cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Entrepreneurship and human action

As defined by the editors of this book, ‘non-market entrepreneurship’ consists of all forms of entrepreneurship not being undertaken solely for purposes of profit maximization or commercialization, and encompasses entrepreneurial activities such as social enterprise and entrepreneurship, public sector entrepreneurship, policy entrepreneurship, non-profit entrepreneurship, and philanthropic enterprise, among many others. The eminent cast of contributors gives coherence to the academic and public discussions on the topic, builds a theoretical edifice within the field of entrepreneurship and helps to establish and delineate the contours of the research field of non-market entrepreneurship.
Cherenkov radiation fluence estimates in tissue for molecular imaging and therapy applications

Cherenkov radiation has emerged as a novel source of light with a number of applications in the biomedical sciences. It’s unique properties, including its broadband emission spectrum, spectral weighting in the ultraviolet and blue wavebands, and local generation of light within a given tissue have made it an attractive source of light for techniques ranging from widefield imaging to oximetry and phototherapy. To help guide the future development of this field in the context of molecular imaging, quantitative estimates of the light fluence rates of Cherenkov radiation from a number of radionuclide and external radiotherapy beams in tissue was explored for the first time. Using Monte Carlo simulations, these values were found to be on the order of 0.1 – 1 nW/cm 2 per MBq/g for radionuclides and 1 – 10 μW/cm 2 per Gy/sec for external radiotherapy beams, dependent on the given waveband and optical properties. For phototherapy applications, the total light fluence was found to be on the order of nJ/cm 2 for radionuclides, and mJ/cm 2 for radiotherapy beams. To validate these findings, experimental validation was completed with an MV x-ray photon beam incident onto a tissue phantom, confirming the magnitudes of the simulation values. The results indicate that diagnostic potential is reasonable for Cherenkov excitation of molecular probes, but phototherapy may remain elusive at these relatively low fluence values.
Robust Regression

Discriminative methods (e.g., kernel regression, SVM) have been extensively used to solve problems such as object recognition, image alignment and pose estimation from images. These methods typically map image features ( ${\mathbf X}$ ) to continuous (e.g., pose) or discrete (e.g., object category) values. A major drawback of existing discriminative methods is that samples are directly projected onto a subspace and hence fail to account for outliers common in realistic training sets due to occlusion, specular reflections or noise. It is important to notice that existing discriminative approaches assume the input variables ${\mathbf X}$ to be noise free. Thus, discriminative methods experience significant performance degradation when gross outliers are present. Despite its obvious importance, the problem of robust discriminative learning has been relatively unexplored in computer vision. This paper develops the theory of robust regression (RR) and presents an effective convex approach that uses recent advances on rank minimization. The framework applies to a variety of problems in computer vision including robust linear discriminant analysis, regression with missing data, and multi-label classification. Several synthetic and real examples with applications to head pose estimation from images, image and video classification and facial attribute classification with missing data are used to illustrate the benefits of RR.
Changing Subsystem Information Strategies Using Weighted Objectives: Increasing Robustness to Biased Information Passing

Complex system design requires managing competing objectives between many subsystems. Previous field research has demonstrated that subsystem designers may use biased information passing as a negotiation tactic and thereby reach sub-optimal system-level results due to local optimization behavior. One strategy to combat the focus on local optimization is an incentive structure that promotes system-level optimization. This paper presents a new subsystem incentive structure based on Multi-disciplinary Optimization (MDO) techniques for improving robustness of the design process to such biased information passing strategies. Results from simulations of different utility functions for a test suite of multi-objective problems quantify the system robustness to biased information passing strategies. Results show that incentivizing subsystems with this new weighted structure may decrease the error resulting from biased information passing.Copyright © 2015 by ASME
Is School Value Added Indicative of Principal Quality

AbstractStates across the country are developing systems for evaluating school principals on the basis of student achievement growth. A common approach is to hold principals accountable for the value added of their schools—that is, schools’ contributions to student achievement growth. In theory, school value added can reflect not only principals’ effectiveness but also other school-specific influences on student achievement growth that are outside of principals’ control. In this paper, we isolate principals’ effects on student achievement growth and examine the extent to which school value added captures the effects that principals persistently demonstrate. Using longitudinal data on the math and reading outcomes of fourth- through eighth-grade students in Pennsylvania, our findings indicate that school value added provides very poor information for revealing principals’ persistent levels of effectiveness.
Robust Factor Models with Explanatory Proxies

We provide an econometric analysis for the factor models when the latent factors can be explained partially by several observed explanatory proxies. In financial factor models for instance, the unknown factors can be reasonably well predicted by a few observable proxies, such as the Fama-French factors. In diffusion index forecasts, identified factors are strongly related to several directly measurable economic variables such as consumption-wealth variable, financial ratios, and term spread. To incorporate the explanatory power of these observed characteristics, we propose a new two-step estimation procedure: (i) regress the data onto the observables, and (ii) take the principal components of the fitted data to estimate the loadings and factors. The proposed estimator is robust to possibly heavy-tailed distributions, which are encountered by many macroeconomic and financial time series. With those proxies, the factors can be estimated accurately even if the cross-sectional dimension is mild. Empirically, we apply the model to forecast US bond risk premia, and find that the observed macroeconomic characteristics contain strong explanatory powers of the factors. The gain of forecast is more substantial when these characteristics are incorporated to estimate the common factors than directly used for forecasts.
Organic chemistry: No double bond left behind

Alkenyl halides are some of the most useful building blocks for synthesizing small organic molecules. A catalyst has now allowed their direct preparation from widely available alkenes using the cross-metathesis reaction. See Article p.459 Olefins with a halide substituent are a mainstay in synthetic chemistry. However, the scope for the efficient stereoselective synthesis of acyclic alkenyl halides — a class of compound common that includes many biologically active natural products — has been limited. Amir Hoveyda and colleagues show here that previously unknown halo-substituted molybdenum alkylidene species are exceptionally reactive and can participate in high-yielding olefin metathesis reactions that produce acyclic 1,2-disubstituted Z-alkenyl halides. Many alkenyl chlorides, bromides and fluorides can be obtained in up to 91% yield and complete Z selectivity.
HREM of Electron Irradiated Quartz

In situ electron irradiation has been carried out in transmission electron microscopes to monitor the dynamic evolution of α-quartz during the transition to the metamict state from the crystalline state. Crystals of different orientations were examined. HREM images were digitized and Fourier transformed to monitor degradation of periodicities. The final uniform metamict structure was characterized by radial distribution functions obtained from energy-filtered electron diffraction.
A 5-mm piezo-scanning fiber device for high speed ultrafast laser microsurgery

We develop an air-core photonic bandgap fiber based piezo-scanning ultrafast microsurgery scalpel with 5mm diameter. Energy transmission, damage thresholds and mechanisms are characterized resulting in 4 ms ablation of 150 x 150 μm^2 tissue area
Molybdenum nitrides as oxygen reduction reaction catalysts: structural and electrochemical studies.

Monometallic (δ-MoN, Mo5N6, and Mo2N) and bimetallic molybdenum nitrides (Co0.6Mo1.4N2) were investigated as electrocatalysts for the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR), which is a key half-reaction in hydrogen fuel cells. Monometallic hexagonal molybdenum nitrides are found to exhibit improved activities over rock salt type molybdenum nitride (γ-Mo2N), suggesting that improvements are due to either the higher molybdenum valence or a more favorable coordination environment in the hexagonal structures. Further enhancements in activity were found for hexagonal bimetallic cobalt molybdenum nitride (Co0.6Mo1.4N2), resulting in a modest onset potential of 0.713 V versus reversible hydrogen electrode (RHE). Co0.6Mo1.4N2 exhibits good stability in acidic environments, and in the potential range lower than 0.5 V versus RHE, the ORR appears to proceed via a four-electron mechanism based on the analysis of rotating disc electrode results. A redetermination of the structures of the binary molybdenum nitrides was carrie...
A synthetic method for palladium-catalyzed stannylation at the 5- and 6-benzo positions of indoles.

The stannylation of indole derivatives proceeds in good yields under palladium catalysis (5 mol %) without protection of the indolic nitrogen. The general utility of both PdCl2(PhCN)2/PCy3 and Pd2dba3/PCy3 as catalytic systems for the stannylation of three indole derivatives, with varying degrees of electron density, is presented.
Competing technologies and industry evolution: The benefits of making mistakes in the flat panel display industry

This article investigates the post-entry implications of pre-entry technological choices made during the uncertain period before a dominant design. Building on work on technological dynamics and organizational inertia, I argue that too early commitments to the winning technology may impede the ability to bring the best product to market, but delaying investment too long limits the ability to accumulate useful knowledge. Using data from the evolution of the flat panel display industry from 1965 to 2005, the study shows empirical support for the two theoretical mechanisms and offers the surprising result that firms starting in the losing technology before switching outperform other firms in terms of product value. Switching, while difficult behaviorally in recovering from failure, both delays difficult-to-reverse technological commitments and develops market knowledge
Influence of birth hospital on outcomes of ductal-dependent cardiac lesions

OBJECTIVE: The goal was to determine the effect of birth hospital pediatric cardiac specialty center status and neonatal level of care on 90-day mortality for infants with ductal-dependent congenital heart disease. METHODS: A population-based, retrospective, cohort study was conducted in Washington State in 1987–2006. All infants born in Washington with gestational ages of ≥32 weeks and birth weights of ≥1500 g who were admitted to a Washington hospital for the care of a congenital cardiac anomaly likely to be ductal dependent were included. Subjects were required to receive a surgical or interventional cardiac procedure within 30 days after birth. Birth certificate data were linked with death certificate data and hospital administrative records. The exposures of interest were birth hospital pediatric cardiac specialty center status and neonatal level of care. The primary outcome was death within 90 days. RESULTS: A total of 823 infants met the inclusion criteria, 285 born at specialty centers and 538 at other centers. After adjustment for cardiac diagnoses, other congenital anomalies, birth year, maternal income quartile, and definitive-care hospital, there was no significant difference in 90-day mortality for infants born at specialty centers versus other centers (odds ratio: 1.05 [95% confidence interval: 0.65–1.68]). CONCLUSION: For infants with ductal-dependent congenital heart disease, there was no difference in 90-day mortality for infants born at specialty centers versus other centers in the state of Washington.
The Application of Quaternion Algebra to Gyroscopic Motion, Navigation, and Guidance

Currently, many six degree of freedom (6-DOF) trajectory simulations and simulations of gyroscopic motion use quaternions to define a vehicle’s orientation. Of those that do, however, none take full advantage of the properties of quaternion algebra. Quaternions are also known as hypercomplex numbers. They can be treated as individual quantities for which all the standard algebraic operations are defined. Consequently, they have advantages that Euler angles and transformation matrices do not. This paper will first define an alternative 6-DOF formulation, that, when combined with quaternion algebra, is potentially much more powerful than current simulations. Also, the paper will present a special case of spin stabilized rigid bodies. Next, the paper will describe the use of quaternion algebra and elliptic functions to obtain a closed form solution for torque free gyroscopic motion in terms of the rotational quaternion and its derivative. This is the homogeneous solution to the problem. Then exact solutions for certain nonhomogeneous cases will be discussed. These could represent spacecraft maneuvering in a vacuum or even certain atmospheric cases. Then numerical results will be presented.
Growth hormone-binding proteins.

Growth hormone binding proteins (GHBP) were first recognized over a decade ago in plasma of pregnant mouse, rabbit and man. Initial skepticism about the existence of bound forms of circulating Polypeptide hormones has given way to over 430 publications dealing with various aspects of the GHBP, as listed in Medline at the time of this writing. Space limitations for this chapter do not permit citation of all; I apologize to those colleagues whose work is not mentioned for this reason. Much has been learned about the nature, source and generation of the GHBP, some of its biological activities have been characterized, and much effort has been expended at defining the regulation of plasma GHBP levels. Interestingly, despite a decade of intensive investigation, the ultimate biological role and physiological significance of the GHBP remains unknown.
Silyl Enol Ether Prins Cyclization: Diastereoselective Formation of Substituted Tetrahydropyran-4-ones

A diastereoselective synthesis of cis-2,6-disubstituted tetrahydropyran-4-ones was developed. The key step of this methodology, a silyl enol ether Prins cyclization, was promoted by a condensation reaction between a hydroxy silyl enol ether and an aldehyde to afford substituted tetrahydropyran-4-ones. The cyclization was tolerant of many functional groups, and the modular synthesis of the hydroxy silyl enol ether allowed for the formation of more than 30 new tetrahydropyran-4-ones with up to 97% yield and >95:5 dr. The cyclization step forms new carbon–carbon and carbon–oxygen bonds, as well as a quaternary center with good diastereoselectivity. The method provides a versatile route for the synthesis of substituted tetrahydropyrans.
Use of systemic proteasome inhibition as an immune-modulating agent in disease.

Bortezomib is the first proteasome inhibitor to be used clinically for the treatment of multiple myeloma and has been suggested as a possible treatment for a wide variety of hematologic and solid malignancies. Recent data suggests that potent immunomodulatory effects can also occur with systemic proteasome inhibition. This has been recently shown to occur in a graft-versus host disease model following bone marrow transplantation in mice. The suggested direct immunological effects of bortezomib treatment to include a decrease in anti-apoptotic protein levels, an increase in expression of TNF-family receptors (specifically Apo2L/TRAIL), induction of apoptosis, and inhibition of the transcription factor NF- κB. The NF- κB pathway has been associated with the regulation of numerous immune and inflammatory response mediators. In this review, we will present recent information concerning the potential therapeutic implications of bortezomib for a range of immune disorders. These findings would suggest that bortezomib treatment may be of clinical significance to suppress solid organ transplant rejection, autoreactive T cell responses, pro-inflammatory cytokine production, and consequently disease progression and pathology in autoimmunity.
Legume finishing provides beef with positive human dietary fatty acid ratios and consumer preference comparable with grain-finished beef.

Consumer liking, proximate composition, pH, Warner-Bratzler shear force, fatty acid composition, and volatile compounds were determined from the LM (longissimus thoracis) of cattle ( = 6 per diet) finished on conventional feedlot (USUGrain), legume, and grass forage diets. Forage diets included a condensed tannin-containing perennial legume, birdsfoot trefoil (; USUBFT), and a grass, meadow brome ( Rehmann; USUGrass). Moreover, representative retail forage (USDA Certified Organic Grass-fed [OrgGrass]) and conventional beef (USDA Choice, Grain-fed; ChGrain) were investigated ( = 6 per retail type). The ChGrain had the greatest ( 0.05) to that of both USUGrain and USUGrass. Both grain-finished beef treatments were rated greater ( 0.05) with that of USUGrain and ChGrain. Flavor liking was rated greatest ( 0.05) to those of ChGrain, USUGrass, and OrgGrass. Cumulative SFA and MUFA concentrations were greatest ( 0.05) to those of USUGrain and USUGrass. Each forage-finished beef treatment, USUGrass, OrgGrass, and USUBFT, had lower ( < 0.001) ratios of -6:-3 fatty acids. Hexanal was the most numerically abundant volatile compound. The concentration of hexanal increased with increasing concentrations of total PUFA. Among all the lipid degradation products (aldehydes, alcohols, furans, carboxylic acids, and ketones) measured in this study, there was an overall trend toward greater quantities in grain-finished products, lower quantities in USUGrass and OrgGrass, and intermediate quantities in USUBFT. This trend was in agreement with IMF content, fatty acid concentrations, and sensory attributes. These results suggest an opportunity for a birdsfoot trefoil finishing program, which results in beef comparable in sensory quality with grain-finished beef but with reduced -6 and SFA, similar to grass-finished beef.
Techniques for Submitting Successful Proposals for SHAPE America National Conventions

This article covers the basic components of the submission process before submitting a proposal for the SHAPE America national convention. The article discusses various techniques specific to the process, including the unique discipline areas. Other issues addressed include an understanding of the SHAPE America review process and how it works, preparing the proposal (topic, content, objectives, organization and national standards), common proposal errors, and submission of the proposal online. The article has been written in collaboration with a panel of experts who have been involved in the review process at the state, district and national levels for a number of years. The article also has been reviewed by and is supported by the SHAPE America convention program committee.
Language-Based Games.

We introduce language-based games, a generalization of psychological games [6] that can also capture reference-dependent preferences [7]. The idea is to extend the domain of the utility function to situations, maximal consistent sets in some language. The role of the underlying language in this framework is thus particularly critical. Of special interest are languages that can express only coarse beliefs [9]. Despite the expressive power of the approach, we show that it can describe games in a simple, natural way. Nash equilibrium and rationalizability are generalized to this setting; Nash equilibrium is shown not to exist in general, while the existence of rationalizable strategies is proved under mild conditions.
FUSION: a tool for facilitating and augmenting android bug reporting

As the popularity of mobile smart devices continues to climb the complexity of “apps” continues to increase, making the development and maintenance process challenging. Current bug tracking systems lack key features to effectively support construction of reports with actionable information that directly lead to a bug’s resolution. In this demo we present the implementation of a novel bug reporting system, called Fusion, that facilitates users including reproduction steps in bug reports for mobile apps. Fusion links user-provided information to program artifacts extracted through static and dynamic analysis performed before testing or release. Results of preliminary studies demonstrate that Fusion both effectively facilitates reporting and allows for more reliable reproduction of bugs from reports compared to traditional issue tracking systems by presenting more detailed contextual app information. Tool website: www.fusion-android. com Video url: https://youtu.be/AND9h0ElxRg
Augmented Reality in Medical Education and Training

ABSTRACTAugmented reality, while not necessarily a new technology, is becoming more well-known and gaining some momentum in medical education through Google Glass and Microsoft’s HoloLens. Not only can augmented reality aid in student education, but it also can impact patient care through its ability to enhance medical training. Medical libraries can partake in this new endeavor by being aware of applications in augmented reality that can benefit students and educators.
Stratégies de dépistage de l’adénocarcinome pancréatique chez les patients à haut risque

Screening high-risk individuals with imaging tests, such as endoscopic ultrasound and computed tomography, can lead to the detection and treatment of predominantly asymptomatic premalignant lesions. These pancreatic lesions consist of resectable, mostly branch-type non-invasive intraductal papillary mucinous neoplasms. Endoscopic ultrasound features of chronic pancreatitis are highly prevalent in high-risk individuals and these directly correlate with multifocal lobulocentric parenchymal atrophy due to pancreatic intraepithelial neoplasia. Long-term, multi-prospective studies are needed to determine if screening for early pancreatic adenocarcinoma and timely intervention will result in decreased pancreatic cancer incidence and mortality in high-risk individuals.
On the Approximation Error of Mean-Field Models

Mean-field models have been used to study large-scale and complex stochastic systems, such as large-scale data centers and dense wireless networks, using simple deterministic models (dynamical systems). This paper analyzes the approximation error of mean-field models for continuous-time Markov chains (CTMC), and focuses on mean-field models that are represented as finite-dimensional dynamical systems with a unique equilibrium point. By applying Stein's method and the perturbation theory, the paper shows that under some mild conditions, if the mean-field model is globally asymptotically stable and locally exponentially stable, the mean square difference between the stationary distribution of the stochastic system with size M and the equilibrium point of the corresponding mean-field system is O(1/M). The result of this paper establishes a general theorem for establishing the convergence and the approximation error (i.e., the rate of convergence) of a large class of CTMCs to their mean-field limit by mainly looking into the stability of the mean-field model, which is a deterministic system and is often easier to analyze than the CTMCs. Two applications of mean-field models in data center networks are presented to demonstrate the novelty of our results.
Multi-scale volumes for deep object detection and localization

This study aims to analyze the benefits of improved multi-scale reasoning for object detection and localization with deep convolutional neural networks. To that end, an efficient and general object detection framework which operates on scale volumes of a deep feature pyramid is proposed. In contrast to the proposed approach, most current state-of-the-art object detectors operate on a single-scale in training, while testing involves independent evaluation across scales. One benefit of the proposed approach is in better capturing of multi-scale contextual information, resulting in significant gains in both detection performance and localization quality of objects on the PASCAL VOC dataset and a multi-view highway vehicles dataset. The joint detection and localization scale-specific models are shown to especially benefit detection of challenging object categories which exhibit large scale variation as well as detection of small objects. HighlightsMulti-scale feature reasoning for deep object detection in images is analyzed.A multi-scale contextual reasoning approach is proposed using multi-scale volumes.Scale-specific, joint detection and localization models increase robustness.The approach efficiently handles challenging cases of large variation in scale.
Is protection of ischemic neonatal myocardium by cardioplegia species dependent

Hypothermia combined with pharmacologic cardioplegia protects the globally ischemic adult heart, but this benefit may not extend to children, resulting in poor postischemic recovery of function and increased mortality. The relative susceptibilities to ischemia modified by hypothermia alone and by hypothermia plus cardioplegia were assessed in isolated perfused neonatal (3- to 4-day-old) rabbit and pig hearts. Hearts were perfused aerobically with Krebs buffer solution in the working mode for 30 minutes and aortic flow was recorded. This was followed by 3 minutes of hypothermic (14° C) coronary perfusion with either Krebs or St. Thomas’ Hospital cardioplegic solution No. 2 followed by hypothermic (14° C) global ischemia (rabbits 2, 4, and 6 hours; pigs 2 and 4 hours). Hearts were reperfused for 15 minutes in the Langendorff mode and 30 minutes in the working mode, and recovery of postischemic aortic flow was measured. Hypothermia alone provided excellent protection of the ischemic neonatal rabbit heart, with recovery of aortic flow after 2 and 4 hours of ischemia at 91% ±4% and 87% ±5% (mean ± standard deviation) of its preischemic value. Recovery after 6 hours of ischemia was depressed to 58% ±9% of its preischemic value. Ischemic neonatal pig hearts protected with hypothermia alone recovered 94% ±3% of preischemic aortic flow after 2 hours; none was able to generate flow after 4 hours. St. Thomas’ Hospital solution No. 2 decreased postischemic aortic flow after 4 hours of ischemia in rabbit hearts from 87% ±5% to 70% ±7% (p
A Relevant Content Filtering Based Framework for Data Stream Summarization

Social media platforms are a rich source of information these days, however, of all the available information, only a small fraction is of users’ interest. To help users catch up with the latest topics of their interests from the large amount of information available in social media, we present a relevant content filtering based framework for data stream summarization. More specifically, given the topic or event of interest, this framework can dynamically discover and filter out relevant information from irrelevant information in the stream of text provided by social media platforms. It then captures the most representative and up-to-date information to generate a sequential summary or event story line along with the evolution of the topic or event. This framework does not depend on any labeled data, it instead uses the weak supervision provided by the user, which matches the real scenarios of users searching for information about an ongoing event. The experiments on two real events traced by Twitter verified the effectiveness of the proposed framework. The robustness of using the most easy-to-obtain weak supervision, i.e., trending topic or hashtag indicates that the framework can be easily integrated into social media platforms such as Twitter to generate sequential summaries for the events of interest. We also make the manually generated gold-standard sequential summaries of the two test events publicly available (https://drive.google.com/open?id=15jRw13i0xARUW3HqBn3BdR45IXk7P2Qj-HO__OFmMW0) for future use in the community.
Exploring the Food Expenditure Patterns of College Students

Agricultural sector, unlike other sectors of the economy, is distinguished by specific risk factors, which largely depends on natural climatic conditions and the ongoing global meteorological changes. Insurance is the financial mechanism, with its considerable contribution to the country's social and economic stability. The insurance sector's prospects and problems today are vital issues for the agriculture as well as for the economy and employment. In case of Georgia, the development direction and the situation was not so successful, until 2014, the share of agricultural insurance in the insurance sector did not exceed 1%. The article discusses the importance of the index insurance for the development of agricultural insurance and the need for Government Support in its promotion. The prospects and problems of agro-insurance development have been identified on the basis of comparative analysis of the insurance policies and compensation claims, regional distribution and dynamics of recent years in Georgia. Also, based on theoretical and practical analysis the essential recommendations have been designed to eliminate them and to promote development of the agriculture insurance. As well as, an attention is paid to the inclusion and use of the type of index insurance in the Georgian agricultural insurance sector.
Hail Day Frequency Trends and Associated Atmospheric Circulation Patterns over China during 1960–2012

AbstractBased on a comprehensive collection of hail observations and the NCEP–NCAR reanalyses from 1960 to 2012, the long-term trends of hail day frequency in mainland China and the associated changes in atmospheric circulation patterns were analyzed. There was no detectable trend in hail frequency from 1960 to the early 1980s, but a significant decreasing trend was apparent in later periods throughout most of China and in particular over the Tibetan Plateau from the early 1980s and over northern and northwestern China from the early 1990s. Hail frequency in southern China did not decrease as significantly as in other regions over the last couple of decades. An objective classification method, the obliquely rotated T-mode principal component technique, was used to investigate atmospheric circulation patterns. It was found that 51.85% of the hail days occurred during two major circulation types, both of which were associated with cold frontal systems in northern China. More specifically, the synoptic troug...
Statistical fluctuations in laser transients

A new technique is described to characterize fluctuations in lasers through an application of the concept of first passage time (FPT) distributions. The basic question addressed is the following: if we allow the laser radiation to develop from a spontaneous emission background, what is the distribution of times for the intensity to reach a certain prescribed value (lref)?
Acceleration of analog simulation by partial LU decomposition

This paper presents a method for accelerating analog simulation by incrementally updating the admittance matrix, and re-solving only the part of the matrix that depends on the factors that changed. There is substantial speedup for large linear subcircuits of the type generated by RLGC extractors for interconnect analysis. It makes little if any difference for small nonlinear circuits.
Taking the Guesswork out of Locating Evidence‐Based Mathematics Practices for Diverse Learners

Legislations mandates that educators use evidence-based practices (EBPs) that are supported by scientifically based research. EBPs have demonstrated a likelihood to work for students with disabilities. EBPs should match targeted needs of the student receiving the instruction, which sometimes requires educators to search for the best intervention to meet specific student needs. This article discusses the impetus for practices supported by evidence, where to find interventions and strategies, and what to do when targeted interventions do not exist. Additionally, this article emphasizes the need to evaluate effectiveness of intervention at the student level.
A Transcriptional Lineage of the Early C. elegans Embryo

During embryonic development, cells must establish fates, morphologies, and behaviors in coordination with one another to form a functional body. A prevalent hypothesis for how this coordination is achieved is that each cell's fate and behavior is determined by a defined mixture of RNAs. Only recently has it become possible to measure the full suite of transcripts in a single cell. Here we quantify genome-wide mRNA abundance in each cell of the Caenorhabditis elegans embryo up to the 16-cell stage. We describe spatially dynamic expression, quantify cell-specific differential activation of the zygotic genome, and identify genes that were previously unappreciated as being critical for development. We present an interactive data visualization tool that allows broad access to our dataset. This genome-wide single-cell map of mRNA abundance, alongside the well-studied life history and fate of each cell, describes at a cellular resolution the mRNA landscape that guides development.
Depletion region surface effects in electron beam induced current measurements

Electron beam induced current (EBIC) is a powerful characterization technique which offers the high spatial resolution needed to study polycrystalline solar cells. Current models of EBIC assume that excitations in the p-n junction depletion region result in perfect charge collection efficiency. However, we find that in CdTe and Si samples prepared by focused ion beam (FIB) milling, there is a reduced and nonuniform EBIC lineshape for excitations in the depletion region. Motivated by this, we present a model of the EBIC response for excitations in the depletion region which includes the effects of surface recombination from both charge-neutral and charged surfaces. For neutral surfaces, we present a simple analytical formula which describes the numerical data well, while the charged surface response depends qualitatively on the location of the surface Fermi level relative to the bulk Fermi level. We find that the experimental data on FIB-prepared Si solar cells are most consistent with a charged surface an...
Recent amplification of the North American winter temperature dipole

During the winters of 2013-2014 and 2014-2015, anomalously warm temperatures in western North America and anomalously cool temperatures in eastern North America resulted in substantial human and environmental impacts. Motivated by the impacts of these concurrent temperature extremes and the intrinsic atmospheric linkage between weather conditions in the western and eastern United States, we investigate the occurrence of concurrent "warm-West/cool-East" surface temperature anomalies, which we call the "North American winter temperature dipole." We find that, historically, warm-West/cool-East dipole conditions have been associated with anomalous mid-tropospheric ridging over western North America and downstream troughing over eastern North America. We also find that the occurrence and severity of warm-West/cool-East events have increased significantly between 1980 and 2015, driven largely by an increase in the frequency with which high-amplitude "ridge-trough" wave patterns result in simultaneous severe temperature conditions in both the West and East. Using a large single-model ensemble of climate simulations, we show that the observed positive trend in the warm-West/cool-East events is attributable to historical anthropogenic emissions including greenhouse gases, but that the co-occurrence of extreme western warmth and eastern cold will likely decrease in the future as winter temperatures warm dramatically across the continent, thereby reducing the occurrence of severely cold conditions in the East. Although our analysis is focused on one particular region, our analysis framework is generally transferable to the physical conditions shaping different types of extreme events around the globe.
Strategic ethnic performance and the construction of authenticity in urban Japan

ABSTRACTThis paper introduces the concept of strategic ethnic performance (SEP), when members of one ethnic group present themselves as members of a phenotypically similar ethnic group for economic gain. I use ethnographic and interview data focused on Sub-Saharan African merchants involved in the Hip Hop fashion boutique business in urban Japan to show how SEP develops from four interconnected areas: the opportunity structure for ethnic entrepreneurs, the physical presentation of sellers, the arrangement of the selling venue, and feedback loops between the seller and the consumer. By utilizing SEP, ethnic entrepreneurs enhance the perceived authenticity of their goods and themselves. A thorough analysis of this process illuminates the interactional nature of ethnic authenticity as it is understood by consumers within urban areas.
Affine PBW bases and affine MV polytopes

We show how affine PBW bases can be used to construct affine MV polytopes, and that the resulting objects agree with the affine MV polytopes recently constructed using either preprojective algebras or KLR algebras. To do this we first generalize work of Beck–Chari–Pressley and Beck–Nakajima to define affine PBW bases for arbitrary convex orders on positive roots. Our results describe how affine PBW bases for different convex orders are related, answering a question posed by Beck and Nakajima.
Cascade Reactions of Nitrones and Allenes for the Synthesis of Indole Derivatives

Cascade reactions involving nitrones and allenes are known to facilitate the rapid synthesis of several indole derivatives. The chemoselectivity of these complicated transformations can be influenced by substrate functionalization, reaction conditions, and catalyst control. While seminal studies established primary reactivity patterns, recent work has illustrated the impact of these cascade reactions for creating diverse libraries, increased the breadth of these methods with facilitated access to challenging nitrones, and shown that these transformations can be controlled by asymmetric catalysis.
Semi-supervised learning and graph cuts for consensus based medical image segmentation

Abstract Medical image segmentation requires consensus ground truth segmentations to be derived from multiple expert annotations. A novel approach is proposed that obtains consensus segmentations from experts using graph cuts (GC) and semi supervised learning (SSL). Popular approaches use iterative Expectation Maximization (EM) to estimate the final annotation and quantify annotator's performance. Such techniques pose the risk of getting trapped in local minima. We propose a self consistency (SC) score to quantify annotator consistency using low level image features. SSL is used to predict missing annotations by considering global features and local image consistency. The SC score also serves as the penalty cost in a second order Markov random field (MRF) cost function optimized using graph cuts to derive the final consensus label. Graph cut obtains a global maximum without an iterative procedure. Experimental results on synthetic images, real data of Crohn's disease patients and retinal images show our final segmentation to be accurate and more consistent than competing methods.
Building Vocabulary Knowledge in Preschoolers through Shared Book Reading and Gameplay.

This study moves beyond previous investigations to examine whether an educational intervention combining shared book reading with a vocabulary game increases children's vocabulary knowledge. Four-year-olds (N = 44) were randomly assigned to dyads in either an intervention (shared book reading plus vocabulary review game) or comparison condition (shared book reading, after-reading vocabulary review, and game that did not teach vocabulary). After two 30-min sessions, results demonstrated that the intervention condition outperformed the comparison condition on measures of receptive and expressive knowledge of taught vocabulary words. Children in the intervention group who scored the lowest at pretest on the receptive measure saw the most gains in taught word knowledge. Findings suggest that combining vocabulary gameplay with shared book reading improved children's learning of the vocabulary words in comparison to a comparison group.
Havens: Explicit reliable memory regions for HPC applications

Supporting error resilience in future exascale-class supercomputing systems is a critical challenge. Due to transistor scaling trends and increasing memory density, scientific simulations are expected to experience more interruptions caused by transient errors in the system memory. Existing hardware-based detection and recovery techniques will be inadequate to manage the presence of high memory fault rates. In this paper we propose a partial memory protection scheme based on region-based memory management. We define the concept of regions called havens that provide fault protection for program objects. We provide reliability for the regions through a software-based parity protection mechanism. Our approach enables critical program objects to be placed in these havens. The fault coverage provided by our approach is application agnostic, unlike algorithm-based fault tolerance techniques.
Online Learning of Feasible Strategies in Unknown Environments

Define an environment as a set of convex constraint functions that vary arbitrarily over time and consider a cost function that is also convex and arbitrarily varying. Agents that operate in this environment intend to select actions that are feasible for all times while minimizing the cost's time average. Such action is said optimal and can be computed offline if the cost and the environment are known a priori. An online policy is one that depends causally on the cost and the environment. To compare online policies to the optimal offline action define the fit of a trajectory as a vector that integrates the constraint violations over time and its regret as the cost difference with the optimal action accumulated over time. Fit measures the extent to which an online policy succeeds in learning feasible actions while regret measures its success in learning optimal actions. This paper proposes the use of online policies computed from a saddle point controller which are shown to have fit and regret that are either bounded or grow at a sublinear rate. These properties provide an indication that the controller finds trajectories that are feasible and optimal in a relaxed sense. Concepts are illustrated throughout with the problem of a shepherd that wants to stay close to all sheep in a herd. Numerical experiments show that the saddle point controller allows the shepherd to do so.
Rotamer Libraries for the High-Resolution Design of β-Amino Acid Foldamers.

Summary β-Amino acids offer attractive opportunities to develop biologically active peptidomimetics, either employed alone or in conjunction with natural α-amino acids. Owing to their potential for unique conformational preferences that deviate considerably from α-peptide geometries, β-amino acids greatly expand the possible chemistries and physical properties available to polyamide foldamers. Complete in silico support for designing new molecules incorporating non-natural amino acids typically requires representing their side-chain conformations as sets of discrete rotamers for model refinement and sequence optimization. Such rotamer libraries are key components of several state-of-the-art design frameworks. Here we report the development, incorporation in to the Rosetta macromolecular modeling suite, and validation of rotamer libraries for β 3 -amino acids.
Number Balancing is as Hard as Minkowski’s Theorem and Shortest Vector

The number balancing (NBP) problem is the following: given real numbers \(a_1,\ldots ,a_n \in [0,1]\), find two disjoint subsets \(I_1,I_2 \subseteq [n]\) so that the difference \(|\sum _{i \in I_1}a_i - \sum _{i \in I_2}a_i|\) of their sums is minimized. An application of the pigeonhole principle shows that there is always a solution where the difference is at most \(O(\frac{\sqrt{n}}{2^n})\). Finding the minimum, however, is NP-hard. In polynomial time, the differencing algorithm by Karmarkar and Karp from 1982 can produce a solution with difference at most \(n^{-\varTheta (\log n)}\), but no further improvement has been made since then.
Modeling localized corrosion with an effective medium approximation

Abstract A model of localized corrosion is developed, in which the effective local properties of the electrolyte are adjusted based on a continuously variable porosity parameter that permits penetration of the electrolyte into the corroding medium in an average sense. The model is applied to corrosion of multilayer aluminum alloy electrodeposits in salt water, and compared to experimental results on several different coatings. The model can accurately reproduce a number of phenomena specific to localized corrosion, including the effects of variations in film thickness, dissolution through a barrier, and relative lifetimes of different coatings in immersion conditions.
Caustic rings of dark matter

Abstract It is shown that the infall of collisionless dark matter onto isolated galaxies produces a series of caustic rings in the halo dark matter distribution. The properties of these caustics are investigated. The density profile of the caustic is derived for a specific case. Bumps in the rotation curve of NGC 3198 are interpreted as due to caustic rings of dark matter.
Stability with one-sided incomplete information

Two notions of stability, ex ante stability and Bayesian stability, are investigated in a matching model with non-transferrable utility, interdependent preferences, and one-sided incomplete information. Ex ante stable matching-outcomes are unblocked for every belief on the blocking partner's type while Bayesian stable matching-outcomes are unblocked with respect to prior beliefs. Ex ante stability is a minimal requirement. Bayesian stability is a more selective desideratum with sound efficiency properties.
Hydropower Plant Load Frequency Control Via Second-Order Sliding Mode

Super-twisting algorithm, a second order sliding mode control method, is studied for hydropower plant frequency control. Two versions of this algorithm are introduced in this paper. Simulation results from both methods and regular sliding mode control are compared on the basis of system responses and control efforts. We show that the second order sliding mode controller is able to reduce chattering effects associated with regular sliding mode control and preserve the robustness of regular sliding mode control as well.Copyright © 2012 by ASME