cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Space-time codependence of retinal ganglion cells can be explained by novel and separable components of their receptive fields.

Reverse correlation methods such as spike-triggered averaging consistently identify the spatial center in the linear receptive fields (RFs) of retinal ganglion cells (GCs). However, the spatial antagonistic surround observed in classical experiments has proven more elusive. Tests for the antagonistic surround have heretofore relied on models that make questionable simplifying assumptions such as space–time separability and radial homogeneity/symmetry. We circumvented these, along with other common assumptions, and observed a linear antagonistic surround in 754 of 805 mouse GCs. By characterizing the RF's space–time structure, we found the overall linear RF's inseparability could be accounted for both by tuning differences between the center and surround and differences within the surround. Finally, we applied this approach to characterize spatial asymmetry in the RF surround. These results shed new light on the spatiotemporal organization of GC linear RFs and highlight a major contributor to its inseparability.
Safety in Police Numbers: Evidence of Police Effectiveness from Federal COPS Grant Applications

Understanding the impact of police on crime is critical to designing policies that maximize safety. In this article, I use a novel estimation approach to measure the impact of police hiring, which exploits variation in federal Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) hiring grants, while also controlling for the endogenous decisions of police departments to apply for these grants. Using data from nearly 7,000 U.S. municipalities, I find that a 10% increase in police employment rates reduces violent crime rates by 13% and property crime rates by 7%. The results also provide suggestive evidence that law enforcement leaders are forward-looking.
High quality factor platinum silicide microwave kinetic inductance detectors

We report on the development of microwave kinetic inductance detectors (MKIDs) using platinum silicide as the sensor material. MKIDs are an emerging superconducting detector technology, capable of measuring the arrival times of single photons to better than two microseconds and their energies to around ten percent. Previously, MKIDs have been fabricated using either sub-stoichiometric titanium nitride or aluminum, but TiN suffers from the spatial inhomogeneities in the superconducting critical temperature and Al has a low kinetic inductance fraction, causing low detector sensitivity. To address these issues, we have instead fabricated the PtSi microresonators with the superconducting critical temperatures of 944 ± 12 mK and high internal quality factors ( Qi≳106). These devices show typical quasiparticle lifetimes of τqp≈30– 40 μs and spectral resolution, R=λ/Δλ, of 8 at 406.6 nm. We compare PtSi MKIDs to those fabricated with TiN and detail the substantial advantages that PtSi MKIDs have to offer.
Learning Optimal Parameters for Multi-target Tracking with Contextual Interactions

We describe an end-to-end framework for learning parameters of min-cost flow multi-target tracking problem with quadratic trajectory interactions including suppression of overlapping tracks and contextual cues about co-occurrence of different objects. Our approach utilizes structured prediction with a tracking-specific loss function to learn the complete set of model parameters. In this learning framework, we evaluate two different approaches to finding an optimal set of tracks under a quadratic model objective, one based on an linear program (LP) relaxation and the other based on novel greedy variants of dynamic programming that handle pairwise interactions. We find the greedy algorithms achieve almost equivalent accuracy to the LP relaxation while being up to 10$$\times $$× faster than a commercial LP solver. We evaluate trained models on three challenging benchmarks. Surprisingly, we find that with proper parameter learning, our simple data association model without explicit appearance/motion reasoning is able to achieve comparable or better accuracy than many state-of-the-art methods that use far more complex motion features or appearance affinity metric learning.
The Prevalence and Impact of Substance Use Disorder and Treatment on Maternal Obstetric Experiences and Birth Outcomes Among Singleton Deliveries in Massachusetts

Objectives Despite widely-known negative effects of substance use disorders (SUD) on women, children, and society, knowledge about population-based prevalence and impact of SUD and SUD treatment during the perinatal period is limited. Methods Population-based data from 375,851 singleton deliveries in Massachusetts 2003-2007 were drawn from a maternal-infant longitudinally-linked statewide dataset of vital statistics, hospital discharges (including emergency department (ED) visits), and SUD treatment records. Maternal SUD and SUD treatment were identified from 1-year pre-conception through delivery. We determined (1) the prevalence of SUD and SUD treatment; (2) the association of SUD with women's perinatal health service utilization, obstetric experiences, and birth outcomes; and (3) the association of SUD treatment with birth outcomes, using both bivariate and adjusted analyses. Results 5.5% of Massachusetts's deliveries between 2003 and 2007 occurred in mothers with SUD, but only 66% of them received SUD treatment pre-delivery. Women with SUD were poorer, less educated and had more health problems; utilized less prenatal care but more antenatal ED visits and hospitalizations, and had worse obstetric and birth outcomes. In adjusted analyses, SUD was associated with higher risk of prematurity (AOR 1.35, 95% CI 1.28-1.41) and low birth weight (LBW) (AOR 1.73, 95% CI 1.64-1.82). Women receiving SUD treatment had lower odds of prematurity (AOR 0.61, 95% CI 0.55-0.68) and LBW (AOR 0.54, 95% CI 0.49-0.61). Conclusions for Practice SUD treatment may improve perinatal outcomes among pregnant women with SUD, but many who need treatment don't receive it. Longitudinally-linked existing public health and programmatic records provide opportunities for states to monitor SUD identification and treatment.
Information transfer and conference calls

A long-standing literature documents intra-industry capital market co-movements around earnings releases, yet the dynamics of these information transfers remain largely unexplored. We provide evidence on both the sources and channels of information transfers by separating two distinct events within the reporting window using intra-day data and by exploring potential mechanisms of information flows. We document that the co-movement of absolute and signed stock returns over the conference call windows of announcing firms and their industry peers are statistically and economically larger than the co-movement over the corresponding earnings announcement windows. Turning to mechanisms, we find that shared analyst coverage, coverage by analysts providing industry recommendations, shared institutional ownership, and joint financial media mentions are each individually and incrementally associated with higher rate of information transfer over both the earnings announcement and conference call windows. Textual analyses reveal that peer mentions and macroeconomic discussions both significantly contribute to conference call information transfers.
Moonlighting Sonata: Conflicts, Disclosure, and the Scholar/Consultant

Although the impact of conflicting interests is of constant concern to those in legal education and other fields, a recent scholarly article and an extensive analysis in the New York Times suggest the problem is more pressing than ever. In the context of legal scholarship the problem arises when a professor is, in effect, employed by two entities. Disclosure of possible conflicts is the most commonly proposed response. The article argues that disclosure is merely a risk shifting devise that does not fully address the issue of bias. It draws on comparisons with products liability and legal ethics to suggest that many conflicts should simply be avoided.
Personal change and the continuity of the self

Five studies explore how anticipating different types of personal change affects people's perceptions of their own self-continuity. The studies find that improvements are seen as less disruptive to personal continuity than worsening or unspecified change, although this difference varies in magnitude based on the type of feature being considered. Also, people's expectations and desires matter. For example, a negative change is highly disruptive to perceived continuity when people expect improvement and less disruptive when people expect to worsen. The finding that some types of change are consistent with perceptions of self-continuity suggests that the self-concept may include beliefs about personal development.
When Do Redundant Requests Reduce Latency

Many systems possess the flexibility to serve requests in more than one way, such as distributed storage systems that store multiple copies of the data. In such systems, the latency of serving the requests may potentially be reduced by sending redundant requests : a request may be sent to more servers than needed and deemed served when the requisite number of servers complete service. Such a mechanism trades off the possibility of faster execution of the request with the increase in the load on the system. Several recent works empirically evaluate the latency performance of redundant requests in diverse settings. In this paper, we perform an analytical study of the latency performance of redundant requests, with the primary goals of characterizing under what scenarios sending redundant requests will help (and under what scenarios it will not), and of designing optimal redundant-requesting policies. We show that when service times are i.i.d. memoryless or “heavier,” and when the additional copies of already-completed jobs can be removed instantly, maximally scheduling redundant requests achieves the optimal average latency. On the other hand, when service times are i.i.d. “lighter” or when service times are memoryless and removal of jobs is not instantaneous, then not having any redundancy in the requests is optimal under high loads. Our results are applicable to arbitrary arrival processes.
The metabolic bone disease associated with the Hyp mutation is independent of osteoblastic HIF1α expression.

Abstract Fibroblast growth factor-23 (FGF23) controls key responses to systemic phosphate increases through its phosphaturic actions on the kidney. In addition to stimulation by phosphate, FGF23 positively responds to iron deficiency anemia and hypoxia in rodent models and in humans. The disorder X-linked hypophosphatemia (XLH) is characterized by elevated FGF23 in concert with an intrinsic bone mineralization defect. Indeed, the Hyp mouse XLH model has disturbed osteoblast to osteocyte differentiation with altered expression of a wide variety of genes, including FGF23. The transcription factor Hypoxia inducible factor-1α (HIF1α) has been implicated in regulating FGF23 production and plays a key role in proper bone cell differentiation. Thus the goals of this study were to determine whether HIF1α activation could influence FGF23, and to test osteoblastic HIF1α production on the Hyp endocrine and skeletal phenotypes in vivo . Treatment of primary cultures of osteoblasts/osteocytes and UMR-106 cells with the HIF activator AG490 resulted in rapid HIF1α stabilization and increased Fgf23 mRNA (50–100 fold; p Phex gene deletion in the Hyp mouse was bred onto mice with a HIF1α/Osteocalcin ( OCN )-Cre background. Although HIF1α effects on bone could be detected, FGF23-related phenotypes due to the Hyp mutation were independent of HIF1α in vivo . In summary, FGF23 can be driven by ectopic HIF1α activation under normal iron conditions in vitro , but factors independent of HIF1α activity after mature osteoblast formation are responsible for the disease phenotypes in Hyp mice in vivo .
Broadband terahertz modulation in electrostatically-doped artificial trilayer graphene

We report a terahertz optical modulator consisting of randomly stacked trilayer graphene (TLG) deposited on an oxidized silicon substrate by means of THz-Time Domain Spectroscopy (THz-TDS). Here, the gate tuning of the Fermi level of the TLG provides the fundamental basis for the modulation of THz transmission. We measured a 15% change in the THz transmission of this device over a broad frequency range (0.6-1.6 THz). We also observed a strong absorption >80% in the time-domain signals and a frequency independence of the conductivity. Furthermore, unlike previous studies, we find that the underlying silicon substrate, which serves as a gate electrode for the graphene, also exhibits substantial modulation of the transmitted THz radiation under applied voltage biases.
Downlink Non-Orthogonal Multiple Access With Limited Feedback

In this paper, we analyze downlink non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) networks with limited feedback. Our goal is to derive appropriate transmission rates for rate adaptation and minimize outage probability of minimum rate for the constant-rate data service, based on distributed channel feedback information from receivers. We propose an efficient quantizer with variable-length encoding that approaches the best performance of the case where perfect channel state information is available everywhere. We prove that in the typical application with two receivers, the losses in the minimum rate and outage probability decay at least exponentially with the minimum feedback rate. We analyze the diversity gain and provide a sufficient condition for the quantizer to achieve the maximum diversity order. For NOMA with $K$ receivers where $K > 2$ , we solve the minimum rate maximization problem within an accuracy of $\epsilon $ in time complexity of $O\left ({K\log \frac {1}{\epsilon }}\right )$ , and then, we apply the previously proposed quantizers for $K = 2$ to the case of $K > 2$ . Numerical simulations are presented to demonstrate the efficiency of our proposed quantizers and the accuracy of the analytical results.
Results of a Single Institution Experience with Dose-Escalated Chemoradiation for Locally Advanced Unresectable Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer.

Abstract: Background: We determined factors associated with morbidity and outcomes of a series of non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients treated with dose escalated chemoradiotherapy at the University of Pittsburgh Lung Cancer Program. Methods and Materials: The records of 170 stage III NSCLC patients treated with definitive intent were retrospectively reviewed. All patients received 4D-CT simulation scan and had respiratory gating if tumor movement exceeded 5 mm. Overall survival (OS), locoregional control (LRC), and freedom from distant metastasis (FFDM) were calculated using log rank and Cox regression analysis. Results: For the present series of patients, median follow-up was 36.6 months, median survival 27.4 months, and the 2- and 4-year (OS) was 56.0 and 30.7%, respectively. The 4-year local regional control (LRC) and freedom from distant metastases (FFDM) were 43.9% and 40.7%, respectively. No benefit was associated with irradiation doses above 66 Gy in overall survival (OS) (p=0.586), LRC (p=0.440), or FFDM (p=0.230). On univariate analysis, variables associated with worse survival included: clinical stage IIIB (p=0.037), PTV over 450 cc (p 20% (43.8 vs. 21.3 months, p-0.01) were associated with lower survival. Grade 2 or higher acute lung toxicity and esophagitis were detected in 9.5% and 59.7%, respectively of patients. Grade 2 or higher acute lung toxicity was reduced if lung V5 was < 65 (7.4% vs. 23.8%, p=0.03). Grade 2 or higher acute esophagitis was reduced if V60 < 20% (62% vs. 81.3%, p=0.018). The use of Intensity Modulated Radiation Therapy (IMRT) was more frequent in stage IIIB compared to stage IIIA patients (56.5% vs. 39.5%, p=0.048), and was associated with a higher lung V5 and V10. Conclusions: The outcomes of a program of dose escalated chemoradiotherapy for unresectable stage IIIA and IIB NSCLC patients were consistent with other studies and showed no benefit to radiation doses above 66 Gy. Furthermore, maintaining low esophageal V60 and lung V5 were associated with lower morbidity and mortality.
How Conformational Dynamics Influences the Protein Search for Targets on DNA

Protein search and association to specific target sequences on DNA is essential for all fundamental biological processes. The detailed qualitative and quantitative mechanism of fast target finding is still unknown in spite of numerous experimental and theoretical efforts. Particularly, the role of protein conformational fluctuations in the search dynamics remains uncovered. We extend developed earlier theoretical method to analyze how the conformational dynamic affects the process of finding the specific targets on DNA. Our approach is based on discrete-state stochastic model that takes into account main physical-chemical processes. This allows us to evaluate explicitly the protein search for the targets on DNA at different conditions. Our calculations show that conformational fluctuations might strongly affect the protein search dynamics. We discuss the contribution of the shift in the conformational equilibrium in the target search kinetics. We utilized extensive Monte Carlo computer simulations to validate our theoretical predictions.
Fast Redistribution of a Swarm of Heterogeneous Robots

We present a method that distributes a swarm of heterogeneous robots among a set of tasks that require specialized capabilities in order to be completed. We model the system of heterogeneous robots as a community of species, where each species (robot type) is defined by the traits (capabilities) that it owns. Our method is based on a continuous abstraction of the swarm at a macroscopic level, as we model robots switching between tasks. We formulate an optimization problem that produces an optimal set of transition rates for each species, so that the desired trait distribution among the tasks is reached as quickly as possible. Our solution is based on an analytical gradient, and is computationally efficient, even for large choices of traits and species. Finally, we show that our method is capable of producing fast convergence times when compared to state-of-the-art methods.
Solvability of planar complex vector fields with homogeneous singularities

AbstractIn this paper, we study the equation , where L is a -valued vector field in with a homogeneous singularity. The properties of the solutions are linked to the number theoretic properties of a pair of complex numbers attached to the vector field. As an application, we obtain results about an associated Riemann–Hilbert problem for the vector field L.
HPA-Axis Activation as a Key Moderator of Childhood Trauma Exposure and Adolescent Mental Health.

Individual differences in a child’s sensitivity to stress may influence whether youth exposed to trauma develop symptoms of psychopathology. We examined the interaction between HPA-axis reactivity to an acute stressor and exposure to different types of childhood trauma as predictors of mental health symptoms in a sample of youth. Youth (n = 121, ages 9–16; 47% female) completed a standardized stress task, including 5 post-stress salivary cortisol samples. Parents also completed the Child Behavior Checklist as a measure of child internalizing and externalizing symptoms in the past month, and completed the Early Trauma Inventory (ETI) as a measure of their child’s trauma exposure. More emotional abuse and non-intentional trauma were associated with greater internalizing symptoms. Youth exposed to physical abuse who demonstrated slower HPA-axis reactivity had elevated internalizing and externalizing symptoms. Youth exposed to emotional abuse or non-intentional traumatic events who demonstrated faster HPA-axis reactivity had elevated internalizing and externalizing symptoms. Profiles of exaggerated or attenuated HPA-axis reactivity to acute stress may be risk factors for psychopathology in children facing different stressful social environments.
Quantum Emulation of Extreme Non-Equilibrium Phenomena with Trapped Atoms

Ultracold atomic physics experiments offer a nearly ideal context for the investigation of quantum systems far from equilibrium. We describe three related emerging directions of research into extreme non-equilibrium phenomena in atom traps: quantum emulation of ultrafast atom-light interactions, coherent phasonic spectroscopy in tunable quasicrystals, and realization of Floquet matter in strongly-driven lattice systems. We show that all three should enable quantum emulation in parameter regimes inaccessible in solid-state experiments, facilitating a complementary approach to open problems in non-equilibrium condensed matter.
Genetic mapping and haplotype analysis of a locus for quantitative resistance to Fusarium graminearum in soybean accession PI 567516C

A major novel quantitative disease resistance locus, qRfg_Gm06, for Fusarium graminearum was genetically mapped to chromosome 6. Genomic-assisted haplotype analysis within this region identified three putative candidate genes. Fusarium graminearum causes seed, root rot, and seedling damping-off in soybean which contributes to reduced stands and yield. A cultivar Magellan and PI 567516C were identified with low and high levels of partial resistance to F. graminearum, respectively. Quantitative disease resistance loci (QDRL) were mapped with 241 F7:8 recombinant inbred lines (RILs) derived from a cross of Magellan × PI 567516C. Phenotypic evaluation for resistance to F. graminearum used the rolled towel assay in a randomized incomplete block design. The genetic map was constructed from 927 polymorphic single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) and simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers. One major QDRL qRfg_Gm06 was detected and mapped to chromosome 6 with a LOD score of 20.3 explaining 40.2% of the total phenotypic variation. This QDRL was mapped to a ~400 kb genomic region of the Williams 82 reference genome. Genome mining of this region identified 14 putative candidate disease resistance genes. Haplotype analysis of this locus using whole genome re-sequencing (WGRS) of 106 diverse soybean lines narrowed the list to three genes. A SNP genotyping Kompetitive allele-specific PCR (KASP) assay was designed for one of the genes and was validated in a subset of the RILs and all 106 diverse lines.
On the Efficiency of Connection Charges—Part I: A Stochastic Framework

This two-part paper addresses the design of retail electricity tariffs for distribution systems with distributed energy resources such as solar power and storage. In particular, the optimal design of dynamic two-part tariffs for a regulated monopolistic retailer is considered, where the retailer faces exogenous wholesale electricity prices and fixed costs on the one hand and stochastic demands with intertemporal price dependencies on the other. Part I presents a general framework and analysis for revenue adequate retail tariffs with advanced notification, dynamic prices, and uniform connection charges. It is shown that the optimal two-part tariff consists of a dynamic price that may not match the expected wholesale price and a connection charge that distributes uniformly among all customers the retailer's fixed costs and a price-volume risk premium. A sufficient condition for the optimality of the derived two-part tariff among the class of arbitrary ex-ante tariffs is obtained. Numerical simulations quantify the substantial welfare gains that the optimal two-part tariff may bring compared to the optimal linear tariff (without connection charge). Part II focuses on the impact of two-part tariffs on the integration of distributed energy resources.
The null-geodesic flow near horizons

This note describes the behavior of null-geodesics near nondegenerate Killing horizons in language amenable to the application of a general framework, due to Vasy and Hintz, for the analysis of both linear and nonlinear wave equations. Throughout, the viewpoint of Melrose's b-geometry on a suitable compactification of spacetime at future infinity is adopted.
Gender Differences in Demographic and Clinical Correlates among Veterans with Musculoskeletal Disorders

Abstract Background Studies suggest that women may be at greater risk for developing chronic pain and pain-related disability. Methods Because musculoskeletal disorders (MSD) are the most frequently endorsed painful conditions among veterans, we sought to characterize gender differences in sociodemographic and clinical correlates among veterans upon entry into Veterans Health Administration's Musculoskeletal Disorders Cohort ( n = 4,128,008). Results Women were more likely to be younger, Black, unmarried, and veterans of recent conflicts. In analyses adjusted for gender differences in sociodemographics, women were more likely to have diagnoses of fibromyalgia, temporomandibular disorders, and neck pain. Almost one in five women (19.4%) had more than one MSD diagnosis, compared with 15.7% of men; this higher risk of MSD multimorbidity remained in adjusted analyses. Adjusting for sociodemographics, women with MSD were more likely to have migraine headache and depressive, anxiety, and bipolar disorders. Women had lower odds of cardiovascular diseases, substance use disorders, and several MSDs, including back pain conditions. Men were more likely to report “no pain” on the pain intensity Numeric Rating Scale, whereas more women (41%) than men (34%) reported moderate to severe pain (Numeric Rating Scale 4+). Conclusions Because women veterans are more likely to have conditions such as fibromyalgia and mental health conditions, along with greater pain intensity in the setting of MSD, women-specific pain services may be needed.
Hyperplane arrangements and diagonal harmonics

In 2003, Haglund's {\sf bounce} statistic gave the first combinatorial interpretation of the $q,t$-Catalan numbers and the Hilbert series of diagonal harmonics. In this paper we propose a new combinatorial interpretation in terms of the affine Weyl group of type $A$. In particular, we define two statistics on affine permutations; one in terms of the Shi hyperplane arrangement, and one in terms of a new arrangement - which we call the Ish arrangement. We prove that our statistics are equivalent to the {\sf area'} and {\sf bounce} statistics of Haglund and Loehr. In this setting, we observe that {\sf bounce} is naturally expressed as a statistic on the root lattice. We extend our statistics in two directions: to "extended" Shi arrangements and to the bounded chambers of these arrangements. This leads to a (conjectural) combinatorial interpretation for all integral powers of the Bergeron-Garsia nabla operator applied to the elementary symmetric functions.
Daily Exchange Rate Pass-through into Micro Prices

This article estimates the exchange rate pass-through (ERPT) by using good-level daily data on wholesale prices of imported agricultural products, where the identification is achieved by using dail...
Conditional Davis pricing

We study the set of Davis (marginal utility-based) prices of a financial derivative in the case where the investor has a non-replicable random endowment. We give a new characterisation of the set of all such prices, and provide an example showing that even in the simplest of settings – such as Samuelson’s geometric Brownian motion model –, the interval of Davis prices is often a non-degenerate subinterval of the set of all no-arbitrage prices. This is in stark contrast to the case with a constant or replicable endowment where non-uniqueness of Davis prices is exceptional. We provide formulas for the endpoints of these intervals and illustrate the theory with several examples.
Natural resources, incentives and human capital: reinterpreting the curse*

We show that natural resource rents when distributed as lump-sum transfers to individuals distort the incentive to invest in tertiary education. Developing an overlapping generations model for the ...
Temperature-Dependent Optical Properties of Plasmonic Titanium Nitride Thin Films

Due to their exceptional plasmonic properties, noble metals such as, gold and silver, have been the materials of choice for the demonstration of various plasmonic and nanophotonic phenomena. However, noble metals’ softness, lack of tailorability, and low melting point, along with melting point depression in nanostructures as well as challenges in thin film fabrication and device integration in standard semiconductor processing, have prevented the realization of practical plasmonic devices for technologically important high temperature and heat-assisted applications. In the recent years, titanium nitride (TiN) has emerged as a promising plasmonic material with good metallic and refractory (high temperature stable) properties. The refractory nature of TiN could enable practical plasmonic devices operating at elevated temperatures for energy conversion and harsh-environment industries such as gas and oil. Here we report on the temperature-dependent dielectric functions of TiN thin films of varying thicknesse...
Approximation Algorithms for Schema-Mapping Discovery from Data Examples

In recent years, data examples have been at the core of several different approaches to schema-mapping design. In particular, Gottlob and Senellart introduced a framework for schema-mapping discovery from a single data example, in which the derivation of a schema mapping is cast as an optimization problem. Our goal is to refine and study this framework in more depth. Among other results, we design a polynomial-time log(n)-approximation algorithm for computing optimal schema mappings from a given set of data examples (where n is the combined size of the given data examples) for a restricted class of schema mappings; moreover, we show that this approximation ratio cannot be improved. In addition to the complexity-theoretic results, we implemented the aforementioned log(n)-approximation algorithm and carried out an experimental evaluation in a real-world mapping scenario.
Lasso screening rules via dual polytope projection

Lasso is a widely used regression technique to find sparse representations. When the dimension of the feature space and the number of samples are extremely large, solving the Lasso problem remains challenging. To improve the efficiency of solving large-scale Lasso problems, El Ghaoui and his colleagues have proposed the SAFE rules which are able to quickly identify the inactive predictors, i.e., predictors that have 0 components in the solution vector. Then, the inactive predictors or features can be removed from the optimization problem to reduce its scale. By transforming the standard Lasso to its dual form, it can be shown that the inactive predictors include the set of inactive constraints on the optimal dual solution. In this paper, we propose an efficient and effective screening rule via Dual Polytope Projections (DPP), which is mainly based on the uniqueness and nonexpansiveness of the optimal dual solution due to the fact that the feasible set in the dual space is a convex and closed polytope. Moreover, we show that our screening rule can be extended to identify inactive groups in group Lasso. To the best of our knowledge, there is currently no exact screening rule for group Lasso. We have evaluated our screening rule using synthetic and real data sets. Results show that our rule is more effective in identifying inactive predictors than existing state-of-the-art screening rules for Lasso.
Hardware trust implications of 3-D integration

3-D circuit-level integration is a chip fabrication technique in which two or more dies are stacked and combined into a single circuit through the use of vertical electroconductive posts. Since the dies may be manufactured separately, 3-D circuit integration offers the option of enhancing a commodity processor with a variety of security functions. This paper examines the 3-D design approach and provides an analysis concluding that the commodity die system need not be independently trustworthy for the system of joined dies to provide certain trustworthy functions. In addition to describing the range of possible security enhancements (such as cryptographic services), we describe the ways in which multiple-die subsystems can depend on each other, and a set of processing abstractions and general design constraints with examples to address these dependencies.
Testing Theories of Gun Policy Preferences Among Blacks, Latinos, and Whites in America*

Objective Research examining the factors shaping gun policy attitudes has focused on the general population or whites. Little is known about how self-interest, political values, or racial prejudice shape the gun policy preferences of minorities. We seek to assess the effect of self-interest, political values, and racial prejudice on the gun policy attitudes of whites, Latinos, and blacks. We also introduce a measure of prejudice difference in group violence—which has not been previously used in the literature on gun policy opinion. Methods We use data from a new survey (2015) and analyze whites, blacks, and Latinos separately. Results We find that many of the drivers of support for gun control found in the general population apply to minorities as well, but the substantive effects vary across groups. Similar to prior general population findings, we find that for all groups concern about crime is associated with more support for gun control, and that gun ownership, being the victim of a crime, and conservative political values are associated with less support. Conclusion In contrast, we find that racial prejudice is negatively correlated with support for gun control among whites and Latinos, while one type of racial prejudice—racial resentment—increases support for gun control among blacks.
Renal Artery Stenosis: Anatomic Classification for Percutaneous Transluminal Angioplasty

Most lesions that decrease renal blood flow originate within the renal artery; however; large, aortic, atherosclerotic plaques can overhang the renal ostium producing a functional renal artery stenosis. At the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, 45 consecutive percutaneous transluminal angioplasties were examined retrospectively and classified as to site of the obstructing lesions and clinical outcome. Stenoses within the renal artery responded very well to angioplasty, with 83% of patients showing either an excellent or good result. Conversely, when aortic plaques were responsible for inflow obstruction, 76% of patients responded poorly or not at all to balloon dilatation. It is proposed that this disparity of response reflects the anatomic differences in the orientation of elastic and collagen fibers of the muscularis and advential layers of the renal artery and the aorta.
Renal Transplantation: An Analysis of Logistical and Medical Factors Affecting Cadaver Organ Availability

The National Organ Transplant Act (PL98-507) was enacted in 1984 to support the continued development of a comprehensive procurement and distribution network in the United States for transplantable organs and tissues as well as a registry for potential recipients. Demand for one organ, the kidney, has increased dramatically for a number of desirable reasons: More patients have been accepted for transplantation, age limits for transplantation have been extended, results have improved, and there are more transplantation centers doing more transplants. Undesirable factors have also increased the demand: There has been no major breakthrough in treatment of the renal diseases that most frequently progress to end-stage failure, and graft rejection continues to be a problem. On the other hand, the supply of cadaver kidneys has decreased: Fortunately, the number of fatal motor vehicle accidents has fallen because of the lowered highway speed limit and seat belt use, but, unfortunately, public misconceptions about transplants, lawsuits against physicians participating in cadaver organ retrieval, and gaps in professional understanding have also decreased the supply. Although rejection can be treated with immunosuppression after transplantation, histocompatibility matching of donor and recipient before transplantation has significantly increased graft survival. The national initiative may provide the critical mass necessary to correct some of the misconceptions and lingering problems that frustrate the optimal use and success of human organ transplants.
Home Parenteral Nutrition for Patients With Advanced Intraperitoneal Cancers and Gastrointestinal Dysfunction

The use of total parenteral nutrition (TPN) in patients with advanced, untreatable cancer is controversial. Occasionally, however, damage to bowel by tumor, radiation, or surgery renders these patients unable to eat and TPN may be indicated to prevent premature death from starvation. We have used Home Parenteral Nutrition (HPN) to support three patients with advanced, untreatable abdominal cancer and inability to eat. Morbidity was minimal and survival times were 24, 6 and 1.5 months. Payment was covered by third party agencies. All patients and their families were gratified by the ability to return home with nutritional support. HPN can be used to support terminal cancer patients with bowel obstruction and may afford them longer survival. Ideally, patients considered for this should be well motivated, with good support systems, and with survival estimated to be at least months.
Detection and Staging of Renal Neoplasms: A Reassessment of MR Imaging

The use of magnetic resonance (MR) imaging in the detection and staging of renal neoplasms was investigated in 104 patients with 106 renal cell carcinomas confirmed at surgery or autopsy. Overall, MR imaging demonstrated 101 of 106 lesions (95%), including all 93 tumors that were larger than 3 cm in diameter but only eight of the 13 smaller tumors (62%). MR imaging enabled accurate staging of 82% of all detected lesions but led to the understaging of nine lesions and the overstaging of nine. At present, MR imaging cannot be used as a screening modality for renal tumors. However, its negative predictive values of 98% and 99%, respectively, for the evaluation of tumor vascular extension and tumor spread to adjacent structures makes it an excellent staging modality that should be used when the CT findings are equivocal. MR imaging is not accurate in indicating bowel and mesentery involvement, but rapid technical advances and the introduction of bowel contrast medium may improve this present limitation.
A Low Sperm Concentration Does Not Preclude Fertility in Men With Isolated Hypogonadotropic Hypogonadism After Gonadotropin Therapy

In order to define the minimal number of sperm needed for conception, we studied semen characteristics of men with isolated hypogonadotropic hypogonadism (IHH) who became sperm-positive during gonadotropin therapy. Twenty-two of 24 men (92%) proved fertile, initiating a total of 40 pregnancies. The mean (± standard error of the mean) sperm concentration at the time of conception was 16.7 ± 4.0 × 106/ml. However, 71% of pregnancies were conceived when the mean sperm concentration was
Rapid Biochemical Identification of Gram-Negative Bacilli from Blood Cultures Using API-20E Strips

Using cold, sterile water to lyse erythrocytes permits the direct inoculation of API-20E (Analytab Products, Inc., Plainview, NY) biochemical strips with gram-negative bacilli from blood culture broth. Of 126 blood culture isolates tested, 126 (100%) were speciated correctly, while 103 (82%) resulted in the identical profile number, when compared to standard API methods. A presumptive identification can be achieved in five hours using the API same-day identification index.
Treatment of Advanced Invasive Cervical Cancer: Changing Times and Trends

A retrospective analysis of the treatment results and complications in 140 patients with advanced (Stage IIB or more) invasive cervical cancer treated at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine (AECOM) from 1962-1970 and the State University of New York at Buffalo (SUNYAB) from 1974-1982 is the subject of this report. All patients were clinically staged and received external pelvic radiotherapy followed by one to two intracavitary radium insertions, and those with histologically proven positive para-aortic nodes received on additional 4,500 to 5,000 rads to the para-aortic areas. Forty-four patients had pretherapy surgical staging (26 transperitoneal, 18 extraperitoneal). In the clinical staging group, a survival time of 5 years or longer was attained in 22 of 39 patients (56%); with Stage IIB, 11 of 30 patients (37%) with Stage IIIA, two of 13 patients with Stage IIIB and two of 12 patients with Stage IVA disease. Of 26 patients staged via transperitoneal approach, two survived more than 5 years and three others were alive at last contact (after more than 3 years follow-up). The last 18 patients have been subjected to laparoscopy and retroperitoneal pelvic and para-aortic node biopsies followed by tailored radiotherapy with [12] or without [6] chemotherapy. Chemotherapy consisted of alternating weekly courses of vincristine and bleomycin and hydroxyurea. Mitomycin-C was added to this regimen at the conclusion of the course of radiotherapy. Only one patient developed a vesicovaginal fistula. At last contact, seven patients in the combined therapy group were alive and free of disease. Combined therapy following extraperitoneal surgical staging appears to be feasible and justifiable. It deserves further trials in larger series.
On the difficulty of achieving equilibrium in interactive POMDPs

We analyze the asymptotic behavior of agents engaged in an infinite horizon partially observable stochastic game as formalized by the interactive POMDP framework. We show that when agents' initial beliefs satisfy a truth compatibility condition, their behavior converges to a subjective E-equilibrium in a finite time, and subjective equilibrium in the limit. This result is a generalization of a similar result in repeated games, to partially observable stochastic games. However, it turns out that the equilibrating process is difficult to demonstrate computationally because of the difficulty in coming up with initial beliefs that are both natural and satisfy the truth compatibility condition. Our results, therefore, shed some negative light on using equilibria as a solution concept for decision making in partially observable stochastic games.
Poverty-specific purchasing power parities in Africa

The paper revisits the issue of poverty-specific purchasing power parities (PPPs), using the most recent (2011) International Comparison Program (ICP) results. The World Bank's global poverty count uses a common international poverty line -- currently $1.90 at 2011 international prices—based on the ICP PPPs for consumption. The use of these PPPs is often criticized for two reasons. First, the ICP PPPs are based on patterns of aggregate household consumption, not the consumption of the poor. Second, the basket of goods and services used for collecting prices for the ICP is not poverty specific. On the first issue, using data from 28 African countries, the paper concludes that the poverty-specific PPPs estimated with household expenditure survey weights are very similar to the ICP PPPs. On the second issue, poverty-specific PPPs were estimated after removing items deemed to be irrelevant for the poor. The overall effect of removing these items from consumption PPPs is shown to be negligible.
A methodology for reduced order modeling and calibration of the upper atmosphere

Atmospheric drag is the largest source of uncertainty in accurately predicting the orbit of satellites in low Earth orbit (LEO). Accurately predicting drag for objects that traverse LEO is critical to Space Situational Awareness. Atmospheric models used for orbital drag calculations can be characterized either as empirical or physics-based (first principles based). Empirical models are fast to evaluate but offer limited real-time predictive/forecasting ability, while physics-based models offer greater predictive/forecasting ability but require dedicated parallel computational resources. Also, calibration with accurate data is required for either type of models. This paper presents a new methodology based on proper orthrogonal decomposition (POD) towards development of a quasi-physical, predictive, reduced order model that combines the speed of empirical and the predictive/forecasting capabilities of physics-based models. The methodology is developed to reduce the high-dimensionality of physics-based models while maintaining its capabilities. We develop the methodology using the Naval Research Lab's MSIS model and show that the diurnal and seasonal variations can be captured using a small number of modes and parameters. We also present calibration of the reduced order model using the CHAMP and GRACE accelerometer-derived densities. Results show that the method performs well for modeling and calibration of the upper atmosphere.
Forecast revisions of Mexican inflation and GDP growth

We analyze the forecasts of inflation and GDP growth contained in the Banco de Mexico’s Survey of Professional Forecasters for the period 1995–2009. The forecasts are for the current and the following year, and comprise an unbalanced three-dimensional panel with multiple individual forecasters, target years, and forecast horizons. The fixed-event nature of the forecasts enables us to examine their efficiency by looking at the revision process. The panel structure allows us to control for aggregate shocks and to construct a measure of the news that impacted expectations in the period under study. We find that respondents anchor to their initial forecasts, updating their revisions smoothly as they receive more information. In addition, they do not seem to use publicly-known information in an efficient manner. These inefficiencies suggest clear areas of opportunity for improving the accuracy of the forecasts, for instance by taking into account the positive autocorrelation found in forecast revisions.
Analyzing the correlations between the uninsured and diabetes prevalence rates in geographic regions in the United States

The increasing prevalence of diagnosed diabetes has drawn attentions of researchers in recently years. Research has been done in finding the correlations between diabetes prevalence with socioeconomic factors, obesity, social behaviors and so on. Since 2010, diabetes preventive services have been covered under health insurance plans in order to reduce diabetes burden and control the increasing of diabetes prevalence. In this study, a hierarchical clustering model is proposed by using Expectation-Maximization algorithm to investigate the correlations between the uninsured and diabetes prevalence rates in 3142 counties in United States for years from 2009 to 2013. The results identified geographic disparities in the uninsured and diabetes prevalence rates of individual years and over consecutive years.
Teaching Data Analytics Using ACL

ABSTRACT: We present a case for teaching data analytics skills in auditing and/or forensic accounting classes using ACL Analytics. We introduce fraudulent transactions into an existing dataset and ...
Comment on “The Empirical Basis for Antitrust: Cartels, Mergers, and Remedies”

AbstractIn this journal, James Langenfeld critically reviewed four of the present authors’ articles that analyze the size of cartel overcharges and their antitrust policy implications. In this comment, we explain why we believe Langenfeld errs in his criticism of our work. In particular, this comment discusses the variation in research quality of the sources used to compile a large sample of historical cartel overcharges; the advisability of trimming outliers or large estimates from the sample; alleged publication bias; why our 25% median estimate is much more likely to be correct than the US Sentencing Guideline’s 10% presumption; and the implications of the average cartel overcharges results for optimal deterrence and antitrust policy.