cometadata/datacite-rtg-text-other-reclassification-records huggingface dataset:
Parity violating Friedmann Universes
Creators: name: Magueijo, João
name: Złośnik, Tom
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2019
Subjects: subject: General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology (gr-qc)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: We revisit models, within the Einstein-Cartan theory, where the cosmological constant $Λ$ is promoted to a variable, at the cost of allowing for torsion even in the absence of spinors. We remark that some standard notions about FRW Universes collapse in these theories, most notably spatial homogeneity and isotropy may now co-exist with violations of parity invariance. The parity violating solutions have non-vanishing Weyl curvature even within FRW models. The presence of parity violating torsion opens up the space of possible such theories with relevant FRW modifications: in particular the Pontryagin term can play an important role even in the absence of spinorial matter. We present a number of parity violating solutions with and without matter. The former are the non-self dual vacuum solutions long suspected to exist. The latter lead to tracking and non-tracking solutions with a number of observational problems, unless we invoke the Pontryagin term. An examination of the Hamiltonian structure of the theory reveals that the parity even and the parity violating solutions belong to two distinct branches of the theory, with different gauge symmetries (constraints) and different numbers of degrees of freedom. The parity even branch is nothing but standard relativity with a cosmological constant which has become pure gauge under conformal invariance if matter is absent, or a slave of matter (and so not an independent degree of freedom) if non-conformally invariant matter is present. In contrast, the parity violating branch contains a genuinely new degree of freedom.
description: Citations updated
Power law scaling of early-stage forces during granular impact
Creators: name: Krizou, Nasser
name: Clark, Abram H.
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2019
Subjects: subject: Soft Condensed Matter (cond-mat.soft)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: We experimentally and computationally study the early-stage forces during intruder impacts with granular beds in the regime where the impact velocity approaches the granular force propagation speed. Experiments use 2D assemblies of photoelastic disks of varying stiffness, and complimentary discrete-element simulations are performed in 2D and 3D. The peak force during the initial stages of impact and the time at which it occurs depend only on the impact speed, the intruder diameter, the mass density of the grains, and the elastic modulus of the grains according to power-law scaling forms that are not consistent with Poncelet models, granular shock theory, or added-mass models. The insensitivity of our results to many system details suggest that they may also apply to impacts into similar materials like foams and emulsions.
description: 5 pages, 4 figures
Spontaneous R-Parity violation bounds
Creators: name: Frank, M.
name: Huitu, K.
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2001
Subjects: subject: High Energy Physics - Phenomenology (hep-ph)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: We investigate bounds from tree-level and one-loop processes in generic supersymmetric models with spontaneous R-parity breaking in the superpotential. We analyse the bounds from a general point of view. The bounds are applicable both for all models with spontaneous R-parity violation and for explicit bilinear R-parity violation based on general lepton-chargino and neutrino-neutralino mixings. We find constraints from semileptonic B, D and K decays, leptonic decays of the mu and tau, electric dipole moments, as well as bounds for the anomalous magnetic moment of the muon.
description: 22 pages
The Environmental Kuznets Curve Hypothesis as a Problematic: Beyond "Falsificationism"
Creators: name: Erb, Paul
Publisher: name: University of Massachusetts Amherst
Year: 2018

description: Halfway into its third decade, the debate surrounding the environmental Kuznets curve (EKC) hypothesis has stalled with political economists and socio-ecologists ascendant and modernization theorists scrambling to give their apparently moribund perspective new life. But beyond the rise and fall of the EKC, there remains a second-order question and decades of data: how do the theoretical perspectives of these contenders shape what their protagonists do and don't see? How have they mistaken episodes of "talking past each other" for genuine dialogue? Which perspective has had the biggest impact on the other’s way of thinking? A qualitative and quantitative analysis compares the top-ranking journals in economics with interdisciplinary journals of environmental economics revealing a categorical divergence in the types of critical thought deployed in the EKC debate over an almost 15 year period. The few articles appearing in the top ranking economic journals systematically fail to grasp the fundamentals of ecology which is evident in both their measurements and conclusions. I offer an abridged discussion of the critiques socio-ecology presents contemporary economics as what, in Kuhnian terminology, may well be described as a discipline in the crisis moment of a paradigm shift in no particular direction. I then conclude by siding with Habermas and Adorno against Popper's ideologically impoverished “falsifactionism”: progress in science depends as much on a theory of ideological critique as it does on the acquisition of technical knowledge. My intent has been to argue that ideological critique is empirically possible as the history of thought.
Codes and results for UPLIFT WP1
Creators: name: Medgyesi, Márton
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2021
Subjects: inequality, urban young, European Union, metropolitan regions, regional clusters

description: Policies attempting to mitigate the effects of urban inequality, often disregard affected citizens’ experiences, and thus fail to achieve maximum impact. By incorporating these perspectives into the policy design process, the project "Urban PoLicy Innovation to address inequality with and for Future generaTions" (UPLIFT), funded under the EU Horizon 2020 program aims to find innovative interventions in a bottom-up approach. The aims of UPLIFT project are to understand patterns and trends of inequality across Europe and to understand how individuals experience and adapt to inequality through participatory research. Moreover the project will together with the communities in four locations, co-design a policy tool aimed at addressing and reducing inequality and socio-economic divisions. The activity and results of the project can be followed at https://www.uplift-youth.eu/. Workpackage 1 of the project aims to elaborate macro level operationalisation and quantitative analysis of drivers, factors, scale and trend of socio-economic inequalities in the EU on the national scale and across major EU regions. The files archived contain results and codes to replicate results of deliverables of WP1, Deliverable 1.3. ("Atlas of inequalities in Europe") and 1.4. ("Framework study on socio-economic inequalities in Europe"). To replicate results follow the instructions in the readme.txt file.
description: UPLIFT project has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (H2020-SC6-TRANSFORMATIONS-2019) under grant agreement No 870898.
Towards an in situ, full-power gauge of the focal-volume intensity of petawatt-class lasers
Creators: name: He, C. Z.
name: Longman, A.
name: Pérez-Hernández, J. A.
name: De Marco, M.
name: Salgado, C.
name: Zeraouli, G.
name: Gatti, G.
name: Roso, L.
name: Fedosejevs, R.
name: Hill, W. T.
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2019
Subjects: subject: Plasma Physics (physics.plasm-ph)
subject: Optics (physics.optics)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: About 50 years ago, Sarachick and Schappert [Phys. Rev. D. 1, 2738 (1970)] showed that relativistic Thomson scattering leads to wavelength shifts that are proportional to the laser intensity. About 28 years later Chen et al. [Nature 396, 653 (1998)] used these shifts to estimate their laser intensity near 10^18 W/cm^2. More recently there have been several theoretical studies aimed at exploiting nonlinear Thomson scattering as a tool for direct measurement of intensities well into the relativistic regime. We present the first quantitative study of this approach for intensities between 10^18 and 10^19 W/cm^2. We show that the spectral shifts are in reasonable agreement with estimates of the peak intensity extracted from images of the focal area obtained at reduced power. Finally, we discuss the viability of the approach, its range of usefulness and how it might be extended to gauge intensities well in excess of 10^19 W/cm^2.
description: 10 pages, 3 figures, Optics Express (accepted), Final version submitted to OE for publishing
Design of Non-Uniform Linear Array via Linear Programming and Particle Swarm Optimization and Studies on Phased Array Calibration
Creators: name: Bai, Hua
Publisher: name: University of Massachusetts Amherst
Year: 2014

description: For a linear array, the excitation coefficients of each element and its geometry play an important role, because they will determine the radiation pattern of the given array. Side Lobe Level (SLL) is one of the key parameters to evaluate the radiation pattern of the array. Generally speaking, we desire SLL to be as low as possible. For the linear array with uniform spacing, there are some classic methods to calculate the excitation coefficients to make the radiation pattern satisfy the given requirements. For the linear array with non-uniform spacing, linear programming and particle swarm optimization are proposed to calculate the excitation coefficients to make the array get minimum SLL in this thesis. They are demonstrated for symmetric and asymmetric array in the first part of this thesis. In the second part of this thesis, a simple method is proposed for correcting excitation coefficients of a linear phased array. This proposed method corrects the coefficients through using the Normalized Least Means Squares(NLMS) algorithm, dither signal and a near-field sensor being used for sensing the field emitted by the array. The advantage of this proposed method is that it avoids the problem of estimating the largest eigenvalue of the coefficient matrix to get optimal step size. Its robustness in different environments is demonstrated as well as the effect of noise with various Signal-to-Noise Ratio (SNR), and mutual coupling. In addition, the effect of using discrete dither signal to the array is considered, because the continuous dither signal cannot be generated in practice.
A lattice model of heavy-light three-body system
Creators: name: Guo, Peng
name: Döring, Michael
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2019
Subjects: subject: High Energy Physics - Lattice (hep-lat)
subject: High Energy Physics - Phenomenology (hep-ph)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: We present a study of a $1+1$ dimensional heavy-light three-body system in finite volume. The heavy-light system is simulated by a coupled-channel $ϕ^4$ type lattice model, and both ground state and excited states of multiparticle energy spectra are measured on various lattices. The lattice simulation data analysis is performed based on variational approach.
description: The missing relativistic kinematic normalization factors due to pair-wise interaction when third particle behaves as a spectator $\langle p_3 | p'_3 \rangle = 2 E_{p_3} (2\pi) \delta (p_3 - p'_3)$ are installed in the equations in Sec. IV A2 and thereafter. More discussions about missing relativistic kinematic factor have been added in Appendix C2, and Fig.10 is updated
Evaluation and Validation of Distraction Detection Algorithms on Multiple Data Sources
Creators: name: Mehrotra, Shashank
Publisher: name: University of Massachusetts Amherst
Year: 2018

description: This study aims to evaluate algorithms designed to detect distracted driving. This includes the comparison of how efficiently they detect the state of distraction and likelihood of a crash. Four algorithms that utilize measures of cumulative glance, past glance behavior, and glance eccentricity were used to understand the distracted state of the driver and were validated on two separate data sources (i.e., simulator and naturalistic data). Additionally, an independent method for distraction detection was designed using data mining methods. This approach utilized measures like steering degree, lane offset, lateral and longitudinal velocity, and acceleration. The results showed a higher likelihood of distracted events when cumulative glances were considered. However, the state of distraction was observed to be higher when glance eccentricity was added. Additionally, it was observed that glance behavior using the four legacy algorithms were better detectors of the state of distraction as compared to the data mining method that used vehicular measures. This research has implications in understanding the state of distraction, predicting the power of different methods, and comparing approaches in different contexts (naturalistic vs simulator). These findings provide the fundamental building blocks towards designing advanced mitigation systems that give drivers feedback in instances of high crash likelihood.
Simple analytic evaluation of the integrals in the Gaussian model of Bose-Einstein correlations
Creators: name: Zalewski, K.
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2002
Subjects: subject: High Energy Physics - Phenomenology (hep-ph)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: A generating function for products of Hermite polynomials is used to significantly simplify the evaluation of the integrals G_m(p,p') occurring in the Gaussian model of multiple particle production. These integrals are crucial for studies of multiparticle effects in Bose-Einstein correlations.
description: latex, 6 pages, no figures
McGlade_Christine_2018_MDES_SFI.pdf
Creators: name: McGlade, Christine
Publisher: name: figshare
Year: 2019
Subjects: subject: 160503 Communications and Media Policy
subject: FOS: Political science
subject: 160505 Economic Development Policy
subject: 160805 Social Change
subject: FOS: Sociology
subject: 160511 Research, Science and Technology Policy

description: Artificial intelligence, and specifically, predictive models based on machine learning, will be the basis of future economic and social systems. While a great deal of focus has been placed on job loss in the face of automation, the more profound effect of machine learning will be fundamental changes throughout our technologically based social systems, as we witness the increasing use of machine learning systems in governance roles.
Machine learning has so far shown itself to be a double edged sword in its ability to accelerate social justice: therapy chatbots, for example, have shown how we might scale mental healthcare to include persons who may not be able to afford a therapist. But precrime predictive algorithms in use by some of North America’s largest police forces are biased by flawed data sets and tend to perpetuate racial and economic stereotypes.
My project will research, analyse, deconstruct, and then map trends in machine learning onto a Three Horizons foresight framework with a 12 year time horizon. I will describe a third horizon vision for machine learning as a social and not economic innovation that delivers social impact, second horizon strategies that might steer applications of machine learning towards greater designedness for social justice, and a Theory of Change alternative to the concept of business model to describe how we might implement machine learning strategies for human rather than economic growth.
Rigorous Proof of Pseudospin Ferromagnetism in Two-Component Bosonic Systems with Component-Independent Interactions
Creators: name: Yang, Kun
name: Li, You-Quan
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2002
Subjects: subject: Soft Condensed Matter (cond-mat.soft)
subject: Statistical Mechanics (cond-mat.stat-mech)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: For a two-component bosonic system, the components can be mapped onto a pseudo-spin degree of freedom with spin quantum number S=1/2. We provide a rigorous proof that for a wide-range of real Hamiltonians with component independent mass and interaction, the ground state is a ferromagnetic state with pseudospin fully polarized. The spin-wave excitations are studied and found to have quadratic dispersion relations at long wave length.
description: 4 pages, no figure
APPRENDRE ET ENSEIGNER AVEC LA BIENVEILLANCE : POUR UNE NOUVELLE PEDAGOGIE FRANÇAISE
Creators: name: Moinfar, Amena
Publisher: name: University of Massachusetts Amherst
Year: 2018

description: This thesis focuses on reflections made my contemporary thinkers in France concerning the wellness of children through their times in French public schools. Journalists, educators, parents seem to agree that the current French pedagogy instilled in the Education nationale system can no longer be acceptable and needs profound change. If academic performances are important, they cannot be the only center of interest in French schools. Instead, these writers propose and advocate for a pedagogy where wellness, benevolence and personal happiness occupy a crucial place.
The purpose of this thesis is to identify these voices and to take into account the fact that the world of education is discussed, questioned beyond the walls of education. The pédagogie de la bienveillance, or benevolence pedagogy, transcends one particular field. Instead, people concerned about children’s emotional health advocate for a change in order to help these children become happy adults. Instead of just denouncing a system that they deem unjust, each of the writers presented in this thesis, offer alternatives, solutions. They also document experiments they have conducted and offer their experience as possibilities to teach differently and to consider children differently as well.
Políticas e práticas de habitação social: visão dos assistentes sociais
Creators: name: De Sousa, Vânia Raquel
name: Gonçalves, Hermínia
Publisher: name: Revista Temas Sociais
Year: 2024

description: As profundas alterações da sociedade têm promovido mudanças nas políticas habitacionais ligadas às transformações socioculturais de vida dos sujeitos, desafiando cada vez mais o Serviço Social a uma prática crítica, estruturalista e de mediação do acesso. A nova geração de políticas habitacionais oferece instrumentos inovadores na tentativa de mitigar o problema estrutural de condicionamento do direito à habitação em Portugal. Atualmente, as políticas têm alternado entre a promoção direta de habitação (como a construção em situações de carência de habitação dos estratos sociais insolventes) e a promoção indireta (através da atribuição de apoios financeiros e benefícios fiscais bem como o apoio à aquisição da sua própria habitação) (Matos, 2001, Serra, 2002, Antunes 2018). No âmbito deste artigo, interessou-nos o ângulo de visão do Serviço Social, sobre o modo como são percecionadas as possibilidades reais de acesso, no quadro das novas políticas e sobre possíveis transformações no campo de práticas. Como é que as alterações da política de habitação são percecionadas pelos profissionais? Quais as teorias da prática? Como se articula com recursos/políticas universalistas, capazes de reforçar o direito à habitação? Metodologicamente organizamos a pesquisa como estudos de caso, mobilizando o método qualitativo, para estudar práticas e visões de acesso em 4 concelhos da região norte de Portugal. Da pesquisa constataram-se visões positivas da transformação da política, nomeadamente pela alavancagem de novos recursos que permitem aumentar o acesso. Os profissionais reproduzem uma abordagem próxima das visões clássicas, individualista-reformista, de tipo assistencialista, muito suportada nos regulamentos municipais. Percebe-se que, a escassez do recurso tem desencadeado uma postura profissional normativa e tecnocrata, em detrimento de posturas reflexivas e críticas, de mediação política. A narrativa de eficácia e eficiência nem sempre corresponde à evidência empírica. É importante que os assistentes sociais adotem um paradigma alternativo de práticas, que enfatize a mediação, dado que o problema da habitação é um problema estrutural.
description: Revista Temas Sociais , n. 7 (2024): Temas Sociais
Measuring the social costs of suboptimal combinations of policy instruments: A general framework and an example
Creators: name: Bullock, David S.
name: Salhofer, K.
name: Bullock, David S.
name: Salhofer, K.
Publisher: name: Unknown
Year: 1998
Subjects: subject: Agricultural and Food Policy
subject: Production Economics
subject: Social costs
subject: Policy instruments
subject: Suboptimal combinations

description: Since most agricultural programs employ two or more policy instruments simultaneously, it is notable that little research has attempted to find optimal instrument combinations and no research exists which evaluates the social costs (unrealized benefits) of combining instruments suboptimally. In our paper we report a simple and feasible method to find optimal policy instrument combinations, and we provide the first general, formal approach to measuring the social costs of suboptimal policy instrument combinations. Our approach is illustrated in an analysis for five major U.S. crops (com, feed grains, wheat, rice, cotton). The simple model we employ for the illustration suggests that except for the feed grains program, the observed programs combined policy instruments quite suboptimally. We conclude that agricultural economics research now can and should begin placing increased emphasis on studying optimal policy instrument combinations. © 1998 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.
A Search for Instantons at HERA
Creators: name: Koblitz, Birger
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2001
Subjects: subject: High Energy Physics - Experiment (hep-ex)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: A search for QCD instanton (I) induced events in deep-inelastic scattering (DIS) at HERA is presented in the kinematic range of low x and low Q^2. After cutting into three characteristic variables for I-induced events yielding a maximum suppression of standard DIS background to the 0.1% level while still preserving 10% of the I-induced events, 549 data events are found while 363^{+22}_{-26} (CDM) and 435^{+36}_{-22} (MEPS) standard DIS events are expected. More events than expected by the standard DIS Monte Carlo models are found in the data. However, the systematic uncertainty between the two different models is of the order of the expected signal, so that a discovery of instantons can not be claimed. An outlook is given on the prospect to search for QCD instanton events using a discriminant based on range searching in the kinematical region Q^2\gtrsim100\GeV^2 where the I-theory makes safer predictions and the QCD Monte Carlos are expected to better describe the inclusive data.
description: Invited talk given at the Ringberg Workshop on HERA Physics on June 19th, 2001 on behalf of the H1 collaboration
Improving cosmological parameter estimation with the future 21 cm observation from SKA
Creators: name: Zhang, Jing-Fei
name: Gao, Li-Yang
name: He, Dong-Ze
name: Zhang, Xin
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2019
Subjects: subject: Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics (astro-ph.CO)
subject: General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology (gr-qc)
subject: High Energy Physics - Phenomenology (hep-ph)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: Future observations of 21 cm emission from neutral hydrogen survey will become a promising approach to probe the large scale structure of Universe. In this paper, we investigate the impacts of Square Kilometer Array (SKA) 21 cm observation on the estimation of cosmological parameters. We use the simulated data of the baryonic acoustic oscillation (BAO) measurements based on the future SKA experiment with the intensity mapping (IM) technique to do the analysis. For the current observations, we use the latest cosmic microwave background (CMB) observation from {\it Planck} 2018, the optical BAO measurements, and the Type Ia supernovae (SN) observation (Pantheon compilation). We find that the SKA mock data could break the degeneracy between the matter density and the Hubble constant, further improving the cosmological constraints to a great extent. We also find that the constraint on the equation of state parameters of dark energy could be significantly improved by including the SKA mock data into the cosmological global fit.
description: 8 pages, 3 figures, accepted for publication in PLB
Capacity-resolution trade-off in the optimal learning of multiple low-dimensional manifolds by attractor neural networks
Creators: name: Battista, Aldo
name: Monasson, Rémi
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2019
Subjects: subject: Disordered Systems and Neural Networks (cond-mat.dis-nn)
subject: Statistical Mechanics (cond-mat.stat-mech)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: Recurrent neural networks (RNN) are powerful tools to explain how attractors may emerge from noisy, high-dimensional dynamics. We study here how to learn the ~N^(2) pairwise interactions in a RNN with N neurons to embed L manifolds of dimension D << N. We show that the capacity, i.e. the maximal ratio L/N, decreases as |log(epsilon)|^(-D), where epsilon is the error on the position encoded by the neural activity along each manifold. Hence, RNN are flexible memory devices capable of storing a large number of manifolds at high spatial resolution. Our results rely on a combination of analytical tools from statistical mechanics and random matrix theory, extending Gardner's classical theory of learning to the case of patterns with strong spatial correlations.
The Deers’ cave- a hidden treasure chest of historical biodiversity
Creators: name: Gaglioti, Martina
Publisher: name: figshare
Year: 2021
Subjects: subject: Paleontology
subject: 50202 Conservation and Biodiversity
subject: FOS: Biological sciences
subject: Marine Biology

description: This contribution is based on field observation conducted in the MPA of Capo Caccia-Isola Piana. The Deers' Cave is a marine cave located in the nearby of Punta Giglio (Sardinia, Central Tyrrhenian Sea). This contribution is based on descriptions made on the basis of some field observations occurred both during leisure and work time. Hope enjoyable!
Modulation of the Redox Environment During Sensitive Developmental Periods Impairs Pancreatic Organogenesis in the Zebrafish (Danio rerio)
Creators: name: Jacobs, Haydee
Publisher: name: University of Massachusetts Amherst
Year: 2018

description: The developing pancreas has been identified as a potentially sensitive target for oxidative damage caused by environmental toxicant exposure in the developing zebrafish, Danio rerio. The objectives of this study were to 1) investigate the effects of exposure to a common pro-oxidizing toxicant, Mono(2-ethylhexyl) phthalate (MEHP), on pancreatic development, and 2) elucidate redox-sensitive temporal windows of pancreatic organogenesis in the zebrafish. We also investigated the involvement of Nrf2 (Nfe2l2), a transcription factor involved in the oxidative stress response, in toxicant-mediated pancreatic toxicity. In aim one, zebrafish embryos were exposed to 0 or 200 µg/L MEHP beginning at 3 hours post fertilization (hpf) through 168 hpf, and imaged live under a fluorescence microscope to visualize pancreas development from 48-168 hpf. Glutathione (GSH) and cysteine (CyS) redox couples were quantified by HPLC at 72 hpf, and gene expression was investigated at 96 hpf. This study utilized wild type (AB) Tg(ins:GFP), Tg(gcga:GFP) (endocrine islet), and Tg(ptf1a:GFP) (exocrine pancreas) zebrafish strains. We observed that MEHP exposure significantly reduced endocrine islet area and exocrine pancreas length at all timepoints (48, 72, 96, 168 hpf). No significant changes were observed in the redox potential of GSH or Cys, however MEHP exposure significantly altered expression of GSH-related genes (gsr, gstp1), as well as pancreas-specific genes (insa, sst2, ptf1a). These data indicate that the developing pancreas is a sensitive target tissue of embryonic exposure to MEHP. In aim two, we exposed transgenic Tg(ins:GFP) and Tg(gcga:GFP) zebrafish embryos to water, dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO), N-acetyl cysteine (NAC), sulforophane (SFN), tert-butylhydroperoxide (tBOOH), or tert-butylhydroquinone (tBHQ) at 24, 48, or 72 hours post fertilization (hpf), and assessed endocrine islet morphology at 96 hpf. We found both chemical-, stage-, and cell-type specific effects of redox modulation on the endocrine pancreas. Pro-oxidant exposures resulted in decreased ß-cell cluster area and an increased frequency of islet variants, while antioxidant exposures significantly increased ß-cell cluster area. These effects were most significant at the 48 hpf exposure timepoint. a-cell cluster area was only affected by prooxidant exposure at 48 hpf. These results indicate that ß-cells are uniquely sensitive to oxidative stress, specifically at 48 hpf.
How to define and study farmers' management capacity: theory and use in agricultural economics
Creators: name: Rougoor, Carin W.
name: Trip, Ger
name: Huirne, Ruud B.M.
name: Renkema, Jan A.
name: Rougoor, Carin W.
name: Trip, Ger
name: Huirne, Ruud B.M.
name: Renkema, Jan A.
Publisher: name: Unknown
Year: 1998
Subjects: subject: Farm Management
subject: Production Economics
subject: Review study
subject: Management capacity
subject: Decision-making process
subject: Frontier production function
subject: Efficiency
subject: Fann performance

description: Textbooks and articles on farm management stress the importance of the management capacity of the fanner with respect to his farm results. However, explicit definitions together with an elaboration of this concept are hard to find. In this article, aspects of management capacity are grouped into: (1) personal aspects, consisting of fanner's drives and motivations, fanner's abilities and capabilities and his biographical facts such as age and education; and (2) aspects of the decision-making process, consisting of practices and procedures with respect to planning, implementation and control of decisions at the farm. Empirical studies on the role of management capacity in relation to farm results are reviewed. Frontier production functions are widely used in recent literature to estimate technical and economic efficiency of farms. However, in explaining differences in efficiency most studies do not go further than adding a biographical variable (e.g., level of education). This study concludes that a next step would be to include aspects of the decision-making process. Longitudinal on-farm observations, which give possibilities for studying the dynamic aspects of the decision-making, are suggested to further analyze the concept of management capacity. © 1998 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.
Dispersive Techniques for $α_s$, $R_{had}$ and Instability of the Perturbative Vacuum
Creators: name: Srivastava, Y.
name: Pacetti, S.
name: Pancheri, G.
name: Widom, A.
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2001
Subjects: subject: High Energy Physics - Phenomenology (hep-ph)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: Recent dispersive techniques developed by us are applied to discuss three problems: 1. A long standing discrepan-cy between the measurements of $R(s)$ for $\sqrt{s} = (5÷7.5)GeV$ by Crystal Ball and MARK I has been analyzed and its consequences analyzed for the number of contributing quarks. 2. Noting that the perturbative $α_s$ has the wrong analyticity, analytic models consistent with asymptotic freedom (AF) and confinement have been constructed and applied to discuss $τ$ decay. 3. It is shown that AF leads to a wrong sign for $\im\big(α(s)\big)$ which signals an instability of the perturbative QCD vacuum.
description: 4 pages, 4 figures, e^+e^- Physics at Intermediate Energies Workshop - Contribution T19
Understanding farmers' decision making processes and improving managerial assistance
Creators: name: Ohlmer, Bo
name: Olson, Kent
name: Brehmer, Berndt
name: Ohlmer, Bo
name: Olson, Kent
name: Brehmer, Berndt
Publisher: name: Unknown
Year: 1998
Subjects: subject: Farm Management
subject: Productivity Analysis
subject: Decision making
subject: Management assistance
subject: Decision aids
subject: Farm management
subject: Psychological models

description: Few studies have been made of how fanners make decisions. Most research and teaching has focused on the decision event, not the whole process. Current knowledge of the decision making process is reviewed and described as a set of eight functions or elements: values and goals, problem detection, problem definition, observation, analysis, development of intention, implementation, and responsibility bearing. The relevancy of this view of fanners' decision making behavior is tested through a series of case studies. Based on these observations, the conceptual model of the decision process is revised to include four phases and four subprocesses. The four phases are problem detection, problem definition, analysis and choice, and implementation. The four subprocesses are searching and paying attention, planning, evaluating and choosing, and checking the choice. In addition, we note that fanners prefer the ability to continually update their evaluation and plans, a qualitative vs. quantitative analysis, a "quick and simple" vs. detailed and elaborate analysis, small tests and incremental implementation, and feed forward and compensation vs. post-implementation evaluation. Implications of this fuller view of the decision making process for management assistance are discussed. © 1998 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.
Development and Application of A SERS Needle for One-step Multi-phase Analysis
Creators: name: Chen, Haoxin
Publisher: name: University of Massachusetts Amherst
Year: 2018

description: Surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) is an emerging and sensitive technique in food analysis providing advantages of rapid detection, simple sample preparation and on-site detection capability over GC and LC methods. Most SERS applications focus on detecting trace amount of analyte in liquid as an alternative approach to HPLC. Herein, we invented an innovative SERS-active needle which is composed with an injection needle and a gold-nanoparticles coated fiber inside the injection needle. The gold nanoparticles-coated fiber was fabricated by reducing gold (III) on a chemically etched stainless wire. The SERS needle can be used to insert into the headspace and liquid sample for simultaneous multiphase sample detection, or a soft tissue like a tomato fruit to detect the analyte inside of the tissue with minimum invasion. Using this needle, we can detect as low as 5 ppb of fonofos in the headspace of water and apple juice samples, compared with the dip method, which cannot detect lower than 10 ppb in water and 50 ppb in apple juice. The SERS needle was also applied in real time pesticide translocation study to monitor internalized thiabendazole in tomato fruit after root uptake. The SERS needle detected thiabendazole inside tomato fruits 30 days after the pesticide exposure in a hydroponic planting environment. Moreover, realizing the advantage of detecting volatile components in the headspace of food sample, we applied the SERS needle in a ground beef spoilage study to detect the spoilage biomarkers in the headspace of the raw beef. As a result, the SERS needle detected volatile spoilage compounds produced by bacteria Lactobacillus. Overall, this invention opens a new field of SERS strategy for broad analytical applications.
The effects of expenditure growth and urbanisation on food consumption in East Asia: a note on animal products
Creators: name: Rae, Allan N.
name: Rae, Allan N.
Publisher: name: Unknown
Year: 1998
Subjects: subject: Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety
subject: Production Economics
subject: Consumption
subject: Animal products
subject: East Asia
subject: Elasticities
subject: Urbanisation

description: Consumption functions for total animal-derived food products were estimated for six East Asian countries. Incorporation of urbanisation was found to make a significant contribution to the functions. The urbanisation elasticities were always positive, indicating that the process of urbanisation had a positive effect on the demand for animal food products. The expenditure elasticities were also positive, but often less than they would be if estimated from consumption functions that excluded the effects of urbanisation. Thus, projections of consumption that ignore the influence of urbanisation may be biased. © 1998 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.
Suicide by crashing into a heavy vehicle: Professional drivers’ views
Creators: name: Radun, Igor
name: Radun, Jenni
name: Kaistinen, Jyrki
name: Olivier, Jake
name: Parkkari, Inkeri
name: Kecklund, Göran
name: Töres Theorell
Publisher: name: Taylor & Francis
Year: 2019
Subjects: subject: Medicine
subject: Molecular Biology
subject: Pharmacology
subject: Biotechnology
subject: Sociology
subject: FOS: Sociology
subject: Immunology
subject: FOS: Clinical medicine
subject: 69999 Biological Sciences not elsewhere classified
subject: FOS: Biological sciences
subject: Developmental Biology
subject: Science Policy
subject: 111714 Mental Health
subject: FOS: Health sciences

description: Objective: Every profession has its own safety and health risks. In addition to the risk of being involved in a “normal” road crash, professional heavy vehicle drivers are at risk of becoming victims of people attempting suicide by crashing into their vehicles. Road suicides are not that rare, at least not in Finland, where they represent about 12% of all fatal road crashes. The purpose of this study was to survey professional heavy vehicle drivers about their experiences, views and opinions regarding road suicides. Methods: The sample included heavy vehicle drivers (N = 863) randomly recruited from a transport workers' union. Results: About 18% of the respondents reported a suspected suicide attempt of a motor vehicle driver crashing into their vehicle, with 15% of these (i.e.2.8% of the whole sample) also reporting a resulting crash. More than half of the respondents reported personally knowing another professional driver who had experienced a crash caused by a suicidal driver. Almost 80% of the drivers reported being afraid that someone would attempt suicide by crashing into their vehicle; however, thinking about such a possibility produces a level of anxiety in less than half of all respondents. Most respondents agreed about the challenges of avoiding a crash if somebody deliberately drives their car towards their vehicle. Conclusion: Heavy vehicle drivers perceive road suicides as an occupational risk in their profession. We discuss possible preventive measures against suicide attempts by crashing into a heavy vehicle.
Semi-supervised representation learning via dual autoencoders for domain adaptation
Creators: name: Yang, Shuai
name: Wang, Hao
name: Zhang, Yuhong
name: Li, Pei-Pei
name: Zhu, Yi
name: Hu, Xuegang
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2019
Subjects: subject: Machine Learning (cs.LG)
subject: Machine Learning (stat.ML)
subject: FOS: Computer and information sciences

description: Domain adaptation aims to exploit the knowledge in source domain to promote the learning tasks in target domain, which plays a critical role in real-world applications. Recently, lots of deep learning approaches based on autoencoders have achieved a significance performance in domain adaptation. However, most existing methods focus on minimizing the distribution divergence by putting the source and target data together to learn global feature representations, while they do not consider the local relationship between instances in the same category from different domains. To address this problem, we propose a novel Semi-Supervised Representation Learning framework via Dual Autoencoders for domain adaptation, named SSRLDA. More specifically, we extract richer feature representations by learning the global and local feature representations simultaneously using two novel autoencoders, which are referred to as marginalized denoising autoencoder with adaptation distribution (MDAad) and multi-class marginalized denoising autoencoder (MMDA) respectively. Meanwhile, we make full use of label information to optimize feature representations. Experimental results show that our proposed approach outperforms several state-of-the-art baseline methods.
description: This paper has been accepted by the journal of KNOWLEDGE-BASED SYSTEMS (KBS) 2019
An AI automated self-organising, feature imitating approach for point cloud data reduction
Creators: name: Raska Soemantoro
name: Yue, Hao
name: Omer, Muhammad
name: Margetts, Lee
Publisher: name: Loughborough University
Year: 2021
Subjects: subject: 19999 Mathematical Sciences not elsewhere classified
subject: FOS: Mathematics

description: This paper presents a novel AI based self-organising data reduction technique which combines feature detection and topological learning to reduce the memory footprint of point cloud data in an adaptive way, reducing point density in featureless parts of the point cloud whilst maintaining sufficient points to preserve details of interest to the engineer. As a case study, this is applied to a 3D LiDAR scan of a masonry bridge with localised details such as anchors, cracks and patches of vegetation. The process comprises 4 stages: For each point, the distance to its neighbouring point is calculated using a nearestneighbours search. Afterwards, 3D point cloud data is projected onto a 2D plane using principal component analysis. Next, the variables are mapped into the feature space where they are grouped using a clustering algorithm. Clusters correspond to specific physical features within the point cloud. Points within these clusters are assigned a feature weight that dictates their level of bias compared to points that do not belong to an engineering feature. Finally, a weighted self-organising map (SOM) algorithm is applied to learn the topology of the original point cloud, with a specific focus on feature points. This algorithm is a type of artificial neural network that uses competitive learning to generate an output map iteratively adjusted to represent the input. An advantage of the SOM is that the output map can be used to define the position of vertices in a finite element mesh. The results show that the standard SOM was able to reduce the data size by over 90%. However, such a reduction in data size risks loss of smaller engineering features. Upon application of a feature weight, the method was able to produce the same data reduction with up to 35% decrease in quantization error compared to a standard SOM. The research is of timely importance. It reduces the computational cost of point cloud visualisation and improves the reverse engineering process, enabling conversion of point clouds into CFD and FE meshes. The work will benefit academics, researchers and engineers in developing their models.
Die Bedeutung der DEFA Film Library im Ostdeutschen Erinnerungsdiskurs
Creators: name: Schiller, Konstanze
Publisher: name: University of Massachusetts Amherst
Year: 2018

description: The relation between memory and identity is significant, particularly if an identity-establishing entity such as a state has vanished. In the context of GDR memory, this pertains to the type of memory discourse: what is remembered, how, and by whom? What are the differences in the discourse about East German memory between the US and Germany?
Based on approaches of the Aleida Assmann’s approaches to individual, collective, and cultural memory this thesis seeks to examine the notion and impact of archives in collective memory processes and to analyze the extent to which the medium of film as a concrete and abstract archival complex can represent a part of individual and collective memory. Therefore, I combine the notion of the archive – based on approaches of Benjamin and Foucault – with memory discourses, going beyond the archive’s material character. Furthermore, in my analysis I follow the media studies’ definitions of film as a material-based dualistic, communicative and semiotic system.
The analysis focuses on the work of the DEFA Film Library at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, which is important for American utilization and circulation of DEFA films and the distribution of audiovisual images of and about the former GDR.
The DEFA Film Library is the only archive and research center outside of Germany devoted to a broad spectrum of filmmaking from and related to the former GDR. The DEFA Film Library has been distributing DEFA movies and providing materials for media education since the early 1990s.
In this thesis, I examine the multilayered role of the DEFA Film Library in US-East German sociocultural relationships, particularly with respect to its impact on raising awareness of East German culture, history and politics through public and academic film programming and exchange. Using the DEFA Film Library’s work as a case study, I analyze the political impact of film work amidst the challenges of preserving, circulating, and communicating the audiovisual memory of the GDR.
Application and Evaluation of Lighthouse Technology for Precision Motion Capture
Creators: name: Sitole, Soumitra
Publisher: name: University of Massachusetts Amherst
Year: 2019

description: This thesis presents the development towards a system that can capture and quantify motion for applications in biomechanical and medical fields demanding precision motion tracking using the lighthouse technology. Commercially known as SteamVR tracking, the lighthouse technology is a motion tracking system developed for virtual reality applications that makes use of patterned infrared light sources to highlight trackers (objects embedded with photodiodes) to obtain their pose or spatial position and orientation. Current motion capture systems such as the camera-based motion capture are expensive and not readily available outside of research labs. This thesis provides a case for low-cost motion capture systems. The technology is applied to quantify motion to draw inferences about biomechanics capture and analysis, quantification of gait, and prosthetic alignment. Possible shortcomings for data acquisition using this system for the stated applications have been addressed. The repeatability of the system has been established by determining the standard deviation error for multiple trials based on a motion trajectory using a seven degree-of-freedom robot arm. The accuracy testing for the system is based on cross-validation between the lighthouse technology data and transformations derived using joint angles by developing a forward kinematics model for the robot’s end-effector pose. The underlying principle for motion capture using this system is that multiple trackers placed on limb segments allow to record the position and orientation of the segments in relation to a set global frame. Joint angles between the segments can then be calculated from the recorded positions and orientations of each tracker using inverse kinematics. In this work, inverse kinematics for rigid bodies was based on calculating homogeneous transforms to the individual trackers in the model’s reference frame to find the respective Euler angles as well as using the analytical approach to solve for joint variables in terms of known geometric parameters. This work was carried out on a phantom prosthetic limb. A custom application-specific motion tracker was also developed using a hardware development kit which would be further optimized for subsequent studies involving biomechanics motion capture.