of femoroacetabular impingement syndrome (FAIS).

Methods

75 patients seeking care for hip-related pain were included for participation. All patients underwent both SAE and SCE and were randomised to the order of the examinations. Diagnostic accuracy statistics were calculated for both examination group for a final diagnosis of FAIS. Mean diagnostic accuracy results for each group were then compared using Mann-Whitney U non-parametric tests.

Results

The diagnostic accuracy of individual SAE and SCE manoeuvres varied widely. Both SAE and SCE demonstrated no to moderate change in post-test probability for the diagnosis of FAIS. Although low, SAE demonstrated a statistically greater mean diagnostic accuracy compared with the SCE (53.6% vs 45.5%, p=0.02).

Conclusion

Diagnostic accuracy was statistically significantly higher for the self-exam than for the traditional clinical exam although the difference may not be clinically relevant. Although the mean accuracy remains relatively low for both exams, these values are consistent with hip exam for FAIS reported in the literature. Having established the validity of an SAE, future investigations will need to evaluate implementation in a telehealth setting.
#UsToo: implicit bias, meritocracy and the plight of black minority leaders in healthcare
Authors: Busari Jamiu O
Published: October 2019

In the fall of 2017, the #MeToo movement ushered in one of the most astonishing revolts against the perils of workplace-related harassment. Several unsuccessful campaigns geared towards ending the harassment and subjugation of women in corporate organisations finally got a thrust that resulted in significant and far-reaching changes in many organisations. While the #MeToo movement highlighted the pains and struggles of gender inequality over the years, an unintended consequence has been the shadow it has cast over the plight of other minority groups facing harassment in the workplace. In several academic and healthcare (learning) environments, people of colour, like women, face explicit and implicit forms of harassment on a regular, if not daily basis. Unlike gender harassment, however, racial harassment affects both sexes with relatively more predominance among men. The effect of racial harassments does not just impact performance and self-confidence but also influences the opportunities available to black professionals to advance their academic and professional careers. In the academic and healthcare industries, the issue of how to tackle implicit bias and unfair practices is not clear-cut. While the subjugated feel the impact of bias, the perpetrators of the actions either lack the ability (or are unwilling) to acknowledge these biases. Furthermore, the complexities inherent to the different contexts make it problematic if not impossible, to call out racist behaviours. In this paper, a real-life case scenario is used to provide a scholarly analysis of the dynamics of racial harassment, implicit bias and the impact on minority leader roles in healthcare delivery.
Deal with the real, not the notional patient, and don’t ignore important uncertainties
Authors: Foster Charles
Published: October 2019

There is a strong presumption in favour of the maintenance of life. Given sufficient evidence, it can be rebutted. But the epistemic uncertainties about the best interests of patients in prolonged disorders of consciousness ("PDOC") and the wishes that they should be presumed to have are such that, in most PDOC cases, the presumption cannot be rebutted. It is conventional and wrong (or at least unsupported by the evidence) to assume that PDOC patients have no interest in continued existence. Treatment withdrawal/continuation decisions should focus on the patient as he or she actually is, and should not unjustifiably assume that the premorbid patient continues to exist unchanged, and that the actual patient has the same interests as the premorbid patient and would make the same decisions in relation to treatment as the premorbid patient would have done.
‘Livestock are not the global warming enemy’
Authors: Costain ffinlo
Published: October 2019

ffinlo Costain argues that the focus on ruminant methane in causing global warming is ill‐informed and in fact restoration of grass‐based systems can result in net zero emissions from UK agriculture by 2030.
Implications for new physics in $$b\rightarrow s \mu \mu $$ transitions after recent measurements by Belle and LHCb
Authors: Kowalska Kamila , Kumar Dinesh , Sessolo Enrico Maria
Published: October 2019

We present a Bayesian analysis of the implications for new physics in semileptonic$$b\rightarrow s$$b→stransitions after including new measurements of$$R_K$$RKat LHCb and new determinations of$$R_{K^*}$$RK∗and$$R_{K^{*+}}$$RK∗+at Belle. We perform global fits with 1, 2, 4, and 8 input Wilson coefficients, plus one CKM nuisance parameter to take into account uncertainties that are not factorizable. We infer the 68% and 95.4% credibility regions of the marginalized posterior probability density for all scenarios and perform comparisons of models in pairs by calculating the Bayes factor given a common data set. We then proceed to analyzing a few well-known BSM models that can provide a high energy framework for the EFT analysis. These include the exchange of a heavy$$Z^{'}$$Z′boson in models with heavy vector-like fermions and a scalar field, and a model with scalar leptoquarks. We provide predictions for the BSM couplings and expected mass values.
Near-$$AdS_2$$ perturbations and the connection with near-extreme Reissner–Nordstrom
Authors: Porfyriadis Achilleas P.
Published: October 2019

The geometry very near the horizon of a near-extreme Reissner–Nordstrom black hole is described by the direct product of a near-$$AdS_2$$AdS2 spacetime with a two-sphere. While near-$$AdS_2$$AdS2 is locally diffeomorphic to $$AdS_2$$AdS2 the two connect differently with the asymptotically flat part of the geometry of (near-)extreme Reissner–Nordstrom. In previous work, we solved analytically the coupled gravitational and electromagnetic perturbation equations of $$AdS_2\times S^2$$AdS2×S2 and the associated connection problem with extreme Reissner–Nordstrom. In this paper, we give the solution for perturbations of near-$$AdS_2\times S^2$$AdS2×S2 and make the connection with near-extreme Reissner–Nordstrom. Our results here may also be thought of as computing the classical scattering matrix for gravitational and electromagnetic waves which probe the region very near the horizon of a highly charged spherically symmetric black hole.
A first determination of parton distributions with theoretical uncertainties
Authors: Abdul Khalek Rabah , Ball Richard D. , Carrazza Stefano , Forte Stefano , Giani Tommaso , Kassabov Zahari , Nocera Emanuele R. , Pearson Rosalyn L. , Rojo Juan , Rottoli Luca , Ubiali Maria , Voisey Cameron , Wilson Michael
Published: October 2019

The parton distribution functions (PDFs) which characterize the structure of the proton are currently one of the dominant sources of uncertainty in the predictions for most processes measured at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). Here we present the first extraction of the proton PDFs that accounts for the missing higher order uncertainty (MHOU) in the fixed-order QCD calculations used in PDF determinations. We demonstrate that the MHOU can be included as a contribution to the covariance matrix used for the PDF fit, and then introduce prescriptions for the computation of this covariance matrix using scale variations. We validate our results at next-to-leading order (NLO) by comparison to the known next order (NNLO) corrections. We then construct variants of the NNPDF3.1 NLO PDF set that include the effect of the MHOU, and assess their impact on the central values and uncertainties of the resulting PDFs.
Axion hilltops, Kahler modulus quintessence and the swampland criteria
Authors: Emelin Maxim , Tatar Radu
Published: October 2019

We study the interplay among extrema of axion potentials, Kahler moduli stabilization and the swampland criteria. We argue that moving away from the minima of nonperturbatively generated axion potentials can lead to a runaway behavior of moduli that govern the couplings in the effective field theory. The proper inclusion of these degrees of freedom resolves the conflict between periodic axion potentials and the gradient de Sitter criterion, without the need to invoke the refined de Sitter criterion. We investigate the possibility of including this runaway direction as a model of quintessence that satisfies the swampland criteria. Using a single nonperturbative effect, the maximum along the axion direction provides such a runaway direction, which is unstable in the axion directions, sensitive to initial conditions and too steep to allow for a Hubble time of expansion without violating the field excursion criterion. Adding a second nonperturbative effect generates a saddle point in the potential satisfying the refined de Sitter criterion, which solves the steepness problem and improves the initial conditions problem although some fine-tuning remains required.
Chiral modular bootstrap
Authors: Ashrafi M.
Published: October 2019

Using modular bootstrap we show the lightest primary fields of a unitary compact two-dimensional conformal field theory (with [Formula: see text], [Formula: see text]) has a conformal weight [Formula: see text]. This implies that the upper bound on the dimension of the lightest primary fields depends on their spin. In particular if the set of lightest primary fields includes extremal or near extremal states whose spin to dimension ratio [Formula: see text], the corresponding dimension is [Formula: see text]. From AdS/CFT correspondence, we obtain an upper bound on the spectrum of black hole in three-dimensional gravity. Our results show that if the first primary fields have large spin, the corresponding three-dimensional gravity has extremal or near extremal BTZ black hole.
Performance Analysis of Multi-Hop Multi-Branch Amplify-and-Forward Cooperative Communication Over Rician Fading Channels
Authors: Fathollahi Hadi , Madani Mohammad H.
Published: October 2019

Performance of multi-hop multi-branch amplify and forward (AF) cooperative communication over Rician fading channels is presented in this paper by a novel analysis method. Rician distribution is used to analyze the system because this channel model is useful in aerospace wireless communication channels. We derive an asymptotic expression for the statistics of the received signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) in the system under study with well-known moment-generating function (MGF)-based approach with maximal ratio combining (MRC) scheme. Moreover, for comparative analysis in different branches and hops, outage probability and symbol error ratio are derived. Finally, numerical simulation results are provided to confirm the theoretical results. These results are presented to illustrate the considerable performance improvement achieved by the increasing number of branches and hops.
Loop conditions for strongly connected digraphs
Authors: Olšák Miroslav
Published: October 2019

We prove that every strongly connected (not necessarily finite) digraph of algebraic length 1, which is compatible with an operation [Formula: see text] satisfying a non-trivial identity of the form [Formula: see text], has a loop.
Additive Aggregation Functions: Generalizations and Modifications of Additivity
Authors: Kolesárová Anna , Kouchakinejad Fateme , Mesiar Radko
Published: October 2019

In this paper we study some modifications and generalizations of additivity in the case of aggregation functions on the unit interval [0, 1]. We prove that some common properties of aggregation functions can be viewed as modifications of additivity — additivity with constraints.We also generalize additivity into pseudo-additivity and k-pseudo-additivity, and provide characterization of pseudo-additive and k-pseudo-additive aggregation functions, including maxitive and k-maxitive aggregation functions.
A Hierarchically ⊥-Decomposable Fuzzy Measure-Based Approach for Fuzzy Rules Aggregation
Authors: Saleh Emran , Valls Aida , Moreno Antonio , Romero-Aroca Pedro , Bustince Humberto , Torra Vicenç
Published: October 2019

A Fuzzy Decision Tree is a classification method consisting of a set of rules defined on fuzzy variables. The final class assignment is done according to the output of all the rules of the tree. Generally, the maximum operator is used to aggregate the results of the rules. However, some approaches based on more complex aggregation operators have appeared recently. In this work we propose to use Sugeno and Choquet integrals together with a Hierarchically ⊥-Decomposable Fuzzy Measure (HDFM) to aggregate the rules' values. The HDFM exploits the hierarchical structure of the fuzzy decision tree and takes into account the confidence value of the output together with the classification ambiguity of the rules. The HDFM is built using Sugeno-Weber t-conorms.We validate this approach on several classification problems and make a comparison of the performance with the state of art aggregation operators. Finally, a case study with a real dataset of diabetic patients is analyzed to predict the risk of suffering from diabetic retinopathy.
A NEW STRUCTURE OF FLEXIBLE OLED WITH COPPER NANOWIRE ANODE AND GRAPHERE OXIDE/PEDOT: PSS ANODE BUFFER LAYER
Authors: LIU PING , WANG JIANGHAO , CHENG JIE , LIU LIMING , WANG HONGHANG , ZENG BAOQING , CHI FENG
Published: October 2019

A flexible organic light-emitting device (OLED) was produced using copper nanowire (CuNW) film as anode and Graphene oxide (GO)/poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene):poly(styrene sulfonate) (PEDOT:PSS) film as anode buffer layer. Compared with other transparent conductive films (TCFs), CuNWs are low cost, easy to fabricate, and compatible with flexible substrates over a large area. Due to these advantages, CuNWs are showing greater and greater promise for the next generation of TCF. Modified by PEDOT:PSS, the conductivity and work function of the CuNW film can be dramatically enhanced. However, PEDOT:PSS is highly acidic and easy to corrode the CuNW film, which will reduce maximum luminous brightness and current efficiency of the OLED. In this paper, GO/PEDOT:PSS was used as anode buffer layer to modify the CuNW anode and the composite transparent electrode exhibited excellent optoelectrical properties. The driving voltage of the OLED with CuNW/PEDOT:PSS is 6.2[Formula: see text]V, and the maximum luminous brightness is 2737.2[Formula: see text]cd/m2. The driving voltage of the OLED with CuNW/GO/PEDOT:PSS anode was reduced to 5.1[Formula: see text]V, and the maximum luminous brightness was improved to 3007.4[Formula: see text]cd/m2.
Uniform stabilization for the semilinear wave equation in an inhomogeneous medium with locally distributed nonlinear damping and dynamic Cauchy–Ventcel type boundary conditions
Authors: Almeida A. F. , Cavalcanti M. M. , Gonzalez Martinez V. H. , Zanchetta J. P.
Published: October 2019

In this paper, we consider the Cauchy–Ventcel problem in an inhomogeneous medium with dynamic boundary conditions subject to a nonlinear damping distributed around a neighborhood [Formula: see text] of the boundary according to the Geometric Control Condition. Uniform decay rates of the associated energy are established and, in addition, the exact internal controllability for the linear problem is also proved. For this purpose, refined microlocal analysis arguments are considered by exploiting ideas due to Burq and Gérard [Contrôle Optimal des équations aux dérivées partielles. (2001); http://www.math.upsud.fr/burq/articles/coursX.pdf ].
Gap opening in two-dimensional periodic systems
Authors: Borisov D. I. , Exner P.
Published: October 2019

We present a new method of gap control in two-dimensional periodic systems with the perturbation consisting of a second-order differential operator and a family of narrow potential “walls” separating the period cells in one direction. We show that under appropriate assumptions one can open gaps around points determined by dispersion curves of the associated “waveguide” system, in general any finite number of them, and to control their widths in terms of the perturbation parameter. Moreover, a distinctive feature of those gaps is that their edge values are attained by the corresponding band functions at internal points of the Brillouin zone.
Optimal weighted feature vector and deep belief network for medical data classification
Authors: Kadam Vinod Jagannath , Jadhav Shivajirao Manikrao
Published: October 2019

Medical data classification is the process of transforming descriptions of medical diagnoses and procedures into universal medical code numbers. The diagnoses and procedures are usually taken from a variety of sources within the healthcare record, such as the transcription of the physician’s notes, laboratory results, radiologic results and other sources. However, there exist many frequency distribution problems in these domains. Hence, this paper intends to develop an advanced and precise medical data classification approach for diabetes and breast cancer dataset. With the knowledge of the features and challenges persisting with the state-of-the-art classification methods, deep learning-based medical data classification methodology is proposed here. It is well known that deep learning networks learn directly from the data. In this paper, the medical data is dimensionally reduced using Principle Component Analysis (PCA). The dimensionally reduced data are transformed by multiplying by a weighting factor, which is optimized using Whale Optimization Algorithm (WOA), to obtain the maximum distance between the features. As a result, the data are transformed into a label-distinguishable plane under which the Deep Belief Network (DBN) is adopted to perform the deep learning process, and the data classification is performed. Further, the proposed WOA-based DBN (WOADBN) method is compared with the Neural Network (NN), DBN, Generic Algorithm-based NN (GANN), GADBN, Particle Swarm Optimization (PSONN), PSO-based DBN (PSODBN), WOA-based NN (WOANN) techniques and the results are obtained, which shows the superiority of proposed algorithm over conventional methods.
Multi-criteria Analysis for Rapid Strategic Environmental Assessment in Tourism Planning
Authors: Khosravi Fatemeh , Fischer Thomas B. , Jha-Thakur Urmila
Published: October 2019

Multi-criteria analysis (MCA) is a group of analytical approaches allowing us to compare criteria or alternatives when making complex decisions. It can be applied in Strategic Environmental Assessment for supporting the integration of environmental, social and economic aspects into the development of strategies, policies, plan and programme making. This paper reports on an application of analytical hierarchy process (AHP) as one of MCA approaches to assess Gilan Tourism Development Plan in Iran. Here, the Global Sustainable Tourism criteria were weighted by AHP on the basis of experts’ opinions. The extent to which development options for Gilan Tourism Development Plan were likely to be sustainable was assessed using a list of weighted criteria. The evaluation of the findings suggests that the plan has not met all the sub-criteria of sustainable tourism.
Abnormal phase transition and polarization mismatch phenomena in BaTiO3-based relaxor ferroelectrics
Authors: Hu Qingyuan , Wei Xiaoyong
Published: October 2019

Relaxor ferroelectrics have been extensively studied due to their outstanding dielectric, piezoelectric, energy storage, and electro-optical properties. Although various theories were proposed to elaborate on the relaxation phenomena, polar nanoregions formed by disruption of the long-range-order structures are considered to play a key role in relaxor ferroelectrics. Generally, relaxor ferroelectrics are formed by aliovalent substitution or isovalent substitution in normal ferroelectrics, or further combinations of solid solutions. Herein, one category of BaTiO3-based relaxor ferroelectrics with abnormal phase transition and polarization mismatch phenomena is focused. Characteristic parameters of such BaTiO3-based relaxor ferroelectrics, including the Curie temperature, polarization, and lattice parameter, show a typical “U”-shaped variation with compositions. The studied BaTiO3-based relaxor ferroelectrics are mostly solid solutions of [Formula: see text]-site coupling and [Formula: see text]-site coupling ferroelectrics, exhibiting polarization mismatch in certain compositions [e.g., 0.9BaTiO3–0.1BiScO3, 0.8BaTiO3–0.2Bi([Formula: see text][Formula: see text]O3, 0.8BaTiO3–0.2Bi([Formula: see text][Formula: see text]O3, 0.5BaTiO3–0.5Pb([Formula: see text][Formula: see text]O3, 0.4BaTiO3–0.6Pb([Formula: see text][Formula: see text]O3, etc.]. Of particular interest is that excellent electrical properties can be achieved in the studied relaxor ferroelectrics. Therefore, polarization mismatch theory can also provide guidance for the design of new high-performance lead-free relaxor ferroelectrics.
DCMI
Authors: Koraei Mostafa , Fatemi Omid , Jahre Magnus
Published: October 2019

Iterative Stencil Loops (ISLs) are the key kernel within a range of compute-intensive applications. To accelerate ISLs with Field Programmable Gate Arrays, it is critical to exploit parallelism (1) among elements within the same iteration and (2) across loop iterations. We propose a novel ISL acceleration scheme called Direct Computation of Multiple Iterations (DCMI) that improves upon prior work by pre-computing the effective stencil coefficients after a number of iterations at design time—resulting in accelerators that use minimal on-chip memory and avoid redundant computation. This enables DCMI to improve throughput by up to 7.7× compared to the state-of-the-art cone-based architecture.
Probabilistic verification of fairness properties via concentration
Authors: Bastani Osbert , Zhang Xin , Solar-Lezama Armando
Published: October 2019

As machine learning systems are increasingly used to make real world legal and financial decisions, it is of paramount importance that we develop algorithms to verify that these systems do not discriminate against minorities. We design a scalable algorithm for verifying fairness specifications. Our algorithm obtains strong correctness guarantees based on adaptive concentration inequalities; such inequalities enable our algorithm to adaptively take samples until it has enough data to make a decision. We implement our algorithm in a tool called VeriFair, and show that it scales to large machine learning models, including a deep recurrent neural network that is more than five orders of magnitude larger than the largest previously-verified neural network. While our technique only gives probabilistic guarantees due to the use of random samples, we show that we can choose the probability of error to be extremely small.
Derivative grammars: a symbolic approach to parsing with derivatives
Authors: Henriksen Ian , Bilardi Gianfranco , Pingali Keshav
Published: October 2019

We present a novel approach to context-free grammar parsing that is based on generating a sequence of grammars called
derivative grammars
from a given context-free grammar and input string. The generation of the derivative grammars is described by a few simple inference rules. We present an
O
(
n
2
) space and
O
(
n
3
) time recognition algorithm, which can be extended to generate parse trees in
O
(
n
3
) time and
O
(
n
2
log
n
) space. Derivative grammars can be viewed as a
symbolic
approach to implementing the notion of
derivative languages
, which was introduced by Brzozowski.

Might and others have explored an
operational
approach to implementing derivative languages in which the context-free grammar is encoded as a collection of recursive algebraic data types in a functional language like Haskell. Functional language implementation features like knot-tying and lazy evaluation are exploited to ensure that parsing is done correctly and efficiently in spite of complications like left-recursion. In contrast, our symbolic approach using inference rules can be implemented easily in any programming language and we obtain better space bounds for parsing.

Reifying derivative languages by encoding them symbolically as grammars also enables formal connections to be made for the first time between the derivatives approach and classical parsing methods like the Earley and LL/LR parsers. In particular, we show that the sets of Earley items maintained by the Earley parser implicitly encode derivative grammars and we give a procedure for producing derivative grammars from these sets. Conversely, we show that our derivative grammar recognizer can be transformed into the Earley recognizer by optimizing some of its bookkeeping. These results suggest that derivative grammars may provide a new foundation for context-free grammar recognition and parsing.
BDA: practical dependence analysis for binary executables by unbiased whole-program path sampling and per-path abstract interpretation
Authors: Zhang Zhuo , You Wei , Tao Guanhong , Wei Guannan , Kwon Yonghwi , Zhang Xiangyu
Published: October 2019

Binary program dependence analysis determines dependence between instructions and hence is important for many applications that have to deal with executables without any symbol information. A key challenge is to identify if multiple memory read/write instructions access the same memory location. The state-of-the-art solution is the value set analysis (VSA) that uses abstract interpretation to determine the set of addresses that are possibly accessed by memory instructions. However, VSA is conservative and hence leads to a large number of bogus dependences and then substantial false positives in downstream analyses such as malware behavior analysis. Furthermore, existing public VSA implementations have difficulty scaling to complex binaries. In this paper, we propose a new binary dependence analysis called BDA enabled by a randomized abstract interpretation technique. It features a novel whole program path sampling algorithm that is not biased by path length, and a per-path abstract interpretation avoiding precision loss caused by merging paths in traditional analyses. It also provides probabilistic guarantees. Our evaluation on SPECINT2000 programs shows that it can handle complex binaries such as gcc whereas VSA implementations from the-state-of-art platforms have difficulty producing results for many SPEC binaries. In addition, the dependences reported by BDA are 75 and 6 times smaller than Alto, a scalable binary dependence analysis tool, and VSA, respectively, with only 0.19% of true dependences observed during dynamic execution missed (by BDA). Applying BDA to call graph generation and malware analysis shows that BDA substantially supersedes the commercial tool IDA in recovering indirect call targets and outperforms a state-of-the-art malware analysis tool Cuckoo by disclosing 3 times more hidden payloads.
Automatic repair of regular expressions
Authors: Pan Rong , Hu Qinheping , Xu Gaowei , D'Antoni Loris
Published: October 2019

We introduce RFixer, a tool for repairing complex regular expressions using examples and only consider regular expressions without non-regular operators (e.g., negative lookahead). Given an incorrect regular expression and sets of positive and negative examples, RFixer synthesizes the closest regular expression to the original one that is consistent with the examples. Automatically repairing regular expressions requires exploring a large search space because practical regular expressions: i) are large, ii) operate over very large alphabets---e.g., UTF-16 and ASCII---and iii) employ complex constructs---e.g., character classes and numerical quantifiers. RFixer's repair algorithm achieves scalability by taking advantage of structural properties of regular expressions to effectively prune the search space, and it employs satisfiability modulo theory solvers to efficiently and symbolically explore the sets of possible character classes and numerical quantifiers. RFixer could successfully compute minimal repairs for regular expressions collected from a variety of sources, whereas existing tools either failed to produce any repair or produced overly complex repairs.
Static analysis with demand-driven value refinement
Authors: Stein Benno , Nielsen Benjamin Barslev , Chang Bor-Yuh Evan , Møller Anders
Published: October 2019

Static analysis tools for JavaScript must strike a delicate balance, achieving the level of precision required by the most complex features of target programs without incurring prohibitively high analysis time. For example, reasoning about dynamic property accesses sometimes requires precise relational information connecting the object, the dynamically-computed property name, and the property value. Even a minor precision loss at such critical program locations can result in a proliferation of spurious dataflow that renders the analysis results useless.

We present a technique by which a conventional non-relational static dataflow analysis can be combined soundly with a value refinement mechanism to increase precision on demand at critical locations. Crucially, our technique is able to incorporate relational information from the value refinement mechanism into the non-relational domain of the dataflow analysis.

We demonstrate the feasibility of this approach by extending an existing JavaScript static analysis with a demand-driven value refinement mechanism that relies on backwards abstract interpretation. Our evaluation finds that precise analysis of widely used JavaScript utility libraries depends heavily on the precision at a small number of critical locations that can be identified heuristically, and that backwards abstract interpretation is an effective mechanism to provide that precision on demand.
Relational verification using reinforcement learning
Authors: Chen Jia , Wei Jiayi , Feng Yu , Bastani Osbert , Dillig Isil
Published: October 2019

Relational verification aims to prove properties that relate a pair of programs or two different runs of the same program. While relational properties (e.g., equivalence, non-interference) can be verified by reducing them to standard safety, there are typically many possible reduction strategies, only some of which result in successful automated verification. Motivated by this problem, we propose a novel relational verification algorithm that learns useful reduction strategies using reinforcement learning. Specifically, we show how to formulate relational verification as a Markov Decision Process (MDP) and use reinforcement learning to synthesize an optimal policy for the underlying MDP. The learned policy is then used to guide the search for a successful verification strategy. We have implemented this approach in a tool called Coeus and evaluate it on two benchmark suites. Our evaluation shows that Coeus solves significantly more problems within a given time limit compared to multiple baselines, including two state-of-the-art relational verification tools.
On the design, implementation, and use of laziness in R
Authors: Goel Aviral , Vitek Jan
Published: October 2019

The R programming language has been lazy for over twenty-five years. This paper presents a review of the design and implementation of call-by-need in R, and a data-driven study of how generations of programmers have put laziness to use in their code. We analyze 16,707 packages and observe the creation of 270.9 B promises. Our data suggests that there is little supporting evidence to assert that programmers use laziness to avoid unnecessary computation or to operate over infinite data structures. For the most part R code appears to have been written without reliance on, and in many cases even knowledge of, delayed argument evaluation. The only significant exception is a small number of packages which leverage call-by-need for meta-programming.
Mergeable replicated data types
Authors: Kaki Gowtham , Priya Swarn , Sivaramakrishnan KC , Jagannathan Suresh
Published: October 2019

Programming geo-replicated distributed systems is challenging given the complexity of reasoning about different evolving states on different replicas. Existing approaches to this problem impose significant burden on application developers to consider the effect of how operations performed on one replica are witnessed and applied on others. To alleviate these challenges, we present a fundamentally different approach to programming in the presence of replicated state. Our insight is based on the use of invertible relational specifications of an inductively-defined data type as a mechanism to capture salient aspects of the data type relevant to how its different instances can be safely merged in a replicated environment. Importantly, because these specifications only address a data type's (static) structural properties, their formulation does not require exposing low-level system-level details concerning asynchrony, replication, visibility, etc. As a consequence, our framework enables the correct-by-construction synthesis of rich merge functions over arbitrarily complex (i.e., composable) data types. We show that the use of a rich relational specification language allows us to extract sufficient conditions to automatically derive merge functions that have meaningful non-trivial convergence properties. We incorporate these ideas in a tool called Quark, and demonstrate its utility via a detailed evaluation study on real-world benchmarks.
Compiler fuzzing: how much does it matter?
Authors: Marcozzi Michaël , Tang Qiyi , Donaldson Alastair F. , Cadar Cristian
Published: October 2019

Despite much recent interest in randomised testing (fuzzing) of compilers, the practical impact of fuzzer-found compiler bugs on real-world applications has barely been assessed. We present the first quantitative and qualitative study of the tangible impact of miscompilation bugs in a mature compiler. We follow a rigorous methodology where the bug impact over the compiled application is evaluated based on (1) whether the bug appears to trigger during compilation; (2) the extent to which generated assembly code changes syntactically due to triggering of the bug; and (3) whether such changes cause regression test suite failures, or whether we can manually find application inputs that trigger execution divergence due to such changes. The study is conducted with respect to the compilation of more than 10 million lines of C/C++ code from 309 Debian packages, using 12% of the historical and now fixed miscompilation bugs found by four state-of-the-art fuzzers in the Clang/LLVM compiler, as well as 18 bugs found by human users compiling real code or as a by-product of formal verification efforts. The results show that almost half of the fuzzer-found bugs propagate to the generated binaries for at least one package, in which case only a very small part of the binary is typically affected, yet causing two failures when running the test suites of all the impacted packages. User-reported and formal verification bugs do not exhibit a higher impact, with a lower rate of triggered bugs and one test failure. The manual analysis of a selection of the syntactic changes caused by some of our bugs (fuzzer-found and non fuzzer-found) in package assembly code, shows that either these changes have no semantic impact or that they would require very specific runtime circumstances to trigger execution divergence.