cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Stress—Temperature Studies of Transitions in Rubbers

The stress‐temperature method was employed as a means of studying the apparent ``second‐order'' transition occurring in rubbers. The rubbers studied were a natural rubber gum, a butyl gum, a loaded GR‐S, and a loaded Hycar OS‐10. Pronounced stress relaxation was observed for all rubbers at temperatures not too far below the transition region, but not at temperatures a few degrees above the transition. For both the butyl and the Hycar OS‐10 rubbers the transition temperature was observed to depend strongly upon extension, the transition temperature decreasing with increasing sample extension. No such dependence upon extension was observed for the natural rubber stock. Comparison data were also obtained from volume dilatometric studies. With the exception of the data for natural rubber, the transition temperatures determined by the volume dilatometric method were somewhat lower than the lowest values obtained in the stress‐temperature studies.
Recent Advances in the Chemical Synthesis of Glycosylphosphatidylinositols (GPIs): Expanding Synthetic Versatility for Investigating GPI Biology

Carbohydrate chemists have been remarkably successful at developing methods for the chemical synthesis of glycosylphosphatidylinositols (GPIs), a highly complex and structurally diverse family of glycolipids that anchor proteins to eukaryotic cell surfaces. With the goal of generating new tools for GPI biological research, several groups in this field have recently shifted their attention from narrowly focused target-oriented total synthesis to the development of more versatile synthetic strategies that allow access to a broad variety of GPIs, GPI analogs, and GPI-anchored proteins. These recent efforts are the topic of this review article.
Development of the Mars Pathfinder inflatable airbag subsystem

Landing Sequence The entry, descent, and landing system of JPL's Mars Pathfinder spacecraft includes a unique subsystem of airbags for impact attenuation. The airbag geometric configuration and associated landing dynamic analysis was performed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and Sandia National Laboratories [1,2]. Detailed design and fabrication of subscale and full scale prototypes and flight airbag systems is being performed by ILC Dover. This paper presents key steps in the development effort that produced the current airbag system, including materials selection, patterning, fabrication issues, component design, and packaging/deployment. These steps outline many elements common to the development of engineered softgoods products for aerospace applications.
Iron(II)-Catalyzed Benzylic Fluorination

Direct C–F functionalization of benzylic sp3 C–H bonds is a synthetic challenge that has yet to be propitiously overcome. A mild, one-pot synthesis of monofluorinated benzylic substrates is reported with commercially available iron(II) acetylacetonate and Selectfluor in good to excellent yields and selectivity. A convenient route to β-fluorinated products of 3-aryl ketones is also highlighted, providing a synthetic equivalent to the difficult to accomplish conjugate addition of fluoride to α,β-unsaturated ketones.
Enhanced Charge Transport in Amorphous Li2O2

The properties of the Li2O2 discharge phase are expected to impact strongly the performance of Li–air batteries. Although both crystalline Li2O2 (c-Li2O2) and amorphous Li2O2 (a-Li2O2) have been reported to form in Li–air cells, little is known regarding possible differences in charge and mass transport within these phases. To reveal these differences, here we predict the properties of a-Li2O2 using first-principles “melt-and-quench” molecular dynamics and percolation theory. We find that the band gaps and equilibrium electrochemical potentials of c-Li2O2 and a-Li2O2 are similar; nevertheless, their transport properties are quite different. Importantly, the ionic conductivity of a-Li2O2 is predicted to be 2 × 10–7 S/cm, which is 12 orders of magnitude larger than that in the crystalline phase. This enhancement arises from increases in both the concentration and mobility of negative lithium vacancies. The electronic conductivity of a-Li2O2 is also enhanced, but to a much smaller extent (4 orders of magnitu...
Collective leadership as institutional work: interpreting evidence from Mound Bayou:

In this article, we refine and extend the conceptualization of collective leadership by examining how institutional work can play a central role in the emergence of collective leadership success or failure through conflict. Specifically, based on historical traces collected from the first African American town in Mississippi, Mound Bayou, which was founded and led by a group of ex-slaves, we conceptualize collective leadership as a compilational process and elucidate the development of collective leadership amid the relational and inspirational aspects of conflict that arose among this cadre of historical collective leaders. We selected the case of Mound Bayou because the specifics of the case allowed us to explore how collective leadership emerged, and over time, led to conflict engendered by issues that arose within the institutional processes of formation, maintenance, and transformation of the town. We used interpretivist epistemology into which we incorporated and utilized historiometric methodology ...
Algorithm design

The quest for efficiency in computational methods yields not only fast algorithms, but also insights that lead to elegant, simple, and general problem-solving methods.
ASSESSMENT OF THE OPTIMAL OUTCOME SCORE FOR REVERSE SHOULDER ARTHOPLASTY

Purpose With growing attention being paid to quality and cost effectiveness in healthcare, outcome evaluations are becoming increasingly important. This determination can be especially difficult in reverse shoulder arthroplasty (RSA) given the complex pathology and extensive disabilities in this patient population. Several different scoring systems have been developed and validated for use in various shoulder pathologies. The purpose of this study was to assess the use three outcome scores in a population of patients undergoing RSA. We aim to demonstrate the validity of three outcome scores in patients undergoing RSA, and to determine if one score or a combination of scores is superior to others. Methods Using a database of patients treated with RSA, we assessed preoperative and postoperative Constant Scores, American Shoulder and Elbow Surgeons (ASES) scores, and subjective shoulder values (SSV) in 148 shoulders. The outcomes at each scoring period were described and the scores were compared to one another as well as to active range of motion using linear regression modeling. Results There were no significant differences in the mean improvement of any of the scores. All of the outcome scales improvements were correlated with each other and improvement in forward elevation but not with external rotation. Using multivariate regression analysis all 3 outcome measures were able to predict 38.9% of the variation in improvement in functional outcomes (forward elevation). This was only slightly greater than that provided by improvements in the outcome variable CS alone (36.7%). Conclusion The three shoulder outcome scores evaluated, regardless of whether they were patient reported or physician based, appear to appropriately reflect improvements after RSA with equal validity. The objective physician assessed Constant score had the strongest correlation with function of the arm, and use of a combination of all 3 outcome scores does not increase the ability to predict range of motion compared to using the Constant Score alone.
Predictability and hierarchy in Drosophila behavior

Even the simplest of animals exhibit behavioral sequences with complex temporal dynamics. Prominent among the proposed organizing principles for these dynamics has been the idea of a hierarchy, wherein the movements an animal makes can be understood as a set of nested subclusters. Although this type of organization holds potential advantages in terms of motion control and neural circuitry, measurements demonstrating this for an animal's entire behavioral repertoire have been limited in scope and temporal complexity. Here, we use a recently developed unsupervised technique to discover and track the occurrence of all stereotyped behaviors performed by fruit flies moving in a shallow arena. Calculating the optimally predictive representation of the fly's future behaviors, we show that fly behavior exhibits multiple time scales and is organized into a hierarchical structure that is indicative of its underlying behavioral programs and its changing internal states.
Modeling Flow in Porous Media with Double Porosity/Permeability: Mathematical Model, Properties, and Analytical Solutions

Geo-materials such as vuggy carbonates are known to exhibit multiple spatial scales. A common manifestation of spatial scales is the presence of (at least) two different scales of pores, which is commonly referred to as double porosity. To complicate things, the pore-network at each scale exhibits different permeability, and these networks are connected through fissure and conduits. Although some models are available in the literature, they lack a strong theoretical basis. This paper aims to fill this lacuna by providing the much needed theoretical foundations of the flow in porous media which exhibit double porosity/permeability. We first obtain a mathematical model for double porosity/permeability using the maximization of rate of dissipation hypothesis, and thereby providing a firm thermodynamic underpinning. We then present, along with mathematical proofs, several important mathematical properties that the solutions to the double porosity/permeability model satisfy. These properties are important in their own right as well as serve as good (mechanics-based) a posteriori measures to assess the accuracy of numerical solutions. We also present several canonical problems and obtain the corresponding analytical solutions, which are used to gain insights into the velocity and pressure profiles, and the mass transfer across the two pore-networks. In particular, we highlight how the solutions under the double porosity/permeability differ from the corresponding solutions under Darcy equations.
Silicon–Carbon Bond Formation via Nickel-Catalyzed Cross-Coupling of Silicon Nucleophiles with Unactivated Secondary and Tertiary Alkyl Electrophiles

A wide array of cross-coupling methods for the formation of C–C bonds from unactivated alkyl electrophiles have been described in recent years. In contrast, progress in the development of methods for the construction of C–heteroatom bonds has lagged; for example, there have been no reports of metal-catalyzed cross-couplings of unactivated secondary or tertiary alkyl halides with silicon nucleophiles to form C–Si bonds. In this study, we address this challenge, establishing that a simple, commercially available nickel catalyst (NiBr2·diglyme) can achieve couplings of alkyl bromides with nucleophilic silicon reagents under unusually mild conditions (e.g., −20 °C); especially noteworthy is our ability to employ unactivated tertiary alkyl halides as electrophilic coupling partners, which is still relatively uncommon in the field of cross-coupling chemistry. Stereochemical, relative reactivity, and radical-trap studies are consistent with a homolytic pathway for C–X bond cleavage.
Numerical Procedure for Computing Deflections, Moments, and Buckling Loads

A numerical procedure for computing the deflections and moments in beams and columns is described herein. The method is of particular applicability in determining critical buckling loads and config...
Who supports violent extremism in developing countries ? analysis of attitudes based on value surveys

What are the common characteristics among radicalized individuals, willing to justify attacks targeting civilians? Drawing on information on attitudes toward extreme violence and other characteristics of 30,787 individuals from 27 developing countries around the world, and employing a variety of econometric techniques, this paper identifies the partial correlates of extremism. The results suggest that the typical extremist who supports attacks against civilians is more likely to be young, unemployed and struggling to make ends meet, relatively uneducated, and not as religious as others, but more willing to sacrifice own life for his or her beliefs. Gender and marital status are not found to explain significantly the individual-level variation in attitudes toward extremism. Although these results may vary in magnitude and significance across countries and geographic regions, they are robust to various sensitivity analyses.
On the Unification of the Constants of Nature

A short essay that unifies electromagnetism and gravity with a 5−D system of natural units.
Classical Simulated Annealing Using Quantum Analogues

In this paper we consider the use of certain classical analogues to quantum tunneling behavior to improve the performance of simulated annealing on a discrete spin system of the general Ising form. Specifically, we consider the use of multiple simultaneous spin flips at each annealing step as an analogue to quantum spin coherence as well as modifications of the Boltzmann acceptance probability to mimic quantum tunneling. We find that the use of multiple spin flips can indeed be advantageous under certain annealing schedules, but only for long anneal times.
Key-Alternating Ciphers and Key-Length Extension: Exact Bounds and Multi-user Security

The best existing bounds on the concrete security of key-alternating ciphers Chen and Steinberger, EUROCRYPT '14 are only asymptotically tight, and the quantitative gap with the best existing attacks remains numerically substantial for concrete parameters. Here, we prove exact bounds on the security of key-alternating ciphers and extend them to XOR cascades, the most efficient construction for key-length extension. Our bounds essentially match, for any possible query regime, the advantage achieved by the best existing attack. Our treatment also extends to the multi-user regime. We show that the multi-user security of key-alternating ciphers and XOR cascades is very close to the single-user case, i.e., given enough rounds, it does not substantially decrease as the number of users increases. On the way, we also provide the first explicit treatment of multi-user security for key-length extension, which is particularly relevant given the significant security loss of block ciphers even if ideal in the multi-user setting. The common denominator behind our results are new techniques for information-theoretic indistinguishability proofs that both extend and refine existing proof techniques like the H-coefficient method.
Changing Food Safety Risk Perceptions: The Influence of Message Framings & Media Food Safety Information

Human cases of E. coli O157:H7 infections linked to the consumption of contaminated beef products consistently receive public attention due to their far-reaching health and economic implications. As consumers’ risk attitudes and perceptions remain pivotal to beef food safety initiatives, the study seeks to investigate the role of message framings and media food safety information on consumers’ valuation of their risk of an E. coli food infection, and attitudes towards food safety technologies. Using a nationally representative sample of 1,842 residents across the US, respondents were randomly assigned into six information groups. Findings reveal that message framings, particularly loss-framed messages influence consumers’ perceived risks, and attitudes towards food safety interventions. Respondents who received the media story about the plight of a consumer who suffered an E. coli infection showed more concern about the risk of an infection, while those who received loss-framed information were in general more accepting of food safety interventions such as vaccines and direct fed microbials. These findings could help the beef industry and policy makers develop effective food safety communication strategies.
La larga sombra de las categorías acusatorio-inquisitivo

Este trabajo argumenta que las categorA­as acusatorio e inquisitivo han sido mAis centrales para el derecho procesal penal comparado que lo que se ha reconocido previamente ya que han contribuido a constituirlo y a moldearlo como campo transnacional al reflejar y restringir sus principales tendencias teA³ricas y sus mayores temas de interA©s. Se identifican las principales tradiciones teA³ricas de este campo mediante un relevamiento de los usos que la doctrina y la jurisprudencia le han dado a la distinciA³n entre acusatorio e inquisitivo, y se argumenta que incluso los principales anAilisis alternativos existentes operan dentro de estas mismas tradiciones teA³ricas. AdemAis, se aduce que la dicotomA­a acusatorio-inquisitivo tambiA©n ha contribuido a limitar el tipo de temas tratados por este campo. Finalmente, se esbozan diversas maneras mediante las cuales el derecho procesal penal comparado puede superar laÂ larga sombra teA³rica y temAitica de las categorA­as acusatorio-inquisitivo y asA­ expandir y enriquecer nuestro conocimiento y anAilisis, tanto positivos como normativos, sobre el proceso penal.Â
Interaction of gravitational waves with superconductors

Applying the Helmholtz Decomposition theorem to linearized General Relativity leads to a gauge-invariant formulation where the transverse-traceless part of the metric perturbation describes gravitational waves in matter. Gravitational waves incident on a superconductor can be described by a linear London-like constituent equation characterized by a “gravitational shear modulus” and a corresponding plasma frequency and penetration depth. Electric-like and magnetic-like gravitational tensor fields are defined in terms of the strain field of a gravitational wave. It is shown that in the DC limit, the magnetic-like tensor field is expelled from the superconductor in a gravitational Meissner-like effect. The Cooper pair density is described by the Ginzburg-Landau theory embedded in curved space-time. The ionic lattice is modeled by quantum harmonic oscillators coupled to gravitational waves and characterized by quasi-energy eigenvalues for the phonon modes. The formulation predicts the possibility of a dynamical Casimir effect since the zero-point energy of the ionic lattice phonons is found to be modulated by the gravitational wave, in a quantum analog of a “Weber-bar effect.” Applying periodic thermodynamics and the Debye model in the low-temperature limit leads to a free energy density for the ionic lattice. Lastly, we relate the gravitational strain of space to the strain of matter to show that the response to a gravitational wave is far less for the Cooper pair density than for the ionic lattice. This predicts a charge separation effect in the superconductor as a result of the gravitational wave.
The Analytic Structure of Non-Global Logarithms: Convergence of the Dressed Gluon Expansion

Non-global logarithms (NGLs) are the leading manifestation of correlations between distinct phase space regions in QCD and gauge theories and have proven a challenge to understand using traditional resummation techniques. Recently, the dressed gluon ex-pansion was introduced that enables an expansion of the NGL series in terms of a “dressed gluon” building block, defined by an all-orders factorization theorem. Here, we clarify the nature of the dressed gluon expansion, and prove that it has an infinite radius of convergence as a solution to the leading logarithmic and large-N c master equation for NGLs, the Banfi-Marchesini-Smye (BMS) equation. The dressed gluon expansion therefore provides an expansion of the NGL series that can be truncated at any order, with reliable uncertainty estimates. In contrast, manifest in the results of the fixed-order expansion of the BMS equation up to 12-loops is a breakdown of convergence at a finite value of α s log. We explain this finite radius of convergence using the dressed gluon expansion, showing how the dynamics of the buffer region, a region of phase space near the boundary of the jet that was identified in early studies of NGLs, leads to large contributions to the fixed order expansion. We also use the dressed gluon expansion to discuss the convergence of the next-to-leading NGL series, and the role of collinear logarithms that appear at this order. Finally, we show how an understanding of the analytic behavior obtained from the dressed gluon expansion allows us to improve the fixed order NGL series using conformal transformations to extend the domain of analyticity. This allows us to calculate the NGL distribution for all values of α s log from the coefficients of the fixed order expansion.
Experimental Validation of Volume-Based Comparison for Double-McCormick Relaxations

Volume is a natural geometric measure for comparing polyhedral relaxations of non-convex sets. Speakman and Lee gave volume formulae for comparing relaxations of trilinear monomials, quantifying the strength of various natural relaxations. Their work was motivated by the spatial branch-and-bound algorithm for factorable mathematical-programming formulations. They mathematically analyzed an important choice that needs to be made whenever three or more terms are multiplied in a formulation. We experimentally substantiate the relevance of their main results to the practice of global optimization, by applying it to different relaxations of difficult box cubic problems (boxcup). In doing so, we find that, using their volume formulae, we can accurately predict the quality of a relaxation for boxcups based on the (box) parameters defining the feasible region. Specifically, we are able to conclude from our experiments that all of the relevant relaxations are round enough so that average objective gaps for a pair of boxcup relaxations can be predicted by appropriately combining the volumes of relaxations of the individual trilinear monomials.
From commodity discovery to production

Major resource discoveries have transformed growth prospects for many low-income countries. However, the sharp downturn in commodity prices in recent years is affecting resource investment in these countries, and may delay the development of recent discoveries into production. This study investigates lead times from discovery to production for a unique data set of gold and copper discoveries worldwide during 1950-2014. The study employs standard parametric and nonparametric duration analysis. The results suggest an important role for copper prices; for instance, an upswing at the time of discovery can hasten the development of the mine by two to three years in low-income countries. There appears to be a similarly beneficial impact on lead times of sounder macroeconomic policies and quality of governance.
Syntactic Structures and Code Parameters

We assign binary and ternary error-correcting codes to the data of syntactic structures of world languages and we study the distribution of code points in the space of code parameters. We show that, while most codes populate the lower region approximating a superposition of Thomae functions, there is a substantial presence of codes above the Gilbert–Varshamov bound and even above the asymptotic bound and the Plotkin bound. We investigate the dynamics induced on the space of code parameters by spin glass models of language change, and show that, in the presence of entailment relations between syntactic parameters the dynamics can sometimes improve the code. For large sets of languages and syntactic data, one can gain information on the spin glass dynamics from the induced dynamics in the space of code parameters.
Honey Onions: A framework for characterizing and identifying misbehaving Tor HSDirs

In the last decade, Tor proved to be a very successful and widely popular system to protect users' anonymity. However, Tor remains a practical system with a variety of limitations, some of which were indeed exploited in the recent past. In particular, Tor's security relies on the fact that a substantial number of its nodes do not misbehave. In this work we introduce, the concept of honey onions, a framework to detect misbehaving Tor relays with HSDir capability. This allows to obtain lower bounds on misbehavior among relays. We propose algorithms to both estimate the number of snooping HSDirs and identify the most likely snoopers. Our experimental results indicate that during the period of the study (72 days) at least 110 such nodes were snooping information about hidden services they host. We reveal that more than half of them were hosted on cloud infrastructure and delayed the use of the learned information to prevent easy traceback.
Performance of Fiber-Reinforced Polymer-Modified Asphalt: Two-Year Review in Northern Arizona

This paper presents a 2-year review and an evaluation of the performance of fiber-reinforced polymer-modified asphalt concrete (FPMAC). A comparison is made of its characteristics with polymer-modified asphalt concrete (PMAC) through laboratory experiments and field observations. Polymers are believed to enhance the binding properties of the asphalt pavements to increase their engineering properties. Some researchers and highway agencies in the cold regions have considered adding fibers in the currently used polymer-modified asphalt concrete to produce FPMAC to be used in pavement construction. FPMAC has the potential to enhance asphalt pavement properties, such as increasing stiffness, resistance to deformation, and stability. An asphalt paving project made of PMAC and FPMAC was implemented in Flagstaff, Arizona, with a goal of evaluating the effect of fiber reinforcement in the performance enhancement of FPMAC. FPMAC and PMAC samples were collected at the job site and shipped back to the materials labor...
Internal control and internal capital allocation: evidence from internal capital markets of multi-segment firms

We investigate the impact of internal control over financial reporting on management decisions in directing corporate resources to alternative investment projects in multi-segment firms. Results from cross-sectional and inter-temporal analyses indicate that internal control weaknesses (ICWs) are associated with distortionary internal capital allocations. The adverse impact on internal capital markets is more pronounced for firms with company-level ICWs. Our analyses also show that firms with weak existing governance mechanisms benefit more from maintaining effective internal control. We further document that the negative impact of ICWs on firms’ internal capital transfers manifests in a lower excess value of diversification.
AFFACT: Alignment-free facial attribute classification technique

Facial attributes are soft-biometrics that allow limiting the search space, e.g., by rejecting identities with non-matching facial characteristics such as nose sizes or eyebrow shapes. In this paper, we investigate how the latest versions of deep convolutional neural networks, ResNets, perform on the facial attribute classification task. We test two loss functions: the sigmoid cross-entropy loss and the Euclidean loss, and find that for classification performance there is little difference between these two. Using an ensemble of three ResNets, we obtain the new state-of-the-art facial attribute classification error of 8.00 % on the aligned images of the CelebA dataset. More significantly, we introduce the Alignment-Free Facial Attribute Classification Technique (AFFACT), a data augmentation technique that allows a network to classify facial attributes without requiring alignment beyond detected face bounding boxes. To our best knowledge, we are the first to report similar accuracy when using only the detected bounding boxes — rather than requiring alignment based on automatically detected facial landmarks — and who can improve classification accuracy with rotating and scaling test images. We show that this approach outperforms the CelebA baseline on unaligned images with a relative improvement of 36.8 %.
Asymmetric Information about Collateral Values

I empirically analyze credit market outcomes when competing lenders are differentially informed about the expected return from making a loan. I study the residential mortgage market, where property developers often cooperate with vertically integrated mortgage lenders to offer financing to buyers of new homes. I show that these integrated lenders have superior information about the construction quality of individual homes and exploit this information to lend against higher quality collateral, decreasing foreclosures by up to 40%. To compensate for this adverse selection on collateral quality, nonintegrated lenders charge higher interest rates when competing against a better-informed integrated lender.
Health, Human Capital, and Domestic Violence

We study the impact of a medical breakthrough (HAART) on domestic violence and illicit drug use among low-income women infected with HIV. To identify causal effects, we assume that variation in women's immune system health when HAART was introduced affected how strongly their experience of domestic violence or drug use responded to the breakthrough. Immune system health is objectively measured using white blood cell (CD4) counts. Because the women in our sample were informed of their CD4 count, it is reasonable to assume they react to it. Using this identification strategy, we find that HAART introduction reduced domestic violence and illicit drug use. To explain our estimates, we treat health as a form of human capital and argue that women with more human capital face stronger incentives to make costly investments with future payoffs, such as avoiding abusive partners or reducing illicit drug use.
Robust controller synthesis using Kharitonov's theorem

The authors present a method based upon Kharitonov's theorem for synthesizing robustly stabilizing feedback controllers. The approach is based upon a multiple plant model formulation with a quadratic cost functional. Sufficient conditions are obtained for characterizing robustly stabilizing static output feedback (proportional) controllers for MIMO (multiple-input multiple-output) plants with denominator polynomial uncertainty. >
Tools and techniques for estimating high intensity RF effects

Tools and techniques for estimating and measuring coupling and component disturbance for avionics and electronic controls are described. A finite-difference-time-domain (FD-TD) modeling code, TSAR, used to predict coupling is described. This code can quickly generate a mesh model to represent the test object. Some applications as well as the advantages and limitations of using such a code are described. Facilities and techniques for making low-power coupling measurements and for making direct injection test measurements of device disturbance are also described. Some scaling laws for coupling and device effects are presented. A method for extrapolating these low-power test results to high-power full-system effects are presented. >
The problem of consciousness

What Is Consciousness? Like most words, ‘consciousness’ does not admit of a definition in terms of genus and differentia or necessary and sufficient conditions. Nonetheless, it is important to say exactly what we are talking about because the phenomenon of consciousness that we are interested in needs to be distinguished from certain other phenomena such as attention, knowledge, and self-consciousness. By ‘consciousness’ I simply mean those subjective states of sentience or awareness that begin when one awakes in the morning from a dreamless sleep and continue throughout the day until one goes to sleep at night, or falls into a coma, or dies, or otherwise becomes, as one would say, ‘unconscious’. Above all, consciousness is a biological phenomenon.We should think of consciousness as part of our ordinary biological history, along with digestion, growth, mitosis and meiosis. However, though consciousness is a biological phenomenon, it has some important features that other biological phenomena do not have. The most important of these is what I have called its ‘subjectivity’. There is a sense in which each person's consciousness is private to that person, a sense in which he is related to his pains, tickles, itches, thoughts and feelings in a way that is quite unlike the way that others are related to those pains, tickles, itches, thoughts and feelings. This phenomenon can be described in various ways. It is sometimes described as that feature of consciousness by way of which there is something that it's like or something that it feels like to be in a certain conscious state. If somebody asks me what it feels like to give a lecture in front of a large audience, I can answer that question.
Randomly removing g handles at once

Indyk and Sidiropoulos (2007) proved that any orientable graph of genus g can be probabilistically embedded into a graph of genus g-1 with constant distortion. Viewing a graph of genus g as embedded on the surface of a sphere with g handles attached, Indyk and Sidiropoulos' method gives an embedding into a distribution over planar graphs with distortion 2^O^(^g^), by iteratively removing the handles. By removing all g handles at once, we present a probabilistic embedding with distortion O(g^2) for both orientable and non-orientable graphs. Our result is obtained by showing that the minimum-cut graph of Erickson and Har-Peled (2004) has low dilation, and then randomly cutting this graph out of the surface using the Peeling Lemma of Lee and Sidiropoulos (2009).
Probabilistic planning with risk-sensitive criterion

Probabilistic planning models and, in particular, Markov Decision Processes (MDPs), Partially Observable Markov Decision Processes (POMDPs) and Decentralized Partially Observable Markov Decision Processes (Dec-POMDPs) have been extensively used by AI and Decision Theoretic communities for planning under uncertainty. Typically, the solvers for probabilistic planning models find policies that minimize the expected cumulative cost (or, equivalently, maximize the expected cumulative reward). While such a policy is good in the expected case, there is a small chance that it might result in an exorbitantly high cost. Therefore, it is not suitable in high-stake planning problems, where exorbitantly high costs should be avoided. With this motivation in mind, Yu, Lin, and Yan (1998) introduced the Risk-Sensitive criterion (RS-criterion) for MDPs, where the objective is to find a policy π that maximizes the probability Pr(cT (s0) ≤ θ0), where cT (s0) is the cumulative cost of the policy and θ0 is the cost threshold. They combine MDPs with the RS-criterion to formalize Risk-Sensitive MDPs (RS-MDPs) and introduced a Value Iteration (VI) like algorithm to solve a typical type of RSMDPs. Liu and Koenig (2006) generalized RS-MDPs by mapping the MDP rewards to risk-sensitive utility functions and sought to find policies that maximize the expected utility—an RS-MDP is a specific case, where the utility function is a step function. They introduced Functional Value Iteration (FVI), which finds optimal policies for general utility functions by approximating it as piecewise linear (PWL) functions. Unfortunately, algorithms like VI and FVI cannot scale to large problems as they need to perform Bellman updates for all states and all break points of their utility function in each iteration. As such, more efficient algorithms can be developed to take advantage of structure in RS-MDPs. In my work, I introduced various algorithms for RSMDPs with different assumptions (e.g., MDPs with dead ends and MDPs with zero or negative cost cycles). In addition to RS-MDPs, POMDPs and Dec-POMDP can also be combined with RS-criterion to formalize Risk-Sensitive POMDPs (RS-POMDPs) and Risk-Sensitive Dec-POMDPs
Is there a “Dark Side” to Monitoring? Board and Shareholder Monitoring Effects on M&A Performance Extremeness

Research summary: We investigate the effects of monitoring by boards of directors and institutional shareholders on merger and acquisition (M&A) performance extremeness using a sample of M&A deals from 1997 to 2006. Both governance research and legal reforms generally have espoused a “raise all boats” view of monitoring. We instead investigate whether monitoring may serve as a double-edged sword that limits CEO discretion to undertake both value-destroying M&A deals and value-creating ones. Our findings indicate that the relationship between monitoring and M&A performance is more complex than previously believed. Rather than “raising all boats” in a shift towards better M&A outcomes, monitoring instead is associated with lower M&A losses, but also with lower M&A gains. Managerial summary: Mergers and acquisitions (M&As) are a quintessential corporate activity. There were $3.8 trillion worth of M&A deals in 2015, despite scholars and practitioners reporting that M&As often perform poorly. We question the widespread belief that more vigilant monitoring by boards of directors and large shareholders will raise M&A performance, overall. Put differently, does monitoring constrain CEOs' discretion to pursue bad deals, while simultaneously encouraging them to pursue good ones? We find that monitoring limits both large M&A losses and large M&A gains. Contrary to widely held beliefs, our results indicate that constraining executives' ability to pursue value-destroying M&A deals does not simultaneously encourage or enable CEOs to pursue value-creating deals. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Annihilation of domain walls in a ferromagnetic wire

We study the annihilation of topological solitons in the simplest setting: a one-dimensional ferromagnet with an easy axis. We develop an effective theory of the annihilation process in terms of four collective coordinates: two zero modes of the translational and rotational symmetries $Z$ and $\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Phi}}$, representing the average position and azimuthal angle of the two solitons, and two conserved momenta $\ensuremath{\zeta}$ and $\ensuremath{\varphi}$, representing the relative distance and twist. A comparison with micromagnetic simulations shows that our approach captures well the essential physics of the process.
Two-arm manipulation tasks with friction-assisted grasping

—The main objective of this paper is to study human dual-arm manipulation tasks and to develop a computational model that predicts the trajectories and force distribution for the coordination of two arms moving an object between two given positions and orientations in a horizontal plane. Our ultimate goal is to understand the dynamics of human dual-arm coordination in order to develop better robot control algorithms. We propose a computational model based on the hypothesis proposed by Uno et al. that suggests that human movements minimize the integral of the norm of the rate of change of actuator torques. We compare the experimental trajectories and force distributions with those obtained from the computational model. The observed trajectories show a significant degree of repeatability across trials and across subjects. We show that the computational model predicts the trajectories and the distribution of forces (torques) for a certain class of trajectories. However, the trajectories in the sagittal and f...
A Morita theorem for algebras of operators on Hilbert space

Abstract We show that two operator algebras are strongly Morita equivalent (in the sense of Blecher, Muhly and Paulsen) if and only if their categories of operator modules are equivalent via completely contractive functors. Moreover, any such functor is completely isometrically isomorphic to the Haagerup tensor product (= interior tensor product) with a strong Morita equivalence bimodule.
Inverse monoids associated with the complexity class NP

We study the P versus NP problem through properties of functions and monoids, continuing the work of [3]. Here we consider inverse monoids whose properties and relationships determine whether P is different from NP, or whether injective one-way functions (with respect to worst-case complexity) exist.
Raloxifene Improves Bone Mechanical Properties in Mice Previously Treated with Zoledronate

Bisphosphonates represent the gold-standard pharmaceutical agent for reducing fracture risk. Long-term treatment with bisphosphonates can result in tissue brittleness which in rare clinical cases manifests as atypical femoral fracture. Although this has led to an increasing call for bisphosphonate cessation, few studies have investigated therapeutic options for follow-up treatment. The goal of this study was to test the hypothesis that treatment with raloxifene, a drug that has cell-independent effects on bone mechanical material properties, could reverse the compromised mechanical properties that occur following zoledronate treatment. Skeletally mature male C57Bl/6J mice were treated with vehicle (VEH), zoledronate (ZOL), or ZOL followed by raloxifene (RAL; 2 different doses). At the conclusion of 8 weeks of treatment, femora were collected and assessed with microCT and mechanical testing. Trabecular BV/TV was significantly higher in all treated animals compared to VEH with both RAL groups having significantly higher BV/TV compared to ZOL (+21%). All three drug-treated groups had significantly more cortical bone area, higher cortical thickness, and greater moment of inertia at the femoral mid-diaphysis compared to VEH with no difference among the three treated groups. All three drug-treated groups had significantly higher ultimate load compared to VEH-treated animals (+14 to 18%). Both doses of RAL resulted in significantly higher displacement values compared to ZOL-treated animals (+25 to +50%). In conclusion, the current work shows beneficial effects of raloxifene in animals previously treated with zoledronate. The higher mechanical properties of raloxifene-treated animals, combined with similar cortical bone geometry compared to animals treated with zoledronate, suggest that the raloxifene treatment is enhancing mechanical material properties of the tissue.
Ship Inspections in Invasive Species Management: Alternate Regimes and Their Properties

When it comes to inspections in invasive species management, the literature has shown that there is frequently a tension between economic cost reduction and inspection stringency. As such, we analyze the properties of two probabilistic inspection regimes that are designed to screen arriving ships in a seaport for the presence of one or more deleterious invasive species. In the first regime, the seaport inspector screens arriving ships by using fast (less stringent) and slow (more stringent) protocols. In the second regime, the inspector uses a uniformly stringent protocol with stages. We use the theory of continuous time Markov chains (CTMCs) to delineate both inspection regimes. Next, we derive some key long run performance measures associated with each of these two regimes. Finally, we discuss the implications of our analysis for practical invasive species management.
Emergence of a new Neisseria meningitidis clonal complex 11 lineage 11.2 clade as an effective urogenital pathogen

Neisseria meningitidis (Nm) clonal complex 11 (cc11) lineage is a hypervirulent pathogen responsible for outbreaks of invasive meningococcal disease, including among men who have sex with men, and is increasingly associated with urogenital infections. Recently, clusters of Nm urethritis have emerged primarily among heterosexual males in the United States. We determined that nonencapsulated meningococcal isolates from an ongoing Nm urethritis outbreak among epidemiologically unrelated men in Columbus, Ohio, are linked to increased Nm urethritis cases in multiple US cities, including Atlanta and Indianapolis, and that they form a unique clade (the US Nm urethritis clade, US_NmUC). The isolates belonged to the cc11 lineage 11.2/ET-15 with fine type of PorA P1.5–1, 10–8; FetA F3-6; PorB 2–2 and express a unique FHbp allele. A common molecular fingerprint of US_NmUC isolates was an IS1301 element in the intergenic region separating the capsule ctr-css operons and adjacent deletion of cssA/B/C and a part of csc , encoding the serogroup C capsule polymerase. This resulted in the loss of encapsulation and intrinsic lipooligosaccharide sialylation that may promote adherence to mucosal surfaces. Furthermore, we detected an IS1301-mediated inversion of an ∼20-kb sequence near the cps locus. Surprisingly, these isolates had acquired by gene conversion the complete gonococcal denitrification nor B- ani A gene cassette, and strains grow well anaerobically. The cc11 US_NmUC isolates causing urethritis clusters in the United States may have adapted to a urogenital environment by loss of capsule and gene conversion of the Neisseria gonorrheae norB - aniA cassette promoting anaerobic growth.
Paco : A System-Level Abstraction for On-Loading Contextual Data to Mobile Devices

Spatiotemporal context is crucial in modern mobile applications that utilize increasing amounts of context to better predict events and user behaviors, requiring rich records of users’ or devices’ spatiotemporal histories. Maintaining these rich histories requires frequent sampling and indexed storage of spatiotemporal data that pushes the limits of resource-constrained mobile devices. Today's apps offload processing and storing contextual information, but this increases response time, often relies on the user's data connection, and runs the very real risk of revealing sensitive information. In this paper, we motivate the feasibility of on-loading large amounts of context and introduce Programming Abstraction for Contextual On-loading ( P aco ), an architecture for on-loading data that optimizes for location and time while allowing flexibility in storing additional context. The P aco API's innovations enable on-loading very dense traces of information, even given devices’ resource constraints. Using real-world traces and our implementation for Android, we demonstrate that P aco can support expressive application queries entirely on-device. Our quantitative evaluation assesses P aco 's energy consumption, execution time, and spatiotemporal query accuracy. Further, P aco facilitates unified contextual reasoning across multiple applications and also supports user-controlled release of contextual data to other devices or the cloud; we demonstrate these assets through a proof-of-concept case study.
LASeR: Lightweight Authentication and Secured Routing for NDN IoT in Smart Cities

Recent literature suggests that the Internet of Things (IoT) scales much better in an information-centric networking (ICN) model instead of the current host-centric Internet protocol (IP) model. In particular, the named data networking (NDN) project (one of the ICN architecture flavors) offers features exploitable by IoT applications, such as stateful forwarding, in-network caching, and built-in assurance of data provenance. Though NDN-based IoT frameworks have been proposed, none have adequately and holistically addressed concerns related to secure onboarding and routing. Additionally, emerging IoT applications such as smart cities require high scalability and thus pose new challenges to NDN routing. Therefore, in this paper, we propose and evaluate a novel, scalable framework for lightweight authentication and hierarchical routing in the NDN IoT. Our ns-3 based simulation analyses demonstrate that our framework is scalable and efficient. It supports deployment densities as high as 40 000 nodes/km2 with an average onboarding convergence time of around 250 s and overhead of less than 20 kibibytes per node. This demonstrates its efficacy for emerging large-scale IoT applications such as smart cities.