cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Economic and welfare impacts of climate change on developing countries

The impact of global climate change on developing countries is analyzed using CGE-multimarket models for three archetype economies representing the poor cereal importing nations of Africa, Asia, and Latin America. The objective is to compare the effects of climate change on the macroeconomic performance, sectoral resource allocation, and household welfare across continents. Simulations help identify those underlying structural features of economies which are the primary determinants of differential impacts; these are suggestive of policy instruments to countervail undesirable effects. Results show that all these countries will potentially suffer income and production losses. However, Africa, with its low substitution possibilities between imported and domestic foods, fares worst in terms of income losses and the drop in consumption of low income households. Countervailing policies to mitigate negative effects should focus on integration in the international market and the production of food crops in Africa, and on the production of export crops in Latin America and Asia.
Overview of Nuclear Physics at Jefferson Lab

The Continuous Electron Beam Accelerator Facility (CEBAF) and associated experimental equipment at Jefferson Lab comprise a unique facility for experimental nuclear physics. This facility is presently being upgraded, which will enable a new experimental program with substantial discovery potential to address important topics in nuclear, hadronic, and electroweak physics. Further in the future, it is envisioned that the Laboratory will evolve into an electron-ion colliding beam facility.
Fixed Effect Models

A term associated with the application of analysis of variance in experimental designs, fixed-effect refers to a type of independent variable or factor. Most researchers exploying experimental designs use fixed-effects in that the levels of the independent variables are finite, known, and in most cases, manipulated by the researcher to be reasonable different to detect a difference on the dependent variable. Keywords: experimental design; independent variable; manipulated
Pricing externalities from passenger transportation in Mexico city

The Mexico City Metropolitan Area has been suffering severely from transportation externalities such as accidents, air pollution, and traffic congestion. This study examines pricing instruments to reduce these externalities using an analytical and numerical model. The study shows that the optimal levels of a gasoline tax and a congestion toll on automobiles could generate social benefits, measured in terms of welfare gain, of US$132 and US$109 per capita, respectively, through the reduction of externalities. The largest component of the welfare gains comes from reduced congestion, followed by local air pollution reduction. The optimal toll and tax would, however, double the cost of driving and could be politically sensitive. Still, more than half of those welfare gains could be obtained through a more modest tax or toll, equivalent to $1 per gallon of gasoline. The welfare gains from reforming the pricing of public transportation are small relative to those from reforming the taxation of automobiles. Although the choice among travel modes depends on specific circumstances, in the absence of road travel pricing that accounts for externalities, there will be potential for higher investment in roads relative to mass transit. Given the rapidly increasing demand for transportation infrastructure in Mexico City, careful efforts should be made to include the full social costs of travel in evaluating alternative infrastructure investments.
Investment and Saving in China

The author analyzes sectoral patterns of investment and saving in China-over time and compared with other countries-to shed light on the factors driving high investment and on how saving is channeled into investment. The findings inform several policy debates. Key findings include: (1) investment by enterprises distinguishes China from other countries and explains most of the variation over time; (2) high household saving explains only a part of the large difference in national saving between China and other countries-the majority is explained by high saving of the government and enterprises (through retained earnings); and (3) only about one-third of enterprise investment is financed via the financial sector, a lower share than in the early 1990s. The author also explores explanations behind high saving of the government and enterprises. His findings have three sets of policy implications. First, the identified financing patterns put in perspective the exposure of the financial sector to investment-related risks but, against a background of concerns about suboptimal allocation of capital, bring to the fore corporate governance, dividend policy, and transparency and accountability of public funds. Second, the findings suggest policy adjustments that would help in achieving the government's goals of improving the quality of growth and increasing the role of consumption. Third, long term saving prospects and the impact of financial sector and pension policies are discussed.
Export shocks and the volatility of returns to schooling : evidence from twelve Latin American economies

This paper builds on previous studies to uncover evidence suggesting that cyclical fluctuations in returns to schooling are determined by fluctuations in foreign demand, which tend to be positively correlated with returns to schooling. The effect of export fluctuations (driven by changes in foreign demand) seems to be attenuated by labor market rigidities, such as constraints on employers to hire temporary workers on an hourly basis. This evidence suggests that countries that have flexible labor markets and experience volatility in their external demand might also experience volatility in returns to schooling. The paper discusses why this might be a concern for developing countries.
Herding dynamic weights for partially observed random field models

Learning the parameters of a (potentially partially observable) random field model is intractable in general. Instead of focussing on a single optimal parameter value we propose to treat parameters as dynamical quantities. We introduce an algorithm to generate complex dynamics for parameters and (both visible and hidden) state vectors. We show that under certain conditions averages computed over trajectories of the proposed dynamical system converge to averages computed over the data. Our "herding dynamics" does not require expensive operations such as exponentiation and is fully deterministic.
High-for-Low and Low-for-High: Efficient Boundary Detection from Deep Object Features and Its Applications to High-Level Vision

Most of the current boundary detection systems rely exclusively on low-level features, such as color and texture. However, perception studies suggest that humans employ object-level reasoning when judging if a particular pixel is a boundary. Inspired by this observation, in this work we show how to predict boundaries by exploiting object-level features from a pretrained object-classification network. Our method can be viewed as a "High-for-Low" approach where high-level object features inform the low-level boundary detection process. Our model achieves state-of-the-art performance on an established boundary detection benchmark and it is efficient to run. Additionally, we show that due to the semantic nature of our boundaries we can use them to aid a number of high-level vision tasks. We demonstrate that using our boundaries we improve the performance of state-of-the-art methods on the problems of semantic boundary labeling, semantic segmentation and object proposal generation. We can view this process as a "Low-for-High'" scheme, where low-level boundaries aid high-level vision tasks. Thus, our contributions include a boundary detection system that is accurate, efficient, generalizes well to multiple datasets, and is also shown to improve existing state-of-the-art high-level vision methods on three distinct tasks.
Case-Only Gene Mapping†

When individuals can be characterized as being affected or unaffected by a disease, marker-trait association can be addressed by comparing marker frequencies between these two categories. It is also possible to infer linkage or association on the basis of marker data from affected individuals only. When there is linkage disequilibrium a test for Hardy-Weinberg proportions among marker genotypes in the affected population is a test about marker allele and genotype associations with the disease locus. However, rejection Hardy-Weinberg at the marker locus in the affected population may simply reflect nonrandom mating in the whole population. Keywords: association; candidate gene; disease marker; linkage disequilibrium; haplotype; Hardy-Weinberg
Anticipating Change in Development Activity Levels

This study demonstrates how cointegration analysis of privately-owned housing within disparate areas of the United States can aid developers in anticipating changes in the level of market activity. The study analyzes change in the number of housing units within four geographic regions: the Northeast, the Midwest, the South and the West. Whereas most studies of regional variation in real estate activity have focused on short-run analysis, this research extends the examination to consider the impact of exogenous variables over a longer time frame. The study uses Citibase data from 1959 through 1995. Results indicate that the four regions move together in the long run and are driven by one common factor, but that change in the South and the West lead those in the other two regions. Results have widespread policy implications for residential and commercial developers nationwide, because change within the dominant areas may serve as indicators of developing change elsewhere.
Twenty-Four-Hour Effects of Bimatoprost 0.01% Monotherapy On Intraocular Pressure and Ocular Perfusion Pressure

Objectives To investigate the 24 h effects of bimatoprost 0.01% monotherapy on intraocular pressure (IOP) and ocular perfusion pressure (OPP). Design Prospective, open-label experimental study. Setting Single tertiary ophthalmic clinic. Participants Sixteen patients with diagnosed primary open-angle glaucoma (POAG) or ocular hypertension (ages, 49–77 years). Interventions Baseline data of 24 h IOP in untreated patients were collected in a sleep laboratory. Measurements of IOP were taken using a pneumatonometer every 2 h in the sitting and supine body positions during the 16 h diurnal/wake period and in the supine position during the 8 h nocturnal/sleep period. After baseline measurements were taken, patients were treated with bimatoprost 0.01% one time per day at bedtime for 4 weeks, and then 24 h IOP data were collected under the same laboratory conditions. Primary and secondary outcome measures Diurnal and nocturnal IOP and OPP means under bimatoprost 0.01% treatment were compared with baseline. Results The diurnal and nocturnal IOP means were significantly lower under the bimatoprost 0.01% treatment than baseline in both the sitting and supine positions. The diurnal and nocturnal OPP means were significantly higher under treatment than baseline in both the sitting and supine positions. Conclusion Bimatoprost 0.01% monotherapy significantly lowered IOP and increased OPP during the 24 h period.
On the taxation of human and physical capital in models of endogenous growth

Abstract This paper studies the effects of factor income taxation and of subsidies to human capital accumulation in models of endogenous growth. It examines in particular how these effects depend on the specification of the leisure activity and on the technology and tax treatment of the sector producing human capital. It shows that the negative effects of factor income taxes on economic growth are stronger when the human capital sector is a market good. Under these circumstances, a subsidy to human capital accumulation can offset the direct growth effects of labor taxation, making it akin to a consumption tax. The paper then briefly discusses the normative implications of the analysis for the optimal taxation of factor incomes.
Depressive symptoms and metabolic markers of risk for type 2 diabetes in obese adolescents.

Objective Although higher rates of depression are found among individuals with type 2 diabetes, it remains unknown if the presence of depressive symptoms is associated with heightened metabolic risk for the development of type 2 diabetes among youth. The objective of this study was to evaluate whether depressive symptoms in obese adolescents are associated with impaired β-cell function relative to insulin sensitivity (oral disposition index [oDI]) and/or dysglycemia or prediabetes, predictors of type 2 diabetes development.
Proceedings of the 2012 workshop on Data-driven user behavioral modelling and mining from social media

It is our great pleasure to welcome you to the workshop on Data-driven user behavioral modeling and mining from social media (DUBMOD), co-located with 23rd ACM Conference on Information and Knowledge Management -- CIKM'14. This workshop builds upon the success of our previously held workshops User modeling from social media (UMSOCIAL), in conjunction with ACM IUI 2012, Data-driven user behavioral modeling and mining from social media (DUBMMSM), in conjunction with ACM CIKM 2012 and Data-driven user behavioral modeling and mining from social media (DUBMOD), in conjunction with ACM CIKM 2013. The call for papers attracted 8 submissions. We accepted 7 papers. The papers represent various topics such as reaction time for user behavior model for social network, user profile for answer quality, predicting requests for Wikipedia articles, linking Pinterest pins to online webshops, scalable mining of social data, predicting online buying behavior, flickr group recommendation. We hope that workshop proceedings will serve as a valuable reference for researchers and practitioners from diverse areas, such as user modeling, social media analysis, natural language processing, data mining and machine learning.
LSTOP: a light-weight scalable truthful routing protocol in MANETs with selfish nodes

We introduce Light-weight Scalable Truthful rOuting Protocol (LSTOP) for selfish nodes problem in mobile ad hoc networks where a node may use different cost to send packets to different neighbors. LSTOP is a truthful and scalable routing protocol. It incurs an overhead of O(n2) in the worst case and only O(n) on the average, a substantial improvement over a recently proposed truthful routing protocol, which incurs an overhead of O(n3). LSTOP encourages nodes' cooperation by rewarding nodes for their forwarding service according to their cost and provides near-least-cost paths and even least paths with high probability in dense networks. We show the truthfulness of LSTOP and present results from an extensive simulation study to evaluate the performance of our protocol. Simulation results show that LSTOP approaches optimal (cost) routing, provides significantly higher packet delivery ratio, generates significantly lower control overhead, lower end-to-end delay and has better overpayment ratio compared to ad hoc-VCG.
Inflationary Cosmology: Progress and Problems

These lecture notes intend to form a short pedagogical introduction to inflationary cosmology, highlighting selected areas of recent progress such as reheating and the theory of cosmological perturbations. Problems of principle for inflationary cosmology are pointed out, and some new attempts at solving them are indicated, including a nonsingular Universe construction by means of higher derivative terms in the gravitational action, and the study of back-reaction of cosmological perturbations.
Regulation and private sector investment in infrastructure - evidence from Latin America

The author assesses the importance of the regulatory framework as a determinant of private sector investment in infrastructure. She uses recently compiled data on private and public sector investment in the water, power, telecommunications, railroads, and roads sectors between 1980 and 1998 in nine countries in Latin America. The author finds that the most significant institutional determinant of private investment volumes is the passage of legislation liberalizing the investment regime. This is important because it indicates that the legal basis for reform is probably more critical in determining the quality of the investment climate than specific aspects of the institutional framework governing private sector participation. In accordance with intuition, the author's results indicate that government action to increase regulatory certainty and minimize the perceived risk of expropriation through the establishment of independent regulatory bodies is a critical determinant of the volume of private investment flows. She also finds that the general relationship of private to public investment is one of substitutability.
Case studies on the development of ScaLAPACK and the NAG Numerical PVM Library

In this paper we look at the development of ScaLAPACK, a software library for dense and banded numerical linear algebra, and the NAG Numerical PVM Library, which includes software for dense and sparse linear algebra, quadrature, optimization and random number generation. Both libraries are aimed at distributed memory machines, including networks of workstations. The paper concentrates on the underlying design and the testing of the libraries.
Varieties of Citizenship

During this Symposium, we will use the concept of citizenship to talk about all kinds of things: about the enjoyment of rights of various kinds, about political and civic engagements, about experiences of collective identity and solidarity, and about the possession of formal national membership status or nationality. As you can see, “citizenship” is a term that does a lot of work—perhaps too much work. However, as requested by the organizers, I am going to address myself to the last understanding of citizenship I have mentioned: citizenship in the formal national status sense. I will do that by talking about a class of people who lack that status by legal definition—the class the law calls aliens. Understanding the condition of aliens is obviously important for practical reasons, given that, in this country and all over the world, increasing numbers of people find themselves living outside of their countries of nationality without citizenship status, often to their disadvantage. But attention to alienage is also theoretically important because it is a category in which different understandings of citizenship converge in challenging ways. Alienage is “about” citizenship as nationality, but it is also just as much “about” citizenship in its other registers. Consequently, I will consider the relationship among the various understandings of citizenship as they converge in the alienage setting. Very briefly, I will argue that alienage is a site where citizenship’s contrasting normative impulses—universalist and exclusionary—meet and compete in ways which citizenship theory as a whole needs to attend to. My comments are mainly conceptual, but they are motivated by two convictions: first, that mainstream citizenship theory (including constitutional theory) is often too internally focused and needs to pay more attention to national borders; and second, that the operation of borders implicates some of the deepest questions of equal and democratic citizenship that we face today. To set the stage, I want to say a word about citizenship’s analytical orientation. Citizenship is an idea—or an optic—that looks both inward and outward. On the one hand, we use the term to talk about social and political
Crystal properties via group theory

1. Tensor properties of crystals: equilibrium properties 2. Tensor properties of crystals: transport properties 3. Review of group theory 4. Linear relations treated group theoretically 5. The magnetic point groups and time reversal 6. Matter tensors of rank 0, 1, and 2 7. Matter tensors of rank 3 8. Special magnetic moments 9. Matter tensors of rank 4 and 5 10. Matter tensors of rank 6 Appendix A. Review of tensors Appendix B. Stress, strain and elasticity Appendix C. Finite deformation Appendix D. The great orthogonality theorem Appendix E. The symmetry-coordinate transformation tables for the 32 point groups and two infinite groups Appendix F. Proof of the fundamental theorem Appendix G. Theorems concerning magnetic groups References.
The electrochemistry of metalloporphyrins in nonaqueous media

Mise au point sur le comportement electrochimique des porphyrines de fer, de certains metaux de transition, des platinoides, du cuivre et du zinc, etc
Learning Microbial Interaction Networks from Metagenomic Count Data.

Many microbes associate with higher eukaryotes and impact their vitality. To engineer microbiomes for host benefit, we must understand the rules of community assembly and maintenance that, in large part, demand an understanding of the direct interactions among community members. Toward this end, we have developed a Poisson-multivariate normal hierarchical model to learn direct interactions from the count-based output of standard metagenomics sequencing experiments. Our model controls for confounding predictors at the Poisson layer and captures direct taxon-taxon interactions at the multivariate normal layer using an l1 penalized precision matrix. We show in a synthetic experiment that our method handily outperforms state-of-the-art methods such as SparCC and the graphical lasso (glasso). In a real in planta perturbation experiment of a nine-member bacterial community, we show our model, but not SparCC or glasso, correctly resolves a direct interaction structure among three community members that associates with Arabidopsis thaliana roots. We conclude that our method provides a structured, accurate, and distributionally reasonable way of modeling correlated count-based random variables and capturing direct interactions among them.
Estimation of a Binary Choice Model with Grouped Choice Data

Abstract We propose an econometric technique for estimating the parameters of a binary choice model when only aggregated data are available on the choices made. The model performs favorably in applications to both simulated and real world choice data.
THE IMPACT OF ADULT CIVIC EDUCATION PROGRAMMES IN DEVELOPING DEMOCRACIES

SUMMARY Are individuals in emerging democracies more likely to embrace democratic values, to learn basic knowledge about political processes, and to engage in politics in response to donor-sponsored civic education programmes? After more than a decade of civic education evaluations, it is a good time to take stock of what we have learned about the impacts of these efforts to strengthen democratic political culture in developing democracies. This article describes four US Agency for International Development-sponsored evaluations that have been conducted since the late 1990s, summarizes their most important findings, and discusses the lessons learned. I show that civic education can have meaningful and relatively long-lasting effects in terms of increasing political information, increasing feelings of empowerment, and mobilizing individuals, even in contexts beset by political and ethnic violence. However, these interventions are much less likely to affect ‘deep-seated’ democratic values such as political tolerance, support, and trust. Moreover, the size of the effects depends critically on how the programmes are designed, the kinds of pedagogical methods employed, and the quality of the trainers. I conclude with a discussion of current developments in the field. © 2014 The Authors. Public Administration and Development published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Determining possible and necessary winners under common voting rules given partial orders

Usually a voting rule requires agents to give their preferences as linear orders. However, in some cases it is impractical for an agent to give a linear order over all the alternatives. It has been suggested to let agents submit partial orders instead. Then, given a voting rule, a profile of partial orders, and an alternative (candidate) c, two important questions arise: first, is it still possible for c to win, and second, is c guaranteed to win? These are the possible winner and necessary winner problems, respectively. Each of these two problems is further divided into two sub-problems: determining whether c is a unique winner (that is, c is the only winner), or determining whether c is a co-winner (that is, c is in the set of winners). We consider the setting where the number of alternatives is unbounded and the votes are unweighted. We completely characterize the complexity of possible/necessary winner problems for the following common voting rules: a class of positional scoring rules (including Borda), Copeland, maximin, Bucklin, ranked pairs, voting trees, and plurality with runoff.
Wireless Device Identification Based on RF Oscillator Imperfections

The exploitation of slight imperfections of transmitters’ hardware for identification of wireless devices has recently emerged as an effective method for security enhancement in wireless access networks. Previously, we introduced a model-based approach for device identification based on the imperfections of two main wireless transmitter components: 1) the digital-to-analog converter and 2) the power amplifier. Here, motivated by applications with transmit power control mechanisms, we analyze the degree to which a device can be identified from the unique, power mode independent characteristics of a third main component: the RF oscillator. The model-based device identification method introduced here allows for effective device identification even from short time records at relatively low signal-to-noise ratios when exploiting imperfections of commercially used RF oscillators.
Double Bruhat cells and total positivity

We study intersections of opposite Bruhat cells in a semisimple complex Lie group, and associated totally nonnegative varieties.
Thermal Phase Transitions in Finite Quantum Systems

In this Proceedings, I will describe the behavior of two different quantum-mechanical systems as a function of increasing temperature. While these systems are somewhat different, the questions addressed are very similar, namely, how does one describe transitions in phase of a finite many-body system; how does one recognize these transitions in practical calculations; and how may one obtain the order of the transition.
Fusion ignition research experiment (FIRE)

Experiments are needed to test and extend present understanding of confinement, macroscopic stability, alpha-driven instabilities, and particle/power exhaust in plasmas dominated by alpha heating. A design study of a Fusion Ignition Research Experiment (FIRE) is underway to assess near term opportunities for producing and studying fusion dominated plasmas in the laboratory. The emphasis is on understanding the behavior of fusion plasmas dominated by alpha heating (Q ≥ 5) that are sustained for a duration comparable to the characteristic plasma time scales (≥ 20 τ E and ∼ 1.5 τ skin , where τ skin is the time for the plasma current profile to redistribute at fixed current). These requirements can be satisfied with BeCu/OFHC toroidal field coils and OFHC poloidal coils that are pre-cooled to 77 °K prior to the pulse. The plasma facing components will have tungsten divertor plates and Be first wall tiles. No graphite is allowed inside the vacuum vessel due to tritium retention issues. The mission of FIRE is to attain, explore, understand and optimize alpha-dominated plasmas to provide knowledge for the design of attractive magnetic fusion energy systems. The programmatic strategy is to access the alpha-heating-dominated regime with confidence using the present advanced tokamak data base (e.g., Elmy-H-mode, ≤ 0.75 Greenwald density) while maintaining the flexibility for accessing and exploring other advanced tokamak modes (e. g., reversed shear, pellet enhanced performance) at lower magnetic fields and fusion power for longer durations in later stages of the experimental program. A major constraint is to develop a design concept that could meet these physics objectives with a construction cost in the range of &1B.
Tangible bits: designing the boundary between people, bits, and atoms

A summary form only given. Where the sea meets the land, life has blossomed into a myriad of unique forms in the turbulence of water, sand, and wind. At another seashore between the land of atoms and the sea of bits, we are now facing the challenge of reconciling our dual citizenships in the physical and digital worlds. Windows to the digital world are confined to flat square screens and pixels, or 'painted bits'. Unfortunately, one can not feel and confirm the virtual existence of this digital information through one's body. Tangible Bits, our vision of human computer interaction, seeks to realize seamless interfaces between humans, digital information, and the physical environment by giving a physical form to digital information, making bits directly manipulable and perceptible. The goal is to blur the boundary between our bodies and cyberspace and to turn the architecture space into an interface between the body, bits, and atoms. The author presents a variety of tangible user interfaces. The Tangible Media Group is designed and presented within the CHI, SIGGRAPH, UIST, CSCW, IDSA, ICSID, and Ars Electronica communities.
HepSim: A Repository with Predictions for High-Energy Physics Experiments

A file repository for calculations of cross sections and kinematic distributions using Monte Carlo generators for high-energy collisions is discussed. The repository is used to facilitate effective preservation and archiving of data from theoretical calculations and for comparisons with experimental data. The HepSim data library is publicly accessible and includes a number of Monte Carlo event samples with Standard Model predictions for current and future experiments. The HepSim project includes a software package to automate the process of downloading and viewing online Monte Carlo event samples. Data streaming over a network for end-user analysis is discussed.
Improving XML Query Performance Using Social Classes

In this paper, we define the notion of social classes of data nodes and present a framework of query evaluation in which both positions and social classes of data nodes are used with structural joins to further improve query performance. A social class of a data node is defined as an equivalence class induced by tags of other nodes that are associated with the given node in a given structural relation. In our framework, social classes of data nodes are obtained during data loading. Then during query compilation, queries are analyzed to determine required structural relations among query nodes and to derive required social classes for each individual query node. The positions of data nodes, the social classes of data nodes, and the required social classes of query nodes are used during query evaluation to provide an effective mechanism for filtering and indexing XML data. We present a number of algorithms that implement this framework and report on results from our experiments. Our results show that this new method could substantially improve performance of XML queries that require multiple structural joins.
Methods and approaches of utilizing ionic liquids as gas sensing materials

Gas monitoring is of increasing significance for a broad range of applications in the fields of environmental and civil infrastructures, climate and energy, health and safety, industry and commerce. Even though there are many gas detection devices and systems available, the increasing needs for better detection technologies that not only satisfy the high analytical standards but also meet additional device requirements (e.g., being robust to survive under field conditions, low cost, small, smart, more mobile), demand continuous efforts in developing new methods and approaches for gas detection. Ionic Liquids (ILs) have attracted a tremendous interest as potential sensing materials for the gas sensor development. Being composed entirely of ions and with a broad structural and functional diversity, i.e., bifunctional (organic/inorganic), biphasic (solid/liquid) and dual-property (solvent/electrolyte), they have the complementing attributes and the required variability to allow a systematic design process across many sensing components to enhance sensing capability especially for miniaturized sensor system implementation. The emphasis of this review is to describe molecular design and control of IL interface materials to provide selective and reproducible response and to synergistically integrate IL sensing materials with low cost and low power electrochemical, piezoelectric/QCM and optical transducers to address many gas detection challenges (e.g., sensitivity, selectivity, reproducibility, speed, stability, cost, sensor miniaturization, and robustness). We further show examples to justify the importance of understanding the mechanisms and principles of physicochemical and electrochemical reactions in ILs and then link those concepts to developing new sensing methods and approaches. By doing this, we hope to stimulate further research towards the fundamental understanding of the sensing mechanisms and new sensor system development and integration, using simple sensing designs and flexible sensor structures both in terms of scientific operation and user interface that can be miniaturized and interfaced with modern wireless monitoring technologies to achieve specifications heretofore unavailable on current markets for the next generation of gas sensor applications.
Baxter Algebras and Hopf Algebras

By applying a recent construction of free Baxter algebras, we obtain a new class of Hopf algebras that generalizes the classical divided power Hopf algebra. We also study conditions under which these Hopf algebras are isomorphic.
Mitigating Hypothetical Bias In Stated Preference Data: Evidence From Sports Tourism

One of the major criticisms of stated preference data is hypothetical bias. Using a unique dataset of both stated and actual behavior, we test for hypothetical bias of stated preference survey responses. We consider whether respondents tend to overstate their participatory sporting event behavior ex ante when compared to their actual behavior at different registration fees. We find that stated behavior accurately predicts actual behavior at a middle level of respondent certainty, overpredicts actual behavior at a lower level of certainty, and underpredicts behavior at a higher level of certainty. This result suggests that respondent uncertainty corrections can be used to mitigate hypothetical bias and stated preference data can be used to better understand actual behavior in situations where no data exist.
The Initial Mass Function in the Galactic Center

The Galactic Center contains the most massive young clusters in the Galaxy and serves as the closest example of a massive starburst region. Our recent results suggest that the Galactic Center environment produces massive clusters with relatively flat initial mass functions, as might be expected on theoretical grounds. I will discuss these recent results, along with evidence for star formation in the immediate vicinity of the super massive black hole at the Galactic Center. The results of this work might be useful in extrapolating to other galactic centers with similar conditions, as well as other starburst regions.
Precision natural SUSY at CEPC, FCC-ee, and ILC

Testing the idea of naturalness is and will continue to be one of the most important goals of high energy physics experiments. It will play a central role in the physics program of future colliders. In this paper, we present projections of the reach of natural SUSY at future lepton colliders: CEPC, FCC-ee and ILC. We focus on the observables which give the strongest reach, the electroweak precision observables (for left-handed stops), and Higgs to gluon and photon decay rates (for both left- and right-handed stops). There is a “blind spot” when the stop mixing parameter X t is approximately equal to the average stop mass. We argue that in natural scenarios, bounds on the heavy Higgs bosons from tree-level mixing effects that modify the $$ hb\overline{b} $$ coupling together with bounds from b → sγ play a complementary role in probing the blind spot region. For specific natural SUSY scenarios such as folded SUSY in which the top partners do not carry Standard Model color charges, electroweak precision observables could be the most sensitive probe. In all the scenarios discussed in this paper, the combined set of precision measurements will probe down to a few percent in fine-tuning.
Gravitational memory, BMS supertranslations and soft theorems

The transit of a gravitating radiation pulse past arrays of detectors stationed near future null infinity in the vacuum is considered. It is shown that the relative positions and clock times of the detectors before and after the radiation transit differ by a BMS supertranslation. An explicit expression for the supertranslation in terms of moments of the radiation energy flux is given. The relative spatial displacement found for a pair of nearby detectors reproduces the well-known and potentially measurable gravitational memory effect. The displacement memory formula is shown to be equivalent to Weinberg’s formula for soft graviton production.
Structure and Evolution of Circumstellar Disks Around Young Stars: New Views from ISO

A question central to understanding the origin of our solar system is: how do planets form in circumstellar disks around young stars? Because of the complex nature of the physical processes involved, multi-wavelength observations of large samples will be required in order to obtain a complete answer to this question. Surveys undertaken with ISO have helped to solve pieces of this puzzle in addition to uncovering new mysteries.We review a variety of studies aimed at understanding; i) the physical structure and composition of circumstellar disks commonly found surrounding young stellar objects; and ii) the evolution of circumstellar disks from the active accretion phase to post-planet building debris disks.
Non-intersection bodies, all of whose central sections are intersection bodies

We construct symmetric convex bodies that are not intersection bodies, but all of their central hyperplane sections are intersection bodies. This result extends the studies by Weil in the case of zonoids and by Neyman in the case of subspaces of Lp.
An application of uncertain reasoning to requirements engineering

This paper examines the use of Bayesian Networks to tackle one of the tougher problems in requirements engineering, translating user requirements into system requirements. The approach taken is to model domain knowledge as Bayesian Network fragments that are glued together to form a complete view of the domain specific system requirements. User requirements are introduced as evidence and the propagation of belief is used to determine what are the appropriate system requirements as indicated by user requirements. This concept has been demonstrated in the development of a system specification and the results are presented here.
A kleptocrat's survival guide : autocratic longevity in the face of civil conflict

Autocratic regimes are quite often short-lived kleptocracies formed and maintained through force and used to appropriate wealth from subjects. Some of these autocracies collapse after only a year or two of plundering while others manage to survive for 15 or 20 years. This paper asks why some autocratic regimes survive while others fail. A database of political regimes from 1960 to 2003 is introduced and accompanies the paper in an appendix. A model of political survival suggests that autocrats exchange constraints on their executive power for their continued survival. The relationship between payouts from successful rebellion and ease of rebellion determines how willing kleptocrats are to extend the political franchise and protect their power. Results show that extremely oppressive regimes and great expenditures on security are likely to accompany the most difficult environments for defense of the state. The model is used to identify the costs of pervasive political conflict and to decompose the civil peace dividend enjoyed by inclusive democracies that do not suffer from the malady of kleptocratic rule. Finally, the model suggests that slow democratization pushed by the autocratic elites to guarantee their survival, accompanied by stable development, may be the best path toward a democratic future for many fragile states.
There is Individualized Treatment. Why Not Individualized Inference

Doctors use statistics to advance medical knowledge; we use a medical analogy to build statistical inference “from scratch” and to highlight an improvement. A doctor, perhaps implicitly, predicts a treatment's effectiveness for an individual patient based on its performance in a clinical trial; the trial patients serve as controls for that particular patient. The same logic underpins statistical inference: To identify the best statistical procedure to use for a problem, we simulate a set of control problems and evaluate candidate procedures on the controls. Recent interest in personalized/individualized medicine stems from the recognition that some clinical trial patients are better controls for a particular patient than others. Therefore, an individual patient's treatment decisions should depend only on a subset of relevant patients. Individualized statistical inference implements this idea for control problems (rather than for patients). Its potential for improving data analysis matches that of personal...
Dehn filling, volume, and the Jones polynomial

Given a hyperbolic 3–manifold with torus boundary, we bound the change in volume under a Dehn filling where all slopes have length at least 2π. This result is applied to give explicit diagrammatic bounds on the volumes of many knots and links, as well as their Dehn fillings and branched covers. Finally, we use this result to bound the volumes of knots in terms of the coefficients of their Jones polynomials.
Endogenous Sequencing in Models of Settlement and Litigation

Most lawsuits never go to trial: The negotiation process that transpires prior to trial often results in a settlement being reached, thereby obviating the trial itself.' This has been recognized in a series of interesting articles written over the past two decades focusing on the economics of settlement and litigation. Like most developing literatures, this one has grown in a disorganized fashion, resulting in a multitude of models involving different informational endowments and timing structures. In this article our main objective is to provide a model that subsumes and organizes much of the recent theory in this area. This is worthwhile, not simply because the models employ different assumptions, but because they generate different efficiency and distributional implications as well. Moreover, when such models "form the threat" (or are subgames) in other analyses, or are used to directly evaluate policies, it is useful to know which models are consistent with various timing and informational considerations.
Stein’s method and Plancherel measure of the symmetric group

We initiate a Stein's method approach to the study of the Plancherel measure of the symmetric group. A new proof of Kerov's central limit theorem for character ratios of random representations of the symmetric group on transpositions is obtained; the proof gives an error term. The construction of an exchangeable pair needed for applying Stein's method arises from the theory of harmonic functions on Bratelli diagrams. We also find the spectrum of the Markov chain on partitions underlying the construction of the exchangeable pair. This yields an intriguing method for studying the asymptotic decomposition of tensor powers of some representations of the symmetric group.
Hardness of peeling with stashes

The analysis of several algorithms and data structures can be framed as a peeling process on a random graph: vertices with degree less than k and their adjacent edges are removed until no vertices of degree less than k are left. Often the question is whether the remaining graph, the k-core, is empty or not. In some settings, it may be possible to remove either vertices or edges from the graph before peeling, at some cost. For example, in hashing applications where keys correspond to edges and buckets to vertices, one might use an additional side data structure, commonly referred to as a stash, to separately handle some keys in order to avoid collisions. The natural question in such cases is to find the minimum number of edges (or vertices) that need to be stashed in order to realize an empty k-core.We show that both these problems are NP-complete for all k ź 2 , with the sole exception being that the edge variant of stashing is solvable in polynomial time for k = 2 on standard (2-uniform) graphs. Removing a minimal stash from a graph to leave an empty k-core is NP-complete.We construct a polynomial-time reduction from Vertex Cover.We analyze the complexity of removing both a stash of vertices and edges.This result holds for standard graphs and hypergraphs with one exception.
Nonuniform dynamic discretization in hybrid networks

We consider probabilistic inference in general hybrid networks, which include continuous and discrete variables in an arbitrary topology. We reexamine the question of variable discretization in a hybrid network aiming at minimizing the information loss induced by the discretization. We show that a nonuniform partition across all variables as opposed to uniform partition of each variable separately reduces the size of the data structures needed to represent a continuous function. We also provide a simple but efficient procedure for nonuniform partition. To represent a nonuniform discretization in the computer memory, we introduce a new data structure, which we call a Binary Split Partition (BSP) tree. We show that BSP trees can be an exponential factor smaller than the data structures in the standard uniform discretization in multiple dimensions and show how the BSP trees can be used in the standard join tree algorithm. We show that the accuracy of the inference process can be significantly improved by adjusting discretization with evidence. We construct an erative anytime algorithm that gradually improves the quality of the discretization and the accuracy of the answer on a query. We provide empirical evidence that the algorithm converges.
Log-dimensional spectral properties of one-dimensional quasicrystals

We consider discrete one-dimensional Schrodinger operators on the whole line and establish a criterion for continuity of spectral measures with respect to log-Hausdorff measures. We apply this result to operators with Sturmian potentials and thereby prove logarithmic quantum dynamical lower bounds for all coupling constants and almost all rotation numbers, uniformly in the phase.
Auto-carrying HSGT systems: a strategic option for increasing HSGT ridership and benefits

The ridership and external benefits that can be reliably estimated for high speed ground transportation (HSGT) systems proposed for the US are simply too small to readily justify investment, as the difficulty in convincing governments and the private sector to initiate construction indicates. There is no fundamental problem with the HSGT technologies, but rather it is with the market for the service being too small-essentially an air travel market. To expand the market, and hence benefits, the transportation function of HSGT systems must be changed, so they serve the much larger markets of intercity travel dominated by motorists. An HSGT system designed to achieve this, by carrying autos with passenger-occupants, is sketched, and questions related to its feasibility are addressed. Such service would be far more suited to US travel patterns and lifestyles, and it would be compatible with offering of conventional passengers-in-HSGT-passenger-car service on the same lines. Synergistic aspects of such a system with intelligent vehicle/highway systems (IVHS) are discussed. >