bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Spreadsheets - 90+ million End User Programmers With No Comment Tracking or Version Control
Authors: Durusau Patrick , Hunting Sam
Published: August 2015

Stephen Gandel's Damn Excel! How the 'most important software application of all time' is ruining the world is NOT an indictment of Excel. It is an indictment of the inability to:

link spreadsheets to emails

track relationships between cells and between cells and formulas

track comments on spreadsheet errors

have versioning for cell contents/formulas

Without those capabilities, spreadsheets are dangerous to their authors and others.

How dangerous you ask? A short list of horror stories would include: 2013, the "London Whale," JPMorgan Chase, lost £250 million; 2013, error in calculation of international Government debt to GDP ratios; 2012, JPMorgan Chase loses $6.2 billion due to a spreadsheet formula error; 2011, MF Global collapses, in part due to the use of spreadsheets to track assets and liabilities; 2010, US Federal Reserve, spreadsheet error on calculation of $4 billion in Consumer Revolving Credit. The EuSpRIG Horror Stories page has a generous sampling of more spreadsheet horror stories.

Statistically speaking, F1F9 estimates:

88% of all spreadsheets have errors in them, while 50% of spreadsheets used by large companies have material defects, resulting in loss of time and money, damaged reputations, lost jobs and disrupted careers.

If that weren't bad enough, other research indicates that 33% of all bad business decisons are traceable to spreadsheet errors. That's right, 33% of all bad business decisions. That's a business case looking for a solution. Yes?

Disclaimer: Topic maps, even a legend based on the Topic Maps Reference Model, ISO/IEC 13250-5 (2015), cannot magically prevent fraud, stupidity or human error. Topic maps can enable the modeling of relationships within spreadsheets, create comment tracking on errors/spreadsheets, even when the comments are in emails, and explore the subject identities and merging practices required for content level versioing of spreadsheets. Our goal is to empower you to detect fraud, stupidity and human error.

On the technical side, we will analyze real world spreadsheets, determine subjects to be represented and how to identify them, create a legend that will constrain the representatives of subjects (using ordinary XML tools), create a topic map of an actual spreadsheet and review our results against the known requirements to improve auditing of spreadsheets. The auditing process itself will be shown to be auditable.
Markup as Index Interface
Authors: Holstege Mary
Published: August 2015

To a search engine, indexes are specified by the content: the words, phrases, and characters that are actually present tell the search engine what inverted indexes to create. Other external knowledge can be applied add to this inventory of indexes. For example, knowledge of the document language can lead to indexes for word stems or decompounding. These can unify different content into the same index or split the same content into multiple indexes. That is, different words manifest in the content can be unified under a single search key, and the same word can have multiple manifestations under different search keys. Turning this around, the indexes represent the retrievable information content in the document. Full text search is not an either/or yes/no system, but one of relative fit (scoring). Precision balances against recall, mediated by scoring.

The search engine perspective offers a different way to think about markup:

As a specification of the retrievable information content of the document.

As something that can, with additional information, unify different markup or provide multiple distinct views of the same markup.

As something that can be present to greater or lesser degrees, with a goodness of match (scoring).

As a specification that can be adjusted to balance precision and recall.

What does this search engine perspective on markup mean, concretely? Can we use it to reframe some persistent conundrums, such as vocabulary resolution and overlap? Let's see.
Diagramming XML
Authors: Quin Liam R. E.
Published: August 2015

The growth in popularity of “Big Data” has brought an increased interest in visualization; that is, in software that draws graphical representations of data in the hope that a human observer can spot emergent patterns. Visualization takes data and shows a usually incomplete view.

People working with XML documents may have large amounts of data to visualize, in which case some of these techniques can be very effective. People may also wish to explore constraints on the XML documents, such as those typically expressed in an XML DTD or schema.

This paper will focus primarily not on data visualization of trends but on explicit visual representation of relationships: that is diagrams that illustrate a DTD schema, an XML instance, a universe of possible instances, and relationships between these things. Techniques used will focus on producing diagrams intended for use in Web browsers using libraries such as D3.js.

An underlying motivation for this work is to explore affordances peculiar to XML documents: to ask, what makes XML special, or, what would need to be reinvented if one were to abandon XML for other systems.
Introduction to Cultural Heritage Markup
Authors: Cayless Hugh A.
Published: August 2015

Cultural heritage materials are remarkable for their complexity and heterogenity. This often means that when you’ve solved one problem, you’ve solved one problem. Arrayed against this difficulty, we have a nice big pile of tools and technologies with an alphabet soup of names like XML, TEI, RDF, OAIS, SIP, DIP, XIP, AIP, and BIBFRAME, coupled with a variety of programming languages or storage and publishing systems. All of our papers today address in some way the question of how you deal with messy, complex, human data using the available toolsets and how those toolsets have to be adapted to cope with our data. How do you avoid having your solution dictated by the tools available? How do you know when you’re doing it right? Our speakers are all trying, in various ways, to reconfigure their tools or push past those tools’ limitations, and they are going to tell us how they’re doing it.
Data transforms, patterns and profiles for 21st century Cultural Heritage
Authors: Ogbuji Uche , Baker Mark
Published: August 2015

If you search for books and other media on the Web, you find Amazon, Wikipedia, and many other resources long before you see any libraries. This is a historical problem of librarians' having started ahead of the state of the art in database technologies, and yet unable to keep up with mainstream computing developments, including the Web. As a result, libraries are left with extraordinarily rich catalogs in formats which are unsuited to the Web, and which need a lot of work to adapt for the Web. A first step towards addressing this problem, BIBFRAME is a model developed for representing metadata from libraries and other cultural heritage institutions in linked data form. Libhub is a project building on BIBFRAME to convert traditional library formats, especially MARC/XML, to Web resource pages using BIBFRAME and other vocabulary frameworks. The technology used to implement Libhub transforms MARC/XML to a semi-structured, RDF-like metamodel called Versa, from which various outputs are possible, including data-rich Web pages. The authors developed a pipeline processing technology in Python in order to address the need for high performance and scalability as well as a prodigious degree of customization to accommodate a half century of variations and nuances in library cataloging conventions. The heart of this pipelining system is in the open-source project pybibframe, and the main way to customize the transform for non-technical librarians is a pattern microlanguage called marcpatterns.py. Using marcpatterns.py recipes specialized for the first Libhub participant, Denver Public Library, further specialized from common patterns among public libraries, (FIXME - not quite sure what is being said here) The first prerelease of linked data Web pages has already demonstrated the dramatic improvement in visibility for the library and quality, curated content for the Web, made possible through the adaptive, semistructured transform from notoriously abstruse library catalog formats. This paper discusses an unorthodox approach to structured and heuristics-based transformation from a large corpus of XML in a difficult format which doesn't well serve the richness of its content. It covers some of the pragmatic choices made by developers of the system who happen to be pioneering advocates of The Web, markup, and standards around these, but who had to subordinate purity to the urgent need to effect large-scale exposure of dark cultural heritage data in difficult circumstances for a small development and maintenance team. This is a case study of where proper knowledge of XML and its related standards must combine with agile techniques and "worse-is-better" concessions to solve a stubborn problem in extracting value from cultural heritage markup.
"To those who startle at innovation..."
Authors: Randall Laura
Published: August 2015

In these times of electronic journal publishing, adopting a continuous publication model is easy: Open an issue, publish articles electronically as they flow through the pipeline, close an issue. Even print journals offer this quick access to the content, publishing online before issuing the printed publication. The goal is clear: Provide access to the information as soon as possible. These models incorporating quick electronic access offer clear benefits to the community, so it's no wonder the model is so widely adopted.

But these models aren't new to the digital age. They're not exclusive to electronic publishing. Almost 200 years ago, at least one journal publisher was facing the same struggle of how to get information to their readers quickly. In the editor's words, from January 1828, "We only ask that those printed sheets which lie from one to thirteen weeks in the printing-office...may appear...half-monthly.... To those wo startle at innovation, we put forth this plain question:—Can there be any objection, that each packet...of this Journal should go forth to those who wish to have it every fifteen days...?"

This publication model, familiar as it is, presents its own set of challenges to our modern system. The journal is being digitized as part of a National Library of Medicine (NLM) and Wellcome Library project to digitize NLM's collection and be made available to the public through PubMed Central (https://www.nlm.nih.gov/news/welcome_library_agreement.html). So our challenge now is this: How do we integrate a 200-year-old publication model in current vocabularies when we've re-invented the same model in a different medium?
Integrating Digital Epigraphies (or, if you think the 19th century was bad, try living in the 20th)
Authors: Sosin Joshua D.
Published: August 2015

IDEs aims to provide core infrastructure for the field of Greek epigraphy (the study of texts carved on stone), by supporting annotation across an array of disparate digital resources. Epigraphy was born in the early to mid 19th century and has been productive ever since. Perhaps a million Latin and Greek inscriptions are known today. These objects are often badly preserved, physically removed from their original context or even lost; many are repeatedly re-published, emended, joined to other fragments, re-dated, re-provenanced, and not only do they lack a single unambiguous identification system, but many thousands are known by multiple, competing and badly controlled bibliographic shorthands. They are unstable in many senses. Print publication of inscriptions in the late 19th century and throughout the 20th is marked by a considerable and fulsome descriptive rigor. In the generation straddling the 20th and 21st centuries, scholars developed a rich variety digital epigraphy tools. But in all cases these were descendants of previous print resources and entailed significant suppression of the semantic richness that was the (albeit loosely controlled) norm in print publication. In a way, then, much of our effort is devoted to creating a framework for allowing users to re-infuse a suite of late 20th-century tools with the 19th-century scholarly sensibility (and even the very data!) that long informed print epigraphy.
Duplicitous Diabolos
Authors: Zeldes Amir
Published: August 2015

This paper briefly discusses markup, metadata and evaluation issues that arise when projects do not include a critical edition adjudicating different variants, but instead incorporate multiple, full diplomatic transcriptions. When used naively, such corpora will cause duplicate results that are hard to discern in quantitative studies, and in cases of incomplete, unexact or fragmentary parallel witnesses, substantially complicate the decision about what users actually want to have. Using a case study on Coptic manuscripts, the paper suggests that as a provisional strategy, documents should be partitioned as finely grained as necessary such that each section's parallel witness status is encoded, and that for each parallel set, it can be useful to define a redundancy metadatum which identifies the 'best' candidate for quantitative study among the available choices.
Measuring Implementation Strength for Integrated Community Case Management in Malawi: Results from a National Cell Phone Census
Authors: Heidkamp Rebecca , Hazel Elizabeth , Nsona Humphreys , Mleme Tiope , Jamali Andrew , Bryce Jennifer
Published: August 2015

Program managers, investors, and evaluators need real-time information on how program strategies are being scaled up and implemented. Integrated Community Case Management (iCCM) of childhood illnesses is a strategy for increasing access to diagnosis and treatment of malaria, pneumonia, and diarrhea through community-based health workers. We collected real-time data on iCCM implementation strength through cell phone interviews with community-based health workers in Malawi and calculated indicators of implementation strength and utilization at district level using consensus definitions from the Ministry of Health (MOH) and iCCM partners. All of the iCCM implementation strength indicators varied widely within and across districts. Results show that Malawi has made substantial progress in the scale-up of iCCM since the 2008 program launch. However, there are wide differences in iCCM implementation strength by district. Districts that performed well according to the survey measures demonstrate that MOH implementation strength targets are achievable with the right combination of supportive structures. Using the survey results, specific districts can now be targeted with additional support.
Serum Anti-Cryptosporidial gp15 Antibodies in Mothers and Children Less than 2 Years of Age in India
Authors: Lazarus Robin P. , Ajjampur Sitara S. R. , Sarkar Rajiv , Geetha Jayanthy C. , Prabakaran Ashok D. , Velusamy Vasanth , Naumova Elena N. , Ward Honorine D. , Kang Gagandeep
Published: August 2015

Little is known about the type and longevity of the humoral response to cryptosporidial infections in developing countries. We evaluated serum antibody response to Cryptosporidium gp15 in 150 sets of maternal, preweaning and postinfection/end-of-follow-up sera from children followed up to 2 years of age to determine the influence of maternal and preweaning serological status on childhood cryptosporidiosis. Fifty two percent (N = 78) of mothers and 20% (N = 30) of children were seropositive preweaning. However, most positive preweaning samples from children were collected early in life indicating transplacental transfer and subsequent rapid waning of antibodies. Although 62% (N = 94) of children had a parasitologically confirmed cryptosporidial infection (detected by stool polymerase chain reaction) during the follow-up, only 54% (N = 51) of children were seropositive postinfection. Given there were striking differences in seropositivity depending on when the sample was collected, even though Cryptosporidium was detected in the stool of the majority of the children, this study indicates that antibodies wane rapidly. During follow-up, the acquisition or severity of cryptosporidial infections was not influenced by maternal (P = 0.331 and 0.720, respectively) as well as the preweaning serological status of the child (P = 0.076 and 0.196, respectively).
Cavity Forming Pneumonia Due to Staphylococcus aureus Following Dengue Fever
Authors: Miyata Nobuyuki , Yoshimura Yukihiro , Tachikawa Natsuo , Amano Yuichiro , Sakamoto Yohei , Kosuge Youko
Published: August 2015

While visiting Malaysia, a 22-year-old previously healthy Japanese man developed myalgia, headache, and fever, leading to a diagnosis of classical dengue fever. After improvement and returning to Japan after a five day hospitalization, he developed productive cough several days after defervescing from dengue. Computed tomography (CT) thorax scan showed multiple lung cavities. A sputum smear revealed leukocytes with phagocytized gram-positive cocci in clusters, and grew an isolate Staphylococcus aureus sensitive to semi-synthetic penicillin; he was treated successfully with ceftriaxone and cephalexin. This second reported case of pneumonia due to S. aureus occurring after dengue fever, was associated both with nosocomial exposure and might have been associated with dengue-associated immunosuppression. Clinicians should pay systematic attention to bacterial pneumonia following dengue fever to establish whether such a connection is causally associated.
Patterns of Flavivirus Seroprevalence in the Human Population of Northern Laos
Authors: Conlan James V. , Vongxay Khamphouth , Khamlome Boualam , Jarman Richard G. , Gibbons Robert V. , Fenwick Stanley G. , Thompson R. C. A. , Blacksell Stuart D.
Published: August 2015

A total of 1,136 samples from 289 households in four provinces in northern Laos were subjected to Japanese encephalitis virus (JEV) and dengue virus hemagglutination inhibition (DENV HI). Overall, antibodies to JEV were detected by HI in 620 (54.6%) of 1,136 people; of which 217 (19.1%) had HI activity against JEV only. Antibodies to DENV4 were detected by HI in 526 (46.3%) of 1,136 people; of which 124 (10.9%) had HI activity against DENV4 only. Antibodies to DENV1–3 were detected by HI in 296 (26.1%), 274 (24.1%), and 283 (24.9) of 1,136 people, respectively; of which 7, 1, and 0, respectively, had HI activity against DENV1–3 only. JEV was the most prevalent Flavivirus in Oudomxay, Luangprabang, and Huaphan provinces and DENV4 was the most prevalent in Xiengkhouang province. Seroprevalence for JEV increased with increasing age and wealth and was higher in villages where rice was cultivated in paddy fields and highest for people of Lao-Tai ethnicity.
Mercadeo Virus: A Novel Mosquito-Specific Flavivirus from Panama
Authors: Carrera Jean-Paul , Guzman Hilda , Beltrán Davis , Díaz Yamilka , López-Vergès Sandra , Torres-Cosme Rolando , Popov Vsevolod , Widen Steven G. , Wood Thomas G. , Weaver Scott C. , Cáceres-Carrera Lorenzo , Vasilakis Nikos , Tesh Robert B.
Published: August 2015

Viruses in the genus Flavivirus (family Flaviviridae) include many arthropod-borne viruses of public health and veterinary importance. However, during the past two decades an explosion of novel insect-specific flaviviruses (ISFs), some closely related to vertebrate pathogens, have been discovered. Although many flavivirus pathogens of vertebrates have been isolated from naturally infected mosquitoes in Panama, ISFs have not previously been reported from the country. This report describes the isolation and characterization of a novel ISF, tentatively named Mercadeo virus (MECDV), obtained from Culex spp. mosquitoes collected in Panama. Two MECDV isolates were sequenced and cluster phylogenetically with cell-fusing agent virus (CFAV) and Nakiwogo virus (NAKV) to form a distinct lineage within the insect-specific group of flaviviruses.
Promoting Influenza Vaccination to Restaurant Employees
Authors: Graves Meredith C. , Harris Jeffrey R. , Hannon Peggy A. , Hammerback Kristen , Parrish Amanda T. , Ahmed Faruque , Zhou Chuan , Allen Claire L.
Published: August 2015

Purpose.

To evaluate an evidence-based workplace approach to increasing adult influenza vaccination levels applied in the restaurant setting

Design.

We implemented an intervention and conducted a pre/post analysis to determine effect on vaccination.

Setting.

Eleven Seattle-area restaurants.

Subjects.

Restaurants with 25+ employees speaking English or Spanish and over 18 years.

Intervention.

Restaurants received influenza vaccination promotion materials, assistance arranging on-site vaccination events, and free influenza vaccinations for employees.

Measures.

Pre/post employee surveys of vaccination status with direct observation and employer interviews to evaluate implementation.

Analysis.

We conducted descriptive analysis of employee survey data and performed qualitative analysis of implementation data. To assess intervention effect, we used a mixed-effects logistic regression model with a restaurant-specific random effect.

Results.

Vaccination levels increased from 26% to 46% (adjusted odds ratio 2.33, 95% confidence interval 1.69, 3.22), with 428 employees surveyed preintervention, 305 surveyed postintervention, and response rates of 73% and 55%, respectively. The intervention was effective across subgroups, but there were restaurant-level differences.

Conclusion.

An access-based workplace intervention can increase influenza vaccination levels in restaurant employees, but restaurant-level factors may influence success.
A Reach, Effectiveness, Adoption, Implementation, Maintenance Evaluation of Weekend Backpack Food Assistance Programs
Authors: Shanks Carmen Byker , Harden Samantha
Published: August 2015

Purpose.

The purpose of this study was to evaluate an ongoing statewide weekend backpack program through the Reach, Effectiveness, Adoption, Implementation, and Maintenance (RE-AIM) framework.

Design.

Mixed-methods inquiry was used to explore the reach, effectiveness, adoption, implementation, and maintenance of backpack programs within Montana.

Setting.

Study participants completed audio-recorded one-on-one phone interviews.

Participants.

Key informants (e.g., managers at food banks, staff at participating schools, policy makers) were purposively sampled (N = 20).

Method.

Semistructured interviews were conducted to gather data to describe each RE-AIM dimension. Interviews were transcribed verbatim and deductively (i.e., using RE-AIM as themes) coded for meaning units, placed into higher-order categories, and summarized in narrative. Supporting quantitative data (e.g., the proportion of eligible students that joined the program, rate of school-level adoption) were calculated using descriptive statistics.

Results.

Backpack programs with a broad reach and evidenced effect may be appealing to adopt. Weekend food bags cost an average $3.87 (SD ± .94) and there were some positive (i.e., ease, protecting participants' privacy) and very few negative (logistical) components of implementation. Collaborators and community partners are necessary for long-term sustainability.

Conclusion.

Backpack programs are widespread and have potential to relieve weekend hunger; however, more efforts need to be made to end childhood hunger.
Using mHealth to Deliver Behavior Change Interventions Within Prenatal Care at Community Health Centers
Authors: Mauriello Leanne M. , Van Marter Deborah F. , Umanzor Cindy D. , Castle Patricia H. , de Aguiar Emma L.
Published: August 2015

Purpose.

To test an iPad-delivered multiple behavior tailored intervention (Healthy Pregnancy: Step by Step) for pregnant women that addresses smoking cessation, stress management, and fruit and vegetable consumption.

Design.

A randomized 2 × 5 factorial repeated measures design was employed with randomization on the individual level stratified on behavior risk. Women completed three sessions during pregnancy and two postpartum at postdelivery months 1 and 4.

Setting.

Women were recruited from six locations of federally funded health centers across three states.

Subjects.

Participants (N = 335) were English- and Spanish-speaking women at up to 18 weeks gestation.

Intervention.

The treatment group received three interactive sessions focused on two priority health behavior risks. The sessions offered individually tailored and stage-matched change strategies based on the transtheoretical model of behavior change. The usual care group received March of Dimes brochures.

Measures.

The primary outcome was the number of behavior risks. Stage of change and continuous measures for all behaviors also were assessed.

Analysis.

Data were analyzed across all time points using generalized estimating equations examining repeated measures effects.

Results.

Women in the treatment group reported significantly fewer risks than those in usual care at 1 month (.85 vs. 1.20, odds ratio [OR] = .70) and 4 months postpartum (.72 vs. .91, OR = .81).

Conclusion.

Healthy Pregnancy is an evidence-based and personalized program that assists pregnant women with reducing behavior risks and sustaining healthy lifestyle behaviors.
Improvements in Health Behaviors, Eating Self-Efficacy, and Goal-Setting Skills Following Participation in Wellness Coaching
Authors: Clark Matthew M. , Bradley Karleah L. , Jenkins Sarah M. , Mettler Emily A. , Larson Brent G. , Preston Heather R. , Liesinger Juliette T. , Werneburg Brooke L. , Hagen Philip T. , Harris Ann M. , Riley Beth A. , Olsen Kerry D. , Douglas Kristin S. Vickers
Published: August 2015

Purpose:

This project examined potential changes in health behaviors following wellness coaching.

Design:

In a single cohort study design, wellness coaching participants were recruited in 2011, data were collected through July 2012, and were analyzed through December 2013. Items in the study questionnaire used requested information about 11 health behaviors, self-efficacy for eating, and goalsetting skills.

Setting:

Worksite wellness center.

Participants:

One-hundred employee wellness center members with an average age of 42 years; 90% were female and most were overweight or obese.

Intervention:

Twelve weeks of in-person, one-on-one wellness coaching.

Method:

Participants completed study questionnaires when they started wellness coaching (baseline), after 12 weeks of wellness coaching, and at a 3-month follow-up.

Results:

From baseline to week 12, these 100 wellness coaching participants improved their self-reported health behaviors (11 domains, 0- to 10-point scale) from an average of 6.4 to 7.7 ( p < .001), eating selfefficacy from an average of 112 to 142 (on a 0- to 180-point scale; p < .001), and goal-setting skills from an average of 49 to 55 (on a 16- to 80-point scale; p < .001).

Conclusion:

These results suggest that participants improved their current health behaviors and learned skills for continued healthy living. Future studies that use randomized controlled trials are needed to establish causality for wellness coaching.
Adolescent and Young Adult Smokers Who Self-Identify as Nonsmokers
Authors: Walker Jerome F. , Loprinzi Paul D.
Published: August 2015

Purpose.

Examine the extent to which low-nicotine dependent daily smokers identify themselves as nonsmokers (smoking nonsmokers) over time, and examine the effect of nicotine-related withdrawal symptoms and cravings in predicting self-identified smoking status.

Design.

Longitudinal.

Setting.

National Youth Smoking Cessation Survey 2003–2005.

Subjects.

One hundred thirty-two adolescents and young adults (16–24 years).

Measures.

A questionnaire was used to assess smoking identity, withdrawal, cravings, and smoking intensity parameters.

Analysis.

Multivariable logistic regression analysis.

Results.

Among the 132 smoking nonsmokers at baseline, 45% remained smoking nonsmokers at the 2-year follow-up, with 55% transitioning to smoking (i.e., self-identified as smoking smokers in the interim). After adjustments, participants exhibiting greater restlessness and cravings over time, respectively, had 3.59 (p = .01) and 4.31 (p = .008) greater odds of being a smoking nonsmoker at baseline but then transitioning into a smoking smoker at 2-year follow-up.

Conclusion.

These findings may have implications with respect to interventions emphasizing withdrawal and craving symptoms. Further, given that some youth smokers self-identify as nonsmokers, and do so over time, potential intervention efforts may be pointed toward cognitive-related strategies at improving self-perceptions.
Dynamic statistical optimization of GNSS radio occultation bending angles: advanced algorithm and performance analysis
Authors: Li Y. , Kirchengast G. , Scherllin-Pirscher B. , Norman R. , Yuan Y. B. , Fritzer J. , Schwaerz M. , Zhang K.
Published: August 2015

Abstract. We introduce a new dynamic statistical optimization algorithm to initialize ionosphere-corrected bending angles of Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS)-based radio occultation (RO) measurements. The new algorithm estimates background and observation error covariance matrices with geographically varying uncertainty profiles and realistic global-mean correlation matrices. The error covariance matrices estimated by the new approach are more accurate and realistic than in simplified existing approaches and can therefore be used in statistical optimization to provide optimal bending angle profiles for high-altitude initialization of the subsequent Abel transform retrieval of refractivity. The new algorithm is evaluated against the existing Wegener Center Occultation Processing System version 5.6 (OPSv5.6) algorithm, using simulated data on two test days from January and July 2008 and real observed CHAllenging Minisatellite Payload (CHAMP) and Constellation Observing System for Meteorology, Ionosphere, and Climate (COSMIC) measurements from the complete months of January and July 2008. The following is achieved for the new method's performance compared to OPSv5.6: (1) significant reduction of random errors (standard deviations) of optimized bending angles down to about half of their size or more; (2) reduction of the systematic differences in optimized bending angles for simulated MetOp data; (3) improved retrieval of refractivity and temperature profiles; and (4) realistically estimated global-mean correlation matrices and realistic uncertainty fields for the background and observations. Overall the results indicate high suitability for employing the new dynamic approach in the processing of long-term RO data into a reference climate record, leading to well-characterized and high-quality atmospheric profiles over the entire stratosphere.
Comment on "Radiative forcings for 28 potential Archean greenhouse gases" by Byrne and Goldblatt (2014)
Authors: Kochanov R. V. , Gordon I. E. , Rothman L. S. , Sharpe S. W. , Johnson T. J. , Sams R. L.
Published: August 2015

Abstract. In the recent article by Byrne and Goldblatt, "Radiative forcing for 28 potential Archean greenhouse gases", Clim. Past. 10, 1779–1801 (2014), the authors employ the HITRAN2012 spectroscopic database to evaluate the radiative forcing of 28 Archean gases. As part of the evaluation of the status of the spectroscopy of these gases in the selected spectral region (50–1800 cm−1), the cross sections generated from the HITRAN line-by-line parameters were compared with those of the PNNL database of experimental cross sections recorded at moderate resolution. The authors claimed that for NO2, HNO3, H2CO, H2O2, HCOOH, C2H4, CH3OH and CH3Br there exist large or sometimes severe disagreements between the databases. In this work we show that for only three of these eight gases a modest discrepancy does exist between the two databases and we explain the origin of the differences. For the other five gases, the disagreements are not nearly at the scale suggested by the authors, while we explain some of the differences that do exist. In summary, the agreement between the HITRAN and PNNL databases is very good, although not perfect. Typically differences do not exceed 10 %, provided that HITRAN data exist for the bands/wavelengths of interest. It appears that a molecule-dependent combination of errors has affected the conclusions of the authors. In at least one case it appears that they did not take the correct file from PNNL (N2O4 (dimer)+ NO2 was used in place of the monomer). Finally, cross sections of HO2 from HITRAN (which do not have a PNNL counterpart) were not calculated correctly in BG, while in the case of HF misleading discussion was presented there based on the confusion by foreign or noise features in the experimental PNNL spectra.
Improvement of density models of geological structures by fusion of gravity data and cosmic muon radiographies
Authors: Jourde K. , Gibert D. , Marteau J.
Published: August 2015

Abstract. This paper examines how the resolution of small-scale geological density models is improved through the fusion of information provided by gravity measurements and density muon radiographies. Muon radiography aims at determining the density of geological bodies by measuring their screening effect on the natural flux of cosmic muons. Muon radiography essentially works like a medical X-ray scan and integrates density information along elongated narrow conical volumes. Gravity measurements are linked to density by a 3-D integration encompassing the whole studied domain. We establish the mathematical expressions of these integration formulas – called acquisition kernels – and derive the resolving kernels that are spatial filters relating the true unknown density structure to the density distribution actually recovered from the available data. The resolving kernel approach allows one to quantitatively describe the improvement of the resolution of the density models achieved by merging gravity data and muon radiographies. The method developed in this paper may be used to optimally design the geometry of the field measurements to be performed in order to obtain a given spatial resolution pattern of the density model to be constructed. The resolving kernels derived in the joined muon–gravimetry case indicate that gravity data are almost useless for constraining the density structure in regions sampled by more than two muon tomography acquisitions. Interestingly, the resolution in deeper regions not sampled by muon tomography is significantly improved by joining the two techniques. The method is illustrated with examples for the La Soufrière volcano of Guadeloupe.
Moving sociohydrology forward: a synthesis across studies
Authors: Troy T. J. , Konar M. , Srinivasan V. , Thompson S.
Published: August 2015

Abstract. Sociohydrology is the study of coupled human–water systems, building on the premise that water and human systems co-evolve: the state of the water system feeds back onto the human system, and vice versa, a situation denoted as "two-way coupling". A recent special issue in HESS/ESD, "Predictions under change: water, earth, and biota in the Anthropocene", includes a number of sociohydrologic publications that allow for a survey of the current state of understanding of sociohydrology and the dynamics and feedbacks that couple water and human systems together, of the research methodologies being employed to date, and of the normative and ethical issues raised by the study of sociohydrologic systems. Although sociohydrology is concerned with coupled human–water systems, the feedback may be filtered by a connection through natural or social systems, for example, the health of a fishery or through the global food trade, and therefore it may not always be possible to treat the human–water system in isolation. As part of a larger complex system, sociohydrology can draw on tools developed in the social–ecological and complex systems literature to further our sociohydrologic knowledge, and this is identified as a ripe area of future research.
Linking baseflow separation and groundwater storage dynamics in an alpine basin (Dammagletscher, Switzerland)
Authors: Kobierska F. , Jonas T. , Kirchner J. W. , Bernasconi S. M.
Published: August 2015

Abstract. This study aims at understanding interactions between stream and aquifer in a glacierized alpine catchment. We specifically focused on a glacier forefield, for which continuous measurements of stream water electrical conductivity, discharge and depth to the water table were available over 4 consecutive years. Based on this data set, we developed a two-component mixing model in which the groundwater component was modelled using measured groundwater levels. The aquifer actively contributing to streamflow was assumed to be constituted of two linear storage units. Calibrating the model against measured total discharge yielded reliable sub-hourly estimates of discharge and insights into groundwater storage properties. Our conceptual model suggests that a near-surface aquifer with high hydraulic conductivity overlies a larger reservoir with longer response time.
Self-Organizing Maps approaches to analyze extremes of multivariate wave climate
Authors: Barbariol F. , Falcieri F. M. , Scotton C. , Benetazzo A. , Carniel S. , Sclavo M.
Published: August 2015

Abstract. In this paper the Self-Organizing Map (SOM) technique to assess the multivariate sea wave climate at a site is analyzed and discussed with the aim of a more complete representation which includes the most severe sea states that otherwise would be missed by the standard SOM. Indeed, it is commonly recognized, and herein confirmed, that SOM is a good regressor of a sample where the density of events is high (e.g. for low/moderate and frequent sea states), while SOM fails where the density is low (e.g. for severe and rare sea states). Therefore, we have considered a trivariate wave climate (composed by significant wave height, mean wave period, and mean wave direction) collected continuously at the Acqua Alta oceanographic tower (northern Adriatic Sea, Italy) during the period 1979–2008. Three different strategies derived by the standard SOM have been tested in order to widen the range of applicability to extreme events. The first strategy contemplates a pre-processing of the input dataset with the Maximum Dissimilarity Algorithm; the second and the third strategies focus on the post-processing of SOM outputs, resulting in a two-steps SOM, where the first step is the standard SOM applied to the original dataset, and the second step is an additional SOM on the events exceeding a threshold (either taking all the events over the threshold or only the peaks of storms). Results suggest that post-processing strategies are more effective than the pre-processing one in representing the extreme wave climate, both in the time series and probability density spaces. In addition, a complete graphical representation of the outcomes of two-steps SOM as double-sided maps is proposed.
Committed near-future retreat of Smith, Pope, and Kohler Glaciers inferred by transient model calibration
Authors: Goldberg D. , Heimbach P. , Joughin I. , Smith B.
Published: August 2015

Abstract. A glacial flow model of Smith, Pope and Kohler Glaciers has been calibrated by means of inverse methods against time-varying, annualy resolved observations of ice height and velocities, covering the period 2002 to 2011. The inversion – termed "transient calibration" – produces an optimal set of time-mean, spatially varying parameters together with a time-evolving state that accounts for the transient nature of observations and the model dynamics. Serving as an optimal initial condition, the estimated state for 2011 is used, with no additional forcing, for predicting grounded ice volume loss and grounding line retreat over the ensuing 30 years. The transiently calibrated model predicts a near-steady loss of grounded ice volume of approximately 21 km3 a−1 over this period, as well as loss of 33 km2 a−1 grounded area. We contrast this prediction with one obtained following a commonly used "snapshot" or steady-state inversion, which does not consider time dependence and assumes all observations to be contemporaneous. Transient calibration is shown to achieve a better fit with observations of thinning and grounding line retreat histories, and yields a quantitatively different projection with respect to ice volume loss and ungrounding. Sensitivity studies suggest large near-future levels of unforced, i.e. committed sea level contribution from these ice streams under reasonable assumptions regarding uncertainties of the unknown parameters.
Tax Reform Consequent upon an Embedded Single-Rate Vat Just Might Prevent Injustice While Revivifying a Geriatric Uncle Sam
Authors: Phillips Emir
Published: August 2015

Economists and legislators have proposed many theories and plans for overhauling the corporate tax system (and the U.S. tax system as a whole); however, this Article argues that any viable proposal should begin with the enactment of a value added tax (VAT).

As a result of the IRC's unworkably complex corporate section, the United States economy has been hindered by high compliance costs and the loss of business overseas. Overall, a substantial federal VAT is the best option in terms of compliance and administration costs as well as reducing opportunities for federal tax evasion. But merely placing a VAT on top of the existing system would merely send us in reverse by further increasing the variable and substantial fixed costs of administration and compliance. A mere changing of the marginal rates or deduction rules would be insufficient to deal with the systematic problem caused by the yawning federal deficit and the arcane IRC. A VAT rate set too low would impose substantial costs per dollar of additional revenue. Thus, Congress should enact either a federal VAT (15%) capable of significantly reducing the federal deficit or none at all.
De Erfrechtverordening in een notendop: toepassingsgebied, toepasselijk recht en de Europese verklaring van erfrecht
Authors: Knot J.G.
Published: August 2015

De erfrechtverordening in een notendop: toepassingsgebied, toepasselijk recht en de Europese verklaring van erfrecht

IPR-vragen in nalatenschappen die op of na 17 augustus 2015 openvallen, worden in Nederland en de meeste andere EU-lidstaten beantwoord aan de hand van de regels uit de Erfrechtverordening. Dit artikel beoogt – in het kader van het onderhavige themanummer over de Erfrechtverordening – een overzicht te geven van de hoofdlijnen van deze verordening. Daarbij wordt onder meer ingegaan op het toepassingsgebied (welke onderwerpen regelt de verordening zoal en welke niet?) en het door de verordening als toepasselijk aangewezen erfrecht, zowel met als zonder rechtskeuze van de erflater. Ook wordt het in de verordening nieuw geïntroduceerde instrument van de Europese verklaring van erfrecht nader beschouwd.
Many ways to break a heart
Authors: Rowton Megan , Moskowitz Ivan P
Published: August 2015

A mutant transcription factor that has been linked to congenital heart disease has wider effects than previously thought.
Preferences of Second Language Earners on Corrective Feedback and their Relationships to their English Academic Performances
Authors: Valerio Ma. Theresa B.
Published: August 2015

Amidst the issues and research on language learning, correcting the learners’ mistakes and errors is an eventual quest among L2 teachers because acquiring mistakes by the learners and checking done by the L2 teachers are always intertwined with language learning. This study describes the inevitable phenomena of actual classroom scenarios of feedbacks as an inseparable part of language learning among the multi-dialectal learners of Quirino Province, Philippines. In gathering the necessary data, the researcher used questionnaires and interviews among the respondents. Findings reveal that the respondents somewhat preferred the explicit and metalinguistic corrective feedbacks while they moderately preferred recast and clarification request. Results also reveal that along explicit corrective feedback, there exist significant differences when they are grouped by ethnicity and courses. The overall responses of the respondents, along with the types of corrective feedbacks, show that all the students wanted to be corrected but in different ways. It is important for teachers to know the learners’ preferences for corrective feedback to maximize their potential effects on the latter’s academic performances. Although recent pedagogical studies have investigated students’ preferences on corrective feedback, this paper reveals additional evidences for feedbacks and their facilitative roles in grammar learning among bilingual learners. Keywords - Education, academic development, corrective feedbacks, descriptive-correlational research, Philippines
PARENTS' PERCEPTION ON THE INSTRUCTIONAL PRACTICES OF VOLUNTEER CHILD DEVELOPMENT WORKERS IN DAVAO CITY, PHILIPPINES
Authors: GERADO RINA O. , GUINTO EVANGELINE M.
Published: August 2015

Child development workers of Playgroup Network, Incorporated are volunteers in providing care to children ages 3 to 6 years old. They assume role of teachers and second parents to children while mothers are at work. The main purpose of this study is to analyze the instructional practices of the volunteer child development workers (CDW) according to the lens of the parents. There were 232 respondents who participated in the study and they rated the instructional practices of child development workers high. The moderator variable is the educational attainment of the respondents who were the parents of the children. Utilizing descriptive– correlational method with mean, t-test and ANOVA, it was found out that there was a significant difference on the instructional practice of CDW when parents were grouped according to educational attainment. The study concluded that the educational profile of the respondents matters in the manner of assessing the instructional practices of the CDWs.Keywords: Social work, instructional practices, volunteer child development workers,descriptive-correlation, Davao City, Philippines
Readiness of Students and its Influence on Academic Grades of Students in College Algebra
Authors: ABELLANOSA GAUDENCIO G.
Published: August 2015

The study was conducted and anchored on the concept of Secker (2009) that many students who earn a high school diploma do not have the knowledge and skills needed to succeed in college. This study aimed to determine the significant relationshipbetween the readiness of students in college algebra and their academic grades. Descriptive correlation survey was used in this study. It focuses on the present conditionwith the purpose of finding new truth and it is valuable in providing facts on which specific judgments may be based. The study was conducted in the University of Southeastern Philippines College of Governance and Business to 180 student-respondents. Mean, t test for independent samples, Pearson Product Moment Correlationand Linear Regression were the statistical tools used for the data analysis. The findings of the study are as follows: The level of readiness of students in college algebra is low with the mean rating of 2.48. The academic grade of students in collegealgebra was low with the mean rating of 2.86. There was a significant relationship between the level of readiness of students in college algebra and their academic grades as revealed in the r value of -0.58 with the p-value of .000. The readiness of students in college algebra has a significant influence on their academic grade as reflected in the F-value of 12.78 with the p-value of .000 which is lesser than .05 level of significanceimplying the increase in readiness of students would mean the increase in their academic grades.Keywords: Readiness of Students, College Algebra, and academic grades